My Blunders
What an awesome thread!
This is my first post on the DIY Audio forums. What a better way to start than telling everyone about my royal screwups.
When I was very (VERY) young, I made an adjustable battery tester. It consisted of two angle-brackets mounted on a block of wood, with cheap speaker wire connected from each of them to a 110V plug. The idea behind it was to make it easy to stick your tongue to each end of an AAA thru D size battery to judge its state of charge by the tingle, as some people do with 9V batteries. You put the battery between the brackets, then touch the prongs of the plug to your tongue to test the juice.
It worked very well, but when my dad saw it he got quite nervous, thinking it was my attempt at making a battery charger. He ordered me to dismantle it before someone plugs it in.
Another dumb thing I used to do was connect two 9V batteries head-to-head, and watch them heat up. I don't think any of them exploded though, but I did it outdoors, just in case.
I also dismantled a D-Cell once. They have a little seal in them that when punctured with a pencil, squirts something toxic out. I washed my hands quite quickly after that.
In high school I was a bit wiser...but I still had a long way to go. I did a science fair project, where I hooked a line of 8 LED's to the user port on the back of my Vic-20 computer, and wrote software to make them chase and flash in different patterns. That took me to the Canada-Wide science fair. For that one I adapted my design to 120V christmas lights, switched with triacs triggered by the output lines on my Vic-20. It worked great at home, but my mistake was building 8 channels of 120V switches on a small breadboard from Radio Shack. Well, some time during transit, a wire or lead got crossed with another, and when I was setting it up, sparks flew! The Vic was toast -- I opened it up and found a hole blown in the top of the video chip, and cracks in some of the other chips...and a few burnt traces on the motherboard. Needless to say, I didn't win anything at the Canada-Wide...but what a trip!
What an awesome thread!
This is my first post on the DIY Audio forums. What a better way to start than telling everyone about my royal screwups.
When I was very (VERY) young, I made an adjustable battery tester. It consisted of two angle-brackets mounted on a block of wood, with cheap speaker wire connected from each of them to a 110V plug. The idea behind it was to make it easy to stick your tongue to each end of an AAA thru D size battery to judge its state of charge by the tingle, as some people do with 9V batteries. You put the battery between the brackets, then touch the prongs of the plug to your tongue to test the juice.
It worked very well, but when my dad saw it he got quite nervous, thinking it was my attempt at making a battery charger. He ordered me to dismantle it before someone plugs it in.
Another dumb thing I used to do was connect two 9V batteries head-to-head, and watch them heat up. I don't think any of them exploded though, but I did it outdoors, just in case.
I also dismantled a D-Cell once. They have a little seal in them that when punctured with a pencil, squirts something toxic out. I washed my hands quite quickly after that.
In high school I was a bit wiser...but I still had a long way to go. I did a science fair project, where I hooked a line of 8 LED's to the user port on the back of my Vic-20 computer, and wrote software to make them chase and flash in different patterns. That took me to the Canada-Wide science fair. For that one I adapted my design to 120V christmas lights, switched with triacs triggered by the output lines on my Vic-20. It worked great at home, but my mistake was building 8 channels of 120V switches on a small breadboard from Radio Shack. Well, some time during transit, a wire or lead got crossed with another, and when I was setting it up, sparks flew!
The Vic was toast -- I opened it up and found a hole blown in the top of the video chip, and cracks in some of the other chips...and a few burnt traces on the motherboard. Needless to say, I didn't win anything at the Canada-Wide...but what a trip!
The first Seventh Veil Loudspeaker?
For my first stereo I took an old valve (tube) record player and an old valve radio (this was about 1970) and bought a new ceramic stereo cartridge. I played one channel through the record player and managed to find a place inside the radio that I could solder a lead for the other channel. It worked great. Stereo! I was amazed.
Sadly, I didn't stop there. I decided to take the speaker out of the radio and the speaker out of the record player and mount them inside matching cabinets. These I naturally made square (it made sense at the time) out of thin plywood (why not?) and I drilled several holes in the back (for luck). To finish I painted them bright red and edged them with gold tape. I was so proud.
