[Engineering] The sorry state of...

{rant}

The sheer mediocrity of design and engineering in household objects is amazing to me. A couple examples:

I have a humidifier. It just died. Well, more like the motor rusted out. A humidifier is what makes my apartment liveable, my skin not itch, my allergies not overwhelm, and keeps my piano and cello from turning into cracked kindling.

So I decided to do some comparison shopping for a new humidifier, seeing as I don't particularily intend to buy a replacement Hunter humidifier, since the nonfunctional one I have has a wicking system that doesn't work, a leaky water reservoir, and a humidity control that cannot seem to understand "On" at 40% and "Off" at 60%. Oh, and the motor had already been recalled due to fire hazard!

You'd think that there would be something out there that people like and has been reviewed well. Nope. Almost all humidifiers on the market are two stars out of five at best. They suck. Warm mist ones bascially steam clean you, and you have to clean them constantly. Cool mist ones (evaporative), while the more natural way of doing things, tend to break and have lots of issues, including bacteria, dust, etc. The only model that seems to be well thought of is the VENTA line, which is a German company. Here's the problem with their novel turning disc humidifier: It costs over $400! And you have to fill it with anti-sediment solution every few days thats $50 a year. And you have to replace the filters fairly often. I can buy a whole new humidifier every time mine gets dirty for less that the upkeep costs on some of these units. What a waste. At some point the cost/benefit analysis will favor just buying distilled water at the grocery store and filling the humidifier with that every single day.

How amazing that we can perform feats of engineering wonder, and yet reliably getting a little bit of water into the air quietly, cleanly, cheaply, and in a low-maintainence manner, seems beyond the collective talents of the world's manufacturers. Someone, please, come up with a 2.5-4 gallon humidifier that is quiet, low on required cleaning, sanitary, doesn't generally require replacement filters or solutions, has a working digital humidistat, and doesn't break. I don't need some gaudy wood paneled whole house unit. My apartment is 525 square feet, I'd have nowhere to put it.

I DID find something that can reliably turn the humidifier on and off to keep a consistent humidity (important with cellos). This is an industrial grade humidistat with a 7% on/off range, adjustable humidity, and I could use it with any humidifer. The only hiccup is that it costs $120. For just the switch that turns the humidifier on and off! Still, since my cello is worth thosands, and my piano at least a grand, it seems like a decent investment. I still have to find a decent (or egad, maybe disposable) humidifier to hook it up to, and then not go broke or nuts replacing filters and cleaning the damn thing. I also find it funny that this model is called the THC-1, and the unit is sold on lots of 'home grow' sites. Probably because its being used to control the humidity on pot crops and not pianos.

Another item: razors. I have a very good razor that properly used works extremely well. I almost never use it. Why? Because it is a straight razor (cutthroat strop razor) from Solingen, Germany, and I have an aversion to bleeding to death if my hand slips. Most of the time I grind away with a POS Norelco electric, you know the crappy burn-your skin ones with the little circular blades that go dull in about a month and cost almost as much as a new razor to replace? I understand that Grundig makes some decent high-end shavers, but again, they cost a fortune (which tends to go with the Made in Germany label). The only piece of razor equipment that I have that works well is my beard trimmer, and that is because I removed the safety head and trim raw. Oh, and it blows through AA batteries in about a month. Do engineers know how much AA batteries COST? They aren't cheap unless you buy them in 100 packs, and who wants that. Please, please, will somebody engineer a decent razor that is safe, painless, effective on my bony jawline, is a close but not-too-close shave, has a decent power reserve, and does not cost a fortune?

I know these are not easy things to engineer. But we put a man on the moon! Maybe we can get some NASA folks to take a few weeks off and come up with something that works. And maybe we can get ISO standard razorblades, wicks, filters, toner cartridges, etc. so these manufacturers can stop trying to screw us with proprietary refills.

The list goes on, but I get the distinct feeling that the overall quality of almsot every household product has gone down markedly in the last few decades. Everything is not-so-cheap disposable junk. Consumer electronics alone could take up a weeks worth of bitch-blogs.

Manufacturing concerns of the world: please, quit building crap. We are an abstract value society in that we think we value products. Real materialist socieities would have, as Benjamin Hoff put it, no landfills. There would be no poorly manufactured products. Stop taking the Wal-Mart approach to building stuff and actually build quality again.

And I'm STILL looking for a decent alarm clock!

{/end of rant}