G'day Bob,



12 Oct 96 10:09, Bob Lawrence wrote to Rod Gasson:



 BL>> I don't understand the amazing improvement in motor reliability

 BL>> over the last few years, not only in hard drives by VCRs too.

 BL>> They hardly ever fail!



 RG>> I don't know where you get this idea from

 BL>   I got it from the returns of a major service operation.



All that proves is that the motors in these machines are as good as

they ever were, but the machines are failing in other areas due to

their crappy/cheap design ;-)



 RG>> but next to belts and other rubber parts, the motors in VCR's

 RG>> would be the next most common part to fail. If anything, the

 RG>> motors in the newer machines are failing far more, and far

 RG>> sooner than those in the older machines.



 BL>   I was thinking of the spinning head when I wrote that, as analogous



The heads drum motors have always be VERY reliable..  It has been the

capstan and load motors that seem to cause most of the

problems/failures.



 BL> to the hard drive. I don't know your service operation, but Palsonic

 BL> sell 20,000 VCR a year and fix them all under warranty plus probably

 BL> half of them through their life. The initial failure rate is less

 BL> than 2% per annum (about the same as Dave stated for the hard drive)

 BL> and the head assembly would not be 10% of that.



They must be doing something right...   When I was working with Radio

Rentals (the only place I've worked that sold new equipment), the

failure rate on machines less than 6 months old was up around the 10%

mark.



 BL>   But I understand that all techs think everything they fix is a heap

 BL> of shit,



Not everything..  Just most.



 BL> that they don't make them as good as they used to



This is true.



 BL> (in spite of all evidence to the contrary),



Why is it that when I first got into this line of work, the average

life expectancy of any particular machine is/was at least five years.

Today, it is not unusual for me to recomend people to scrap machines

that are barely 2 or 3 years old ?



 BL> and in particular not as good as

 BL> the Hoonomatic Vc11234-rt-3A that was the best (whatever) ever

 BL> made,



Nah...  the NV180 was the best VCR ever made.  ;-)



 BL> and that the entire world would stop if they didn't keep

 BL> servicing junk that should have been scrapped three years ago.



If people choose to live in a disposable society, why do so many of

them seem to get upset when I tell them their 3yo VCR is uneconomical

to repair ?



Tis a sad fact of life that people are buying disposable products, yet

at the same time they expect them to be servicable.



Cheers,

Rod



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