Early Risers.

[Ozexpatriate]

5 hours ago, iL Dottore said:

I think that it would still have been rough - given the emergence of low-cost/high-quality Chinese manufacturing).

 

2 hours ago, JohnDMJ said:

I would question this comment!

I don't. Excepting the presence of lazy manufacturing workers who don't care*, everything is designed to price/quality objectives. The Chinese demonstrably can create relatively low-cost and high quality product.

 

* Something for with which Britain at one point (several decades ago) had a problematic reputation.

 

12 minutes ago, Happy Hippo said:

So would I, although there is high quality engineering and products coming out of not only China, but the rest of the far east, there is also low cost junk as well.

Unquestionably. It is all a matter of whether the purpose is very low price with attendant poor quality.

 

The other end of the spectrum is German manufacturing which has long had a reputation for quality.

[JohnDMJ]

Engineering tolerances are taking on a new meaning, it seems! It used to be the difference between a Go and a NoGo gauge, loose fit or interference fit. Now it would seem it has become 'how much more of this carp can we tolerate?'

 

9 minutes ago, Happy Hippo said:

So would I, although there is high quality engineering and products coming out of not only China, but the rest of the far east, there is also low cost junk as well.

 

I recently ordered a number of colletts for my milling machine.  Great stuff.

 

I also ordered some spare colletts for a router trimmer: Garbage.........

 

They were all bored out undersize, and although they fit the machine, none of my cutters will fit.

 

But as Baz, Debs, NHN and any of the other engineers will tell you, it's easier to remove some metal than to try and put it back.

 

All I need to do is secure the collett so that it is at it's widest, and them pass a parallel reamer through the centre.

 

The maths to close it up and then work out what size of smaller reamer to do the job so that when it opens it is the correct size, is too complex for my feeble mind at present.

 

A lot of, dare I mention, model railway products are now being produced in China as well as Vietnam, Japan, etc. The number of rejects, malfunctioning items, incomplete items seems to have risen almost exponentially. Well known, well reputed German brands are suffering due to poor production, inspection, quality control, etc. it seems!

 

Case in point, I heard of an instance where a model locomotive purchased under a reputable Austrian brand had failed within 1/2 hour of running in due to increasing whining from the motor and a crank pin jamming then falling out of the linkage. Cost of loco: in excess of £400. Apparently made in Vietnam. Now, I believe, winging its way back to Austria. For one part of this Austro-German amalgamation, at least 125 years good excellent reputation down the metaphorical pan!

[tigerburnie]

My experience of German made equipment wasn't that great, we had more problems with their stuff than any other manufacturer, one machine in particular only got accepted by the skin of it's teeth and never worked consistently, never owned a German car so can't comment on them, but the gear that was used to make the cars was overrated in the opinion of most who had to use them.

[Dave Hunt]

Evening all. Just a quick visit to give a word of warning. If you get an email offering home deliveries of cheap tins of processed pork, don't reply.

 

......................

 

 

It's Spam

 

Night night

 

Dave

[newbryford]

2 hours ago, JohnDMJ said:

Pivot Day draws to a close after another hectic day answering phone calls including from some who seem to clearly escapes from the asylum! Still, "la vie continue malgré tout"!

 

 

 

I wonder if those were the ones that I passed onto you/other suppliers.................?

 

 

I've got "one" who couldn't grasp how a DCC reversing loop worked - despite many emails/advice and even asking the same questions and getting the same answers in two other forums apart from our helpline. And how with his test setup, his loco kept stopping and reversing as it left the loop.

 

I eventually got him to send me pictures of his test setup, I noticed he was using a DC controller .......................

DOH!

 

As I said a few days ago - they still walk amongst us.

 

Work will be sort of worked again tomorrow. Quite a strange atmosphere when there's only 2-3 of us in three buildings and the only contact is by phone or shouting up and down the stairs.

 

I will be making the case for more WFH.

At least I can keep on working and go to the virtual pub at the same time to drown my exasperation at some of the calls.

 

Have a good Thursday folks - my highlight of the day should be receipt of a replacement item from my acquaintances in Widnes. (The original had a fault that I've only seen 2-3 times in all my years of railway modelling - a faulty motor winding.)