They looked awful but sounded even worse. You've probably never heard any valve equipment sounding that bad. Mind you, as a result of this disaster, the next time I wanted to build a speaker, I bought a book.
Steve
PS: Actually, my next DIY attempt was a great 'amaze your friends' project. I built a tiny medium-wave transmitter with a crystal and an even smaller Sinclair micro-radio kit (about the size of a small match box - does anyone remember them?)
My transmitter would drown out just about any other medium wave station, all across the band, for a radius of about 100 yards. I connected it to my record deck and broadcast.
Here's the trick ... When friends came round I would explain that the tiny Sinclair radio - it had an earpiece instead of a speaker - was a new, miniature record player and asked them what they would like to hear? I would then nip up to my room, put the record on the turntable and broadcast to the radio.
Worked a treat.
For my first stereo I took an old valve (tube) record player and an old valve radio (this was about 1970) and bought a new ceramic stereo cartridge. I played one channel through the record player and managed to find a place inside the radio that I could solder a lead for the other channel. It worked great. Stereo! I was amazed.
Sadly, I didn't stop there. I decided to take the speaker out of the radio and the speaker out of the record player and mount them inside matching cabinets. These I naturally made square (it made sense at the time) out of thin plywood (why not?) and I drilled several holes in the back (for luck). To finish I painted them bright red and edged them with gold tape. I was so proud.
They looked awful but sounded even worse. You've probably never heard any valve equipment sounding that bad. Mind you, as a result of this disaster, the next time I wanted to build a speaker, I bought a book.
Steve
PS: Actually, my next DIY attempt was a great 'amaze your friends' project. I built a tiny medium-wave transmitter with a crystal and an even smaller Sinclair micro-radio kit (about the size of a small match box - does anyone remember them?)
My transmitter would drown out just about any other medium wave station, all across the band, for a radius of about 100 yards. I connected it to my record deck and broadcast.
Here's the trick ... When friends came round I would explain that the tiny Sinclair radio - it had an earpiece instead of a speaker - was a new, miniature record player and asked them what they would like to hear? I would then nip up to my room, put the record on the turntable and broadcast to the radio.
Worked a treat.
One more reason to read the labels: Last year about this time I was experimenting with building electrostatic loudspeaker panels. I started out with smaller prototypes, about 12" x 24". The stators were lincaine, the diaphragm was Saran wrap.
Well, not many glues hold Saran wrap very well to cardboard OR lincaine, so what better way to fix the whole assembly together than with electrical tape?
After taping my first prototype up and throwing a couple thousand volts of swing into the stators, I picked one corner up off the ground (thumb on +, index finger on -) so that the diaphragm had more ventilation (y'know, trying to move some more air, get those SPLs).
Well, the Radioshack electrical tape was only rated to 1000V, so it wasn't long before my arm got zapped. Fortunately I regained feeling from the elbow down shortly afterwards.
Now I always make sure to read the label carefully before doing anything dangerous like that.
-brian
Well, not many glues hold Saran wrap very well to cardboard OR lincaine, so what better way to fix the whole assembly together than with electrical tape?
After taping my first prototype up and throwing a couple thousand volts of swing into the stators, I picked one corner up off the ground (thumb on +, index finger on -) so that the diaphragm had more ventilation (y'know, trying to move some more air, get those SPLs).
Well, the Radioshack electrical tape was only rated to 1000V, so it wasn't long before my arm got zapped. Fortunately I regained feeling from the elbow down shortly afterwards.
Now I always make sure to read the label carefully before doing anything dangerous like that.
-brian
Switched pads
After making a PCB, poulating it with cheap surplus components to confirm that everything was right, I decided to make a few improvements for the final version. One inprovement was to improve the footprint for all the TO-92 devices by increasing the pad size and making the triangle arrangement just a little wider - all in order to improve solderability and solidity of construction.
To this day I don't know how I did it but in doing the above I swapped the base and collector pins. I didn't discover this untill the final initial test of the "final" PCBs. On this device that was especially bad since it was a non-symetric swap, i.e. I could not just turn the TO-92 devices around backwards. There were nine of the dicices on each board. About the only thing salvagable were the output devices, heatsinks and mounting hardware. Everthing else was trimmed so neatly that the leads were too short to reuse.
