Clive Mitchell wrote...

It's not about proper training any more. It's just about shifting
liability away from management. We'd be safer without the HSE.

Not sure I agree with that. Following a row on rec.arts.theatre.stagecraft
a couple of years ago about an alleged CO2 incident, I spoke several times
with the HSE guy responsible for the entertainment industry and I was very
impressed with his attitudes regarding safety of smoke and dry-ice effects.

It may be what you are saying, but the problem is with managers shifting
blame and HSE is the best safety police force we are likely to get - without
them I doubt that those irresponsible managers would even bother about
blame - let alone try to shift it!

David

Clive Mitchell wrote:

It's like the HSE said "Ooh! Lots of people fall at work so lets ban
ladders." Well lots of people get knocked down by cars so lets ban them
too. It's the same logic.

Shh, for Chrissakes!

David

We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the
drugs began to take hold. I remember saying something
like:

The worst film I ever showed we got 2 of the 12 reels round the wrong
way - but it was so bad no-one even noticed!

"Eraserhead", perchance?
--

Dave

gentlegreen wrote:

I'm fairly sure mine said "automatic" on it - there was apparently a way of
opening the sides that caused the bread to flip over when you closed them
again ;-)

Absolutely. As the side is hinged down, a little arm fastened to
it nudges the bottom of the slice from behind, whereupon it
slides down the open side, untoasted side uppermost, ready to be
toasted.

Elegant simplicity.

Chris
--
Chris J Dixon Nottingham UK


Have dancing shoes, will ceilidh.

wrote:

Those are the ones I used to work with. Made in 1942, but they looked
older. The arc was 40v at 40A. I remember one day one of us found one
on show in a museum somewhere, we were still using them. Excellent
optics.

That sounds about right for a smallish place; carbons generally run at
a higher Voltage but lower Current than xenons. I've been to the
Loew's Jersey Theatre, http://www.loewsjersey.org/ They are still
running arcs, Ashcraft Super Core-lites with rotating positives,
running at about 185A. The positives are about 14mm. Sadly, they may
not have them much longer, as the mirrors are well past their best, and
they're having trouble getting new ones, or the old ones re-silvered.
There's a picture of the box in the 'Virtual Tour' section of the site.

When MOMI was still open there was a picture on the back window of the
box. It was a still from 'The Smallest Show on Earth', with the old
Kalees, 7s or 8s I think they were, and would have probably dated from
about the mid-late '20s. At that time MOMI was using DP-70s, from
1958, so the actual machines in use there were older than the ancient
ones in the film were when the film was made. I know of a couple of
cinemas which were still running 1930s projectors until about three
years ago. There are plenty of 1950s ones still in use, albeit
converted to xenon, fitted with stereo cells, etc.

I still do the odd projection shift, I'm doing a few hours on Thursday
and a full day on Saturday this week, but sadly it's all xenon lamps
and solid state rectifiers these days.

No tending arcs

Pity.

no CO from failed vent fans

Never had a problem with that. When you go into an old box that's been
disused for years you can sometimes still smell the arcs though.

no temporary blindness from looking in the back end at the arc

If you've got an old enough lamp the asbestos curtain will keep some of
the light out of your eyes

no changeovers,

We're still running changeovers; most films are run on 6k spools, so
there's only one changeover during most features, but I still run some
things on 20 minute changeovers, the Saturday morning children's film
for example, and the last show on Thursday, so I can make a quick
get-out at the end of the day. Or when there's going to be a taxi
waiting to take the print on crossover as soon as the show finishes.
Of course, xenons are not really suited to 20 minute reels.

Digital projection due to go in next month, but I can't see it
happening by then, there's a lot of preparatory work to be done, and we
will still be running film as well for some time to come.

The worst film I ever showed we got 2 of the 12 reels round the wrong
way - but it was so bad no-one even noticed!

I ran one somewhere once, in the late '70s probably. It was made by
and about dissident Chineese lesbians, and consisted of many such
people talking to camera, about what I'm not sure, since I don't speak
Chineese. There were subtitles - in Spanish! I think there were about
two people in the audience, and they had probably only come in to get
out of the rain!

