Re: OT high-power radio broadcasting (was Re: red SATA cable corruption)

[Martin]

[...]
> By the way I saw an absolutely brand-spanking-new Rolls Royce here
> (Chicago) over the weekend. They are incredibly ugly.
[...]

Blame BMW for that. Tut mir auch leid.
This is way off topic isn't it?

Re: OT high-power radio broadcasting (was Re: red SATA cable corruption)

[Nicholas Geovanis]

Well it should be obvious to all that the "Upper Class Twit Of The
Year" is not confined to the British Isles. True, it's a different
variety than here, look at Trumpf. And here they have ocean liners
rather than Aston-Martins. Yet there is no genetic diversity among
them across borders.
By the way I saw an absolutely brand-spanking-new Rolls Royce here
(Chicago) over the weekend. They are incredibly ugly. A sort of cross
between the new Dodge Chargers and a llama. Why must our upper-class
rulers have no lower limit? Yours too, FYI. And it was made over
there.
On Tue, Sep 18, 2018 at 4:36 PM Dominic Knight  wrote:
>
> On Tue, 2018-09-18 at 16:13 -0500, Nicholas Geovanis wrote:
> > Brian -
> > Are you British?
> > Reading your reply was like reading a Monty Python script. If such
> > existed.
> >
> That's just normal for us Brits.
> In the late sixties we were somewhat miffed to discover that our
> excellent, serious, documentary on British class systems "The Flying
> Circus" was considered to be comedy in other parts of the world :)
>

Re: OT high-power radio broadcasting (was Re: red SATA cable corruption)

[Dominic Knight]

On Tue, 2018-09-18 at 16:13 -0500, Nicholas Geovanis wrote:
> Brian -
> Are you British?
> Reading your reply was like reading a Monty Python script. If such
> existed.
> 
That's just normal for us Brits.
In the late sixties we were somewhat miffed to discover that our
excellent, serious, documentary on British class systems "The Flying
Circus" was considered to be comedy in other parts of the world :)

Re: OT high-power radio broadcasting (was Re: red SATA cable corruption)

[Nicholas Geovanis]

Brian -
Are you British?
Reading your reply was like reading a Monty Python script. If such existed.
This is almost too embarrassing to explain to you Brian, but the
contact point would be the DIY ethic,
wouldn't it be, My Main Man Brian?
Homemade Linux, homemade radios, homemade beer: 3 peas in a pod.
We just didn't get to the beer part yet..
On Tue, Sep 18, 2018 at 3:02 PM Brian  wrote:
>
> On Tue 18 Sep 2018 at 15:50:45 -0400, Gene Heskett wrote:
>
> > On Tuesday 18 September 2018 15:12:52 Nicholas Geovanis wrote:
> >
> > > Go In Peace.
> > > Real radio engineering, despite everything, is a dying art/science.
>
> [...]
>
> > Now you know why my posts occasionally end with a sigh...
>
> As do my reading of them.
>
> > > Check out the Crystal Set Society, my man.
> > > Real Men, Real Women, Real Radios.
> > > https://www.midnightscience.net/
>
> [...]
>
> And once again, way off topic...
>
> Unusual for you. :)
>
> --
> Brian
>

Re: OT high-power radio broadcasting (was Re: red SATA cable corruption)

[Brian]

On Tue 18 Sep 2018 at 15:50:45 -0400, Gene Heskett wrote:

> On Tuesday 18 September 2018 15:12:52 Nicholas Geovanis wrote:
> 
> > Go In Peace.
> > Real radio engineering, despite everything, is a dying art/science.

[...]
 
> Now you know why my posts occasionally end with a sigh...

As do my reading of them.
  
> > Check out the Crystal Set Society, my man.
> > Real Men, Real Women, Real Radios.
> > https://www.midnightscience.net/

[...]

And once again, way off topic...

Unusual for you. :)

-- 
Brian

Re: OT high-power radio broadcasting (was Re: red SATA cable corruption)

[Gene Heskett]

On Tuesday 18 September 2018 15:12:52 Nicholas Geovanis wrote:

> Go In Peace.
> Real radio engineering, despite everything, is a dying art/science.

Yes, its got so bad the ma & pa small town broadcaster has to call in a 
factory engineer to keep them on the air.  The days of the likes of 
Chester Simpson, Elmer Nelson, and me are about finished.

