onetrack

Ozzietriker - Do an eBay search using "swivel end springs". You will find some go-kart springs are nearly identical. You can also get them in stainless, which may be a more durable option.

You may have to modify the curl on the hook on the eBay springs, to match yours.

Anyone who builds a model steam engine using a Coke bottle pressurised to 100 psi, needs his head examined!!

Steel boilers built to operate at 100 psi need an extensive examination, along with engineering calculations being provided, just so a Boiler Certificate that authorises its use, can be issued!!

I utilise a technique to rejuvenate pressure-pak spray cans of paint that have run low on pressure - by holding them on the floor and pressing my air blowgun over the plastic tube of the spray can, after I've removed the spray nozzle.

I then apply the trigger on the blowgun to force air pressure from the air compressor into the can (you need to hold some rag or paper towel around the join point, to prevent errant sprays of paint!).

This usually works just fine for nearly all spray cans, with the compressor pressure switch shutoff set at just over 100 psi. The "rejuvenated" cans usually get an adequate increase in pressure, to be able to completely empty the can.

However, last night I was doing this to a spray can that still had about a quarter of the contents in it. As I finished pressurising it, and lifted it off the floor, I heard a loud POP!

Puzzled, I lifted the can to examine it - only to find the normally-inverted base of the can had completely blown out, and was now the exact reverse of its normal inverted shape!

Luckily, the bottom join still held! - or today, I'd be telling you the story of the exploding paint can disaster!!

Sikorsky S-38. An 8 seater amphibian produced from 1928, and Igors first really successful aviation product, with 101 built. Not a bad effort for the Great Depression era, when every other business was going downhill fast.

It's interesting to see that Berkshire Hathaway have dumped all their airline shares during April, at a substantial loss. Most of the American airline shares are trading at a third or less of their pre-COVID-19 value.

What is more interesting, is that Warren Buffet refused for years to invest in airlines, and warned others not to invest in them, as he regarded them as a constant poor investment.

But in 2016, he was obviously persuaded that he was wrong, as the U.S. airlines concentrated on good returns to shareholders. So Buffet bought into them in a sizeable way, owning more than 10% of the shares of some of those airlines.

However, Buffet has admitted at a BH meeting just gone, that he made a mistake investing in airlines, and it appears that now, he's gone back to his previous position where he regards investment in airlines as poison - certainly for the foreseeable future - say 4 or 5 years.

Contrary to Buffets move, some investors are saying that the better U.S. airlines will recover more quickly than expected - even though pax numbers may be considerably lower for quite some time.

The advantages of cheap fuel, the deletion of poorly-paying routes, and possibly a bigger selection of newer, cheaper (and more efficient) aircraft, along with a better-than-expected increase in pax numbers, and higher ticket prices, may be the factors these latter investors are looking at favourably.

Nev, I've taken a 240V jolt through serious inattention, and I'm still here. Sure smartened up my attention, though.

The Americans need to use twice the thickness of wiring than we do, to get their backwards 110V system to work, too.

OME, you've got me with "kangarooing the dike"? Never heard that one before, and I've been around for a while, and been in with some roughies.

I've seen 240kmh for an extended distance on a remote Australian highway, on a Honda VF1200R, in the late 1980's, and I can tell you, you just don't want a single thing to go wrong at that speed.

Just hitting a rabbit at that speed would feel like you hit a kangaroo. Many of the big Jap bikes are simply missiles, just open the throttle and aim, and go along for the ride.

No less than 4, twin-cyl engines in the GEN H-4. Yep, very little to go wrong!

There is one thing that rules overall, and which can't be trained for - practical, hands-on experience. The long experience of "old hands" who have experienced every possible combination of things going wrong, and who know the way to handle the current Charlie Foxtrot that has occurred, is invaluable. Thus the reason for older people for leaders, Many a country has run very successfully with a leader well past "retirement age".

Most of the Boomer generation has a trade or skill developed over a wide range of experiences, and training from many older people with their skills and knowledge handed down.

