The Future of Repairing ... (list those soon to be extinct..)
 

The sewing machine thread (funny pun) got me thinking about repairing those machines as well as other things like old clocks, old appliances and what have you.

The generation of teens now have no clue how to do anything with their hands let alone get involved in such things as repairing old clocks or sewing machines.

Lets start a list of the things that will be soon impossible to find repair folk for...

I'll start:

Typewriters
Mechanical Clocks
Sewing Machines

Your turn...

Coasters.

Roller or stationary?
SmileWavy

The mechanical clock/watch industry is alive and well - not sure about the other two. That said sadly society is becoming disposable

Automobiles. Some companies literally keep the proprietary OBD2 information under lock-n-key.

Computers. Apple and Win8 designed for 8yo.

Those are significant.

The PC thing really gets me. Not that long ago it was common to 'build' a PC from parts, either the fastest/best or the cheapest stuff you could find, your call. Now PC's are so cheap it doesnt make much sense.

I cant think of the last time I saw a typewriter, not sure there are any in use.

Small engine stuff is getting ridiculous, just buy a new weedwacker/blower every year or 2 instead of cleaning the carb.

I first thought of electrical components/appliances: TV, VCR/DVD players, CD players, kitchen appliances, etc. Maybe vacuum cleaner repairmen are still in business. But we've become a society where it's cheaper to buy a new one than it is to repair an older/broken one.

Shoe repair. Used to be a fairly common business. When was the last time you got your shoes resoled?

The last time I got a set of boots resoled, it cost more than the boots were worth.

Rapid obsolescence freaks me out. They say 1/4 of all the copper that exists on earth is now in landfills.

Of course new things just keep getting ''Better''... However, most of the things from the past that no one can now fix are fairly easily repaired by a competent do it yourselfer. But when was the last time you saw carbon paper or a mimeograph machine ?

How about a dial phone ? I'm pretty sure you can't even hook one of those up anymore. Well, you can, you just can't dial one...

I got a pair of cowboy boots resoled and rebuilt for $40. Way cheaper than replacing thm and they were nicely broken in.

Tv repairman etc with a made in china consumer society are on the endangered species list.

Toaster.

I remember back in the 60's a neighbour was fixing one in his garage. There was a smell of burnt toast... Wait maybe I was having an epileptic seizure...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mSN86kphL68

Even if cars were more repairable back in your day, they were often scrapped instead of being repaired.

Any simple appliance repair. I had to replace my washing machine due to a "bad circuit board". A replacement board isn't available anymore, and the washer was about 15 yo.

TVs used to last 20 years, and could be repaired. Now they last about 8 years, and are not nearly as serviceable, or cost more to repair than to replace.

A few weeks ago but they're some Florsheims. I'd like to have some hiking boots resoled. My brother left them in the garage so the glue that holds the sole on went to crap.

I'd love to find someone to clean and restore a Selectric that my parents bought and I keep in the office.

Flat panel TVs are surprisingly easy to repair as long as the screen isn't damaged if an acceptable repair is replacing the bad board inside the set. Since they keep getting larger/better and prices keep dropping I can see why a lot of people don't do it.

Residential HVAC I feel is trying to go to a replace instead of repair scenario. Everyone I know gets a sales pitch for a new system that has however many more SEER than their broken one and uses a different kind of refrigerant. Nevermind the $5-$10K bill the new one instead of 1/10th that to repair what they have.

"Right to Repair" legislation is changing that with autos.

I had a favorite pair of boots re-soled last year, so yes there are still shoe repair guys / cobblers around.

I find television repair places and the like to be non-existent anymore. Ditto appliance repair places. They're all throwaway now and cheaper to replace with new than to repair.

With today's high tech products and the rapid advancement of technology it really doesn't make much sense to make a TV or a toaster or even a car that is highly serviceable. People just want to go get that latest and greatest for the lowest price down at Walmart or Harbor Freight or the Porsche dealer . The item they're buying may obsolete and out of production in a year.

