should DIY be a green cause

In the interests of the conservation of materials and energy, should not DIY, especially the repair of goods, be a priority for the environmental movement?

Bill

Reply to
Bill Wright
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It must present an interesting conflict for many a green... on the one hand it is a very good fit with the political ideology, and yet on the other the knowledge requirements and attention to detail required are likely to be counter to the (lack of) thought process that makes much green policy seem even plausible in the first place.

Reply to
John Rumm

DIY often results in a great deal of unused product which a professional would use on another job, as well as often entailing multiple visits to B&Q.

It also wastes plasters and bandages.

Cheers

Reply to
Syd Rumpo

I do, but it needs working at.

One of the worst excesses of DIY has to be single household tool proliferation. So, this sort of thing:

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DIY on its own as it stands probably wastes more than it saves.

Also, skill sharing. IMHO DIY gets bodged because the DIYer doesn't have the time/experience to get up to speed. It often takes me three or four times to get things even remotely right, whereas some things seem more natural. So share skills:

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(don't know anything about them, but does seem to organise the principle of skill sharing)

And then there's the issue of putting trades people out of work.

Reply to
RJH

Well there is already a subset of them who are keen to promote the "sharing economy" for tools - something I find hard to argue with if it's true the average electric drill is used for less than 20 minutes in its life[1]. Streetclub, Streetbank etc

[1] I suspect that should be "the median total use is less than 20 minutes" given a long tail of well-used drills will increase the mean, even if trade use is excluded, but can't find the source of the claim.
Reply to
Robin

Yes.

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Reply to
Adrian Caspersz

someone probably interviewed their fellow journalists, one of whom owned one but gave up after one use.

NT

Reply to
tabbypurr

WTF is a 'green cause'

Mould?

Reply to
The Natural Philosopher

If you keep what is left over after DIY, perhaps fewer visits to B&Q? But then a seasoned DIYer wouldn't go near B&Q anyway.

Reply to
Dave Plowman (News)

You're a right barrel of laughs.

Cheers

Reply to
Syd Rumpo

Very true with some.

Have a pal who is into 'green' Replaced his Mini which he'd bought new and had done few miles (9,000 in 3 years) with an electric Smart car. Claiming it will save money as well as the planet. It's one of these where you rent the battery. The total cost per mile of his motoring must be horrendous. But tries to wind me up about my gas guzzling ancient Rover. ;-)

Reply to
Dave Plowman (News)

Yes. It is. There are many environmental groups running "Repair Cafes" and similar.

Of course, from the point of view of the environment, there is no particular advantage to ripping out that three year old kitchen yourself as opposed to paying a builder to do it for you.

Reply to
Martin Bonner

Can't speak for any other Green, but I find no conflict.

Reply to
Martin Bonner

if it take you 4 times longer I can only assume you do it for fun. ;-)

So why don't people get pros in... the answer is usually cost.

Really , just seemed like an expensive place to shop.

£70 for an ipad case ! that's even more than Aple charge !

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Not just trades peolpe but what of all those economic migrants looking for work or ayslum seekers who don't want benifits but want to work. :-)

Reply to
whisky-dave

Huh! One of our local comedians wanted to borrow a chain saw to remove a tree stump.

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Reply to
Tim Lamb

Just an ideologically left-wing way of putting the toolhire companies out of business.

Bill

Reply to
Bill Wright

A B & D rep once told me that the DIY drills are expected to run for 8 hours.

Bill

Reply to
Bill Wright

More the aggravation.

A good pro is like gold.

Most (9/10ths when I was looking to have my roof retiled) either don't turn up, charge silly money, cancel at the last minute or just talk bullshit and look crap.

Reply to
Tim Watts

As far as repairing goods is concerned, the whole point of mass production certainly since the Industrial Revolutiin is to manufacture and assemble all goods as far as possible by machine with as little labour input as possible. As its this that makes goods so cheap in the first place.

Given economies of scale and labour costs its usually far more economic to manufacture a new item from scratch than it is to train up technicians to disassemble, diagnose and repair faults, maintain an inventory of spares etc.Especially when new models might be introduced on an annual basis.

In larger items such as cars these are often broken down into sub-assemblies, headlights etc which need to be replaced entirely and are imposible to repair.

Although this may be wastful of material, overall the cost saving in labour is probably far greater than any labour costs incurred in sourcing new material. For the present at least

This really is old stuff; going all the way back to Vance Packard and the "Waste Makers" in the 50's/60's.

So which particular knowledge requirements and attention to detail are you suggesting might reasonable be subsituted for say an injection moulding machine or a numerically controlled lathe ?

michael adams

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Reply to
michael adams

Well a good pro is something else.

So what did you do. I had to have pros in as I don't own scaffolding and I doubt I could put it up by myself, otherwise the scaffolding company wouldn;t be employing 3 people to do it but would just employ one person wouldn't they ?

Reply to
whisky-dave

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