They have a multitude of skills that the younger "me-me-me, shallow entertainment, smartphone and computer generation" lack. Many young people lack good hands-on practical skills.

They can be very proficient at manipulating key strokes and finding ways to do things with computer programmes, but they lack the important hand-on skills such as handling equipment, approaches to jobs, construction and practical repair work.

I was intrigued to find that all the Railways in W.A. up to 1929 were built by men with no tertiary education. These blokes had no degrees in engineering, but they were masters of railway construction in the most practical manner, using time-honoured skills, approaches and rules. They knew the cross-slope required for certain curve radiuses to prevent trains falling off the rails at speed - or they knew the maximum speed limits for those curve radiuses.

Nowadays, a railway engineer relies on a computer programme to generate the figures - but he often has no hands-on practical skills directly related to railway building.

A mechanical engineer I was in partnership with told me a story of a Middle Eastern engineering graduate he worked with. The bloke asked him if he might know why his electric razor had stopped working.

My partner said to him, "Have you emptied the cut whiskers out of it recently?". The Middle Eastern bloke looked a bit stunned, and said, "No, how do you do that?"

So he was shown how to flip the top of the electric razor and empty the cut whisker remnants out - a move that amazed the Middle Eastern bloke. And my partner exclaimed, "And this bloke had an engineering degree!".

...... fancy when you went to the toilet. That made it all worthwhile". Meanwhile the media pounced on Turbo as soon as he presented his new simplified attachment device. They wanted to know what it was called.

"I'd call it a Charlie Foxtrot", said Cappy under his breath. "Because even the village idiot can see it won't work, it's on a par with a Chinese puzzle, and it's been built using a Arabic ruler, that reads from right to left!

"Well", said Turbo, with furrowed brow, in response to the media question, and ignoring Cappys mutterings, "We have yet to name this terrific invention, it took our team several months to put this together, using all our facilities and faculties, and working around the clock; so we haven't had time to name it yet. However, it's been suggested a suitable name would.....

I don't think there's enough evidence available in the few photos on the Kathryns Report website to be able to determine what went wrong.

The pilot simply reported "control issues", and I read that as something went wrong with the control mechanisms - as one could reasonably expect in a vintage aeroplane. Perhaps it was a maintenance error issue.

What a shame that the only flying example has been wrecked - but it's good to hear the pilot is O.K. There's going to be some serious amount of work involved in rebuilding the aircraft.

http://www.kathrynsreport.com/2020/05/de-havilland-dh-4-n32517-accident_3.html

Nev - If you're still talking with regard to the Cat starting engines, they were all solid cast-iron watercooled twins, and shared the cooling system coolant with the main engine.

The smaller Cat diesels utilised a horizontally opposed side valve twin, laid across the rear of the engine above the flywheel housing - the larger Cat diesels utilised a vertical 2 cyl water-cooled starting engine placed alongside the left rear of the block.

The bloke with the slideshow below has good photos of the Cat diesel horizontal starting engine. The Americans referred to them as the "pony" engine, Aussies generally refer to them as the "donkey" engine.

They ran at about 5000RPM for starting the main engine, and they were a constant source of trouble. One of the biggest problems came from operators leaving the starting engine fuel tank tap turned on.

Vibration of the main engine would make the carburettor float bounce and let petrol flood the starting engine.

This would run through to the starting engine sump and dilute the oil so badly, the starting engine wouldn't get adequate bearing lubrication. The next result was a huge BANG, as the little engine "threw a leg out of bed"!

https://www.mervbergman.net/wp-content/uploads/ss2caterpillar/#IMG_0099.JPG

S.P. - The fuselage nose is not the same shape on the Farman pusher, as the one in red750's photo.

I'm going to go out on a limb, and say a very early or prototype Vickers F.B. 5 or "Gunbus".

But the 4 wheel, spoked undercarriage is not what is commonly seen on the gunbus - although I did see a photo of a gunbus with 4 disc wheels.