After making a PCB, poulating it with cheap surplus components to confirm that everything was right, I decided to make a few improvements for the final version. One inprovement was to improve the footprint for all the TO-92 devices by increasing the pad size and making the triangle arrangement just a little wider - all in order to improve solderability and solidity of construction.
To this day I don't know how I did it but in doing the above I swapped the base and collector pins. I didn't discover this untill the final initial test of the "final" PCBs. On this device that was especially bad since it was a non-symetric swap, i.e. I could not just turn the TO-92 devices around backwards. There were nine of the dicices on each board. About the only thing salvagable were the output devices, heatsinks and mounting hardware. Everthing else was trimmed so neatly that the leads were too short to reuse.
Power supply explosion
Many years ago, I decided that I needed a high current DC power supply. Scrounging together a bunch of old surplus parts, I decided to practice point to point construction, and worked very late into the night on it. It really turned out beautifully, with exquisite component, neat solderwork, etc.
When I plugged it in, the power transformer had an unusual hum, at least for what I thought was an unloaded power supply. Within 2 minutes, 100,000 uf of smoothing caps blew up, filling the room with acrid smoke, and waking up my wife. Only then did I notice that I forgot to install the bridge rectifiers in the circuit.
My wife almost forbade me from touching anything electronic back then. Now, I try not to be half asleep when building my projects
Many years ago, I decided that I needed a high current DC power supply. Scrounging together a bunch of old surplus parts, I decided to practice point to point construction, and worked very late into the night on it. It really turned out beautifully, with exquisite component, neat solderwork, etc.
When I plugged it in, the power transformer had an unusual hum, at least for what I thought was an unloaded power supply. Within 2 minutes, 100,000 uf of smoothing caps blew up, filling the room with acrid smoke, and waking up my wife. Only then did I notice that I forgot to install the bridge rectifiers in the circuit.
My wife almost forbade me from touching anything electronic back then. Now, I try not to be half asleep when building my projects
Patience is a virtue..
OK, so it's my turn, and I've had enough cabernet sauvignion to admit this one:
Back in 1963 yes... being an unruly teenager, decided to make my own radio station. A transmitter was required.
I found a nice design that I had almost all the components for.
So I built it, and ordered the missing component: an 0A2 gas regulator valve (tube). This was to decouple and stabilize the oscillator.
I just couldn't wait...So without the regulator installed, I set up a 100m aerial (antenna) and fired it up. It was very disappointing; I couldn't hear any transmission, just a hiss - that appeared to be all over the medium wave band. So I just left it and went downstairs to watch TV. Some channels (Band 3) were OK, but the one on band 1 had bad interference, which my father put down to atmospherics.
Only later on that evening, after the second set of neighbours came to enquire (they knew me well) did it dawn on me that the tramsmitter was "hooting" all over the place. Instead of a fixed frequency of 900KHz or so, it was wiping out everything from 15KHz to 48MHz.
Apologies to any of my neighbours of the time if they are reading this... I'm much better behaved now...
OK, so it's my turn, and I've had enough cabernet sauvignion to admit this one:
Back in 1963
yes... being an unruly teenager, decided to make my own radio station. A transmitter was required.I found a nice design that I had almost all the components for.
So I built it, and ordered the missing component: an 0A2 gas regulator valve (tube). This was to decouple and stabilize the oscillator.
I just couldn't wait...So without the regulator installed, I set up a 100m aerial (antenna) and fired it up. It was very disappointing; I couldn't hear any transmission, just a hiss - that appeared to be all over the medium wave band. So I just left it and went downstairs to watch TV. Some channels (Band 3) were OK, but the one on band 1 had bad interference, which my father put down to atmospherics.
Only later on that evening, after the second set of neighbours came to enquire (they knew me well) did it dawn on me that the tramsmitter was "hooting" all over the place. Instead of a fixed frequency of 900KHz or so, it was wiping out everything from 15KHz to 48MHz.
