repairing things

Lubricated the street door cos I'd noticed it was sticking again. Seems rlike it's not getting done apart from by me. Surprised it's lasted a yearand a bit if so.& idiot next door is still going to the mindless bother of lining up latch handle so it looks like door locked when it isn't. Noticed that as soon as they started but douche anyway.

Finally fixed laser lens on cd player last week. Found out how to remove case and wiped out the cradles. Plugged in the player and saw how a cd was picked up for play. Tried using a disc cleaner but it read as No Disc then wound up taking a qtip with isopropyl alcohol and wiping the lens then clearing off excess with the other end of the stick cotton wool.
Nothing much in the unit otherwise. Did think there might be 15 years worth of dust accumulating. But no, a couple of long hairs but otherwise no.
Did find laser has a shutter that I hadn't anticipated so maybe cleaning disc just not getting to it.
Anyway playing ok now. Not skipping discs either.
Biggest chore was getting to plug and moving the unit. Probably not been moved in a decade. Plus I had a pile of boxes trapping the plug that I had to move then put back.
So got music now.

patched the drywall holes mentioned upthread. followed recommendations here not to bother with patch kit 👍🏻

replaced flush valve in toilet (american toilets boy, i don't know).

What, caek, can’t handle all that freedom?

Flush valves, flappers, and freedom

my toilet was struggling with all the freedom sauce

I once discovered a dissolving tank-to-bowl gasket that caused the water to run depending on how the flapper hit. The toilet wasn't ancient, but the average lifetime for these things is 4-5 years! Who wants to troubleshoot their running toilet twice per decade?

I replaced gaskets and washers on one of the bolts holding the tank to the bowl and no longer find tiny mysterious pools at the base of the toilet … we won’t go into how many years it took to figure out the problem

the paperwork for the flush valve on my thing said "replace all toilet cistern fixtures and supply lines every five years" ?!

this is Big Plumbing's scam. Same goes for shower valves that start letting water leak through after a bit of deposit build up on the mechanism.

you’re also supposed to clean the filter on your dishwasher after every cycle lol

I had to remove a piece of our clothes washer's armor just to clean the filter when it wouldn't drain. If you know it will need to be cleaned, you could at least make it easily accessible! they want you to depend on them.

Needed to change a lightbulb in the oven, which should be the easiest thing in the world. Just to be safe I googled and found the official LG how-to: turn bulb cover counter clockwise, remove bulb, replace bulb, replace cover. Easy, right? Except the goddamn oven bulb cover won't come off, and googling again, this is apparently a really common oven problem. Some folks took months to find a way to get it off. Some people literally took *years*. Some people - which is to say, more than one! - suggested just breaking the glass cover with a hammer, because it's easier to replace than remove. Wtf? The solution several suggested (and we'll see if it works) is getting a $10 universal oil filter wrench (like, for a car) that attaches to a ratchet. Never thought I'd be going to Autozone to change an oven lightbulb.

it's just a big adjustable spanner.

would something that works via suction do the job? or can you improvise a belt wrench?

I don't think so, because it's in such an awkward space in the oven. Some folks suggested a swivel wrench, but the oil filter wrench should serve the same purpose. I watched one video where a guy succeeded, and he had grippy gloves and used brute strength and still it looks like it took him a while.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8MoWcqC8EWA

Had a similar situation in my MiL's fridge where the water filter hadn't been changed in years and was super-awkward to remove.

Holy crap the oil filter wrench worked. The more you know ...

he water filter hadn't been changed in years

this is something that needs replacing?!

lol my thought exactly

Every three months, or at least according to the mailers we keep getting sent by the manufacturer increasingly panicked sounding because we aren't ordering a filter directly from them in a timely enough fashion (or, at all, in our case - I have actually changed it twice, but did not pay the exorbitant fees they want).

They *totally* need to be changed. Our fridge shows a countdown (6 months, iirc) until it's time. But I have a friend whose fridge doesn't mention it, and he noticed the water pressure of the dispenser getting worse and worse. Each time he had his guy out to try to adjust and tweak the pressure, but to no avail. No matter how strong and powerful the pressure, the dispenser still barely streamed. Eventually he did a deep dive on the internet and, duh, realized he had never changed the filter, which was more or less literally bricked solid. He got a new filter and installed it, which was easy enough, but ... forgot to readjust the pressure, so when he pressed the water dispenser it, finally relieved and unblocked, jetted out into his face with the force of a fire house.

ohh y'all are talking about fridges with like water taps or ice makers, not applicable

Yeah - only fridges with water hookups...

