OXO Cleaning Product Geekery

I doubt this would be a shock to anyone, but I am very peculiar about my dish washing implements. Especially because right now, I am living without a dishwasher: definitely suckness. I favor some of the OXO products--the Soap Squirting Palm Brush, and the sponge-on-a-stick (with soap in the handle) setup below. However, it just broke the other day.



I don't know if you can make it out from the photo, but there used to be two plastic tabs on the clear plastic part, that lock into the notches in the sponger backer. When they break off, the entire handle part is useless. Grr. I wouldn't be so annoyed except for the fact that this is the second one that has failed this way. I went to several local malls, and none of them carry it anymore. Grr.

I was about to send a nastygram to OXO ("Dear Sirs: Your polymer engineering skills suck ass."), when I looked at their current products on the web. It turns out that they came to the same conclusion (the sucking ass part): the current iteration changes the attachment mechanism of the sponge to a tapered slot setup, which has a lot more bearing area than the two tabs.

So... I'm stuck with a few useless sponge refills, and two broken wands. Grr.

Wait! [Lightbulb]

Fished the pieces out of the trash. Two #6 x 1/2" stainless steel machine screws and a tap set later:



Admittedly, I need to get out a screwdriver every time I need to add more soap. And a drill every time I change sponges. But being a person who carries a Leatherman tool on him for most of his waking hours, that's not much on an issue.