appliances and electronics and furniture and....are thrown away for minor repairs. DVD player quit, 2 screws, shaken out (nothing fell out) blowed out with canned air, lens cleaned with q-tip and alcohol, close exam with flash light, no obvious defects, just a good cleaning, and 5 minutes later back in perfect working order.
I think most times they are trashed because they are no longer wanted appliances etc. One mans trash is another mans treasure (or something like that).
Dumpster divers can make a decent living in the right neighborhoods. One excellent source of such goodies is a dumpster near dorms and frat/soror houses when they are moving out.
vacuum cleaner still works but it makes a gawdawful noise when it's running. I've tried to clean it. I've taken the pipes off that go into the motor compartment and blown compressed air in there with no luck.
It did work a lot better after I cleaned all of the filters but can't figure the noise out. Maybe a bad bearing but seems unlikely. I think something got sucked into the motor compartment but don't ask me how with all the filters and bent pipes on the way there.
I have two great TVs I can't give away because they need converter boxes. The thrift store doesn't want them so I will probably end up throwing them away.
They often build them for planned obsolescence - with things like tiny little screws that no human can screw back in without a lot of light, magnification and cuss words.
Not on my account. I've fixed 2 DVD, many CD players, a washer, the clothes dryer twice. All on my own.
I'm not sure cleaning counts as repairing, but I agree about the planned obsolescence.
:coffee:
There's a lot of satisfaction in being able to identify problems and fix them. Good for you, Sam. Feels good, don't it.
Happy New Year!
Just fixed my drywall screw gun by cutting off the old plug and taping another one on. One of my most effective repairs for electronics is to give the offending piece of gear a ride in the backseat over a rough dirt road.
Those tv sets make great for dvd viewing for children and others wanting to invade at the same time intended for live sports viewing.
I'm sure that's true. I just bought another DVD/VCR unit at Best Buy for about $100 because the DVD would only work once in a while. With my track record on appliance repairs, and at a reasonable hourly rate, I probably saved myself hundreds of dollars and possibly a trip to the emergency room or insurance claim for burning down the house. Some people are handier and more patient than others; I'm neither.
but Steve
it's so simple...
I'll do the typical invederate do-it-yourselfer Engineer LS thing and give you steps 1, 5 and 10, you only have to figure out steps 2, 3, 4, 6, 7, 8 and 9.
I personally have a rule, no worky on my own Car-ey. Being in this business I don't know how many times I heard "you can fix the dismogrifier on your car, it's really simple, all you do is..." and then they proceed to leave out 90% of the directions assuming I know all that extra stuff.
but Steve
I will do two things to a car...
replace burned out light bulbs and put air in the tires.
I used to do air cleaners but with the advent of fuel injection they made it so you have to drop the transmission in order to get the air cleaner out so I leave that to the experts.
