On Thu, 16 Jan 2003, Tony Moss wrote:

> Many years ago a group of students demonstrated their 'robot fire engine' 
> to a visiting VIP.  The sensor was basically a scanning parabolic 
> reflector and a thermistor arranged to home in on a fire then squirt 

Right about here, is where I started LOL! Too many years as an engineer,
not to have made just that kind of mistake...

Dave
37.406847N 122.027872W (at work)

> water on it..  To make the demonstration more realistic a real fire was 
> lit in the courtyard and the robot was sent to put it out. After an 
> initial scan it quickly ignored the experimental fire because it detected 
> a much bigger one high in the sky!  Having carefully aligned its hose it 
> then tried to put the sun out.  In hindsight it had all the makings of an 
> interesting mechanical sundial.
> 
> Tony Moss
> -
> 

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