why I hesitate to make "temporary" repairs

Coany

1. cold night, no heat call in a older Armstrong furnace. I determined it was off on hi-limit. The blower was bound up, the motor mount was broken. I took some perforated strapping and a nut and bolt . I took a chance and attached on end of the strap to the motor mount bolt and wrapped the other end around the broken end of the mount back up to the bolt, I put a tiny nut and bolt through the middle of the strapping and tightened it to increase tension. It worked nicely. I told the customer it was time for a new furnace.

I thought it would hold a few weeks till the furnace could be replaced.

 That was  in 1997. Its still like that.



2. cold day, noise call from the power venter. The thing was badly rotted, the motor was hanging out of the housing and the wheel was scraping making  screeching sound.

I took some smoke pipe wire and made sort of a sling to hold the motor up horizontal to get them through the night.It worked pretty well. I told the customer the power venter need to be replaced.

That was in 2003. Its still like that.



3. water leak call , wee hours of the night. I find a pin hole in a domestic cold water pipe near the boiler. Elderly customer, middle of the night, I cut a circulator flange gasket into a little strip and took a piece of perforated strap and a nut and bolt and made a little band aid to stop the leak. It worked pretty well. I told the customer he needed a plumber to make a more permanent fix. That was in 2007. I was there today and its still like that. I mentioned it to the customer and he said the plumber is coming next week .





each of these I see as a future disaster,

a booby trap set for some unfortunate future service tech.

I hope its not me.

I swear I am never doing it again.

Unknown

I don`t blame ya,,,,

If you have the authorization(even if you don`t), pull the fuel supply and notify the utility to give estimates,,,, that`ll get them thinking!!

Al Letellier_21

common sense fixes

You are to be commended for your common sense approach to making emergency repairs, but if I can make a suggestion, change your approach to follow-up and instead of saying it needs to be fixed permanently, say:" I got it fixed temporarily to get you throught the night to keep the cost down for you, but I will be back tomorrow on straight time to fix it with the right parts". I don't mean to be critical, but it's as much your fault as the customers' that the "fix" is still there after all this time. I don't know how I would sleep at night wondering about that power venter patch job.........too many things can go wrong after the fact and it would be on your shoulders.

Just my 2 cents worth.

Big Ed_4

No Good Deed goes Unpunished

Yeah, we all been there ...

Xray

oh heeell....

Oh, I have worked in the boonies among the complete absence of greenbacks. I realize that you have sacrificed your profit motive, but thanks to your ingenuity, these people have had heat for years..That,sir, is what makes America beautiful!

Xray

Or....

Or, more properly, the Dead Men would be proud of you!

Coany

"temporary" means different things to different people

 for me it means a few weeks.



for some customers it means until it comes apart again.



there is no way to "make' somebody buy something.



except to shut 'em down.

Tom Blackwell_2

Disaster

In 1975, had a call of delayed ignition on an oil burner-the customer was a friend of the company owner. Found an antique stack switch that was hanging up and not shutting the unit down on flame failure. Cleaned the burner, installed a new nozzle and set the electrodes. Missed the fact that the ignition transformer was intermittent. Anyway, I let the boss talk me into allowing the continued operation with the stack switch untill the parts could be procured to change it over to a cad cell. This was on a Friday afternoon; Sunday night the transformer failed and the stack switch stuck again-many minutes later the transformer came alive and blew out the side of the furnace, and ignited the pool of oil on the floor. Between the owner using dirt and the rapid response of the fire department, they limited the damage to the basement. Obviously, this could have killed the occupants. Dodged a bullet that time. Ever since I have locked the fuel supply and insisted that it be fixed properly. Lost a laundry customer that way-found a 150# boiler operating with all the safeties jumped out and applied a gas co. lock to the gas meter-told them they would have to have the gas co. inspect it before they would remove the lock-slept soundly that night.

tom_49

no more temp fixes

Coany, I appreciate the fact that you didnt leave people without heat, however, in this litigiuos society, I dont  make temporary repairs anymore. One night w/o heat aint gonna kill em, but a jumped control or whatever could.



I have jumped out limit switches on furnaces to get them through the night. I literally could NOT sleep all night thinking about the consequences if there ever was a problem. its just not worth it. Call me paranoid, but I have worked too hard in my life to loose it all because of "helping" somebody out. Careful out there.