Right to Repair

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Whether it be electronics, automobiles or medical equipment, the manufacturers should not be able to horde “oem” parts, render your stuff useless if you repair it with aftermarket parts, or hide schematics of their products.

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McDonald's Ice Cream Machines, Break Often, Intentionally A Pain to Diagnose, and Impossible to Fix (www.ifixit.com)

submitted 1 year ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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iFixit tears down a Taylor ice cream machine and finds that it overheats often, takes hours to restart, and these issues are impossible to fix because of locked down software and terrible error messages. No wonder, since Taylor makes 25% of its money charging $315 per 15 minutes for their exclusive repairs.

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[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 year ago (2 children)

It's crazy for even a company like McDonald's to get fucked by this sort of thing.

You'd think they'd have enough institutional power to not have to deal with this, but I guess if front office decided on an icecream machine supplier then franchisees are the ones dealing with the extortionate repair pricing.

I dont get why McDonald's doesnt't design and commission a machine in-house, imagine if their grills and fryers were out of commission as often as the ice-cream machines. I think those machines are custom for McD's

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago (2 children)

I'm guessing it's because McDonald's is getting some sort of kickback from Taylor. They're definitely coming out on top over this, otherwise they would have gotten out of it a while ago. This is McDonald's we're talking about, everything in that restaurant is intentional.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

yeah someone is def getting rich with these expensive "repairs" by intentionally designing the hardware to require outside maintenance

likely management at mcd's has someone behind this even though this seems to cost invidual restaurants lot of downtime on products which doesnt really make lot of sense to support

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

It's depressing when things are purposely shitty for shareholder value.

Tim Hortons in canada used to have in-store bakers that cost about as much per baked good as the frozen pre-made shit they get now. But Tim Hortons corporate makes more by forcing franchisees to buy the frozen donuts, and the bakers were skilled labour they got to get rid of.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

I can almost guarantee someone in house is getting kick backs from Taylor to not replace the machines with something else