Well, it's taken two return trips by the techs and 20 ft of PVC pipe, but the ductless a/c seems to be working. The system startled us by suddenly dripping a lot of water on the floor. The water spread out to be quite a large puddle, although not very deep. Just proves they did a good job when they laid the slab.
It turned out that the way our ceiling is built, they couldn't get a good downhill slope the way they originally tried. So now the drain tube goes the other way, out over the double doors from the patio. It drains into an elbow on a run of PVC that goes across above the window over the sink, around the corner, over the other window, and then drops down to nearly ground level. I'd take a photo but my kitchen counters, which you can see through the windows, are an absolute mess and I'm not going to display that to the whole world. More spring cleaning to do, of course.
As for the other problems, the technician suggested checking the second remote (my policy is to buy a second remote at the time, not wait years until the replacement is no longer available) and all the other problems went away. We're not sure if the first remote was bad or if it was the wrong remote. The remote that came with our system had been robbed out of the box and they'd brought us a substitute. The second remote was dropped off the next day and we didn't even put the batteries in it, just put it into a drawer with the paperwork.
So now the system is working perfectly. We close the doors to the family room and use it during the day and it's cool and comfortable. Meanwhile, the rest of the house stays fairly cool because we've had the windows open all night. Here in the desert, the nights get very cool; a temperature drop of 40°F is common. We use that natural cooling to get the house cool enough so that we can ride it out until it starts cooling off the next evening. With the help of a few fans, that works pretty well.
I had a panic with my Kindle the day before yesterday. It wouldn't wake up, although I did manage to turn it off completely, not just sleep it. I went to the Kindle help site and immediately found the answer. It booted up, very obligingly, and has been working just fine since. I was pretty upset, since I was in the middle of a great book. However, I have a number of regular books that I need to read, so it wouldn't have been a catastrophe if I'd had to send the Kindle for repairs. It would have been inconvenient, because my husband is a light sleeper and clicking the Kindle is much quieter than turning the page of a book. How quickly we adapt!
So all's well here, electronically and mechanically. At least for now.
My husband's little laptop is starting to act a little oddly, so I just bought him a replacement from eBay. These laptops were last manufactured about four years ago and he's not ready to change over to a newer model (he runs a dual boot, Linux and XP). I'm using an even older laptop and am on my third replacement. I'm still running W2K. I have a 1600x1200-pixel 16.1" display and I'm not ready to switch over to the letterbox-shaped displays that the newer laptops have. Fortunately, we still have a couple of replacements in reserve. We'll both have to give up eventually, I'm sure, but we'll probably manage to skip another generation before we do.
Gordo the Wonder Collie is doing well on his new medication schedule. We've reduced the doses and he's a great deal more lively. He got a floppy rhinoceros from Orvis for his birthday. He's very fond of it and takes it to bed with him at night, using it for a pillow. He also got a dog nest and an outdoor dog bed and he's using them both.
I've taken most of the photos I promised in the last posting and will be putting them up soon. I think I've found the right lace pattern for the beautiful silk and I'll be getting back to knitting. Now that it's so cool in the family room, I'm ready to knit again.
Showing posts with label Technology. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Technology. Show all posts
28 May 2009
16 February 2009
Out of the Blue
I got a very interesting phone call last week and it really was a thrill. It's kind of complicated, so I'll have to start with some background.
Back in 1991 a couple of guys I worked with doing in-flight simulation were Technical Chairman and a Session Chair, respectively, at the AIAA Simulation Science Conference, which was held at the same time and place as the AIAA Guidance, Navigation, and Control and Atmospheric Flight Mechanics Conferences. My husband and I always went to these conferences, which are in August. The guys wanted me to write a paper about in-flight simulation at Dryden. There were two reasons for this, that I'd been managing the in-flight simulation at Dryden for years and that it wouldn't look like an advertisement, since Dryden used the various aircraft, rather than providing the service. I guess I need to mention that the conference TC was the USAF manager of their in-flight simulators and the Session Chair was the department head of the company that operated those aircraft and a couple of their own. You can see where them writing such a paper might not look entirely neutral on the subject.
So I wrote the paper. It took a lot of research and I spent a lot of time up at the Ames Research Center, going through fiches and reading old, old papers. I blew a lot of them back and would have a heavy box to carry back on the KingAir on every trip. I went around and interviewed past and present research test pilots and engineers and generally had a good time, but it was harder to write this paper than it was to turn out a more focused paper on some flight test results. I also spent a lot of time picking out photos so the paper wouldn't be just text.
I gave the paper at the conference (it was in New Orleans that year) and the room was full to overflowing and engineers came up afterward to tell me how much they'd liked it, engineers I knew and respected. As a result, I decided it was a pretty good paper. AIAA couldn't publish it as a journal paper because it was way too long and there was no good way I could cut it down, so I was kind of stuck, looking for a more widely distributed publication method. I happened to talk to Dick Hallion, who was working as a historian for the Air Force Wright Aeronautical Laboratory at the time, about the paper (he'd liked it) and he suggested I try the Journal of the American Aviation Historians Society. Dick had written a very good history of Dryden some years before this, which was when I'd gotten to know him.
So I sent it to the AAHS and they were very happy to publish it for me. I made a few small changes and we sent it off, with a stack of photos, and got back copies of the magazine some time later. They did a beautiful job printing the paper, because they used glossy paper and photos were important to them.
