Do you mean that, i.e. that Panny's have proportional control? If you'd said only Panny's have cycling control, I'd have agreed with you. We have an old Panny, at least 25 years old, maybe even 30, and I'm sure it pulses, as milk about to boil over rises then falls back, then rises again and so on, and you can hear a change in the sound, in time with the milk rising and falling. Because of that, I reckon that a short time of say a few seconds, on 'simmer' (it only has four settings) puts in the same amount of power as the same time on full power. Longer times give the pulsing a chance to take effect.
That could well have been the cause in this case but it would have been the first time in 30 years (not that stops it being the case etc).
In hindsight you may have been right, but I was pretty sure a genuine replacement (anything) wouldn't have been available and I wasn't sure what I could have replaced it with that would have been 'safe' etc?
People are (especially these days), I'm generally not, in fact I've save many_an_item from being dumped, either directly or via Freecycle etc.
Understood.
As it happens, whilst the microwave was taken away by our daughter, it hadn't been dumped yet so I got the chance to take it to bits tonight. ;-)
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I think it's done well to last 30 years and daughter has bought Mum a replacement as she wanted to. ;-)
Cheers, T i m
p.s. Tonight I saved a Dyson DC04 from being dumped by stripping the main beater-brush down and cleaning and re-lubing the bearings. It probably needs a pair of belts as they have never been changed but it seems to be going ok for now.
I've often wondered... if microwave cookers have a removable magnetron that has a highly directional output, could you break an egg on to a plate and then cook it by waving the beam over the egg?
Not intending to try it but in theory, could you do that without frying your own gonads (and other bits)?
any plastic that doesn't heat up in a microwave, or you can buy mica-like sheet. Or simply nothing, it will then work ok for years until gunk buildup causes a repeat show.
Corr! That's a very impressive hole in the inner casing in your picture.
We had an incident here in which my dotty mum put a large metal saucepan in our 1980s Panasonic microwave and ran it on full power for several minutes!
The saucepan handle got badly charred and the microwave gave off a terrible smell like a burnt out old telly for months after whenever it was used
Most amazing of all, the microwave continued to work perfectly.
I bet the insulation on the wiring inside the microwave may not have been entirely intact after this but my dotty mum doesn't worry about trivial details like that and carried on using it.
At least some recent Panasonics have proportional control where you reduce the power to a continuous low level without pulsing. They do it with an inverter design reducing the magnetron output power I understand. Our Belling uses different values of series capacitance to limit the current into the magnetron. We've had one capacitor failure in
40 years, plus a few bulbs. I can't comment on older Panasonic units using pulse control. Maybe Apple/Dyson can look at the problem and set the new(old) performance standards. I hate to think how many modern microwave ovens I've had food explode in. People even sell food covers for microwaves because of this control problem. On LOW, the Belling never needs a food cover and is perfect for butter softening!
In the army 4Mk7 radar the magnetron was stowed during transportation. It just so happened that the wave guide, apart from leaking like a sieve, also just fitted a Gingsters meat pie. On deployment you could slide the meat pie into the wave guide and swing the magnetron back into position. When the radar was fired up a few seconds would ensure a very hot pie. Unfortunately, sometimes someone else turned the radar on without knowing the pie was in position and after more than a few seconds the whole site was covered in a fine smoke smelling strongly of recently incinerated meat pie.
To make a portable egg cooker all you would need to add to the magnetron is a horn to match the magnetron impedance to free air.
Hmmmm. Now, if it were mine I and in hindsight I might have tried that. However, we already have a working microwave ...
We popped round to Mums tonight and I recovered the rogue plastic tub that *may* have been party to the problem. Now I have had a proper chance to de-brief Mum on what happened she said that she saw sparks and then smelled the burning and saw flames inside the thing before quickly turning it off. She then put the flames out with a wet cloth, then took it outside in case anything had caught fire in the void at the top.
It is, but you can understand why. Very few people these days have the skills (or tools even) to do anything and have more disposable income to spend on cheaper (now mostly what are considered 'disposable') items.
The worst example of this are those who actually throw away (as opposed to give away or re-cycle even) perfectly good stuff, simply because it doesn't match their new colour scheme. I really think too much importance is set on 'style' and 'fashion' forcing the weak minded to do stuff they often can't really afford, simply to keep up with the Jonses. The kids hate school uniform but then change into the 'uniform' fashion of the time?
Every house must (apparently) be empty of any signs that people actually *live* there and be whatever colour we\\ they are told it
*must* be.
But I think it's like the idea of 'sealed for life' bearings versus grease nipples. They stopped fitting grease nipples because few people bothered to use them in any case. There are people who would *rather* pay someone to fit a new bit than maintain the things they have (something I will have to hold my hand up to when said things aren't of interest to me or part of my skillset, like regularly preserving a fence and then it rots away). ;-(
Lack of the most elementary knowledge. What I regard as basic skill stuff. Everyone knows time is money, that's not the issue. Throwing out what you p aid £60 for because the fuse needs replacing is... well, brainless. So much perfectly good stuff is simply dumped, much of it because people beli eve a lot of nonsense.
