This page details all our blog posts about repair in Tog. Our next Repair Cafe will be listed below. If you would like to be a fixer, please get in touch via our Contact Us page.
- Repair Cafe for Trinity’s Green Week!
We’re teaming up with Unit 18 (Trinity in the Community) to run a special Repair Café as part of Trinity’s Green Week. It’s a smaller Repair Café than our usual big TOG events, but it’ll still have all the best bits: friendly fixers, practical repairs, and plenty of good chats. Got something broken? Bring along your small household items, small furniture, or electrical bits that have stopped working, and we’ll do our best to help you repair them while you wait. Expect a bit of hands-on problem solving, a cup of tea, and a nice lunchtime vibe. When: Friday, 13 … - New power tools added to “Repair Café in a Box”
We’re delighted to share an upgrade to our Repair Café in a Box programme: we’ve added a range of power tools to the equipment kit that community groups can borrow to help run repair events. This work is funded by the Community Climate Action Programme (Round 1) under the Government’s Climate Action Fund. It builds on our 2024 funding and helps us expand what we can offer through our Repair Café rental programme, making it easier for more groups across the Dublin region to host repairs safely and confidently. What’s included? Alongside the usual Repair Café essentials, we now have …Continue reading “New power tools added to “Repair Café in a Box””
- The Salvage Squad came to our Repair Café and the lamp lived to tell the tale
Back in August last year, we had a great surprise visitor at one of our Repair Cafés. The team from Virgin Media’s The Salvage Squad dropped in with a lamp that needed a bit of TLC. Cameras and curiosity in tow, they joined the usual Repair Café buzz at TOG, with fixers working away on everything from small electronics to household bits and bobs. The lamp landed on the bench with our member Shane, supported by the other volunteer fixers on the day. With a bit of careful troubleshooting and plenty of know-how, the lamp was brought back to life. …Continue reading “The Salvage Squad came to our Repair Café and the lamp lived to tell the tale”
- Learn to Wire a Plug (Engineers Week Edition) – Workshop at TOG
We’re running our Learn to Wire a Plug workshop again at TOG Hackerspace — a practical, confidence-boosting skill that’ll serve you for years. If you’ve ever looked at a broken plug or a dodgy extension lead and thought “I should know how to sort that”… this is the evening for you. What’s it all about? This is a hands-on session where we’ll guide you through safely wiring a 13A plug and connecting it to a 4-gang extension lead. No prior experience needed — we’ll go step-by-step and explain the “why” as well as the “how”. Each participant will: All tools …Continue reading “Learn to Wire a Plug (Engineers Week Edition) – Workshop at TOG”
- Back On Air: Repairing a Broken Encoder on a Yaesu FT-857A repair story from our own Ben EI9IUB. Today’s repair is on one of my radios – a Yaesu FT-857. While testing a new headset and tuning around the bands, the select knob twisted its last and came out of the front panel and into my hand: disaster! This encoder is vital to using the radio, so its breaking rendered it a paperweight. The radio itself has been out of production for a number of years now, but unlike most “consumer” devices, amateur radios have very good technical documentation available to end users. I dug up a PDF copy of …
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- More Philips Boombox Tinkering
Having recently fixed the Philips boombox CD player, we decided to review the battery compartment mod, done at least 20 years ago, and still working. The original idea was to fill the battery compartment with 8x rechargeable D cells and arrange that they would be constantly trickle-charged while the mains lead was plugged in. The battery compartment’s positive terminal was connected via a current-limiting resistor to the power supply section of the PCB. This trickle charges the cells at about 10mA. This is enough to charge them up over a few days, but not enough to cook them. Good quality … - January Repair Cafe
Bring your broken tech and trinkets to get them fixed by the skilled volunteers at TOG Hackerspace – with a bit of help from our friends at Dublin Maker! On Sunday, 18 January 2026, between 12 pm and 4 pm, TOG Hackerspace will host the first Repair Cafe of the new year in our own space. At this event, volunteers will share their expertise and passion for repair, helping you fix your broken items and breathe new life into them. Whether it’s a malfunctioning gadget, a piece of clothing in need of mending, or a household item that’s seen better … - Another “Miracle” Repair
OK, so not quite as old as that 1970s tape recorder that we fixed last week, but a 1996-vintage Philips AZ8640 Radio-Tape-CD boombox. The CD had stopped working, but the tape and radio were still fine. Opening up, these things are not meant to be easily disassembled. They tend to be built from the inside out, with not much thought about future disassembly or serviceability. When we fix old electronics, there are a few “usual suspects”, which quite often give us a fix. Old electrolytic caps are one…. they dry out after a decade or two of service. Another is … - A Christmas Miracle Repair, Bringing a 1970s Tape Recorder Back to Life
We got a message in the run-up to Christmas with a simple ask. Could we pull off a last-minute repair of a vintage tape recorder and save the day? When the request came from our long-time friend Claire Downey, the person who first introduced us to Repair Cafés over ten years ago, we knew we had to give it a proper go. The patient from a charity shop on the bench was an ITT Schaub-Lorenz SL54 Automatic, a Taiwanese-made radio cassette recorder from the mid 1970s, roughly 1974 to 1976. A proper bit of kit, and the kind of thing …Continue reading “A Christmas Miracle Repair, Bringing a 1970s Tape Recorder Back to Life”