In message , Chris J Dixon
writes
I'm fairly sure mine said "automatic" on it - there was apparently a way of
opening the sides that caused the bread to flip over when you closed them
again ;-)

Absolutely. As the side is hinged down, a little arm fastened to it
nudges the bottom of the slice from behind, whereupon it slides down
the open side, untoasted side uppermost, ready to be toasted.

I had a toaster incident recently. It was at Glasgow's Christmas light
switch-on and I was in our control cabin where the control computer for
all the lights is. I'd decided that the control system should be
plugged into the main power DB for the lights so that it was independent
from the cabin power in case we had some unlikely incident that tripped
the RCD and killed the controller.

This turned out to be a good move. A few minutes before the countdown I
decided to abuse the toaster by making a cheese and ham toastie in it in
a manner which involved jamming the sandwich into a single slot with
force. This had worked every time I had tried it before, but on this
instance, while the cabin was full of event management, I managed to
make bread to element contact and trip the RCD plunging the cabin into
darkness.

Fortunately it was easy enough to pop outside and reset the RCD in the
mains pillar, and thanks to foresight the computer was still happily
running ready for the switch-on without any heart-in-mouth reboot time.


Getting the untoasted cheese and ham toastie out of the toaster was a
very messy affair.

--
Clive Mitchell
http://www.bigclive.com

In message .com,
writes
Digital projection due to go in next month, but I can't see it
happening by then, there's a lot of preparatory work to be done, and we
will still be running film as well for some time to come.

Heard that some of the digital projection systems use uncompressed video
stored on huge drives. Makes sense from a quality perspective I
suppose.

--
Clive Mitchell
http://www.bigclive.com

Clive Mitchell wrote:

Heard that some of the digital projection systems use uncompressed video
stored on huge drives. Makes sense from a quality perspective I
suppose.

The audio is usually uncompressed, but not the picture. It can be
either MPEG or motion JPEG. The latter stores every frame, but each
frame is still compressed. The system going in at Croydon comes with
750GB as standard, which I think can store something like five hours.
It can be expanded up to an additional 750GB, in 250GB increments. Not
that big really; in my main job, not cinema related, we have some LaCie
thernet attached disk units, one rack unit high, and they hold 2TB
each. You would need a lot more than that to store the picture in
uncompressed form.

Clive Mitchell wrote...
This turned out to be a good move. A few minutes before the countdown I
decided to abuse the toaster by making a cheese and ham toastie in it in a
manner which involved jamming the sandwich into a single slot with force.
This had worked every time I had tried it before, but on this instance,
while the cabin was full of event management, I managed to make bread to
element contact and trip the RCD plunging the cabin into darkness.

I thought that anybody who had ever been an impoverished student knew that
bread should always be inserted with the green side to earth! ;-)

David

In article ,
Clive Mitchell writes:

I just discovered that in Norway they teach electronics at primary
school, including soldering!

Well, I had picked up my father's soldering iron by that age,
having got an interest in electronics probably from around
age 7 or 8.

When I got to O-level physics, I recall being rather disappointed
to find that we missed out on electronics and domestic wiring which
I would have sailed through, whilst those in the bottom set who did
CSE rather than O-level did have these in their course.

--
Andrew Gabriel

In article ,
Clive Mitchell writes:

I'm surprised he wasn't forced to wear a safety harness as well. The
weirdest thing is seeing the traffic light guys being forced to wear
fall arrest harnesses. If they fall and the shock absorber in the
lanyard deploys they will still hit the ground.

I saw one only yesterday. He'd used his harness to tie the top
of the step ladder to the pole, because there was no ground surface
around it which was horizontal enough to stand the ladder on with
more than 2 of its feet on the ground ;-)

--
Andrew Gabriel

In message . com,
writes
The audio is usually uncompressed, but not the picture. It can be
either MPEG or motion JPEG. The latter stores every frame, but each
frame is still compressed. The system going in at Croydon comes with
750GB as standard, which I think can store something like five hours.
It can be expanded up to an additional 750GB, in 250GB increments. Not
that big really; in my main job, not cinema related, we have some LaCie
thernet attached disk units, one rack unit high, and they hold 2TB
each. You would need a lot more than that to store the picture in
uncompressed form.