Yeah, I was freaking out for a second; I have no water or ice dispenser

last month I learned: 5/8" drywall is significantly heavier and harder to cut than 1/2" drywall, they actually sell 2x2 squares of drywall that are termed "repair size" but really are ideal for working with rooms with 10 foot ceilings, almost two decades later, I still have retained muscle memory of creative mudding techniques developed from having to make nice looking art walls out of drywall scraps scavenged from construction site dumpsters

also realized the freedom of having the walls I'm working on _not_ be art gallery walls, thus the surface doesn't have to be perfectly smooth

Here is a question tangentially related to repair. The waste management people managed to break a bottle or two in the alley, so we're talking about hundreds of pieces of glass on an uneven strip of rough concrete, full of nooks and crannies. It's not my job to clean it up, but I'm sick of seeing all the broken glass, so what's the best way to get it up? I don't have a shop vac, the alley is too rough to sweep, there's too much to clean up by hand ...

is the alley public space? if so call 311?

don't they recommend using bread for picking up glass or have i imagined that? not on this scale, obv, but even though it sounds like an accident waiting to happen.

ha, yes, https://homeservicesforamerica.com/using-bread-to-pick-up-glass/

Yeah, maybe I'll just call the local government into action.

May take a while to get action---I've got some long, thick gloves, supposedly protective against thorns etc., for gardening; haven't used them yet, but also I got ads for ones to be worn when handling dogs (you know which online store all this is coming from)If some of the glass is where a barefoot person might step on it, or a critter get it in pawpads, you might try gloves, otherwise I'd leave it for the gov.

Maybe just attach slices of bread to the soles of your shoes and walk around the alley.

I saw someone essentially suggest wearing a glove wrapped in thick tape.

shop vacs are only like $30 and handy for many things, just saying

Could it get clogged, though? Maybe crunch the bigger glass with mallet or baseball bat or something first.

Crunch it w handle of a broom or rake or etc., so won't put your back out.

too rough to sweep, like, you are afraid you would get mugged for your broom if you were to attempt it? idgi?

shop vacs are only like $30 and handy for many things, just saying

― thinkmanship (sleeve), Thursday, August 11, 2022 4:17 PM (four hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

Yes, you already knew the answer Josh. Nobody wants to be their dad, but it is time.

Just bought a shop vac and I'm loving it. Today I realized that the nozzle fits onto the end of my random orbital sander's dust chute *swooooooon*

lol josh i’m not minimising your situation but i have multiple broken bottles in my surrounding streets and alleys every day and have kind of just accepted it as a normal part of living in the city. i can’t imagine what the response would be if i actually got through to someone at the council about it.

I'm pretty sure they'll clean it sooner rather than later. I'm a taxpayer, dammit! But seriously, my municipality is pretty responsive.

Anyway, xpost, I meant "too rough" as in the actual literal surface; all the glass is nestled in the cracks and stuff, so sweeping doesn't work. It has to be either picked up by hand or vacuumed. On that front, there are soooooo many shop/wet-dry vacs! Are capacity and vacuum strengths the only real variables? There seems to be a good, small Craftsman one for about $40. What would I be missing out on with that model vs. the one for, say, $100 (which is by no means the top of the line, either)?

This is the one I was eying:

https://www.lowes.com/pd/CRAFTSMAN-2-5-Gallon-Corded-Portable-Wet-Dry-Shop-Vacuum-Corded/5013057707

Prices seem to go up from there in line with capacity and power.

you could get some syringes and take the needles out and toss them around.. could get some more attention on it

If there were syringes strewn about they would be gone in a second, because hey, free syringes. (#jackhandey)

Are capacity and vacuum strengths the only real variables?

yes

We have a leaky tap. It's a mixer, the cartridge seems to be non standard and the easiest way to check if a new one will fit is to take the old one with me so three times now I've turned off the water via the hard to access screw whose head seems in danger of being stripped, and removed the cartridge to take to a shop, with no luck. The last time I put it back the leak stopped - for a while. Which makes me question if the cartridge is even the problem.

I need to see if i can get sand out of the telescopic lens section of my camera. Don't want to have to pay loads to get the camera repaired. Wondering if having a vacuum cleaner would make things easier since i have seen that suggested. JUst not opening when the power is switched on which has been a pain cos I have had things i would have shot since this happened.

I wonder if compressed air might be more effective than a vacuum?

I attempted to fix a leaky shower. Went outside to the curb to shut off the water and the entire "pit" under the manhole was filled with dirt. Took awhile of digging to find just the meters, much less the nozzle to shut everything down.

So I decided that the shower wasn't really leaking that much.

I swapped out my tail light assemblies a few weeks ago and it felt really good to be out there on the street taking a car apart with tools.

a while back our ancient dryer stopped heating and I revived it with a new heating element; this week it started overheating so much clothes were almost too hot to touch

I replaced the thermostat and the dryer is working at sub-combustion temperatures again

My wife and I troubleshot and fixed the thermocouple on our hot water heater together and it was GLOOOOORIOUS.