Earlier quoted context omitted.
What are the risks of changing brakes? Never thought of that as a particularly risky endeavor before.
In addition to the other answers, brake fluid is toxic and removes paint.
Only the old dot3 does that.
How I replaced deadly garage door torsion springs (2002)
261–270 of 344 posts
Re: How I replaced deadly garage door torsion springs (2002)
#262Earlier quoted context omitted.
Thank you. I agree on all examples. Absolutely not worth the risk. Not even close. I wince thinking about when I changed my own oil in my 20s... Potentially throwing away so many good years, for so little gain. The car danger can be mitigated if the work is done under a professional lift.
I do my oil changes top-side now, using an air-powered Mityvac (MV7300; no affiliation). That's the factory-recommended procedure for several brands now and works well on my Mercedes and Honda. I was skeptical at first, but did the extraction and then removed the drain plug and the oil I got from the bottom wouldn't have half-filled a shot glass, so that's good enough for me. As long as the filter is accessible from…
NOt all crankcases can be drained fully this way. Please test using the drain plug the first few times. Budfy locked up his benz with this shortcut.
Re: How I replaced deadly garage door torsion springs (2002)
#263I have replaced these and am still alive. Apparently thats a big deal? When did we become so afraid of being responsible for our own safety?
Re: How I replaced deadly garage door torsion springs (2002)
#264I think the next time I have to replace my torsion springs, I'm going to install the Coplay Ez-Set system, anyone have experience with it? It has a built in tensioning system. https://www.homedepot.com/p/Clopay-EZ-Set-Torsion-Conversion... It has a built-in winder that uses a power drill. There are tools that will attach to the traditional winders and you can use a power drill, those tools are $800, which is a bit ha…
I've installed doors with that system, or a very similar Menard's carries.
Given the choice, I'd opt for it since it is easier to fine tune, but I'm not convinced it's safer than the traditional way. You still have to secure the door against unintentional movement and ensure everything is assembled correctly before tensioning.
The only "safety" feature I see is it eliminates the appeal to use an inadequate tool to tension the spring, so resist the urge to use a flimsy old screwdriver and you'll probably have similar risk either way.
Re: How I replaced deadly garage door torsion springs (2002)
#265Earlier quoted context omitted.
I once bought a table saw, then watched a YouTube safety video about table saws, and then sold my table saw. I wouldn't even consider owning a lathe. I know my limits, and even the chop saw in the garage gives me the shivers.
I used a Craftsman radial arm saw for a while. One day, I rotated the head 90 degrees to do some ripping. The saw grabbed the wood, and climbed up on it, and fired it at unbelievable speed at the wall. It punched a neat hole in the wall the exact size of the board, and the board disappeared into the next room. I got rid of the saw after that, and bought a sweet Makita cutoff saw instead, and a table saw for ripping.…
For what it's worth the 3M full-face respirators are very well designed in that the inlet air passes over your face and then into a sub mask where it is inhaled. Exhaled air is directed out of the front and down. I spent hundreds of hours with one (the FF400) in unconditioned spaces running power tools in fairly strenuous ways and never had it fog at all.
Re: How I replaced deadly garage door torsion springs (2002)
#266It's interesting whenever this comes up on Reddit and there are a hundred comments parroting how dangerous this is, but on closer inspection you can see the comments cannot discriminate between important details - eg. talking about how dangerous extension springs are, having no clue that they are different than torsion springs. Always fun to see how many people will pretend they have knowledge on a subject they have…
Something I've noticed is that, when under the guise of safety/"don't do this thing", netizens seem to have few inhibitions sharing information from topics they barely understand or have experience in. Some caution is always good, but I feel like people are too comfortable using it as an excuse for sharing unsubstantiated information as fact.
Re: How I replaced deadly garage door torsion springs (2002)
#267Earlier quoted context omitted.
"Notably, "unintentional fall" is the #1 cause of emergency department visits for adults" Most of these are not from DIY, but age realted
Among the workplace population, if you look at fatal workplace accidents [1] you'll find that falls are the second-most-common cause of death (deaths on the road are the most common) Construction workers have the second-highest number of workplace deaths (transportation workers are the highest) and among construction workers, falls are the most common cause of death. Transport and construction are second and third in…
I guess the problem I find with using these statistics is that there are a whole lot of people who are... I guess to put it frankly... doing things completely wrong.
For example, I regularly use my table saw but and I see accident videos on Instagram/YouTube where people are doing something inherently dangerous, dumb, and obviously wrong on a table saw that I'd never imagine even trying to do, and then I read replies and everyone is like "oh that's an honest mistake and it could have happen to anyone," which is a complete farce because they should have NEVER even attempted doing it that way to begin with. And if you attempt to explain why this method is dangerous and say something like "oh, you shouldn't do it this way because of the rotation of the blade's spin and the direction that you pushing the piece in means that you pulling your fingers into the blade," they'll attack you and tell you that it's a mistake anyone could make.
I guess it bothers me that people don't try to learn how something works, get into accidents, write it off as honest mistakes, and then thinks everyone makes mistakes as often as them. It's like a major disconnect between learning how to do something and learning how to be good at it and not having imposter syndrome.
Re: How I replaced deadly garage door torsion springs (2002)
#268I had a teacher in high school who was blinded (I think only in one eye) trying to do this repair. You could not pay me enough money to do this repair. >This work is risky, but the risk is comparable to doing your own car repairs, or climbing on the roof of your house to clean your gutters. Notably, "unintentional fall" is the #1 cause of emergency department visits for adults [1], which is why I'd hire a professiona…
> Notably, "unintentional fall" is the #1 cause of emergency department visits for adults Yes. Until it happens to you, it seems like someone else's problem. I say this as someone who found himself staring at the sky with a concussion and whiplash after the ladder decided to walk out from under me on my concrete walkway. (I'll admit that it was probably my error, but I'll never really know since the ladder took a tri…
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Re: How I replaced deadly garage door torsion springs (2002)
#269I had a teacher in high school who was blinded (I think only in one eye) trying to do this repair. You could not pay me enough money to do this repair. >This work is risky, but the risk is comparable to doing your own car repairs, or climbing on the roof of your house to clean your gutters. Notably, "unintentional fall" is the #1 cause of emergency department visits for adults [1], which is why I'd hire a professiona…
I don’t understand why it’s even considered safe to have one of these springs in one’s garage without a solid shield of some sort. While the energy involved is small on the scale of energy storage devices ( Which brings to mind some rather different designs. A rather small motor with a lot of mechanical advantage can easily open a close a garage door, and if a DC or low voltage AC motor is used, it could do so quite…
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Re: How I replaced deadly garage door torsion springs (2002)
#270Earlier quoted context omitted.
It’s amazing and honestly kind of sad how risk averse some people are. The reason I don’t change my oil anymore is it just isn’t worth the time and hassle. The “unsafety” of such a task doesn’t even register on my things to be worried about: at all. Jack it up, remember to put on gloves(!!!!) put the fucker on stands and go. The actual scary thing is I’m pretty sure way back when I was a kid we’d just dump the oil do…
I’m baffled too. Changing oil in a car is dead simple and effectively zero risk with a proper pair of jack stands and a modicum of common sense and mechanical aptitude.
Not everyone is born with common sense. I sure wasn't. I'll find some way to do something that will leave the people with common sense scratching their heads, saying "but why wouldn't you just...".