They're supposed to be better.

There is a constant balance between utilizing new technology to accomplish a task, and the reality of the environment we live in. Micro controllers of some form inhabit pretty much all electronic devices we have, and they have done wonders for not only reducing the size of machines, but also allowing those machines to operate more efficiently. On the other hand, micro controllers are also pretty sensitive to disturbances, and power surges are fairly common here. So on the parts of our electric system that we don't have surge protection, its not uncommon for the "Placa" (micro control board) to no longer function. So all of that is to say that sometimes when it comes to equipment, old school "electromechanical" control is what I prefer. Electromechanical devices can take a lot more abuse than a micro controller, but sometimes you find your self in a situation where you exchanged one set of problems for another.

Enter exhibit A. Pictured below is an electromechanical timer removed from one of the dryers here. The center features various shaped cams in the center that, driven by a small electric motor, slowly rotate around in a circle and engage various switches for certain amounts of time. Thus giving you dry clothes after several minutes.

Cam timers are very robust and reliable (in this form they date back to the 50's, but da vinci even featured cams in his machines). I prefer equipment down here to use them over a micro controller because of their durability. However sometimes you run into unexpected tradeoffs. Normally this timer lives behind a cover and the white plastic stem has a knob attached to it and that's what we rotate when setting the timer. So to allow a motor driven timer to also receive input from a human, this was designed with a friction interface. Whenever you rotate the knob to a new setting, you aren't actually spinning the electric motor that controls the timer, you are simply sliding the cams into a new position. When you release the knob the motor will then return to spinning the cams around but from this new setting. Its pretty novel solution to a problem of having both a human, and an electric motor controlling the position of the cams. The problem though is when there is too much friction and you suddenly find yourself unable to turn the knob. The very human response is to then just use more force to turn it. Unfortunately in this case, that happened, and the result was broken control knobs and then a complete inability to use the dryer. Not an ideal situation when the hospital is quite full an thus doing many loads of laundry every day.

At the end of the day even my beloved cam timers aren't a cure all. In this case we were able to get things working enough that the dryer can be used, but it will need further repairs in the future. I'm looking forward to our next container shipment that has the new commercial dryers that will be replacing these.