Text 26272, 160 rader
Skriven 2012-03-01 05:58:48 av Roy Witt (1:387/22)
  Kommentar till text 26138 av Richard Webb (1:116/901.0)
Ärende: Popular echo?
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29 Feb 12 14:33, Richard Webb wrote to Roy Witt:

 RW>>> the only reason I carry it.  AS for weather, I do actually

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 RW>> I've actually used it for vessels heading for one of those places on
 RW>> ham radio, although for areas right off NOrth America I get that
 RW>> stuff from noaa web, thanks to Mark Lewis it ends up in my inbound
 RW>> where my automation slices dices and processes it to make it
 RW>> presentable for me to read on the air, either by dumping off to my
 RW>> braille embosser when it worked,

 Roy>> Damn that's got to be a lot of work...


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 RWebb> I do the noaa wx radio thing first thing in the morning, it's
 RWebb> programmed in memory of my ht, and the dual band rig on the bench
 RWebb> here, so I punch it up, let the Rottweiler out while listening to
 RWebb> what it's telling me. Actually the slice and dice of incoming noaa
 RWebb> data is all done by automation.

I used to check the weather channel on the bedroom TV while getting
dressed...They take a long time getting around to Texas and when they do,
it's short piece. Dishnet has the local version weather, but you have to
wait for the 'click enter on your remote now' to get it.

 RW>> Hmmm. No one else around who can help you fix it?

 RW> Maybe, if I knew somebody around with all the right tools,
 RW> and waht the specs are supposed to be.

There has to be a factory manual or a service manual around. Something on
the order of those one model per books on fixing, tuning a radio...


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 Roy>> Adjusting a pin stroke can't be all that difficult, if one has the
 Roy>> tools and a pair of eyes to see what's going on.

 RW> And knows what it's supposed to be when all's right with its world
 RW> <g>. That's sorto f what I was thinking too, this ain't rocket
 RW> science, it's mostly mechanical.

Seems to me that it has to be all mechanical accept for the electronics
that operate the pins and rolls the paper.

 RW>> After they swap out the bad components they twaek the thing, use a
 RW>> micrometer to look at dot height and make sure all's copacetic, and
 RW>> he'll get a complete checkup and going over with that $1k.

 RW> <snip>

 Roy>> I don't see how a micrometer would help, perhaps a depth-mic would
 Roy>> make that job easier. I recently moved my verticle mill into my
 Roy>> garage and could probably set your braill machine up on the mill
 Roy>> table, use a dial indicator and set the stroke of all pins to the
 Roy>> same height when fired. Having an X-Y table movement that would be
 Roy>> a piece of cake to do.

 RW> YEp, I'm sure that's what he was meaning.  Guy and I had a
 RW> nice conversation, he's a ham also, family from nEw ORleans.

Ahhh.

 Roy>> I wouldn't have any clue as how to fine tune it though.

 RWebb> And that's what you get for your $1k.

He's probably working on it like my BIL did in the copymachine business.
When all else fails, read the service manual...

 RWebb> Thing is, I could put another $1k with it and get one of the newer
 RWebb> consumer machines, (had one and it was junk) but this one's built
 RWebb> like a tank. Naturally being a braille embosser there's a lot of
 RWebb> different mechanical stuff going on, and it's got to be built
 RWebb> tough.

My friend Andrew says that some blind institute has this stuff on loan.
His mother worked with the blind and knows those ropes.

 RWebb> This thing is, when brand new was $5k, and the only people using
 RWebb> them were institutional users. Serial number's permanently in
 RWebb> braille on the printing plate, and he could tell me exactly when
 RWebb> this thing was made, etc.  The unitis 20 years old, and until
 RWebb> recently was chugging along churning out braille flawlessly.  iT
 RWebb> is definitely worth repairing.

Better hang on to that...you're right about being worth repairing.

 RW>>> I do read railfan, it's gated from misc.transport.rail.americas,
 RW>>> and there are actual humans there carrying on conversations.

 RW> <snip>

 RW>> Yep, there again I mostly follow the technical threads over
 RW>> there in rf.

 Roy>> One thing that would interest them is that here in Texas, San
 Roy>> Antonio and now New Braunfels have 'quiet' crossings on all major
 Roy>> highways and streets.

 RW> YEah I bet. Back where i grew up lots of folks complain
 RW> about that with the Burlington NOrthern coal trains that go
 RW> through town in the middle of the night.

Heard the train this morning. Short blasts on the horn, then stopped
blasting when he got to the first silent crossing up on the hill north of
us.

 RW>   Doesn't matter in Burlington Iowa though, even if you're farther by
 RW> road from the tracks, the town's built on three hills, and the tracks
 RW> go down the valley, and of course the sound of that whistle blows up
 RW> the hills rather nicely, no matter what the time of year <g>. I just
 RW> got used to it, was part of the background noise.

LOL! That's what it's like with my tinitus, background noise.


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 RWebb> What i used to find more annoying, especially for awhile when I
 RWebb> was running small recording studio out of my house in WEst
 RWebb> Burlington was when the railroad engine maintenance shops were
 RWebb> stress testing engines.

Been there, done that. The Navy had jet engine repair facilities at their
site across the freeway from where we lived in San Diego. That was like
living next to the launch ramp at the airport.

 RWebb> They'd wind those guys up and have them pull, I think against each
 RWebb> other and see what breaks, but that high pitched whine combined
 RWebb> with a bit of the low frequency rumble, couldn't do any work at
 RWebb> all when they were doing that, and they averaged about one night a
 RWebb> week doing that for awhile <g>.

That sounds to be as frustrating as when a laundry next to my shop was
moving in and using an air hammer to remove concrete on his side of the
building. I couldn't do any work for 4 days, until the city's building
code guy came on Friday and stopped him from working without a permit.
I expected a faster response time to my complaint, but was happy that I
could get my work out the door over the week end.

                R\%/itt


  ... Only those who will risk going too far can possibly
  ... find out how far one can go ~ TS Eliot


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