Should we start a military wing?

[The Medway Handyman]

Hi All

I'm sure we are all fed up with the stupid fixings & instructions supplied with consumer goods.

Those 1 1/4" x No 7, Phillips head screws, with the plastic plugs with no apparent equivalent drill diameter, designed for us to drill 2 x 7.25mm holes in crumbly masonry exactly 263.2mm apart............

Last week I installed an Indesit cooker hood. Screws included to fix the hood to the front panel had Torq heads, in two sizes, for no apparent reason. The height adjusters of course had hex heads and the mains screws were No2 Phillips.

Today I fitted 5 Wickes pine doors with 5 Wickes 'Door Kits'. Slotted brass screws included - useless. Instructions suggested drilling a 22mm hole for the latch - did it fit? Did it hell, needed 10 mins with a chisel to 'adjust' the hole. Mind you, with a 32mm door there wasn't much room for adjustment.

Isn't it time we fought back? Should we make our voice heard?

Possibly fire bomb offending manufacturers? Or castrate the knobheads who design the stuff?

OK, maybe just e-mail them? Would they take any notice? Maybe if enough of us did it?

[nightjar]

Perhaps they follow the Meccano philosophy - introduce deliberate errors into the instructions, in order to encourage the users to think for themselves.

Colin Bignell

[John White]

Not forgetting all the goods that arrive with one or two vital components missing.

It's just typical isn't it.

You've just put away the black helicopter for the night and somebody goes and posts to Usenet. :-)

I doubt it. I'm still waiting for a reply from several manufacturers I'm trying to buy stuff from.

If they can't stir themselves to take money from willing customers then there's very little chance of them listening to complaints.

John

[MJ]

I bought a ceiling fan/light from B&Q a couple of months ago. There were so many pieces to assemble I'm sure with just a little bit of thought I could have put it together as a jet engine instead. It took me most of an evening to put up, aggravated by having a mixture of crosshead and straight screws. And the crossheads refused to fit any Philips/Posi bit in my collection.

Then there was the double electric blanket I bought, with absolutely everything individually poly wrapped, including all the cable from end to end. And a set of those vacuum bags that you suck out the air from, with bloody great big non-removeable stickers warning about suffocation.

And child proof caps. We lost a perfect way of cleansing the gene pool when they were invented. Then there's my dvd player which will get thrown out of the window one day when I finally get pissed off with waiting 20 secs while it scrolls a welcome message across the display before it opens the tray to insert the disc.

MJ

[Dave Fawthrop]

|Hi All | |I'm sure we are all fed up with the stupid fixings & instructions supplied |with consumer goods.

Guerilla tactics in educating the poor DIYer how to do it properly would be better.

[Andy Hall]

It was from Italy and it was getting towards summer factory closedown?

There might be some convoluted logic in that one. If the kits are also used for fitting hardwood doors, then for some hardwoods, brass or stainless steel is appropriate (e.g. oak) because the tannins in the wood attack mild steel causing staining.

However, it's unwise to drive brass screws directly into hardwood - the technique is to drill and then drive the same sized steel screw first, remove it and replace with the brass one.

Go for direct action. Castration. With a blow torch.

[Guy King]

The message from "The Medway Handyman" contains these words:

Take them back and keep taking them back till the retailers put sufficient pressure on the manufacturers.

Emailing them can work - I bought a TacWise stapler the other day which though good had a couple of irritating design niggles. At least the took the trouble to reply to my email, though whether it'll have any effect I'll probably never know.

[Guy King]

The message from [e-mail] contains these words:

My Philips 3005 DVD player is really dumb. If you press Eject while it's still waking up from standby it crashes and stays that way till you give it a cold start. And, since the cable is hardwired not a plug you have to grovel on the floor to do it.

I ain't buying anything from Philps ever again, they only do user-fiendly.

[Christian McArdle]

You missed the implied first step in any set of instructions.

1. Throw away any wall fixings supplied with this product. Replace with decent brown plugs and 5mm x 60mm screws.

Once you do this, fitting any device or furniture to the wall will become much easier.

Christian.

[Broadback]

It even goes as far as architects designs of house. Why place a window, in an other wise blank wall to one side so that there is no room for curtains to be hung on one side? Designed by a man for a woman?

[Mary Fisher]

Why for a woman? Men hang curtains!

:-)

Mary

[Huge]

I recently bought a new radiator/towel rail for our posh new bathroom. To my enormous shock it came with decent screws & plugs! About 3" No.14s...

[meow2222]

The trouble is they couldnt care less. The only thing that counts is volume of sales. And the only way to put off future buys is reviews.

Meanwhile the way to stay sane is to not expect new goods to be to an acceptable standard, and to either see them in use first or buy used. There really are some farcical designs out there, and as a buyer the solution rests with me to satisfy myself of adequacy before purchase. And where that cant be done, just walk.

NT

[Lobster]

Or by a man without input from Building Control? The regs stipulate that (normally) a window can't be less than than 550mm from the corner of a building which leaves plenty of curtain room

David

[Guy King]

The message from Lobster contains these words:

That sure wasn't around in the late 60s when this place was built!

[The Medway Handyman]

That really hacks me off! Cross head screws that don't fit Phiollips OR Pozi. Arrrrghhhhh!!!

[The Medway Handyman]

Unfortunately I'm often in the situation of installing stuff other people have already bought.

[Guy King]

The message from "The Medway Handyman" contains these words:

What you need is a lead screwdriver. If the tip's soft enough it'll conform to just about anything.

[Joe]

Presumably Far-East 'Phillips'. Even the Japanese think they are the same as the Western type.

Japanese manufacturers don't like using a name that sounds like one of their competitors, so they refer to screwheads as either plus or minus.

[meow2222]

Yup. I have plenty of tools and fixings for modifications.

NT