Replacing a broken set of blinds in my house and apparently no one sells the old standard kind where you pull the cord to raise them, I guess because kids and/or pets could tangle in the cord? Bit of an education in miniblinds today.

  • mumblerfish@lemmy.world
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    3 months ago

    That is the only kind I know of. How does the other kind work?

    Edit: should have been more specific; the string ones are the ones I know of.

    • Tarquinn2049@lemmy.world
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      3 months ago

      We use honeycomb blinds here. You can get them in partially transparent or blackout. They are spring-loaded, and you really can’t use them wrong, pull them up or down as fast or as crooked as you want.

      • JusticeForPorygon@lemmy.world
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        3 months ago

        I think those are the ones being referred to. Nowadays they makes ones that look almost identical but don’t have the pullstrings. You can just raise and lower them from the bar on the bottom.

        • Soggy@lemmy.world
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          3 months ago

          Which suck if you have windows higher than your head. Pullstring can be ten feet long and work just fine.

    • OZFive@lemmy.world
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      3 months ago

      You lift them from the bottom and there is a system of gears and springs (citation needed) that assist with them being raised and hold them in place.

      Pull them down from the bottom and they come down (with some resistance).

        • growsomethinggood ()@reddthat.com
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          3 months ago

          They can! They look identical to the old blinds, just without the string. I had to ask if the installers forgot the strings when we got new ones a few years ago!

          • mumblerfish@lemmy.world
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            3 months ago

            Wait, I meant like in between the glass of the windows. If you have to pull and push the blinds themselves that would not work… right?

            • TheRedSpade@lemmy.world
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              3 months ago

              Are you saying that they’d be in between 2 stationary panes of glass? That sounds like a nightmare to deal with anyway.

              • mumblerfish@lemmy.world
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                3 months ago

                Stationary for usual operations, at least. There is usually a mechanism to open it up so you can mend them if necessary.

    • linearchaos@lemmy.world
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      3 months ago

      The ones I put up in my house have a high tension spring inside the top. When you want to raise the blinds you lift them up when you want to lower the blinds you pull them down. They’re not fantastic but they work well enough. You have to kind of coax them to go up lift them up a few times but then again mine were the cheapest Walmart had available

      • Broken_Monitor@lemmy.world
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        3 months ago

        I’ve got the Ikea version of these and they work great, no coaxing at all. Way easier than that stupid pull cord, I would never go back. Put them up all over the house. One of them went slightly crooked and I never did figure out why or how to fix it though. I think I will eventually get some higher quality replacements anyway.

        • Annoyed_🦀 @monyet.cc
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          3 months ago

          I love that thing when i saw it, unfortunately i can’t have it because i suspect my cat will destroy it in a week, so i got a cheapo one with beaded cord that loop. I guess i have to tie that up for safety.

      • Fester@lemm.ee
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        3 months ago

        I also use the cheapest Walmart ones and they’re fine - much better than the “try 15 angles till you find the right one” cords. The trick is to raise them slowly and gingerly so that you’re not just bunching up the blinds.

        My favorite thing about them is the snap-on installation. No more sketchy slide-in plastic cubes with a plastic cover. Just drill the metal clamp on and snap them in. Surprisingly sturdy.

        I actually didn’t know the old style was “illegal.” I just thought they were so unpopular that they replaced them, even at the most basic option.

    • Ogmios@sh.itjust.works
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      3 months ago

      Mine have a hard “handle” with a string attached to it on a pulley. Twist the handle to adjust the angle, pull the string down on one side to open them, pull the string down on the other side to close.

  • TheRedSpade@lemmy.world
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    3 months ago

    I didn’t even realize they were called "mini"blinds until I moved in to my current place and there was some kind of rule that mentioned them. I’d only heard them referred to as “blinds” my entire life up to that point. This implies the existence of larger blinds which I’ve yet to see.

    Edit: I’ve definitely seen them. Apparently my brain is underclocked today.

  • RunawayFixer@lemmy.world
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    3 months ago

    This seemed like such an arbitrary law that I went looking for it and apparently it’s a small committee (4 persons*) rule that was poorly substantiated. The rule itself has been shot down by an appeals court in 2023, but the industry obviously had already set plans in motion to change their product line ups.

    “On September 13, 2023, the U.S. Court of Appeals vacated the CPSC’s rule on custom window coverings. The court agreed with WCMA that CPSC failed to provide an opportunity to comment on the underlying incident data, conducted a flawed cost-benefit analysis that ignored the enormous harm that the rule would have caused the multibillion-dollar custom window coverings industry, and selected an arbitrary effective date for the rule. The CPSC acknowledges that the industry will need at least 2 years to develop completely new products. So the six-month effective date would make it impossible for the window covering industry to create proven safe replacement products.”

    https://suncoastblinds.com/understanding-the-cpsc-rule-on-window-coverings-and-the-appeal/

    • I’m not from the USA, so to me it seems very weird that this is how decisions with far reaching consequences are taken. In the eu legislation like this gets putten through the wringer in the eu Commission, probably also voted on by the eu Parliament, and then still given years preparation time and back and forth between industry/lobby groups/government. But instead this was: 4 non elected people take a vote and those 4 see no issue with a 6 month deadline. Wth, what a rugpull this would have been for the industry.

