Redneck Repairs

[heavyhitterokra]

Don't Try This at Home!

Our 3 ton airconditioner decided the hottest day of the year would be just as good a time as any to break down, so today at about 5:00 pm the condensor fan gave up the ghost.  Of course, by then, no parts stores were still open, and no serviceman could be found who was not booked into next week because of the Holiday weekend.  So over here at "Hillbillies R Us", I had to go dig through my barn to see what I had on hand that might get us through the night.  It was already 90 degrees inside the house by then. 

Finally, I found an old 20" inch high speed fan that we had bought from Walmart about 20+years ago.  Back then, we used the Walmart fan as a makeshift window unit, (before we borrowed money to have central heat and air added to or mortgage).  Back then, I just removed a window from the house and mounted a plywood blank in its place.  I used a jig saw and cut a circular hole in the plywood, so I could mount the fan in the window opening and pointed the exhaust to blow outside.  That served much the same as an attic fan does, except it was not very air tight and was notorious for letting bugs in at night. 

After I cleaned the dirt dobber nests off the old 20" inch house fan that I found in the barn, I took the old, dead, condensor fan motor off, robbed the grill from the back of it and tyrapped the 20" inch Walmart house fan to the under side of the grill.  I bypassed the 220 volt motor controls and plugged the house fan straight into a 110 volt outlet, so that it runs all the time, then, I flipped the disconnect back on to power the compressor. 

By that time, it was 92 degrees inside the house.  I went back inside, set the thermostat to 78-degrees and turned everthing back on.

So far, that set up has been running for about two hours and has dropped the temperature back down to 80 degrees inside the house.  I go outside to check the suction side of the compressor ever 10 or 15 minutes to make sure the fan is pulling enough hot air away from the condensor coils to keep the compressor cool.  Two hours into it now, and the suction side is holding steadily at about 48 degrees.  So far, it seems to be working just fine.  



Sizing the fan up with the opening.  It was nearly a perfect fit!

The finished product, after removing the legs from the Walmart fan, by-passing the controls, and removing the old condensor fan from the housing, I tyrapped it in place and dropped it in the hole.  You can see the 110 cord going out the side.  I think this ought to work overnight, until I can get to town to buy another condensor fan and hook it up right.  (Sure hope it doesn't decide to rain before then!)

[macmex]

Oh my! Hope the heat breaks soon!

[heavyhitterokra]

Our air conditioner ran for 3 hours and 50 minutes before it finally cycled off at 78 degrees inside our house. The 110-volt house fan that I rigged up outside is still running. I don't think it will hurt to keep it on all night, just in case the air conditioner's thermostat calls for more cool air in the middle of the night. The condenser coil fan was 220 volts, so I had to bypass the control circuit at the relay and just run power straight to the replacement fan for tonight. I've just been waiting for the system to cycle, so I can finally go to bed, knowing everything still works alright after getting overheated earlier today.

I need to send some photos to my heat and air buddies tomorrow before I tear it all down to replace the old, dead, fan. They'll get a kick out of it. (I might add some duct tape, just for the visual effect).

I almost posted this under "Tips and Tricks" but I didn't want to make it appear that I was encouraging anyone to try this at home.

[chrysanthemum]

Wow. That’s so far beyond my skill set. I’m impressed. Did you get a new condenser fan?

[Deleted]

Good work, Ron! I'm sad that it is still hot out.

[heavyhitterokra]

No new condenser fan yet. No parts dealers are open until Tuesday, because of the Holiday Weekend. It rained cats and dogs here last night, but I had the unit covered with a tarp that I built in place before the rains came, so the Walmart house fan was not damaged. So far the Walmart fan is keeping pace with it and we are on day 3. The compressor only went out on high pressure once during the entire ordeal. I was able to remove the temporary fan, use cool water to hose off the condensing coils, and the hot compressor (with the power turned off) and it reset, as the heat dissipated.
The old capaciter bit the dust and caused my fan motor to smoke out last Friday at quittin' time.  I had a spare capacitor in the barn to replace it with but not a spare condensor fan motor.