 

Cheers,

Mick

 

 

[iL Dottore]

Regarding the quality of items being produced in China, Korea, Vietnam (and now - apparently - Cambodia), you can get incredibly good products at a low cost from manufacturers in these countries. One of my guitar magazines recently reviewed  a Harley Benton (Thomann Music.de house brand) Les Paul inspired guitar that was made in Vietnam and found it to be the dog’s b0ll0cks. It all comes down, I think, to two things: the stringency of the QC standards for a product and how closely the QC standards are monitored by the/for the client (Back in the days of CDs I remember reading an article about the manufacture of the CD player chassis, which claimed that practically all CD players used the same chassis and the difference in price and performance was down to the stringency of the QC specifications for the finished product.  Which meant that for the high end CD player producer more CD chassis from a production run would be rejected due to QC findings than would be rejected by a low end CD player producer).
Put in place a low QC specification and fail to monitor its application will certainly result in carp products being made. Conversely, put in place a highly detailed and demanding QC specifications and monitor the application of those standards on a regular basis, then you’ll get amazing products like the iPhone (which is made in China!)

In all these countries you have highly skilled and highly motivated employees who will produce exactly what you want, exactly as you have specified (That’s not to say that aren’t any dubious or fly-by-night manufacturers in these countries, that sort of thing is a universal) so caveat emptor and good specs and  supervision are very much the watchwords when getting things manufactured there

and now...

G’Night All

iD

[Coombe Barton]

Surviving

 

https://johncolby.wordpress.com/2020/04/01/excited-to-be-attending-an-online-meeting/

[bbishop]

London is weird.  Carriage to myself going up, average of three coming back.  Second day "worked", four more to go.  And now to bed.

 

Bill

Edited April 1, 2020 by bbishop

[Barry O]

Evening all!

Something  was happening at Leeds Bradford Airport today as well. No commercial flights but two of the wildcats arrived then a Typhoon landed...

 

Engineering.. major problem are the  bean counters..it happens everywhere..even..dare I say it Switzerland.

 

Chinese kit is so variable and has a major problem. They don't  do spare parts! QC even now ranges from the good to the very very bad. (Ask the Kiwirail guys about the Chinese DL locos with the non asbestos asbestos insulation..an on going saga)

 

UK had a problem with quality ( not enough money spent to get the product right in the first place.). But in some areas our equipment is still seen as being a good quality product.

 

German kit is also variable in quality and an inability to match the customers real requirements is something that happened to me with two major German Defence companies. Jamie may know about a problem affecting the West Yorkshire firearms squad. If you dropped their heckler and koch guns they could fire without you pulling the trigger. The company involved always said it was due to poorly trained officers ( as in they shouldn't  drop them!).

 

At the end of the day quality costs. The bean counters can't understand that so... you pays your money and gets your choice (but as they won't be using said carp gear the bean counters don't care.

 

Baz

 

[Barry O]

Goodnight  all!

Baz

[PeterBB]

20 minutes ago, Coombe Barton said:

Surviving

 

https://johncolby.wordpress.com/2020/04/01/excited-to-be-attending-an-online-meeting/

Particularly liked the Ravel Bolero performance.

[PhilJ W]

Evening all from Estuary-Land. I wondered whats happening to Farcebook as it was refusing to load any pics from about ten this evening. Just had a newsflash that its gone down together with Instagram and Whatsapp. Probably overloaded due to the extra use its been getting. 

[laurenceb]

School meal, most were edable. Apart from liver, even now cannot eat the stuff

Birthday greetings to Mrs Rick

Night awl

[The Stationmaster]

School dinners - was put on them once while at Ing fants School as mum facied a break from walking me there and back just ton get me home for dinner.  Paid for a week, lasted two days - made sure I didn't have to go any more by spitting food back onto my plate on Day 2 - it was yuck.

 

Grammar School - had to stay for dinner, too far to walk home for dinner and mum was back at work by then anyway. But we had a brand new main hall with adjacent kitchen and most of the offerings weren't bad although the boiled potato always seemed to smell of disinfectant and the bolied fish every other Friday was absolutely revolting.  The alternated Friday was deep fired fish and some pretty good quality chips.  Only other really doubtful area was the peas - which obc viously came dried and sometimes weren't soaked for long enough prior to cooking.  You will of course have already worked out that the boiled fish always came with mashed potato and peas - fortunately the pudding that day was either tapioca or semolina and jam and rather alot of people hated both while I loved them so at least got plenty of pud after an empty plate for the first course.