One day after I had been the CE at WDTV for about 3 years, '87 I think 
the local school sent up a couple bussloads of 8th graders, spring break 
I guess, and I got volunteered to give them the $5 tour, explaining how 
tv worked from our end. Getting to the end where I'd turned on the 
cameras and monitors in the news studio and let them all "see 
themselves" on tv, I wrapped up my speech by saying that someday I'll 
retire, and that I hoped I had several of them nipping at my heels 
wanting a pretty good job.

Blew me away, that was the best standup comedy they had heard in quite a 
while. "who would want a job like yours?"  Thats when I understood 2 
things, first that our educational system was well and truly broken if 
it wasn't making the technology of the day interesting enough, and that 
when I did retire, my replacement would need years of care and feeding 
before he would be ready to do what I'd been doing since 1964. I had him 
as an assistant for 5 or 6 years. It wasn't enough.

Now you know why my posts occasionally end with a sigh...
 
> Check out the Crystal Set Society, my man.
> Real Men, Real Women, Real Radios.
> https://www.midnightscience.net/

Chuckle.  My last crystal set was in '47.  Worked pretty good too. But 
when I took a room in Des Moines in 1951 so I'd be within walking 
distance of my job as the service tech at A.A.Schneiderhahn Co., fixing 
the zenith stuff the dealers couldn't fix for Iowa and the north half of 
Missouri, mother took the chance and cleaned out my old bedroom of 
everything but the bed & dresser.  Fairly new house I'd helped my 
stepfather build right after the war, and I'm the one who wired it, at 
13 yo.

I stopped in my old home town and visited that house in the fall of 2007, 
one my way home from saying goodbye to my oldest daughter who was dying 
of cancer, and did within a week, and my fuse box and wiring had finally 
been replaced during a remodel in 2005.

And once again, way off topic...

-- 
Cheers, Gene Heskett
--
"There are four boxes to be used in defense of liberty:
 soap, ballot, jury, and ammo. Please use in that order."
-Ed Howdershelt (Author)
Genes Web page 

Re: OT high-power radio broadcasting (was Re: red SATA cable corruption)

[Nicholas Geovanis]

Go In Peace.
Real radio engineering, despite everything, is a dying art/science.
Check out the Crystal Set Society, my man.
Real Men, Real Women, Real Radios.
https://www.midnightscience.net/
On Fri, Sep 14, 2018 at 2:57 PM Gene Heskett  wrote:
>
> On Friday 14 September 2018 13:58:40 Marty wrote:
>
> > The Debian whippersnappers need to know their hacker history :)
> >
> > I've heard the stories about getting caught on or near a tower.
> > Supposedly you can feel it before it scrambles your brains. I would
> > not seek out the experience.
>
> Sufficient power to be quickly dangerous being absorbed by the body has a
> side effect of raising ones tempurature, and you are generally well
> aware of it. Maximum safe long term is 10 milliwatts per cubic cc of
> flesh. And we only had one small window looking into the transmitter
> that exceeded that since we have to rent a field meter and measure that
> every 5 years at license renewal.
>
> The only time I was aware of the higher rf field was up in the UP, at a
> channel 8, and one of the neighbors 3/4 mile back down the hill, came up
> to visit with an implanted pacemaker, and he had to leave quickly as his
> pacemaker was going burzerk.
>
> > On 09/12/2018 02:08 AM, Gene Heskett wrote:
> > > Yeah, I've some experience. And it goes back quite a ways timewise.
>
> I'm generally ok. The only brain damageing event I've encountered is a
> pulmonary embolism, usually fatal, 3 years ago that seems to have
> dropped my IQ by maybe 5 points. I've since failed the mensa test.
>
> I sure don't recommend it as a way to die, its scary as can be, not being
> able to draw a decent breath even with your lungs full to the bursting
> point. The shot worked, but the docs, with several internish people in
> tow at a time, that did come to look at a survivor, made sure that I
> knew I was one lucky guy as the odds of my living thru it were maybe 5%.
> That was about 3 years ago, and I'll be 84 in a long couple weeks. There
> is of course some rat poison to discourage a repeat in my nightly
> pill-tainer. :)
>
> But even 15+ years retired, I find my talents at keeping stuff on the air
> are in demand. I have been told several times that people that actually
> fix transmitters are a dying breed. Some of the horror story's I've
> heard from owners while working on something make me believe it.
>
> I'm not a "papered" engineer either, I done this sort of thing all my
> working life on an 8th grade education, getting a G.E.D. about 25 years
> ago to please the missus of 29 years come December, and who has a degree
> in music. Passed the test for a 1st phone in about 1.5 hours in 1962,
> passed the C.E.T. in just over an hour back in 1972, so I have one of
> those next to the 1st phone in my billfold.
>
> Its been an interesting ride thats still interesting. I could do w/o the
> aches and pains of the years, but I'm the one down 4 feet in the ditch
> in my front yard patching a broken water line 2 weeks ago. And I had to
> rent a backhoe to dig the ditch. Carefully, the gas line is in the same
> ditch!.  Seems the town got hungry and decided to license backhoe etc
> operators AND institute a job permit too. But even the guys who own one
> found it too costly and time wasteing, so nobody is doing that sort of
> work inside the city limits now.
>
> Sigh.  The town has apparently not heard of TANSTAAFL. I wonder how
> painfull that hole in their foot is.
>
> --
> Cheers, Gene Heskett
> --
> "There are four boxes to be used in defense of liberty:
>  soap, ballot, jury, and ammo. Please use in that order."
> -Ed Howdershelt (Author)
> Genes Web page 
>