Apologies to any of my neighbours of the time if they are reading this... I'm much better behaved now...
What you say must be true....
Hugo,
Slightly off topic, but....
Only today did I connect the pictures of the inside of your house (that had been posted in another thread) with you.
The elegance of decoration is astounding, to me. Please don't imagine any sarcasm, this is true.
Personally, I have zero artistic creativity, but I can appreciate others' work.
What does this prove?
It means that BOTH sides of your brain are active and efficient!
Salute!
Hugo,
Slightly off topic, but....
Only today did I connect the pictures of the inside of your house (that had been posted in another thread) with you.
The elegance of decoration is astounding, to me. Please don't imagine any sarcasm, this is true.
Personally, I have zero artistic creativity, but I can appreciate others' work.
What does this prove?
It means that BOTH sides of your brain are active and efficient!
Salute!
Did you ever doubt what I said…?
Even off-topic.
I should start a thread (and maybe I will) named “Behind every great man stands a great woman” or is it the other way around?
This is almost the entire work of my dear wife.
The house is an old factory (19th century somewhere) and she managed to decorate it in a most beautiful way.
Indeed, many people who come here are astonished.
It’s a little oasis of peace and quite and it’s very nice to live here.
I let her read your words and she was very pleased.
I would say: both half of our brains (my wife’s and mine) are matched.
/Hugo
There's no way to avoid a reply to this beautiful flattering remark.dhaen said:
Even off-topic.
I should start a thread (and maybe I will) named “Behind every great man stands a great woman” or is it the other way around?
This is almost the entire work of my dear wife.
The house is an old factory (19th century somewhere) and she managed to decorate it in a most beautiful way.
Indeed, many people who come here are astonished.
It’s a little oasis of peace and quite and it’s very nice to live here.
I let her read your words and she was very pleased.
I would say: both half of our brains (my wife’s and mine) are matched.
/Hugo
dhaen said:
An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
dave
The pictures were URLs posted on the Joe List with the subject "Finally ...a sensible use for 300Bs ;-)"
http://www.izzy-wizzy.com/audio/
Izzy Wizzy Audio
dave
http://www.izzy-wizzy.com/audio/
Izzy Wizzy Audio
dave
Re: Did you ever doubt what I said…?
Anything artistic in my house is also entirely down to my Wife (and her consultants).....
Cheers,
Hugo,Netlist said:snip...
This is almost the entire work of my dear wife.
The house is an old factory (19th century somewhere) and she managed to decorate it in a most beautiful way.
Indeed, many people who come here are astonished.
It’s a little oasis of peace and quite and it’s very nice to live here.
I let her read your words and she was very pleased.
I would say: both half of our brains (my wife’s and mine) are matched.
/Hugo
Anything artistic in my house is also entirely down to my Wife (and her consultants).....
Cheers,
Creativity
Unfortunately the school system is very efficient at forcing us
to use the left half of the brain only. Studies of childrens
drawings, for instance, show that something ususally happens
roughly around the age of twelve. Then many specialized
educations eg. engineering, has a tendency to further reduce
the role of the right brain, which is hardly a good thing from
an engineering point of view either, since some amount of
creativity is often required to be a good engineer. For some
reason, it seems that mathematicans surprisingly often also
are good musicians (or at least I get that impression). One
would perhaps suspect them to be as indoctrinated as
engineers, financial people etc. but I guess it may be because
you don't get very far as a pure mathematician without quite
an amount of creativity.
Don't get depressed, though. You do have a right brain half, you
just have to find a way to let it take command over the left one
sometimes. A good way is to do something which is difficult
for the left half, so it tires after a while. Try this, for instance.
Take a photo of a persons face, from the newspaper, your
mantlepiece or whatever, and try to make a drawing of the
face. Now, turn the photo upside down and make a new
drawing. Suddenly the left half of your brain gets confused,
doesn't quite make the photo fit its completely wrong model
of what faces look like and gives up. Guess what usually
happens?