You can read the TM version of the paper, In-Flight Simulation Studies at the NASA Dryden Flight Research Facility, here. It's not very technical and it may be interesting.
OK, that's the background. You can see why I said that you needed it to understand what happened last week.
Dick Hallion is back working for NASA as a historian again. The agency is putting together a four-volume series on NACA/NASA aeronautics research history, aimed at letting the young engineers learn about all the stuff that has been done in aeronautics over the years. Three of the volumes are about aerodynamics and wind tunnels and the fourth volume is about handling and flying qualities and topics like that. At least, I think that's how Dick described it. I may be wrong, though. Dick is in charge of this effort (I think he's a contractor, not that it matters) and he'd remembered my paper all these years and thinks it should be included.
So he called me up to ask me if I'd like to bring it up to date for inclusion in this, because he thinks it's important to include the topic and I'd already written such a good paper, he thought. This is a form of profession immortality, in its way. I'll be a contractor to NASA and I think I'll be able to use the Dryden library and photo lab, as well as having access to the pilots and researchers. So far as I know, there hasn't been a lot of in-flight simulation studies at Dryden since I wrote the paper. Handling and flying qualities research has really dropped off the charts for funding these days, as has aeronautics, at least at NASA (and, I think, the USAF). Aeronautics has kind of been the red-headed step child at NASA once the Space program really started sucking up the funding.
And I get a copy of the four-volume set, too. Plus they pay me, although not a huge amount.
Back in 1991 a couple of guys I worked with doing in-flight simulation were Technical Chairman and a Session Chair, respectively, at the AIAA Simulation Science Conference, which was held at the same time and place as the AIAA Guidance, Navigation, and Control and Atmospheric Flight Mechanics Conferences. My husband and I always went to these conferences, which are in August. The guys wanted me to write a paper about in-flight simulation at Dryden. There were two reasons for this, that I'd been managing the in-flight simulation at Dryden for years and that it wouldn't look like an advertisement, since Dryden used the various aircraft, rather than providing the service. I guess I need to mention that the conference TC was the USAF manager of their in-flight simulators and the Session Chair was the department head of the company that operated those aircraft and a couple of their own. You can see where them writing such a paper might not look entirely neutral on the subject.
So I wrote the paper. It took a lot of research and I spent a lot of time up at the Ames Research Center, going through fiches and reading old, old papers. I blew a lot of them back and would have a heavy box to carry back on the KingAir on every trip. I went around and interviewed past and present research test pilots and engineers and generally had a good time, but it was harder to write this paper than it was to turn out a more focused paper on some flight test results. I also spent a lot of time picking out photos so the paper wouldn't be just text.
I gave the paper at the conference (it was in New Orleans that year) and the room was full to overflowing and engineers came up afterward to tell me how much they'd liked it, engineers I knew and respected. As a result, I decided it was a pretty good paper. AIAA couldn't publish it as a journal paper because it was way too long and there was no good way I could cut it down, so I was kind of stuck, looking for a more widely distributed publication method. I happened to talk to Dick Hallion, who was working as a historian for the Air Force Wright Aeronautical Laboratory at the time, about the paper (he'd liked it) and he suggested I try the Journal of the American Aviation Historians Society. Dick had written a very good history of Dryden some years before this, which was when I'd gotten to know him.
So I sent it to the AAHS and they were very happy to publish it for me. I made a few small changes and we sent it off, with a stack of photos, and got back copies of the magazine some time later. They did a beautiful job printing the paper, because they used glossy paper and photos were important to them.
You can read the TM version of the paper, In-Flight Simulation Studies at the NASA Dryden Flight Research Facility, here. It's not very technical and it may be interesting.
OK, that's the background. You can see why I said that you needed it to understand what happened last week.
Dick Hallion is back working for NASA as a historian again. The agency is putting together a four-volume series on NACA/NASA aeronautics research history, aimed at letting the young engineers learn about all the stuff that has been done in aeronautics over the years. Three of the volumes are about aerodynamics and wind tunnels and the fourth volume is about handling and flying qualities and topics like that. At least, I think that's how Dick described it. I may be wrong, though. Dick is in charge of this effort (I think he's a contractor, not that it matters) and he'd remembered my paper all these years and thinks it should be included.
So he called me up to ask me if I'd like to bring it up to date for inclusion in this, because he thinks it's important to include the topic and I'd already written such a good paper, he thought. This is a form of profession immortality, in its way. I'll be a contractor to NASA and I think I'll be able to use the Dryden library and photo lab, as well as having access to the pilots and researchers. So far as I know, there hasn't been a lot of in-flight simulation studies at Dryden since I wrote the paper. Handling and flying qualities research has really dropped off the charts for funding these days, as has aeronautics, at least at NASA (and, I think, the USAF). Aeronautics has kind of been the red-headed step child at NASA once the Space program really started sucking up the funding.
And I get a copy of the four-volume set, too. Plus they pay me, although not a huge amount.
07 June 2007
Still Here, Not There
OK, it's a long story, but we haven't gone to Lancaster yet. The big delay was that I finally got the receptacles on the circuit for my freezer changed from GFCIs to regular receptacles yesterday afternoon. The GFCI is a great invention, particularly for circuits that are around water, but it's crummy for freezers and refrigerators. If a GFCI trips and there's no one around to reset it, everything inside the freezer or fridge will spoil. In the summer heat we have here, it'll spoil quickly, so the once-a-week check our house sitter does won't be enough. I think I'd have to call in one of those companies that cleans up after undiscovered dead bodies to get the stink and mess out if it happened with the fridge.
