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Sooooo WD stands for Water Displacer. It isn't a lubricant, it's more of a cleaning agent. It was originally developed to keep Atlas rockets from rusting. WD-40 might fix an electrical component by floating off any water-based electrolyte that might be shorting something out.
Fair enough, that being said the problem in question was with a solenoid where the coil has broken insulation allowing a short to ground. He was instructing me to shoot a bunch of WD-40 into the solenoid housing with the core and spring where there were no electronics.
Okay yeah that's a little dumb. I could maybe see using WD-40 to free up a solenoid that was mechanically stuck but broken insulation says to me replace the part.
Yeah that's exactly the reason I was so baffled by his instructions. I just stared at him and said "but this isn't a mechanical issue, it's an electrical issue" "oh well that's what I do most of the time and usually it works"
Seeing first hand how he couldn't diagnose a basic issue like that and how he just trusted some catch all solution to fix his problems (for that particular part) really connected the dots to why exactly he seemingly didn't trust scientists or the scientific process at all.
Reminds me of the advice you see in classic Macintosh circles; they'll tell you to stick the motherboard in the dishwasher to wash off leaky capacitor sauce.