This photo proves a point. There are two questions, one easy, one maybe not so easy. The easy question is what do you see here? The tricky question is what do I see? I’ll provide a few clues. Look at the X-shaped fitting at lower left. From a plumbing viewpoint, it is about as useless as imaginable. But they sold one to me, did they not?
Actually, that joint has a purpose, which is to (inefficiently) spread out a sprinkler system. But I said useless, because whenever anybody parks their car on the lawn at your 30th birthday party, it cracks these pipes underground. And nobody has answered my second question.Nobody likes this weather. Everyone gets to say, “I never thought it would rain all day.” It is rare in Florida, where tropical downpours are more the norm. I began by shopping at Big Lots for cat food, now that Pudding-Tat is cautiously returning. Big Lots is across from the Panera, where I dropped in to notice Pete is nowhere to be found (as usual). Do you suppose maybe he’s sick again? Health insurance companies know if you are ill more than 90 days, your chances of recovery are near zero. Pete keeps bouncing back evermore to their dismay.
Then I went by Dave-O’s, who is still laid low by the germs and sorely in bad health. I cannot relate because he is basically a tough guy, or didn’t I say? He assures me his recovery is progressing and that he doesn’t need anything. None of that was verified by his general appearance. I started for Ft. Lauderdale only to get caught in the rain that would not quit. The nearest shelter was Home Depot, where I picked up these PVC parts. It is weird how so many people cannot think of a single usage for PVC other than to do plumbing.
By mid-afternoon, I was famished and bought a McDonald’s Happy Meal™, 430 calories and climbing each year. It came with an Avatar toy, upon which I decided I wanted the flashing circuit inside to construct a battery testing device for my microphones at Jimbos. Remember my odyssey of taking apart that laser code pen from BK? This figurine was even thornier (is that a word?). I gave up and drove to Jimbos in the rain (I have a poncho). Their parking lot contains every tool known to civilization safely stored in automobile trunks. McD’s builds these toys to prevent children from dismantling bite size pieces, and they do a fantastic job.
They have to. These days, when somebody else's kid swallows your toy, even if his mother gave the kid the toy, that is somehow your fault.
It took forty minutes to dismember the thing, during which we got so much unsolicited advice, I finally dumped the package of the PVC fittings on the counter. That kept the rank and file busy for two hours, with a visible dividing line between the dummies and the thinkers. Sammy and I spread the rumor that we are building a time machine to go back and get Marilyn Monroe or to bet on some fights. Eddie’s girlfriend says she is not riding the thing until one of us comes back. I’ve christened this vehicle “The Spirit of St. Jimbos”.
During all this fun, I took some careful measurements on the electric bicycle motor. The battery is tiny, around the size of two D cells. The harness or coupling looks similar to a computer power supply clip, but is a custom design. There are also some thick cables from the motor running to what at first seem like a part of the mounting bracket, but on inspection seem to be some type of stator or assembly to control the current. I’d have looked it up and hooked it up, but the libraries and post office were closed today. Martin Luther King’s death date, I’m told. Hey, we take a break for Santa Claus, do we not? Increased public holidays are the classic sign of the empire in decline.
Here’s a partial answer to what I see, giving the world a chance to spot any difference. Or is my thinking so simple all can be guessed by the millions of people smarter than I am; the ones too smart to spend good money on PVC when they don’t even own a sprinkler system? You decide. I’m just showing my version. I will contact the manufacturer (Mueller) to see of other joints are available. Either I’m too dumb to figure out these basic shapes would take care of most situations or I already have situations where they aren’t sufficient. You decide again.
Most curious to me is that 90 degree elbow. Inside the joint, the theoretical cross section at the 45 degree position must increase and form an ellipse with the major axis the root of the sum of the squares of two semi-major axes. I don’t have the focal points or any “string and pins” to draw such a shape, but somebody somewhere does. That reminds me, I found software that converts jpegs to rapid-fire avi movies.
Last, I discovered part of what was causing my solder joints to fail. At the phone place, solder was heated onto custom made wrapping pins, not circuit boards. On the circuit boards, I was carelessly letting the hot iron touch the substrate. Nobody told me I couldn’t. I reviewed my training manuals, including publications by CuriousInventor.com and Elenco Electronics. In the seven expert videos and articles I carefully studied before beginning, this totally essential fact was not even mentioned. So, time to start over again.
Poco รก poco.
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