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Category: Greg’s Stuff (Page 8 of 12)

Car Safety… a look back

December 20, 2008 / / 1 Comment

modeltwreck

As a Saab Technician, I really get a feeling of being indestructable as I test drive new cars. The brakes are good… the belts hold you in and there are airbags all over the place. (At least 6 bags in the 9-3’s.) This is a false feeling as there are other things on the road that are killers, like semi-trucks.

But cars are a lot safer. My grandpa, Art Specht, got involved in a wreck in a Model-T Ford when he was younger. From what he says, a huge spike of plate glass cut up his face. There is a lot to be said for safety glass.

Seat belt are another thing. My first car, a 1952 Ford, had no belts, and when they started putting them in, I thought they were a nuisance. I only started using belts because I had a bad habit of driving absolutely as fast as I could go. I’m over all that now, however I wouldn’t think of crossing the street now without seat belts…

Then there are dual master cylinders. Up until 1968 or so cars had a single hydraulic circuit to feed all the brakes. This is fine till something happens, like a blown wheel cylinder or a failed seal in the master cylinder or a rusted out line. Then you have no brakes. (Well, you did have an emergency brake, but did you ever try to stop a car with one? Not to good.) I lost a Corvair like that, in order to stop I had to run into a building. (It was a Police station at that, but that’s another story)

Now cars have all these safety items, including stiffer cages. Not long ago a Saab Convertible rolled over a couple of times, and the roof didn’t collapse. And you could still open the doors. That would have never happened to a convertible made up to the seventies.

However, human nature being what it is, you would think this would lower the accident rate and whatever. Insurance companies used to give a discount to people whose cars had this safety equipment but they no longer do. They found out that people think they’re safe so they just drive faster…

greg

Sail(plane)ing into oblivion….

December 17, 2008 / / 0 Comments

Back in the eighties I went thru my flyboy period. I took sailplane lessons for awhile in an old Schweitzer WW2 trainer in Waynesville Ohio. There are a few sailplane places around Waynesville with pretty modern planes, but this was the best they had. Not to complain, it wouldn’t stay up all day but it was cool. Ken was my flight instructor, and I think he only did this so he could afford to go up all day.

Sailplanes are cool. As they kept reminding me, they didn’t burn when they crashed, as there was no engine. That was reassuring. They would get this old guy with a piper cub to drag you up a couple a thousand feet and let you go. (I can’t remember the old guy’s name, but when he was younger, his big thing was to fly low over a crowd, and crawl out of the backseat of his piper cub and shimmy up the wing root and climb into the front seat. This was neat as he was the only guy on board. What a guy!)

After he let you go, you looked around for some big fluffy clouds, for they marked the thermals. These were big warm columns of air that were rising. They were just a big sailplane elevator. Once you got in one you just circled around till you got high enough, then bailed out and sailed around for a while.

Once you ran out of thermals, it was time to come back down. This was dicey at this particular airfield as there were telephone wires close up to all edges of the field. To get a sailplane down you had to pass over the wires, then cross up the controls, in effect to drop the plane as fast as possible. Then just before you hit the ground, you staighten the controls up and make a controlled landing. Nothing to it. Except one day, my sister Lisa talked the old guy into giving her a ride in his piper cub, and he took off right in front of me on the way down. It was too late to go back up, so we turned into the plowed field next door and made an improptu landing. This is when you learn to land with the furrows, not against them.

Like they say, any landing you walk away from is a good landing. Especially if you don’t burn.

greg

Leasing cars is a bad thing…. for the cars

December 12, 2008 / / 0 Comments

We live in an ownership society, and as such, we take care of things. Renters don’t take care of things… but owners do. If you lease a car, any maintenance it needs is just a pain in the ass. And it is also an expense you can do without… mainly because it’s not yours. It’s somebody else’s problem. Usually if you skip on maintenance, nothing will really happen to it while your driving it but the next guy is the guy that pays up.

Manufacturers are also guilty here. In order to make their cars look good in comparison to other cars they have lengthened the maintenance intervals. It’s like their cars don’t really need to have the oil changed much. However, yes they do. One reason is the EPA. In order to meet emission standards, car makers have had to go to great lengths to make a car run clean. They have emission controls that do this pretty good, but the EPA also wants a car to run clean while it’s warming up, something that emission controls can’t really do. So car makers try hard to get their cars warmed up quickly, one of the ways is to stuff the catalytic converter up against the engine. These things can run 1600 degrees at times, and warms the oil up quick. But it is always there. Your oil is getting baked every day in the interest in tailpipe emissions, coupled with lengthened oil change intervals and bingo. Now you got a crankcase full of sludge and hard things that plug up the oil pickup. Now you need an engine…

The best thing you can do for a car is change the oil… 3500 miles for regular oil, 5000 miles for semi-synthetic oil, and 10000 miles for synthetic. (somehow, even with synthetic, I still can’t let it go that long…) Your car will be grateful….

greg

Computerized Engine Controls.. a Modern Miracle

December 9, 2008 / / 0 Comments

There once was a time not so long ago where if you had taken a car’s engine apart for some serious rebuilding, that half the work was getting it running good again. You had to massage the mixture, cajole the timing, and usually had to accept some irregularity or other. That stuff is all over.

