Sharp R-21LC Microwave, Blind Friendly

Mfg: Sharp
Model: R-21LCF
Description: Commercial medium duty microwave oven, 1000 Watts, 1 Cu FT.
Price: $265
User manual and more info

One of the bad thing of me having low vision is I can't see well enough to operate appliance with flat control panel.  The button labels on many flat panels are too small and/or have poor contrast, and I can't find the correct button to push by feel.  So when my Panasonic microwave oven died last month, I went searching for a microwave oven with mechanical buttons or with control knob.  Well, no luch finding a microwave with mechanical button, but I found this easy to use Sharp microwave oven.

The Sharp R-21LCF is very simple to operate.  It only has one large knob to set the cooking time and no LCD display.  There is no power level button, no pop corn button, no defrost button, etc.  This is just fine because I only use the microwave to reheat foods.

The timer marking on the dial is backlighted but the numbers are too small for me to read.  But fear not, the knob has tactile feedback, so I just count the number of clicks to set the cooking time.  For example, 10 clicks equal 2 minutes.  To stop the microwave, just open the door, this would reset the timer back to zero.

There is no turn table with this microwave but the food seem to be reheated evenly.  Without the turn table, clean up is easy.I found the interior light too dim to be useful for me. 

The drawing below is the knob dial.  I count the number of clicks to set the cooking time, each click corresponds to a markng on the dial.   For example:

• 5 clicks = 50 seconds
• 12 clicks = 2.5 minutes
• 16 clicks = 4 minutes

T

Update 7/21/2017
The microwave oven die after 3 uears and 3 months, soom after the 3 years warranty priod.   The reason I paid high dollar for this commercial microwave oven was hoping it would last much longer than 3 years.  We only use the oven at most 30 minutes per day, it is very disappointing it die under such light usage.