So what sort of resolution are the digital films projected at?

--
Clive Mitchell
http://www.bigclive.com

In message , Owain
writes
No handy spotlight and frying pan on this event?

Hey, that was a proper wok. Sized to fit the parcan properly.

http://www.emanator.demon.co.uk/stirfry.jpg

--
Clive Mitchell
http://www.bigclive.com

In message , Andrew Gabriel
writes
Well, I had picked up my father's soldering iron by that age, having
got an interest in electronics probably from around age 7 or 8.

Did you pick it up by the right end?

When I got to O-level physics, I recall being rather disappointed to
find that we missed out on electronics and domestic wiring which I
would have sailed through, whilst those in the bottom set who did CSE
rather than O-level did have these in their course.

They did?

I had to wait until I reached 16 then went and did it for real. Not
domestic wiring though, I ended up serving my apprenticeship with an
electrical engineering company doing construction and steelworks. Much
better than school!

--
Clive Mitchell
http://www.bigclive.com

wrote:
wrote:

Those are the ones I used to work with. Made in 1942, but they looked
older. The arc was 40v at 40A. I remember one day one of us found one
on show in a museum somewhere, we were still using them. Excellent
optics.

That sounds about right for a smallish place; carbons generally run at

I dont remember the number but I know the venue seated about 1000 at
max capacity, though we never showed to a full house. Judging by floor
space I guess we must have maxed out at around 750, 800 or so on
popular stuff like Christine.

The Kalees would easily have handled a bigger venue, on sky shots the
screen was so bright it was painful. But the old sound system struggled
at times.


a higher Voltage but lower Current than xenons. I've been to the
Loew's Jersey Theatre, http://www.loewsjersey.org/ They are still
running arcs, Ashcraft Super Core-lites with rotating positives,
running at about 185A. The positives are about 14mm. Sadly, they may
not have them much longer, as the mirrors are well past their best, and
they're having trouble getting new ones, or the old ones re-silvered.
There's a picture of the box in the 'Virtual Tour' section of the site.

I cant imagine why they would be unable to get something resilvered.


When MOMI was still open there was a picture on the back window of the
box. It was a still from 'The Smallest Show on Earth', with the old
Kalees, 7s or 8s I think they were, and would have probably dated from
about the mid-late '20s. At that time MOMI was using DP-70s, from
1958, so the actual machines in use there were older than the ancient
ones in the film were when the film was made. I know of a couple of
cinemas which were still running 1930s projectors until about three
years ago. There are plenty of 1950s ones still in use, albeit
converted to xenon, fitted with stereo cells, etc.

I guess film was such a slow moving technology, and cinema economics so
marginal, that the ancient kit stayed in use. In our case I'm not
convinced anyone outside of the projectionists even knew what was in
the box.


I still do the odd projection shift, I'm doing a few hours on Thursday
and a full day on Saturday this week, but sadly it's all xenon lamps
and solid state rectifiers these days.

No tending arcs

Pity.

no CO from failed vent fans

Never had a problem with that. When you go into an old box that's been
disused for years you can sometimes still smell the arcs though.

no temporary blindness from looking in the back end at the arc

If you've got an old enough lamp the asbestos curtain will keep some of
the light out of your eyes

Such luxuries


no changeovers,

We're still running changeovers; most films are run on 6k spools, so
there's only one changeover during most features, but I still run some
things on 20 minute changeovers, the Saturday morning children's film
for example, and the last show on Thursday, so I can make a quick
get-out at the end of the day. Or when there's going to be a taxi
waiting to take the print on crossover as soon as the show finishes.
Of course, xenons are not really suited to 20 minute reels.

Digital projection due to go in next month, but I can't see it
happening by then, there's a lot of preparatory work to be done, and we
will still be running film as well for some time to come.

I'll bet the digital kit wont have anything like the life of the old
projectors, though it should end the quality issue. We had the
occasional film so scratched up I couldnt figure out what kind of
terrible equipment it must have been on.


The worst film I ever showed we got 2 of the 12 reels round the wrong
way - but it was so bad no-one even noticed!

