April 30, 2025

Yesteryear
One year ago today: April 30, 2024, Puerto Rico’s a basket case.
Five years ago today: April 30, 2020, the smell of mukluk.
Nine years ago today: April 30, 2016, instant audience.
Random years ago today: April 30, 1981, paid on time.

           Top news story is how 30,000 millionaires have fled England. No word where they went, but I doubt it was California. I’m back, we’ll build or fix something today. May is the middle of my planning year, if I never told you my first journal entry ever (now long lost) was May 1, 1969. I was just a kid. Let’s see if I get any work done on the floor of my cabin 56 years later. I’m going to start segregating the vacuum tubes as well. Those retailing less than $5 are first to go.

           Pancakes first, and we examine the workings of a NOR gate. I traced the wiring on my existing 2014 model and it may just need rewiring. For those with an interest in learning this field, here’s that all important point that the so-called experts leave out most of the time. They show you the diagram, which does not tell you how or why the circuit behaves as it does. Yes, I do blame them because they so consistently do this that it amounts to lying.

           The idea of gates is you are trying to get dumb electronic components to behave in ways that emulate logic. The classic first step is gates, like the one shown here. There are two NOR gates, one marked S (set) and the other marked R (reset). The trick to giving it memory is to connect the gates so that the output of one becomes the input of another. What they don’t tell you is this effect is not instant. There is a tiny but important delay from the time you input the signal until the circuit reacts. It might be a millionth or billionth of a second, but it is what “causes” this circuit to function. It looks instant, which threw me until extensive reading taught me right.

           The fault in my circuit has something to do with this. Until I learned about this delay, I was looking for the wrong problem. You may be able to see the two tiny white wires. This are the feedback connections. And that is where to start over again. Apply that to the red lean-to, I found the roof leak. Fortunately it is repairable, back then I took the extra step of applying two layers of tarpaper and barrier sheet. It must have been one hell of a wind when I was not home to peel up the first three layers. I’ll patch it for now. Funny I never noticed it until today. And get another photo of that linden tree, already blocking my footpath.

           How about a couple hours in the shed? More boxes and lots of progress. We’ve gone from one box every four hours to four boxes in one hour, that’s what you see here. I now have jigs for cutting the pieces, but no jugs yet for assembly. These are the sides to four boxes and represent the latest model of what I call the Z-box. It incorporates small changes, such as a better positioned thumb-hole and a slightly thicker bottom plate.
           That plate is also cut from fence lumber, but the larger, wider (and more expensive) pickets. So far, all boxes here have been built with cull lumber, costing 70% less than new and probably the most unreliable source. These are utility boxes only and I’ve made a few concessions to the finishing, also to speed things up. These units are destined to store the most expensive vacuum tubes, which I have not really counted yet. But there’s an estimated 100 of them priced over $15.

Picture of the day.
Saffron farming.
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           Folks, I’m aware boxes and tubes are not the liveliest blog topics, but as far as what others are up to, this activity “sure beats a swift kick in the balls with a frozen mukluk”, as the old saying goes. I’d love to be reporting on how the latest gigs went, but the deal is you find ‘em, I’ll play ‘em. It’s not as easy as it used to be. Much of today’s popular music sounds even worse if you try to play it live. Did I just say that? Well, so there.

           My bandsaw needs replacing. There is no easy way to keep the blade guides adjusted any more and the part that guides the blade, you guess it, costs almost as much as a new saw. Shown here are some disks that should have taken a minute each. This was more like 15 minutes as the blades thick enough to cut fast easily warp in the existing assembly. The disks are for a peanut feeder from the $10 book I bought in Miami last week.
           Peanuts? Won’t the squirrels attack? According to the text, the quarter-inch mesh blocks the squirrels, you see, the peanuts are left in the shells. The birds have no trouble because their beaks easily fit through to pierce the shells and get at the goodies. This, I got to see. Peanuts are a budget item so there is an endless supply if needed. Nothing is too good for my birdies. Have I mentioned that I’ve got myself a liking to iced coffee? The tea is still in the cupboard, but it doesn’t cool you down as fast. We’ll see, the coffee has to be made by the glass, not by the quart.

           Back inside as the temperature climbs to 85°F, I’m looking at the NOR gate. If you are unfamiliar with how computer memory works, it is simple in the extreme. A value can be one or zero, and everything else is a combination of that principle. The basic circuit is just one that remembers the last signal no matter if the signal changes, until you hit the reset switch. Pretty much any style of gate can be used to build such a circuit, usually called a “latch”, a rare engineering term that is actually descriptive of its function.

           I have chosen the NOR gate because it has other purposes that I’d like to investigate. After we get this working. I’ve removed the white jumpers and the circuit lit up. That’s encouraging, but I have some Jim Croce to practice and I need a siesta and time to review April expenditures. Some extras this month were the tow to the dealership, that $250 van battery, and the high speed balance was also unplanned, I thought they’d include it with replacing that axle. Wrong.

           Moments later, I got the two gates working independently. A one-byte memory circuit needs two of these gates with two transistors each. One downside of this form of memory circuit is that is needs to stay powered up even when it is off. That is, you must keep power supplied to this circuit when you want it turned off. I’m close to building my first memory circuit that I understand at the atom level. I must have had it wired wrong, or a defective wire, or a loose connection, I intend to find out.
           If this works, it is not out of sight that I might build a full adder, just to say in my life I once did it. I would remind the reader my background is in software, I have no training whatsoever in circuits, soldering, hardware, in fact, none of it.
           To counterbalance that, here are some of the boxes built today. Nice matching set and ideal for their intended purpose. Did I mention these are the “B” model with a thicker bottom plate. Instead of screwing with clamps (I have the wrong kind), I’ve learned to use the plate to force the sides into squareness. Did I just say squareness? Um, let me think quick, got it, that is a demo of my complete mastery of the English language. No wonder the ladies like me so much.

ADDENDUM
           Let’s look at the news. A California politician wants to legalize welfare fraud under $25,000. No need to tell you what she looks like. I do believe we have another critter taking up residence under my house. They can only get in there from the laundry deck so that’s my plans for tomorrow. Just now, I took a drive downtown for batteries, the stopped at the old club in Bartow. It was a rare local crowd playing country on the juke box, so I stuck around and wrote a letter to Harry. You don’t know Harry. I was carrying my crash kit when I walked in and Cathy’s friend was on duty. She’s naturally inquisitive and knows to ask what I’m up to.
           My kit contained the NOR gate setup, so I gave a demo. Either she’s one fast learner or I’m one great teacher. We got the thing to work 50% right after just an explanation of what was supposed to happen. It will not remember a zero, which just means there is still a bad connection. The point is, what a gal, a genuine interest in the new and challenging. Happily married and not my type, but on the ball. She paid me a high compliment likely without knowing. She said the rustic circuit (see this morning) was more interesting than anything in a book.

Last Laugh