Watched a guy at a Des Moines estate sale fix a 1972 KitchenAid mixer on the driveway, made me rethink my whole 'swap the part' habit | Appliance Repairers - Thought Shares
Watched a guy at a Des Moines estate sale fix a 1972 KitchenAid mixer on the driveway, made me rethink my whole 'swap the part' habit
Stopped at an estate sale on Ingersoll Avenue three Saturdays back and saw an older fellow pull the back off a Hobart-era KitchenAid, clean the governor springs with a bit of fine steel wool, and have it running smooth in about 15 minutes. I have been swapping whole gearboxes on those mixers for years because it is faster and the customer never argues, but he charged $40 and the woman hugged him. How many of you still repair the old mechanical bits instead of just ordering the assembly?
Feels like swapping the whole gearbox is just covering up the real problem though. Those governor springs get gunked up and sticky, and a new assembly is gonna do the same thing in ten years if nobody ever cleans it. The old guy fixed the actual issue for 40 bucks and that mixer outlives both of us now.