[Coco] Re: Ouch!

[Gene Heskett]

On Thursday 18 December 2003 12:02, Richard E. Crislip wrote:
>Hello Gene
>
><big snip>
>
>> I could relate some of my "Harris" experiences too, most of them
>> unflattering to Harris.  The MW-1 comes to mind quickly.
>
>Hehe... Is that the Harris that supplied FirstEnergy with the
> computer equipment for their grid dispatching and monitoring site? 
> 8-))).  I wonder if they are still using it? I have no way of
> knowing now since they bid me *ADIOS*.
>
Possibly Richard.  They'll do anything to make a buck, often not very 
well.  Since this is a family group, I'll not repeat the comment I 
made to the corporate head of engineering many years ago about the 
means of his creation.

He was the one responsible for specing the motorized powerstat used as 
a line regulator in the MW-1(A).  The stationary contact, ridden by a 
steel spring on the back of the brushholder wheel, was aluminum.  
ElCheeeeeepoooo.  You can guess the result as it first welded itself 
together, then finally broke the weld with the driving motor, thereby 
causing the steel contact to have to burn its way thru the Al oxide 
to make a new contact by punching a hole and rewelding itself.  Al is 
a VERY reactive metal in the presence of the nominally 20% oxygen 
content of normal air, taking only about .001 seconds after its 
scratched for form an oxide coat in the scratch whose insulation 
breakdown is at least 50 volts, and can reach 400 or more given 
enough time.  I ordered new parts to use as a pattern, and duplicated 
things in brass and phospher-bronze, took most of a day to build it 
right.  Thats when I took the time to call him up and "discuss" his 
parentage with him.  I think he could smell the smoke coming out of 
my ears all the way from CA to IL.

That sort of idiocy I do not well tolerate, even today.  But thats now 
history by 23 years so the smoke has mostly cleared.  But I still 
look at anything Harris wants to sell me very very carefully.  And 
then go insist we get something else from somebody else 99% of the 
time.  Having overriden the purchase of a new tx once from them 
(we're still running the now nearly 40 year old GE), I'd hoped they 
might have improved things, but who knows today.  Their proposal at 
the time was for a box that didn't have enough power by about 20%, 
and I knew full well it couldn't ever make its rated power reliably 
based on the tube it used.  The sales dweeb wasn't at all technical, 
and they wouldn't put me in touch with anyone who could actually 
answer my questions.  Obviously the out of warranty tube sales were a 
prime factor in the profit picture...

I only have 2 squawks about the old GE. The 4-1000 tubes it needs 4 of 
are discontinued and we'll have to redesign it for something else 
eventually, and its not 100% mouse and snake proof.  Major blowups 
have been caused by that.  Oh, and we changed the final, a big water 
cooled copper and glass jug that weighs about 45 or 50 lbs, thinking 
it was bad a couple of months ago, but when we sent the old one to 
econco for a rebuild, they said its fine and sent it back.  It had  
been in the socket non-stop for 8 years.  Econco probably hates me, 
but its unspoken :-)  Most stations figure on 2 finals a year.  I'm 
doing something right I figure. :-)  Plus this is "big iron" running 
at half throttle so it just cruises along.

-- 
Cheers, Gene
AMD K6-III at 500mhz 320M
Athlon1600XP at 1400mhz  512M
99.22% setiathome rank, not too shabby for a WV hillbilly
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by Gene Heskett are:
Copyright 2003 by Maurice Eugene Heskett, all rights reserved.