On Home Repair

June 19, 2021
 
Bigger Hammer:  You encounter a hard-to-remove screw, and you discover the stuck screw you're working on has a slot/phillips head but is also a hex nut head, so you think "socket set!" because you envision the increased torque you can achieve using a ratchet versus a screwdriver handle (and you silently deny, again, that you are losing grip and twist strength as you age)... and you find that little-used socket set with the small sockets in the garage tool collection, and are reminded that the metrics and nots are jumbled up (and now you realize you've forgotten the promise you made to yourself the last time you accessed this set, to organize it properly, so you make the promise again), and, after guessing the size you need and returning to the porch worksite to find that no, that's the wrong size, twice, and then decide you can bring the other screw, the one that wasn't stuck, out to the socket collection in the garage to find a proper fit, and then, back on the ladder, on the porch, you romp on the reluctant screw embedded in a rafter, and it breaks off, a #10 screw, no less... this is when you revisit the whole brain-brawn thing. Just when you thought you understood it. Is it a dichotomy or a continuum????

Sensory acuity: The old fan has five blades, and each is attached with two machine screws to the spinning part. You carefully remove each in turn, holding the weight of each blade on the top of your head as you loosen the screws (recall you are on a ladder), and then return the screws to the spinning part so that the next installer will have all the parts right at hand.

But one screw drops.

You hear it hit metal, so clearly it hit the aluminum ladder, so therefore it's now on the porch carpet. The six minutes or so you spend looking for it are lost forever. But your wife comes out to check on progress (perhaps she saw the blades resting on the top of your head, and that's the real reason she's come out, to do a well-check, but she's not letting on about that) so you ask her to look. Another six minutes gone.

You carefully fill the old light globe with light bulbs and other hardware the next owner will need to install the light/fan, and pack all the parts into a cardboard box, and accidentally tip that globe so stuff falls out into the box, and in your scramble to find all the spilled parts, you tip another metal internal part, and out falls the missing screw.

"Why spend the extra money on the better speakers any more, when you can't assess a falling screw?" you ask yourself. And yet, you smugly recall the two of you were right: no screw was in sight on that porch carpet!!! Score one for vision, anyway.

If the screw fits: Electrical boxes for various components (switches and lights come to mind) have certain standards of manufacture, relative to size and configuration. If you are old enough, you will remember those metal circles we all tried to pass off as nickels... even though they had slots in them for the tip of a screwdriver.

Anyway, there are flanges with threads cut into them in the boxes for affixing switches and fixtures. The measurments are standard as to how far apart they are, and the threaded flanges have the same size hole. One is reasonably confident, therefore, that things will fit.

But, when you disassemble things, you lose screws (rule #1 in the book of backyard bumbling, get a container for all parts; rule #2, use it). So when it comes time to put the new frazzit in place, you're looking for screws. Again. Only this time, it's an easy ten minutes. And in the end, you've located only one screw that fits.

Which turns out to be not a problem. You put it in, tighten it up, and realize that the standard sizing rule previously mentioned doesn't apply to this installation. Even if you had a screw to fit, the frazzit hole and the box hole won't ever line up.

So, remember that broken #10 screw in the first chapter of this rant? Well, the other screw (that didn't break) is still available, and its hole in the ceiling, and the hole in the frazzit, perfectly align.

Sometimes, regardless of how far you stray from conventional wisdom (and the directions that came with the new unit)...sometimes you find Valhalla.
 
 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Austin and Lockhart TX brisket tour Nov. 7-12, 2024

Image
( bolded and underlined and blue signifies a link) When in Texas... our first foray was as guests of my HS and lifelong buddy and his wife, also a HS classmate, Marc and Barb (Oates) Knisely. The venue was County Line on the Lake in Austin. I went with the ribs, Linda went with the brisket tacos, and I refrained from photos out of respect for Marc and Barb... great ribs, which I got into for a subsequent breakfast (yup, it's Texas, baby) and the leftover tacos are next up for another breakfast. Our second foray was with nephew and niece Jack and Hanna, who like Barb and Marc are also residents in Austin. Joining us, their parents Jim and Janet, Linda's sister and her husband, who flew in from central Oregon. Jim, Janet, Linda, and I are sharing an Airbnb for the five-day expedition.   So Jack and Hanna took us to Loro Asian Smokehouse and Bar which, again, no photos from me out of an abundance of respect but an amazingly wide variety of combinations and tastes - Q - centr...
Read more

Rock 'n' roll

Image
We are not unusual, I think, relative to other homeowners. Surely there are small differences, such as we may mow more frequently, or shovel snow more often... no wait, that's my neighbor Trish. Ok,  she and I may have strains of OCD coursing through us. Everyone's on the scale somewhere, right? Notice I didn't say spectrum. But by and large, suburban homeowners either do, or have done, maintenance of one sort or another pretty much constantly. It comes with the territory of home ownership, right? Stuff needs replacing, repairing, repainting, vacuuming, watering... some work is done several times a day, some things happen oh, every quarter century or so.  It just depends on the situation. Load stuff into the dishwasher? Several times a day. Replace windows or a driveway? Hopefully the longer haul... and so many in-between actions, relative to periodicity, such as weeding, or window-washing, or washing the car, and so on. And that's how we landed on this landscaping adve...
Read more

Rink blues

Image
Hard to believe there's so little to say, and a whole Internet upon which keyboarded drivel can be inflicted. Talk about the show about nothing. The rink is soup and Mother Nature is 0-2 in two consecutive seasons. O where is the winter of my youth? Howling winds, driven snow, days off school... No matter. Best constructed rink ever, best rink liner ever (this one actually holds water!), and best lighting scheme ever. But no ice. So we are compensating for this by logging beaucoup ice arena hours, following (bringing? not!) Jamie to venues throughout Michigan, studying Google maps and handheld GPS directions to the Ice Cube, Eddie Edgar, Devon-Aire and various other Colisea (right?) and arenae (right?) . Boy do we know how to partee.
Read more