I live and work in the semi-urban part of my town. The buildings on the main streets are two or three stories high with store fronts on the ground floor and apartments or offices on the floors above with a few seven or eight story buildings scattered about and few parking lots.
Because of this, except for my main shopping day and an occasional trip to BFE I use my bike to get around.
I think people like me are an under served market segment. I don't need a 36 speed, super shocked, hard core mountain bike or a ball crushing, a seat up the ass racing bike. Since there lots of hills in the area, a simple one speed cruiser will not do either. But, believe it or not, that isn't the subject of this entry.
As an apartment dweller in an area with lots of retail establishments, bike storage is a problem.
I can't keep it outside. Like retailers, bums like to be where the foot traffic is. It makes for better panhandling. The problem is that when the panhandling doesn't pan out (yuk yuk), they steal, and they will steal anything, including parts of an unattended bicycle. It would take a good ten minutes to secure all the parts of a bike well enough so that they couldn't be stolen. And then there is the weather issue -- rain being bad for metal and all.
So that leaves keeping it in my apartment, which I do and it sucks. With the handle bars, pedals and room to lean it, a bike takes up as much room as a small couch.
My ceilings are only eight feet high, so suspending it isn't an option.
I looked into folding bikes and they aren't for fat people. At three bills, I'm way over their weight limits. Even if I was in shape, they couldn't handle my weight and a couple bags of groceries. So they're out.
The thing is, all the manufacturers need to to is enable us to quickly and easily significantly reduce one dimension of of the bike. The easiest would be the width, that is just handle bars and pedals. It would be fairly simple to make the pedals flip up and back and latch in their positions. A similar mechanism could be made for handle bars. This is not difficult engineering. People have been making collapsible things for thousands of years.
One last thing I want is a parking brake. As it stands now I can't lean it against the wall without the front wheel rolling and the bike falling. My low tech solution is a length of bungee cord tied around the handle that I use to hold the brake down when the bike is in my apartment.
I don't think I'm asking too much of the manufacturers.
Finally, it must be remembered that once the walking dead have overrun the earth, the infrastructure for cars will be gone, yet it will be a few years before the roads are impassable by bikes.
Unfortunately our concerns won't be limited to zombies. Other survivors can't be counted on to be as civilized as they once were, so we will need to take our bikes into our hidey holes at night. Given the expected weight loss in this situation, a folding bike would be fine.
Saturday, May 7, 2011
Tuesday, April 5, 2011
Fountain Pens, Seriously?
For a number of years now, I've seen people pull fountain pens out of their pockets whenever a signature is called for. I've always assumed they were pretentious posers and probably, even worse, lawyers.
I recently discovered the Pilot Varsity, a disposable fountain pen, and decided to try it out to see what the big deal was. I was not impressed. It felt like a gel pen when writing and it shared the major shortcoming of gel pens. If the paper is curling and the tip makes any contact, ink flows. Worse, I was playing with the cat, whipping the pen back and forth for him to bat at it and and it flung ink out. I can just see these on the playground. Kids would be having ink fights.
It turns out that the Bic Crystal, a 60 year old design, is still the most practical pen around. The hexagonal body prevents it from rolling too far. The transparent body lets you know when you should think about a replacement. It won't leak in your pocket, even if you loose the cap. It's cheap. It's sturdy, you can put it in your back pocket and sit on it with out breaking it. I even found one under the carpet of my car several years after I bought it and after some coaxing it still wrote. Finally the ink is thick enough and the point sturdy enough that it requires some serious pressure to write with it.
I understand that artists and calligraphers might have uses for fountain pens, but not the rest of us.
When the zombies come, all the diaries will be written with Bic Crystals or pencils.
So, yes, fountain pens are for pretentious posers.
I recently discovered the Pilot Varsity, a disposable fountain pen, and decided to try it out to see what the big deal was. I was not impressed. It felt like a gel pen when writing and it shared the major shortcoming of gel pens. If the paper is curling and the tip makes any contact, ink flows. Worse, I was playing with the cat, whipping the pen back and forth for him to bat at it and and it flung ink out. I can just see these on the playground. Kids would be having ink fights.
