The sheer joy of repairing something.

[G6Tanuki]

My comment a while back has elicited some interesting responses.

The way I view it is that we should always embrace progress and never ever accept a 'make-do' if there's something better available.

if we'd only ever "made-do-and-mended" we'd still be making-do with one single 405-line TV channel [TV? you don't *need* a TV - you can make-do with a trip to the Odeon on a friday night to watch Pathe News!], only a couple of State-provided AM radio-stations [FM? You hoi-polloi can make-do with Medium Wave! And don't even dream of Stereo - remember your place in society], only landline phones [Telephone? who needs a telephone? You can send the maid to the telegraph office!], outside toilets and coal-fires. Spend money on a new pair of socks? Surely these darned ones will see you through the winter?

While old-stuff can be fun to play around with I'm really glad that I don't have to depend on it in my daily life. And I gave up on 'dumpster-diving/skip-scavenging' ages ago - I don't want to build any part of my life around other-people's garbage or cast-offs, I'm worth more than that!

[G6Tanuki]

Originally Posted by mark_in_manc

Scrapping my last car really hurt, this way. In most people's eyes it was finished, but thought of in this way (and compared to, say, a potato ) it was at least 90% of the way to being a totally working car. It frustrated me so much that that 10% eluded me, but of course time is finite too, and not all the family sees things the way I do.

In the early 1980s (after stuffing my 3-month-old XJ6 into a tree) I learned not to fall in love with inanimate objects like cars.

The older I get the more I see the sense in this.

Time is not fungible. The older you get the higher the price you should place on each of those fleeting, remaining hours of your life. Don't waste those remaining hours on trivial things, because you'll never get those un-sensibly-expended hours back.

[MurphyNut]

I'm always fixing things and extending the life well beyond their perceived expectations.
The biggest challenge I have is my original wooden windows from 1937. My house is the only one left in the road that still has them. I'm up a ladder every five years inspecting, repairing and repainting them. I know people think I'm mad but the "cream and green" looks so much better than the sea of white PVC that now dominates much of suburbia, I love preserving them.
I get a huge amount of pleasure in doing this and the joy of how they look.

[Paul_RK]

Originally Posted by G6Tanuki

Time is not fungible. The older you get the higher the price you should place on each of those fleeting, remaining hours of your life. Don't waste those remaining hours on trivial things, because you'll never get those un-sensibly-expended hours back.

Ah, there we agree absolutely. Only to me the "trivial things" are and have always been the latest electronic gadget, the new kitchen and soft furnishings, whatever everyone's wearing this season... absolute sinks of time in terms of the hours of work to pay for them, staying au fait with what's in and what's out, shopping, upheaval for installation work, learning to use stuff... whereas fixing things up and extending their working life, or adopting what someone else has discarded, can actually be quite rewarding. It won't, of course, if it runs counter to your notion of what you're worth... but to me that looks like just another trap. At any rate we each have to determine for ourselves which cares, concerns, occupations and preoccupations are worth the time of day.

Paul

[Bazz4CQJ]

Originally Posted by G6Tanuki

Time is not fungible. The older you get the higher the price you should place on each of those fleeting, remaining hours of your life. Don't waste those remaining hours on trivial things, because you'll never get those un-sensibly-expended hours back.

But you can only decide what is trivial by your own standards and for yourself; I wouldn't waste time trying to refute the view that messing about with old radios is trivial. But if I enjoy it, then it's my prerogative. Surely the aim now is to go out doing what ever makes one happy, however trivial others may regard that

B

[MotorBikeLes]

How about this for a proposition. People of my age learned to darn their socks in early teens, as well as fixing their own push bikes, and so on until they could fix many other things as well. We were fed minimum amounts of food (rationing) and later could not afford excessive amounts even as it became more available. We are the generation who have managed to live longer than any previous one. Apparently younger ones can afford more (rubbish?), eat more, spend more, do less "worthwhile" stuff in their spare time, and are now beginning to show shorter lifespans. I have two more motorcycles I wish to get fully roadworthy and ride; one of them I bought fifteen years ago which I designated as my ultimate "very old man" 'bike.Maybe I will start using it in about five years time as an octogenarian.
Les.

