July 29, 2024

Yesteryear
One year ago today: July 29, 2023, he’s still got no band.
Five years ago today: July 29, 2019, only the good UFOs.
Nine years ago today: July 29, 2015, except – they ain’t real auctions.
Random years ago today: July 29, 2007, parts $98, labor $50.

           Sure, I bemoan not meeting people with brains, but that’s not to say I don’t know any. It’s that they are so far-flung. I was on the phone for nearly an hour with one of the few people who can get me that long. In this case, the executor of my estate who has bought a boat and wanted to chat. She will tell you equally how difficult it is to find anyone above rat-race level to even chum around with. It’s noteworthy what we covered so I thought on this nothing Monday morning, to go over one of the topics. The files for my vacuum tube business.

           On-line, you realize quickly that while others may have lists of their tubes, they are not masters of organization. Here is a sample of one corner of my “database” of tubes. It isn’t a database at all, but that’s the charm. She quickly realized that although these are ordinary flat files, they are arranged into database fields. Yes, if you design the database, these files can be imported directly. They are arranged in meaningful columns, the operational part beginning on column F, blank in this sample. It would contain a symbol to indicate the tube had been photographed and if it had been listed. That’s too much info, but none of these are listed. In bold italics are the tube names, this file is sorted. Next column is a cross reference where I got, in this case, the $3 wholesale price. KA is the label on the box where they are stored in the shed.

           The blank columns are equally important but their significance is proprietory. You many wonder what the far left column is for. It is line-item, which shores the order in which each record was key-entered. If anything goes too wrong, it allows you to sort the files back into their original order. You be damn careful sorting spreadsheet fields, it is one of their most ill-thought-out commands. Thus, it looks and acts like a database. As it ages, it changes. For example, right now I list only tubes over $10. You see there is one here for $8. I will eventually get to those before the $3, all at my fingertips. And I know from what I see on eBay, this gives my tubes a fighting chance against bigger, more entrenched operators.

           So the Captain, her new nickname, and I had a great time going over the design, This may strike some as boring or even what-the-hell. Ha, that’s because they have not lived a full enough life to know how badly they will waste their senior years. To be sure, most of us would rather be partying downtown, but when the parties over, will you still know anyone interesting to talk to? I knew off-moments increased with age, I prepared, and I still wound up surrounded by do-nothings. Fine, because I’d rather talk to a gal about something academic any day than like the rest, sitting at home staring at the weather channel.

           See this book? It was written in 1963 and carried the hefty price tag of 50¢. It’s dry technical material concerning radio waves, but to my delight, it showed some excellent diagrams and fold-out templates on building vacuum tube radios. I recognized the tubes and what some them are for. No, I won’t be building any, for they require things I don’t have or don’t want around here, like 300V power supplies. But here is proof there are diagrams readable by mere mortals. The on-line crap often does not even show the pin number, the old you-re-supposed-to-know sequence so beloved by unsuccessful parents. The tech parts of the book are similar in complexity to celestial navigation, so let me read it over a few times before I say I won’t even try.

Picture of the day.
Luxury cave house.
Remember to use BACK ARROW to return to blog.

           Feeling like getting some work done, I cataloged another 150 tubes since 5:30AM, finding only two with price tags above $10. I photographed and listed those, deciding I want the rest of the day off. I contacted Agt. M to proceed with the van radio, so maybe this weekend or something, I’ll zip down state. I will have to make a trip to Nashville for the paperwork on this one, and it is now a $300 trip with gasoline prices high again. This means the events of the past two weeks have cost me $4,100 and the transmission will be another $3,000 or so. But I will not be caught without a vehicle again. A third of my cost was over the towing, which worked out to $6.35 per mile. That’s partly why I need the day off. This tube has something prophetic in the blurb. Keep reading.

           Or at least part of the afternoon off. Just go for a drive to my old favorite motorcycle touring grounds, the farmland to the SE of Mulberry. The new Hyunda, Unit 35, runs smoothly enough and it needs an extended test run, say 100 miles. There are no towns or services in the area except places we’ve already been. I’m craving a milk shake. Let’s combine these and see where it gets us to.
           I received word from Valdosta that this $588 radiator sprung a leak.

           The tube count this morning put me over the half-way mark. Once they are inventoried, they can sit in the shed. Part of the reason it’s moving faster is I did the hard part first, that is, all the small tubes. With fewer tubes in the big boxes at the back, things go faster and I was not sure how many boxes of these existed. I’m getting box after box of $3 tubes, prompting me to do some thinking. After they are neatly stacked in the shed awaiting sale, I am left with a fairly nifty inventory system that won’t be used for much. I need to think of what I can retail that fits the formula. Small, light, non-perishable, tell you what, let me grab a coffee and check good old Craigslist for estate sales and such.

           I rarely read forums. They move too slow and suffer badly from trolling. One caught my attention today, about a lady who never bothered with personal privacy. She lived in that fantasy world that nothing bad had happened to her from giving out all her personal information on-line to anyone who wanted it. Posted everything on Facebook. She’s also a prominent poster on Gab, which is how I recognized her name. Yes, she uses her real name on-line.
           There she was, bitching and moaning. Seems the system caught up with her and she got sued. Her complaint was no matter how she tried to defend herself, the Plaintiff knew everything about her. They seemed completely prepared to counter everything she said. I think I’ll keep an eye on this one, see how well she fares. She’s also the one who has, in the past, accused anyone who wanted privacy as being a criminal of some sort. Anyway, the feature that makes the blog isn’t this story, but that the story got me to read a forum.

ADDENDUM

           Much of learning electronics as a hobby is a slow string of small victories at often complicated gadgets. You are tricking DC electricity into doing things that seem intelligent. The Delay Relay was fascinating. Here’s a picture of the working parts inside the glass housing. Also, a closeup of the warning label heralding it unaffected by altitude, moisture, and years ahead of the Green New Deal, climate changes. Makes sense, the thing is inside a vacuum, but we are talking the 1950s when finishing high school was still a novelty.
           To my surprise, I recognized the entire apparatus. There are the two “telephone company” contacts. Where our models used magnetism to operate the contacts, this one has a heater attached directly onto one of the bimetal strips. For those who don’t recall the principle, the strip is made from two metals with different coefficients of expansion. When heated, one metal expands more than the other, causing the strip to bend, in this case, until the contacts meet. Removing the power lets the strip cool. What this was used for, I don’t know.
           This is a terrible pic, but this computer has not software that even brighten this shot. The two tiny “buttons” are visible in their normally open position. If you are really eagle-eyed, you can spot the heater on the left. It’s white piece of ceramic with a tiny coil of wires wrapped around. The way to time this for five seconds seems to me an astounding analog feat. This tube may be rare enough that I really can’t find the pricing on it.

Last Laugh