About 4 years ago I went online to find the manual to our ice cream maker as it had a recipe we wanted to try, and at the time we could not find it (that was before we used the filing cabinet and even were really organized). It took about 3 hours of searching, traversing various sites, before I found what I was looking for. The manufacturer’s site was of no help. Their site looked like it was made from geocities. With that in mind, I was hesitant to begin the phase of going paperless where you download or scan your manuals to get rid of the paper copies.
I’m happy to say things have improved dramatically in the last 4 years. The ice cream maker’s site? I found the manual in about 45 seconds. For most manufacturers even, you can now track down a manual for something you own to download and throw out the paper copy. It’s fantastic!
But there are still limits. Store brands are woefully under-represented. It is still possible to find such manuals online, but you have to go to sites that advertise themselves as manual repositories, and usually just contain links back to the manufacturer or store front who doesn’t have that manual available for download. Some of the sites do have manuals, but the download link is obscured around several dozen google ads they try to make you click by accident. I’m pretty sure that’s their business model. They can be found, but it does take some hunting. Craftsmen and Husky proved particularly challenging.
Another limiter is that a lot of the manufacturers only provide manuals for products they are actively selling. A shop vac I bought from Ryobi is no longer offered and the manual cannot be found anywhere.
There are also time limits, even for larger companies that you wouldn’t think would be a problem. A Frigidaire refrigerator we bought in 2005 had an easy to find manual, but the chest freezer from 2001 could not be located. If you want to go paperless, start downloading manuals now! Just because you can find them now does not mean they’ll still be around when you need them.
It has been a good two weeks of getting rid of paper. I hope to snap a photo of everything that we’re putting out for recycling this Thursday.
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