What did you last repair?

Virtually all newer vehicles have nigh on impossible to change headlights. It is by design. They absolutely do not want you to work on your vehicle under any circumstances.

The cost of having anything repaired is out of control nowadays. That's why I hired my buddy to work on my house with me. They wouldn't even give me a quote. Only one "contractor" even agreed to do the work, and they wanted a $12,000 retainer with no cap on the cost. We easily repaired it for well under $1,000. It was a whole lot of work though.

I'm too old and mean to work, but I can easily do the work of someone less than half my age. This is modern logic. On the real tip, you wouldn't want to hire me and subject me to all this modern nonsense. I'd be right back at you with the same BS, I guarantee you.
 
HSU 500a bass amplifier. Had an OCD power switch episode rated at 5 amps and replaced it
with 15 Amp and problem solved
This thing never gets even close to warm. Standard power supply and appears class a/b from the looks of it.
Faceplate had finger print discolorations all over it and used aluimprep acid to slowly remove the anodizing
for a new finish
That bright blue led craze once again was changed
 
This is modern logic.
Physical reality is all a bore anyway, so you might as well live in some virtual one where all levels of relationship, real or imagined, are available at a key click. (As Zuckerberg would have it)

Analog engineers are becoming harder to find. What modern person wants to make a physical model to see how it all pans out? Why make something self-serviceable if there's no majority of customers interested?
 
That's just creepy.

We have arrived. People live on the internet; young people get engaged to people they've never met in person. Remember, that beautiful Ukrainian princess you're in love with just might be, uh,....

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Right outside that door is a real world. It's not perfect, but it's real.
 
Picked up an old Proton 520 amp for free last week. Had abt 1.5V DC offset on one channel. Tried adjusting offset-trimmer, but nothing happened, so I first assumed it was something worse, but turned out to be the trimmer itself, so I replaced trimmers on both channels just to be sure. I have now added a simple BT module with DSP to it, and gave it to my father mainly for TV sound. Did some basic measurements and tuned the FR for a slightly sloped response and some more extension in the bass. Happy with the result.
Amp was in good condition, so it was definitely worth doing. I listened to it myself after fixing it, and found it to be a good sounding amp, especially when bypassing the pre-amp (split pre and final stage).
 
I repaired my electric hand planer.

Thought I'd be smart and use an old sock to collect the chips, as its bag was missing. Made such a mess throwing crap everywhere, using it to level plywood flooring underlayment edge joints.

Inevitable! The sock part got sucked into the rotating blades, where it jammed so hard my bench vise would rather turn on its turret than budge the stuck cloth. Chipped a blade end I couldnt see trying to rotate the drum with a screwdriver. Finally took one of the 3 blade bolts out, stuck a driver post in there and worked it back n forth until the cloth came out...

I'm pretty sure it didnt go back together quite the same - so not a full repair; will require a someday revisit. Extend myself for a sliver of convenience, end up nearly ruining the tool. Now I cut, vacuum, cut, vacuum - which considering the time it took to undo the mishap, is the routine I should have stuck with.
 
I had a faint buzz coming from my left speaker - a quad amped three way with two woofers using TDA7293. I had tried to get the earthing right to avoid any earth loops, but on closer investigation I found I had a left an earth wire connected that was a duplicate. I disconnected that one and it was then so quiet I though it had stopped working, but now if you put your head right next to the speaker you can hear a very faint hiss. It now produces music very nicely without any buzzing in the quiet bits! In case you were wondering why the right speaker wasn't doing the same, that was prototype number 2, which is pretty good for earth loop noise, but I need to rewire like prototype number 3 which is the left speaker. At my normal listening position the residual noise can't be heard.
 
You will possibly be as staggered as myself in solving the Mathematical Solution to one of Life's great problems:

https://bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/math-tie-shoes-correct/

What it boils down to, is 50% of us have got this problem wrong! Why do my shoelaces come undone?


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The left Chirality solution will work, the right one doesn't. You can see the difference. OK, those are my gardening shoes. I still keep them.
 
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I had to change the radiator on a friend's Mazda 6 which involved removing essentially the whole front of the car including the headlights. I was a bit pissed off!
Many years ago, I owned a Volkswagen Rabbit. I could replace anything that I wanted in a matter of minutes. Case in point the radiator took maybe 30 minutes. No such thing anymore.
 
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That sounds like my Pinto I had in college. You could repair just about anything in 30 minutes on that car.

You can't make stuff that people can repair themselves any more. For the most part, they want you to keep buying new stuff over and over again. And with computers in everything, they can clearly define the service life of their products. Case in point: my old cell phone, which they tried to force me to replace for years. I downloaded a new OS onto it a couple times just to **** them off. About a year ago they bricked it. I guess they thought I'd just bend over and buy a new phone from them. They don't know me. I'll NEVER do business with those thieving bastards again. I don't play those millennial games. When I buy something, I own it - not you.
 
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I replaced the drivers cup holder on my BMW using one of the tools included in the car's tool kit... took 5 minutes. It's the only thing that has been that simple on the car though. Changing the headlight bulbs requires a jack because the inner wheel arch has to be removed to get to it.
 
I'll NEVER do business with those thieving bastards again.
Went to the local QFC to get some spare cash for yard sailin'. Was happy to pick up a couple quarts of Almond milk, to be able to use their cash withdrawal feature at the checkout. Informs me of a 50 cent charge to use that feature after I requested it... Do you want to proceed? Yeah, you sort of have me over a barrel at this point.

Not quite "thieving bastard" category, but...here's one less possible customer for ya, whoever made that decision at the conference room table. I'll learn to pay better attention to what's not in my wallet, when I happen to be near my bank branch. Or just head in that direction instead of visiting your store.

I mean that stuff seems to be on the level of "You dont get a header sheet, when you print something out anymore. Saves a piece of paper. You deal with sorting through the uncollated pile - at $100 an hour, or whatever it was we engineers cost them".
 
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Last thing I fixed was an Apogee CRQ-12 parametric equaliser, got it used and it was a sick little puppy: most of the EQ section switches were intermittent, with the In/Out LEDs flickering -- sometimes on when the switch was out! Popped the lid to find Omar Sharif standing on a circuit board, surrounded by waves of earth, saying "The Nefud Desert is the worst place God created." One could not see the bottom of the box for the dust is what I'm saying here.

A few minutes with 80 PSI of airhose love got most of the grime out and into my lungs but the unit was still sadly SNAFUed. Drastic measures were wanted, as in pulling all the daughterboards from the mainboard and spraying the mating surfaces with Deoxit, then saturating the switches with the same. Buttoned it back up, plugged it in, and everything worked like a charm. Even the LEDs that had flickered on spuriously now behaved; I can only surmise the dust was just conductive enough to let a bit of current through.

Now the fan wants replacing since I can hear it, which is annoying. The fan supply is 24 volts max (thermistor controlled) so it needs a bit of stepping down before a nice little Noctua can find its home.

The first CRQ-12 needed much less attention, only a new fan to replace the noisy old one. It now lives in my headphone rack where it does a fine job tempering an HD-800's more temperamental tendencies.
 
Angle grinder handle broke, the insert molded bolt came off.
Used Araldite to repair, came off again.

So I got a 6" long pipe nipple, 1/2" BSP, and got a welder to gas weld a M 10 x 20 bolt to one end with acetylene welding.
All in cost, $1...

Will put the old handle over it as a sleeve, for better grip and insulation.
 
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