I ran one somewhere once, in the late '70s probably. It was made by
and about dissident Chineese lesbians, and consisted of many such
people talking to camera, about what I'm not sure, since I don't speak
Chineese. There were subtitles - in Spanish! I think there were about
two people in the audience, and they had probably only come in to get
out of the rain!

lol, sounds very similar Ours went on for hours, longest one we ever
showed I think. Think we ended with just one audient out of about 4
still awake. It sounded like it was in French, which sounds promising,
but not being native speakers, and with a not very clear sound system,
no-one could make out a word. The scenes were very long and nothing
happened, just mumbling. The funny thing was afterwards the remaining
audient came and told us how good it was Never mind that he was sat
in the gallery where he didnt have a hope in hell of hearing it all,
and didnt speak French.


NT

Clive Mitchell wrote:

I had a toaster incident recently. It was at Glasgow's Christmas light
switch-on and I was in our control cabin where the control computer for
all the lights is. I'd decided that the control system should be
plugged into the main power DB for the lights so that it was independent
from the cabin power in case we had some unlikely incident that tripped
the RCD and killed the controller.

This turned out to be a good move. A few minutes before the countdown I
decided to abuse the toaster by making a cheese and ham toastie in it in
a manner which involved jamming the sandwich into a single slot with
force. This had worked every time I had tried it before, but on this
instance, while the cabin was full of event management, I managed to
make bread to element contact and trip the RCD plunging the cabin into
darkness.

Fortunately it was easy enough to pop outside and reset the RCD in the
mains pillar, and thanks to foresight the computer was still happily
running ready for the switch-on without any heart-in-mouth reboot time.


Getting the untoasted cheese and ham toastie out of the toaster was a
very messy affair.

lol, bad man


NT

In article 1165886427.708645@athnrd02, Ioannis wrote:
Red tape and unskilled labour is making even the simplest job a chore.
It's time to emigrate.

Where to though? This thing is catchy. In a few years nobody will be allowed
to do anything without a Ph.D. in their respective field.

No. A PhD in an irrelevant field. Working on electrics? You need a PhD
in Media Studies. Working as a journalist? You need a PhD in architecture.

--
Aidan
Aberdeen, Scotland
Written at Tue, 12 Dec 2006 06:31 GMT, but posted later.

In message valid,
Aidan Karley lid
writes
No. A PhD in an irrelevant field. Working on electrics? You need
a PhD in Media Studies. Working as a journalist? You need a PhD in
architecture.

So true. I remember being totally blanked for a maintenance job at a
local Alcan plant. They specifically wanted students with an HND (any
HND) to work on their machinery. Not a real electrician with tons of
electronics, panel building and maintenance experience.

Then they shut down. Maybe they couldn't keep the machines running.

--
Clive Mitchell
http://www.bigclive.com

Clive Mitchell wrote:
In message valid,
Aidan Karley lid writes
No. A PhD in an irrelevant field. Working on electrics? You need
a PhD in Media Studies. Working as a journalist? You need a PhD in
architecture.

So true. I remember being totally blanked for a maintenance job at a
local Alcan plant. They specifically wanted students with an HND (any
HND) to work on their machinery. Not a real electrician with tons of
electronics, panel building and maintenance experience.

Then they shut down. Maybe they couldn't keep the machines running.

I can gert em that price online..

BUT its accepatble for now. I am going to leave it. If the new cartridge
when this one runs out doesn't fix it, its by by my old and faithful
laserjet..and probably hello color one..

Grimly Curmudgeon wrote:
saying something like:

The worst film I ever showed we got 2 of the 12 reels round the wrong
way - but it was so bad no-one even noticed!

"Eraserhead", perchance?

Getting a nice tidy neat title together would be asking too much of
this one. I've no idea what it was called, but I'm sure the title would
have been long, meandering, pointless, of no consequence at all, and in
French.


NT

We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the
drugs began to take hold. I remember saying something
like:

Grimly Curmudgeon wrote:
saying something like:

The worst film I ever showed we got 2 of the 12 reels round the wrong
way - but it was so bad no-one even noticed!

"Eraserhead", perchance?

