Hotpoint Ultima S-Line RPD 10667 DD

Hotpoint's flagship Ultima S-Line washer packs in excellent features and offers superb energy efficiency

What is the Hotpoint RPD 10667 DD?

Billed by Hotpoint as its greenest and most efficient washing machine ever, the Ultima S-Line RPD 10667 DD is a premium machine bristling with features such as Direct Injection stain removal and Steam Hygiene intensive clean.

However, achieving the best results requires a specific combination of programmes and options, alongside keeping the load large but not excessive (about 7kg, in fact). Get all that correct and the net result is an accomplished big-capacity machine that delivers on its impressive A+++ -40% energy promise.

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Hotpoint RPD 10667 DD – What is it like to use?

As befits a premium washing machine, the Hotpoint Ultima S-Line RPD 10667 DD is quite a looker. It sports a neat, modern-looking fascia that combines a chunky dial for programme selection and an orange digital display. Programme numbers are on the edge of the dial and selection is simply the uppermost number.

The sleek, uncluttered look is largely thanks to this model not listing its numerous programmes in bold legends on the soap drawer. As you turn the dial, the programme description is shown in the display, but there’s a clever manual reference too. Open the swing-out soap drawer and above it you’ll find a swing-out cover with all the programmes listed. Neat.

The orange display colour is a little Marmite, though – and it isn’t what you’d call high definition, either. The slightly pixellated text and graphics are informative, providing the full gamut of run-time, phase of the cycle, temperature and spin speed all on the same screen.

The nine buttons surrounding the display handle this machine’s comprehensive selection of wash options, each with corresponding symbols on the display when engaged.

Above the Start/Pause button is a separate control for the Direct Injection feature. This pre-mixes water and detergent, activating biological powders before spraying the mix directly into the wash. The presence of the switch is a bit of a mystery; we can’t think of a good reason why you wouldn’t want the Direct Injection as part of all your washes.

The enormous smoke-tinted door is certainly a bold statement of style, and the inset handle is sleek and easy to use. Behind it is a good-sized porthole opening that’s ringed by an antimicrobial door-seal gasket. This should stop mould and musty odours forming around the damp rubber.

The lush-looking drum proudly legends its titanium construction and is plenty large enough for a good-sized wash. Like most big-capacity machines, however, 10kg of dry cotton clothing would be an impossible volume to get in the drum. We managed around 8kg – and the load was stuffed tight. It does have a load-balancing feature that jiggles the washing to evenly distribute it around the drum.

Hotpoint RPD 10667 DD – How noisy is it?

Running several loads on this luxury Hotpoint showed it was certainly a reasonably quiet washer. Our test results agreed with the figures on the energy label at an average of around 56dB. This is still below the level of quiet speech in the home so won’t be intrusive, yet the sound is a little spiky rather than constant. Every minute or so, a change of drum direction results in a noise above 60dB.

The spin cycle is a little less impressive, although this should be offset by the fact that this is a super-fast 1,600rpm spin machine. The early phases of the spin are quiet enough, but the final spin ramps up to a few minutes at 78dB. This wouldn’t be considered particularly quiet for a premium machine; many consider 80dB to be annoying. However, it’s only for a few minutes and the spin results are well worth it!

Hotpoint RPD 10667 DD – What programmes does it have?

The top-line figure for this Hotpoint Ultima S-Line is 14 programmes. Not a heroic number by any stretch of the imagination, but add in features such as Direct Injection, Steam and a Woolmark-approved wool cycle, and you have a very comprehensive set of washes on offer.

Stain removal is a big push for Hotpoint ,and this machine is one of the lineup that claims to eliminate more than 100 common stains at a 20^oC wash.

As a result, taking pride of place in the number one position on the programme list is the Anti-Stain Power 20^oC wash. This can handle a full 10kg of mixed washing, spins at 1,600rpm and uses a range of sensors to gauge wash-cycle duration, energy and water. Good stain removal takes time, though, so don’t expect any combination to take less than 3 hours.

For half-loads there’s a 45-minute stain wash cycle with a maximum 1,200rpm spin. For those in a real hurry, a 30-minute Fast-30 wash will freshen up 4kg of lightly soiled clothes. Headline Cotton (10kg) and Synthetics (5.5kg) programmes complete the “Daily Wash” selection.

Colour Care, Ultradelicates and Wool washes top the special programmes section with varying load capacities and spin speeds.

The Wool cycle of this machine has been approved by The Woolmark Company for wool garments labelled as “hand wash”, and a dedicated Shirts programme handles up to 2kg of your finest office-wear.

The two main Eco Cotton programmes are full load, maximum spin cycles, offered at 60^oC and 40^oC. These promise sub-1kWh energy use for a 10kg wash, which would be right up there with the very best machines at any price. The trade-off is wash times that you can measure in lunar cycles; 5hrs 40mins is one of the longest wash cycles we’ve ever tested!

Extra programmes include Baby and Anti-Allergy, with additional washing and rinsing phases; Bed & Bath, specifically for a week’s worth of sheets and towels; and a Duvet programme that is also suitable for garments such as puffer jackets.

Steam operates a little differently on this Hotpoint machine compared to some other steam washers on the market. Rather than offering a dedicated steam refresh cycle, or an option to steam through laundry at the end to loosen fibres, the RPD 10667 DD uses steam during the wash to remove bacteria and allergens from your clothes.

For family members with super-sensitive skin this could be ideal, although it does increase the wash duration a little, and the door steams up. But at least you know it’s working.

