The REAL Reason McDonalds Ice Cream Machines Are Always Broken

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And CNN wonders why YouTube channels have more viewers than them. This is the in depth journalism.

If you think that i'm gonna spend 1/2 hour learning why the ice cream machines of mcdonald's are broken....you're god damn right

Since the video is relatively old now, I googled to see if there are any news on this, and apparently, Kytch has filed a lawsuit against Taylor and McDonald's for defamation. The monopolists filed a motion to dismiss the case, but it was rejected. So, apparently, there is a chance, that something will change.

I also have news for you. This happens ALL OVER in every industry. I spent 8 years in the Marines and worked on the original F/A-18 Hornets. The body panels of that jet are held in place by flathead fasteners that the heads stripped on all the time. You couldn't use power tools because of the fuel and potential for spark so you had to hand drill them out. Literally any kind of fastener would have lasted longer, allen head, torx, hell even a Phillips head. But somewhere there was a company with a government contract to supply the military with easy stripping fasteners on a regular basis.Thats just one small example.

As a McDonald's Employee this makes a MASSIVE amount of sense. I can't tell you how many times I've looked over every inch of this machine, tried to decipher its cryptic messages with the manual like I'm referencing the Rosetta Stone, all while getting the look of death from customers who think I must be the biggest moron to ever work there because I can't get the ice cream machine to work. No matter what we always end up at that infamous conclusion: "Just call the guy..."

Update: a judge just ruled that McDonald’s franchisees can repair their own machines. Essentially cutting Taylor out as a middle man.

Burger King Franchisee here. We use the C606HTD which is similar to the McDonald’s unit. It has two different sides, one for ice cream and one for milkshakes. The heat treat units only need to be fully disassembled and cleaned every 2 weeks since the mix is heat pasteurized once per day. As mentioned in the video, you have to have to correct amount of mix in each hopper. Too much or too little and you get a heat treat failure. The problem with cleaning bi-weekly is you don’t really get that familiar with the machine. There are quite a few parts that have to be disassembled and cleaned properly. I am a fairly sharp guy and I’m mechanically inclined. It still took me a while to get the hang of cleaning the machine and I did have a few issues early on. Only managers or well trained employees are allowed to clean our ice cream machines because these suckers are EXPENSIVE! (Around $18,000) Repairs are expensive and you have lost revenue (and pissed off customers). There are a lot of wear and tear parts on the machine including scraper blades, o-rings, bushings, and pumps hoses. Our stores get the parts auto-shipped so it is easy to remember when to change them out. These ice cream machines are very complex. Other than keeping the mix at the proper temperature, they mix the flavor syrups for the milk shakes, heat pasteurize the mix to keep it safe, and most restaurants are very high volume. The machine is probably much more complicated than the average employee can handle, and it is even complicated for most managers. I think a company could make a killing by offering a service to clean and “maintain” the ice cream machines for the stores. All they have to do is keep the mix filled to the proper levels. Just set the heat treat time for after closing and stagger the 2 week cleaning day. It takes about 1-2 hours to properly disassemble, clean, and reassemble the machines.

I live in Europe. Never been told the ice cream machine is broken. Looks like Taylor don’t want their machines to work because they are earning so much from repairs. This is illegal to do in Europe as it’s extortion.

Johnny getting life insurance after unearthing company secrets He knows McDonald's is out for him

Wait, did I just watch 30 minutes of unbiased, source confirmed, real journalism? Wow imagine if this much effort was put into any story you see in the headlines today.

I used to clean these in the 80s as well. The most common reason why the ice cream machine would go down is because improper maintenance during the night. Maybe someone didn't put it together right, and the machine malfunctioned, or they didn't clean it properly and the product has traces of cleaner in it, or the reused product soured, meaning no more could be sold until it was redone. which is a process that took hours. And nobody in store during the day had the knowledge and time to do it. It was done by trained staff during the night shift. It was never done during the day because it's messy, takes up a lot of space and takes man hours that none of the day minions have training for. That can't be done during the middle of daylight business hours. The second biggest reason the machine is down is because the machine itself only "freezes" a small cylindrical amount of product at a time. And it takes time, it doesn't freeze in the span of time it takes for the liquid product to filter through the machine. It takes about 30 minutes to an hour. If you're selling it faster than it can freeze, eventually the machine will dispense only partially frozen product making it poor quality and unsellable.

the same business model as John Deer has, when farmers can't even install a new part on their equipment without "calling a guy"

I work at McDonald’s... the number of people in the last few days who have come through the drive thru and told me that we are getting screwed over by Taylor is astronomical 😂

I’m Japanese man who learn English. And somehow I reached to this video and watched it 10 times to learn English so far. I don’t even know how big American humbarger compared to Japanese, But I now know how to fix McDonal’s ice creme machine.

Haha. He nailed it with the full hopper being an issue. I worked maintenance and serviced these terrible machines. Managers would always tell workers to keep the hoppers full and would be confused that it fails. No matter how many times I told them to let it drop the level for overnight

This is so typical, with so many companies and corporations that it doesn't surprise me, one bit. Thank you for going through all this work to keep us informed. You are the best!

I hope this goes ultra viral because I feel like that's the only way things could change for the better

i never thought i’d watch a 30 min vid about mcdonald’s ice cream but i’m here for it

It's very similar with cars: As a normal person, you only get useless codes displayed. Technicians, on the other hand, have special tools that show roughly what the problem is. On the "hidden market", so to speak, there are tools that actually only internal employees from the car company are supposed to have, that clearly show what the problem is and can also simply delete errors to see whether the problem still exists or was a one-off read error. The same with repairs: A panel on the car comes loose. Officially, the whole car has to be taken apart for several hundred euros and a week of work, and many parts have to be replaced. A nice mechanic was able to put in a single screw for 50 euros, "actually not according to regulations" and the whole thing has lasted for years without any problems. 😂