One of the major causes for loss of oil pressure is having external hoses that can burst, or external oil lines that can fracture. Minimise them, and you have a much lesser chance of losing oil pressure.

Nev - The Caterpillar diesels 2 cyl starting engine was built as an integral part of the engine by Caterpillar, not Delco. It was fitted to nearly all Cat diesels as standard up to the early 1950's, regardless of application.

The only Cat diesel application that had a standard Delco-Remy electric starter were the Cat Marine diesels, because engine starting conditions on the water meant that very low temperatures were rarely encountered.

The 2 cyl starting engines were initially crankhandle start, or started with a pull rope around the flywheel. In the 1940's, electric start was offered for the 2 cyl starting engines.

Some later model Cat diesels from the mid-1950's had a standard starter opening in the flywheel housing, with a Delco-Remy electric starter offered as an option - whereby the 2 cyl starting engine was eliminated.

Many big industrial diesels utilise a Delco-Remy or equivalent starter, with a prelube pump attached, as an extension of the starter motor. As soon as the starting motor is cranking, lube oil pressure is raised by the attached prelube pump.

https://www.dfjauto.com/product/dfj020300-starter-motor/

If I had a dollar for every time I saw "the maintenance records provided were incomplete, or - the maintenance records were missing", in aviation crash reports, I'd have enough for a decent holiday.

How is a maintenance review of a logbook costing $199 going to ensure that the owner is 100% compliant if the owner is determined to avoid mentioning incidents, or is just simply lax at providing a full and extensive description of what was carried out?

"Compliance" is simply ensuring your logbook meets regulatory requirements, it doesn't necessarily mean it's an accurate reflection of what has been done to the aircraft.

A good insurance broker is your best bet against dealing with dodgy insurance companies.

....get that excited, he'd write up a whole new tome on personality disorders amongst the pilot and entrepreneur groups.

However, once Turbs heard the ABC was looking for him, he started to get excited himself. Not only would he increase his media exposure with an ABC interview, it would expose him to a whole market of ABC left-wingers, who wouldn't normally know he existed.

He began practising his facial expressions and most dulcet voice tones in a mirror. He'd heard actors and long-time TV presenters did this as standard to improve their presentation.

Next, he began to commit to memory, word-for-word, all the subtle advertising lines for the TE aviation products and housing developments.

It was going to blow everyone away, this ABC interview - and he hoped he could pull off the not-so-subtle advertising on the ABC for TE, without raising the ire of the DITRDC and initiating an inquiry.

Besides, if a DITRDC inquiry started, there was the problem that they also handled Transport and Infrastructure, and that could lead to some awkward questions, as to how TE got approval to develop that RAMSAR wetlands into a......

Octave, whenever I'm in the house, my phone switches to the NBN router in the house, via wi-fi, so I save on phone data allowance - particularly when it comes to downloading updates. But my wi-fi is secured by WPA2 level security.

However, there will be others using wi-fi with their phones, who do not have the required level of wi-fi security.

People can use the app over a wireless network. If that wireless network is not secure, the phone user is open to being hacked.

You'd think they could've done a little better than exhausting the steam at a level that was near the pilots head, wouldn't you?

One wonders what the potential would be, to build a similar unit now, using todays technology and materials, that would likely result in a sizeable weight saving.

There's a good "write-up" about the engine and aircraft in the link below. The ability to reverse the engine immediately upon landing, gave an amazing braking ability, that eliminated any potential for nose-over.

https://www.456fis.org/BESLER_STEAM_AIRPLANE.htm

.....Major Oilfield Imaginative Suburb Titling (known by it's acronym, MOIST). The MOIST award was highly sought after, for its associated good feelings.

However, trouble with the suburban development started immediately, with the "Left" part of the development naming, causing outrage in many circles, and a slump in projected sales.

"It sounds like a Communist plot to introduce East German living to the West!", sniffed Mrs Gladioli Wartford-Dingwell, of Peppermint Grove.

