Are mains plugs ...

Apparently, Fish can be cooked in one.

In message , Dan S. MacAbre writes

I put those in a jam jar nearly full of water, let it stand for while, and then shake it a lot. Repeat a few times, and it works well enough for me.

I've heard that as well. However, when you read into the process you just t hink "f*ck all that", and bung it in the oven.

Micro SD cards can be successfully, if accidentally, washed in a washing machine. As can a Swiss Army Knife.

That reminds me of people who say they clean their PC motherboard in the dishwasher.

Personally, I am not so sure I would do that but the posters seem genuine. Maybe they were just lucky.

Dishwasher powder is extremely aggressive and I'd be reluctant to put anything in there that was at all complicated or fragile. Especially if there was a chance of electrolytic corrosion. Hell, out dishwasher ate the aluminium mounts on some kitchen knives, never mind a bloody motherboard (admittedly over the course of some years!)

It destroys the rivets on some of our pan handles. I have sometimes had to replace them with stainless screws.

With the right (mild) cleanser added and not too hot - 60C should be OK - the only components that'd suffer would be those added after soldering and cleaning, especially 'open' ones, but those are rare. At work there was a linear machine that sprayed detergent solution (I guess that the pH wasn't too far off neutral, certainly not 10+) over PCBs that were on the books at £20k each in the mid-80s. Lots of rinsing, of course.

I shorten cables with zip ties, but I wouldn't cut them - a too-long cable is always more useful than a too-short cable.

Washing them properly after use works well too. :-) Or just keep a few new ones in stock, then you'll never feel the need to rescue an old one that isn't clean.

But not my favourite pocket flashlight. :-(

People sell Bakelite electrical fittings on eBay ...

I've kinda given up with brushes and rollers over the years. I just keep them "moist" with cling film during the job, then throw them away when it's finished. Especially since we have private drains which I'm not keen on flushing paints washings into.

People sell all kinds of s*it on eBay.

I'm firmly in your camp on this one. But I can't help wondering if never cutting tleads, however untidy, when there is no foreseeable possibiliy of moving the appliance is almost as obsessive as always cutting them.

I often remove cables from electrical stuff I'm scrapping, just in case I find a use for them somewhere else ...

And here we are back at the "oldie" thread!

(I have a big box of IEE "kettle leads". I have no idea where they came from!)

I've got to the stage that I actually throw away "kettle leads" from old PCs etc because I've got enough in reserve, but I still keep leads that have the rarer clover-leaf 3-pin plug or figure-of-eight 2-pin plug on the end.