Text 26286, 191 rader
Skriven 2012-03-02 00:18:20 av Richard Webb (1:116/901.0)
  Kommentar till text 26272 av Roy Witt (1:387/22)
Ärende: Popular echo?
=====================
HI Roy,

On Thu 2012-Mar-01 05:58, Roy Witt (1:387/22) wrote to Richard Webb:

 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.

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

YEp, I like their version on the hotels cable systems.  IT
gives you the local for where you are, it seems fairly
regularly.

 Roy>> 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.

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

YEah would hope so.  Had the braille owner's manual which
told me dot height and some other stuff, it burned in my
after hurricane fire, but I'm thinking 0.001 inch.  Don't
know if they've ever released a "shop manual" to the public, but it sure would
be nice.  Especially since most of the
purchasers of their products are institutional purchasers
who just ship 'em back to their bench for doctoring.


I sell a piece of gear I'm trying to move though and that's
one of the first priorities for the money.  Like I say, I
could get one of the new consumer models for $2k but this
one's much better build quality.

 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.

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

Yep, that's as I look at it.

<snippety doo dah>
 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.

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

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

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

YEah no doubt. HE's worked on tons of 'em though he tells
me.  they were a very popular model back in the '90's.
Thing is, a lot of institutional buyers sold them off to get the interpoint
models that emboss on both sides of the page.

 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.

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

That's how this one came to me, was their loaner stock at an agency in the
midwest, was just given to the client who had
it on loan, provided for his job as a programmer, then he
saved his sheckels and bought himself an interpoint machine
so he turned me onto this one.  OFten if it's job related
they'll pony up, but usually it's the newer consumer units.
I could probably jump through all the certification hoops
and get one of those in a year or so, but by then I'll have
moved that piece of gear I'm trying to move, and would just
as soon put the $1k in this baby.  yEah I know, 40
characters per second embossing, and only one side of a
page, but for rip and read radio stuff, and occasionally
session notes for a studio project it does waht I need when
it's functioning, and it does it, reliably, every time.  The consumer unit I
had would decide every once in awhile to
flake out and generate half a dozen form feeds for no reason in the middle of a
document, etc.  With fanfold once you do
that youcan't reuse the pages that easy.

only thing with this unit is with vibrations and all it's
best to isolate him on his own table or stand, and ti better be a heavy duty
one <g>.  When you pick him up you've got an armload.

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

<snip>
 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.

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

I'd have to get used to them again.  Small town TEnnessee
what i hear in the morning is maybe locals on 2 meters from
the radio room, my computer chattering during the 6:00 A.M.
reboot in here, and not much else.  I'm even out of major
flight patterns in and out of mEmphis here.  Place we did
live up here was right in the flight pattern into Memphis
airport, and you'd get some flights from the naval station
here at mIllington, especially choppers overhead there.
YOu'd hear the jets doing their braking thing there all the
time, but out here it's dead quiet at nights.

 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.

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

YEah I suffer from that too, too many years both loud
bandstands and doing construction.  I've learned to get
around it doing audio work. Heck of it is, I learned about
the osha standards and the like for hearing protection in
the '90's once I got an internet connection and started
reading technical discussions related to my profession and
hearing loss/damage.  IT changed the way I work in some
major ways.


 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.

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

<rotfl>  I can picture it.

 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>.

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

YEah I can relate to that one too.  it was frustrating, but
they only did it about one night a week, and I'd do such
things as tape editing that I could do under headphones,
calibrating equipment, etc.  Always soemthing to do to keep
a recording studio humming along.

                       Regards,
           Richard
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 * Origin:  (1:116/901)