Capitol assets (made in the USA at least) are, at least in my opinion, doing very well in terms of serviceability. Just about every industry pushed the envelope in terms of capability until they went too far. The desirable capability is well known and many product lines have been developed over half a century or more. In many cases, the ideal product has been in production longer than its service life and lifetime extension programs are economical and practical. For locomotives, a road unit should have six axles and ~4,400 hp and switcher should have 4-axles, 60k lbs tractive effort and 2k hp. A ship should be panamax size or smaller. A bulldozer should be in the D6-D9 size range.

The BNSF is using a locomotive built in 1943 in every day use. It was built for the Great Northern as an FT B-unit #400C and then rebuilt by EMD in 1959 as GP9m #905. In 1992 the BN had it rebuilt by Morrison Knudsen into a GP28m and it's currently in service as BNSF #1521. It could be sent to EMD to be rebuilt into a GP22ECO which would extend its useful life through its centennial. As a matter of fact, nobody builds new 4-axle power anymore because everyone is just rebuilding their stuff over and over again. Even the brand new SD70ACe will probably see 40-50 years on the high iron.

CAT dealers are busy fully remanufacturing fairly new equipment.
Ship yards are busy overhauling ships.
The lifeblood of Lycoming and Continental is engine remanufacturing.

All of these companies are reaping the rewards of producing highly serviceable products, some would go out of business without them. They'd be downright stupid to make a product you couldn't take apart, inspect, put back together and use for a good while longer. Oh boo hoo you are required to replace the roller lifters on an IO-360-L2A at overhaul. They probably lasted longer than the flat tappets you'd probably have had to replace anyway.

That's not to say some competitors aren't going for the Walmart toaster model. GE locomotives just get scrapped after their 20-year lease is up. You don't see much older equipment of lesser brands on construction sites. Chinese ships just get scrapped after 10 years.

Just don't confuse technological advancements with a crappy product.

I use one in my study at home. 1950s Bakelite model, it works, as in makes and receives calls, but doesn't handle the "press 1 for accounts, press 2 for dispatch" type options.
When I got it, the kids (then 12 & 16) took a while to figure it out.

Agree. I've said this before but "new" to me simply means "cheaper, chincier, more prone to breaking and of questionable quality - probably made in China".

I think we've "jumped the shark" in terms of the zenith for customer quality on most products. Everything now seems to be made as cheaply as possible - lots of plastic, tinny construction, terrible build quality, etc. Sadly as customers we're our own worst enemies here. If we simply demanded better it would happen, but we stupidly roll over and keep paying for this junk (usually multiple times since things break several times, requiring repeat business).

I don't see "brand new" as a positive feature on a product I'm looking to buy. In fact more often than not the opposite is true.

Just like new windows that will save you heating money! Only if you live another 50 years.

It's the law of entropy guys. A battle that won't be won. Everything disintigrates...just a matter of how long it takes.

We can stiil get sewing machines(industrial) repaired but there are now so few mechanics that it can now take 2 days for them to attend our works

I have a great backpack (very well made, big, nice padding) that I bought 25 years ago in Hong Kong, that had started ripping at the seam at the top where the straps attach. I was going to get a new one, until my wife said 'let me take it to Mr. Lee (local shoe repair shop). For $19 he made it look like new! - so apparently shoe repair is alive and well at least here in Cincinnati....my wife takes stuff to him, and she has enough shoes to keep him in business for the next decade :).

B-52's - they've been flying forever. I heard there are pilots that are flying the same exact airframe that their grandfathers flew.

Entropy will destroy the universe in a several billion years. We really don't need to worry about things past 1,000 years.

One thing that is the opposite of the OP question is airplanes. Every pilot in the Air Force is younger than the B-52. It started service in the mid 1950s and is expected to be in service in the middle 2040s. 90 years of service is beyond the wildest dreams of the designers.

