Submitted 3 days ago by Mickey7@lemmy.world to [deleted]
https://lemmy.world/pictrs/image/feaeb8cb-faee-47ae-8485-416b301fecdc.jpeg
Taking away the instructions on how to service and repair a car was a result of capitalists wanting to make more money by forcing you to get your car repaired by them.
Adding instructions not to drink battery acid is likely for companies to avoid getting sued because people will always argue that there was no warning about drinking battery acid so the company owes you compensation.
This is a false comparison.
Also helps them get away with hiding shoddy/cheap parts.
~2018-2020 Hondas have defective air condensers. They aren’t rated for the refrigerant. They are basically guaranteed to fail. You also have to go to a dealership to get your AC serviced. There’s a warranty for the AC, but it’s that dealer that checks whether your AC meets the warranty or not (amazing how easy it is to find bits of debris and deny the warranty when no third party can double check.
You could crack open an original Xbox and do a lot of modifications with it. The Xbox 360 was designed to be as annoying to take apart as possible, possibly to hide the cheap components that lead to the red ring of death…
The Xbox 360 was designed to be as annoying to take apart as possible, possibly to hide the cheap components that lead to the red ring of death…
actually, this was probably to fit it into the very weird and particular form factor that microsoft wanted it to fit in.
The red ring of death issue was actually due to faulty chip manufacturing, rather than bad cooling, it was an inevitable flaw due to manufacturing defects, rather than design failures. The heating and cooling cycles just greatly exaggerated the effect of the problem, that’s why it’s so closely linked.
Also you could’ve mentioned the update fuses in the CPU, IIRC there are fuses that are blown when the system updates, to prevent you from going back, no matter what you do.
I mean I do agree with you. Planned obsolescence and whatnot is very real.
But also, fixing a car from 70’s is very different than trying to fix a car from this millenium.
As technology improves and becomes more detailed, it might also get harder to repair. This isn’t to be taken as a defense of companies which have used planned obsolescence. But even if there was a very user friendly car company, I think it would be more complex to adjust your valves today than it was 30-40 years ago.
I mean I do agree with you. Planned obsolescence and whatnot is very real.
it’s complicated, a good example, actually probably the ideal example, of planned obsolescence is airpods. Designed to not be repaired, thrown away, and then replaced.
It can also apply to things like “lifetime” designed products, you may design something to mechanically wear out, before it needs to be maintained, or perhaps, require no maintenance, until you need to replace it. It’s harder to say whether this is strictly planned obsolescence, or just cost cutting engineering, which in the long run, probably doesn’t change much.
i think the most semantically accurate version of this would be releasing a product that is 100% good, and then a year later releasing a product that is 200% good, surpassing and replacing the previous product entirely, removing the previous product from the product line up, and only supporting the most recent product. I.E. it’s planned to become obsolete, shortly into the future.
Vehicles are also a weird market segment, they’ve gotten considerably more reliable since the early days of the automotive industry, they’ve gotten significantly more comfortable, they’ve gotten significantly more safe. They’ve also gotten several orders of magnitude more complicated since than as well. To deal with the aforementioned advances. Though there have been a lot of issues in recent manufacturing leading to parts that are just, bad.
This implies it was the previous generation that Draco the content of the battery
Right, or that back then they just didn’t care if you drank the battery because there wasn’t a hugely well-developed culture of lawsuits like we have now. Those fuckers in 1914-1950 were definitely down for a battery party, no doubt. The ones that made it now think that everyone had common sense because only the ones that did made it through.
Torpedo juice.
They drank anything that would get them intoxicated
And who put lead in the gas?
And asbestos in the walls? And said cigarettes were healthy?
50ish years ago, back when people actually read Popular Science, they told people to dispose of their old motor oil by digging a small hole in your backyard, filling it with gravel, and pouring the motor oil into it.
Oh and don’t forget all the advertisements for your Doctor’s favorite cigarette.
Also, there are two main actual reasons why far fewer car manuals nowadays include instructions on valve adjustments:
A whole lot more modern cars use hydro-compensators, which greatly reduces the need to manually adjust the valves.
Car companies really, really want you to go to a dealership or officially certified maintenance shop so they can overcharge you on maintenance.
Or just pour it along the fence where the tall grass grows (before weed whackers)
But pray do tell me, what generation is responsible for car manufacturers discouraging repair and forcing you to go to certified dealers?
Last I checked, my generation didn’t put Reagan into office.
no, just trump
If you want to get technical it was largely folks who were adults during the regan presidency who trump in.
Trump is the symptom of a problem Reagan was the harbinger of. Without Reagan and all that followed after him, you do not get a Trump presidency.
