primitives tell funny repair stories

[franksolich]

http://www.democraticunderground.com/1018357648

Oh my.

It's hard to find campfires not dealing with Massa Barry's tampering with the primitives' social security checks; one hopes the primitives hurry up and get over their impotent indignation, and go back to discussing more important issues, like this one.

Archae (25,860 posts)    Sat Apr 6, 2013, 06:04 PM

Funny repair stories?

My Dad was a TV repairman in his first career, and did it on the side for extra money after changing careers.
 
Once, I was in the basement with him, I was watching a show while my Dad was working on the TV.

The TV started making a "pop" sound.

The picture tube (this was back in the 1970's, when tube TV's were still fairly common,) blew up.
 
Scared the patooties out of us both, but we weren't hurt.

Took me days to clean up all the glass, the TV was ruined.

My Mom still remembers coming down into the basement after hearing the bang, glass all over, my Dad and I sitting on the cement looking like we both had seen a ghost.

jmowreader (23,678 posts)   Sat Apr 6, 2013, 06:27 PM

1. How to fix a Model 40 Teletype printer

after which a photograph of a 1960s-era computer

This is a Mod 40. The printer is on the left.

We had this one Mod 40 in Berlin that would break about once every three months. This is very unusual because Mod 40s NEVER break. Put enough machine oil on the ****ers and they run forever. Except for this one.
 
There was a female mech named Brenda among our number who developed The Only Way To Fix This Machine. She would come upstairs with her little cart, put the printer on it, haul it to Electronics Maintenance Division, go back where no one could see her perform her magic, and bring the printer back in fine working shape.
 
Turns out Brenda's magic involved taking the printer to the loading dock which was the only concrete floor in the place, holding the printer out at waist height and dropping it. It was going to either fix it or break it for good, and it always fixed it.
 
(When we decommissioned the Mod 40s, the mechanics decided to use sledgehammers to get rid of them. It took hours to beat one machine into submission and we had thirty of them. The mechs had real big smiles for about a week afterward.)

Archae (25,860 posts)   Sat Apr 6, 2013, 06:33 PM

2. "Impact adjustments!"

[Carl]

I grew up in the era of picture tubes and as I recall the only danger of one "blowing up" was if they were impacted in some way.
When one burned out it was just that,they quit working,sometimes totally and sometimes just a line across the screen.

[marv]

That explains why Archae's dad had a second career.......

BTW, we still have two tube TVs....and three flat screens. They all work.

[GOBUCKS]

It was pretty rare for a TV to last long enough to need a new picture tube.

The damn things had two or three dozen vacuum tubes, which were constantly burning out.

The coup de grace was usually when the tuner went bad, and a newer, bigger screen model was in the stores.

We have it good now.

You have to think up an excuse to get rid of a TV, and they're cheap - it wasn't unusual to pay a month's salary for those old black-and-white sets.

[ChuckJ]

It was pretty rare for a TV to last long enough to need a new picture tube.

The damn things had two or three dozen vacuum tubes, which were constantly burning out.

The coup de grace was usually when the tuner went bad, and a newer, bigger screen model was in the stores.

We have it good now.

You have to think up an excuse to get rid of a TV, and they're cheap - it wasn't unusual to pay a month's salary for those old black-and-white sets.

I can still remember when we got our first color TV. It was 19". Seemed huge to me. Before that we had about 14" black and white.

[RobJohnson]

I can still remember when we got our first color TV. It was 19". Seemed huge to me. Before that we had about 14" black and white.

I remember when my parents had to pay $499 for a 19" RCA color TV. No remote, or features. Buying a TV was a huge deal and a great expense.

[BlueStateSaint]

That explains why Archae's dad had a second career.......

BTW, we still have two tube TVs....and three flat screens. They all work.

We have one and one--both are in operation as I type this; The Heiress watching Dora on the flat-screen, and I'm checking in on Fox & Friends.

[ChuckJ]

The first color TV we got was, I believe, a Sylvania. It seemed to last forever. For the last years of its life it would cut off by itself every so often and you'd have to press a reset button to turn it back on.

In my mid to late teens someone who my dad knew opened a Curtis Mathis dealership, and he talked my dad into buying a new TV.  We were big time then. We had two TVs. My mom wasn't happy because in her mind there was no way in hell anyone needed more than one TV.

Of course back then there really wasn't too much to watch on TV. We only got three channels. Four if you count PBS. There was one more we could get if the weather was right, but it was very snowy. I don't think any of them broadcasted 24 hours a day.

I finally paid to have cable TV installed when I was 19. We went from three channels to about twenty. I think their cable is still listed in my name.

[Conservative Libertarian]

I suspect that the DUmmy's TV repairman father either hooked up something wrong or, by some chance, the High Voltage transformer went haywire.

We got out first color TV in 1972. It was a used 25 in. console model. Befor that, we had a 19 in. BW portable--meaning that it was on a wheeled stand.

I now have 1 plasma and 2 LCD screen TVs and three that have a picture tube. In fact, I'm considering giving away one ot two of the older TVs. I have a 19in. TV that I bought 22 years ago that is still good.

I may have to get rid of the Plasma TV if Samsung doesn't provide me with extra filtering to counter their FCC violation of putting out broadband noise that wipes out my ability to receive on my licensed ham radio bands.