[mark_in_manc]

Originally Posted by MurphyNut

...I know people think I'm mad but the "cream and green" looks so much better than the sea of white PVC that now dominates much of suburbia, I love preserving them...

Hey, I'm with you with the green and - white, in my case (1905, but in places they're a bit of a 'Trigger's Broom')

(Well, I know transport is off limits on here for good reasons, but if the mods will tolerate cat pictures then perhaps the very odd outbreak of gloss paint envy is OK )

[samjmann]

Hi, Murphy Nut's windows look great! Very much in keeping with the period of the house.

We all seem to move on with technology, some slowly, others embracing every new trend. But now it seems we're forced to buy new rather than even contemplating a repair.

I had a 2010 Philips LCD Tv. Almost the top of the range, probably the best Tv I've ever owned. Then it went wrong last year with a very intermittent shut-down reboot fault. This was going to be a difficult fault to find, and the service manual implied that the reported error was on the main board. A reworked pcb was well over £100.00 even to me still in the trade. Very, very
reluctantly I decided that unless I could a find a used board, the Tv would be scrap. The display is perfect no patches, no loss of brightness, the rest of the Tv just as good as new. I since replaced the Tv, and the new Samsung has got a fantastic picture, but I can't bring myself to dispose of the Philips.

I know this must seem mad, but it's just such a waste. It might just be a bad connection on a BGA... But to fix it? What I'm saying is if I'm drawn kicking and screaming into the replace - replace - replace culture, and I'm in the repair trade, what hope is there for the general public!

If the cost of raw materials really went up, and plastic became an expensive item, then repairing might become viable again for a lot of consumer products. Until then we'll just consume - consume - consume and pass all the attendant problems on to our grandchildren.

SJM.

[mark_in_manc]

Originally Posted by samjmann

If the cost of raw materials really went up, and plastic became an expensive item, then repairing might become viable again for a lot of consumer products. Until then we'll just consume - consume - consume and pass all the attendant problems on to our grandchildren.

Hit the nail on the head. It's a consequence of deciding everything based on $, and by the time oil is expensive enough to regret all we wasted, it will have been...wasted.

Mind you, when oil runs short and cheap stuff is no longer cheap, where I live I'll be back to getting broken into once a month. I need to work on taking that philosophically. And I'd feel the same as you did about your telly.

[The Philpott]

Always have a donor vehicle if you have the room. It delays scrapping just a little bit!

As regards the joy of repairing something, unfortunately sometimes with me it's more a case of immersing myself in repair and re-design/upgrade as it helps to push negativity out. I think the Victorians called it 'prolonged melancholy'. Anything that helps to tie it's shoelaces together for half a day is very welcome.

[mark_in_manc]

Originally Posted by The Philpott

...sometimes with me it's more a case of immersing myself in repair and re-design/upgrade as it helps to push negativity out....

I'm haunting this thread - I'll stop, promise - but I'm with you there too. If I can get over the 'hump' of the first 15 minutes where my motivation is totally shot, I get stuck in and the day goes much, much better. I don't kid myself its any better than macrame basketwork at the metaphorical day centre. Not that I'm not in awe of the many skilled people on here, of course.

[dave walsh]

If things do ever crash, being in a group of Forum members can't hurt. Most people here are fairly competent [especially by comparison with society in general] and some individuals are really enormously skilled. I'm glad Tanuki is back and sticking with his views. I suspect he will be right in the end. Unless things do go adrift. it's probaly the future and I can see the pragmatic argument for it but when things are too easy, human beings seem to loose direction-look at America after 1960.

Some people think films are used to introduce us to the future. There's a cartoon type feature [can't recall the title] but it includes a chase sequence where they go underground and everyone is large and moving around in a sort of disability scooter because the ability to walk seems to have been lost Did anybody see Our Wildest Dreams tonight-CH4? Not sure that's the way to go!