Like I said then. What *you*, *I*, and many others here would consider 'rudimentary is rocket science to many.
It is for some (along with all the other tings I mentioned).
Of course, but that's only valid if you know it's a fuse. I got a Dyson cylinder cleaner off Freecycle that was 'broken'. The PO had bought it new, it had gone wrong, they paid yo have it repaired and later it went wrong again. Not wanting to spend *again*, they decided to buy a new one. Within about 5 seconds of getting it home I diagnosed a fractured mains cable where it enters the moulded plug, cut that off, fitted a new one and it's been fine ever since.
Or don't have the confidence, ability, strength, tools or time to
*try* to fix it themselves.
Like the DC04 I saved from the skip tonight. It was pretty well used and the symptoms were that the brush wasn't rotating. It rotated when you turned it by hand so it was presumed it wasn't seized.
I took the brush out (hard whilst the belt was in place) and span the brush on it's bearing and could now fee that the bearings were tight. How would anyone not familiar with such thinks know what felt 'right' or not. I then pulled one end cap off, the shaft out of the brush and then felt each bearing to find one nearly seized and noted the shaft had been spinning in the bearing. How would any non engineer spot that? I then rinsed the bearings though with some WD40 and blew them out with an airline. I then put a drop of engine oil on each and worked it in (for now).
Now, you can buy a new brush with new bearings and belts for about 7 quid on eBay and the parts individually for much more. The bets are worn, the brush is worn, the shaft is worn and the bearings are worn. So, you don't need to have the skills to understand how it goes together or how to (try to) fix it, but you do have to know that you can get the brush out with the belt on, as long as you can pull it hard enough (or have the right tool of course).
Now, if you want to actually change both belts you have to get the clutch out and strip that down (maybe another 10 parts) and put it all back together again in the right order. Or you can buy a complete new clutch with belts fitted for about 15 quid. However, that is only any use if you have a long T15 driver and can get the knob off the selector ... etc etc.
How many people would spend say £120 on a charger to help a friend test a 36V Lithium battery pack ... or spend similar on a car coolant pressure test kit that they may only use once (even if it would cost
60 quid to get done in the garage)?
You can still have all the gear but no idea (when or how to use it).
The number of times I've been with other people and asked to borrow their multimeter to faultfind some equipment they have asked me to look at, only to be told they don't have one? How can you own a house, car or any electrical equipment and not own a multimeter! Just the same as they can own a car and not own a foot pump, battery charger, some jump leads or even the workshop manual I guess? ;-(
Its worse. Given the cost of overheads in running a repair shop, you probably want to charge around £60 an hour to fix stuff.
By the time you have talked to the customer, pulled the thing apart, identified the blown part, which may or may not be obtainable, and may be anything from pence top £150. and phoned the customer back 'I've fixed it: That will be £120' and they say 'f*ck that, I'll get a new one
- they're on sale at £90....and you are left with a repaired item you cant sell for more than £30...
I have walked into my favourite PVC builder and walked out with a perfectly good computer intact, and a monitor, simply because 'its a customer trade in, and we cant sell it because its worthless'
Two RAM chips and an hour later and Linux Mint is flying in a machine that last ran a virus raddled Windows XP.
Two hours of my time....would anyone pay me £120 for it? Nah.
It does say on most of the instructions that the machines can be damaged after such events but that may be down to how well designed they are ... if there is anything such as overload protection built in etc?
The chances are any wiring would be ok as it's generally in the void between the inner and outer casings.
Because Mums old microwave hadn't actually been dumped I managed to strip it down last night (well, pull the key components for the S&S's) and now I'm thinking of putting it back together, just to see if it still works. The only thing (apart from being able to correctly re-connect the wiring) was the magnetron (the bit that generates the microwaves) fell off the table and on to the concrete and I'm guessing that's not the ideal way to treat such things?
We were taking Mum though her new Russell Hobbs pushbutton microwave last night and I'm really not sure that it's going to be as 'easy' to use as her old two knob jobby for her needs. Yes you can do two stage cooking (defrost then cook) and set a timer to start it cooking at a specific time but it seems to rely quite a bit on knowing the weights of things and that means she's also got to have the scales handy.
Will she remember that 10% is the same as the 'Defrost' position on her old one. Will she remember / work out how to set it to 10%?
We bought this model for her because we got it at a good price, it seemed as large as her old one and had good reviews re it's cooking (heating) ability. In trying to research the microwave it reminded me why we still have our 30+ year old one and our old conventionally vented tumble dryer and why buying such things can be like buying laptops or shoes for someone else.
But she can't complain (not that she has or is likely to), we did offer to take her round and look at a range so she could choose for herself but she didn't want to, "I'll leave it up to you ...". ;-(
The problem is you can't really try these things in the shops.
It really annoys me to see perfectly good* furniture dumped outside when an hour the rain renders it useless, when the council and a local charity do free furniture uplift for resale in the recycling centre.
My neighbours don't even own a screwdriver and had no idea what to do with an electric cooker that didn't have a plug on it. They do drink quite a lot of buckfast though, and enjoy munchy boxes.
Owain
Well, it would appeal to people who like interior design by Poundstretcher
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