Home Repair Scrabble

 Today I went from hero-to-smuck-to-hero-to-smuck and back to hero.

The first trip to smuck was when our microwave ceased to function.

I was back to hero because I had a back-up, which did not work...hence the second trip to smuckdom.

Then I disassembled the door of the broken microwave and this is what I found:

I put the broken spring in a baggie so Mrs ERJ had something to show the guys in the hardware store.

The spring that pulls down the prongs of the door latch had broken into two pieces. The microwave has a fail-safe to ensure it does not run with the door open. Without the spring pulling down on the prongs, the switch tells the device the door is still open.

Mrs ERJ made a trip into town and brought home a sampler-pack of springs that Bruce at Pettitts Hardware thought might work. He apologized profusely for having to gouge her for $3.

As most people know, any time you can fix an electrical appliance at home it comes with a multiplier of 10X. If you can fix it with a zip-tie, that is another 5X and the ultimate is to fix something electrical with both a zip-tie and baling twine which carries an additional multiplier of 7.5X

Since the tension spring from the hardware store had full-rounds on both ends and the injection molded feature on the door was a blade that would not accept a round hooks, I drilled a small hole in the bottom of the plastic casing of the door and snaked a loop of baling twine up to grab the round end of the spring.

Then I tied the two ends of the loop I passed up over a zip-tie, tensioning it until the latch hooks "felt" right. I tightened the zip-tie and trimmed to tidy things up.

This fix came with a Home Scrabble Repair score of 375 and my name is once again inscribed on the wall in the Hall of Heroes.