Myself, I started painting for about ten years ago. It wasn't
even my own idea, I had thought about it, but was convinced
I had no talent for it. Howver, my girlfriend at that time, seemed
to think so and gave me some watercolours. I didn't find myself
very sucessful, since I tried the DIY approach, trying to learn
from the, unfortunately not so good book, my girlfriend had
also given me. When I started take evening courses, I at least
learnt some basics so I found I had enough talent to find it
fun to paint. Later on I have had the opportunity to attend
summer courses with some of most well-known professors
of painting in Sweden (cost some money, though), but getting
the chance for amatuers to meet such people was a revolution
for many of us. It opened up a new world, a new way of thinking.
Believe it or not, what one of these professers taught me about
art, later made me view my proffesional area of compute science
in new ways. I started to see analogies and relations that had
never occured to me. Actually, I have found the most fundamental
obstacle in learning art, that makes the difference between
(maybe) getting an artist or merely a decent painter, is almost
an exact analogy to the biggest obstacle in learning mathematical
logic (I have tought that subject), and the same phenomenon
seems to me to appear also in many other places. The world
isn't really as strictly divided into different areas as we think,
our society has just made us think so.
Had I had more time, I would have made it briefer (can't
who said that, though).
Oh, I forgot, originally I meant to reply to your radio experience.
As far as I am told, you share that experience with a famous
professor at MIT, who did about the same thing in Bronx at
about the age of twelve. I think his transmitter was stronger,
though; it is said that has a partially dysfunctional arm from
microwave radiation and that he was also brought in by
the NYPD. In other words, nothing to be ashamed of, you're in
good company.
dhaen said:
Unfortunately the school system is very efficient at forcing us
to use the left half of the brain only. Studies of childrens
drawings, for instance, show that something ususally happens
roughly around the age of twelve. Then many specialized
educations eg. engineering, has a tendency to further reduce
the role of the right brain, which is hardly a good thing from
an engineering point of view either, since some amount of
creativity is often required to be a good engineer. For some
reason, it seems that mathematicans surprisingly often also
are good musicians (or at least I get that impression). One
would perhaps suspect them to be as indoctrinated as
engineers, financial people etc. but I guess it may be because
you don't get very far as a pure mathematician without quite
an amount of creativity.
Don't get depressed, though. You do have a right brain half, you
just have to find a way to let it take command over the left one
sometimes. A good way is to do something which is difficult
for the left half, so it tires after a while. Try this, for instance.
Take a photo of a persons face, from the newspaper, your
mantlepiece or whatever, and try to make a drawing of the
face. Now, turn the photo upside down and make a new
drawing. Suddenly the left half of your brain gets confused,
doesn't quite make the photo fit its completely wrong model
of what faces look like and gives up. Guess what usually
happens?
Myself, I started painting for about ten years ago. It wasn't
even my own idea, I had thought about it, but was convinced
I had no talent for it. Howver, my girlfriend at that time, seemed
to think so and gave me some watercolours. I didn't find myself
very sucessful, since I tried the DIY approach, trying to learn
from the, unfortunately not so good book, my girlfriend had
also given me. When I started take evening courses, I at least
learnt some basics so I found I had enough talent to find it
fun to paint. Later on I have had the opportunity to attend
summer courses with some of most well-known professors
of painting in Sweden (cost some money, though), but getting
the chance for amatuers to meet such people was a revolution
for many of us. It opened up a new world, a new way of thinking.
Believe it or not, what one of these professers taught me about
art, later made me view my proffesional area of compute science
in new ways. I started to see analogies and relations that had
never occured to me. Actually, I have found the most fundamental
obstacle in learning art, that makes the difference between
(maybe) getting an artist or merely a decent painter, is almost
an exact analogy to the biggest obstacle in learning mathematical
logic (I have tought that subject), and the same phenomenon
seems to me to appear also in many other places. The world
isn't really as strictly divided into different areas as we think,
our society has just made us think so.
Had I had more time, I would have made it briefer (can't
who said that, though).
Oh, I forgot, originally I meant to reply to your radio experience.
