Did we somehow ruin the next generation?

[R D S]

I'm provoked to post this after the thread about whether people DIY or not anymore. I've been wondering for some time, in particular WRT my own kids (both men now in their 20s) if their lives have been so much easier that necessity has *not* bred any variant of invention. They are so needy and incapable that I had occasionally wondered if they were on some spectrum or other but I speak to other people my age and it sounds par.

I've a tome of anecdotes but i'll stick to a couple.

We had* 2 bagless vacuum cleaners at work (me, son, apprentice), one upstairs, one down. I noted one day that both were downstairs, so I asked why. The response was that one of them wasn't sucking. Later I noted that neither had been used in a while, the place was untidy, apparently now neither were sucking. So I went off one one about how i'm not the ####ing caretaker, vacuum cleaners aren't ####ing rocket science and demanded they check for blockages and if necessary clean the filters. Neither knew that vacuum cleaners had filters (why would they) so on my instruction the apprentice washed the filters and put them back in. He put them in WET and proceeded to use it.

*One has since died, hardly surprising.

Recently, a machine at work is leaking polish on the floor. I'm ignoring the problem to see what the son will do about it. Then I prompt.. "why is it leaking", "where is it leaking from" etc. and finally have to intervene when the best he can come up is to mop up the leakage from the floor with a face like an injured puppy. (It's about 30 quid per gallon)

This isn't merely a rant, i'm genuinely fearful for the future.

[newshound]

Mine are all cyclists (even the girl) and that keeps them practical.

[simon mitchelmore]

You are not alone and I, too, am worried for our future.

Its wider than the Millennials (although they are worst); in our road I appear to be the only one who lifts a car bonnet and definitely the only one who uses car ramps. I get looks of disbelief as dog walkers walk past and I'm under my car.

A friend, a GasSafe engineer, summed it up nicely saying in the past he'd explain what he'd done to fix their central heating but he doesn't bother now because many don't know what a boiler is, or want to know, frightening really.

Teachers should replace 'Meja' studies with Meccano and how to bodge electrical appliances with insulating tape.

[R D S]

There's something of a catchphrase in our place, "Hey Dad, good if [broken appliance/machine] was working wouldn't it?"

"Fix it then", I'll suggest, to be told, "I don't know how", like *I* was somehow born with all the answers. I feel like I was a better influence as they were growing up but people of that age are all just sort of broken.

[T i m]

<snip> 63 here with a 39 year old daughter so not sure if we are in the same category.

When daughter was young I would encourage her to 'help' in whatever I was doing and if she wanted to, learn how to do it herself. The first example of that was her soldering up a Vellerman LED xmas tree project when she was about 6. ;-)

'We' made her dolls house after that (daughter was happy using the vibro saw) and she had a go in the workshop on the pillar drill helping me make a bench or welding and angle grinding etc.

Oversize gloves, goggles and other PPE didn't make it any easier for her but she generally did well (she joined some scraps together with my MIG welder and put her initial on the front better than I could have!).

When an elderly family friend needed some decorating doing, daughter and I did it and from that, daughter recently decorate her own flat (and very nicely I'm pleased to say. Good prep, good coverage, neat cutting in / masking).

She also does most of the straightforward jobs on her own vehicles, assuming you consider changing the alternator overrun clutch on her Transit Connect or the rear springs on her Corsa straightforward. ;-)

She also serviced her Suzuki 600 Bandit and stripped the carbs off and down to clean them.

Now to be fair, she does most of that under (my) supervision because

1) she still learning and 2) mistakes can be expensive but the point is that she does them.

That said, she also mentioned the other day that the Dyson she bought us, borrowed and hasn't given back, wasn't working properly the other (pulsing intermittently) and TBF she had cleaned the canister, removed the roller and de-haired that, but 1) (as you say) didn't know there was a washable filter hidden in the man body and then 2) didn't think to look between the main intake and the canister to see if there was still stuff blocking the airways.

I guess part of the issue is that 1) I am still about and so would she have tried harder if 2) it was her own stuff (not wanting to risk breaking something that wasn't hers).

She used to maintain her own chainsaws but was taught that at Arb College.

So I think it's a mix of need, opportunity (to learn / be taught / be mentored), things being much cheaper and so more disposable than they were (cost / disposable income) and things being more reliable but less repairable than they once were (but I thought there was talk of that changing)?

The good thing is that her first thought is 'can it be fixed' (by her then me / us), not just throwing it away and just buying a new one.