Tanuki doesn't want to build his life around other peoples cast-offs, he's worth more than that, a little harsh perhaps but fair enough, while Marc doesn't seem to like things being controlled by the corporate structure ie "The Man" or "The Farm" as Dylan says. Definetely fair enough-especially if you might think we are already heading towards a Blade Runner future. In that film the computer can dive into a film image and go round a corner [1982]. They can do that now. Overall, both viewpoints seem valid to me but I'm such a diplomat. "Pardon a lie" as Dylan says laughing on one recording. He's trying to cover up by saying "it ended
there" [ie just before the mistake!]

Dave

[Tractionist]

There was a short lecture on BBC R4 yesterday - delivered by an ex marketing man. He refers to the fact that we are bombarded via every available means [TV, Radio, Internet, text and hard-copy mail 'flyers] with adverts. Some of these adverts are for services [or gym membership etc.] - but many are for goods.

Some of the afore-mentioned goods we may already be 'consuming' - but many others we hadn't even considered or known about. So the questions are: do we really need this stuff; is it just a fad; do we purchase on a whim etc.? Then there's the matter of over-taxed landfill; the cost of disposal; the cost of re-cycling etc.

Very obviously the stuff that we want and need already comprises that which we already have ..... but which is broken or worn-out. There would definitely therefore seem to be a good argument for repairing that which we already have.

Other issues seem to revolve around objects which haven't essentially altered in many years [e.g. electric kettles]. Kettles are used extensively [particularly during major re-build head-scratches!], but as we all know - heating elements don't last for ever. However, most new kettles feature weld-sealed elements which cannot be changed - albeit that some named brand 'designer appliances' cost well over £35.00 a pop.

There is a whole debate to be had here regarding the apparent manufacturer-contrived impossibility of actually repairing consumer goods - seemingly in an effort to compel us to replace/buy new. This isn't 'in-built' obsolescence .... because the devices aren't obsolete ...... merely defective ...............................

[dseymo1]

Originally Posted by The Philpott

Always have a donor vehicle if you have the room. It delays scrapping just a little bit

I agree in principle, but more often than not it works out like an oven I've recently had to replace. When the door glass broke spontaneously, I discovered that a replacement was unobtainable, so I hunted down a 'spares' oven and used the glass from that, keeping the rest as a supply of spares for future repairs. A few years down the line, what was the next fault? Yes, the door glass again, of course!

[G6Tanuki]

Originally Posted by samjmann

If the cost of raw materials really went up, and plastic became an expensive item, then repairing might become viable again for a lot of consumer products. Until then we'll just consume - consume - consume and pass all the attendant problems on to our grandchildren.

SJM.

The "Cost of raw materials" argument against progress is one which always amuses me. The Stone Age didn't come to an end because we ran out of Stone. I remember in previous decades (even back as far as the 1960s when I was at school) there was fretting about 'Peak Oil' and people said we'd run out of the stuff. (before that, in the 1930s/1950s people wondered if the UK coal-mines could produce enough coal for the future.)
It didn't happen, indeed the USA, at one time the world's greatest user of oil, is now pretty much self-sufficient in it.

The famous "Simon-Ehrlich Wager" of the 1970s - see https://www.investors.com/politics/c...d-won-the-bet/ - is a great example of how worrying about 'running out of raw materials' is a red herring. Only in the last couple of years people were once again worrying about the supply of 'rare earth' metals for things like mobile-phones and solar-cells. Seems the "rare earths" aren't as rare as they were once thought to be.

Like I said, time is the ultimate raw-material that we all individually *will* run out of. OK it's fine 'making-do-and-mend' of domestic stuff if that's what you enjoy spending your time on - but it's not for me. I like doing stuff with old radios, cars etc, but I also joyously embrace technology and progress which provides me with the modern-stuff-that-works for daily use!

[GrimJosef]

Originally Posted by G6Tanuki

... The famous "Simon-Ehrlich Wager" of the 1970s - see https://www.investors.com/politics/c...d-won-the-bet/ - is a great example of how worrying about 'running out of raw materials' is a red herring ...

