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Review broken products instead of new ones

buyforlife.com

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Re: Review broken products instead of new ones

#91

Post by bmn__ »

imtringued wrote: post #84

The fundamental problem with easy repairability is that you need to maintain availability of replacement parts. How can you expect that a given piece of equipment is repairable if you cannot get a replacement PCB? Manufacturing the old electronics is often not possible because regulations change. When leaded solder was banned, some old PCB designs were unaffected, others had to be redone. Components may no longer be…

> The only real solution is longer warranties

> maintain availability of replacement parts

That sounds like requirements for military use. On a civilian level, there are certainly other, less hard-nosed possibilities. Legislature could mandate the following instead:

• The manufacturer is forbidden to prevent a supplier from offering replacement parts on the free market.

• The manufacturer is forbidden from coercing a supplier to slightly modify a standard part just to make it incompatible and thus cripple third-party repair.

• The manufacturer must supply a repair manual with component data sheets and schematics so that a suitable replacement part can be produced by third parties.

Thus we return to the standard of repairability we enjoyed in the previous century. These ideas are free to implement or certainly magnitudes less expensive than keeping stock of replacement parts which takes the wind out of the sails of opposition to these changes in ordinance or law.

Re: Review broken products instead of new ones

#92

Post by hubraumhugo »

eigenvector wrote: post #73
hubraumhugo wrote: post #2

For most people, the majority of positive reviews are noise on any product and they evaluate them by reading negative reviews. For once, let's turn it all upside down: We should build a collection about how things break - review broken and worn-out products to teach how to identify cheap products (where are the stress points, what manufacturing techniques exist to alleviate those). Then compare those with used produc…

Hi there, I checked out your website. It's a cool idea and one that is needed. What do you think of the fact that many of the products are in fact disposable by backed by a "lifetime" warranty precisely because they're so highly marked up that the manufacturer can give you a new one for free instead of attempting even trivial repairs? Osprey is the king of this. This seems to be the opposite of the buy for life menta…

Very interesting point that I haven't thought of. How could we solve this? I guess after a lot of reviews/comments and some downvotes, it would become clear that Osprey doesn't provide a proper reapir service and is in fact, a wasteful company.

Re: Review broken products instead of new ones

#93

Post by hubraumhugo »

wojciii wrote: post #72
hubraumhugo wrote: post #2

For most people, the majority of positive reviews are noise on any product and they evaluate them by reading negative reviews. For once, let's turn it all upside down: We should build a collection about how things break - review broken and worn-out products to teach how to identify cheap products (where are the stress points, what manufacturing techniques exist to alleviate those). Then compare those with used produc…

Will I own the review after I create it? Will it be shared by the community? I don't trust your company .. or any single company. This task should be done a Wikipedia kind of company and the data should be available for anyone for free or a small fee.

Yes you will own the review after you created it. Trustworthiness is the main asset of this page. I'm even thinking about creating a non-profit org for it.

Re: Review broken products instead of new ones

#94

Post by tpoacher »

rciorba wrote: post #88
IgorPartola wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You pinpointed what I’ve been feeling. There are things I want to buy for life. Things like (most) tools, camping equipment, or things I don’t expect to improve over time. But there is a large number of products that I don’t plan to hold onto because they are imperfect either because state of the art hasn’t advanced enough or because I can’t afford the better version yet. For example: Boots. I can afford the boots I…

> Boots. I can afford the boots I can afford today and I like them. But I am sure that 10 years from now I’ll be able to afford better ones. If you can get 10 years out of a pair of boots it means they were good. I've had a pair of Caterpillar boots break after 2 years. I'm happy to see a review site with a strong focus on long term ownership.

I have to say, it's very surreal to see Terry Pratchett's "Sam Vimes Boots Theory of Socio-economic unfairness" play out for real in a HN thread!

Re: Review broken products instead of new ones

#95

Post by tinus_hn »

watwut wrote: post #61
Igelau wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> a $60 T shirt will need to last me more than 20 to make it worth it. And then there's the $120 T-shirt they endorse: https://www.buyforlife.com/products/33/outlier-ultra-fine-me... That better last more than 40 years and be wholly responsible for saving my life +1 family member, wash/dry on any cycle I want, and never get chewed up by mice if I leave it on floor.

