21
Condor
6y

Recently I disassembled this Remington beard trimmer that I have, right. Thinking that I probably just depleted the battery or something like that, and that that's why the fucking thing would turn off after 10 seconds, with a miserable motor speed that could only be caused by what.. 2.5V or something like that? So I kept up with it for a while, and then a few days ago, I finally disassembled the fucking thing.

New 4.2V LiPo battery of my own attached, wicked! The thing has a 2Ah capacity and is fully charged, so fuck all in a big ship, I'ma shave my fucking hair without protection, who cares with 2Ah anyway, given that motors at 4.2V consume only 800-ish mA, right. So I shaved my head, and figured.. holy shit mate, I fucking beat this fucking cunt, fuck you Remington! Planned obsolescence my ass!!!

Just now @xewl sent me a request that made me reconsider this shaver. Some PS3 controller, should be easy enough to fix. But I referenced my shaver so I figured that I might actually check it beforehand.

The original fucking battery has 4V left on it. 4 fucking volts! That ain't gonna trip shit for an overdischarge protection circuit!!! WHY THE FUCK REMINGTON, WHY THE FUCK DID IT (IF ANYTHING) TRIP?! And more importantly, why did you make the motor turn for only 10-ish seconds after charging, 1 year after purchase, despite the fucking cell having 4 fucking volts in it, which is more than plenty to get the thing turning for at least a 60% charge?! Planned obsolescence perhaps, hmm?

But let's say that it was bad contacts or something like that. After all, my probing was a bit intermittent, showing 1.5V (if it's shorting, shouldn't it be in the mV range?) and then 4V at times, until I separated the nickel connectors from the 16500 cell. Why the fuck should that thing short, considering that it's unprotected?! The fucking cell is unprotected, and you Remington are going to let it short? What kind of fucking engineering is that, you fucking braindead morons?!!!

And why do you use a 16500 cell which isn't very standard over a 18650 cell, which is? Again, planned obsolescence? Fucking vile pieces of shit.

Now what's more.. I tried to power on the shaver for a picture for this fucking rant, using a LiPo cell of my own that I used to shave my hair with the other day, to get a nice picture of my little hack. But the fucking thing, despite having 3.89V left in it after that fucking shave, which is more than plenty for a lithium cell, the fucking unit doesn't power on. WHAT THE FUCK REMINGTON?!! That's planned obsolescence at its best, init?!! You vile fucking pieces of shit.

So I guess that this rant is no more one of "I beat these Remington cunts". It is one of "you can bet your fucking ass that planned obsolescence is a thing!!"

Comments
  • 2
    It's always been a thing. Hell look at rechargeable drills, every-fucking-year they change the profile of the batteries and either discontinue or charge 4 times than a battery was the year before. Cunts think they can make a killing, jokes on them i just cut them open and replace the damn battery cells
  • 1
    @PerfectAsshole That should always be the appropriate reaction really.. fuck the form factor, new cells and fuck it, just like new! But unfortunately companies don't always agree :/

    (I tested this shaver another time with that cell and got it working btw.. so the "fuck you Remington and your shitty planned obsolescence!! I beat ya cunts!!!" still holds! :3)
  • 3
    My razor runs on AAs, which is pretty nice. I miss being able to easily replace batteries in some devices.
  • 1
    Maybe the original battery is so shitty that the voltage drops massively as soon as you apply a load, thus triggering the overdischarge protection? (Not that it's an excuse, but it might explain what's happening when you try to measure its voltage)
  • 1
    I bought this Phillips trimmer qt4011 and after 2 months of use it started discharging within a minute of full charge.
    I went to the service centre and the guy opened it up and said that the circuit is shot due to contact with water, hence the quick discharging of battery.

    Since water was involved the guy fucking refused to fix it under warranty and wanted to me pay 75% of the original market price as he'd have to change the whole board.

    Fucking shit, I felt like I'm being conned since I don't know much about circuits and electronics and refused his offer. Now my trimmer doesn't charge and I have to use it while it's plugged in the power socket.
  • 1
    @nvzard that guy is a fucking Genius! Not in the positive way, the guy's a fucking Crapple Genius Bar level idiot. Water damage can short the battery, sure. But the contacts are miles away from each other! Unless it was completely submerged and consequently blew up, fuck it! What's the worst that could happen.. battery shorts and blows up, that's a problem. Controller could short, overheat and let out the magic smoke out, sure and that'd also be a problem. Solution: replace the fucking component, not the entire board you Genius twat! At least that's what I would say to them, or rather, actually do myself. And not only that, how does a BATTERY that doesn't hold a charge require replacement of the MOTHERBOARD?!! Cheeky little service center twat.

    Considering that the thing still works but doesn't hold a charge, I suspect that the battery is the problem. Those things are easily replaceable, so fuck it. I mean sure if it's a li-ion cell of 18650 or 16500 type it usually involves spot welding some nickel tabs on and soldering those into the board, but still.. it isn't very costly and it costs like 15 minutes of labor at most?

    Please don't service the thing yourself if you don't know what you're doing (lithium cells can blow up when handled improperly), but what I can say is that if the repair costs more than like €20, for me at least that shit ain't gonna fly, not for a simple razor.

    That said, water damage is usually not covered under warranty so of course a repair of that isn't free. And it's a human labour so it is expensive compared to the work of the machines that make the units.

    Finally, please don't use water near electronics _/\_ it's a reasonably good conductor so it risks shorting stuff, but it also corrodes contacts. If the board and the components aren't conformally coated, water ingress can easily damage the electronics inside.
  • 2
    Solution: dont shave
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