My generation wasn’t much of his support but great job with the “voters who voted against this are also to blame” bullshit!
Our generation has warning labels because their generation actually did it. Buncha lead addled boomers acting like we’re fools for learning from their stupidity.
If you want to play relative knowledge, 50 years ago they used asbestos as bathroom waterproofing
And painted the whole room with a pretty green colored lead paint.
And also asbestos as cigarette filters
Are we boomer posting today?
Boomer-est image I’ve seen in a while
Downvote because OP is just a boomer, not a shitposter.
Make an alt account and do both
Or just don’t vote and move along
If I’m not gonna quickly form an opinion on something I just saw for the first time and immediately proclaim it to millions of strangers in a way it can never be deleted, then what’s the point?
::sigh:: Old cars had instructions on adjusting valves because you needed to. Improvements in manufacturing processes means that valves and valve seats simply don’t wear the way that they use to. You may still need to change valve shims if your clearance is out of tolerance, but on most cars that’s going to be well over 100,000 miles before service is needed. It’s also a really tedious, long job, and takes tools that most people aren’t going to have. (I have done it multiple times on a motorcycle; that’s a 10,000 miles service interval b/c the engines on the bikes I ride redlines at 18,000rpm, which means significantly more wear on engines, and higher chances of thing like valve flutter.) Cars are vastly more complicated than they used to be, because they’re also far, far more efficient, and last far longer; it used to be a big deal if a car made it to 100,000 miles, and now a car that dies at 100k is considered an unreliable lemon.
Well, they don’t last far longer as a whole, but the advances in machining tolerances and material science, the mechanical internals can go far longer without anything more than fluid changes.
As far as longevity, soy based wiring harnesses, poorly shielded ECUs, and borked software updates are what are killing cars these days.
As a whole, they def. do last longer. I can look on FB Marketplace right now and find cars that are in fairly good, operational condition with 250,000 miles. The issues you’re talking about aren’t the kind of major mechanical things that become improbably expensive to repair, e.g., a broken timing chain with high interference valves & cylinders. Although yeah, replacing a main wiring harness on a car is a PITA and very expensive unless you can find a functional used one on eBay.
Also, there’s not great empirical evidence that the soy-based insulation is significantly worse than its petroleum based counterpart. There’s a ton of anecdotal claims about it attracting rodents, but no direct evidence AFAIK. The class-action lawsuits over rodent damage have been dismissed. And, TBF, I’ve had older cars that had wiring chewed by mice. Part of the difference with newer cars seems to be that there’s just more wiring packed into smaller areas, areas that look like great nests for rodents; you didn’t see that kind of wiring density 20 years ago.
This isn’t the flex you think it is. The reason why they warn you not to drink the battery is that someone did it.
I assume that’s why it’s posted in shit posts. So one doesn’t know whether to upvote for it being shit, or downvote for it being dumb.
Exactly, and it probably took several instances of this happening going back to 1950 before they finally decided to make that warning label.
Don’t drink the battery warnings fall into the cover-your-ass listings of all the stupid things people have done that might lead to litigation.
But around a century or so ago, Boy Scouts learned to build a bungalow and a tool shed which were part of their bear badge.
When I was a cub scout I had the option of building a pinball machine. Of course it didn’t say how and a basic pachinko machine was easier if more tedious.
Note I didn’t do any of these things, being a latchkey kid and no internet, nor libraries in walking distance. I flunked out of boy scouts.
That all said, most appliances we buy have a lot of instructions we don’t remember, and the ones that are not obviously dangerous tend to require multiple infractions plus wear and tear before they’re actually hazardous. But the US is a litigious society.
I mean, I could absolutely imagine someone doing this. They’re probably a well meaning person, but probably not of great intelligence. They’re driving through the desert one day, absolutely thirsty. They’re desperate for a drink, about to pass out. Then they remember in their delerium - “Wait! There’s some water in the car’s battery! I could drink some of that and be fine! I’ll just drain it while the car is running (so I don’t have to restart it), keep the engine running, and be able to make it to the next town. My God, I’m a genius. I’m saved!” They then proceed, in the manner of unique creativity only the ignorant possess, to find a way to drain the fluid from the battery of a running car engine. And they have a big old swig of that battery water.
What would be required for this? All that it would take is for someone to just have very poor chemistry knowledge. Someone sees a fluid that looks like water, and they assume it’s water. Maybe they figure a car battery works like a potato battery and there’s just water in the cell. Even if the “water” is clearly foul, maybe someone would assume it’s just dirty water, but still water. (As in, not an acid.)
