Hey Guest!
Hey - did you know if you click on the title of a thread it will take you to the first unread post since you last visited that thread?
but were afraid to ask: 
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smilie in place of the real @
Pretty Please - add it to our Events forum(s) and add to the calendar! >> 
angelfj1
Yoda
Offline
These stories are true. They're from another forum but I thought they were interesting enough to share.
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No.1 "I’m an industrial designer by education, as well as a mechanical engineer by experience, so I think I have a pretty relevant viewpoint (and experience base) about the design and engineering of consumer products-the good and the bad.
I own a Dack and Blecker CSxxx cordless electric leaf blower. It’s orange, tubular, blows air, plugs in to recharge, no problem. I’ve owned it for around two years. Then, one day I turn it on, and it suddenly vibrates like a blender with a brick in it. I look into the air intake, and note that the plastic impeller has blown chunks of itself into the air intake. No real surprise-it’s plastic, it should be pretty cheap to buy another one and install it like most other blowers.
Well, no-the real surprise comes when I try to order a replacement impeller. Turns out that Dack and Blecker will sell me that replacement impeller, but it’s attached to an electric motor, and that’s installed inside a housing with a handle and a switch and an LED and wires and screws and a bunch of other stuff and it looks just like the great big orange thing that no longer blows air on my blower.
Turns out that you have to buy an entire new “blower assembly” for $50 to “repair” your leaf blower. It’s sort of like buying a new car to “repair” a broken cupholder. The company only stocks five “repair parts” for this model of leaf blower, and of course the $2 part that breaks is only available by ordering the $50 part. And then you have to throw away the “broken” part.
So, as a designer/design engineer, I’d like to know how they can justify this sort of sloppy engineering, unserviceable product design, and built-in obsolescence? A consumer/former customer has to throw away a perfectly good blower assembly with a working motor, electrical system, wiring, and so on, for the sake of an non-replaceable $2 impeller part?"
No. 2
"I recently picked up my 2000 Japanese Compact from the shop. I had the head gasket replaced. On the parts list was a new oil dipstick. I asked about it and they said the plastic top had separated from the metal stick. I told them that was the fourth oil dipstick that I replaced. It seems that the gasket around the top of the dipstick makes such a good seal that it causes the heat to be trapped which in turn causes the plastic pin holding the metal stick to become brittle (heat fatigue).
When I have gone to the dealer to get replacements for the previous broken dipsticks, the service person always says “That rarely happens,” to which I have replied “Then why is the part always in stock?” I have never received an answer to my question. Monkeys must not know what types of plastics to put in high temperature environments."
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<span style="font-style: italic">
No.1 "I’m an industrial designer by education, as well as a mechanical engineer by experience, so I think I have a pretty relevant viewpoint (and experience base) about the design and engineering of consumer products-the good and the bad.
I own a Dack and Blecker CSxxx cordless electric leaf blower. It’s orange, tubular, blows air, plugs in to recharge, no problem. I’ve owned it for around two years. Then, one day I turn it on, and it suddenly vibrates like a blender with a brick in it. I look into the air intake, and note that the plastic impeller has blown chunks of itself into the air intake. No real surprise-it’s plastic, it should be pretty cheap to buy another one and install it like most other blowers.
Well, no-the real surprise comes when I try to order a replacement impeller. Turns out that Dack and Blecker will sell me that replacement impeller, but it’s attached to an electric motor, and that’s installed inside a housing with a handle and a switch and an LED and wires and screws and a bunch of other stuff and it looks just like the great big orange thing that no longer blows air on my blower.
Turns out that you have to buy an entire new “blower assembly” for $50 to “repair” your leaf blower. It’s sort of like buying a new car to “repair” a broken cupholder. The company only stocks five “repair parts” for this model of leaf blower, and of course the $2 part that breaks is only available by ordering the $50 part. And then you have to throw away the “broken” part.
So, as a designer/design engineer, I’d like to know how they can justify this sort of sloppy engineering, unserviceable product design, and built-in obsolescence? A consumer/former customer has to throw away a perfectly good blower assembly with a working motor, electrical system, wiring, and so on, for the sake of an non-replaceable $2 impeller part?"
No. 2
"I recently picked up my 2000 Japanese Compact from the shop. I had the head gasket replaced. On the parts list was a new oil dipstick. I asked about it and they said the plastic top had separated from the metal stick. I told them that was the fourth oil dipstick that I replaced. It seems that the gasket around the top of the dipstick makes such a good seal that it causes the heat to be trapped which in turn causes the plastic pin holding the metal stick to become brittle (heat fatigue).
When I have gone to the dealer to get replacements for the previous broken dipsticks, the service person always says “That rarely happens,” to which I have replied “Then why is the part always in stock?” I have never received an answer to my question. Monkeys must not know what types of plastics to put in high temperature environments."
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