- Repair Café At Leixlip Library
Bring broken bits from home to Leixlip Library for a morning of repair, chat and climate action with volunteers from TOG Hackerspace. On Saturday, 13 December 2025, from 10.00 to 13.00, Leixlip Library will host a Repair Café in partnership with TOG Hackerspace and the Kildare County Council Climate Action Office. Skilled volunteers will help you give worn and broken items another shot at life, instead of sending them to the landfill. Multiple 30-minute slots run through the morning. Booking is through Leixlip Library, so contact the library desk or check the library website for full details. What you can … - TOG on RTÉ Radio 1 from the Tullamore Repair Café
Delighted to share that our Tullamore Repair Café was featured on RTÉ Radio 1’s CountryWide. The 5-minute clip captures the buzz on the day with voices from across our fixer crew and visitors.👉 Listen back on RTÉ Radio 1: “A visit to the repair café in Tullamore” For context on the event, see our original post:👉 Tullamore Repair Café – Event Details And check out the photos from the day:👉 Tullamore Repair Café – Gallery Big thanks to everyone who came along and to our partners in Offaly for the support. Onwards with more repair! - Fix All The Things
If you follow Tog, you’ll know that we’re no stranger to Repair Café. It’s become a bit of an institution around here. We never know whats going to come in our door on the day. We’re probably well into 4 figures in terms of the number of items that we have fixed over the years. Repair Café also embeds a culture of repair in all those who get involved with them. When is the last time you darned a pair of socks however? This is an easy fix, and probably one that most of us will have the means to … - October Repair Cafe
Bring your broken tech and trinkets to get them fixed by the skilled volunteers at Tog Hackerspace! On October 18, 2025 (International Day of Repair), between 2 and 6 pm, TOG Hackerspace will host a repair cafe! At this event, the skilled volunteers at TOG will share their expertise and passion for repair, helping you fix your broken items and breathe new life into them. Whether it’s a malfunctioning gadget, a piece of clothing in need of mending, or a household item that’s seen better days, bring it along and let the TOG team work their magic. What can you … - Jeffrey Roe Named Reuse & Repair Champion at the Full Circle Awards 2025
We’re thrilled to share some amazing news from the repair community: our very own Jeffrey Roe has been awarded the title of Reuse & Repair Champion at the Full Circle Awards 2025 by Circular.ie. The awards ceremony took place at the launch of Circular.ie in Lansdowne Road, and the judges had high praise for Jeffrey: “Jeffrey has been the driving force behind Repair Cafés in Ireland and is a well-recognised champion and leader in the field. His community-driven, hands-on approach empowers people with valuable repair skills and fosters collaborative, social spaces for learning. Jeffrey stands out for his technical innovation …Continue reading “Jeffrey Roe Named Reuse & Repair Champion at the Full Circle Awards 2025”
- Tullamore Repair Café
We’re excited to be bringing our Repair Café to a brand-new town — Tullamore! Join us for a morning of fixing, learning, and community spirit. 📍 Where: Tullamore Library, O’Connor Square, Tullamore, Offaly, R35 X226 📅 When: Saturday, 11th October 2025 ⏰ Time: 10:00 am – 1:00 pm This special Repair Café is only possible thanks to the support of The Climate Action Team, The Community and Culture Department and the Just Transition Team of Offaly County Council. What can you bring? We’ll be ready to tackle repairs on a wide range of household items, including: Each repair is limited … - Jeffrey Shortlisted for Full Circle Awards 2025We’re delighted to share some exciting news from the Tog community – our very own Jeffrey Roe has been shortlisted as a finalist in the Repair & Reuse Hero category of the Full Circle Awards 2025! 🎉 The Full Circle Awards celebrate people and projects across Ireland making a real difference in circular living. Jeffrey’s nomination recognises his huge contribution to growing the Repair Café movement here in Ireland, from rolling up his sleeves to fix household items and carry out safety testing, to running hands-on workshops teaching skills like soldering, multimeter use, and wiring plugs. He’s in great company …
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- Tog at the EPA Circular Economy Conference 2025We’re packing up our tools (and a few stories) for the EPA Circular Economy Conference 2025 on Wednesday, 24 September, in the Aviva Stadium. You’ll find us in the exhibition area, flying the flag for Repair Cafés and the workshops we run at Tog. We’ll be chatting about how fixing the things you already own is good for your pocket, good for the planet, and good craic altogether. And since we’re on the topic, we’ve got not one but two Repair Cafés coming up this October. Keep an eye on the details here: tog.ie/repair So if you’re at the Aviva, …
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- Rethink Your Stuff Carnival in Kilkenny
Last week, we packed up our toolboxes and headed down to Kilkenny for the Rethink Your Stuff Carnival. The event was all about celebrating repair, reuse and creative sustainability – and we were delighted to be part of it with our own Repair Table. It was a fun afternoon full of chats with visitors (many stopping by on their lunch break) and plenty of fixes. Among the items we brought back to life were: One of the best parts of the day was sharing the space with so many other brilliant groups and makers. Big shout-out to VOICE Ireland, Ruth’s …