As far as I am told, you share that experience with a famous
professor at MIT, who did about the same thing in Bronx at
about the age of twelve. I think his transmitter was stronger,
though; it is said that has a partially dysfunctional arm from
microwave radiation and that he was also brought in by
the NYPD. In other words, nothing to be ashamed of, you're in
good company.
Re: Creativity
There's a good book on this, called "Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain" by Betty Edwards.
This is going a little off-topic but I believe that creativity is a fascinating issue and probably a little more complex then just 'switching on the right side of the brain'.
For example, the higher levels of consciousness (as experienced by advanced Yogis, Tibetan Masters, etc.) are often described as 'Creativity' or 'Psychedelia' (mind manifesting) and for good reason. Creativity most likely arises from the correct integration of both hemispheres of the brain.
For myself, I've also found that creativity can be enhanced by some mind-body practices - for example The Feldenkrais Method. Such things are probably way beyond the scope of this posting.
I think that the crucial thing, both for our society at large and for mere designers of hi-fi, is that creativity should be recognized and rewarded and that it should be recognized that creative abilities can be developed in normal individuals and this could start at school or before.
Creativity is something that can pervade our life, from the way we design our speakers to the way that we handle our knife and fork. We can be creative in the way we look at life in general and in the way we react to it. Creativity is not merely in the domain of the artist, writer or musician.
Steve
Christer said:
There's a good book on this, called "Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain" by Betty Edwards.
This is going a little off-topic but I believe that creativity is a fascinating issue and probably a little more complex then just 'switching on the right side of the brain'.
For example, the higher levels of consciousness (as experienced by advanced Yogis, Tibetan Masters, etc.) are often described as 'Creativity' or 'Psychedelia' (mind manifesting) and for good reason. Creativity most likely arises from the correct integration of both hemispheres of the brain.
For myself, I've also found that creativity can be enhanced by some mind-body practices - for example The Feldenkrais Method. Such things are probably way beyond the scope of this posting.
I think that the crucial thing, both for our society at large and for mere designers of hi-fi, is that creativity should be recognized and rewarded and that it should be recognized that creative abilities can be developed in normal individuals and this could start at school or before.
Creativity is something that can pervade our life, from the way we design our speakers to the way that we handle our knife and fork. We can be creative in the way we look at life in general and in the way we react to it. Creativity is not merely in the domain of the artist, writer or musician.
Steve
Re: Re: Creativity
Actually, that is where I picked up that stuff about what happens
to schoolchildern, and also that face-drawing experiment I
suggested. Try that one, it's very interesting. I would think
it will have an interesting outcome even if you have never even
tried to draw a face before.
Yes, I am sure the it is much more complex. Yet, it is well known
that the two halves of the brain do specialize in different tasks.
I have observed when painting, that the most important
decisions in the process seem to be when two halves of
the brain interact on peer level. I get the impression that
they somehow alternate in taking control for brief periods and
check each other to refute or accept what the other one is
up tp. After a while this process seems to become more and
more subconcious and then interesting things start to happen. (This is speculative, yes, since it is hard to
really know what is going on, but I have often felt that this
is about what happen at important stages). I would suppose
the same process occurs also when doing other things
requiring creativity. I just have never been able to "observe"
clearly what happens in other cases.
[/B][/QUOTE]
7V said:
Actually, that is where I picked up that stuff about what happens
to schoolchildern, and also that face-drawing experiment I
suggested. Try that one, it's very interesting. I would think
it will have an interesting outcome even if you have never even
tried to draw a face before.
Yes, I am sure the it is much more complex. Yet, it is well known
that the two halves of the brain do specialize in different tasks.
I have observed when painting, that the most important
decisions in the process seem to be when two halves of
the brain interact on peer level. I get the impression that
they somehow alternate in taking control for brief periods and
check each other to refute or accept what the other one is
up tp. After a while this process seems to become more and
more subconcious and then interesting things start to happen. (This is speculative, yes, since it is hard to
really know what is going on, but I have often felt that this
is about what happen at important stages). I would suppose
the same process occurs also when doing other things
requiring creativity. I just have never been able to "observe"
clearly what happens in other cases.
[/B][/QUOTE]
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