Boost weak wi-fi...with a baking tray

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Permalink Reply by Hugh on November 9, 2011 at 11:00

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Permalink Reply by Alan Stanton on November 9, 2011 at 12:57

Ah, the fun of improvising with household objects!

Reminds me of the metal coat hangers people used as portable TV aerials. And I know someone who locked themselves out and used a coat hanger through the letterbox to retrieve the doorkey from the hall table. (Though it's obviously wise not to leave keys within reach like this.)

I once suggested to Haringey's Environment Service that street cleaners needed a tool to extract cans and litter wedged 'tidily' behind phone cabinets. They said the cleaners could turn their brooms around and poke the cans out. I got a similar answer after a resident phoned in a panic when a pool of water over a blocked drain gully was getting close to his front door. Haringey's staff advised wiggling a broom handle down the drain. It worked fine.

Since then I've found other uses for widely available free tools — such as twigs.

(Tottenham Hale ward councillor)

 

 

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Permalink Reply by Old-Age-Emporium(OAE) on November 9, 2011 at 15:02

Homo Habilis was pretty handy with improvised tools back in the early Pleistocene period. So too my old Nan a little later in getting intelligible sounds from her old wireless via the same discarded sash-window weights she used to protect her chicks from thunderbolts. Neither of these ladies felt bound by branded technology or Ikea instruction sheets and allan keys.

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Permalink Reply by L F T Snowflake on November 9, 2011 at 15:21

This rather reminds my of a (probably not true) story of a pal of mine who was a gas cooker engineer. On getting called to a job, she found that the woman was complaining because the location of her cooker (and being made of metal) meant that it had become a radio receiver permanently tuned to Radio 1.

 

"Well, I don't know what you want me to do about it" pleaded my friend. "I've not got a problem with receiving radio she replied, its just ahta I was wondering if you could retune it to Radio 4"

 

Slightly off topic, but

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