Here's where I had to re-wire the relay to get the 120 volt fan to work from the 220 volt power supply.

Not exactly 'Factory Specs' but it'll get the job done as long as nothing gets wet.

[macmex]

Only an electrician or someone of that caliber would be able to do such a thing and get away with it! Oh, and some old time farmers. 

[heavyhitterokra]

Now that the Holiday weekend is finally over, I was able to buy a condensor fan motor at Locke's Supply today, to replace the house fan that I had rigged up out back, and was able to get my air conditioner to running up to specs again.  Boy, I'll tell you, that is a good feeling to finally not have to worry about the house fan getting rained on or just plain old burning up under a heavier load than it was designed for.    We made it 4 days in scorching hot weather without the right equipment, but the temporary repair worked and we got by once more.

Thank you, God, for getting us through another rough patch!  

[heavyhitterokra]

Another Redneck repair day at dry Creek Farm!

This time, it was our dishwasher that needed repairs.  A piece of silverware fell to the bottom of the dishwasher and ended up against the heating element, which in turn burned a hole through the 'spinny-jigger' down below, that creates the pressurized water jets that clean our dishes.

With a giant hole burned in the side of the spinny jigger, no water pressure could build up and no dishes were getting washed.

Being how no parts were available to fix this right away, I just took it out and gave it the same ol' grin that Davey Crochet used to 'grin' down his grizzly bear. (It didn't work for me either), so I had to try something else.

I got to thinking to myself, "Self ... Do you reckon a guy could use an acetylene torch to weld plastic, the same way he could weld metal?"

Being the last resort, before having to resort to washing my own dishes, I decided to give it a shot.  I took a pair of tin snips to the rim of a 5-gallon plastic bucket and cut myself a length of plastic 'filler rod' then I lit my acetylene torch and adjusted the flame to just a little hotter that a cigarette lighter (a tiny flame) and gave it a try.

I heated the side of the 'spinny jigger' until the hard plastic became pliable and was beginning to puddle slightly, then, I fed the molten puddle with fresh plastic from the filler rod I'd cut from the rim of a 5-gallon bucket earlier. By and by, the hole became smaller and smaller. Finally, as I fed in enough hot plastic into the damaged area, the hole was filled and fully repaired.  (Probably could have done the same thing with a hot glue gun, but I ain't got one of those, so I used a cutting torch instead).

I ain't saying' it was purdy or nothin' but it was fixed good enough to let it cool and give it a try.

I put it back into the dishwasher, turned it back on, and voila` it worked!  The old, busted, spinny jigger was as good as new!

Since I could find no matches in my Google seach for a dishwasher 'Spinny Jigger' I'm not sure how much one would cost to replace, but I'm guessing it probably saved me about $20.00 in parts?  Not to mention that I didn't have to call out a repair man.

If you look closely, you can see that the 5-gallon bucket I used was white.  It didn't match the color of the spray arm that I welded it to. 

The fully reppaired 'Spinny Jigger.' (No bailing wire or duct tape was harmed in the repair of this part). 

[heavyhitterokra]

Another 10 Cent Redneck Repair Job, Literally.

If it's not one thing, it's another. After a hard day of working outside in the hot sun, I threw a load of clothes in the washer, just to discover some hours later that they never did wash. Over the years, with 2 adults and 4 kids in the house, our old washing machine has finally earned a day of breakage. It has been a good machine, but like me, it's getting old and tired.

Actually, nothing really broke, the pushrod leading from the lid switch lever to the micro-switch inside the machine was just worn smooth out. The pushrod was made of plastic and over the years, it had just become worn from friction and had gotten too short to activate the micro-switch that controls the agitate and spin cycles. Once I figured out what was causing the problem, all I had to do was figure out a way to fix it without having to wait on parts to arrive by mail or else making a special trip all the way to Muskogee just to buy a part from Maytag.

