That old timer who called me out for using canned air on shutters

A retired repair guy watched me blast a shutter with canned air and just shook his head. He said 'you're just pushing grit deeper into the pivots, use a blower bulb instead.' I brushed him off at first, but after three repairs came back with sticky blades, I caved. Switched to a rubber blower bulb for all shutter work about 6 months ago, and my return rate dropped from like 1 in 8 to maybe 1 in 40. Canned air still gets used for sensors and mirrors, but not on mechanical parts anymore. Has anyone else had to unlearn a bad habit from a stubborn lecture?

2 comments

2 Comments

karen_nelson4023d ago

That 'pushing grit deeper into the pivots' thing really stuck with me when I read your post. My friend Dave runs a little fix-it shop and he used canned air on everything, including old stereo knobs and switches. One day a customer brought back a vintage receiver he'd cleaned, said the volume knob was grinding worse than before. Dave swore the canned air was fine, but the customer made him open it up right there. Dust and gunk had been blasted down into the contacts, actually packing them tighter. He switched to a bulb blower after that and his repair guy (who's like 70) finally stopped giving him the side eye every time he picked up a can.

wesley_thompson23d ago

That's a great real-world example of something I've seen happen more times than I'd like to admit. Did Dave ever figure out if the bulb blower actually fixed those packed-in contacts, or did some of the old repair guy's tricks end up being the real solution?