keeping your electronics happy doesn't have to involve phone calls for warranty service. many are straightforward jobs that require a sink, a screwdriver, and an episode of DS9 playing in the background.

today's fun bit of elective surgery and preventative maintenance: taking apart and cleaning the brew unit on my GE Profile automatic espresso machine

(if you recognize the shape of this machine, that's probably because SMEG re-shelled the machine and uses identical parts internally. so anything i've done here equally applies to its cousin.)

the manual assures you that there are no user serviceable parts inside, and that only GE's warranty service can do it. it doesn't say that GE stopped offering any kind of service or parts for these machines two years ago.

espresso machine elitists are of zero help as well, toeing the usual line "just go buy a REAL machine like a $2k Lelit that uses standard parts" blah blah.

understandably, everyday people give up and toss these machines in the landfill.

i've owned a half dozen machines and grinders in my life - some in the $3k range, and none of them make an *excellent* espresso for the $200 this machine can.

in the interests of extending its life for as long as possible, some preventative maintenance is super easy to do:

the brew unit detaches from the side of the machine with two squeeze-clips. it has six beefy phillips #2 screws to remove. once those are off, you'll see the guts of the brew unit. it's just a few plastic gears. look how vile they've become after 2 years of daily use 😬 (pic 1)

as soon as i started cleaning it, my fingers got gunky - sticky! all of the parts were gooped in white lithium grease, which had mixed with old coffee and produced quite a mess. i took out all of the gears, and scrubbed them all in the sink with hot water and lots of dish soap. an old toothbrush worked great.

pic 2: the cleaned up parts. cleaning off all the gunk also removed all of the grease, so i re-greased each gear using an old tube of food-grade silicone grease i had laying around from years ago.

pic 3: the brew unit back inside of the machine. you can see the orange plastic squeeze-clips that let you easily remove the brew unit for cleaning.

pic 4: the re-assembled machine, working happily.

#selfrepair #diyrepair #mottai #coffee #permaculture

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A satisfying fix!

Fixed our automatic bin lid, again... I have fixed it before, a long time ago, but a different issue.

The reported "fault" was , "this thing is clearly broken, even new batteries haven't sorted it".

Found 3 issues:

1. One of the 4 D cell batteries was in the wrong way around. Easy fix!
2. The On/Off switch was iffy. Contact cleaner fixed that.
3. There was debris in the lid gears jamming it. Another easy fix.

All issues fixed, and the bin is back in business!

#DIYrepair

Seems like I might have to replace the micro mouse switch on my Kensington Orbit K75327 trackball... The left click is registering double clicks. Hope I still remember my soldering skills! Will try to get some replacement 7.3mm silent Kailh switches.

https://kailhswitch.net/products/kailh-mute-button-6-6-7-3mm-square-silent-wireless-wired-mouse-micro-switch-mouse-button-tact-switch

Quick disassembly guide: https://www.reddit.com/r/Trackballs/comments/o8ai5q/microswitch_replacement_in_kensington_orbit_scroll/

#diyrepair #mouse #trackball #trackballmouse #mouserepair #kailh

@DerReparierer Ich bin etwas ratlos. Habe hier einen #defekt|n Bewegungsmelder mit Helligkeitssensor. Hast du einen Tipp, wo ich anfangen könnte zu messen?
Die eine Leiterbahn sieht unterbrochen aus, da ist aber Durchgang. Die Sicherung hat auch noch Durchgang.

#diy_electronics #DIYrepair

one of the little skills i've begun to learn over the past few years is how to repair books. i don't mean the kind of heavyduty book restoration you see done by professionals. i mean fixing your beloved thrashed paperback that you just can't bear to toss out, because who even does that

today i wanted to (finally) read Myst: The Book of Atrus, and when i opened it up a hunk of chapters completely separated from the adjoining pages. this is probably why i got it for $2 at a thrift store years ago.

book restoration is an art, and i'm a programmer. so this is how i do it.

pic 1: the damaged section. you can see where a hunk of pages has separated from the neighbouring section. there are even little wisps of paper left.

pic 2: i glue down the little torn wisps of paper using my trusty swiss army knife of tools: a dental flosser. it has the most useful tip for almost any job. i'm using it as a poker and paintbrush today. i've put a tiny dab of PVA glue on the tip, and i've glued the tiny wisps of paper to the page

pic 3: i've applied a conservative amount of PVA glue to the broken section. it's going to bond against the spine, and when smushed, will also bond against the adjoining pages.

pic 4: resting the book on the spine for an hour or two to ensure a good bond, and let the glue dry a bit. that's the ph-neutral Polyvinyl Acetate (PVA) glue i use. it is the most useful glue in my house.

if this will be your first time fixing a page that has fallen out of a book, or fixing a spine like this one: a tiny amount of PVA goes a LONG way. it tends to get runny, so give the bottle a good shake before you start. it also dries a lot faster than the usual white schoolroom glue.

#mottai #diyrepair #books #bookstodon #myst #permaculture #solarpunk #repair

Half the #DIYrepair effort is knowing the name of the replacement part you're searching for.

After that, it's 1/3 waiting on shipping & the remainder complaining about skinned knuckles or dropped nuts & bolts.

Back in November 2013, I bought myself a new laptop to celebrate that I was in full-time employment for the first time in my life.

The laptop was a Panasonic Toughbook CF-53 Mk2. I still have it, typing on it now in fact. Its had a few upgrades, but the keyboard is still the original.

A couple of the scissor switch mechanisms are starting to fail now, with a few keys becoming unresponsive or the key caps popping up. Most annoyingly, right-shift and enter. So it's new keyboard time.

I've ordered one of these, it's a backlit chiclet keyboard. Mine's not backlit, and not a chiclet, but it says its for CF-53 so hopefully will fit. $50 isn't a lot to spend anyway, so worth a gamble.

https://www.ebay.com.au/itm/276625672231

Replacement doesn't look hard from the iFixit article I found, so we'll see.

#CF53 #Toughbook #Keyboard #DIYRepair

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