Or, maybe they even know it’s not something you should regularly drink. They know there’s some fluid called “battery acid” in the battery. But they also know that soda is acidic, and that is safe to drink. So maybe battery acid is OK in small amounts? Just how strong does an acid have to be before you can’t safely drink it? Maybe they could just try a small quantity, maybe about a spoonful? Surely that would be fine…
Those on the bottom 10% of the IQ distribution don’t deserve to die. Those who failed high school chem don’t deserve to drink battery acid.
When planning public health or public safety interventions, you have to balance between cost and effectiveness. For example, imagine some new car widget that will increase automobile safety. You’re a regulator trying to decide whether to mandate them on all new vehicles. You run the numbers; you want to balance the increased vehicle price against the projected lives saved. You run the numbers and find that this will cost $1 billion per life saved. Probably not worth mandating them. It’s not that those lives aren’t worth saving, but there are more cost effective ways to save lives. We could tax everyone the same money they would spend buying these devices, and then use this money to expand Medicare eligibility. Or we could mandate some other vehicle safety device. The number of lives saved is always balanced against the cost of an intervention. The value of a life is infinite; the number of dollars available to save lives is finite.
But printing on a battery? The manufacturers already print a labels on them. It costs tiny fractions of a penny per battery to add the safety warnings. Even if it only prevents a handful of deaths or serious injuries over a decade, the cost is so low we might as well do it. There’s something like 14 million new vehicles sold in the US each year. Imagine over ten years that’s 140 million vehicles. Let’s say it costs a penny to include a warning label on each battery. That’s a cost of $1.4 million over an entire decade.
I would say in that case, if even a single life is spared over that decade, if only a single living person is saved from the reaper…Then it is worth it. Hell, that’s probably even a fair amount to prevent a life-altering injury. If even one person per decade is stupid enough to drink battery acid, and this warning will prevent it, then it is worth doing!
Proper fucking boring boomer banter that.
Is this the terrible facebook memes community now?
To paraphrase an answer I once read: yes, we tend to introduce warnings against bad behaviours we detect and deprecate obsolete information.
In this case: I don’t need to tinker a valve in an engine nowadays. The fuel injection is done through an incredibly precise system, controlled by a computer. Even mechanics require specialized tools and equipments to fiddle with that part of an engine.
Car batteries have been built more and more to be maintenance-less; you buy it, run, when it dies you replace it and that is it. Battery acid is a thing and it is dangerous, hence the attempt to divert people from messing with it.
But because less and less people are prone to go into mechanics, the need to advise against tinkering with your battery really needs to be reinforced.
Warning labels are often first written in blood before taking form of paper and ink.
Sometime, you grab the manual of some old piece of junk, there’s all the electronic schematics, parts list, all adjustable things that should never face end user, etc. described in it.
Now, it’s just “push button. if led not go vroom vroom, call support”.
Think of how incredible it would be if you could go on line and get manuals to fix any part of anything you own from a PS5 to a Refrigerator, to a Rivan Truck including all the protocols, chip sets, ect… Or just explore them to see how things work, I’m sure a lot of great inventions and ideas came about from people tinkering with and exploring manuals like these. Anymore these are considered “top secret” and you have to reverse engineer anything to figure out how it works. I think this speaks more to the fact that the things you “buy” these days aren’t really considered yours. You are borrowing the IP to use for a fee and if it breaks, tough shit.
This is an established cool community ran resource for all kinds of schematics, repairs, and breakdowns of all kinds of devices for manufacturers that suck at telling you how to fix their stuff.
There’s owners manuals and there’s repair manuals.
They where the same thing. That’s the point.
Old cars could actually have their stuff adjusted, though. You’d have to tinker with the carburator if the weather was significantly colder/hotter, etc. to get it to run properly.
Even cars in the 90s started getting too complex - electronic fuel injection, variable valve timing, and more. There’s no need to adjust the valves because the computer does it, and better than you could.
I wouldn’t say the computer adjusts the valves, variable valve timing serves a completely different function than an old fashioned valve adjustment.
It’s true that most lifts are hydraulic nowadays, and self-adjust by filling with oil. So your point still stands, it’s just mechanical, not computer controlled.
My 2017 Honda V6 does require valve adjustments, but I doubt many people actually do it themselves though. And most people probably don’t have it done at all.
(I’m a hobbyist, not a mechanic, so anyone feel free to correct me if I’m wrong)
You’re correct.
Also, cars became pointless after they removed distributors.
My dad would print this meme out and mail it to me if he knew how to rightclick
He can always mail you a manuscript
Who’s job is it to teach common sense? If you find the future generation lacking, that’s probably your fault.
When I was a teenager, my dad gave me shit for not knowing how to change brake pads, and my response was “Who was supposed to teach me?”. Like, it’s not like I could afford a car working weekends, and he was always too busy to have me around whenever something went wrong. So next time he changed the brakes, he actuality taught me.