    Edit to add: that rule that lost in appeal in 2023, was from November 2022, so maybe it does go in effect in november 2024, since it seems like that timetable was the biggest issue for the industry. Just speculating though, can’t look it up atm.

    • Captain Aggravated@sh.itjust.worksOP
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      3 months ago

      Actually I don’t think it is, because they’re fixing it. “Hey here’s a problem, let’s use engineering to eliminate the problem.” Best thing we do as a species.

      • AwkwardLookMonkeyPuppet@lemmy.world
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        3 months ago

        Don’t make the two strings into a loop. Problem solved. Or secure the loop to the wall. Problem solved. But really what I meant is that it’s depressing that people have managed to strangle themselves in a contraption that’s pretty benign by design.

        • Dearth@lemmy.world
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          3 months ago

          I agree. It’s really sad when children and pets die accidentally or for any reason really.

          What’s truly depressing is all the jaded assholes who think that their adult intelligence is the standard for every baby and animal in the world so it’s somehow the kids fault for strangling themselves because they should have known better

        • NιƙƙιDιɱҽʂ@lemmy.world
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          3 months ago

          They tend to tie themselves into a loop, even when left open.

          The risk is not to people in general, but specifically young children and pets that wouldn’t be expected to know how to get themselves out.

          • AwkwardLookMonkeyPuppet@lemmy.world
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            3 months ago

            I guess that’s understandable. The ones we have use a metal chain that’s in a loop, but secured to the wall. You just pull one side or the other to raise or lower the blinds. It works okay. We do have one of those old-school ones in the kitchen though, and I like how rapidly I can raise the blinds.

        • pyre@lemmy.world
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          3 months ago

          in this magical world you live in, do corded ear buds stay untangled as well?

  • sunbrrnslapper@lemmy.world
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    3 months ago

    I thought it was a myth that kids got tangled up in the cord until my kid did it. Thank God I was standing near by.

  • UncleGrandPa@lemmy.world
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    3 months ago

    About 9 children die every year , strangled by mini blinds. 3500 children are killed by guns every year.

    Why did we only fix the most unlikely one?

  • ContrarianTrail@lemm.ee
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    3 months ago

    Anything is lethal when you give it to a million people. This is the main reason I take issue with pointing out individual examples of for example autonomous vehicle crashes and treating that as an evidence for why they’re inherently dangerous. Almost nothing is 100% safe. I bet there are dozens of people suffocating to their pillows each year.

    • Annoyed_🦀 @monyet.cc
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      3 months ago

      So by your logic if a collision from bicycle or even from people running isn’t 100% safe, then it’s as dangerous as car?

    • acosmichippo@lemmy.world
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      3 months ago

      Are you saying we should not have safety regulations just because we can’t make everything 100% safe?

      • BobTheDestroyer@lemm.ee
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        3 months ago

        Nothing is ever 100% safe. Risk assessment is a big part of federal regulations. (See refs at JSTOR and NCBI) One of the key questions is what is the cost/benefit balance for a product. Kitchen knives are hazardous, but it’s very hard to cook without them, so they balance heavier on the benefit side despite the risks. Radithor is all risk and no benefit, so it was an easy decision to ban it.

        The point ContrarianTrail was making is that there is some risk in nearly everything. People have died as a result of garden tools, cars, house pets, shaving, buckets, toothpicks, baseball, etc. Here’s a list. The part he left out is the cost/benefit analysis. I prefer pull cords on my blinds, and I find the new regulations annoying. But I guess some federal agency decided they aren’t so useful that it’s worth the risk to children. And it would be selfish to be all upset about it if it saves some child’s life.

        • acosmichippo@lemmy.world
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          3 months ago

          I was giving them the chance to clarify their point, because they didn’t say anything beyond “nothing is safe” as a justification for poo-pooing an attempt to improve safety. Hence the question, which they have so far declined to answer themselves.

          The point ContrarianTrail was making is that there is some risk in nearly everything. People have died as a result of garden tools, cars, house pets, shaving, buckets, toothpicks, baseball, etc. Here’s a list.

          Yes, we all know “nothing is safe”. it’s a trivial point to make, and if that’s the only part of the situation you mention (as the person above did) you’re either not thinking very hard or are being deliberately misleading.

          I prefer pull cords on my blinds, and I find the new regulations annoying. But I guess some federal agency decided they aren’t so useful that it’s worth the risk to children. And it would be selfish to be all upset about it if it saves some child’s life.

          Exactly, it’s not that hard to understand. Pull-cord blinds cause deaths, and other reasonable alternatives do not. Framing the discussion to “100%” and dismissing accidents/deaths as anecdotes, to me, seems deliberately misleading. Yet you accuse me of being inflammatory by asking a follow up question. okay.

