Mr and Mrs Fixit

I was fixing something again today, I got to use the ratchet set!! And I had a little epiphany.

My father-in-law was an electrician for the city of Los Angeles. Reeder remembers going with his dad to the job, climbing up into the inner workings of buildings all over Los Angeles, including City Hall. He also got to go up on the mountains to see (and work on) the relay tower stations... all of it wonderful adventure for a kid.
And so he understands all things electrical. And while I bragged about fixing our ice maker (a second time the other day,) because I could figure out where the line was freezing and thaw it, HE replaced a part on our water softener and got it up and going again. He had studied it as it would try to run, then just stop part way through its cycle. He figured out where it was failing and then went and bought this little $8 part.
"I am so impressed you figured that out, I seriously pictured us dishing out several hundred bucks for a new unit this weekend." He answered,
"YEARS of working in the lab and repairing Gas Chromatograph machines. I simple had to study it to figure it out."

My epiphany came when I realized Jim is much like his dad in these things, and I am more like MY dad.
My dad has always been a jack-of-all-trades, and by profession, an engineer. No, he didn't drive trains (although, funny you should ask, he loves laying out model trains in his retirement.)
He designed engines and their paraphenalia for Hughes Aircraft in So California for many years. Then he was offered to go to design spaceships with NASA, but instead he stayed in So Cal and ended up working for Special Devices, Inc, where he designed stuff for the army. There was always a drafting table set up in his bedroom covered in plans. I remember once he was designing fake grenades for training purposes, that would 'explode' with some sort of dye, to show a soldier he was 'dead'.

I LOVED the exactness of those plans, the fine measurements involved, and his very neat printing. And he could always repair everything around the house.

So today, I set out to replace the dead fan in our bathroom. I was determined to NOT go get a handy-man for this, it seems relatively easy to pop it out and then replace it. The fan sits up in the ceiling of our little toilet area, directly above the toilet, so the first hurdle to get over is just how to reach the silly thing. After picturing for days how to get our various ladders in that TINY room, I told my friend and she suggested I use this tall step-stool she had. It JUST barely clears the toilet bowl, but it does straddle it, for really easy access to the ceiling. (Brilliant, Nichole!)

I consulted the resident electrician about the various parts of the whole procedure. I showed him the little motor I'd pulled down, and he pointed out it might not be the motor, but rather a transformer, and I'd need to pull out the whole unit. He understands the electrical motor part of it, I understand the larger bugs to be worked out.... Really important things, like ladder placement.

A word of warning: The reason our fan died was immediately evident when I removed the cover, which itself was pretty dusty. The inside motor was COVERED w/ fuzzy lint. I mean, it looked basically like a beige tennis ball up there (or something one might find in the back of one's fridge.... not that that has ever happened in THIS household. ;c) I wish I'd taken a photo of it.
The other fan (photo) in the larger part of the bathroom has only a quarter of the fuzz of the bad one, so it's clear the lovely soft toilet tissue we use creates too much 'dust' which gets sucked right up onto that motor..... so save yourself some repairing headaches and vacuum your fans before they die of suffocation or overheat or something. Popping off the cover to do so is a must, though jockeying a stool or ladder in there will be a pain.

So after a trip to Home Depot, it turns out we were both right - that little motor COULD be replaced. Or, as we did, you pop out the whole unit and replace it. I did the popping out and staging before I ran off to work, and Jim put the new one up in there. Tomorrow I'll be sure to vacuum the rest of our exhaust fans. But not tonight, I'm exhausted. And I've exhausted all my clever lines here, so I should wrap this up.