 

Diggers of trenches have not reappeared at all today, fortunately they hadn't reached our gate with te actual digging otherwise they'd come back to find part of their trench full of concrete (it's not a very wide or deep trench and I've got just enough ballast on hand to 'do a job on it' if needed)

[brianusa]

Luckily we lived only about ten minutes from school so I always went home for lunch.  In those days, kids always had a mother at home and when you're that age , it was always a good feeling!

     Brian.

[BSW01]

Good evening everyone 

 

Well not a great deal has actually been done, but I’ve been busy none the less. The weather was a bit hit and miss today, after watering the garden first thing, it then rained! So I gave up and went to the cellar where I turned the inner door over and gave the unpainted side a coat of undercoat/primer and then gave the door knobs another rub down before giving them a 3rd coat of varnish. I then went to the workshop and decided to have a look at just what I’d got in all those drawers on the wall! There was some interesting stuff, plenty of DC relays, (6V, 12V and 24V), quite a lot of bases for those relays, but far too many, so I chucked about 50% in the bin. After dinner I gave the door another coat of paint and carried on in the workshop. 

 

After tea I set up a fruit tea loaf and it will left soaking overnight, I’ll add the flour tomorrow and chuck it in the oven when I get back from the fodder run. 

 

The evening was rounded off with a bottle of ‘Old Speckled Hen’ and catching up on sone recorded TV. 

 

Goodnight all

[The Stationmaster]

G'night all

[PhilJ W]

Goodnight all.

[J. S. Bach]

Good night owl from the Piedmont.

[AndyID]

Weather still a bit strange here but relatively few earthquakes today. Actually there none that we were aware of but there might still be some aftershocks. There were quite a few yesterday.

 

There was a seismologist on the TV yesterday who said they really have no idea what's causing them. There are no known faults at that spot.

[pH]

41 minutes ago, AndyID said:

Weather still a bit strange here but relatively few earthquakes today. Actually there none that we were aware of but there might still be some aftershocks. There were quite a few yesterday.

 

There was a seismologist on the TV yesterday who said they really have no idea what's causing them. There are no known faults at that spot.

 

The strongest recorded earthquakes in the US east of the Rockies happened around New Madrid in what is now the state of Missouri in 1811-12. The causes of those quakes are not well understood, either.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1811–12_New_Madrid_earthquakes

[iL Dottore]

Morning all,

A rather bizarre night: firstly Lucy woke me up about 3 am with some very loud sneezing (presumably she got a muzzle full of dust). Then, after managing to doze off again, I was plagued by a really weird dream. Normally, dreams are very, very quickly forgotten, but even now-a few hours after the dream-I still feel a little unsettled by it. I suppose it is my subconscious trying to make sense of what has been happening over the past day or so (and, as you ask, nothing special or nothing in particular has happened - that’s why the dream was so bizarre and weird).

Now, onto a more cheerful topic: as a friend has injured her knee (nothing serious fortunately) and must keep off it for a day, so we are going to be taking care of her dog - Frida - during the day for a few days. Frida is, together with Lucy and Schotty, a BDwBA (Bad Dogs with Bad Attitudes) gangsta. So we are looking at a chaotic few days ahead of us as the three of them together will be quite a handful. Needless to say l am quite fond of “mah bitches” (correct term for a female dog in case you thought I was being misogynistic) and their naked mercenary opportunism can be quite endearing. When Lucy comes into my home office every day at 11am it’s both affection and shameless self-interest (she gets both a fuss and a meat treat). Frida aka “The Furry Floozy” is equally transparent about what she wants. I wish humans (especially human females) were equally honest.

 

Finally, a thought about quality: very clearly, as others have pointed out, quality costs. And that is the problem as few are willing to pay for that quality as they don’t expect items to last and expect to replace the items in a year or two. Even relatively expensive things have built in obsolescence. My top of the line domestic oven, only 7 years old, is now starting to fail (the plastic retaining clips for the glass door now have material fatigue and one has already snapped off). I am supposed to replace it - which annoys me (if I do,  I won’t be getting an “all singing, all dancing” domestic oven, but a simple professional kitchen oven: just on/off, temperature and even heating throughout). And yet there was a time when “built to last” meant exactly that. In fact, I inherited a pair oh very high quality Wharfedale monitors from my Uncle, he bought the at the end of the 1960s and they are STILL working flawlessly. Doncha just luv conspicuous consumerism.