    • WalrusDragonOnABike [they/them]@lemmy.today
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      3 months ago

      Username checks out. If they weren’t so awful, maybe people would care about defending them, but there’s just all-around awful. They’re uglier, harder to use, and seem to frequently get damaged (probably mostly from people trying to fight with them or just bending them out of the way because damaging them is worth it to avoid dealing with them…

      • ContrarianTrail@lemm.ee
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        3 months ago

        There’s always roller blinds for the ones among us to whom mini blinds are too difficult to use.

        • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
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          3 months ago

          Is it that they’re “too difficult to use” or is it just that they’re a pain in the ass? Because it’s the latter in my experience.

          • y0kai@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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            3 months ago

            In my experience, one begets the other.

            It’s a pain in the ass because its difficult to use. Or, at least more difficult than it needs to be.

            • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
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              3 months ago

              Yeah, but they also break really easily, and then you have the fun of either trying to get the string fixed or back on the track or whatever or just replacing the whole thing.

    • I_Has_A_Hat@lemmy.world
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      3 months ago

      Oh, I see you havent used the style that replaced them yet. Infinitely worse.

      The idea in concept is you just lift up or pull down from the bottom of the blinds and they’ll stay in place. In practice however, you pull down and they refuse to budge, risking you breaking them. And then when you lift up, they go to a certain point and then just stop retracting and will fall down halfway from where you wanted them.

      I hate them. I hate them so much. Although, I will say blinds in general are just awful. Curtains are the superior window shade.

      • tyler@programming.dev
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        3 months ago

        You got cheap ones. And like bottom of the barrel cheap. I have ones from Home Depot and that has never happened. What has happened is that the internal strings have a lot more friction on them and they have snapped, rendering the entire thing broken. But of course I got the cheapest ones from Home Depot too.

      • lightnsfw@reddthat.com
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        3 months ago

        I haven’t experienced them those but the pull down shades I’ve used in the past have thing where you can twist the rod to set the tension and make them work better. Does it have something like that you can do? Also I agree with you about just using curtains

  • JusticeForPorygon@lemmy.world
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    3 months ago

    I remember my dad bought some for his house and they didn’t have the pullstrings. I remember thinking that was so neat because the pullstring ones were always a pain in the ass to raise/lower.

  • tacosplease@lemmy.world
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    3 months ago

    Maybe miniblinds specifically? I bought nice Bali brand blinds from Home Depot a few months ago, and those hdad pull cords.

    They’re a lot thicker than mini blinds though. Not sure why it matters for the cord. A kid could strangle on the Bali cord easier than with a cheaper set.

  • MNByChoice@midwest.social
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    3 months ago

    I used to think it was “only” toddlers. Tragic stories of 12 year olds dying from the pull cords. Fucking horrible.

      • AnIndefiniteArticle@sh.itjust.works
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        3 months ago

        Take two pieces of string with wooden knobs at the ends and hang them up together.

        Put your arm between them and pull down quickly.

        Repeat, and notice how a fraction of the time those wooden knobs may wrap around each other and become tied by a knot held by the downward force of your arm until you pull up which you can’t do if you’re hanging.

    • kungen@feddit.nu
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      3 months ago

      Am I misunderstanding what pull cords are, or why not have it so the two strings can separate easily? The two strings in my blinds “snap” together so that it’s easy to raise/lower the blinds, but the strings separate very easily from each other if applying force in any other kind of way (would be impossible for a child to accidently hang themselves with it for example)

      • kn33@lemmy.world
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        3 months ago

        It’s not just going between the cords. There’s also a problem that under the wrong circumstances, the cord can whip around the neck and become tangled on the tassel, around the neck.

        • cadekat@pawb.social
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          3 months ago

          I’m going to need to see a reenactment or video before I believe this.

      • MNByChoice@midwest.social
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        3 months ago

        The strings come off the “screwed in” part?

        I don’t think politicians came up with the new design, but embraced the new design. This has been an issue for decades and the ban is newin USA.

    • Elkenders@feddit.uk
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      3 months ago

      I know a family whose baby hung themselves on the cord. Must be common enough that they just banned them.

    • SmilingSolaris@lemmy.world
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      3 months ago

      Ah yes, let’s get the consumer product safety commission on the problem of school shootings. Hell, since they are so able to ban the way blinds chords are setup, why aren’t they ending climate change? The genocide of palastinians? I for one demand the consumer product safety commission do it’s fucking job and reform the American policing system.

  • ShareMySims@sh.itjust.works
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    3 months ago

    When my cat was a baby she got tangled by the neck in a blinds cord, thankfully I was right there, but it scared the shit out of me. I rent, and still (and everywhere else I’ve lived) have corded blinds, but the cords are now rolled up and tied to the top so they’re out of the way. This kind of regulation is a good thing.

    • Tinks@lemmy.world
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      Many cats die every year from them actually, just like children. I am super vigilant about hiding mine out of the way so ours can’t see them to play with because I’m terrified of it happening. I really just need to replace them, but they’re the nice heavy wooden white ones and throwing them out seems like such a waste.