Getting a nice tidy neat title together would be asking too much of
this one. I've no idea what it was called, but I'm sure the title would
have been long, meandering, pointless, of no consequence at all, and in
French.

The reason I asked was that, on viewing Eraserhead, I was of the opinion
that someone had got the reels mixed up somewhere.
--

Dave

In article , Clive Mitchell wrote:
The
weirdest thing is seeing the traffic light guys being forced to wear
fall arrest harnesses. If they fall and the shock absorber in the
lanyard deploys they will still hit the ground.

Not if they've properly selected the harness and shock-absorber,
fitted it properly, and chosen a suitable anchor point. That they don't
do that / won't do that / don't understand the issues involved is no
surprise. It's a bit of a condemnation of the inadequacies of their HSE
training people though.
Go back to where the work for developing those harnesses, shock
absorbers, etc - a properly-kitted out caver can be doing his
engineering work on a tiny ledge above a 220ft drop, take a slip, and
come to a halt with the anchor point below his eye level while
suspended. But that's someone who *understands* his ropes and
harnesses, not someone who's just thrown on the harness because he
doesn't need to be bollocked by the "fookin elf & unsafety man".

Quick question - do these poor sods on the top of the traffic
lights have their own personal set of kit (harnesses, personal-sized
shock absorbers, anchors, etc) or do they just keep one harness in the
van, stretched to the max so everyone can get into it and never
adjusted to fit any one? Stupid question, really.

--
Aidan
Aberdeen, Scotland
Written at Thu, 14 Dec 2006 12:58 GMT, but posted later.

In article , Guy King wrote:
He was - but it wasn't clipped to anything as there wasn't anything to
which to clip it.

Top of the pole?
(Assuming they've got the rain cap off already to get at the
cables)
--
Aidan
Aberdeen, Scotland
Written at Thu, 14 Dec 2006 13:08 GMT, but posted later.

In article , Clive Mitchell wrote:
It's not about proper training any more. It's just about shifting
liability away from management.
Was it ever anything else?

We'd be safer without the HSE.

While I'm no great fan-boy for the "Paper Tigers", their main
role is actually in trying to stop management shedding liability down
to individuals without providing adequate equipment, training and time.
Management have, of course, evolved to try to nullify these
pressures. With, it must be said, the whole-hearted and conscious
connivance of sub-contractors, particularly those on piece-work, who go
apoplectic about having to take the time to do the job according to the
rules. (So what if they won't earn as much money per day as they'd
hoped - they'd included these timings in their estimates for the job
hadn't they?)

--
Aidan
Aberdeen, Scotland
Written at Thu, 14 Dec 2006 13:10 GMT, but posted later.

In message valid,
Aidan Karley lid
writes
Quick question - do these poor sods on the top of the traffic
lights have their own personal set of kit (harnesses, personal-sized
shock absorbers, anchors, etc) or do they just keep one harness in the
van, stretched to the max so everyone can get into it and never
adjusted to fit any one? Stupid question, really.

Most likely each person has their own harness. I have mine my
colleagues have theirs. The only time one is shared is if someone
visits a job and unexpectedly needs one.

In construction you don't get much choice on the shock absorber. It
does appear to be one size fits all.

Now scaffolders.... Do they ever clip on to anything? Saw one recently
with the harness over his shoulders but his legs not through the loops.
Just dangling behind him.

--
Clive Mitchell
http://www.bigclive.com

In message valid,
Aidan Karley lid
writes
While I'm no great fan-boy for the "Paper Tigers", their main
role is actually in trying to stop management shedding liability down
to individuals without providing adequate equipment, training and time.

I thought their main role was to help shed responsibility from
management. All the ones I've met have worked that way. White collar
looking after white collar....

--
Clive Mitchell
http://www.bigclive.com

On Thu, 14 Dec 2006 22:33:35 GMT, Aidan Karley wrote:

Top of the pole?
(Assuming they've got the rain cap off already to get at the cables)

How do you get the rain cap off if you "can't work" without being clipped
on?

