Summer in Mount Druitt is not the summer they get on the coast. This part of the Cumberland Plain runs several degrees hotter than the eastern suburbs on the very same day, and shutters here spend January working in conditions the specification sheet never really contemplated.
We cover Mount Druitt and the surrounding 2770 suburbs, including Whalan, Tregear, Dharruk, Bidwill, Hebersham and Lethbridge Park. Rooty Hill, Minchinbury and St Marys are all part of the same run.
The housing dates mostly from the 1960s and 1970s, a good deal of it renovated since, and the shutters are retrofits. Heat and age together account for very nearly everything we find.
A shutter that only misbehaves in February is not broken in the usual sense. It has run out of clearance. Opening up the tolerance slightly in the rails, clearing the tracks of grit and using a lubricant rated for high temperatures deals with the bulk of these calls. It also helps to close the shutters on the western side of the house before the afternoon heat arrives rather than after, because a cool curtain rolls a great deal more easily than a hot one. If a unit has been jamming every summer for several years, the slat edges have probably taken damage too, and that is worth inspecting while the rails are open.