Other options include Time Saver to speed up the wash and to reduce energy consumption for lightly soiled loads; three colour options (bright colours, dark colours and whites) for the Colour Care wash programme; and an Auto-Clean cycle that actually runs empty and cleans the washing machine itself.

Hotpoint RPD 10667 DD – How well does it wash?

“You canne change the laws of physics, cap’n”… and 10kg of typical cotton clothes washing is simply too much to fit into the Hotpoint’s drum. It will of course handle up to 10kg of more dense fabrics such as mats, folded linen and so on – but 10kg of screwed up clothes is about the size of a small car and isn’t going to fit.

Even at our normal 80% max load, the Hotpoint was right on its limit at just shy of 8kg of mixed cotton washing that included t-shirts, shirts, tea-towels, towels and smalls. Also in this wash was a test stain strip with dried-on blood, coffee, turmeric, wine, ketchup and oil; we used a leading brand non-bio detergent wash capsule.

The slightly bewildering array of programme options had us head-scratching for a while before we opted for the standard Cotton 40^oC programme without Direct Injection. This would give us a benchmark of how the Hotpoint performed at a basic level against competitors. At 2hrs 40mins, this was a pretty quick cycle by modern standards.

Results were a tad disappointing. All six of our test stains could still be seen, albeit faintly in the case of the blood, coffee, ketchup and wine. Neither the turmeric or oil were particularly well addressed.

Moreover, a strong fabric crease had appeared on the test strip material where it had become folded in the densely packed washing. This over-stuffed drum was likely the primary reason for the poor wash result too – more on which later.

Looking at our meters and gauges nearly instigated a steward’s enquiry. The entire 8kg wash had used a super-frugal 1kWh of electricity, and even when handling the clothes we could feel the spin was very effective.

Sure enough, residual water remaining was only 30% of the original wash weight, which makes this Hotpoint a spectacularly good spinner. Water consumption was more in keeping with a modern 10kg machine at 92 litres for the entire wash, but overall those are some very impressive figures.

We ran the same programme again, but this time with a half load, or 40% of the maximum capacity (4kg). We stuck in another test strip to test our theory of the stuffed drum compromising wash action.

Wash time remained at 2hrs 40mins, but electricity use was down only around 15% to 0.9kWh. Water use dropped significantly to 49 litres and spin efficiency remained at its excellent 30%.

The second stain strip was certainly better addressed. On this sample the blood, ketchup and wine were gone, and there was only a hint of the coffee remaining. Turmeric and oil were diminished, if not given a serious scrubbing. The wash was certainly better, but not outstanding for a mid-priced machine.

Switching to the Eco Cotton programme and engaging Direct Injection changed the Hotpoint’s performance once again. With a 4kg load, electricity consumption was down to 0.64kWh, water remained around 50 litres, and spin efficiency was equally excellent at just under 30%. The 5hrs 40mins wash time may not be an issue if you tend to put on your washing and go to work. But if work happens to be testing washing machines… aaarrrgh!

Our slightly mixed results on standard tests led us to try out some other washes and options over the course of a few weeks. Clearly, the Hotpoint isn’t at its cleaning best when stuffed, even if that delivers the lowest running cost per kilo of washing.

You’re far better sticking to a maximum of around 7kg of washing – which is still a huge load – and using the Eco programmes with the Direct Injection feature. This worked particularly well with biological detergents and delivered significantly better cleaning results than we experienced on the first full-load test.

Spin results remained consistently excellent, which will reduce your subsequent drying times on the line or running costs in the tumble dryer.

This machine definitely has the potential to be a great washer and is very economical to run, but some experimenting is required in order to get the best from it.

Hotpoint RPD 10667 DD – How much will it cost to run?

Given the wide dynamic range of energy results depending on programme, option and load combinations, there’s little chance of us being able to predict exactly what this machine might cost to run in an average year. Living up to its A+++ – 40% efficiency, it’s likely to be appealingly low – whichever way you go.

If we take our standard annual wash regime for consistency, we’d be looking at 240 washes. Some 200 would be Cotton 40 full-load programmes, plus 40 half-load washes split evenly between standard and Eco Cotton.

From our results, this would use around 230kWh per year, or just under £35 in electricity and around 20,000 litres of water. This equates to £75 for those paying an average £3.50 per cubic meter supply and waste.

For a 10kg washer this is good, but not outstanding. If you want to leverage the best wash/lowest running costs from the RPD 10667 DD, then you need to use the dedicated Eco programmes, the Direct Injection feature, large loads with bio-powder – and have the patience of a saint to wait for the epic-duration wash times.

If you did all that for the 240 loads per year (200 full, 40 half), our results suggest this machine would use 186kWh (£28) of electricity and 15,000 litres (£52) of water.

Given that would clean a staggering 1,760kg of clothes, that’s pretty darn efficient. Beware, though: due to the long cycles times, this equates to over 56 days of 24/7 washing. The nightmares have begun.

Should I buy the Hotpoint RPD 10667 DD?

This Hotpoint Ultima S-Line flagship washer has the potential to be great, and is backed up with excellent features. However, you’ll have to put in some effort to see this machine at its best.

A full drum will impact cleaning results, and there’s a variety of energy and water consumption results depending on the programmes and options selected.

Hit the right combination of Eco programmes, bio-powder and large but not overly-stuffed loads and this machine will deliver great cleaning results, low running costs and excellent spin drying.

Verdict

Not exactly plug and play success, but this flagship Hotpoint offers great potential through useful features and low running costs.

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