--
Cheers
Dave. pam is missing e-mail

In sci.engr.lighting and uk.d-i-y Alex writes:

I have never understood how it is still permitted to have a
lampholder like in the OP:
http://www.toolstation.com/messages.html?closeUp=27046

The way the lampholder is suspended depends on the grip of the
actual screw-fittings on the bare wires!



On 10 Dec 2006, Clive Mitchell wrote:

It's not just relying on the wire being clamped. When assembled
correctly the wires are looped over strain relief hooks which
remove a lot of the pull force.



At end of the day, with or without strain relief hooks, the weight of
the lampshade is going to be carried at one point by only the two copper
multi-stranded mains wires and their respective insulation.

The heavier gauge protective outer sheath of the flex is not used in the
UK ceiling pendants I have seen.

I don't know what the breaking strain is of those two little wires but
it can't be all that much.

ISTR that a UK ceiling flex is about 6A (0.75 mm^2 and perhaps made up
of 24 strands of 0.2mm diameter). For example:
http://www.maplin.co.uk/Module.aspx?ModuleNo=6198&C=SEO
http://uk.farnell.com/jsp/endecaSear...jsp?SKU=730858

One link happens to show 3 cores but usually there will be only two
cores holding a ceiling lampholder & shade.

What is the breaking strain of those two cores alone without any outer
sheathing? Is anyone able to test this and get a reading of the
required force?




If a moderately heavy lampshade is used then the whole thing seems
to be asking for trouble.







--
PS: groups widened to alt.engineering.electrical & sci.physics

In article ,
Alex Coleman writes:

What is the breaking strain of those two cores alone without any outer
sheathing? Is anyone able to test this and get a reading of the
required force?

Max permitted weight supported by a two-conductor flex in
UK Wiring Regs is:

0.5mm² 2kg
0.75mm² 3kg
=1mm² 5kg

--
Andrew Gabriel

Andrew Gabriel wrote...

What is the breaking strain of those two cores alone without any outer
sheathing? Is anyone able to test this and get a reading of the
required force?

Max permitted weight supported by a two-conductor flex in
UK Wiring Regs is:

0.5mm² 2kg
0.75mm² 3kg
=1mm² 5kg

Indeed - from product specifications for MK ceiling roses and pendant sets:

"Suitable for fittings of up to 5kgs. Heavier fittings must be
installed using independent support eg. ceiling hook."

Although MK pendant sets are supplied pre-fitted with "0.75mm2 two core
circular cable", so there is some discrepancy with your quoted max permitted
weight.

David

"Alex Coleman" wrote in message ...
| In sci.engr.lighting and uk.d-i-y Alex writes:
|
| I have never understood how it is still permitted to have a
| lampholder like in the OP:
| http://www.toolstation.com/messages.html?closeUp=27046
|
| The way the lampholder is suspended depends on the grip of the
| actual screw-fittings on the bare wires!
|
|
|
| On 10 Dec 2006, Clive Mitchell wrote:
|
| It's not just relying on the wire being clamped. When assembled
| correctly the wires are looped over strain relief hooks which
| remove a lot of the pull force.
|
|
|
| At end of the day, with or without strain relief hooks, the weight of
| the lampshade is going to be carried at one point by only the two copper
| multi-stranded mains wires and their respective insulation.

Yes.
|
| The heavier gauge protective outer sheath of the flex is not used in the
| UK ceiling pendants I have seen.
|
| I don't know what the breaking strain is of those two little wires but
| it can't be all that much.

We don't have 100 lb lampshades, those are chandeliers with
other means of support. As you correctly stated, you "don't know".



|
| ISTR that a UK ceiling flex is about 6A (0.75 mm^2 and perhaps made up
| of 24 strands of 0.2mm diameter). For example:
| http://www.maplin.co.uk/Module.aspx?ModuleNo=6198&C=SEO
| http://uk.farnell.com/jsp/endecaSear...jsp?SKU=730858
|
| One link happens to show 3 cores but usually there will be only two
| cores holding a ceiling lampholder & shade.
|
| What is the breaking strain of those two cores alone without any outer
| sheathing?


About 100 lbs.

Is anyone able to test this and get a reading of the
| required force?

