miia monthly » equipment

Blew thermal fuse on the Shop-Vac again!

AuSable — Thu, 25 Mar 2010 18:51:54 +0000

I thought that it was kind of strange the first time around, when I blew out the thermal fuse on the Shop-Vac. But blowing the fuse a second time really threw me for a loop, since I didn’t think that the filter was even that dusty to cause the Shop-Vac to overheat. Go figure.

At least I was smart enough to install the replacement thermal fuse with bullet style electrical quick connects, in case it ever needed to be replaced again. This time around I going to use a slightly higher temperature thermal fuse than the first time around. So this time I’m going to go with a 291.2F (144C) thermal fuse. Since the next highest temperature thermal fuse at Radio Shack was 550F, but at that temperature, I would think that the plastic housing would start to melt before the thermal fuse would trip. Which would kind of defeat the whole purpose of having a thermal fuse to begin with.

It took me about 10 to 15 mins to do the thermal fuse swap, and I was back up and running with the Shop-Vac, so we’ll see how long this fuse lasts.

New Fuse:
Radio Shack part# 270-1320, 291.2F (144C) Thermal Fuse

Commercial Deli Meat Slicer

AuSable — Fri, 08 Jan 2010 14:40:24 +0000

Well I probably just got one of the best birthday gifts in a very long time from my sister and brother-in-law. And what could that gift have been…..why none other then a professional 12″ deli slicer. OH YES, you read that right! This is one of those things that I’ve wanted to get for the longest time. Because it doesn’t matter how thin you want then to cut your cold cuts at the deli counter, they just never cut it thin enough. Lets face it, people are lazy and the thinner you cut it, the more effort you have to exert for the same finished weight.

So after I received the deli slicer, I basically left it in the middle of my dinner table, just so I could look at and marvel at now having such a piece of machinery. But with all upside, always comes a little bit of downside. And the downside with this slicer was that it needed a little bit of a tune-up.

But first a little bit of background on this deli slicer. This isn’t a new slicer, as much as a 2nd/3rd hand slicer. To quote Chairman Kaga “If memory serves me right”, the slicer was purchased used, so that it could be put into service at my sister/brother-in-laws restaurant. After a number of years of heavy use at the restaurant, they finally decided it was time to upgrade to a new Hobart or Berkel deli slicer. So after the upgrade, the old slicer was removed from service and just gathering dust in their garage. Hence where I stepped into the picture, and took this “burden” off their hands.

With that little back story out of the way, let’s get back to the tune-up. The easy part of the tune-up was just re-greasing the carriage slides. The real work came down to three items: the blade cover, the blade itself, and the on-board sharpener.

Project 1: Blade cover.

With the slicer my sister included an extra blade cover. Since the current cover was slightly damaged, in that the threads at the center attachment post were stripped. But the problem with the new cover was that the center post was 5mm taller then the original cover. Turns out that there is a double threaded steel insert in the center post of the cover, so all I had to do was remove the new threaded insert from the new cover (very easy) and swap it for the rusted threaded insert on the old cover (very hard, since I had to use WD-40 and the biggest Vise Grips I own to remove the rusted insert). So with one project done, it was on to the second tune-up project.

Project 2: Sharpen the blade.

Now to the blade, the stones on the on-board sharpener were broken, so I tried to sharpen the blade free hand, which was very hard to do. So I finally bit the bullet and found a professional sharpening company in town, and one of there specialties is sharpening meat processing blade. The price was totally reasonable ($26.20 and done the same day), and holy mackerel is the blade sharp. When I saw the orange sticker on the transport package that said “sharp” in bold black letters I thought to myself “We’ll see how sharp this is, when I start slicing some meat.”

Well, I was cleaning off some oil on the blade with a wadded up piece of paper towel, and for some reason my hand slipped a little bit off the blade face and caught the cutting edge of the blade. And it sliced through all five layers of the wadded up piece of paper towel and nicked off a little bit of my right index finger like it was nothing. Now I keep some sharp knives in the house since I subscribe to the maximum that a “A sharp knife is a safe knife”, but this has to be hands down the sharpest blade in the house. Period.

