A lot of people are asking for the right to repair. Many people believe products should last longer, and therefore when broken, they should be repaired. This requires products to be designed for repair as well as support for repairers of all kinds. The goal of right-to-repair rules, advocates say, is to require companies to make their parts, tools and information available to consumers and repair shops in order to keep devices from ending up in the scrap heap. The surge in interest in right to repair is good news for consumers and environment, but it isn’t great news for those companies keen on planned obsolescence.
Fix, or Toss? The ‘Right to Repair’ Movement Gains Ground article says that in USA both Republicans and Democrats are pursuing laws to make it easier for people to fix cellphones, cars, even hospital ventilators. In Europe, the movement is further along.
Vice article The Right to Repair Movement Is Poised to Explode in 2021 article says that in USA fourteen states are exploring “right to repair” legislation as the movement gains steam. Whether it’s John Deere’s efforts to make tractor repair costly and annoying, Apple’s bullying of independent repair shops, or Sony and Microsoft’s attempt to monopolize game console repair, US corporations have done an incredible job the last few years driving bipartisan public interest in the “right to repair” movement. Last year witnessed monumental progress for right to repair and 2021 is expected to take the effort to an entirely new level.
In addition to the environmental impact of slowing the rate of expanding landfills there are also other benefits. A recent report by US PIRG found that repair monopolization comes with significant costs for American consumers. It also found that American families would save $40 billion ($330 per family) per year if they repaired more products and used them for longer periods. That’s of course
The French repair index: challenges and opportunities article tells that since January 1st 2021, France is the first country in Europe to have implemented a repairability index on 5 categories of electronic devices. While this index is a key milestone for the Right to Repair in Europe, it isn’t without limitations.
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Tomi Engdahl says:
How To Find Where A Wire In A Cable Is Broken
https://hackaday.com/2025/02/15/how-to-find-where-a-wire-in-a-cable-is-broken/
Determining that a cable has a broken conductor is the easy part, but where exactly is the break? In a recent video, [Richard] over at the Learn Electronics Repair channel on YouTube gave two community-suggested methods a shake to track down a break in a proprietary charging cable. The first attempt was to run a mains power detector along the cable to find the spot, but he didn’t have much luck with that.
The second method involved using the capacitance of the wires, or specifically treating two wires in the cable as the electrodes of a capacitor. Since the broken conductor will be shorter, it will have less capacitance, with the ratio theoretically allowing for the location of the break in the wire to be determined.
In the charging cable a single conductor was busted, so its capacitance was compared from both sides of the break and compared to the capacitance of two intact conductors. The capacitance isn’t much, on the order of dozens to hundreds of picofarads, but it’s enough to make an educated guess of where the rough location is.
How To Find Where A Wire In A Cable Is Broke. Which End Of The Broken Cable?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FOzEpJogSFg
I was recently working on an ebikecharger and a I have a broken wire in a cable. It’s easy to find which wire is broken, but wher in the cable is the break? In this video I test two different methods to find the break in the cable.
Tomi Engdahl says:
EEVblog 1407 – Right to Repair with iFixit Founder Kyle Wiens
https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x82p6mi
iFixit founder Kyle Wiens talking about Right to repair at the inaugural 2021 Australian Right to Repair summit.
Dave also talk about the Right to Repair initiative and the Australian Government Productivity Commission Right to Repair Report just released.
00:00 – Dave talks about Right to Repair
05:32 – Kyle Wiens from iFixit
20:30 – Kyle smacks down a John Deer apologist!
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.housedigest.com/1786560/how-use-multimeter-fix-repair-appliances/
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://hackaday.com/2025/03/06/plastic-gear-repair/
Tomi Engdahl says:
The Verge:
A look at the rise of “Frankenstein” laptops in India, made by salvaging parts from multiple brands and sold to students, gig workers, and small businesses
The rise of ‘Frankenstein’ laptops in New Delhi’s repair markets
India’s repair culture gives new life to dead tech.
https://www.theverge.com/tech/639126/india-frankenstein-laptops
“India has always had a repair culture … but companies are pushing planned obsolescence”
Sushil Prasad, a 35-year-old technician, wipes the sweat off his brow as he carefully pieces together the guts of an old laptop. It is a daily ritual — resurrecting machines by stitching together motherboards, screens, and batteries scavenged from other trashed older laptops and e-waste — to create functional, low-cost devices.
“India has always had a repair culture … but companies are pushing planned obsolescence”
“Right now, there is a huge demand for such ‘hybrid’ laptops,” Prasad says, his hands swapping out a damaged motherboard. “Most people don’t care about having the latest model; they just want something that works and won’t break the bank.”
“We take usable components from different older or discarded systems to create a new functioning unit. For instance, we salvage parts from old laptop motherboards, such as capacitors, mouse pads, transistors, diodes, and certain ICs and use them in the newly refurbished ones,” says Prasad.
