Hi Roel,
I too had one of the post-Hobart Kitchen Aid mixers. I too had the
gears strip out but for me it was while kneading rye bread dough. I
repaired it myself. Now it just sits on a shelf in the basement and
I look at it occasionally whenever I want a good laugh.
At first I took it to a local small appliance repair center. They
wanted 150 dollars to repair it. I took it back home unrepaired
since I deemed it not worth 150 dollars.
It's been a number of years since I did the repair job but I'll tell
you what I remember about it. Taking it apart does tend to be a
little tricky. If you're at all mechanically inclined, you'll be
able to get into the guts of it fairly easily. Getting the gears out
was another thing altogether. I finally tried running the mixer
briefly on low speed and the gears popped right out. The problem is
that the gears are now made out of a fiber material and have little strength.
Once I was able to identify the gears necessary I phoned Kitchen Aid
to buy parts. They refused to sell them to me. They did finally
agree to send me a cut of the interior of the machine along with a
parts list. Once having obtaining the part numbers I was able to
order parts from the same local small appliance repair center. Cost
about 20 bucks total.
Once you begin to reinstall the gears be sure to repack the gear box
since surely some grease will be lost in the disassembly process.
After getting the mixer reassembled and running be sure to put it on
a basement shelf and look at it occasionally whenever you want a good laugh.
By the way, If you'll carefully read the instructions that came with
your KA, you'll find a list of restrictions for using it when
kneading bread dough. Restrictions such as: Don't run it faster than
speed number 2. Use no more than three cups of flour in your bread
dough. Don't drop steel measuring cups in while it's
running...... Basically what they've saying is that other than for
cake batter, icing, cookie dough and other light jobs it's sort of useless.
This story however, does have a happy ending. At the recommendation
of one of the King Arthur Flour baking instructors I purchased a
Bosch Concept7 machine and couldn't be happier. I've had it about
six years, have made up to four loaves at a time in it and it even
handles stiff rye bread dough without breaking a sweat. The Concept7
is now an obsolete unit but all of the best features of the Concept
have been integrated into the latest design of the Bosch
Universal. If you do decide to go with the Bosch, be sure to get the
American style, all stainless, dough hook. The European hook is
plastic and stainless and not as durable. One last comment: Although
I don't know what comes with the Bosch Universal, my Concept came
with a blender attachment and mixer whips. This machine will do
anything the Kitchen Aid will do except break.
Happy Baking