Cheers, T i m

p.s. She was also sponsored by an RC Model Car magazine when she was racing 12th scale RC saloon cars. Whilst she did initially build her cars, 'Dad' did most of the pit work / tuning. But then I seemed to be doing that for half the younger drivers that turned up there ... just dumped off by their parents and with little in the way of spares or tools. ;-(

The guys that ran the club used to point them towards me ... 'If you take these spares you have just bought over to that man over there and ask him nicely, he may fit them for you ...!' (and of course I did). ;-)

[Adrian Caspersz]

Blame the advertising industry. Capitalism at its best.

Breed more helpless children so that they can become just consumers, to line the pockets of the decreasing few.

Promote sex, money & Rock 'n' roll. Damn everything else :(

[charles]

my 4 year old grandson used to say "Grandpa will mend it". He doesn't need to any more since he now has a step-dad who it more than capable.

[Tim Streater]

Do they have any coherent reaction when you berate them for being useless? Do they have any natural curiosity? Can they do jigsaw puzzles? Do they ever wonder how things work?

[Tim Streater]

I'd say cars are too complex to do much of that any more. I used to tinker with my Mini 50 years ago and mostly made a mess of it, so I gave up. Can you even buy workshop manuals for today's cars? Don't you need a computer to check everything? The garage will have one but would the right kit be available to an end-user?

Certainly Meccano, but in my case it was more my brother (then in the Navy) bringing back some surplus kit like soldering iron and solder, relays, small lead-acid accumulators, etc. Then I found our old 3-valve Ministry of Supply wartime radio in the loft and, by soldering a grid wire back on, and replacing the broken selenium (?) diode with an OA81, managed to get that working again, enough to listen to Radio Luxembourg anyway.

[Pamela]

[Dave Plowman (News)]

It suits many to think they need a computer to work on a car these days. So are happy to pay a garage to fit new brakes etc that if anything is easier than years ago.

[harry]

And the borrowing.

[Tim Streater]

As a matter of interest, what was the outcome there? Lucky not to buckle the wheel doing that.

I must have been shown how to do it, but I certainly fixed my own - including the ones caused by my step-mother sticking a pin in the tire.

[John_j]

Its actually due to the much higher standard of living and the cost of appliances being much lower in real terms.

With the much lower cost of appliances, yep.

Not even possible to do that and it isnt breeding its what their parents do bringing up wise.

It isnt in fact a decreasing few either. Now that almost everyone has their pensions invested in the operations that are selling the stuff to consumers, its all but those with no jobs now.

[ARW]

If you say anything does she defend them?

[John_j]

You'd be wrong. Its actually much easier now when the OBD2 tells you which sensor has failed and the maintenance manual tells you how to change it.

I used to

Yep, and get them for free too.

Don't you

Nope, just a dirt cheap OBD2 thing now.

The garage will have one but

Yep, for peanuts too.

[tabbypurr]

not a bit

yes

OBDII readers are cheap

Cars have gotten a lot faster to assemble, making them cheaper to buy & quicker to service/repair in many respects - not all. Even with engine stuff when it needs OBDII reading, having an almost diagnosis as easy as plugging something in really helps.

NT

[tabbypurr]

It's scary. Why's it happening? I think there are 2 main reasons.

1. Delusions of celebrityhood are expected of kids today. Getting your hands even vaguely dirty doing something practical is much looked down on. That belief is too often ingrained even in the minority of kids that do practical things. My response to that is 'who do you think has a better life, those that act to solve their problems or those that don't?'
2. We learnt a lot of stuff because we didn't have the money to just buy one that works. That's mostly no longer the case.

NT

[Brian Gaff (Sofa 2)]

Yes me too, I'd have thought in this age the answer was as close as youtube, indeed there is a story in the news today about a person who built his own house from videos on that site

One thing I did find however is that all those who went to University are considerably worse at thinking problems out logically than we were. I never went, it was not the thing in my day. However I did not turn out bad, I can and did hang doors clean vacuums, build cabinets, make electronic circuits an write computer code. It is not rocket science, what it is is thinking things through and checking things, its making mistakes and learning from those mistakes, not simply throwing stuff in the bin if it won't work. I mean surely it soul d be obvious that water and electricity do not sit well together? Likewise leaks have a source, and normally there is a way to find it. To me its common sense, but even in the 80s when I was working they sent me the graduates to learn a bit of logical thinking and what we call common sense. For example a guy with a degree in electronics could not logically divide the circuit up and see what each bit did and deduce where to start looking for the problem and not to just change bits till it worked when half the stuff was ok in the first place. I'm also pretty sure that the current academic loads on nurse training is putting of those who traditionally wanted to be a nurse, its too academic and not enough hands on. Sorry for the rant. Brian

[Brian Gaff (Sofa 2)]

Oh here you should see the queue when Dr Bike sessions visit the town centre, What are the problems? Brakes, chain comes off etc. Blimey. Brian