In Addition to Their Other Charms

Wait until I get my hands on the person who suggested I could fix my space heater.

Dedicated readers will recall that I have an annoying space heater that makes a loud noise when the fan goes on and off. I bitched that the manufacturer should have a setting where the fan runs constantly, to avoid the noise when you're trying to sleep. Someone said I should open it up.

I took the damn thing apart, and I figured I'd bypass the thermostat on the fan circuit. Oh, no. Sorry. It turned out the fan and the heating elements are in series. The fan is a 3V AC job, and I have no way of providing that voltage except by running the power through the heating elements. I tried to measure the resistance of the elements so I could match it, but I can't get a decent reading. Seems like it may be 10 ohms.

I suppose I could go find a 10 ohm 120 V resistor, plug it in, and see what happens.

I decided to open up a second heater which has the same problem, and guess what? The screws have TRIANGULAR HOLES. What sick son of a bitch came up with that idea? A hex wrench will sort of fit some of them. The rest will require a screw extractor.

I swear to God, sometimes trying to use tools is like a chapter out of Kafka. I want to look up the guy who designed those screws and spend about a week kicking him in the groin.

Long story short, I did not fix the heater.