Right now everything is in the van except the few things that can't stand the heat (it's cool today, only 87° with the dew point at 27° (relative humidity 12%). It's been about 10° warmer the last few days and will be again. Unfortunately, there's only a knot or two of wind, which doesn't help much in the garage.
The only knitting that isn't out there is my Argosy baby blanket. I've finished three pattern repeats on the decrease side, binding off six pattern squares (72 stitches). It's funny, but now it looks like a blanket, not a shawl. I don't notice any real change in row length, but I figure it'll show up after another few pattern repeats, when the rows get down below 240 stitches or so.
I've figured out three things about myself in the last few weeks. A lot of other knitters probably have the same traits, so I'm sure I'm not alone.
The first is that I hate knitting to a close deadline. I enjoyed knitting the feather and fan stole until I only had a week or two before I had to have it finished and blocked. I still enjoyed knitting it once I picked it up, but it was really hard to pick it up those last few days. I don't anticipate the same problem with the baby blanket because the deadline is in November and it's fun to knit.
The second is that I greatly prefer a project where I can see progress at a glance, particularly for a longer project. Argosy, in any of its forms, is like that. The pattern repeats are short enough and definite enough that there's instant gratification, even with sport-weight yarn. My fan and feather stole isn't. I think that's because the repeats aren't very distinctive.
And the third is that I hate to have my yarn trapped inside my circular needles. It just bugs me no end and I have to pass the ball through the needles to free the yarn.
I really don't have much to say today. I do some work around the house, knit a couple of rows, do some more, etc. Pretty much everything is packed and I'm just doing the stuff I do so that it's nicer returning. I do all the laundry and get everything folded, run a last load in the dishwasher, put out clean towels, change the bed, that sort of thing. It drives my husband crazy, watching me race around the house doing all this stuff just before we leave, so I'm getting it all done today.
Right now everything is in the van except the few things that can't stand the heat (it's cool today, only 87° with the dew point at 27° (relative humidity 12%). It's been about 10° warmer the last few days and will be again. Unfortunately, there's only a knot or two of wind, which doesn't help much in the garage.
The only knitting that isn't out there is my Argosy baby blanket. I've finished three pattern repeats on the decrease side, binding off six pattern squares (72 stitches). It's funny, but now it looks like a blanket, not a shawl. I don't notice any real change in row length, but I figure it'll show up after another few pattern repeats, when the rows get down below 240 stitches or so.
I've figured out three things about myself in the last few weeks. A lot of other knitters probably have the same traits, so I'm sure I'm not alone.
The first is that I hate knitting to a close deadline. I enjoyed knitting the feather and fan stole until I only had a week or two before I had to have it finished and blocked. I still enjoyed knitting it once I picked it up, but it was really hard to pick it up those last few days. I don't anticipate the same problem with the baby blanket because the deadline is in November and it's fun to knit.
The second is that I greatly prefer a project where I can see progress at a glance, particularly for a longer project. Argosy, in any of its forms, is like that. The pattern repeats are short enough and definite enough that there's instant gratification, even with sport-weight yarn. My fan and feather stole isn't. I think that's because the repeats aren't very distinctive.
And the third is that I hate to have my yarn trapped inside my circular needles. It just bugs me no end and I have to pass the ball through the needles to free the yarn.
I really don't have much to say today. I do some work around the house, knit a couple of rows, do some more, etc. Pretty much everything is packed and I'm just doing the stuff I do so that it's nicer returning. I do all the laundry and get everything folded, run a last load in the dishwasher, put out clean towels, change the bed, that sort of thing. It drives my husband crazy, watching me race around the house doing all this stuff just before we leave, so I'm getting it all done today.
05 June 2007
Joining Ravelry
I just got an invitation to join Ravelry, so I zipped over and did so. Oh, my, there's going to be a lot of keying in information about yarn and projects and patterns. I think I could spend a lot of time there.
Now that I've seen it, I can see why they didn't want to just throw it open to the world all at once. The various databases will benefit, I think, by being built gradually. Even that's not perfect, as I've seen a couple of errors that need correcting.
Anyway, if you've signed up to join, they're clearing the list. However, that list has 4,500 people on it, so it may take them a while.
Now that I've seen it, I can see why they didn't want to just throw it open to the world all at once. The various databases will benefit, I think, by being built gradually. Even that's not perfect, as I've seen a couple of errors that need correcting.
Anyway, if you've signed up to join, they're clearing the list. However, that list has 4,500 people on it, so it may take them a while.
22 May 2007
Aarrgh!
In my previous posting, Photo Finish!, I asked for comments and then somehow managed to disable commenting. If I'd known what I was doing, I would never have done it. It's taken me two days to figure out how to fix it, in fact.
It is fixed now. Please re-read the posting and make comments. Please. I really want to hear what you think.
I don't know any knitters in person, so I don't get any feedback on my knitting. My dear husband is both honest and tactful, but he's mostly evaluating general appearance.