Re: OT high-power radio broadcasting (was Re: red SATA cable corruption)

[Gene Heskett]

On Friday 14 September 2018 13:58:40 Marty wrote:

> The Debian whippersnappers need to know their hacker history :)
>
> I've heard the stories about getting caught on or near a tower.
> Supposedly you can feel it before it scrambles your brains. I would
> not seek out the experience.

Sufficient power to be quickly dangerous being absorbed by the body has a 
side effect of raising ones tempurature, and you are generally well 
aware of it. Maximum safe long term is 10 milliwatts per cubic cc of 
flesh. And we only had one small window looking into the transmitter 
that exceeded that since we have to rent a field meter and measure that 
every 5 years at license renewal.

The only time I was aware of the higher rf field was up in the UP, at a 
channel 8, and one of the neighbors 3/4 mile back down the hill, came up 
to visit with an implanted pacemaker, and he had to leave quickly as his 
pacemaker was going burzerk.

> On 09/12/2018 02:08 AM, Gene Heskett wrote:
> > Yeah, I've some experience. And it goes back quite a ways timewise.

I'm generally ok. The only brain damageing event I've encountered is a 
pulmonary embolism, usually fatal, 3 years ago that seems to have 
dropped my IQ by maybe 5 points. I've since failed the mensa test.

I sure don't recommend it as a way to die, its scary as can be, not being 
able to draw a decent breath even with your lungs full to the bursting 
point. The shot worked, but the docs, with several internish people in 
tow at a time, that did come to look at a survivor, made sure that I 
knew I was one lucky guy as the odds of my living thru it were maybe 5%.  
That was about 3 years ago, and I'll be 84 in a long couple weeks. There 
is of course some rat poison to discourage a repeat in my nightly 
pill-tainer. :)

But even 15+ years retired, I find my talents at keeping stuff on the air 
are in demand. I have been told several times that people that actually 
fix transmitters are a dying breed. Some of the horror story's I've 
heard from owners while working on something make me believe it.

I'm not a "papered" engineer either, I done this sort of thing all my 
working life on an 8th grade education, getting a G.E.D. about 25 years 
ago to please the missus of 29 years come December, and who has a degree 
in music. Passed the test for a 1st phone in about 1.5 hours in 1962, 
passed the C.E.T. in just over an hour back in 1972, so I have one of 
those next to the 1st phone in my billfold.

Its been an interesting ride thats still interesting. I could do w/o the 
aches and pains of the years, but I'm the one down 4 feet in the ditch 
in my front yard patching a broken water line 2 weeks ago. And I had to 
rent a backhoe to dig the ditch. Carefully, the gas line is in the same 
ditch!.  Seems the town got hungry and decided to license backhoe etc 
operators AND institute a job permit too. But even the guys who own one 
found it too costly and time wasteing, so nobody is doing that sort of 
work inside the city limits now.

Sigh.  The town has apparently not heard of TANSTAAFL. I wonder how 
painfull that hole in their foot is.

-- 
Cheers, Gene Heskett
--
"There are four boxes to be used in defense of liberty:
 soap, ballot, jury, and ammo. Please use in that order."
-Ed Howdershelt (Author)
Genes Web page 

OT high-power radio broadcasting (was Re: red SATA cable corruption)

[Marty]

The Debian whippersnappers need to know their hacker history :)

I've heard the stories about getting caught on or near a tower. Supposedly you can feel it before it scrambles your 
brains. I would not seek out the experience.



On 09/12/2018 02:08 AM, Gene Heskett wrote:



Yeah, I've some experience. And it goes back quite a ways timewise.