As long as you put everything back together properly, and without adjusting anything, all you have to do is hook up the battery and turn the key. The engine comes to life immediately, with no hint of it’s latest major sugery… and not only just run, but run good. (disclaimer: the mechanic does have to put it back together properly…)

One interesting thing about computerized engine controls are the idle motors. Back in the 60’s and 70’s getting a car to idle approached something of an art. You had to balance all the factors involved to get what you wanted… did you want it to run clean, or run good? You usually couldn’t have both.. now you get it all. Idle motors work good, so good in fact that they rarely fail, and if you start your car and put it in gear and lay off the brakes, your car will idle itself at about 6mph to Los Angeles if you have enough gas.

Engine computers will also tell you whats wrong with themselves also. Engine failure codes were sparse and not very informative in the 80’s. For example, you would get a code like 42492.. which meant the mixture was incorrect on driving. This could mean anything that had anything to do with the motor could be at fault. It was like having someone tell you your cars running bad. You already knew it. And the fault code list was limited to about 20 generalized codes. Now the number of codes for an engine system runs into the hundreds and are much more detailed as to the fault.

The reason you need codes in modern engine systems is somewhat akin to the larger picture humans have to deal with in modern life. And that is, things are not intuitive anymore. A hundred years ago, the average mechanic could understand everything about the machines he worked on, because you could see the problems and relate to them in a physical way. Now you relate to the problems on a theoretical level, and you have to trust your machines to tell you what’s going on. But it is a miracle it works at all, much less works as good as it does.

We don’t even think about it, and we don’t need to, till it hiccups…

Vietnam R&R…

December 7, 2008 / / 1 Comment

Some time around March 1971, the higher ups decided we needed a break. The U.S. Army had a beach set up just for this purpose. It technically was the 101st Airborne’s beach, but since we were all on the same side, they let us use it. In Country R&R usually lasted about 3 days and ours did but just barely. It was pretty cool, ocean front property. The only indications of the war was the constant buzz of helicopters whipping up the beach, and the vietnamese on the next beach over. They weren’t there for fun though, just fishing to get something to eat.

The first day started off badly. One of our guys broke his back body surfing. He wasn’t killed but his war was over and they hauled him off to Japan.

The next day was my turn. I was far out in the surf, when I noticed one of the helicopters that flew low along the beach was turning around. The gunship started wailing on the water just in front of me with all their machine guns at once. I couldn’t get out of the water fast enough. Then all the Vietnamese charged into the water and dragged the biggest white shark I’d ever seen onto the beach. There must have been 500 bullet holes in him. The Viets carved him up into steaks in no time. I had enough of swimming for awhile, and my hat was off to those chopper guys.

That night a typhoon blew in during the night and levelled most of the hooches we were staying in, including mine. There wasn’t anything to do but ride it out, and the next morning crawled out of the wreckage.

Thank God, this R&R only lasted 3 days…

greg

Intermittent Wipers… too much choice?

December 2, 2008 / / 0 Comments

Driving cars way back in the Fifties, we were lucky we had wipers at all. The wiper motors were driven by vacuum, a source the motor only provided at idle, or at cruising speed. There usually was no vacuum when you needed it the most. Now wiper motors are powered by electric motors and are there for you always.

Sometime during that period they invented intermittent wipers. These were great! It always seemed that when it rained, it didn’t rain enough to leave the wipers on all the time, or it just rained enough that you couldn’t leave them off. My old 1990 Ford Van doesn’t have them. Leave it up to the Americans to make some crucial device an option!

But intermittent wipers have changed. Now they have a slider switch of some sort on them so that you can adjust the interval. You would think this would be great, as even intermittent wipers don’t always match the rain’s fury. It drives me crazy. Just having non adjustable wipers on my van is ok, but on my car I’m constantly adjusting the intermittent wipers…. I’m never satisfied.

Now they have rain sensing wipers. You would think this would be great, but alas it’s not. Now when the rain doesn’t match the wipe speed ( and being human, my perception is that it doesn’t, whether it does or not) you can’t do anything about it other than turning on the regular wipers. It’s up to the computer, not you.