Speaking of dear husbands, mine brought an entire family of Iowans to our marriage and they're wonderful targets of opportunity for a knitter. He can knit, but hasn't done so since the '50s, when he learned. Still, it makes him very empathetic when I'm frogging away.
And, totally unrelated to knitting, you may remember reading about our going to the Honda dealer to look at mini-vans. Well, tomorrow the van modifiers are putting a modified Honda mini-van on a flat-bed and bringing it here (from the San Fernando Valley, 140 miles away) so we can look it over and drive it a bit. This van isn't the one we'd get, because it doesn't have the sunroof or the navigation system, but it is the right color (I told my husband he could have any color he wanted as long as it was red). The right one for us is going to be coming off the assembly line in three or four weeks and the modifiers want to claim it. I guess the next one won't be available for a couple of months.
We never did go look at the Toyota mini-vans. There's so much unanimity regarding the great ride of the Honda that we just didn't bother. Our current mini-van doesn't have the best handling qualities in the world and I've decided that's not going to happen with the new one.
This van is going to be hideously expensive. I keep telling myself that it's not that much per year if we keep it for ten years. After all, we bought the current van in '99, so it's not as if we do this very often. We bought my car in '96 and the convertible in '92 (we dropped a new engine and transaxle in it in '01, though).
And last, but not least, Vivian Høxbro's Domino Knitting showed up on my doorstep this morning. I was convinced by the comments I got here earlier that I really needed this book. I also bought Roxana Bartlett's Slip-Stitch Knitting and volumes 7, 8, and 9 of the Weldon reprints from Interweave Press. I'd bought the first six volumes of the Weldon series when they first came out and then, for some reason I don't remember, stopped getting them. I decided I'd better get the rest of the series now, before any more go out of print. I got volumes 10, 11, and 12 from Amazon for a slight discount and free shipping.
I'm not entirely sure I'll ever do much in mosaic/slip-stitch colorwork. I found the Mason-Dixon ball-band washcloth fairly attractive worked in a variegated yarn with a coordinating solid, so I thought I'd look further at the technique. I don't care for Fair Isle or intarsia. Most of you are probably too young to remember the Mary Maxim intarsia sweaters of the '50s, but if you do, you probably understand my aversion instinctively. As for Fair Isle, maybe it's just that I never liked the Duke of Windsor.
It is fixed now. Please re-read the posting and make comments. Please. I really want to hear what you think.
I don't know any knitters in person, so I don't get any feedback on my knitting. My dear husband is both honest and tactful, but he's mostly evaluating general appearance.
Speaking of dear husbands, mine brought an entire family of Iowans to our marriage and they're wonderful targets of opportunity for a knitter. He can knit, but hasn't done so since the '50s, when he learned. Still, it makes him very empathetic when I'm frogging away.
And, totally unrelated to knitting, you may remember reading about our going to the Honda dealer to look at mini-vans. Well, tomorrow the van modifiers are putting a modified Honda mini-van on a flat-bed and bringing it here (from the San Fernando Valley, 140 miles away) so we can look it over and drive it a bit. This van isn't the one we'd get, because it doesn't have the sunroof or the navigation system, but it is the right color (I told my husband he could have any color he wanted as long as it was red). The right one for us is going to be coming off the assembly line in three or four weeks and the modifiers want to claim it. I guess the next one won't be available for a couple of months.
We never did go look at the Toyota mini-vans. There's so much unanimity regarding the great ride of the Honda that we just didn't bother. Our current mini-van doesn't have the best handling qualities in the world and I've decided that's not going to happen with the new one.
This van is going to be hideously expensive. I keep telling myself that it's not that much per year if we keep it for ten years. After all, we bought the current van in '99, so it's not as if we do this very often. We bought my car in '96 and the convertible in '92 (we dropped a new engine and transaxle in it in '01, though).
And last, but not least, Vivian Høxbro's Domino Knitting showed up on my doorstep this morning. I was convinced by the comments I got here earlier that I really needed this book. I also bought Roxana Bartlett's Slip-Stitch Knitting and volumes 7, 8, and 9 of the Weldon reprints from Interweave Press. I'd bought the first six volumes of the Weldon series when they first came out and then, for some reason I don't remember, stopped getting them. I decided I'd better get the rest of the series now, before any more go out of print. I got volumes 10, 11, and 12 from Amazon for a slight discount and free shipping.
I'm not entirely sure I'll ever do much in mosaic/slip-stitch colorwork. I found the Mason-Dixon ball-band washcloth fairly attractive worked in a variegated yarn with a coordinating solid, so I thought I'd look further at the technique. I don't care for Fair Isle or intarsia. Most of you are probably too young to remember the Mary Maxim intarsia sweaters of the '50s, but if you do, you probably understand my aversion instinctively. As for Fair Isle, maybe it's just that I never liked the Duke of Windsor.
08 May 2007
Aircraft I Have Loved, Part One Continued
More about my favorite airplane, the F-4 Phantom II. The first F-4 I was ever up close and personal with was at NASA Dryden, back in the late '60s when I was a summer hire. We had an F-4 then. I don't know why or what it was used for and my copy of Hallion's book about the history of Dryden, like my copy the revised and updated version by Gorn and Hallion, is, for some inexplicable reason, at my house in Lancaster, not here in Palm Desert.
