6 ms·

Clearly some things are not worth repairing, and there is a cost-benefit analysis to be done but there is just a staggering amount of stuff that is easily repai

• conanbatt 9y ago
  If there really is such lost value on this, then maybe a startup could capture it, by re-purchasing things, fixing them and reselling them. But there is a reason why that is not such an easy business. Take for example startups that buy furniture when you move out and have to re-sell it: furniture is worn but usable, and it is very hard to sell at a profit after handling it. Many times we can see a market "inefficiency" or lost opportunity value,but its not easy to make it real.
  • detritus 9y ago
    Why must such things be driven by start-ups and not simply culture?
    • tzakrajs 9y ago
      I am going to guess that people secretly like when their gadget breaks because it gives them an excuse to buy something new.
      • pbhjpbhj 9y ago
        Because billions upon billions is spent on reinforcing the idea that we should throw away something that's "out of fashion" and have a new thing, because new things make you feel great. You want to feel great, right? So throw away that old thing - get a new thing. Being able to find a part to fix something makes me feel way better about myself than increasing the pile of junk being sent to be re-mined in some Chinese junk-yard.
        • tzakrajs 9y ago
          Totally agree!
    • conanbatt 9y ago
      If there is value ready to be captured, then u can just build a solution to capture it. iCracked lives off of this for example. But it doesnt apply easily to the rest of devices.
      • detritus 9y ago
        My thinking was more of instances, many, where ‘there isn't much value to be captured’. A profit-led mechanic hasn't the scope or motivation to foment much useful change.
  • rootusrootus 9y ago
    I picked up a Steelcase Leap v2 for $150 at a store that specializes in liquidating office furniture from companies going out of business. On the one hand that means there isn't much of a market there (almost 90% discount for a few years old chair is pretty steep) but ... there is a market.
  • adrianN 9y ago
    There are billions spent on marketing efforts to bias consumers against buying used goods. It's no wonder that selling refurbished items is difficult.
    • fjsolwmv 9y ago
      It's also simply expensive to pay for transportation and marketing and the absird sales tax on used goods.
  • pbhjpbhj 9y ago
    There's a lot of lost value. But profit is gained by it's disposal, if we bury a TV then there's an environmental cost but the company gets to sell a new TV and everyone up the supply chain stays in a job a little longer. Profit and value can often point in opposite directions.
    • conanbatt 9y ago
      Consumers have no point in burying the tv. But they cant easily trade a broken thing for money. You can go to craigslist and see people auctioning off perfectly fine stuff for peanutes. I.e. I bought a working printer at 25 with ink: its new value is about 100. But I had to look for it online, find the opportunity, pay in cash, go fetch it, bring it back, and I was also subject to the risk of it being broken, etc.
  • lozenge 9y ago
    There are plenty of people running phone repair businesses on eBay, but a lot of people can't even be bothered selling their broken phone to a repair shop.
• robohoe 9y ago
  Phones get thrown away over a $10 battery. Wouldn't be so bad if a replacement battery didn't cost $80+.
  • vbezhenar 9y ago
    Replacement battery cost is few bucks. But manufacturer prefers to sell new phone instead of battery and free market doesn't always work there because battery are dangerous and consumer might prefer not to risk with cheap chinese battery (even if it's the same as branded one).
    • pbhjpbhj 9y ago
      I bought a battery for my father's phone recently [Nokia Lumia], came from a German company [1] who - it appears - produce their own batteries. The only other one's were either the original batteries, which are pretty old now; or were one's being sold on Amazon from China that had very dodgy looking review profiles and claimed to be Nokia product but didn't seem kosher. Batteries are dangerous and finding trusted suppliers is hard. [1] Found the German company, VHBW, by watching a tear-down where the reviewer was impressed with the safety features in the device.
• fanzhang 9y ago
  I tend to agree with the $10 phone battery example, but not necessarily the TV or fridge example. Perhaps I'm biased because I know how to repair the first, but the latter two seems like I need to take time to learn the specialized skill of diagnosing it and repairing it. Repairability isn't a very visible or salient feature of a product. So manufacturers probably do underoptimize for repairability. They can probably do more to make the most breakable parts user accessible and have self-diagnostics. In many of the cases where repairing makes sense, the manufacturer often does make it easy. We change the oil filter on the car and don't throw the car away. Yet if a engine bricks on a 20-year-old beater, even experienced auto repairman may recommend scrapping the car over an engine replacement -- despite the engine being a visually small part of the car.
  • omikun 9y ago
    The capacitors in TVs and monitors are easy to fix. Just look for bulging caps, desolder those, then order replacements and solder the new ones back on. I’ve fixed a couple with no real knowledge other than basic soldering skills and some googling. I’ve also fixed a dryer by soldering two contacts together. It’s amazing what a little soldering know-how can accomplish.
  • adrianN 9y ago
    Calling the TV repair man when the TV broke used to be the normal thing to do. Today you just buy a new one. Replacing a capacitor is easy and cheap when you know what to do, but even when you have to call a professional it's usually much cheaper than replacing the whole thing. Still, people don't do that anymore.
    • walshemj 9y ago
      And you also called the TV repairman as messing with the HT circuits (which can carry a really nasty voltage) was not for amateurs.
• pbhjpbhj 9y ago
  >TVs get thrown away that need a few dollars worth of power supply capacitors. // I mourn every time I go to the tip, it's pathological with me, however ... the few dollar repair costs in the UK a £100 because of labour costs (and it's kinda like the "you only added one character to the code, why's it cost so much" line with programming, you pay for the experience and knowledge too). So, if there's a chance something else might go wrong then it may be cheaper to get a new one. I daydream occasionally about having a warehouse where old TVs and household goods are repaired or stripped down for parts but the costs of real estate, labour, utilities, etc., make it something one would really need to do as a charity I feel if you want to keep any significant level of electronics out of the dumps [I've not fully costed it]. When Brexit hits things will start to push more to repair being financially viable, and as the balance shifts towards China in the next decade, as I expect it will, then the economy of repairs will become more of a necessity.