Right to repair
20/09/21 02:32
We have a food dryer that is around 40 years old. Over the years, the motor and fan got louder and louder and finally, this fall, while drying some pears and apples, it failed completely. I tried, without success, to find parts for the dryer online. I found out that the brand name of our dryer no longer is used to market appliances, but that the basic design of the machine is still available. It is remarkable that the trays used to hold the food as it is drying are still available for purchase. I suppose that after 40 years it would not have been a wasteful purchase to just replace the dryer, but I resisted because the heating element still works and besides the basic trays and other parts aren’t the kind of things that wear out. They can be washed and reused over and over again.
Finally, I started looking for electric fans recommended for other applications and found one that was very similar in size to the one in the dryer. I purchased the fan, drilled a couple of new holes in the base of the dryer and wired it up. It was very quiet compared to the old fan and at first I wondered if it was circulating enough air for the dryer to work. However, the food dryer seems to be back in business, drying fruit once again.
I don’t think I should be disappointed in the fact that the old motor gave out after many hours of service. There have been years when it saw less service than it presently does because we have lived in places where we had less access to fresh fruit. Here in the Pacific Northwest we are fortunate to live with abundant sources of fruit. The orchard at our son’s farm produces far more than we are able to consume. Preserving fruit seems to be an important task here.
It will be interesting to see how long this new motor will last. I guess if it lasts as long as the previous one I’ll be past my 108th birthday when it needs to be replaced and I may have figured out how to pass the dryer on to someone else by that time.
Looking around our kitchen, we have quite a few items that have served us for all of our married life. Our everyday dishes are the same as the ones we received as wedding gifts. Back then, we didn’t own as many plates and bowls. Because the pattern is common it was easy for us to obtain additional dishes over the years, so I don’t know the age of individual plates, but I’m sure that some of the original set are still serving us. I think we’ve finally replaced most of the pots and pans we received as wedding gifts, but I have cast iron skillets that we obtained used that are likely more than 50 year old.
We have furniture in our house that has been around for several generations. The high chair that Susan’s grandmother used is still in our dining room and our grandchildren have all sat at the table in that high chair.
There are, however, a lot of devices in our home that have short service lives. I’m not sure how old our toaster is, but I don’t think we’ve owned it for a decade and we’ve had a lot of different toasters over the years. The toaster has been the subject of many conversations around our home because Susan’s parents were proud to have had only one toaster in their married life. We have a kind of a joke about that toaster. Her father was quick to point out that the toaster had served since they got married, but I married into their family when the toaster was less than 25 years old and it had a tendency to burn a piece of bread or produce bread that was toasted on one side only. From my point of view they kept the same toaster, but it didn’t exactly work flawlessly for them. I guess the point was that the appliance was manufactured in such a way that it could be taken apart and Susan’s dad was an electrician and he could continue to fix the appliance over the years.
Toasters these days are not designed to be repaired. When a heating element fails they end up in the landfill and a new toaster replaces the old one.
Anything related to computers seems to be designed for regular obsolescence. Not long ago I called a computer repair facility to check on getting a battery replaced in one of our computers and the technician informed me that the battery could not be replaced. “We can’t work on old machines like that,” he said. The machine isn’t old by my standards. In fact it performs as well as it did when it was new, perhaps even better due to upgrades in software, and as long as we keep it plugged in when using it, it probably will serve for much longer.
Right to repair is becoming more and more prominent among users of technology. There are formal advocacy groups pushing manufacturers to make parts, diagnostic tools, and diagrams available to consumers and repair shops. Just last week, the Federal Trade Commission voted unanimously to enforce laws around the Right to Repair in cases involving electronic and automotive devices. Legislative bodies are considering new and more stringent laws to protect the right of consumers to repair their own devices or have them repaired by local technicians.
The right to repair has come to light in the Covid pandemic because many medical devices including ventilators, dialysis machines and crucial diagnostic tools are manufactured by companies that restrict access to essential repair materials. In a time of critical need of ventilators, hospitals have dozens of machines that are not serviceable because of a lack of diagnostic information and repair parts. You can’t just drill a couple of extra holes and slap in a motor and fan designed for another application when it comes to repairing a ventilator.
