My dad swore by WD-40 for squeaky hinges but he was kinda wrong

So last month I moved into this old apartment in Cleveland and every door in the place sounded like a haunted house. My dad told me to just spray WD-40 on everything, that's what he did for 30 years. I did that on 6 hinges one Wednesday and sure enough they were quiet for maybe 3 days. Then the squeak came back worse plus the hinges looked all greasy and collected dust. I finally asked my buddy who works at a hardware store and he laughed, said I needed lithium grease not WD-40. One $4 can later and every hinge has been silent for 2 full weeks now. Has anyone else found out their parent's old fix was actually the wrong one?

2 comments

2 Comments

david_jones388d ago

The WD-40 thing is basically life advice from a generation that thought one product could fix everything from arthritis to marriage problems. It's wild how many of their "hacks" were just temporarily masking the real problem.

parkerbrown8d agoTop Commenter

David's got a point there @david_jones38. My dad used to swear by WD-40 for everything. He'd spray it on a squeaky door hinge then turn around and use it on his rusty old car battery terminals. One time he even tried to fix a sticky carburetor on his lawnmower with it and that thing never ran the same after that. It's funny how they'd avoid actual fixes like rebuilding the carburetor or getting new parts because that cost money and time. WD-40 was just a bandaid that made them feel like they were doing something productive when really they were just making the problem worse down the road.