Houseware Reviews

I've worked with analytical equipment designed to detect ppb (parts per billion) of volatiles, so I realize that a home unit such as the Oregon Scientific Indoor Air Quality Monitor scarcely can compete with that kind of sensitivity. But is it any good?

The really useful things on the unit are humidity and temperature, good for monitoring the quality of household air on a daily basis anyway. As to the VOC (volatile organic compound) sensitivity, I assumed it must be in the high ppm --which means that by the time the device alarms, your nose might have told you something was wrong long before. So, being the geeky, techy type I am, I decided to test the unit out. First, I dipped a cotton swab in shoe polish (which has a petroleum distillate of low volatility as a component.) Held near the air intake, the unit changed from "very good" to "good", meaning the unit did detect something. (The unit shows you air quality with a series of smiley faces, smiling, straight and frowny.) Later, I dipped a swab in household spray cleanser (a more volatile organic as a component) and the unit showed the same neutral face. No alarm went off.

But...here's the fun thing. A day or two later, I had a window open in an adjoining room to the monitor, and someone was burning trash outside somewhere. A waft of smoke and fumes rushed through the house, only for a moment, and the monitor alarmed. It shut off right away, as the air was only momentarily polluted but this did show the unit functions when fumes are present. The smoke was transitory, clearing quite quickly, but the unit detected it--I barely had time to sniff the burning odor.

I would not rely on this device as anything but a confirmation that something is amiss with the air, and it's more of a curiousity than a real detector, such as a smoke detector. But I did once experience a situation where a small fire in an area produced fumes and NO smoke, and our detectors were silent while the room (at work) filled with a noxious odor. So this could be a good back-up to the smoke alarm.

My summary: more of a fun item than a hard-line household detector, but it does seem to work, and it does measure humidity, so it's fine as far as it goes.

I saw the Air Quality Monitor in my Gold Box and decided to buy it, since my wife and I have two young children and you never know what you could be in the air (especially since we live in a smaller condo, with neighbors, cleaning crews, and no way to get cross-ventilation).

The digital thermometer and hygrometer seem to do very well (although I have no way to confirm the readings' accuracy).

The measurement of VOC's is really hit-or-miss. When I first got it, I tested it with things at my parents' house: the VOC measurement goes off the chart when you put gasoline under it -- exactly what I expected. I put an open bottle of pesticide under it, and the VOC measurement didn't move -- not at all what I expected. In the kitchen at home, our readout is usually one rectangle above "V. Good," which really had me wondering until I discovered that peeling an orange near the device makes the VOC reading go off the chart -- again, not at all what I expected.

So does the Air Quality Monitor give a sense of security or a false sense of alarm? For us, both. I wish that the manual had a list of what exactly it detects and what it doesn't; if I knew what it was detecting, I wouldn't be as concerned when it didn't detect a particular thing.

as a clarification to another user's review of this product, the reason the device did not detect pesticide is because pesticides have a low evaporation rate at room temperature, and thus simply holding them under the detector won't set it off; whereas a can of highly vaporous gasoline will instantly sound the alarm.

as for the orange peel... peeling the orange near the device causes dispersion of orange oil in the peel into the surrounding air. it may be that the oil is then oxidized in the air, causing the alarm to sound on the device.

However, it seems to me this device is more aimed at measuring the average air quality over an extended period of time in an area; and the alarm feature is probably not aimed at detection of highly localized pollution that disperses in a short period of time.

That is to say, if you were to put the device in your bathroom, you would not want to use the 70-second measurement feature, since the alarm sounding every time someone uses the facilities is not a very good indication of the overall air quality--and consequent health hazard--in the bathroom.

My husband bought the OXO salad spinner (the only one available in most of the local stores) when my previous salad spinner, a Zyliss, was lost in a move.

I was disappointed from the beginning. The OXO spinner's action is inferior to the Zyliss, which spins in two directions and gets the greens much drier in less time. Also, the construction of the lid allows water to collect between two "layers" where it is impossible to wash properly or to dry, allowing mildew to grow.

After two years of almost daily use, the push-down mechanism in the lid became completely inoperable and I had to discard the lid as useless. (I'm keeping the inner basket to plant summer bulbs in to make them easier to lift and store in the fall.)

I have just purchased another
Zyliss Salad Spinner from Amazon and was astounded to see that it is only half the price of the OXO. It arrived this week and I couldn't be happier with it. Don't spend twice the money for an inferior product!

Sora Colvin

If you want to get a bit fancy with your salad spinning, this is the one to buy. Not only can you spin the lettuce and remove all the water, you can use the bowl to serve a salad or store lettuce in the inner bowl.

It is so easy to use. You release the lock mechanism at the top and press down. The inner basket starts to spin, removing most of the water from the lettuce. I love the fact that you can rinse the lettuce in the removable inner basket.

You really win with this one. Wash, spin, store...so much less to wash and it is never boring. It is quite large so you do need a big space to store it in the refrigerator, unless you have a big refrigerator, then it is no problem.

If you have memories of trying to swing lettuce around in a kitchen towel, or have tried to use paper towels while they are falling apart all over the lettuce, you must try spinning in this great salad spinner. Once you have spun the lettuce you can remove the inner bowl and dump out the water.

I see they now have a mini spinner. I want, I need. That would be great for spinning herbs and small quantities of lettuce.

~TheRebeccaReview.com

I used the microwave to cook the chard I had just picked in the bowl of my Spinner. It is now totally unusable - it is warped and doesn't fit any more and I was stupid to try it. I will certainly buy another spinner - since I can't find a replacement bowl on Internet.
It is handy for picking veggies; just dump them in the sink, then spin. It's a great product.

I mounted this carefully according to directions into a beam. After two months use, the hardware by which it was hung came undone sending the rack and several calphalon pots and lids crashing to the counter where it smashed a new t-fal deep fryer and a new 1050 vacume seaer. I lost about $400 in appliances and felt lucky no one was hurt... Note that the anchor was still secure, their hardware stripped out.

The company has so far stonewalled. I have photos, but they know it is not worth going after them in court...

What a disappointment!

I am a lover of all things to do with cooking. So it wasn't surprising when we ran out of space in the cupboards. We bought the pot rack in November. It came with great instructions, suggestions for keeping it balanced and lots of hooks. We are very pleased with the quality of the product.