Anyway, one day this F-4 was out flying and the fuel pressure relief valve in one wing stopped working. Shortly thereafter the pressure of the fuel blew a hole right through the (wet) wing. Naturally, the pilot, Hugh Jackson, RTBd (Returned To Base) and landed right away. Some time later they brought the plane into the hangar and we all went down to see it. 'd never seen anything like it and probably wouldn't have believed that the fuel could generate enough pressure just from a little aerodynamic heating to blow a hole clear through the wing had I ever thought about it before it happened. It was quite amazing. Of course, we just repaired the wing and finished the program and somewhere along the line the airplane went away.
The next F-4 I was associated with was the analog fly-by-wire F-4 that McAir and the USAF were examining with an eye to reducing battle damage. I've written a bit about that one elsewhere and won't repeat it here.
At the same time, there was the F-4 that McAir was using for safety chase for the new F-15. This was an old F-4, bailed to McAir by the USAF years before and used for all sorts of experiments and programs, from testing new hardware to being safety chase. In its youth, it had been used to set some sort of speed record, in fact. With all those years as a testbed, it had picked up a lot of extra weight. When they'd install some bit of hardware it would have wiring and power supplies and other components, so when that particular test program was over they wouldn't go back and rip out everything they'd installed. Instead, they'd take out the pieces that were easy to reach, but they'd mostly just dyke the wiring off and leave it in place.
Carrying all this extra wire and other bits and pieces made the F-4 heavy and slow, so McAir decided to clear all that junk out. They sort of tore the airplane apart and pulled wire out like crazy. The crew accumulated all the wire and stuff they removed and, when they were done, built an awesome heap of it in the middle of the hangar. It was almost as high as the cockpit sill (11 ft) and proportionately large at the base. Of course, they crumpled the wire into balls, so the pile was pretty fluffy, but still that's a lot of wire and stuff. I was really impressed. The airplane was a lot faster, too.
Before I go on, I should mention that using an older airplane this way isn't at all uncommon. NASA Dryden, for example, only ever bought three new airplanes, the Lockheed F-104N Starfighters (which were actually F-104Gs without the weapons suites) to be support aircraft. All the rest were second-hand military aircraft. Even many of the research aircraft were hand-me-downs from the military, although the X-planes, for example, weren't.
Having said that, it won't be so surprising to read that the next F-4 I had something to do with belonged to AFFTC (the USAF Air Force Flight Test Center), having come there when the USAF exhibition team, the Thunderbirds, switched from F-4s to F-16s. That was back in the first energy crisis, in about 1973. This airplane, an F-4E, still had the oil smoker system from its days as a Thunderbird airplane installed, as well as an inverted oil system. It also had a controller box from its days as a cruise missile safety chase, when the engineer in the back seat was there in part to use that box to take control of the cruise missile and put it into a loiter mode until it ran out of fuel and fell out of the sky. The intent, of course, was that the falling out of the sky part should happen somewhere over the vast, extremely lightly populated desert, not over Lancaster or Santa Barbara.
How do I know so much about an AFFTC F-4? I got a ride in it is how. A good friend, whom I had helped when he was a student at the USAF Test Pilot School, had gotten tired of giving F-4 rides to TV actors (this was just after filming had ended for a made-for-TV movie about Pancho Barnes). He pitched giving me a ride to his CO by pointing out that I could actually recognize and identify an F-4 without help, just as I could identify all the other planes of the flightline, and that I had loved F-4s for decades, being well-known in some circles for my fondness for them. That flight was one of the highlights of my life. I wrote up a description at the time and I'll figure out how to get that posted, for anyone who is interested.
The last F-4 came to Dryden as the testbed for an experiment using spanwise blowing to control the flow over the wing. I believe it was part of the extensive laminar flow experimentation that our aerodynamics people were doing. The idea was to use engine bleed air blown down the wing (from root to tip) to attach the flow and reduce the boundary layer. At least, that's what I think it was, but I'm not an aerodynamicist and I could be wrong. Dryden got this F-4 from the USAF and started modifying it. However, further calculations ended up showing that there wasn't enough bleed air to work, even if they used all of it, which they couldn't. As a result, the experiment was abandoned, the airplane was put back the way it had been, and returned to the USAF. Not long after that, the USAF retired its F-4s completely. The AFFTC F-4Es were the last ones to go.
Anyway, one day this F-4 was out flying and the fuel pressure relief valve in one wing stopped working. Shortly thereafter the pressure of the fuel blew a hole right through the (wet) wing. Naturally, the pilot, Hugh Jackson, RTBd (Returned To Base) and landed right away. Some time later they brought the plane into the hangar and we all went down to see it. 'd never seen anything like it and probably wouldn't have believed that the fuel could generate enough pressure just from a little aerodynamic heating to blow a hole clear through the wing had I ever thought about it before it happened. It was quite amazing. Of course, we just repaired the wing and finished the program and somewhere along the line the airplane went away.
The next F-4 I was associated with was the analog fly-by-wire F-4 that McAir and the USAF were examining with an eye to reducing battle damage. I've written a bit about that one elsewhere and won't repeat it here.
At the same time, there was the F-4 that McAir was using for safety chase for the new F-15. This was an old F-4, bailed to McAir by the USAF years before and used for all sorts of experiments and programs, from testing new hardware to being safety chase. In its youth, it had been used to set some sort of speed record, in fact. With all those years as a testbed, it had picked up a lot of extra weight. When they'd install some bit of hardware it would have wiring and power supplies and other components, so when that particular test program was over they wouldn't go back and rip out everything they'd installed. Instead, they'd take out the pieces that were easy to reach, but they'd mostly just dyke the wiring off and leave it in place.
