With summer just around the corner, people will be looking for cooling options to keep the heat at bay. Our tip? Steer clear of these knock-off bladeless fans.
We found the SmarterHome™ Bladeless DC Motor Slim Smart Fan through online retailer Kogan, but then discovered that the same model was apparently being sold through other retailers, including catch.com.au.
These retailers seem to simply slap their logos on the same dodgy product and give it a different spiffy name, including:
- Fenici Bladeless Tower Fan with DC Motor (from theitmart.com.au)
- Zhibai (Xiaomi Eco-Chain Product) Smart APP Pedestal Bladeless Leafless Electric Floor Fan (from catch.com.au)
- Dimplex 96cm Bladeless DC Tower Fan with remote control (from harveynorman.com.au).
We tested the SmarterHome™ Bladeless Fan from Kogan, but the same shonky fan is available from other retailers under different names.
This tactic in itself is shonky. But the test results from our labs for the fan of many names are even shonkier.
CHOICE tester Adrian Lini puts a fine point on the fan's many shortcomings.
"To me, it's the perfect example of a sham product because almost every feature either didn't work or was pointless, and the performance was the worst we've ever seen."
Although the fan boasts an impressive nine speeds, they're nine different settings of total ineffectiveness.
"You have to push the remote button nine times to reach the maximum speed, at which point the fan still doesn't reach an effective level of output," Lini says.
Our testers measured the volume of air pushed out by 50 different fans in our lab test, and were simply wowed by the under performance of this product.
"It was so low that it looked like an error in the measurement," says Lini. "For the entirety of the test, it could barely reach 0.04 cubic metres per second. It pretty much has no output whatsoever, and that's why the score (44%) is so terrible."
Most of the other tower fans in our pedestal and tower fan reviews reached at least 0.3 cubic metres/second, more than seven times the wind power of the Kogan version of this shonky fan.
The best this fan could do was on par with the minimum output of the other fans in the test – the point at which the testers stop recording the results because from there the measurements would be too low to count toward the test results. Anything less doesn't really qualify as being a fan.
The wind power was so low that it looked like an error in the measurement
CHOICE tester Adrian Lini
Lini says the pitiful performance might be forgivable in a $20 fan, but the Kogan-labelled version of this product sold for $150 when we tested it (an incredible 50% discount from the "standard" price of $300). Last time we checked, the price had dropped to $129.
Come to think of it, says Lini, the SmarterHome fan is probably just a $20 fan stuck inside cheap casing with a Kogan logo slapped on it. Catch.com.au and others appear to be using the same tactic. He recommends buying a $20 fan because it'll probably work better.
Tester Adrian Lini introduces you to the shonkiness that is this white-label fan.
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