It turns out that the Bic Crystal, a 60 year old design, is still the most practical pen around. The hexagonal body prevents it from rolling too far. The transparent body lets you know when you should think about a replacement. It won't leak in your pocket, even if you loose the cap. It's cheap. It's sturdy, you can put it in your back pocket and sit on it with out breaking it. I even found one under the carpet of my car several years after I bought it and after some coaxing it still wrote. Finally the ink is thick enough and the point sturdy enough that it requires some serious pressure to write with it.
I understand that artists and calligraphers might have uses for fountain pens, but not the rest of us.
When the zombies come, all the diaries will be written with Bic Crystals or pencils.
So, yes, fountain pens are for pretentious posers.
Wednesday, February 16, 2011
Bring Back Normal Monitors.
I had to buy a new monitor semi-recently. This was a disappointing experience. I could not find a normal (4 x 3) monitor. In every store I looked in there were only wide screen (16 X 9) monitors available.
What the fuck!? Are computers becoming toys now? I'm sure that some jerkwad is saying to himself "but a lot of video comes in wide screen and I like the big panorama when I'm playing Killoshooto" or whatever. Get yourself a TV and game console.
Wide screens suck for doing anything with text. Have you tried reading a several two foot lines of text? You have to keep bobbing your head back and forth, not to mention the difficulty of simply visually tracking a line that long, especially when the asshole designer decided that some sans-serif font looked pretty.
For working with text, a vertical aspect ratio would be best, something like 21/2 X 1, the same as the European A series standard for paper. Unfortunately the this isn't realizable on laptops due to the need to accommodate keyboards, and it would be more maddening to have two separate standards, one for desktops and another for laptops. So let's just go back to 4 X 3, it's a reasonable compromise.
I don't see that happening. If the display manufacturers can shove one format down everyones throats they will. It's cheaper than having multiple formats. Bastards.
Of course another solution is available. UI designers could offer another window sizing button - a "vertical maximize" which would give you window of (screenHeight/21/2) X screenHeight. The designers of text based applications and web pages could optimize for such a display ratio, reading on-line is easier for everyone and peace, love and harmony will reign throughout the universe.
Yeah, I don't see that one happening either.
What the fuck!? Are computers becoming toys now? I'm sure that some jerkwad is saying to himself "but a lot of video comes in wide screen and I like the big panorama when I'm playing Killoshooto" or whatever. Get yourself a TV and game console.
Wide screens suck for doing anything with text. Have you tried reading a several two foot lines of text? You have to keep bobbing your head back and forth, not to mention the difficulty of simply visually tracking a line that long, especially when the asshole designer decided that some sans-serif font looked pretty.
For working with text, a vertical aspect ratio would be best, something like 21/2 X 1, the same as the European A series standard for paper. Unfortunately the this isn't realizable on laptops due to the need to accommodate keyboards, and it would be more maddening to have two separate standards, one for desktops and another for laptops. So let's just go back to 4 X 3, it's a reasonable compromise.
I don't see that happening. If the display manufacturers can shove one format down everyones throats they will. It's cheaper than having multiple formats. Bastards.
Of course another solution is available. UI designers could offer another window sizing button - a "vertical maximize" which would give you window of (screenHeight/21/2) X screenHeight. The designers of text based applications and web pages could optimize for such a display ratio, reading on-line is easier for everyone and peace, love and harmony will reign throughout the universe.
Yeah, I don't see that one happening either.
Sunday, February 6, 2011
Toilet paper holders
Public bathrooms have some considerations regarding the dispensing of toilet paper beyond those for the home. These are that people will steal anything, even a half used roll of toilet paper and they will overuse what they don't pay for.
The manufacturers of toilet paper holders for public bathrooms have come up with some ugly solutions to these problems. One method to prevent theft is to place a locked cover over the roll with just the end sticking out. Another is to use strange sized rolls, usually under the same locked cover.