Carrying all this extra wire and other bits and pieces made the F-4 heavy and slow, so McAir decided to clear all that junk out. They sort of tore the airplane apart and pulled wire out like crazy. The crew accumulated all the wire and stuff they removed and, when they were done, built an awesome heap of it in the middle of the hangar. It was almost as high as the cockpit sill (11 ft) and proportionately large at the base. Of course, they crumpled the wire into balls, so the pile was pretty fluffy, but still that's a lot of wire and stuff. I was really impressed. The airplane was a lot faster, too.
Before I go on, I should mention that using an older airplane this way isn't at all uncommon. NASA Dryden, for example, only ever bought three new airplanes, the Lockheed F-104N Starfighters (which were actually F-104Gs without the weapons suites) to be support aircraft. All the rest were second-hand military aircraft. Even many of the research aircraft were hand-me-downs from the military, although the X-planes, for example, weren't.
Having said that, it won't be so surprising to read that the next F-4 I had something to do with belonged to AFFTC (the USAF Air Force Flight Test Center), having come there when the USAF exhibition team, the Thunderbirds, switched from F-4s to F-16s. That was back in the first energy crisis, in about 1973. This airplane, an F-4E, still had the oil smoker system from its days as a Thunderbird airplane installed, as well as an inverted oil system. It also had a controller box from its days as a cruise missile safety chase, when the engineer in the back seat was there in part to use that box to take control of the cruise missile and put it into a loiter mode until it ran out of fuel and fell out of the sky. The intent, of course, was that the falling out of the sky part should happen somewhere over the vast, extremely lightly populated desert, not over Lancaster or Santa Barbara.
How do I know so much about an AFFTC F-4? I got a ride in it is how. A good friend, whom I had helped when he was a student at the USAF Test Pilot School, had gotten tired of giving F-4 rides to TV actors (this was just after filming had ended for a made-for-TV movie about Pancho Barnes). He pitched giving me a ride to his CO by pointing out that I could actually recognize and identify an F-4 without help, just as I could identify all the other planes of the flightline, and that I had loved F-4s for decades, being well-known in some circles for my fondness for them. That flight was one of the highlights of my life. I wrote up a description at the time and I'll figure out how to get that posted, for anyone who is interested.
The last F-4 came to Dryden as the testbed for an experiment using spanwise blowing to control the flow over the wing. I believe it was part of the extensive laminar flow experimentation that our aerodynamics people were doing. The idea was to use engine bleed air blown down the wing (from root to tip) to attach the flow and reduce the boundary layer. At least, that's what I think it was, but I'm not an aerodynamicist and I could be wrong. Dryden got this F-4 from the USAF and started modifying it. However, further calculations ended up showing that there wasn't enough bleed air to work, even if they used all of it, which they couldn't. As a result, the experiment was abandoned, the airplane was put back the way it had been, and returned to the USAF. Not long after that, the USAF retired its F-4s completely. The AFFTC F-4Es were the last ones to go.
02 May 2007
Camera To Laptop Problem Solved
Did you notice how nonchalantly I dropped those two photos of the pink top into my last posting? No whining about how much trouble I was having, just a couple of photos to illustrate what I was writing about.
Well, I have to admit, right here in front of God and everyone, that it was all my fault that I couldn't post photos. Mostly. I was trying to use a USB cable and upload from my camera into my laptop (which I still can't do), when all that time I could have been taking the memory card out of the camera and plugging it right into my laptop. My laptop, which is pushing five years old, is limited on what kinds of memory cards it can read and I was just certain it couldn't read the card I use.
Wrong, wrong, wrongitty, wrong. My clever husband had made sure that my laptop could read the memory card when he bought me the camera. So all that complaining and all those photo-less postings were totally unnecessary.
I'll now go back and check the postings to see what I should post photos of. I don't think it's a lot, though. I'd thought of sneaking back and editing the postings to add the photos, but figured out that no one who had read them originally would read them again, which made that a really stupid idea.
Well, I have to admit, right here in front of God and everyone, that it was all my fault that I couldn't post photos. Mostly. I was trying to use a USB cable and upload from my camera into my laptop (which I still can't do), when all that time I could have been taking the memory card out of the camera and plugging it right into my laptop. My laptop, which is pushing five years old, is limited on what kinds of memory cards it can read and I was just certain it couldn't read the card I use.
Wrong, wrong, wrongitty, wrong. My clever husband had made sure that my laptop could read the memory card when he bought me the camera. So all that complaining and all those photo-less postings were totally unnecessary.
I'll now go back and check the postings to see what I should post photos of. I don't think it's a lot, though. I'd thought of sneaking back and editing the postings to add the photos, but figured out that no one who had read them originally would read them again, which made that a really stupid idea.
28 April 2007
An Invisible Finished Object
Well, it might as well be invisible for all my camera and laptop are willing to do. I can look at the photo in the viewfinder, but that's it. I can't get the laptop to acknowledge the camera's existence, no matter what I do. I'm about to go try with the desk-top after having spent all of yesterday fighting with the problem.