"How would anyone with even a smidgeon of Conservative Upbringing, even remotely consider living in a suburban region named 'Left'..."?

A meeting of the Development Board was hurriedly arranged and extensive discussion ranged around the unfortunate Suburban naming - after all, this was the West, where the Right ruled, and Miners were worshipped like Gods.

"We'll just have to modify it slightly, no problem", said Turbo, smoothing down the exasperation of the other Board Members - many of whom were members of the Weld Club and the Karrakatta Club.

"It's just too easy", said Turbo, "We'll simply change the name to......

The biggest single problem with apps is their security. They need to have their security independently tested - regularly - to ensure it meets all the requirements to defeat hackers.

An app that has been rushed into production, as the COVID-19 app has, is bound to be flawed. It's been produced too fast to carry out proper, lengthy testing against hacking.

There are plenty of apps that have inadequate security features. Thus, hackers can intercept any information travelling between your phone and the app website.

Hackers dream of accessing huge databases and peoples personal details. Even email addresses are a hugely saleable item on the criminal web.

Lots of wi-fi sites are not secure - particularly public ones. I refuse point-blank to use public wi-fi, unless it uses WPA or WPA2 security with a strong password. Many passwords used by public networks are very weak.

Many people set their phone settings to automatically connect to public wi-fi networks. This is a mistake, it leaves you wide open to hackers.

Early on in my smartphone ownership, someone hacked into my insecure wi-fi and stole a heap of my data allowance. It was a good lesson. It could've been a lot worse.

Many people use the same passwords across multiple sites, so when a hacker finds a password, it's a goldmine to them. The WWW is a breeding ground for all the scumbags under the sun.

Then of course, we have to understand that "trusted" people, those working in "security", cannot really be trusted, anyway. Human weaknesses being what they are, "trusted" people go rogue and destroy even the best security arrangements.

Police are regularly caught misusing Police databases - which are supposedly 100% secure. If someone gets into financial trouble, usually via gambling, they are a target for corruption.

They then exchange access to secure areas for their desperately-needed money. An IT worker gets narky with management, and sells the "secure" database of the company to "get even".

OMCG's are notorious for inserting "associates" (usually easily-manipulated women) into State Vehicle Registration Depts. The OCMG's then utilise the associate to deliver supposedly secure vehicle registration information to them.

The bottom line is the app is produced by humans, but crims utilise all the best and latest technology - bots, AI, and a dozen other high-level techniques, to hack into websites, apps and company databases.

They never stop looking for that supposedly "secure" gold that will deliver them huge rewards in the form of saleable personal information, blackmail and extortion.

https://blog.se.works/how-often-are-mobile-apps-hacked

....throwing in their dealerships as they saw the writing on the wall with GM and Holden. But the biggest worry was the fascist section of society, who were anti-Govt, and who regularly held meetings in secret places to toast the Fourth Reich.

However, President-Elect Joe Turbineden reckoned they were just all naughty boys with big guns, and they weren't a threat to anyone.

Besides, the fact they were arming Drifters (avref) with automatic assault weapons was their right, anyway, as laid down in the Constitution.

But there was real trouble brewing, that Joe Turbineden was worried about - and that was that Turbine Enterprises was spreading itself too thinly, with operating divisions in every country, as well as a huge range of products such as the multiple versions of the TurbineEncabulator, that was now costing more to produce than it was selling for, thanks to the COVID-19 business logistics problems, and the major drawback to relying on JIT manufacturing principles.

To make things worse, cheap oil was now killing the TurbineEncabulators - it was like a re-run of 1928, when the oilfields were knee-deep in wasted oil, and refined fuel was selling for 5c a gallon.

"There's only one thing we gotta do", said Joe Turbineden - "We gotta get into the oil industry, while it's down! At that, he extended the companys borrowings to the hilt, and bought an oilfield that......

(And dear NES readers, here we have photographic proof of the recently-purchased California oilfield by TE - which is going to turn TE's earnings around, as soon as the oil price lifts again!)