To prevent over use they will usually have some kind of mechanism to stop the roll from turning after so much rotation, or they will have a lot of friction making it impossible to pull out a decent amount without tearing it into shreds.
As I said, these are all ugly solutions, especially for small businesses that aren't going to get a contract with a janitorial supply company and are just going to buy their toilet paper at the local store.
Fortunately someone has come up with a holder that balances the needs of preventing over use, theft and the need to use standard rolls.
You'll note in the picture that the axle for the spindle is off center. This prevents the roll from gaining momentum as someone pulls paper off thus preventing over use.
But, the real brilliance here is the spring loaded axle. The only way to remove the spindle is to pull the axle inside which can't be done with a roll installed. You have to wait until the roll is empty, then tear off the core to pull the axle inside, thus preventing theft.
As you can see, it uses standard rolls.
This shows that a lot of simple, mature technology has room for improvement.
There aren't many zombie issues here since they don't poop and those of us left alive will scared shitless anyway.
Sunday, January 2, 2011
My Irrational Love of Mechanical Watches
I love mechanical watches. I've never really been able to explain it, but I'm going to try here, but I'll probably just come up with a bunch of rationalizations. Here ' goes.
I can't claim that there is any kind of simple elegance. They're very complicated mechanisms. Now days they are using synthetic sapphires and rubies in them. While those are cheap to make, there is something decidedly inelegant about creating a high tech infrastructure for a low tech product.
While accurate enough for any normal life stuff, they don't come close to quartz watches for accuracy.
They're not cheap. If you want to impress the Joneses, you can spend tens of thousands of dollars on one. But you can also spend that amount on a quartz model and get the same social climbing cred. A decent mid-range mechanical will cost about $500.00. A good quartz can be had for $150.00.
So, I guess I have to confess a preference for stupid design here.
But Damn, there is just something insanely cool about getting the kind of accuracy and reliability that they do from springs, levers and gears.
- They require no consumables. You don't need to take them to some drug store to have the battery replaced. This will come in handy when you need to know how long you have until dark so you can get back to your base camp in safety when being hunted by flesh eating hoards of the undead.
- They tick. As one gets older, there is some comfort in hearing your watch through your pillow.
- ...Uhm
- Er...
I can't claim that there is any kind of simple elegance. They're very complicated mechanisms. Now days they are using synthetic sapphires and rubies in them. While those are cheap to make, there is something decidedly inelegant about creating a high tech infrastructure for a low tech product.
While accurate enough for any normal life stuff, they don't come close to quartz watches for accuracy.
They're not cheap. If you want to impress the Joneses, you can spend tens of thousands of dollars on one. But you can also spend that amount on a quartz model and get the same social climbing cred. A decent mid-range mechanical will cost about $500.00. A good quartz can be had for $150.00.
So, I guess I have to confess a preference for stupid design here.
But Damn, there is just something insanely cool about getting the kind of accuracy and reliability that they do from springs, levers and gears.
Friday, December 17, 2010
Staples and Their guns.
The other day, my Black & Decker PowerShot staple gun failed to reset, again. Usually banging it on the side of the table would do the trick, but not this time. I banged and banged to no avail. I checked for jams. There were none to be found. It was broken.
I decided to take it apart and see if I could find something loose or broken and easily replaced. This failed. As soon as I removed the last screw and separated the halves of the case it went all splody sending several parts around the room, propelled by the springs inside. So be it. Repairability was a long shot on something this cheap. There is always a trade off to be made between initial manufacturing cost and repairability. When something is cheap the balance usually leans towards low manufacturing cost. I had already resolved to buy a new one if I couldn't fix this one, so I wasn't too upset.
You'd think this would be an easy enough endeavor—You'd think. I went to Target and picked up a Stanley TR45 and some staples. I was only planning to staple some thin polyethylene tubes so I didn't need a heavy duty model. The one thing I liked about this was that you could open it to clear jams.
