Fix-It Event - Planned for 28th Feb 11:00am to 3:00pm

The event will be less of a workshop in the sense that someone is an expert, and we come with our broken items, and more of an “all hands on deck”. We come together, a range of skills and knowledge, a range of ages and experiences, and we share what we can, put our heads together and work together to fix items that are broken.

Experts are of course welcome but novices too! It’s about letting ourselves be creative, and having a desire to learn when we don’t know.

The items we will work with will be a wide variety of things - some will be standard fixes, others require some research, internet searching, and key experts but there’s nothing we won’t try to fix! Some things may take time, or a few events to get the fit part/fix, but it’s a process where we discover and learn as we go.

Oh, and if it can’t be fixed? It can be hacked!

Come join us and let your creativity soar as we mend, tinker, repair, and re-purpose, to name a few!

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I’m really glad to see this taking off. One thing I’ve noticed that the Fixers Collective do is that they often have themed nights. “Fix your umbrella” seems to be a common one. Having a theme has a few benefits like reducing the learning curve for that device (after you work on the first few, you’ll have a better idea how the rest work), supplying spare parts for said devices (hey, can’t fix em all!), and ensuring that the subject matter experts are on hand. Not sure who that would be for umbrella’s but I’m sure we have somebody.

We should stock up on Sugru and Shapeloc!

Yes!

But we also have a big jar in the chemical locker labelled “Jet Set”, which is a similar product to Shapelock.

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This will be great. I remember someone new bringing their broken LCD TV to the hack space. Some members helped them replace the capacitors. The TV owner was so happy. A couple of tiny parts…and there you have something saved from the garbage.

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Just want to ensure no confusion, because the time changed to 1-4pm :slight_smile:
Also…Vancouver Fix-It Collective if you want to like the page and stay updated, and check yourself off as “going” to the event in…5 days!

This is a great event idea, and an excellent application of the following formula:

trash + effort = not trash

A couple Tuesdays ago I met a non-member who dropped in with his broken Internet router. We replaced a capacitor, got it working, he learned to solder, everyone was happy.

I have a Soundcraft Rac Pac mixer (photo) that I’ve been wanting to fix for a long time. Two of the channels are stuck on solo, and I don’t think it’s due to a switch failure. I think it could be a little more advanced than what I can troubleshoot myself. Is this an appropriate thing to bring to the event? I guess I’ll find out.

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Sure bring the mixer along

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If any of you want to go shopping beforehand, this is the same day

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@lukecyca I realized I never did see this! especially love the equation.
Thank’s for coming out and your dedication to fixing versus tossing is super inspiring and heart warming. Thank-you! And look forward to seeing you at future events…and hearing about how your mixer fix goes in the next round of fixing!

@miststlkr you actually bring up a really good point that I’ve been wanting to combat… all this ridiculous “recycling” that is a lot of times not even broken, but even more so, the simplist of tweaks and it would still work… but once it’s in the “take-back” bin, it’s “illegal” for me to grab it…so I’m thinking about work-arounds. A completely separate model though to getting people together and fixing, but it’s certainly something I’d like to tackle…recycle was the third R for a reason!

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Here are some photos from the event which you may have seen but if not… (more to be posted - on the event page/fb page so be sure to “like” if you have not already). I’ve included the direct link as well, below. @toptekkie @lukecyca

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~facepalm~ just put two and two together… event passed, kinda hard to go to that thing at Trout Lake unless you managed to scavenge a time machine… Sounds like an event like that would be a goldmine for people like us. I’l have to see what i can find out about future trade-ins like that

@miststlkr indeed it did pass but they have these quite frequently. I also was at the PMD recycling depot (third Saturday of each month in Brittania community centre parking lot around back), and they have a e-waste pick-up too… I brought a Fix-It Collective sign and a few flyers to say what we’re all about in hopes that folks would save it not toss it (would rather first encourage people to do it for themselves, fix it etc…versus just giving it to me to fix and save/sell)… but either way, I did keep an eye out too in the bin for items…it’s heartbreakingly insane what folks throw away (or ‘recycle’). At least one person picked up a flyer, and it lead to an interview…so that’s not to shabby for now… if you find out anything though about this kinda thing, i.e. rules around access to items once they have been brought back for recycle…please let me know. :slight_smile:

I think the problem would be that you are literally the competition for these return stations who undoubtedly get paid by weight as scrap metal or whatnot. So they may not be so cooperative. Judging by your last post, I might be wrong though.

True but I think it goes a bit deeper too…or more capitalistic however you want to call it. For example, I did a tour of Gibsons Recycling Depot (amazing facility, though they are now quite controlled by MMBC and as a result have been unable to do the more local recycling they were doing before…ridiculous!), and we had a look in at the electronics they are taking back from people …what we saw in that moment, we figured was at least a few months worth, turns out it was a few days… absolutely ridiculous…but then yes the icing on the cake was… they were told by MMBC or whoever collects it (hard to keep track), that it was a liability thing… basically what I’ve come to learn is that it’s mostly about our endless consumer culture ceasing to exist if we took things like this back to fix and re-sell, or kept fixing them in our own homes… sales would drop…vendors don’t want this so they impose these rules and then use fear as a selling point - “it may blow up in your home, and that’s huge liability…”

The other thing is, places that take back e-waste like Best Buy, a lot of times get perfectly usable equipment, my friend told me a story of a guy who came with a big flat screen TV, he was moving so he didn’t have the “time” to put it on craigslist or find someone for it (which is a whole other story of why we don’t take personal accountability for our own “stuff”) so he offered it to folk at BB who are there to take people’s e-waste. BB employees would be fired if they accepted it for themselves.

Unnecessary recycling/tossing of e-waste (assuming it actually gets recycled and parts salvaged, and hoping it’s done in a safe environment, i.e. if it’s sent oversees that is super harmful or everyone involved including our environment), is shameful when we consider how much conflict exists in the countries where the rare earth metals are mined, how many lives are lost for the tv you can’t bother to deal with responsible,… it’s really a crime, we just haven’t caught up with it yet.

As I say, I need to do more research but I think, or hope, it’s clear how sketchy this whole thing sounds. I really want to understand more where our stuff goes and not just electronics, but actual curb side recycling…how much is actually getting recycled, especially with it being single stream (more contamination)… we’ve kind of switched our problem from tossing everything to landfill to tossing everything to a recycling facility that may or may not be doing what we think it’s doing…hmph!

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Jocelyn
let’s plan to follow a recycling truck to its destination or better still
plant a Spot tracker of sorts in an item and track its travel and
destination
F

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What people chuck is insane. Down here in the west end electronics get tossed all the time. And we have such a transient culture of students and short-term visitors. Methinks if binners could get in on fixing up electronics they could make some serious money. I imagine some people are already doing that.

Looks like the event was great fun. I hope to make another one in the future.

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Jocelyn, thanks a lot for the perspective, it was quite eye-opening for me.

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These are awesome photos, Can someone make a post with them for the blog?

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That would be a really cool project…I’m in! When we see each other again let’s chat about this potential.

Thanks @funvill there shall be more indeed…so to whomever ends up doing that… let me know and I can provide more or feel free to grab off fb just please add cred and/or link to the fb page? That would be great :slight_smile: