I needed to clean the dryer lint chute this morning. Loads seemed to be taking longer to dry. And I know it can be a fire hazard to have a build-up of lint in the chute. We clean the screen with each load, but lint falls down beneath the screen. Speaking as a non-contortionist, that fallen lint can't be easily seen.
Anyway, I need to buy the right tool to make this job easier for me. But for today, the "tools" I had to work with were a wire coat hanger, lots of duct tape, a cardboard pasta box, and the vacuum cleaner. I improvised an extension for the vacuum hose with the pasta box and some of the duct tape. And I made one coat hanger/duct tape attracting tool after another to pick up loose lint and dust that the vacuum attachment couldn't reach. I did get the job done, but it took me about an hour and a half and lots of frustration.
Now on the flip side, having a good tool will make a job go so much more smoothly. After about an hour I grabbed a good flashlight so I could see down the chute and identify the remaining pile of lint/dust that was within my primitive tool reach.
An interesting thing -- we had been thinking the element on our 28 year old dryer was wearing/burning out, as loads were taking longer to dry. After cleaning the chute today, I put a load of sheets into the dryer, went to heat up a bowl of soup for my lunch, took my lunch break (which is only long enough to eat a bowl of soup), and came back to the kitchen to wash my bowl. Was I ever surprised when I couldn't hear the dryer operating! My load of sheets finished drying in about 3/4 of the more recent dry time.
I will be ordering the proper tool this very week. I could have used that hour of work time on a different project. Sometimes being cheap costs more in other areas.
Because a photo of my dryer is not terribly interesting, I also thought I'd show you one of my other projects from today -- a plum coffee cake for my family. I'm told it is delicious (contains milk, so I'm abstaining).