The packaging said it took JT21 staples so that's what I bought, but he damn things didn't fit. They were slightly too narrow to fit on the rail upon which they slide. Figuring I just got a bad batch of staples I went to my Local Ace hardware and bought another box from another manufacturer. They didn't fit either.
So the staple gun was the one that was mis-made.
What the Fuck! These are staples and staple guns, not mechanical watches. The tolerances aren't that tight. Cheap Chinese manufacturing shouldn't be a factor here. If I were stapling up a tarp to hide a camp fire from the ravenous undead, I'd have been fucked.
Since burning the gas to return it would cost almost as much as the thing costs I decided to try to fix it by bending in the edges of the rail. This didn't work so I just threw it away.
I then went back to my local Ace and bought an Arrow T50 because the box claimed it took the same size staples I already bought and it was made in the U.S. It worked fine.
The poorly made staple gun was bad enough but why isn't there an industry standard for staple sizes? There is for the office type paper staplers. ISO has standards for pretty much everything else. Seriously, if it can be measured ISO probably has a standard for it. As an American I know that the standard sized staples wouldn't be available to me since they would be metric, but the more things that have an international metric standard, the more pressure there is for the U.S. to finally get with it.
When the dead rise to mack on our brainy goodness we are going to need to do a lot of improvisation. We are not going to have the luxury of making return trips to the deserted hardware stores for consumables of just the right dimensions or dealing with tools that can't even do what they are manufactured to do.
I decided to take it apart and see if I could find something loose or broken and easily replaced. This failed. As soon as I removed the last screw and separated the halves of the case it went all splody sending several parts around the room, propelled by the springs inside. So be it. Repairability was a long shot on something this cheap. There is always a trade off to be made between initial manufacturing cost and repairability. When something is cheap the balance usually leans towards low manufacturing cost. I had already resolved to buy a new one if I couldn't fix this one, so I wasn't too upset.
You'd think this would be an easy enough endeavor—You'd think. I went to Target and picked up a Stanley TR45 and some staples. I was only planning to staple some thin polyethylene tubes so I didn't need a heavy duty model. The one thing I liked about this was that you could open it to clear jams.
The packaging said it took JT21 staples so that's what I bought, but he damn things didn't fit. They were slightly too narrow to fit on the rail upon which they slide. Figuring I just got a bad batch of staples I went to my Local Ace hardware and bought another box from another manufacturer. They didn't fit either.
So the staple gun was the one that was mis-made.
What the Fuck! These are staples and staple guns, not mechanical watches. The tolerances aren't that tight. Cheap Chinese manufacturing shouldn't be a factor here. If I were stapling up a tarp to hide a camp fire from the ravenous undead, I'd have been fucked.
Since burning the gas to return it would cost almost as much as the thing costs I decided to try to fix it by bending in the edges of the rail. This didn't work so I just threw it away.
I then went back to my local Ace and bought an Arrow T50 because the box claimed it took the same size staples I already bought and it was made in the U.S. It worked fine.
The poorly made staple gun was bad enough but why isn't there an industry standard for staple sizes? There is for the office type paper staplers. ISO has standards for pretty much everything else. Seriously, if it can be measured ISO probably has a standard for it. As an American I know that the standard sized staples wouldn't be available to me since they would be metric, but the more things that have an international metric standard, the more pressure there is for the U.S. to finally get with it.
When the dead rise to mack on our brainy goodness we are going to need to do a lot of improvisation. We are not going to have the luxury of making return trips to the deserted hardware stores for consumables of just the right dimensions or dealing with tools that can't even do what they are manufactured to do.
Wednesday, December 8, 2010
The Yankee Screwdriver
I've recently re-discovered a piece of retro-tech that should never have been abandoned, the Yankee screwdriver, and I don't seem to be the only one to have done so.
These are the screwdrivers where the blade is turned by the user pushing down on the handle. Ask Mr. Google for pictures and a more elaborate description of how they work.