Project 3: On-board sharpener.

I’ve already emailed Eurodibs (the manufacturer of the slicer) and I still haven’t gotten a reply back from the parts department to get some new sharpening stones. So I guess that I’ll have to give them a call to get the parts. I’ve already been to a couple of local food supply service shops, and they don’t carry, nor can they order parts for Eurodibs slicers. So now I’m basically stuck with having to deal with the manufacturer to get the parts that I need. Boo to that!

So with that I’m off to slice some cheese, from the two blocks that I just bought at Costco: Cabot Habanero Cheddar and Cabot Pepper Jack. Try getting those at the deli counter!

Black Friday 2009

AuSable — Sun, 29 Nov 2009 02:30:27 +0000

I didn’t partake in a lot of the Black Friday madness, but there was one item that I had a keen interest in obtaining. For the last couple of months I’ve been thinking about getting a KitchenAid stand mixer, but I just couldn’t pull the trigger. Maybe part of it had to do with the +$400 price tag on the model that I wanted (Pro 600, 6 qt bowl, 575 watts, bowl lift style.)

Being trigger shy turned out to be a good thing, because Costco was running a Black Friday special on a KitchenAid stand mixer. And what a deal it was! Regular price was $279.99, with a $50 off Black Friday coupon, so it was $229.99 before tax. And to sweeten the deal a little bit more, KitchenAid has a $30 mail in cash rebate for select stand mixers. So final price will be $199.99 before tax, which is an awesome deal, so I just couldn’t pass it up.

Yeah, so this mixer isn’t exactly what I originally wanted to get, but for this price I’m more then willing to settle.

Here are the specs on the mixer:
KitchenAid Stand Mixer Professional HD Series – Color: Gloss Empire Red
475-watt motor
5 Qt bowl
Bowl life design
Soft Start Electronic start up
PowerKnead Spiral Dough Hook
Bonus items: Digital timer & 4 prep bowl set (don’t really care about the bowls, but the digital timer is pretty nice)

Shop-vac back in action

AuSable — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 06:50:37 +0000

All it took was less then $4.00 in parts from Radio Shack, and my Show-Vac was back in action. It cost me $1.69 for a thermal fuse, with a 129C limit/10amp rating, and $2.19 for a bag of mixed bullet electrical connectors. At first I thought about just hard wiring the fuse to the circuit. But if the fuse blew up once, more then likely it will blow up again. So I might as well make my life easier, and wire it up using bullet connectors. That way it will be easier for me to swap out the thermal fuse in the future.

This Shop-Vac almost turned into the proverb about “all for want of a nail“. But it helps that I have at least some technical knowledge to get me out of a jam. I would categorize this situation as only a small jam, hence only about an hour or two of time invested into this project, and now I’ve got my Shop-Vac back up and running.

Add one more item to the broken list – Shop-vac

AuSable — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 05:32:20 +0000

And the hits just keep on rolling.
I set out some time tonight to finally vacuum and mop the whole house. And while I was vacuuming my bedroom, which by the way is the only room in the house with carpet, my Shop-Vac stopped working out of nowhere. At first I thought that the extension cord had gone bad. After that was ruled out, all I had left to troubleshoot was the Shop-Vac itself.

After the instruction manual left me wanting, I turned to a couple of online forums and my worst suspicions were confirmed. I ended up blowing the thermal fuse that is all the way inside the motor housing. As you can probably tell from the exploded view below, you really have to take apart the whole shop-vac to get to that little part. Luckily I think that I may have found a replacement thermal fuse at Radio Shack (always saving me in an electronics pinch). So all I have to do is swing by the one that is a couple miles from my house, and pick up a replacement fuse. Wish me luck.