Geoffrey S. Mendelson wrote:
Jules Richardson wrote:


I would suspect that part of the problem today is a lot of the thermal
fuses are being made in places like China, who will build to whatever
level of quality they're told to build to, and unfortunately there aren't
many of us who want to pay an extra ten cents for our product to ensure
that the fuses don't fail prematurely. ;-)


Not only that but the vendors at your end don't want them to last anyway.
Except for consumer electronics, people don't get rid of old items and buy
new ones because they are obsolete with enough frequency to keep them
in business.

They really do make it in volume, and not on single sales.

So if your coffee maker did not die after a year or two you would probably
be using it for the next 20 years.

The latest innovation in coffee makers is the cartridge ones, where the
profit is in the single use cartridges that you must buy.

I am packing up for a crosstown move, after 16 years in this apartment, and
I a finding kitchen items that I had when I moved in, some of which are still
in use everyday. Some I have had that are still in use, but not daily, since
the 1970's, but they are not electric.

Geoff.



It gives me great joy to beat the manufacturers at that game Goeff.

Instead of spending about an hour driving to and from a Walmart to buy a
new Bunn Coffeemaker for $99.00 (plus 6.25% sales tax) I spent less than
a dollar on a thermal fuse and maybe half an hour in my workshop fixing
it while SWMBO cooked up a batch of eggplant melanzano (yummy) for
dinner. (She loves to cook and I love to fix busted things others have
to toss out.)

'Course the current miniscule size of todays electronics and my aging
eyesight makes it a no-win game for me to try and do much fixing of that
kind of stuff those days. 'Twas much easier in the vacuum tube era of my
youth 65 years or so ago when I occasionally even ecountered those old
fashioned resistors which were just round sticks of carbon composition
with right angle solid wire leads wrapped around each end, then painted
and color coded with paint dots.

Jeff

PS: Do you find folks screw around with the second "e" in your first
name by leaving it out or moving it ahead of the "r"?

My first name has only one "e" in it, but unless it goes from my
keyboard to an address or salutation without ever encountering a human
the odds are many to 1 that some jerk will assume I don't know how to
spell my own name and stick an extra "e" in it for me.

The spelling of my name isn't that unusual:

Google Hits on:

Jeffry 9.3 million

Jeffery 48.8 million

Jeffrey 264.0 million

But yours is the winner...

Geoffrey 86.2 million

Geoffry 0.812 million

Geoffery 1.8 million



--
Jeffry Wisnia
(W1BSV + Brass Rat '57 EE)
The speed of light is 1.8*10e12 furlongs per fortnight.