Anyway, I finished the shawl yesterday. I have almost three yards of yarn left from the ball. I wasn't getting very nervous, because I have two more skeins of the yarn. I did get nervous enough to go wind off one skein into a center-pull ball, though. Now I should go back and skein it off, rather than leaving it in the ball.
The shawl pattern is Forest Canopy Shoulder Shawl, by I'm Knitting As Fast As I Can. It's an interesting pattern, easy enough to memorize fairly quickly, but just difficult enough to keep the knitter engaged. And it's pretty. I added a few repeats, to make the shawl bigger. I was using a different yarn and went with US 8 needles. I liked the size given in the pattern, but the recipient, who isn't a small person, asked me to make it bigger.
The yarn is two-ply fingering (sock) weight Peruvian wool in Mermaid and I bought 300 g, in three skeins. It's very nice to knit with and the colors are gorgeous. I think it came out quite beautifully, although I am a bit biased. The yarn is from Enchanted Knoll Farm and I recommend this supplier highly.
I frogged my 50/50 silk/merino DK version of the shawl. Now that I'm made the other one, in fingering weight, on the same-sized needles, I think that I should have been using larger needles for the DK. It just wasn't going to stretch much and it was too small. This former shawl has turned back into two center-pull balls. It's kind of sad, but I have to admit that there's a certain thrill in frogging an entire (if small) lace shawl.
I'm going to make something simple, like another wool scarf, before I start on the next shawl. Actually, I'm thinking it might be a stole, not a shawl. Or a circular or semicircular shawl, just not a triangular shawl. Not everyone looks good with the tip of a triangular shawl pointing right at their bottom. I really like knitting triangular shawls, but I do have to consider the recipients, too.
Wait a minute! I just thought of something to try. I have an itty-bitty 8-meg memory card that my laptop will read directly. If I set the camera for 1-meg photos, I should be able to squeeze a few shots onto the card.
Ah, ha! Photos of the finished but unblocked shawl.
I can't model it because I'm wearing a batik patio dress that's green and blue and matches the shawl superbly. You'd hardly be able to tell the difference. Both yarn and dress are just a little darker than this photo shows.
Here's a closer shot to show you the unblocked lacy pattern texture. I think the texture looks kind of nice, but I know it'll be gone the first time the shawl gets dunked into water, which is going to happen fairly soon now that I've gotten photos posted.
And here is what was left of the ball of yarn:
Am I good at estimating how many repeats are left on the ball or what? Lucky, that's what. I'd have had to frog 18 rows of about 250 stitches each to correct things properly if I'd run out, although I suspect I'd have cheated and just frogged four rows, to skip the last two rows in the hem edging. It wouldn't have looked quite as good, I'm sure, but it would have looked OK to anyone who didn't know how it should look.
Anyway, I finished the shawl yesterday. I have almost three yards of yarn left from the ball. I wasn't getting very nervous, because I have two more skeins of the yarn. I did get nervous enough to go wind off one skein into a center-pull ball, though. Now I should go back and skein it off, rather than leaving it in the ball.
The shawl pattern is Forest Canopy Shoulder Shawl, by I'm Knitting As Fast As I Can. It's an interesting pattern, easy enough to memorize fairly quickly, but just difficult enough to keep the knitter engaged. And it's pretty. I added a few repeats, to make the shawl bigger. I was using a different yarn and went with US 8 needles. I liked the size given in the pattern, but the recipient, who isn't a small person, asked me to make it bigger.
The yarn is two-ply fingering (sock) weight Peruvian wool in Mermaid and I bought 300 g, in three skeins. It's very nice to knit with and the colors are gorgeous. I think it came out quite beautifully, although I am a bit biased. The yarn is from Enchanted Knoll Farm and I recommend this supplier highly.
I frogged my 50/50 silk/merino DK version of the shawl. Now that I'm made the other one, in fingering weight, on the same-sized needles, I think that I should have been using larger needles for the DK. It just wasn't going to stretch much and it was too small. This former shawl has turned back into two center-pull balls. It's kind of sad, but I have to admit that there's a certain thrill in frogging an entire (if small) lace shawl.
I'm going to make something simple, like another wool scarf, before I start on the next shawl. Actually, I'm thinking it might be a stole, not a shawl. Or a circular or semicircular shawl, just not a triangular shawl. Not everyone looks good with the tip of a triangular shawl pointing right at their bottom. I really like knitting triangular shawls, but I do have to consider the recipients, too.
Wait a minute! I just thought of something to try. I have an itty-bitty 8-meg memory card that my laptop will read directly. If I set the camera for 1-meg photos, I should be able to squeeze a few shots onto the card.
Ah, ha! Photos of the finished but unblocked shawl.
I can't model it because I'm wearing a batik patio dress that's green and blue and matches the shawl superbly. You'd hardly be able to tell the difference. Both yarn and dress are just a little darker than this photo shows.
Here's a closer shot to show you the unblocked lacy pattern texture. I think the texture looks kind of nice, but I know it'll be gone the first time the shawl gets dunked into water, which is going to happen fairly soon now that I've gotten photos posted.
And here is what was left of the ball of yarn:
Am I good at estimating how many repeats are left on the ball or what? Lucky, that's what. I'd have had to frog 18 rows of about 250 stitches each to correct things properly if I'd run out, although I suspect I'd have cheated and just frogged four rows, to skip the last two rows in the hem edging. It wouldn't have looked quite as good, I'm sure, but it would have looked OK to anyone who didn't know how it should look.
