I really enjoy Gene's war stories!! I, too am a (relatively) old codger, but still young at heart.
At the risk of being too far off topic, I'd like to add one more war story to Gene's list. Back in the early 60's, I had a 2-way radio repair and maintenance business. Remember, you youngsters, back then almost everything was vacuum tube based. An oil company I supported had a problem with their dispatch transceiver - after it got warm (it was on 24/7), the receiver's output became so garbled, they couldn't understand what was being said. They could transmit OK, which made the audio final stages less suspect since, in this design, they were shared between transmitter and receiver. Within a minute or two after opening the case, the problem would clear up because the internal heat would dissipate. Using an audio probe, I searched everywhere for the problem, but couldn't narrow it down in the time it took for the problem to miraculously go away! I worked on that thing for a week, replacing filter caps, coupling caps, tubes, etc. trying to fix the darn thing. Nothing!! Then, in desperation, I plugged in an external speaker to be able to listen to it while I jury-rigged a heat enclosure to keep everything hot while I ran down the problem. Viola!! CLEAR AS A BELL!!! It was a faulty speaker! Out of curiosity, I tore the speaker apart and it turned out that the voice coil would warp when it got warm and rub against the side of the magnet, causing the distortion. You could see the rub marks on the magnet where the voice coil rubbed. The end of the story is that the customer got charged for a new speaker and the labor to replace it, while I ate the difference in actual time spent! Part of doing business - and customers wonder why labor charges are so high! I learned a valuable lesson - and that was to always start with the obvious and easiest to check before heading to the more subtle causes!! IN 1964, I took my first job in computer programming and stuck to it for the rest of my 36 year career - and that lesson served me just as well there (if not more so) as it did in electronics. Keep on with the war stories, Gene - they bring back long-forgotten memories!! Dennis ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Keep Your Developer Skills Current with LearnDevNow! The most comprehensive online learning library for Microsoft developers is just $99.99! Visual Studio, SharePoint, SQL - plus HTML5, CSS3, MVC3, Metro Style Apps, more. Free future releases when you subscribe now! http://p.sf.net/sfu/learndevnow-d2d _______________________________________________ Emc-users mailing list Emc-users@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/emc-users