It was a real head-scratcher. My first thought was to make a new part from wood, except the part that was worn out had quite a bit of milling done on it in order to fit into a keyway that it slides on and would take a fair amount of whittling and time to replicate. Actually, all it really needed was to be lengthened very slightly, in order to be long enough to fully engage the lid switch. It only needed to be lengthened about the thickness of a dime ... "Oh, wait!" I thought to myself, "I have a dime in my pocket!" So, I just slid that between the end of the pushrod and the lid lever, and, Voila`it was fixed!  a 10 cent repair job.


I'll have to order another pushrod someday, but for now, the dime is working just fine.

[rdback]

I think diagnosing the problem was impressive, let alone the repair! lol

[heavyhitterokra]

As long as it's not a computer, I can usually figure it out.

[john]

My problem is that once I figure out a "temporary" repair that works it will likely stay forever. (Ask my wife)
Ron you are a clever, clever man. These are some ingenious ideas to repair common problems.

[heavyhitterokra]

I don't know if my "temporary" repairs will stay that way forever, but most likely some of them will be there the rest of my life.

[heavyhitterokra]

Moving the World With a Lever

Today, I faced the challenge of lifting a 550 pound, 6' x 6' foot, insulated steel well house, while maintaining it at a height of a little over 8" inches in order to install a concrete block foundation below it.

I accomplished this task within an hour's time with only the use of a few concrete blocks and a lever.  Since the kids are all married and moved away now, I end up doing a lot of things with no help these days ...  No help except God's, of whom I often pray.  Today, I prayed he would give me an idea of how to raise this heavy building with no outside help.

Thank you, God!

If a person clicks on this photo to enlarge it, one can better see the lever and fulcrum that I used.  The immense weight of the building fairly crumpled the steel siding in several places, but nothing that a little work with a hammer and a pair of grozing pliers can't fix.
Earlier in the year, I was given a very heavy, insulated, steel well house structure, which I hoped to someday convert to a handicapped, outdoor restroom.  I needed the outdoor restroom for when handicapped friends come to visit our campgrounds and garden.  The trouble is that it was so dark inside of there, that you could not see your own hand in front of your face when you closed the door behind you, there was zero ventilation, the height of the doorway for some reason was just under 6' feet, so it was a potential head knocker for anyone 6 feet tall (me) and there was no way to clean it out from underneath if need be.  It was very claustrophobic inside there with the door closed, and I needed to solve that problem with no electricity available that far away from the house.

I could solve all of those problems, by placing concrete blocks under the building, utilizing the open webbing to introduce natural light, and natural ventilation ...  The removal of one of those blocks later will create a cleanout from the underside, around back, and raising the whole structure another 8" inches would solve the low doorway problem as well. 

The trouble with this plan was that I would need to raise the entire 550 pound structure a little over 8 " inches by hand, and maintain it at that height, by myself, long enough to install a leveled row of concrete blocks in order to do it.

After a little thought and a few prayers, I was able to get that done by digging a small divot under one side of the steel building, to allow the insertion of a homemade steel lever, (which in this case happened to be the tailgate of a homemade trailer).  I then placed said lever across a fulcrum, (which happened to be two concrete blocks) and stacked more concrete blocks onto the opposite end of the lever until they outweighed the building. 

In essence, I built a teeter totter. 

You know what happens when a bigger kid sits on one end of a teeter totter and a littler kid opposite is catapulted?  It was kind of like that, except in reverse.  This time the bigger kid was made of foam and steel and  the littler kid was made of solid concrete, which made it look sort of odd that a thing taking up so little space could lift a thing so large, so easily.

Using that technique, I was able to raise one side of the building about 9" inches high; which was just high enough to insert the needed row of concrete blocks.  After leveling them, I went to the opposite side of the building to repeat the process.  Within about an hour of effort I had the entire building raised 8" inches higher and am now ready for the handicap rails to be installed inside, which will provide easier access to the composting toilet within.  

Now, my wheelchair bound friends can also be invited to enjoy the garden and the campground when summer finally rolls around. 

Again, Thank you, God.  That help was much appreciated!