Abandoned laundry room.....

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You can find sites devoted to "forgotten" places in most every language for every country. Have seen such sites in German, French, and so forth.

There really is quite allot of abandoned property and or forgotten places out there, one only has to look.

Remember spending a long night looking at a site devoted to abandoned church yards, grave yards and other burial grounds located in England. Scary but none the less interesting.

Don't think many persons/governments intend for things to end up abandoned and or forgotten, just things happen, usually time. In all of our lives we can think of things that are supposed to be done, but we put them off for "tomorrow", then we die.
 
I think I have to agree with Gordon

Tom, I think the language you used was hardly appropriate when you responded to Dave's statement regarding these abandoned machines. To those of us who have been in the repair or restoration business for a number of years (for some of us, more then we would like to admit), what would be considered one man's trash in another one's treasure.
 
I am sorry for the tender ears. If I left out the word "hell," what about the response is harsh? Do you see the rust? Do you see the depth of the organic material and ceiling material on the floor that these appliances are sitting in? Do you see the evidence of the wet environment that cannot do any part of these machines any good? What would you pick of these "precious artifacts" to restore? Would you exhort someone to go into this building without seeing any of the access points or paths to grab these machines in a situation that would be trespassing and without knowing how far away you would have to park? Would you, as a restorer, pick any of these rusted hulks as a prime subject for restoration? I would hope you are not so desperate for machines that you would risk life and health to go after these. They are pieces of crap. Dave's response was an emotional outcry couched in ignorance of the subject. All he saw were old laundry appliances.

John and his brother Jeff and I began restoring appliances together in 1981 and we were doing it separately before that. In 1969 I took apart and put back together a 1958 WP combo with the old style pump and lint filter so I know a bit about restoring appliances, but you have to pick your restoration projects with a little more discernment than Dave's cry and you really try to avoid middling machines like these in a dangerous environment with phyto-toxins & animal waste all over. Fortunately, these would not have the fiberglass insulation to get saturated with rodent urine like some stoves we have reconditioned.

I am very sorry if I disparaged what you consider to be treasure; it looks more like scrap metal in a toxic environment to me.
 
Considering the age of these machines, I seriously doubt they would be worth restoring, even if you could get one good chassis out of these.

There is a lot of rot on those chassis. Even if you could find a good chassis, would you really want to restore an early-90's era machine?

Tom is right about one thing, the rust on the bottom of these machines looks horrendous. Who knows what the mechanicals look like on the inside. Chances are, these things have been sitting in a good six inches of water.

Look at how the ceiling has collapsed, these machines have been rained on. If you could get one of these working, it would be one heck of an investment. The wiring is probably quite delicate and fragile now.

It's a beautiful picture though.
 
When I was on the board of directors for the 1940 Air Terminal Museum in Houston at Hobby Airport we had to deal with a lot of these same kinds of issues. When our foundation acquired the building it looked very much the same way as the room pictured with the washer & dryers.

There is usually asbestos in these old types of buildings and you have to call in asbestos abatement contractors to remove all of it before you can. And they ain't cheap. It can take years of fundraising and work to restore something like that.
At the museum we had roof leaks where water would enter on the top of the building and leak all the way to the first floor through all the walls & floors. And rooms that look like this smell.

The room in the terminal that back in the 1940's was the nurse's office still to this day smells like iodine or merchurachrome even though the room hasn't been used in probably 40 years.


 
When I was on the board of directors for the 1940 Air Terminal Museum in Houston at Hobby Airport we had to deal with a lot of these same kinds of issues. When our foundation acquired the building it looked very much the same way as the room pictured with the washer & dryers.

There is usually asbestos in these old types of buildings and you have to call in asbestos abatement contractors to remove all of it before you can. And they ain't cheap. It can take years of fundraising and work to restore something like that.
At the museum we had roof leaks where water would enter on the top of the building and leak all the way to the first floor through all the walls & floors. And rooms that look like this smell.

The room in the terminal that back in the 1940's was the nurse's office still to this day smells like iodine or merchurachrome even though the room hasn't been used in probably 40 years.


 
Machines surrounded by dereliction can come good!

Hi guys.

A couple of years ago some photos were posted on an urban explorers website in the UK and were reposted on a Discuss o' Mat thread.

After a week or so of investigating and contacting the owner of the building, the machines were rescued by myself and another member.

The machines had resided in a derelict school in Plymouth, on the south west coast of England and are photographed in their old home below...

matchboxpaul++7-17-2012-16-16-45.jpg
 
The machines were purchased from the buildings owner and he was present when money changed hands, outside the building.

Would always suggest that permission is sought and gained, to prevent issues arising later. Plus its simply a lot safer - in my case the school had developed a reputation for being a bit of a drugs den and was in one of the less salubrious parts of Plymouth...

matchboxpaul++7-17-2012-16-20-21.jpg
 
and the Hotpoint 1509/05 Automatic De Luxe.

There is hope for derelict machines, just takes permission from the owner, a bit of money, time and patience.

Cheers
Paul

matchboxpaul++7-17-2012-16-26-4.jpg
 
Diamonds in the (very!) rough...

The before and after pics are just stunning! I can't even imagine how much patience and work those two took to come back to glory. Bravo!

 

RCD
 
outstanding

Nice restoratiom of the Hoovers I would not of thought it possible.I was fascinated with the abandoned laundryroom picture,the only thing that would have made it better would be if the machines were older.I think the room is alot older than the machines.Those are late 80s early 90s direct drives which have a certain charm I sold a few not long ago.I would not attempt restoring these as they are plentiful if you want one.
 
I think that the machine in the center of the room at floyd bennett field is a Design 2000 I have one in my apartment building.
this commercial machine featured the DD tranny and boy is it a power house :)
 

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