They seem to have fallen from fashion with the introduction of cordless electric screwdrivers and drills, which I am now abandoning.
Let's consider the downsides of the standard manual screwdriver. First, they're slow. You can let go and reposition your hand on the tool only so many times in a given time frame and your wrist can only be rotated so much. For a long screw this can be annoyingly time consuming.
Secondly, it is difficult to keep them centered when repositioning for the next turn, especially with that bane of humanity, the slotted screw.
For years now, people have been using corded drills to drive screws. This is usually fine on the bench or when working on a medium sized piece that doesn't involve moving around a lot, tangling the cord and creating a trip hazard, but not when you are moving around a large piece of furniture or something along those lines. And frequently you have to dig up an extension cord, just to use it.
Cordless drills solve the problems of cord tangling and the need for an extension cord but then there is the problem that no one has managed to invent a battery that doesn't suck. They never seem to be charged when you realize you need them so you have to find something else to do while you charge the battery. After a number of chargings they fail to hold much of a charge. They are always in some proprietary, unopenable enclosure so it is frequently cheaper to buy a new drill than it is to buy new batteries. When you really want to apply a lot of torque they drain quickly. And they are big and clunky.
Dedicated cordless power screwdrivers are just junior versions of the drills, with the size problem somewhat mitigated.
One shortcoming of all the power options share is that you really can't control the speed of rotation or feel the torque being applied to the screw.
The Yankee has none of these failings.
It is powered by your own muscles, meaning no battery or cord and you can feel what you are doing and it won't run out of power. You push it up and down so you don't have to reset it for multiple turns. And they are small and light.
I believe that there are several reasons it failed in the market. One is that people, especially male people, are easily seduced by the latest gizmo. I know I am.
Probably, the major reason they failed is that they Stanley failed to adapt. The major shortcoming of the Yankee was the bits. When the cordless electrics came out, they used the, what are now standard, hexagonal bits, which were already in use in bit switching manual screwdrivers. The Yankee used Stanleys* own style bits which when lost were hard to find and expensive to replace. I don't know why Stanley failed to change the Yankee to accept the standard bits. It could be that they thought that thought that they could get away with what printer manufacturers are doing now, trying to keep people locked into a proprietary format. Or, since they made the electric drills and screwdrivers they may have thought that the Yankee was just obsolete. Or it could have been just an oversight. I don't know.
The Good news is that there are still lots of them to be found at flea markets, garage sales, thrift stores and on Ebay and there are several companies making adapters so you can use the hexagonal bits with an original Yankee.
The better news is that two companies have started making them. One is a Chinese company that is called Isomax or Easypower. It's hard to tell what is the company name and which is the product name from the packaging. The other is A German Company called Robert Schröeder. The Chinese company makes a 17 inch one and Schröeder makes an 8.5 incher an 11.5 incher and a 17.5 incher. All take the hexagonal bits except for the Schröeder 8.5 incher, which uses the old Stanley style bits but it does have bit storage in the handle.
I bought the Chinese one and the Schröeder 8.5 incher. The Chinese one is as well made as any genuine Yankee I've seen. It has a plastic handle which some people might see as a shortcoming but I think it's better than wood. The length can make it somewhat unwieldy but this would also apply to the long Schröeder. Because of this I use the Schröeder the most. When building a computer I pretty much only use the Phillips #2 bit which stays in the chuck so the limited bit choices aren't that important. If I ever need to use some of the other bits I have a genuine Yankee and an adapter, although I suppose I could use the adapter with the Schröeder.
They do make drill bits for these, which makes sense they are also know as push drills. I've never used them as drills so I don't know how well they work as such and the only bit size that seems to be available is for drywall screws.
The fact that these don't need electricity to work and can tighten and remove screws quickly means that this is something you're definitely going to want during and after the Zombie Apocalypse.
*I don't approve of possessive apostrophes and I'm not using them unless the noun is plural and pluralized with an "s".
These are the screwdrivers where the blade is turned by the user pushing down on the handle. Ask Mr. Google for pictures and a more elaborate description of how they work.