Yes, hang on it with one of these:
http://www.humboldtmfg.com/images/products/h-4490.jpg

Why are you so concerned when there a several million in use?

What's black, charred and hangs from the ceiling?












An (Irish/Polish/Belgian/Chinese/Pakistani * ) electrician.

* choose ethnic group to suit your locality and create raucous laughter.

Dave Liquorice wrote:
On Thu, 14 Dec 2006 22:33:35 GMT, Aidan Karley wrote:

Top of the pole?
(Assuming they've got the rain cap off already to get at the cables)

How do you get the rain cap off if you "can't work" without being clipped
on?


Rod from the bottom?

Dave Liquorice wrote:
How do you get the rain cap off if you "can't work" without being clipped
on?

You could equally ask "How do you clip on if you "can't work" without being
clipped on?" The answer to which question is obvious - the entire process
of attaching your safety is not part of "the work" but must be carried out
before "work" commences and must be subject to its own risk assessment.

The only issue is whether removal of a cover to gain access to an attachment
point can be carried out safely prior to the installation of fall-arrest
precautions - but this should be covered in the risk assessment and work
instructions for the process.

David

Clive Mitchell wrote:

So what sort of resolution are the digital films projected at?

I didn't know the answer, so I had to look it up; it sems to be 2048 x
1080 for the current, second, generation of machines. This can be
reduced if a wider or narrower aspect ratio is being shown. As an
alternative, for 'Scope' films a 1.25x anamorphic lens can be used,
with the full area of the imaging panels being used.

In sci.engr.lighting Alex Coleman wrote:
In sci.engr.lighting and uk.d-i-y Alex writes:

I have never understood how it is still permitted to have a
lampholder like in the OP:
http://www.toolstation.com/messages.html?closeUp=27046

The way the lampholder is suspended depends on the grip of the
actual screw-fittings on the bare wires!



On 10 Dec 2006, Clive Mitchell wrote:

It's not just relying on the wire being clamped. When assembled
correctly the wires are looped over strain relief hooks which
remove a lot of the pull force.



At end of the day, with or without strain relief hooks, the weight of
the lampshade is going to be carried at one point by only the two copper
multi-stranded mains wires and their respective insulation.

The heavier gauge protective outer sheath of the flex is not used in the
UK ceiling pendants I have seen.

I don't know what the breaking strain is of those two little wires but
it can't be all that much.

ISTR that a UK ceiling flex is about 6A (0.75 mm^2 and perhaps made up
of 24 strands of 0.2mm diameter). For example:
http://www.maplin.co.uk/Module.aspx?ModuleNo=6198&C=SEO
http://uk.farnell.com/jsp/endecaSear...jsp?SKU=730858

One link happens to show 3 cores but usually there will be only two
cores holding a ceiling lampholder & shade.

What is the breaking strain of those two cores alone without any outer
sheathing? Is anyone able to test this and get a reading of the
required force?

It's quite a lot.
From memory, maybe 30Kg?
Which'd be a total of 60Kg for the flex.

In article om, Dave
Liquorice wrote:
Top of the pole?
(Assuming they've got the rain cap off already to get at the cables)

How do you get the rain cap off if you "can't work" without being clipped
on?

Hmm, point.
There are ways it can be done, I'm sure. I'm not a rope-access
technician, but there are no shortage of them around to get the gen on it
(about 200 employed in town, I estimate). If I had to do such a job myself,
I'd chuck a kruzclem'd sling around the pole while I'm climbing up the
ladder (possibly a second one on cows-tail #2 if the lamp-set fittings are
likely to get in the way), then use that as my second security device while
levering off the rain cap. Then whatever skyhook [1] I have on my short
cows-tail over the rim of the pole to act as the security for the main job,
go down a couple of steps to get on with whatever the job at hand is.
Total time added to the job (since you've got to put on the harness
etc in either case) probably not even 2 minutes. Years of practice and
training on the other hand ... would probably put the grunt on the ladder
into a higher pay bracket. Oh, sorry, fatal flaw.
What do the onshore scaffolding companies call the roped access
people? Offshore they're "dopes on ropes", though the animosity seems to
have died down somewhat over the last decade.