As he explains, Manohar Singh, the owner of the workshop-slash-store where Prasad works, flips open a refurbished laptop while sitting on a rickety stool. The screen flickers to life, displaying a crisp image. He smiles — a sign that another machine has been successfully revived.
“We literally make them out of scrap! We also take in second-hand laptops and e-waste from countries like Dubai and China, fix them up, and sell them at half the price of a new one,” he explains.
“A college student or a freelancer can get a good machine for INR 10,000 [about $110 USD] instead of spending INR 70,000 [about $800 USD] on a brand-new one. For many, that difference means being able to work or study at all.”
But this booming market does not exist in isolation. It is entangled with a much larger battle, one between small repair technicians and global technology giants. While these Frankenstein laptops are a lifeline for many, the repair industry itself faces significant roadblocks. Many global manufacturers deliberately make repairs difficult by restricting access to spare parts, using proprietary screws, and implementing software locks that force customers to buy new devices instead of fixing old ones.
Satish Sinha, associate director at Toxics Link, a nonprofit working on waste management, believes repair technicians like Prasad and Singh are on the front lines of a larger battle.
“India has always had a repair culture, from fixing old radios to hand-me-down phones. But companies are pushing planned obsolescence, making repairs harder and forcing people to buy new devices instead,” Sinha says.
“We need to encourage such reuse of materials. These repaired or new hybrid devices minimize waste by extending a product’s lifespan and reducing overall market waste. Reusing components cuts down on the need for new materials, lowering energy use, resource extraction, and environmental impact,” Sinha adds.
The Indian government has started discussions on right-to-repair laws, inspired by similar efforts in the European Union and the United States. However, progress remains slow, and repair shops continue to operate in legal limbo, often forced to source different parts from informal and e-waste markets.
As a result, many repair technicians have no choice but to rely on informal supply chains, with markets like Delhi’s Seelampur — India’s largest e-waste hub — becoming a critical way to source spare parts. Seelampur processes approximately 30,000 tonnes (33,069 tons) of e-waste daily, providing employment to nearly 50,000 informal workers who extract valuable materials from it. The market is a chaotic maze of discarded electronics, where workers sift through mountains of broken circuit boards, tangled wires, and cracked screens, searching for usable parts.
Farooq Ahmed, an 18-year-old scrap dealer, has spent the last four years sourcing laptop components for technicians like Prasad. “We find working RAM sticks, motherboards with minor faults, batteries that still hold charge and sell it to different electronic workshops,” he says. “These parts would end up in a landfill otherwise.”
But while e-waste salvaging provides cheap repair materials, it comes at a steep price. Without proper safety measures, workers handle toxic materials such as lead, mercury, and cadmium daily. “I cough a lot,” Ahmed admits with a sheepish grin. “But what can I do? This work feeds my family.”
Despite the dangers, the demand for Frankenstein systems continues to grow. And as India’s digital economy expands, the need for such affordable technology will only increase. Many believe that integrating the repair sector into the formal economy could bring about a win-win situation, reducing e-waste, creating jobs, and making technology more accessible.
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://hackaday.com/2025/04/10/clever-engineering-leaves-appliance-useless/
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://hackaday.com/2025/04/16/using-a-mig-welder-acetylene-torch-and-air-hammer-to-remove-a-broken-bolt/
Tomi Engdahl says:
When Repairs Go Inside Integrated Circuits
https://hackaday.com/2025/05/20/when-repairs-go-inside-integrated-circuits/
What can you do if your circuit repair diagnosis indicates an open circuit within an integrated circuit (IC)? Your IC got too hot and internal wiring has come loose. You could replace the IC, sure. But what if the IC contains encryption secrets? Then you would be forced to grind back the epoxy and fix those open circuits yourself. That is, if you’re skilled enough!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9y7xRpFYLjk
Tomi Engdahl says:
Developer Unlocks Newly Enshittified Echelon Exercise Bikes But Can’t Legally Release His Software
Jason Koebler
·
Aug 27, 2025 at 4:22 PM
A firmware update broke a series of popular third-party exercise apps. A developer fixed it, winning a $20,000 bounty from Louis Rossmann.
https://www.404media.co/developer-unlocks-newly-enshittified-echelon-exercise-bikes-but-cant-legally-release-his-software/
An app developer has jailbroken Echelon exercise bikes to restore functionality that the company put behind a paywall last month, but copyright laws prevent him from being allowed to legally release it.
Last month, Peloton competitor Echelon pushed a firmware update to its exercise equipment that forces its machines to connect to the company’s servers in order to work properly. Echelon was popular in part because it was possible to connect Echelon bikes, treadmills, and rowing machines to free or cheap third-party apps and collect information like pedaling power, distance traveled, and other basic functionality that one might want from a piece of exercise equipment. With the new firmware update, the machines work only with constant internet access and getting anything beyond extremely basic functionality requires an Echelon subscription, which can cost hundreds of dollars a year.
