On 2013-09-19, Larry Jaques wrote:
On 18 Sep 2013 21:05:30 GMT, "DoN. Nichols"
wrote:
On 2013-09-18, Larry Jaques wrote:
On 18 Sep 2013 04:22:37 GMT, "DoN. Nichols"
wrote:
[ ... ]
We really should move this to private e-mail, though it is not
nearly as far off topic by now as the political postings are. :-) My
e-mail is sort-of spamproofed, but you can see how to fix it in my .sig
at the bottom (if your newsreader doesn't hide it. :-)
[ ... Crystal oven ... ]
Mine's a bit larger. Roughly 14d x 18w x 20"t. There's a small
padlock hasp on the side and 2 shelves in the middle. The heater was
taken out before I got it, and there is a light bulb socket outside
(lower right near the back) which let you know it was running. I put
a piece of steel over the grommeted 3/4" hole on the top.
O.K. An oven -- and likely a lab oven, but not what I would
call a "crystal oven". (Perhaps the brand was "Crystal"? :-)
Unlabeled. It had been used as a crystal baking oven by the eng dept.
way back, hence the title.
Have a look at eBay auction #111172480292 for an example of what
I was talking about. Figure the diameter to be sort of between a 50 cent
piece and an *old* silver dollar.
Probably yours was for a very different style of crystal. :-)
I keep legal papers, DVD backups, and a few coins in it.
I do have a little furnace which will get up to at least 1850F
(in about an hour), with lots of insulation, and a working area about
the size of a brick. It came with the heating elements, but no
controller. I had a NOS Omega controller, sold as overrun from a
project by someone on this newsgroup years ago, which I got "just in
case". I had to hook it to a solid state relay to handle the current
that the oven used, but it does a really nice job. Setting it for 1800F
it goes up to about 1400, turns off for a while to see how much
overshoot there is, then turns back on and eases its way up to the
setpoint. It goes all of 1 degree F over temperature, nothing more.
Just big enough to hammer out a block of katana steel, eh?
Well ... I guess that you could start with that much steel, but
for the subsequent re-heatings, I don't think that it would hold the
growing blade. :-)
[ ... ]
That's when you borrow your buddy's lift and do it overhead, while
standing up. Much safer and easier. Shadetree's a bitch.
I don't have a buddy with a lift. At least none close enough to
make it worth while.
I don't either, but there's a duplex up the street where an auto mech
set up and he has a lift in his garage. I need to get to know him,
see what kind of trades I could work out with him for some lift time.
I miss not being able to check over my vehicles to catch things before
they become a fatal problem.
The priorities did not give me time to make friends with someone
who had a lift. :-) (And the town probably would not allow a private
lift out in the open.
Twice, you've seemed to miss my dual point, seeing only one in the
sentence. Should I have put it A) I need to get my tickee and B) go
to the hamfests to find treasures (and pick brains)?
Looking at the sentence again, I see what I missed. I was
rather sleepy, and you did not call attention to the "and", which was
lurking at one end of a line of text. Perhaps I would have done it as
*and*. :-)
I'll make it a point to determine the level of your awareness BEFORE I
make the next post, Don. 
And -- I was too late last night to reply, and pretty late
tonight, too. :-)
[ ... ]
retirement. However, the *real* reason was that I did not like the
"vibes" in the interaction between different groups there -- not the
cooperation which we had where I had been.
I hear ya.
I got the same vibes from SKF, but they weren't really the ones in
charge. The larger company would have been pretty much calling the
shots since we were moving in with them. We were the smaller of two
companies and I was sure to be shoehorned somewhere I didn't like,
working with people I didn't know or like, and that at the end of a
far-too-long drive. None of that sat well with me. I've never had
one of those corporate-friendly personality types.
:-)
2012.
O.K. It should be good enough then. Not sure how the programs
go -- it could be that they are like one of the ones at the practice
sites. But it is good to get the feel for the exams so you are
comfortable when the real ones come along.
That they are. I believe it's a compilation from online sources ++.
O.K.
[ ... ]
Very different. My body has always wanted to be a late hours
person, and once I retired, my body claimed its due. :-)
I love the extreme quiet in the early morning. No phones, no parties,
no (OK, fewer) dogs.
You can get the same kind of quiet at about 1:00 AM or so -- if
you aren't too near bars which stay open that late. :-)
[ ... ]
Most can't. I've always been a science buff and wild stuff thrills
me. There aren't too many things more wild than lightning.
Interesting. My wife has no problems with the thunder and
lightning -- but our rent-a-daughter (really the daughter of a long time
friend who sometimes stays with us) really does not like it at all.
I think most people are just neutral about it, not caring either way
and not interested in the power and majesty of these things. That's
what I have trouble understanding. I don't understand the lack of
curiosity/interest by most people, and I'm happy I have it.
Indeed -- I'm half-way tempted to move back down to South Texas,
where I can watch the thunderstorms approach from the distance.
I was stationed in Arizona one summer for a communications
experiment, and I saw a thunderstorm out a ways -- which didn't seem to
be getting any closer. I got on my little 50cc motorcycle and putted
out towards it, and found a neat line, wet on one side, dry on the
other, crossing the road and staying put the whole time.
[ ... ]
As for grunion -- sounds more like a British name for an auto
part. :-)
Or a sound Brit trannies make when shifting gears?
Especially when the synchronizer rings get worn. :-)
I find thunder and lightning
fascinating, too. AFAIK, I've never been scared of it.
Earthquakes are kinda cool, too. (Well, up to 4.5 is all I've felt.)
I've only *noticed* one -- a couple of years ago towards central
Virginia. It shook a few things off shelves up here, but no damage to
the house. However, it brought the triangular brick part under the end
of a roof toppling down on a bunch of cars in the parking lot a few
miles way -- sort of variable how hard it hit.
O.K. It was in 2011, and was a 5.8 magnitude. Lots more damage
near the epicenter.
That's a pretty good sized jolt.
Yep -- but something like 50 miles away, so we did not get that
much. It was a small down over the epicenter which got rather messed
up, and some nearer ones with lots of historical brick buildings which
got rather badly damaged.
I could tell that it was somewhat distant, because I first felt
horizontal motion for several seconds, and then vertical, which felt a
lot stronger.
I got a vertical ripple here a few years ago when the quake hit in
NorCal. I could hear it coming like an extremely fast freight train,
then the windows on my right boomed, then a split second later the
other side of the house boomed. We hopped a tenth of an inch, but no
damage. That's the first time I've felt vertical earth oscillations,
and it induced a very mild vertigo in me for a few seconds. That was
new. I don't think I'd like a 10.5 much. You?
No -- except perhaps to view it from a small airplane. :-)
With the horizontal waves, I wasn't really sure that it was a
'quake, but when the vertical ones arrived, I was quite sure. If they
had kept up for more than the few seconds, I would have made for
downstairs and outdoors. :-)
[ ... ]
I think that I was about 17, and pretty much the same feeling.
That's during our Immortal stage, huh? g
Yep. Like the time a few years later when a group of us spent
the night in the crater of a somewhat dormant volcano. :-)
Enjoy,
DoN.
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