Air Hockey Again

Several years ago I purchased a regulation-size air hockey table for my birthday. The thing is as large as a pool table and is really a lot of fun. I got the table after spending a week at a friend's vacation home in Florida. In addition to a large pool, hot tub, elevator, gourmet kitchen, movie theater, and ten guest bedrooms, the house came with a massive arcade. Of course the arcade had a full-sized air hockey table. My boys spent so much time playing air hockey that I figured if I got one, it would get used a lot.

I was right. Well at least for the first couple of months. Now it seems that the only time the air hockey table is used is when we have guests. That is OK, it still gets played quite a bit.

A couple of months ago, I was walking by the air hockey table and tripped on the power cord. While I didn't do any damage to myself, the table ceased to work. Since then the table has served as a drying rack for sleeping bags after camping trips.

This weekend is homecoming for my kids' high school. My oldest son has a group of friends coming over to make pizza before the dance. They need an activity or two while they wait for the pizza to cook, so I decided to finally fix the air-hockey table.

Yesterday I crawled under the table with my trusty Phillips-head screwdriver. As soon as I was on the ground, the dog rushed over and started licking my face like it was time to play. Once the first layer of skin was completely gone, she decided to circle a few times and lie down with her butt right next to my head. I was free to continue my task.

I located where the power cord enters the table and took off the small plastic cover. This involved removing four small screws. Once the cover was gone, I could see the problem. A single connector had come unplugged and fixing the table was simply a matter of reconnecting it. It took less than a second to fix and I plugged in the table to make sure everything worked. It did and so I unplugged the power while I reattached the plastic cover.

It is amazing at how easy those screws came out. Putting them back in was a bit more difficult. You would think that once I had two screws holding the cover in place, the other two screws would automatically line up. They didn't and so I had to go get a flashlight to see what the problem might be. Then I couldn't get the screws to stay on the end of the screwdriver so I could put them back in the hole. Needless to say, this simple job was getting way too complicated way too quickly.

I have a little computer repair kit that I use around the house with all of my electronics. The screwdriver is not magnetic because magnets have a tendency to wreak havoc on hard drives and other parts of a computer. Had it been magnetic, the screw would have attached itself to the screwdriver and it would have been much simpler to put everything back together. So how do you accomplish the same thing without a magnet? The answer was "gum." I was chewing a piece at the time and so I pulled off an extremely small piece and placed it in the head of the screw. I then mashed the screwdriver into the head and watched the neon green gum ooze out. I gave the solution a quick jiggle and the screwdriver held the screw quite nicely. Ten seconds later, my air hockey table was all back together and working perfectly.

I was amazed at something as simple as a small piece of gum being so incredibly useful for fixing my air hockey table. That definitely is one trick to keep in mind the next time I have a pesky little screw that is seemingly impossible to grasp. Now I just need to use the table to help me fix a leaky air mattress before I turn it over to my son and his friends.