Stay Safe, Stay Healthy, Stay Sane

iD

[Ozexpatriate]

1 hour ago, AndyID said:

There was a seismologist on the TV yesterday who said they really have no idea what's causing them. There are no known faults at that spot.

That's weird. A meteorologist here (for some weird reason they have meteorologists cover seismological events) indicated that yesterday's Challis earthquakes were a strike/slip fault quake and were located in the same area (geologically) as the 1983 Borah Peak / Lost River fault earthquake which was of comparable magnitude (6.9).

 

There are plenty of examples of faulting in the Rocky Mountains and (I presume) the Sawtooth as well.

 

USGS said this:

Quote

Tectonic Summary

The March 31, 2020, M 6.5 earthquake west of Challis, Idaho (about 120 km northeast of Boise), occurred as the result of complex strike slip faulting within the shallow crust of the North America plate. Preliminary focal mechanism solutions for the event, which describe the style of faulting in an earthquake, indicate slip likely occurred on a steeply dipping fault striking either east-west (right-lateral) or north-south (left-lateral). This earthquake occurred within the Intermountain Seismic Belt, a prominent zone of recorded seismicity in the Intermountain West, and is within the western part of the Centennial Tectonic Belt, an area of southwest-northeast extension north of the Snake River Plain. The quake is about 16 km north-northeast of the Sawtooth fault, a 60-km-long normal fault that extends along the eastern base of the Sawtooth Range.

 

Historic seismicity in the immediate vicinity of the March 31 earthquake is sparse; no earthquakes of M5+ have occurred within 50 km of this event over the past 50 years, and the most notable historic seismicity in the region occurred about 100 km to the east on the Lost River fault zone. This was the site of the 1983 M6.9 Borah Peak earthquake (October 28, 1983), which was followed by five other M 5+ events over the following year, and most recently a M5.0 earthquake in January 2015, about 60 km to the east of today’s event. The March 31, 2020 event is the largest in Idaho since the Borah Peak earthquake. That event killed 2 in Challis, and resulted in over $12M in damage in the Challis-Mackay area. As of 1 hour after this earthquake, two aftershocks (M 4.6, M 3.6) have been located by the USGS, both to the south of the M 6.5 event.

 

Edited April 2, 2020 by Ozexpatriate

[Ozexpatriate]

47 minutes ago, pH said:

The strongest recorded earthquakes in the US east of the Rockies

Idaho's Challis earthquake yesterday was not east of the Rockies.

[chrisf]

Greetings one and all

 

Congratulations to Mike Stationmaster for a simple but effective April Fool joke!  Another good one may be found on the Scalefour Society forum in the Balcombe thread – well done to Rod Cameron and friends.

 

The season for unexpected phone calls continues.  Yesterday afternoon came one from Yorkshire and a friend from university.  We last met well over 40 years ago.  He rang for no other reason than a decision to phone everyone in his address book.  Briefly I wondered how I came to have an entry in his address book until I remembered that he gets the round robin that goes with my seasonal greetings cards at the winter solstice.  We chatted about this and that and everything and nothing for about 20 minutes and very pleasant it was too.  Life is full of surprises.

 

In the world at large the carnage continues, with both Wimbledon and the Edinburgh Festival biting the dust yesterday.  There is still a deafening silence from Sidmouth but I fear the worst – no change there then.  Maybe the festival director is an expert at burying bad news but they say that timing is everything.  The next thing I dread is that my annual Christmas and New Year in Switzerland trip will go mammaries up.  I have not endured the so-called festive season in this country since 2004 and do not particularly want to start now.  Maybe I am crying before I am hurt, maybe not.  As is so often the case these days, we will see what happens.

 

On Tuesday evening I got some m*d*ll*ng done, not much but every little helps.  Could I find the results yesterday morning?  Well, yes, eventually, but not without increasingly manic and frantic searching.  Where was the project box?  Right under my nose.  Other ways of wasting time are available.

 

Best wishes to all.

 

Chris