Meanwhile, while legislators and others try to force companies to take a longer term view and manufacture items that can be repaired, our food dryer is set for a few more years of service. If only more things were as simple.
Finally, I started looking for electric fans recommended for other applications and found one that was very similar in size to the one in the dryer. I purchased the fan, drilled a couple of new holes in the base of the dryer and wired it up. It was very quiet compared to the old fan and at first I wondered if it was circulating enough air for the dryer to work. However, the food dryer seems to be back in business, drying fruit once again.
I don’t think I should be disappointed in the fact that the old motor gave out after many hours of service. There have been years when it saw less service than it presently does because we have lived in places where we had less access to fresh fruit. Here in the Pacific Northwest we are fortunate to live with abundant sources of fruit. The orchard at our son’s farm produces far more than we are able to consume. Preserving fruit seems to be an important task here.
It will be interesting to see how long this new motor will last. I guess if it lasts as long as the previous one I’ll be past my 108th birthday when it needs to be replaced and I may have figured out how to pass the dryer on to someone else by that time.
Looking around our kitchen, we have quite a few items that have served us for all of our married life. Our everyday dishes are the same as the ones we received as wedding gifts. Back then, we didn’t own as many plates and bowls. Because the pattern is common it was easy for us to obtain additional dishes over the years, so I don’t know the age of individual plates, but I’m sure that some of the original set are still serving us. I think we’ve finally replaced most of the pots and pans we received as wedding gifts, but I have cast iron skillets that we obtained used that are likely more than 50 year old.
We have furniture in our house that has been around for several generations. The high chair that Susan’s grandmother used is still in our dining room and our grandchildren have all sat at the table in that high chair.
There are, however, a lot of devices in our home that have short service lives. I’m not sure how old our toaster is, but I don’t think we’ve owned it for a decade and we’ve had a lot of different toasters over the years. The toaster has been the subject of many conversations around our home because Susan’s parents were proud to have had only one toaster in their married life. We have a kind of a joke about that toaster. Her father was quick to point out that the toaster had served since they got married, but I married into their family when the toaster was less than 25 years old and it had a tendency to burn a piece of bread or produce bread that was toasted on one side only. From my point of view they kept the same toaster, but it didn’t exactly work flawlessly for them. I guess the point was that the appliance was manufactured in such a way that it could be taken apart and Susan’s dad was an electrician and he could continue to fix the appliance over the years.
Toasters these days are not designed to be repaired. When a heating element fails they end up in the landfill and a new toaster replaces the old one.
Anything related to computers seems to be designed for regular obsolescence. Not long ago I called a computer repair facility to check on getting a battery replaced in one of our computers and the technician informed me that the battery could not be replaced. “We can’t work on old machines like that,” he said. The machine isn’t old by my standards. In fact it performs as well as it did when it was new, perhaps even better due to upgrades in software, and as long as we keep it plugged in when using it, it probably will serve for much longer.
Right to repair is becoming more and more prominent among users of technology. There are formal advocacy groups pushing manufacturers to make parts, diagnostic tools, and diagrams available to consumers and repair shops. Just last week, the Federal Trade Commission voted unanimously to enforce laws around the Right to Repair in cases involving electronic and automotive devices. Legislative bodies are considering new and more stringent laws to protect the right of consumers to repair their own devices or have them repaired by local technicians.
The right to repair has come to light in the Covid pandemic because many medical devices including ventilators, dialysis machines and crucial diagnostic tools are manufactured by companies that restrict access to essential repair materials. In a time of critical need of ventilators, hospitals have dozens of machines that are not serviceable because of a lack of diagnostic information and repair parts. You can’t just drill a couple of extra holes and slap in a motor and fan designed for another application when it comes to repairing a ventilator.
Meanwhile, while legislators and others try to force companies to take a longer term view and manufacture items that can be repaired, our food dryer is set for a few more years of service. If only more things were as simple.