It's not ultimately a red herring. Ehrlich was just wrong about the timescale. We won't ever run out of oil but we will, sooner or later, reach the point where the small amount of hard-to-extract oil which is left will have become so expensive that we will choose alternatives to it instead. So we might as well have run out of it because we simply won't be able to use it any more.

As a society we are still at a relatively early stage in this process so the things that we have 'run out of' are few and relatively insignificant. We have run out of large pieces of Blue John https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_John_(mineral) for example. We have run out of dodos. They were a useful resource for mariners and, as a direct consequence, now they're gone.

It's harder to run out of more elemental stuff which doesn't get transmuted when we use it because in principle it can always be reclaimed. We'll only be in trouble then if demand grows to exceed a limited supply. If you want to pursue that line further then you might check out the situation with beryllium. On the timescale of most of us, I suspect, not much is going to run out catastrophically. But if I were an institution with the foresight to plan on a timescale of, say, 100 years I might well be investing in gold. It is very rare (the belief that there is gold in seawater is a myth) and we have scoured the whole earth for thousands of years to locate it. We can be pretty certain that there are not going to be surprising discoveries of large, economically-extractable amounts in the future.

Cheers,

GJ

[Refugee]

I have always wondered how long it will take before we dig up all the old land fill sites to extract elements that were once uneconomical to extract from the stuff that was originally dumped there.

[G6Tanuki]

The spoil-tips from old goldmines are already being 'reworked' because modern processing technology now makes it economic to extract the remaining gold that the first-pass of extraction some years back failed to get.

[ms660]

That's been going on for many years, Geevor, one of the mines I worked at got involved with gold recovery years ago in Ecuador, turned out to be a complete failure, same with the tin mine dumps, Hydaulic Tin at Bissoe were doing that back in the 1970's, more recently was an application to dredge the sea around St Ives Bay area to recover tin from the slimes that ran down the Red River from South Crofty tin mine, I don't think that's come to much either, just like many other mining revival/false dawn ventures.

Some saying's from the industry:

If it can't be grown it has to be mined....

A mine is born to die....

If you want a small fortune through mining investments start off with a big fortune and invest it in some big hype mining scheme...

Lawrence.

[Tractionist]

Make do and mend? Well - the conversation seems to have turned to 'commodities' [AKA Oil, Gas, Minerals, Iron, Steel etc.] - but I am reliably informed that used clothing most of which is somewhat ironically exported to the Third World [whereat most raw material and tailored manufacturing takes place] is worth far more weight for weight than .... oil!

By the by - I was once in the Petrochem business and 'supply' was all we talked about. I also trained as a geologist too - and we all agreed that there are plenty of hydrocarbon deposits on the planet ..... but we can't keep burning it if we wish to survive! If we did - the Planet would survive and 'heal' [check-out Gaya Theory] .... but we wouldn't be around to witness it!!

Far more concerning is the matter of secure supply. Oil prices are currently rising because of the US's current stance re. Iran, Libya is barely on-line, Iraq is performing well below par ..... and then ............ there's Russia and it's LNG!! Similar comments attract to non-EU [and oft non-Commonwealth] suppliers located in troubled geographical regions who supply critical commodities: industrial diamonds, chromium, copper and bauxite etc. etc. Further similar comments apply to 'cash crops' which the impoverished growers and supplier nations can't eat: Tea, Coffee, Vanilla ......

We have to stop this profligacy for many reasons some of which are not simply 'environmental' but also relate to security too. Note too that Vulcan 607 was well past retirement age and due for an appointment with the knackers yard .... but 'make do and mend' ensured that this unique aircraft was able to drop airfield denial ordnance on Port Stanley's runway [thereby denying the Argentinians local air superiority] - it was the only aircraft available capable of performing this task .....

I recommend that all forum members read Jacques Cousteau's last book: 'The Orchid, the Octopus, and the Human' ....