Some products are built to discourage servicing. Maybe it is a liability issue? What bugs me is the special screw heads that make it near impossible to take some things apart. I was trying to get a shop vac (mostly plastic of course) apart to clean the accumulated dust out of the motor and lubricate the bearings. A star bit would not go into the screw heads because there was a pin in the middle of the hole. I guess there is a hollow star bit somewhere. I was able to break the pins out with a sharp punch to allow my star bit to sit down in the screw head.

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1415628755.jpg

Yep, I had to buy a set with a hole in the middle (to accommodate the pin) a while back just so I could spray some cleaner on a MAF sensor. Things like this prove they're just trying to make our lives miserable.

My wife works in IT and has a whole set of all kinds of assorted bits for different types of security screws. The bits are so readily available it seems pointless for odd shaped screws to even exist.

The 1911 is still going strong, and Canada is just about to phase out the last of their Lee Enfield rifles...

I saw an interview with Jay Leno and he was talking about one of his old cars and he said:
"These cars were built back when technology was expensive and labor cheap. Now, it's the other way around--labor's the killer."

I think this ties in with this thread.

We can fix a Typewriters, Mechanical Clocks, Sewing Machines but why! You can replace them for much less than what it would cost to just get an estimate on fixing the item.

Back to the original question.

Alternator / Starter repairmen.
Was in Baja two years ago and one of the vehicles in the group had the alt light come on.

Baja is full of alternator repair shops. We stopped at one and in less than an hour, the guy had removed the alternate, diagnosed the problem, fixed the problem and reinstalled the now working alternator on the Jeep. (I think all this cost us less than $40us). It was amazing to watch.

Old cameras.

iPod Classic

Agree about products now but there is something about the old stuff. while they may not be as reliable as the new disposable stuff, the style and materials is still cool. I really dig retro appliances and what have you but I would shy away from getting any to actually use because if they did break, parts would be a bear to find, if you could find them.

If rapid prototyping and 3D printing took off and making metal parts became mush cheaper I could get into it...

I took mine apart and put in a new screen, lockout switch and earphone jack for about $20. The hardest part was putting those tiny screws back in. I used a set of jeweler's magnifying glasses.

Yesterday my Sharper Image Humidifier started making rumbling noises, I pulled out the squirrel cage fan and sprayed it with CLR to get the calcium deposits off the vanes, put a few drops of gun oil and what looked like the bearing and now it runs dead silent. For kicks I googled the model number of the fan and found I could buy a replacement for $12.99 from ebay. It was about a $50 humidifier a few years ago.

or ripping off people for a service call.

The drive belt came off on a Lawn-boy. To access the belt there was 3 screws on plate that needed to be removed. 3 different sizes Torx!!!

All the guys that know what they are doing are dead or retired.

Remember teletypes?
I went to teletype repair school a long time ago (1970)
I loved working on those machines.
A zillion small levers, clutches, pawls, cams and a bunch of horizontal to
vertical movements.
Feeler gauges and small ignition wrenches were my friend.
Totally obsolete for the past couple decades.

Later I became an Electrical Technician, providing protection for transmission and
distribution of high voltage power circuits.
All the relaying was electro/mechanical so you used wrenches to set the
relays up. Then around 1980, solid state protection started being integrated
into the systems.
The old guys didn't want to have to learn the new electronic age stuff but it came and now, no more little wrenches.
Software and laptops.
Interesting how everything has become this way today.

I had a pair of shoes resoled a few years ago. I asked the cobbler about his business. He said most of his customers were Asian and most of them recent migrants. I guess they have not been fully indoctrinated into the disposable culture yet.

yup...would suspect small savings separated survival and perishing for these folks.

My grandfather survived the depression in the same way. Fixing things became a big portion of the fabric of his being. He had lots of company. Almost all of those sorts are gone now and replaced by too many people in an iCrisis.:(

Repaircafe.org

My problem is finding a shoe repair shop that I'm happy with. Either the work looks off, falls apart too quickly, or costs almost as much as the shoes.