malewithatail
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Post by malewithatail on Apr 19, 2023 8:16:22 GMT 10
The all in one solutions are convenient, bu when something fails, the whole system falls over. The way u chose to go with an external charger was the best for long term reliability, and u learnt something as well. Win win.
Never let someone or something that threatens you get within ‘arms length’ of your position.
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Post by Stealth on Apr 19, 2023 9:48:43 GMT 10
Just a little bit of FYI in regard to those battery boxes Yiiiiiiiiiiiikes! Thanks for the heads up, that sounds like a nightmare! Hopefully (well, not for you, but for me! haha) you just got a dud and I won't have to deal with that problem because if it does occur I have no technical skill to do anything about it! Very disappointing to hear given the price of the item. Especially with the price hike in the last two years for the box. But at least I know what to do if something similar happens to me. Mind you I say I wouldn't have the skill to fix it but no doubt if it actually spudded in I'd be running a bit of google-fu to figure out what went wrong. There's nothing like having a problem that needs fixing to motivate one to learn new skills 😉
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tactile
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Post by tactile on Apr 19, 2023 9:51:20 GMT 10
Just a little bit of FYI in regard to those battery boxes Engel flat refused to give me a price said I had to go to the authorized service agent so I rang the agent and the pointedly told me that I'd have to bring it in and pay a $66 diagnostic fee and then they could give me a price on whatever parts were needed. I was working in the repair industry when this policy came into play.
For the layman, this seems like a rip-off that businesses introduced an up front fee before the item to be repaired has even been looked at, but the truth of the matter always comes back to a small (it was actually quite large in this instance!) group of people stuffing it up for everyone else.
People used to bring stuff in for repair and 80% of the time ask for a quote - just so they knew what they were up for. As the cost of electronics came down, and the quote was getting on a bit (also take into account of new features being added etc.), they would buy a new item and just leave their old one at the repair place and forget about it. Sometimes they would give the go-ahead for the repair and just ghost the repair place and never pick it up!
Now you might think that this was a boon for repair places because by law they own it if not picked up in 3 months and they could sell it, strip it for parts or do what ever they want with it, but it's never that simple. Most repair places are small and quickly get overwhelmed with this crap so the repair place has to pay for storage or disposal or selling (staff etc) none of which is their core job. There was also many a law-suit over repair places getting rid of peoples gear after the 3 month period so they would store them for a lot longer than that.
So an up-front incentive was introduced to encourage people to follow through with the repair. If they dont like paying it...well, they were probably just going to leave it there anyway! When I was working in the industry, the up-front quote would be taken off the final repair fee if they went ahead with the repair. Maybe they dont do this anymore - I dont know...
Thus ends the lesson on the "Quote fee"
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malewithatail
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Location: Northern Rivers NSW
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Post by malewithatail on Apr 19, 2023 12:47:38 GMT 10
"spudded in I'd be running a bit of google-fu to figure out "
Good luck when WW3 starts and the satellites are shut down/destroyed, internet is govt controlled/unavailable. Knowledge is power.
Do some on line electronics courses, now, collect stuff from the tip, pull it apart, work out how it works, and then learn, learn. learn.
Someone who knows how to fix a battery drill is gunna be sought after WTSHTF.
If you make it too tough for the enemy to get in you can't get out.
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tactile
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Post by tactile on Apr 19, 2023 13:12:56 GMT 10
Someone who knows how to fix a battery drill is gunna be sought after WTSHTF. ***News Flash***
They're sought after now.
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Post by Stealth on Apr 19, 2023 14:43:29 GMT 10
I don't need to learn electronics. I have friends and family who have those skills because I find them tedious and difficult to learn. They rely on me for skills that I DO have, that they find difficult or tedious to learn. Shakespeare knew what he was talking about but often times people misquote or reduce his quote and it shows. “A jack of all trades is a master of none, but often times better than a master of one.” I'm not saying being a master of one thing is a bad thing. It's not. But my mastery isn't in electronics and never will be. I refuse to bludgeon myself with continually trying to learn a skill that simply doesn't stick for me, simply because it could be valuable in the future. My myriad of other skills will be just as valuable but none of them require electricity
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malewithatail
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Location: Northern Rivers NSW
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Post by malewithatail on Apr 19, 2023 14:52:46 GMT 10
That's true for our little community here, my sister is a retired RN, my wife has the garden growing knowledge, I can do electronics, tractor work, water etc, and one daughter is a potter, the other a animal vet in training and so on. We have most essential skills covered.