Maybe vacuum wipers aren’t so bad…

greg

Boo Bear ready for Christmas!

December 2, 2008 / / 1 Comment
Boo Bear ready for Christmas!

Boo Bear ready for Christmas!

Ashley’s baby Caiden is getting ready for Christmas… only 3 weeks to go. He’s in our living room today, Kathy and I are babysitting while Ashley and Joey are working. 6 months and a few days old, and he’s trying to get up on his feet already! Stay tuned for more exciting developements…!

greg

Lam Son 719

November 21, 2008 / / 0 Comments

I was a member of a DARRS team in Vietnam. The acronym DARRS stood for Division Advisory Radio Research something or other. The whole Army Security Agency thing was disguised in Vietnam as Radio Research for some legal reason. Our outfit had 10 guys in it, with your associated vietnamese counterparts, attached to the 1st ARVN Division, and we provided intelligence support to this vietnamese division. At the time I worked out of the back of a 5 ton truck, with huge maps of northern I Corps, and a rat rig (radio module) attached to the side. I kept track of order of battle (who and where everyone was) and gave intelligence breifings to the vietnamese General. Our truck was parked in the middle of the Forbidden City in the center of Hue, and was like being in the middle of a National Geographic article.

Sometime around february 1971 we got orders to move our operation to Dong Ha, on route 9, to support the Arvn’s operation in Laos to cut the Ho Chi Minh trail. This operation was called Lam Son 719, and was mainly a vietnamese deal as we weren’t allowed in Laos. Other American outfits reoccupied Khe Sanh, which was down route 9 towards Laos. It was cold, rainy, and we had to go up Highway 1 thru Dynamite Alley, a stretch of road the zips liked to bury bombs in. We only lost 1 jeep.

Our forward base was like any other base camp in Vietnam. Lots of bunkers to dig, lots of wire to stretch and tents to put up. We usually got mortared every night, just about the time we were getting resupplied, as they had the airstrip zeroed in. We watched the show in lawn chairs, like a Mash episode. One of the guys we called speed ran into the wire the first night we were hit. I think he got a purple heart for that.

The Arvn’s spent about a month in Laos getting beat up, hung down, drug down and generally had their ass handed to them. We went in to get some of our guys out, but the Arvns wanted out to, and overloaded helicopters made the news. Some were brought down by the load. The 1st Arvn Division, for instance, lost every tank, truck and helicopter they had in Laos.

2 weeks later, in downtown Hue, there was a big parade. The 1st Arvn division marched through town with new tanks and trucks. There was a big celebration and we all got medals for our great victory during Lam Son 719. For my participation I got a Vietnamese Cross of Gallantry, with palm.

greg

Grandpa almost got some new false teeth…

November 16, 2008 / / 1 Comment

Back in the 60’s, Art Specht had some bought some ground in Missouri, specifically in the Ozark Mountains. Pa was a real rural guy. He grew up in some hard parts of Cincinnati (I think), but his heart was in the country. He liked growing his own food, and really liked organically growing things.

I remember when I was growing up, he kept getting a local newspaper from close to where the land he owned was. There were stories of the guy who had just shot a brown bear, and a picture of him standing next to his trophy. Lots of stories of encounters with rattlesnakes and the like. Pa loved that stuff.

I also remember his story of the country store. He said there was a big barrel in the corner filled with false teeth, twenty five cents each. You could root through that barrel till you found some that fit. He was all for it, till Ma found out that they were taken from people before they were buried.

Those Missourians were practical people!

greg

Anzani… Cool Engines… but not as cool as they could be…

November 9, 2008 / / 0 Comments

The Anzani 3 Cylinder engine made Louis Bleriot famous. He was the first guy to fly nonstop across the English Channel. Back in the early days of flight, having an engine light enough, with enough horsepower to get an airplane off the ground, was the Holy Grail. It was a 3 cylinder semi-radial engine and had 25 horsepower, not a lot, but enough.

Bleriot designed and built the type XI in 1908, but fitted the Anzani engine in 1909. Happy with the results, he decided to try for the British Daily Mail prize of 1000 pounds for the first crossing of the English Channel by air. The problem for Bleriot was the engines problems with overheating… it could be guaranteed to run at least 20 minutes. But that wouldn’t be enough.

He took off on July 25th, 1909 and headed for England. He handed his watch to his friend and said that there was no use ruining a perfectly good watch (since he probably was going to ditch in the channel). All went well till about 20 minutes into the flight when the engine overheated and locked up. As the plane slowly descended to the channel, a rainstorm blew up, cooling down the motor, which Bleriot restarted and finished his flight into history.

greg

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