In the immediate aftermath of this decision, right to repair advocate and popular YouTuber Louis Rossmann announced a $20,000 bounty through his new organization, the Fulu Foundation, to anyone who was able to jailbreak and unlock Echelon equipment: “I’m tired of this shit,” Rossmann said in a video announcing the bounty. “Fulu Foundation is going to offer a bounty of $20,000 to the first person who repairs this issue. And I call this a repair because I believe that the firmware update that they pushed out breaks your bike.”
App engineer Ricky Witherspoon, who makes an app called SyncSpin that used to work with Echelon bikes, told 404 Media that he successfully restored offline functionality to Echelon equipment and won the Fulu Foundation bounty. But he and the foundation said that he cannot open source or release it because doing so would run afoul of Section 1201 of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, the wide-ranging copyright law that in part governs reverse engineering.
“It’s like picking a lock, and it’s a lock that I own in my own house. I bought this bike, it was unlocked when I bought it, why can’t I distribute this to people who don’t have the technical expertise I do?” Witherspoon told 404 Media. “It would be one thing if they sold the bike with this limitation up front, but that’s not the case. They reached into my house and forced this update on me without users knowing. It’s just really unfortunate.”
“A lot of people chose Echelon’s ecosystem because they didn’t want to be locked into using Echelon’s app. There was this third-party ecosystem. That was their draw to the bike in the first place,” O’Reilly said. “But now, if the manufacturer can come in and push a firmware update that requires you to pay for subscription features that you used to have on a device you bought in the first place, well, you don’t really own it.”
“I think this is part of the broader trend of enshittification, right?,” O’Reilly added. “Consumers are feeling this across the board, whether it’s devices we bought or apps we use—it’s clear that what we thought we were getting is not continuing to be provided to us.”
Witherspoon says that, basically, Echelon added an authentication layer to its products, where the piece of exercise equipment checks to make sure that it is online and connected to Echelon’s servers before it begins to send information from the equipment to an app over Bluetooth. “There’s this precondition where the bike offers an authentication challenge before it will stream those values. It is like a true digital lock,” he said. “Once you give the bike the key, it works like it used to. I had to insert this [authentication layer] into the code of my app, and now it works.”
Witherspoon says that, basically, Echelon added an authentication layer to its products, where the piece of exercise equipment checks to make sure that it is online and connected to Echelon’s servers before it begins to send information from the equipment to an app over Bluetooth. “There’s this precondition where the bike offers an authentication challenge before it will stream those values. It is like a true digital lock,” he said. “Once you give the bike the key, it works like it used to. I had to insert this [authentication layer] into the code of my app, and now it works.”
Roberto Viola, the developer of a popular third-party exercise app called QZ, wrote extensively about how Echelon has broken his popular app: “Without warning, Echelon pushed a firmware update. It didn’t just upgrade features—it locked down the entire device. From now on, bikes, treadmills, and rowers must connect to Echelon’s servers just to boot,” he wrote. “No internet? No workout. Even basic offline usage is impossible. If Echelon ever shuts down its servers (it happens!), your expensive bike becomes just metal. If you care about device freedom, offline workouts, or open compatibility: Avoid all firmware updates. Disable automatic updates. Stay alert.”
Witherspoon told me that he is willing to talk to other developers about how he did this, but that he is not willing to release the jailbreak on his own: “I don’t feel like going down a legal rabbit hole, so for now it’s just about spreading awareness that this is possible, and that there’s another example of egregious behavior from a company like this […] if one day releasing this was made legal, I would absolutely open source this. I can legally talk about how I did this to a certain degree, and if someone else wants to do this, they can open source it if they want to.”
Tomi Engdahl says:
JuiceBox Rescue: Freeing Tethered EV Chargers From Corporate Overlords
https://hackaday.com/2025/08/27/juicebox-rescue-freeing-tethered-ev-chargers-from-corporate-overlords/
Having a charger installed at home for your electric car is very convenient, not only for the obvious home charging, but also for having scheduling and other features built-in. Sadly, like with so many devices today, these tend to be tethered to a remote service managed by the manufacturer. In the case of the JuiceBox charger that [Nathan Matias] and many of his neighbors bought into years ago, back then it and the associated JuiceNet service was still part of a quirky startup. After the startup got snapped up by a large company, things got so bad that [Nathan] and others saw themselves required to find a way to untether their EV chargers.
The drama began back in October of last year, when the North American branch of the parent company – Enel X Way – announced that it’d shutdown operations. After backlash, the online functionality was kept alive while a buyer was sought. That’s when [Nathan] and other JuiceBox owners got an email informing them that the online service would be shutdown, severely crippling their EV chargers.
Escaping the chains of tethered products: the Juice Rescue project
https://natematias.com/portfolio/2025-08-22-unchaining-from-broken-software-tethers/
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.404media.co/developer-unlocks-newly-enshittified-echelon-exercise-bikes-but-cant-legally-release-his-software/