Due to my memory issues, I was told I couldn't work as a sparky any more, but I still have the knowledge for use in disaster preparing.
WTSHTF trading knowledge will be vital for survival.
Bring a gun. Even better, bring at least two guns. Bring all of your friends who have guns.
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grumble
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Post by grumble on Apr 19, 2023 15:47:19 GMT 10
Just a little bit of FYI in regard to those battery boxes Engel flat refused to give me a price said I had to go to the authorized service agent so I rang the agent and the pointedly told me that I'd have to bring it in and pay a $66 diagnostic fee and then they could give me a price on whatever parts were needed. I was working in the repair industry when this policy came into play.
For the layman, this seems like a rip-off that businesses introduced an up front fee before the item to be repaired has even been looked at, but the truth of the matter always comes back to a small (it was actually quite large in this instance!) group of people stuffing it up for everyone else.
People used to bring stuff in for repair and 80% of the time ask for a quote - just so they knew what they were up for. As the cost of electronics came down, and the quote was getting on a bit (also take into account of new features being added etc.), they would buy a new item and just leave their old one at the repair place and forget about it. Sometimes they would give the go-ahead for the repair and just ghost the repair place and never pick it up!
Now you might think that this was a boon for repair places because by law they own it if not picked up in 3 months and they could sell it, strip it for parts or do what ever they want with it, but it's never that simple. Most repair places are small and quickly get overwhelmed with this crap so the repair place has to pay for storage or disposal or selling (staff etc) none of which is their core job. There was also many a law-suit over repair places getting rid of peoples gear after the 3 month period so they would store them for a lot longer than that.
So an up-front incentive was introduced to encourage people to follow through with the repair. If they don't like paying it...well, they were probably just going to leave it there anyway! When I was working in the industry, the up-front quote would be taken off the final repair fee if they went ahead with the repair. Maybe they don't do this anymore - I don't know...
Thus ends the lesson on the "Quote fee"
While I understand the core reason for a quote fee to weed out tire kickers there is a point where its simply holding a customer to ransom especially if you are the only one that can supply the price for the component I all I wanted was the price for the part to know how much it was vs simply tossing it and buying a new unit I wasn't asking for a detailed quote nor was I asking for them to spend any time running a diagnostic on it nor was i even bringing it into the shop at this stage so it was not going to be any sort of inconvenience apart from them simply looking on their system and giving me the price for the part over the phone but no in this case i had to bring the unit in and pay a$66 diagnostic fee to find out the part price end of story and they made a point of informing me that I wouldn't find the part online nor can the part be sold to anyone nor fitted by anyone but them to which I had already explained that i was perfectly fine going through the approved channels as i had delt with this many times before with specialized laboratory equipment I was simply looking at the economic feasibility of repair via them vs replace with a new unit that had full warranty and ultimately this policy prevented me from making an informed decision because I had already decided that if the component price alone was greater than $200 I would buy a new unit I can pick up a phone and call pretty much any business and say I am looking for an item do they have it in stock and how much is the item and never before have I been stopped by a paywall that not a subscription-based service. Now I understand when people bring an item into a business that needs to have time spent on it to identify what's wrong and what parts are needed to repair it that makes sense and most business will do that for a nominal fee or charge an hourly rate and I am totally ok with that because time and resources get tide up into something that might progress or lead to nothing. i should thank them though because they encouraged me to find a work around that was actually a better solution and with a broader cross field utility.
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malewithatail
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Post by malewithatail on Apr 19, 2023 16:52:09 GMT 10
Try dealing with John Deere.
Call them and the $500/hr meter starts turning over, yup, $500/hr, for a phone call.
Then, parts. Example an alternator for a header, $1,200. 3 weeks delivery. Great during harvest.