I just want to point something out: Knowing not to drink battery fluid is not common sense!
Common sense is something that anyone would “just know” by instinct. Like not running out on to a highway with vehicles traveling at high speed. No one needs to teach that because it’s obvious from a glance.
If someone had never encountered a highway and never heard of such a thing they might wander out onto one when there’s no traffic. Would that be a failing of common sense? No! Because that type of decision-making requires some education/experience.
Lead tastes sweet! I haven’t tried it (haha) but there’s a reason why loads of children get lead poisoning by eating it every year. If you didn’t know that it’s poisonous and haven’t been educated about not eating/tasting random things you might just try the lead acid of a car battery! Especially if it’s really old and has become less acidic (that’s what sulfation does: Reduces the acidity).
“Common sense” is actually just a practical form of, “basic education”. Not everyone gets it and everyone always has gaps in their knowledge. What’s common sense to one person isn’t to another.
TL;DR: Common sense is a myth. We’re all born ignorant.
PSSSHT
BACK IN MAY DAEEEYY
Go off, let’s hear it!
Back in my day we drank from the hose if we got thirsty and lined up in the street to get sprayed with DDT and painted our homes with lead. Those were the days!
if everyone has common sense back then we wouldn’t be in the middle of this shitshow today
No more boomerposting
Yeah and the last generation keeps sending money to the prince of Nigeria.
That’s just because they’re old though, people our age will probably be getting scammed when we’re old too.
Its not that we’re smarter than the previous generation, we just have access to more knowledge than they did. (and maybe less exposure to lead 😅(but maybe more exposure to microplastics, and who knows what cognitive effects that might have 😅))
Of course, how else could he reclaim his throne and pay you back 10x more than you gave him?
And i still miss those old manuals…
You can’t, because the previous generations allowed capitalism to ruin consumer goods with regulatory capture and planned obsolescence.
It’s time to resurrect the corolla in the backyard.
I mean, I’m pretty sure cars’ lifespans have generally increased over the years, despite not being able to easily tweak valves or what have you. So many older cars don’t have a 6th digit on the odometer because it was so common for a car to die after about 100,000 miles anyway. Now you might hit some issues, but that kind of mileage is basically your car’s 40th birthday.
You can find service manuals online. I found the full blown 1,397 page OEM service manual for my '97 Prelude. For free. And failing that, there’s probably a YouTube video for it, especially if it’s not something incredibly rare.
The keyword is right there: 97. Anything after ~2014 and it’s a mess to find manuals, for older stuff i was able to easily find manuals and fix them no problem
I’llbe 100% honest, bud, but if you can’t find a service manual on the internet or simply ask at the dealership I probably wouldn’t trust you to do the work. They’re available, just try even a little. And boy if you trust what little information may or may not be in an owner’s manual…
Besides, the only reason that info was in there was because the valves needed much more frequent adjusting. You really shouldn’t miss not needing to have that information so readily available.
You’d be surprised how hard it is to find manuals these days.
Manufacturers have taken to:
Not printing them at all
Hiding them behind paywalls with exorbitant prices
You totally can. It’s just usually not cost effective. Buying the tools you need to do major mechanical work is a few thousand dollars, a full service manual runs 400+ pages (if available; i think that the manual for my GTI is only on-line, and is a subscription from VW; IIRC it’s several thousand pages), diagnostic electronics are $200-2000, and so on. Plus, you need a good place to work, like an enclosed garage. I’ve replaced an engine in a Civic after bending valves (timing chain failure), and yeah, a k-swap is def. in the realm of something you can do on you own if you want to spend more than the value of your car getting a shop set up for yourself.
There was a time when everyone had common sense
Oh, OP, you’re such a merry jester!
I’d make a “print a pdf” joke, but honestly, that’s already an unnecessary “skill”.
Sadly, technology has moved towards single finger usability and thrown out features in the process. Printing a PDF is now easy, because there’s a big button (that sells you a cloud subscription for some reason), but it’s also the only thing the app does.
top 10 reasons I have my printer firewalled from the WAN network
Now the new skill is “print to pdf”
That comes out of the box with current versions of Windows. The era of Bullzip PDF Printer is gone.
/boomerhumor, because every generation that comes after is stupid.
Ah yes, when basically the only electronics in a car were the head and tail lights. I can assemble and disassemble a Willy jeep or VW Beatle by just looking at it and going with the flow, I have no fucking clue how to disassemble a modern car’s door panel without breaking anything.
Well guess why we have those warnings, they came from somewhere.
unexposedhazard@discuss.tchncs.de 3 days ago
And who are the people that are the reason for this having to be in the manual. Its the people that were born 50+ years ago…