Posted By Paul
For those of you who try to do your own repairs around the house, here are some great web pages I found:
AppliancePartsPros.com
RepairClinic.com
Both pages let you search for and purchase parts for various appliances. I was trying to find replacement wheels for my dishwasher rack and was able to find and purchase them no problem.
An added bonus is that both pages have pictures where the part is sitting on a 1 inch grid background so you can take a good look at it and make sure it's the right part.
Repair clinic even has a cool feature where you can search based on just the physical description of the part. They have a variety of search criteria that aren't based on knowing a part number, name or brand. For example you can do a search where you essentially say:
"I want to replace a part from a microwave that is between 2 and 3 inches long and is plastic and a single color."
I did the above search when I wanted to replace the part on my microwave that hooks into the motor and makes the turntable turn. Thanks to the page I found out that it's called a "turntable drive coupler", but I never would have guessed that. The above search gave me the part I needed and thanks to the photo I was able to confirm that it was the right size and it was exactly what I needed. It's great to have a page where you can find and order a part without even knowing what it's called or what it does.
I've used both pages and each time I got the correct part to replace the one that had broken.
A great resource when those mysterious but important parts on your appliances break and need to be replaced.
Showing posts with label house repairs. Show all posts
Showing posts with label house repairs. Show all posts
Saturday, April 25, 2009
Monday, September 15, 2008
Article: Paying More When You Try To Save
Posted By Paul
I thought this article was interesting. It's a series of stories where the original intention was to save money on a house project, and then end result was that it ended up costing far more than planned.
It reminded me of when I was a kid and my Dad would have me be his assistant when he did repairs on the car. Many time what was supposed to be an afternoon project would quickly balloon in complexity and price.
My favorite is when what was supposed to be a one day job involved the purchasing of several new tools, and several new parts (because by doing the work he accidentally broke other things) over several days, and the project ended with my Dad paying to get the partially dismantled car towed to a mechanic so that the work could be completed properly.
Of course the annoying part is that with many of these projects you only know if you saved money in hindsight, but I thought it was a good point to keep in mind that sometimes trying too hard to save money can end up costing you.
Enjoy!
Mistakes We've Made, So You Won't Have To
I thought this article was interesting. It's a series of stories where the original intention was to save money on a house project, and then end result was that it ended up costing far more than planned.
It reminded me of when I was a kid and my Dad would have me be his assistant when he did repairs on the car. Many time what was supposed to be an afternoon project would quickly balloon in complexity and price.
My favorite is when what was supposed to be a one day job involved the purchasing of several new tools, and several new parts (because by doing the work he accidentally broke other things) over several days, and the project ended with my Dad paying to get the partially dismantled car towed to a mechanic so that the work could be completed properly.
Of course the annoying part is that with many of these projects you only know if you saved money in hindsight, but I thought it was a good point to keep in mind that sometimes trying too hard to save money can end up costing you.
Enjoy!
Mistakes We've Made, So You Won't Have To
Tuesday, February 19, 2008
Fixed my freezer!
Posted By Paul
I wanted to follow up on my earlier article:
Fix it yourself or call a repairman.
And share another small victory in my never ending war of home-repair.
Recently I noticed a small puddle of water in front of the freezer side of my fridge (we have one of those side-by-side fridge/freezers). At first I thought it was just an old spill so I wiped it up and didn't think much of it, and then I saw it again a couple days later.
A little more investigation and I saw that on the bottom of the freezer section was a nice sheet of ice that had accumulated. My thought was that this sheet of ice was growing, gradually creeping up to the door seam, melting and that this was what was causing the puddle. I removed the sheet of ice, and started watching it closely. Sure enough the ice sheet slowly returned, growing gradually until the puddle of water had returned within about 5 days.
So then it became a question of where was the ice sheet coming from? My first thought was that maybe there was a water leak in the ice maker and this was dripping water that eventually accumulated at the bottom of the freezer and froze. I checked over the ice maker but it all looked fine. Then I thought that maybe during the defrost cycle of the freezer that the ice in the ice maker was melting and providing the water. To test this I emptied out the ice drawer and shut off the ice maker (ice isn't really in demand much in Portland in February anyway). The ice sheet continued to grow so I knew that wasn't it.
I talked to my father-in-law and he said that he was pretty sure what it was. In the freezer there is a drain that is designed to catch the water that drips off during a defrost cycle. The water drains to a pan where it evaporates. He said that if that drain gets clogged then the water can't drain and it will start to accumulate at the lowest point in the freezer.
So I emptied the freezer and removed the access panel, and sure enough there was a drain that was covered with ice. I quick zap with my wife's hair dryer got rid of the ice, but the drain still wasn't draining properly. I tried threading a small piece of wire down there in case there was a clog, but didn't have much luck. I then got a pitcher, filled it with hot water from my tap, and started slowly pouring it into the drain. Since the drain was clogged most of the water overflowed onto the bottom surface of the freezer and onto the floor (luckily I had many towels ready), but by slowly pouring little by little the drain started to drain more quickly. Eventually it drained at a pace that seemed normal. Maybe there was just a little gunk or some residue ice that needed to be washed away.
After flushing out the drain I put the access panel back in place and I have been watching the freezer closely. So far no return of the ice sheet or the freezer puddle.
Another call to the repairman avoided!
I wanted to follow up on my earlier article:
Fix it yourself or call a repairman.
And share another small victory in my never ending war of home-repair.
