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Re: The right to repair

Posted: Fri May 10, 2019 9:44 pm
by Dansin
Electric cars seem to be the future but not Tesla. The VW chief recently vowed to make a Tesla beating car at half the cost. I’m pretty sure with their economies of scale, that will happen. Let’s hope VW don’t try to close the system and allow third party (or owner) repairs.

The wife got an S3 in the end which replaced an S4. Not great economy but with such few miles it still makes sense.

Back on theme of the original post, our washing machine went bang last year. Under Bosch warranty but for some reason wasn’t covered. The nice (Bosch) repair man could get the parts and fit them for £750. A new integrated machine was ‘only’ £500. I remember my mum having a Zanussi machine for twenty odd years back in the day. It went wrong a few times but was always repaired.

Built in obsolescence seems to be the thing nowadays. Just look at mobile phones that apparently require replacing every 12 months.

Re: The right to repair

Posted: Fri May 10, 2019 10:59 pm
by garyboy
Dansin wrote: Fri May 10, 2019 9:44 pm
Built in obsolescence seems to be the thing nowadays. Just look at mobile phones that apparently require replacing every 12 months.


good point !
it boosts sales, of course, but that is only offsetting the low original cost, as these high tech items are fantastic advances and great value.

The other side of it is that these manufacturers can then control your buying behaviour … hence the worry about wuawei letting the Chinese take over our lives?

Re: The right to repair

Posted: Sat May 11, 2019 5:56 am
by PaulinBont
Cant find any parts for my Betamax PVR :(

Re: The right to repair

Posted: Sat May 11, 2019 6:51 am
by WIBO
DavidS wrote: Fri May 10, 2019 5:29 pm You should have cut your toenails more often.
Actually, darned socks were darned uncomfortable, as far as I can remember.



I see what you did there........groan.


:lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:

Re: The right to repair

Posted: Sat May 11, 2019 7:06 am
by daveuprite
Yeah, not sure there's a great demand for Betamax parts these days.

But a few years ago a friend of ours had a sell up, and I bought all his old Sony minidisc equipment. A stereo stacking system and a minidisc walkman, together with loads of recorded and blank discs. Not worth much on the open market, but seriously underrated. OK, it failed to compete with CDs and didn't last long as a format, and it was too expensive when first on sale, but mini-disc is very high quality. The sound is superb. There's a small community of fans exchanging discs. Lots of this old hi-fi stuff is being thrown away these days, now that everything is downloadable, but if it works and sounds great it's tragic to chuck it.

Remember the 'waste hierarchy': FIRST REDUCE, THEN REUSE, THEN RECYCLE.

Re: The right to repair

Posted: Sat May 11, 2019 8:13 am
by MotoCP
daveuprite wrote: Fri May 10, 2019 8:02 am
Many manufacturers profit by engineering their products to deter repairers, even to the extent of sabotaging their own goods so that parts break if repairs are attempted!
This ‘preventative’ attitude from manufacturers is shameful.

Re: The right to repair

Posted: Sat May 11, 2019 8:16 am
by MotoCP
Hugh wrote: Fri May 10, 2019 10:50 am Financial and self worth values that many of us still cling to, especially now that we realise how our current society with it's throw away mentality is screwing things up around the world.
Quite right Hugh. I get a great sense of satisfaction from repairing things.
And the way my pension is looking, i’m going to be drawing on my resourcefulness more and more in the future.
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Re: The right to repair

Posted: Sat May 11, 2019 8:25 am
by Tonibe63
Dansin wrote: Fri May 10, 2019 9:44 pm Electric cars seem to be the future but not Tesla. The VW chief recently vowed to make a Tesla beating car at half the cost. I’m pretty sure with their economies of scale, that will happen. Let’s hope VW don’t try to close the system and allow third party (or owner) repairs.

The wife got an S3 in the end which replaced an S4. Not great economy but with such few miles it still makes sense.

