2025, Family, home, Uncategorized, work

Jiggling The Wires

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We were having some problems with our 15 year old gas stove. If you didn’t start a burner just right, the whole control panel would short out, and we would have to reset the clock, the timer, and the ovens if we had them going.

This was pretty annoying, so we called the local appliance repair company. The technician came out, unplugged the stove from the electrical socket, and pulled the stove out (now I know where the gas turnoff is for the stove. That was an anxiety for me). He removed the back of the stove, checked for frayed wires, checked out connections, replaced the back, and put the stove into position. Nothing needed to be replaced or fixed. It worked perfectly. No matter how the burners were started the electrical panel didn’t short out. The repair guy said sometimes just unplugging the appliance and jiggling the wires will do the trick. We plan to get a dual fuel stove in summer, as electric heat is better for baking. If there wasn’t a gas connection, I would have loved to jiggle the wires.

What appliance woes have you experienced? How are you at jiggling the wires and seeing what happens? Any current appliance worries for you?

23 thoughts on “Jiggling The Wires”

  1. I’m a big proponent of jiggling wires or handles. I am often telling people “just keep pressing buttons.” Usually it will ask you before it deletes anything.
    It kinda makes me a little crazy that people will stand in the dark saying “I didn’t want to touch anything.” It’s just a light switch! Try it!

    Oh, there might be one or two times that didn’t work out so well, but I can’t think of any. 🙂

    Our microwave is little bit glitchy lately. Kelly has been reading up on new ones. I’ve learned how to make popcorn without the ‘popcorn’ button. But I use the ‘add 30 seconds’ button often. That’s a must have.

    When we got a new washer / dryer a few years ago, I was cleaning out the dryer vent pipe before the delivery. I had a long #9 wire (if you know what that is…just a heavy piece of wire about the size of a regular pen ink cartridge) and I tied a rag to the end. And I got the rag stuck in he middle of the pipe. It was a whole big deal and the installers did the washing machine and were about to leave when I finally got it out.
    Note to self; don’t do that again. And I won’t because after the bathroom remodel last winter the vent is now vertical.

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  2. Almost every appliance these days employs some sort of rudimentary computer control so unplugging them to reboot is a good first step when they are acting up.

    I’m less sanguine about jiggling the wires. Unless something is loose and making intermittent contact, that shouldn’t do anything and if it does there’s an issue that needs to be addressed.

    The only appliance I can think of offhand is the television in Robin’s studio that won’t connect occasionally to the internet. The solution is always to reboot the Roku box.

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  3. I don’t really have any current appliance woes. When I moved here in September, the stove was a fire hazard due to so much built-up bacon grease. The oven had not been cleaned ever in its entire life, and the build-up inside was flammable. I didn’t dare use the self-cleaning feature due to risk of fire. I did remove all the coil-type burners on top, and tried to clean underneath them with vinegar and baking soda, then with CitraSolv, but it was really bad. And one of the burners didn’t even work. All four of them were caddywampus when re-installed, and wouldn’t sit flat. The icebox in the old refrigerator had mold in it. Somebody else’s grease and somebody else’s mold. I bought a new stove and refrigerator.

    I also bought a new microwave. I should have researched microwaves. It makes me press a “Stop” button before it will allow me to open the door. Drives me crazy, but it works.

    I moved my washer and dryer over here when I moved in. I moved the pair that was here over to my old place. There was some fuss and bother and expense with that, but it was worth it.

    Sometimes I have the same tv trouble Bill described. Just re-boot the Roku and it works fine again.

    Remember the days when your tv would turn to snow or multi-colored lines rolling up and down on the screen? The fix for that was to give the tv a good solid wallop on the side and it would be fine for a while again.

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  4. Rise and Shine,Baboons,

    The last appliance woes I experienced were in the AZ condo, which is now someone else’s problem. The water heater had to be replaced after failing the day before we were scheduled to return home, so we had to stay until that was completed. The washing machine also broke, but a repair guy fixed our Sears 2003-era washing machine. He said, “Never replace that. They last forever.” We did not replace it. Had we kept the condo, I wanted to replace the stove and fridge which did not have the features I wanted.

    Here appliances are not the issue since everything has been replaced fairly recently. However, our vinyl kitchen floor, only 6 years old, is falling apart under our feet. My construction guy who installed it says the 12″ X 24″ vinyl tiles are falling apart. He had to replace 3 other floors, one which was only 2 years old. So, a new floor is in progress, but right now we are only gathering options.

    OT back to yesterday:

    Clyde, welcome home.

    Linda, I enjoyed the Mary McCaslin song you posted later in the evening yesterday. Thank you. That is so lovely and thoughtful. I have been communing with Carol yesterday and this morning, discussing her demise with her. As PJ pointed out yesterday, I think she had an inkling that her body was failing her.

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    1. This Clyde. Signin is a failure. What wires do I jiggle?
      My current failed appliance is me. So I got home and feel good. But I was producing a great deal of blood in my urine. As directed, I called my doctor. He squeezed me in. Four times before I had urinated this morning and left deep red color in my urine. I went in. Urinated for him. Just like with a repairman, only a slight orange tinge. Same since then. Hope it lasts.
      But he also told me I did not have a UTI. He does not know what, but all hospital labwork says no infection. What put me that far out of it, gave me such chills, made me so weak.
      Kids and have narrowed it down to maybe anesthesia side effect. Never had a reaction before to the many general anesthesias I have had, but as you grow old, they can start to happen.

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  5. I have learned to do a restart on the computer at times, when it’s starting to act wonky.

    Several years ago, our refrig was running so loud we replaced it with… the same damn refrig (least expensive at Menards). Guess what…

    TV off-on clicker no longer works, so I have a tiny phillips screwdriver there that I can reach in and push the on/off button. I imagine we could get a new remote that would work, but….

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  6. A couple of weeks ago we had an electrician here as the city was replacing meters in houses. The visit reinforced my previous observations of electricians in Dickinson that electricians love to gossip. The Luverne electrician just had to tell me all about the current living quarters of the people we bought this house from, and the elaborate sound system they had installed. I guess I would describe the electricians of my acquaintance as Livewires! Plumbers aren’t as talkative.

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  9. When I challenged the Comcast lions in their den two weeks ago, the guys in the store spent over an hour getting my account reduced and getting rid of my land line. This involved three calls to some other departments. The last department told my guy to replace all my boxes with the latest wireless boxes. Nobody in the store could figure out why but they sent me home with four boxes nonetheless, as well as four new remote controls. Took about half an hour to get them all replaced and working. Funny that they call them wireless boxes. Although no co-axial cables any longer, there are still power cords and the hmdi cords to the tvs – that’s not wireless in my book!

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    1. So was Beethoven, in 1770. A pretty good decade for great artists.

      Chris in O-town
      (whose appliance story (saga) is too long to summarize here. Safe to say it was a minor annoyance that took weeks and extra dollars to solve.)

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  11. Our dishwasher is the same vintages the stove. As long as we set it to Pot Scrubber and Turbo zone, the dishes get clean. It is a Kenmore. It will probably be replaced when the stove is.

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