Anyway, the latest was the auto steering mechanism in a JD 500 HP tractor was not working. Modern farm machinery cant be driven by the operator, as they are too busy looking at the seeder etc, so it needs to work.
I spent a few hours tracing the wiring, but the harness is so complicated and goes through so many places, it was a frustrating exercise.
Eventually, the customer rang JD in Sydney and the clock started ticking. I was listening in and the technician made a mistake and gave away some info re a wire color that should have had a certain voltage on it and whilst the customer was making small talk, I traced that wire and found it was indeed broken, inside the plastic coating where it couldn't be seen. I bridged it out and the system sprang to life. The customer then politely said that they were not going to pay such an exorbitant fee for advice and hung up. Meanwhile, I bridged out that wire with a new one and all went well.
Strike out for JD.
A reasonable fee is understandable, but being held to ransom by a manufacturer, during harvest, and they knew it, just isn't cricket.
Anything worth shooting is worth shooting twice. Ammo is cheap compared to your life.
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tactile
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Post by tactile on Apr 20, 2023 7:20:40 GMT 10
With the exception of Apple, I avoid American products. They are mostly crap and they always seem to do some dodgy stuff to get you back to the service centre and this goes way back. Motorola RF test sets used to shut down every 12~24 months so you have to send them back for calibration. Sure, if your doing aviation or some other critical sector then that's fine, but doing CB & Narrow Band commercial? I dont think so...
The things I hear about Tesla - I cant see myself owning one, especially when Elon moves on.
European stuff has its own issues, they tend to really tie up their distributor network so no one outside of it can get service info or parts. While this might sound bad, if you're a dealer for one of their product it's great and if you play fair it can be good for the customer too. American companies tend to not care if their dealers make a decent living, Euro companies (read German) want them to survive.
Japanese companies were the best, but cheap Korean and Chinese products stuffed that all up.
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malewithatail
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Post by malewithatail on Apr 20, 2023 8:03:49 GMT 10
There is legislation coming out on the "right to repair", and that gunna upset a lot of manufacturers, from Tesla to JD. Bring it on !!
Always cheat; always win. If you walk away, it was a fair fight. The only unfair fight is the one you lose.
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malewithatail
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Post by malewithatail on Apr 20, 2023 9:28:36 GMT 10
Apple is just as bad, locking you into their way of doing things, good or bad as that is.
I prefer Linux open platform, and apps etc are available, usually free or minimal cost, to do anything that Windows can do, and generally faster and better as well.
This PC uses windows, only 'cause its still under warranty, but as soon as that expires, it gets the duel boot system, Windows/Linux.
"Everyone has a plan until they are punched in the face." Mike Tyson.
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tactile
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Post by tactile on Apr 20, 2023 12:40:25 GMT 10
Apple is just as bad, locking you into their way of doing things, good or bad as that is. I prefer Linux open platform, and apps etc are available, usually free or minimal cost, to do anything that Windows can do, and generally faster and better as well. This PC uses windows, only 'cause its still under warranty, but as soon as that expires, it gets the duel boot system, Windows/Linux. Apple is as bad in some respects but if I have a problem with a device I just buy a new one. Start it up, log on with my Apple ID and bang, its the same as it was on the old device and life goes on. Their system is closed but that's what makes it work...for me.
Windows is useful is you have a specific need to run a package as is Linux, my go-too will always be IOS and MacOS, until something better comes along...
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norseman
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Post by norseman on Apr 20, 2023 12:51:08 GMT 10
I don't need to learn electronics. I have friends and family who have those skills because I find them tedious and difficult to learn. They rely on me for skills that I DO have, that they find difficult or tedious to learn. Shakespeare knew what he was talking about but often times people misquote or reduce his quote and it shows. “A jack of all trades is a master of none, but often times better than a master of one.” I'm not saying being a master of one thing is a bad thing. It's not. But my mastery isn't in electronics and never will be. I refuse to bludgeon myself with continually trying to learn a skill that simply doesn't stick for me, simply because it could be valuable in the future. My myriad of other skills will be just as valuable but none of them require electricity An oldie but an absolute goldie:- “A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.” ~ Robert Anson Heinlein
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