They seem to have fallen from fashion with the introduction of cordless electric screwdrivers and drills, which I am now abandoning.
Let's consider the downsides of the standard manual screwdriver. First, they're slow. You can let go and reposition your hand on the tool only so many times in a given time frame and your wrist can only be rotated so much. For a long screw this can be annoyingly time consuming.
Secondly, it is difficult to keep them centered when repositioning for the next turn, especially with that bane of humanity, the slotted screw.
For years now, people have been using corded drills to drive screws. This is usually fine on the bench or when working on a medium sized piece that doesn't involve moving around a lot, tangling the cord and creating a trip hazard, but not when you are moving around a large piece of furniture or something along those lines. And frequently you have to dig up an extension cord, just to use it.
Cordless drills solve the problems of cord tangling and the need for an extension cord but then there is the problem that no one has managed to invent a battery that doesn't suck. They never seem to be charged when you realize you need them so you have to find something else to do while you charge the battery. After a number of chargings they fail to hold much of a charge. They are always in some proprietary, unopenable enclosure so it is frequently cheaper to buy a new drill than it is to buy new batteries. When you really want to apply a lot of torque they drain quickly. And they are big and clunky.
Dedicated cordless power screwdrivers are just junior versions of the drills, with the size problem somewhat mitigated.
One shortcoming of all the power options share is that you really can't control the speed of rotation or feel the torque being applied to the screw.
The Yankee has none of these failings.
It is powered by your own muscles, meaning no battery or cord and you can feel what you are doing and it won't run out of power. You push it up and down so you don't have to reset it for multiple turns. And they are small and light.
I believe that there are several reasons it failed in the market. One is that people, especially male people, are easily seduced by the latest gizmo. I know I am.
Probably, the major reason they failed is that they Stanley failed to adapt. The major shortcoming of the Yankee was the bits. When the cordless electrics came out, they used the, what are now standard, hexagonal bits, which were already in use in bit switching manual screwdrivers. The Yankee used Stanleys* own style bits which when lost were hard to find and expensive to replace. I don't know why Stanley failed to change the Yankee to accept the standard bits. It could be that they thought that thought that they could get away with what printer manufacturers are doing now, trying to keep people locked into a proprietary format. Or, since they made the electric drills and screwdrivers they may have thought that the Yankee was just obsolete. Or it could have been just an oversight. I don't know.
The Good news is that there are still lots of them to be found at flea markets, garage sales, thrift stores and on Ebay and there are several companies making adapters so you can use the hexagonal bits with an original Yankee.
The better news is that two companies have started making them. One is a Chinese company that is called Isomax or Easypower. It's hard to tell what is the company name and which is the product name from the packaging. The other is A German Company called Robert Schröeder. The Chinese company makes a 17 inch one and Schröeder makes an 8.5 incher an 11.5 incher and a 17.5 incher. All take the hexagonal bits except for the Schröeder 8.5 incher, which uses the old Stanley style bits but it does have bit storage in the handle.
I bought the Chinese one and the Schröeder 8.5 incher. The Chinese one is as well made as any genuine Yankee I've seen. It has a plastic handle which some people might see as a shortcoming but I think it's better than wood. The length can make it somewhat unwieldy but this would also apply to the long Schröeder. Because of this I use the Schröeder the most. When building a computer I pretty much only use the Phillips #2 bit which stays in the chuck so the limited bit choices aren't that important. If I ever need to use some of the other bits I have a genuine Yankee and an adapter, although I suppose I could use the adapter with the Schröeder.
They do make drill bits for these, which makes sense they are also know as push drills. I've never used them as drills so I don't know how well they work as such and the only bit size that seems to be available is for drywall screws.
The fact that these don't need electricity to work and can tighten and remove screws quickly means that this is something you're definitely going to want during and after the Zombie Apocalypse.
*I don't approve of possessive apostrophes and I'm not using them unless the noun is plural and pluralized with an "s".
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