On Sun, 5 Jun 2011 09:57:22 +0100, "Arfa Daily"
wrote:
I try to avoid TVs as much as I can, as well. The ones that friends and
their friends have that they insist on bringing to me, are invariably over
42" and have the type of construction where 496 screws have to come out to
get inside, as well as the stand having to come off so that it won't stay
upright on the bench.
Same problem. All the LCD TVs I've fixed arrived via friends and
customers. Of course, I have to offer a major discount on my time,
lifetime warranty, parts at cost, and assume responsibility for
everything that happens to the TV in perpetuity. Fortunately, most of
the family is on the other side of the planet, and my bad attitude is
rapidly depleting the friends. At the present rate, I may soon run
out of paying computah repair customers. All this may explain why I
fix few LCD TV's.
I have friends and customers. The difference is that the customers
pay me. Otherwise, they're the same.
A shop that I do a lot of audio work for, specialises
in them. He has a dedicated bench, and a sort of padded 'cradle' made from
copper plumbing fittings and tube, that a stand-less LCD or plasma TV will
happily sit on for servicing.
Good idea. I don't have the bench space to handle a 42" LCD. To
repair the last LCD TV, I had to perform an un-natural act, by
cleaning off my workbench. I'm still recovering.
One thing nice about the 496 screws is that they actually use screws
to hold it together. That's in contrast to the smaller LCD computah
displays, that use snap together plastic cases, which are often tricky
or difficult to open. I like the screws much better.
Another problem is that it's difficult to tell the customer that it
took 30 minutes to get into the case, an hour to reassemble it, and 30
minutes to test it. More if I decide to charge for storage while
waiting for parts, or cleaning off the workbench. Two hours for doing
nothing useful is a bit much for most customers. My friends and
competitors tell me I'm insane to work on big TV's.
Yet another problem is that the price of big screen LCD TV's is
dropping fast. When they cost many thousands of dollars, it was easy
to charge a substantial percentage of the value for a repair. Now
that the price has dropped, expensive repairs are no longer easily
possible.
Incidentally, the few synthesizer keyboards I fix also seem to have
496 screws holding them together. Much as I detest electric
screwdrivers, I now have one solely to remove such screws. I still
replace the screws with a non-powered screwdriver.
Speaking of having too many friends and scraping bottom:
http://802.11junk.com/jeffl/crud/Kenmore-sewing-machine.jpg
Sigh...
--
Jeff Liebermann
150 Felker St #D http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
Santa Cruz CA 95060
http://802.11junk.com
Skype: JeffLiebermann AE6KS 831-336-2558