Repair Tips and Links
N.B. This wiki needs a spring clean and the information on this page may be (considerably) out of date.
It's surprising what can be repaired. Here we'll provide tips, links and resources to those who wish to have a go.
Every Tuesday is Repair Night (too!)
If you have some broken electronics or other product that you would like to try to repair, with some help, feel free to pop along one Tuesday night from 7.30. We ask for a suggested donation of £1 for the club and also that you join our email list but that's all you have to do. We don't yet have house rules for repairs but if we did, they might look very similar to Repair Club's House Rules - please have a look at those!
Environmental Benefit of Repair - each 1kg repaired displaces 27kg embodied energy GHG CO2
Repairing things not only saves money and waste but it also saves energy. The energy that went into the production and material extraction of products is called embodied energy and the associated Green House Gas emissions sometimes abbreviated to GHG (kg CO2). Apple and Dell have previously published data on embodied energy which has been carefully studied (see Comparing Embodied Greenhouse Gas Emissions of Modern Computing and Electronics Products - Paul Teehan and Milind Kandlikar ).
From their analysis of computers in particular, they found, "Embodied impacts identified in our study are linear with respect to mass, with a coefficient of 27 kg CO2-eq per kg of product". So each 1kg of computer equipment had a GHG CO2 equivalent of 27 kg. Worth also noting that Apple's data is much higher at 39kg per kilo though they have been amongst the most transparent manufacturer.
So for each 1kg of computer equipment we are able to repair, we could easily argue we are displacing consumption of an equivalent new product which would have 27kg of GHG (CO2 eq) per kilo of product weight. This is an underestimate of the actual saving because it does not account for shipping.
Repair Resources
We're not endorsing these suppliers just pointing out they exist and are at times very useful!
Parts for White Goods
You can buy all kinds of spares for white goods like washing machines and dishwashers. Some parts have only a limited life (like heating elements) and are quite easy to buy and fit, but even surprising parts like buttons can be purchased too, and often quite easily fitted. If an appliance has a part that breaks quite commonly, you're quite likely to find it!
- http://www.espares.co.uk/ - "1 million spares" available
- http://www.partmaster.co.uk/ - also advertising "1 million parts" available
- http://www.ukwhitegoods.co.uk/help/spare-parts
Finding Odd Screws and Fittings
When you need a hard to find screw or fitting, try these folks.
- http://clerkenwellscrews.com/ - Clerkenwell, London
- http://www.mackay.co.uk/ - MacKay's, Cambridge
Making New Parts
Sometimes you can print spare parts yourself from plastic or order them to be printed online (even from metal).
- https://www.thingiverse.com/tag:spare_part/page:1 - a good place to start
Software Tools
- https://www.grc.com/sr/spinrite.htm - we've seen Spinrite recover very sick computer hard disks and provide excellent maintenance
Local Repair Companies
- http://www.analogic.co.uk/ (Kingston) - specialise in Apple repairs and can repair all makes of Windows laptops too.
Repair Clubs and Organisations
- http://repaircafe.org/en/ - Dutch Repair organisation (now international)
- https://www.thegoodlifecentre.co.uk/events/repair-cafe-a-community-project-to-repair-reuse-recycle-1/ - a London Repair Cafe
- http://www.communitytechnology.org.uk/linux/ (Brixton) is a charity that helps with repairs.
- http://www.computersforcharities.org/ UK based charity.
- KCF: Cheap Community Furniture,Clearance and Collections,Furniture Removal,Recycling Services in Surrey
http://www.kingstoncommunityfurniture.org/
Links
- http://repaircafe.shoutwiki.com/wiki/Main_Page - Repair Cafe Wiki
- http://repaircafe.org/en/200000-kilograms-co2-emissions-saved/ - calculating carbon emissions from repairs
- http://repaircafe.org/en/house-rules/ - Repair Cafe Rules