[1] A "skyhook" is a range of products reasonably easily available on
the mountaineering scene. They're designed for providing "security" on
horizontal traverses. Been around for about 45 years - if I recall properly,
the first commercial ones were made by Royal Robbins after the publicity
from the big wall routes on El Capitan. The mountaineering community have
always found the building community's amusement about skyhooks ... amusing.
See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skyhook_%28climbing%29 and the other
associated uses of the word.
There should be one in the gear shop down George Street :
http://www.nevisport.com/detail.asp?...tegoryID=19 2
&Depth=3&ProductID=367017 . Obviously, it's not equipment to be used without
proper training.

--
Aidan
Aberdeen, Scotland
Written at Fri, 15 Dec 2006 14:37 GMT, but posted later.

In article , Clive Mitchell wrote:
Now scaffolders.... Do they ever clip on to anything? Saw one recently
with the harness over his shoulders but his legs not through the loops.
Just dangling behind him.

Nothing news to me. Which is one of the reasons I always found it
amusing to hear the scaffolders refer to the roped access technicians as
"dopes on ropes".

In construction you don't get much choice on the shock absorber. It
does appear to be one size fits all.

That's no surprise. The climbing world seems to only have one size
too, possibly the same size. But stretch in ropes, slings, etc is an
accepted factor. As is wear and tear on the soft stuff and the need to
replace ropes, slings, harness etc after even quite modest falls. The
industrial uses I see at work require a maximum working lifetime of, IIRC,
6 weeks for any of the semi-fixed soft stuff, and a deal less for harnesses
and any other gear that's in constant use.
There's a constant consideration of forces and hazards in the
business too, rather than the scaffolding/ industrial habit of just going
massively over the top on the materials strength front. Consider - climbing
ropes, harnesses etc all have a breaking strength of 1800 to 2000 kg, but
by changing materials you could easily go up to the 5000kg of even small
steel slings, so why not make them stronger? The answer is that at about
2000 kg people start to come apart. So, to use a rope of 5000 kg breaking
strength would just guarantee that the falling person would hit the ground
in several chunks. By restricting the breaking strength of the items used
to less than the strength of the people, you ensure that really severe
falls end with one item of kit breaking (absorbing some of the energy
generated by the fall), then another item in the string fails, then
another, and eventually a very sore person is hanging around in mid-air on
one of the two rope, possibly screaming that they should have shuffled
their nuts out from under the "knackertrapper" straps. Which is arguably a
better outcome.

--
Aidan
Aberdeen, Scotland
Written at Fri, 15 Dec 2006 15:10 GMT, but posted later.

In article , Clive Mitchell wrote:
I thought their main role was to help shed responsibility from
management.

Are you talking about within-company HSE staff, or HSE
inspectors employed by the government to make companies adhere to the
law and their (company's) rules? I'm talking about the latter.

--
Aidan
Aberdeen, Scotland
Written at Fri, 15 Dec 2006 15:35 GMT, but posted later.

David Lee wrote:

Indeed - from product specifications for MK ceiling roses and pendant sets:

"Suitable for fittings of up to 5kgs. Heavier fittings must be
installed using independent support eg. ceiling hook."

Although MK pendant sets are supplied pre-fitted with "0.75mm2 two core
circular cable", so there is some discrepancy with your quoted max permitted
weight.

Andrew's figures are correct (BS 7671 Table 4H3A) but apply in the
absence of more specific information from a manufacturer. So if MK say
5 kg, that's OK.

--
Andy

On 15 Dec 2006, Andy Wade wrote:


David Lee wrote:

Indeed - from product specifications for MK ceiling roses and
pendant sets:

"Suitable for fittings of up to 5kgs. Heavier fittings must be
installed using independent support eg. ceiling hook."

Although MK pendant sets are supplied pre-fitted with "0.75mm2 two
core circular cable", so there is some discrepancy with your
quoted max permitted weight.

Andrew's figures are correct (BS 7671 Table 4H3A) but apply in the
absence of more specific information from a manufacturer. So if MK
say 5 kg, that's OK.


5kg!! I would be surprised if that's safe. Never mind the electrical
hazard - what if it falls on your head? :-)