Recently I noticed a small puddle of water in front of the freezer side of my fridge (we have one of those side-by-side fridge/freezers). At first I thought it was just an old spill so I wiped it up and didn't think much of it, and then I saw it again a couple days later.
A little more investigation and I saw that on the bottom of the freezer section was a nice sheet of ice that had accumulated. My thought was that this sheet of ice was growing, gradually creeping up to the door seam, melting and that this was what was causing the puddle. I removed the sheet of ice, and started watching it closely. Sure enough the ice sheet slowly returned, growing gradually until the puddle of water had returned within about 5 days.
So then it became a question of where was the ice sheet coming from? My first thought was that maybe there was a water leak in the ice maker and this was dripping water that eventually accumulated at the bottom of the freezer and froze. I checked over the ice maker but it all looked fine. Then I thought that maybe during the defrost cycle of the freezer that the ice in the ice maker was melting and providing the water. To test this I emptied out the ice drawer and shut off the ice maker (ice isn't really in demand much in Portland in February anyway). The ice sheet continued to grow so I knew that wasn't it.
I talked to my father-in-law and he said that he was pretty sure what it was. In the freezer there is a drain that is designed to catch the water that drips off during a defrost cycle. The water drains to a pan where it evaporates. He said that if that drain gets clogged then the water can't drain and it will start to accumulate at the lowest point in the freezer.
So I emptied the freezer and removed the access panel, and sure enough there was a drain that was covered with ice. I quick zap with my wife's hair dryer got rid of the ice, but the drain still wasn't draining properly. I tried threading a small piece of wire down there in case there was a clog, but didn't have much luck. I then got a pitcher, filled it with hot water from my tap, and started slowly pouring it into the drain. Since the drain was clogged most of the water overflowed onto the bottom surface of the freezer and onto the floor (luckily I had many towels ready), but by slowly pouring little by little the drain started to drain more quickly. Eventually it drained at a pace that seemed normal. Maybe there was just a little gunk or some residue ice that needed to be washed away.
After flushing out the drain I put the access panel back in place and I have been watching the freezer closely. So far no return of the ice sheet or the freezer puddle.
Another call to the repairman avoided!
Tuesday, November 27, 2007
Fix It Yourself Or Call A Repairman?
Posted By Paul
However, a little while ago I decided that I would make a specific effort to handle more repairs around the house myself. Partially as a way to hopefully save money, but also as a way to learn more about fixing things in general.
The first thing I discovered is that it's really hard to be handy around the house without at least a basic set of tools. I spent some time accumulating tools (I would buy them, or ask for them as gifts when people wanted to know what to get me), and before long I had a basic but versatile set of tools (which I'll list here):
1) A ratchet set.
2) A set of wrenches.3) A hammer.
4) A rubber mallet.5) Some vice-grips of varying sizes.
6) An adjustable pipe wrench.7) A set of screwdrivers.
Without at least a basic set of tools you have very little chance of successfully fixing something around the house.
So whenever something broke around the house I went with the philosophy that if I try to fix it myself then as long as I don't make it worse I can always call a repairman later.
At one point our refrigerator wasn't defrosting properly. I contemplated trying to fix it myself but I quickly discovered that a modern refrigerator is a pretty complicated device so I ended up calling a repair man. In this case the problem ended up being a bad circuit board (amazing that refrigerators have circuit boards now) that the repairman took care of in a few minutes. In this case calling the repairman was the right call since it would have been nearly impossible for me to diagnose that the circuit board was the problem.
The next thing to go was our dryer. The tumbler spun but it never heated up. I decided to take a shot at this and this wasn't too bad. Thanks to the internet I found instructions for gaining access to the inner workings of my dryer (be sure to search for your specific dryer, I assumed you accessed everything from the back but many dryers are best accessed from the front or sometimes even from inside the drum). Once the dryer was open it became pretty clear what was wrong. It was simple to spot the heating coil and when I noticed that it wasn't warming up when I ran the dryer I removed it and found that there was a gap in the coil wire. I found an appliance parts and repair store that was able to order a replacement coil, I put it in place, and the dryer was as good as new.
The next thing to go was our clothes washer (you're probably starting to think that all of our appliances are junk but these incidents took place over several years). It seemed like it wouldn't drain properly and the display gave an obscure error code. A quick search of the internet suggested that the drain pump was either clogged or broken. When I opened the washing machine up I was able to spot the drain pump pretty easily. I noticed that the motor shaft looked stripped so I decided to remove the motor/pump and order a new one. Once again the appliance store was able to order me a part. This time it was a bit more of a gamble since I wasn't 100% sure that this was the problem, but when I got the new motor/pump I noticed that the new part was MUCH better designed and more durable than the one that was in there originally (which gave me hope that in fact this WAS the problem part and also annoyed me a little to think that they didn't design the more durable part in the first place). It only took about 10 minutes to install the new part, and the washer was good as new.
I know practically nothing about appliances but I am amazed at how much you can accomplish with a few basic rules:
1) Search on the internet for the problem and see if anyone else has run into it and posted a solution.
2) Take the thing apart and look for a part that is obviously broken and replace it.
3) When you take the thing apart do so CAREFULLY so that if you do need to call a repairman you haven't broken anything and made the problem worse.
The more you start trying to fix things around your house the easier it becomes to dig in their and poke around, and thanks to the internet you have a whole world of expertise at your fingertips.
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