On Wed, 23 Mar 2016 13:35:04 -0700, tabbypurr wrote:

On Wednesday, 23 March 2016 14:10:36 UTC, charles wrote:
In article ,
tabbypurr wrote:
On Wednesday, 23 March 2016 13:27:45 UTC, charles wrote:
In article ,
tabbypurr wrote:
On Wednesday, 23 March 2016 12:07:20 UTC, michael adams wrote:
"John Rumm" wrote in message
o.uk...
On 23/03/2016 03:39, Bill Wright wrote:

In the interests of the conservation of materials and
energy,
should not DIY, especially the repair of goods,

As far as repairing goods is concerned, the whole point of mass
production certainly since the Industrial Revolution is to
manufacture and assemble all goods as far as possible by
machine with as little labour input as possible. As its this
that makes goods so cheap in the first place.

Given economies of scale and labour costs its usually far more
economic to manufacture a new item from scratch than it is to
train up technicians to disassemble, diagnose and repair
faults, maintain an inventory of spares etc.Especially when new
models might be introduced on an annual basis.

That's all half true. The reality is a considerable percentage of
what's faulty & what's thrown away is worth repairing. And much
isn't.

There's also the cost of someone's time to be taken into account.
DIY repairs can be worth doing, but paying someone do to the job is
most likely uneconomic.

In that case, it wouldn't be DIY then, would it?


like I said it's often worthwhile. But we live in a throwaway
culture and repair places aren't set up for it, they haven't moved
with the times.


But, things have become far more specialised. Instead of "a kettle
element", a repair place would probably need half a dozen different
types.

Possibly not in the case of 3KW flat elements if my recent experience is
anything to go by. :-)

The problem with electric kettle spares is more to do with holding a
wide enough range of fiddly plastic parts such as the often convoluted
operating lever linkage customised to the various shapes of kettle
dictated by styling requirements that often have no relation to function.


They'd only need to buy one. Not that one would repair a kettle now.


I did! It was a Tesco 3KW plastic jug kettle bought several years ago
for 12 quid less the fiver voucher (almost identical to the Cookworks
Kettle - White 3KW jug we bought in our local Argos store this afternoon,
also for 12 quid less a penny).

http://www.argos.co.uk/static/Product/partNumber/9098415.htm

The original repair, just over a year ago, involved gluing the wishbone
shaped plastic operating lever back together using thin paxolin splints
with a 2 part epoxy resin glue. It just seemed a disgraceful failure mode
for the sake of not paying the attention to the detail it deserved in its
design (sharp 45 degree bends instead of organic curves to avoid stress
concentration mediated failure - it was just begging to fail).

If it had been an element failure, I wouldn't have bothered trying to
repair it but since it was just a stupid failure amenable to a glue
repair, I repaired it and got another 12 months, possibly longer, before
my repair effort finally wore out a just few months ago.

This time I used a half mm drill and a couple of 8mm lengths of
stainless steel wire to beef up the second glue repair. Unfortunately,
this started acting up again just a few days ago and before I could have
yet another go, SWMBI decided it was time for a new kettle, hence the
visit to Argos today (actually, yesterday as I type this).

Actually, despite the replacement being almost identical in shape to the
black Tesco kettle (the base plates were interchangeable), the subtle
changes seem to have improved the fillability via the spout and also the
pouring action (plus, it's not in need of a replacement spout filter) and
the lid opens up more fully so the extra expense of yet another
replacement kettle did offer some additional benefits over the old one.

However, if I care to take a look at the operating lever linkage, I
doubt I'll see any improvement in its design. I guess I'd best wait for
its one year warranty to expire before taking it apart to "Fix It Before
it Breaks". I'm of the opinion that the saying, "If it aint broke, don't
fix it." is just plain bull****, The saying, "A stitch in time saves
nine." seems more appropriate these days.

Often, close inspection will reveal that a lot of this stuff is already
broken by design and a timely 'repair' (or "Stich in time...") will save
it breaking prematurely in relation to components more vital to the
gadget's primary function, in this case, the 3KW flat plate element.

Redesigning this plastic part so it outlasts the element is unlikely to
add more than a penny to the retail price of the finished product over
the lifetime of its production run. There's really no excuse for such
shabby design and it's an issue that the greens ought to be addressing -
it's more than just electric kettles that exhibit this sort of
shortcoming.

--
Johnny B Good