The Toaster- the greatest example of wasting money

[formercia]

32. Remember those small appliance repair shops?

Much like the computer repair shops of today. Their demise was making things so cheaply, it wasn't worth repairing, even if you could.

I worked with a fellow who had been an Engineer for GM. His main task was to find ways of saving money on windshield wiper motors. Just replacing the screws with rivets, saved the company millions. The units were designed no to be repaired, but to have a MTBF comparable with the vehicle. They don't make money by selling a set of replacement motor brushes, but they do by selling you the whole motor assembly.
Like someone said earlier: They want to sell you a new vehicle, when the value of the old one becomes more than the cost of replacing the worn out assemblies.
I remember, back in the 70's, replacing the clutch on my VW bug with nothing more than basic hand tools and a rope slung over a tree branch to hold the engine aligned with the transmission shaft. Try that today..no way, Jose.

MTBF= Mean time between failures.