22 April 2007
Technology Is Winning This Week
My Usenet reader, Forté Agent, played a dirty trick on me earlier this week and I'm struggling with it. It lost all the message list information for my favorite newsgroup, alt.fan.cecil-adams. That wouldn't have been so bad except that I was about 20,000 messages behind already. However, losing every message is a bad way to catch up.
I dinked around with various suggested fixes but finally dug out my hard disk that had the Agent data files backed up in February or so. I copied that data folder over, getting rid of everything I'd done since then. Then I downloaded all the messages that the servers had between then and now. It's almost done, maybe another fifteen minutes. Then I'm going to have to go mark huge chunks of messages as read so I can get back to where I was before this happened. What a pain!
I'm worried about my Forest Canopy Shoulder Shawl. I'm halfway through the second skein and I don't think it's going to be large enough. It's not the fault of the pattern's author, though, it's mine. I wanted something bigger than a shoulder shawl and I wanted to use the Cherry Hill Yarns 50/50 merino and silk. I'm going to snap a few photos and then put it aside for a bit. I'll probably start another lace shawl, though.
Oh, yeah, that's the other victory for technology. I'm still having trouble with my camera and my laptop cooperating. I'm going to take some photos of two finished scarves for Iowa so I can mail them off Monday, whether I get them uploaded here or not. They're beautiful; one's Morehouse Farm bulky merino in berry colors and the other is navy merino/cashmere blend from Lion Brand, knitted in the Argosy scarf pattern.
So don't worry. As soon as I subdue the upstart technology, normalcy will return.
I dinked around with various suggested fixes but finally dug out my hard disk that had the Agent data files backed up in February or so. I copied that data folder over, getting rid of everything I'd done since then. Then I downloaded all the messages that the servers had between then and now. It's almost done, maybe another fifteen minutes. Then I'm going to have to go mark huge chunks of messages as read so I can get back to where I was before this happened. What a pain!
I'm worried about my Forest Canopy Shoulder Shawl. I'm halfway through the second skein and I don't think it's going to be large enough. It's not the fault of the pattern's author, though, it's mine. I wanted something bigger than a shoulder shawl and I wanted to use the Cherry Hill Yarns 50/50 merino and silk. I'm going to snap a few photos and then put it aside for a bit. I'll probably start another lace shawl, though.
Oh, yeah, that's the other victory for technology. I'm still having trouble with my camera and my laptop cooperating. I'm going to take some photos of two finished scarves for Iowa so I can mail them off Monday, whether I get them uploaded here or not. They're beautiful; one's Morehouse Farm bulky merino in berry colors and the other is navy merino/cashmere blend from Lion Brand, knitted in the Argosy scarf pattern.
So don't worry. As soon as I subdue the upstart technology, normalcy will return.
07 March 2007
TV and Knitting
My husband had to call Time-Warner today, to get another HDTV cable line and digital recorder, for the new second HDTV, so I told him to find out how much the package with the DIY channel costs. I said, thinking it would never be so inexpensive, that if it was no more than $5 a month, I'd like to add it so I could watch Knitty Gritty (which always seems like it should have "Dirt Band" tagged on).
He apparently agreed with me about the probable cost, as he pointed out that if I really wanted it I might have to pay a little more. I said no, that I was limiting it to $5 a month because I didn't even know if I'd like the show once I saw it.
Fortunately, (or unfortunately, depending on how you look at it) the package costs exactly $5 a month and we're now getting it. They added it while he was still on the phone setting up the appointment for the HDTV add-on. The wonders of modern technology, as applied to an age-old technology.
Oh, yeah, I got tired of clutching those little 3.5-mm (US 4) needles for the Alien Illusion scarf and started another scarf on 4-mm (US5) needles. It uses a beautiful skein of hand-painted sock yarn that I got from Happy Fuzzy Yarn in a colorway called "Boisterous", that's red and pink and coral and orange and gold and purple. The pattern is the renowned Clapotis. I'm enjoying this greatly, although I'm still doing increase rows. Because I'm using fingering weight yarn, my scarf is going to be a little smaller than the pattern. I think I'm going to make it a little narrower, as well, but I'm not sure.
He apparently agreed with me about the probable cost, as he pointed out that if I really wanted it I might have to pay a little more. I said no, that I was limiting it to $5 a month because I didn't even know if I'd like the show once I saw it.
Fortunately, (or unfortunately, depending on how you look at it) the package costs exactly $5 a month and we're now getting it. They added it while he was still on the phone setting up the appointment for the HDTV add-on. The wonders of modern technology, as applied to an age-old technology.
Oh, yeah, I got tired of clutching those little 3.5-mm (US 4) needles for the Alien Illusion scarf and started another scarf on 4-mm (US5) needles. It uses a beautiful skein of hand-painted sock yarn that I got from Happy Fuzzy Yarn in a colorway called "Boisterous", that's red and pink and coral and orange and gold and purple. The pattern is the renowned Clapotis. I'm enjoying this greatly, although I'm still doing increase rows. Because I'm using fingering weight yarn, my scarf is going to be a little smaller than the pattern. I think I'm going to make it a little narrower, as well, but I'm not sure.
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