Utility of merino is not in them being super ultra durable. It is more that it is warm even when wet when you sweating and they are comfortable when exercising/hiking/whatever in bad weather conditions.

Also lightweight and doesn’t smell if worn multiple days

Re: Review broken products instead of new ones

#96

Post by krageon »

rciorba wrote: post #88
IgorPartola wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You pinpointed what I’ve been feeling. There are things I want to buy for life. Things like (most) tools, camping equipment, or things I don’t expect to improve over time. But there is a large number of products that I don’t plan to hold onto because they are imperfect either because state of the art hasn’t advanced enough or because I can’t afford the better version yet. For example: Boots. I can afford the boots I…

> Boots. I can afford the boots I can afford today and I like them. But I am sure that 10 years from now I’ll be able to afford better ones. If you can get 10 years out of a pair of boots it means they were good. I've had a pair of Caterpillar boots break after 2 years. I'm happy to see a review site with a strong focus on long term ownership.

Buy actual army boots and take care of them. They'll last you that long, probably even longer.

Re: Review broken products instead of new ones

#97

Post by abainbridge »

gwbas1c wrote: post #28

I hope someday stores like Amazon will rate based on expected lifespan. I just had a receiver die. It was 8.5 years old, not really outdated... But those kinds of things should last a lot longer!

I wish Amazon would implement filter-by-warranty-length.

Re: Review broken products instead of new ones

#99

Post by wegs »

imtringued wrote: post #84

The fundamental problem with easy repairability is that you need to maintain availability of replacement parts. How can you expect that a given piece of equipment is repairable if you cannot get a replacement PCB? Manufacturing the old electronics is often not possible because regulations change. When leaded solder was banned, some old PCB designs were unaffected, others had to be redone. Components may no longer be…

I don't feel too bad about replacement parts being obsoleted for good reason (e.g. leaded solder or similar changes). My car/vacuum/desk/etc. might get hit by a meteor, or fall down the stairs, or otherwise be totaled. Life is full of risks.

What I care about is good intent and reasonable measures to support me for the lifetime of the product. In most cases, I can't get replacement parts because manufacturers discontinue them after a few years as a business choice, not because they have to. Most manufacturers rotate product models every year, and I presume it's expensive and not good business to stock parts for models from a decade ago. That's what I want to avoid. I'd like a manufacturer that will continue supporting me as long as reasonable.

What I do now is I look at manufacturer's web pages, and see the oldest products they still support. It's pathetically short.

My last vacuum lasted 15 years before replacement parts ceased to exist. I've been looking at upscale Dyson vacuums, and the oldest ones with replacement parts are a decade old from date-of-introduction (less from date-of-purchase, of course). For a $800 vacuum, that means you're looking at an annualized cost of $80-$160 before you're dumped on the curb.

Of course, there are companies which simply don't offer replacement parts. If a roller or belt fails, the vacuum is disposable. The TCO seems similar, since those don't run $800, though, and a $150 vacuum will probably last a couple of years before something breaks.

What I'd really like is a web site which compiles this sort of information.

Re: Review broken products instead of new ones

#100

Post by Kliment »

abathur wrote: post #14
pavel_lishin wrote: post #7

This is a good idea, but a lot of products are only sold for a few years before being discontinued; reading a review for a printer that's no longer sold (except secondhand) is unfortunately not very useful.

I think this practice is hand-in-glove with the general commercial model that a review site like this inherently pushes back against, though? In any case, I've daydreamed about doing something along these lines, plus an aggressive list of policies that companies/products/brands are delisted for violating (i.e., delisting brands when teardowns find anything they went out of their way to engineer for predictable failur…

Engineering things for predictable failure is often necessary when the alternative is a worse, dangerous failure further down the line. The classical example of this is the fuse - it's a device designed to fail first in order to prevent other, more destructive failures. I know that's not the kind of engineered failure point you're thinking of, but it's important to understand that things like this may actually have good reasons.
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