Back on theme of the original post, our washing machine went bang last year. Under Bosch warranty but for some reason wasn’t covered. The nice (Bosch) repair man could get the parts and fit them for £750. A new integrated machine was ‘only’ £500. I remember my mum having a Zanussi machine for twenty odd years back in the day. It went wrong a few times but was always repaired.

Built in obsolescence seems to be the thing nowadays. Just look at mobile phones that apparently require replacing every 12 months.
Electric cars are only the future because the Political/Corporate powers dictate that it will be. I'm not convinced about the 'whole life' environmental or financial credentials.

When I built our kitchen extension (19 years ago) built in appliances were quiet new to the market so I built the kitchen units taller, deeper and wider to house full size appliances due to concerns about reliability, cost and being big enough for a growing family. The kids have now grown up and left home but we still have the same cooker, hob, fridge/freezer and dishwasher. The cooker burns out a control switch every 5 or 6 years which I replace with an Ebay part costing £30ish.
Personally I think appliances, phones, cars, tv's etc etc are replaced these days under the guise of it can't be repaired when actually it is about a reward/fashion/peer pressure thing.

Re: The right to repair

Posted: Sat May 11, 2019 8:31 am
by MotoCP
bowber wrote: Fri May 10, 2019 4:55 pm We had this discussion recently when I was throwing away all my socks with holes in, my mum said how she used to repair them years ago, now they are thrown away for having a hole in the toe.
I draw the line at darning socks!

Instead, I give ‘holed’ socks one final use in the garage.

I wear them on my hands which is great for cleaning the crud out of nooks/crannies and polishing up wheel rims/spokes.

;)

Re: The right to repair

Posted: Sat May 11, 2019 10:15 am
by daveuprite
Tonibe63 wrote: Sat May 11, 2019 8:25 am
Electric cars are only the future because the Political/Corporate powers dictate that it will be. I'm not convinced about the 'whole life' environmental or financial credentials.
Think of it like this. The world has to urgently move away from fossil fuels. Beyond dispute. Electricity must be generated from non-carbon sources. Beyond dispute. We all know why and denial is pointless and ridiculous. Renewables and nuclear produce electricity. So all means of transporting people and things must harness that electricity from now on, not liquid or gaseous fossil fuel.

In the case of cars/motorbikes that simply means replacing the combustion power pack with a battery power pack. They do exactly the same thing, except the former causes direct individual carbon emissions from each and every vehicle, while the latter stores and discharges power that was generated far more sustainably elsewhere.

Right now we are in a kind of half-way house phase with an immature but rapidly growing renewable energy sector at the same time as a very powerful fossil industry fights ruthlessly to delay its inevitable decline. The liquid fuels industry seeks to discredit renewably-sourced electricity in order to protect its interests, and it still forms the globally dominant economic model after a century of hegemony - so it has the power and money to disrupt the new threat to it.

So for the moment there is conflict, there is deliberate myth and prejudice and there are strong forces resisting change. One means is to sow doubt over the environmental credentials of battery technology, which of course has a major environmental impact but one that is far smaller (cradle to grave) than the equivalent fossil-fuel propulsion. Extensive research bears this out and don't let the Clarksons and Exxons of this world tell you otherwise.

Personally I am like so many others I think, who are very willing and ready to adopt electricity for my transport, can see all the advantages, but who cannot yet afford the price of a new electric car/motorbike. Battery range is improving by the day and already perfectly viable for everyday use. The charging network is still fledgling but expanding fast. We are waiting to make the move. But for people in my position it's better for the meantime to maintain and repair an older vehicle while using it sparingly - until we can afford to make the change. My car has done just 100,000kms in the last 11 years and being a Honda hasn't needed anything but oil and new tyres. But if governments were truly serious about the climate change emergency, I would have been financially incentivised well before now to move over to electric.

Anyway, some of that's a little bit off topic...