Trains.com

Chatterbox Summer 2023

17735 views
197 replies
1 rating 2 rating 3 rating 4 rating 5 rating
  • Member since
    April 2003
  • From: Defiance Ohio
  • 13,318 posts
Posted by JoeKoh on Wednesday, September 20, 2023 12:53 PM

afternoon

Meeting was good.Csx ran I 016 with the Chessie unit on it by during the meeting.Had a few showers this morning.Chores to do.

stay safe

Joe

Deshler Ohio-crossroads of the B&O Matt eats your fries.YUM! Clinton st viaduct undefeated against too tall trucks!!!(voted to be called the "Clinton St. can opener").

 

  • Member since
    April 2003
  • From: Defiance Ohio
  • 13,318 posts
Posted by JoeKoh on Thursday, September 21, 2023 2:24 PM

afternoon

Ran errands in town.The Ndw had plenty of cars to shuffle but only 1 engine in the yard.Fall starts on Saturday.Matt is going to be at Fostoria to help with the train show.Glad Friday has arrived.

stay safe

Joe

Deshler Ohio-crossroads of the B&O Matt eats your fries.YUM! Clinton st viaduct undefeated against too tall trucks!!!(voted to be called the "Clinton St. can opener").

 

  • Member since
    December 2001
  • From: Northern New York
  • 25,020 posts
Posted by tree68 on Thursday, September 21, 2023 7:38 PM

Great day on the railroad.  The colors in the Adirondacks are starting to turn in earnest.  This might be a case of "almost" this weekend and "past peak" next weekend.  And if we get a windy, rainy storm, all of the leaves will be down anyhow.

Got some accessories for the new laptop - extra power supply, CD/DVD external drive (laptops no longer come with them), and a significant memory upgrade.

Stuff around home tomorrow, then back on the railroad Saturday.  I'll have a student engineer, which hopefully means I can sit back and relax.  Or not.

LarryWhistling
Resident Microferroequinologist (at least at my house) 
Everyone goes home; Safety begins with you
My Opinion. Standard Disclaimers Apply. No Expiration Date
Come ride the rails with me!
There's one thing about humility - the moment you think you've got it, you've lost it...

  • Member since
    July 2009
  • From: San Francisco East Bay
  • 1,360 posts
Posted by MikeF90 on Friday, September 22, 2023 6:35 PM

'Tis the season for e-waste generation.

A short time ago my 20+ y/o Braun electric toothbrush finally gave up the ghost. Excellent for something used multiple times a day.

Today my 20+ y/o Braun coffee bean grinder died. Not bad product life either. German design and manufacture still deserves some credit.

Last week my 10 y/o Lenovo Thinkpad died suddenly but with the worst possible symptom - dead motherboard.  Not time or cost effective to replace. Fortunately the e-bay used market served me well; got a P52 Thinkpad for a good price. Look it up, it's a monster!

BTW computer memory and storage prices are dirt cheap, reportedly farmers are buying microSD cards in place of fertilizer.  Also, the GB/$ crossover price of SSD vs HDD storage is now about 1TB - a very good time to recycle those smaller, slow HDDs.

  • Member since
    December 2001
  • From: Northern New York
  • 25,020 posts
Posted by tree68 on Friday, September 22, 2023 7:33 PM

MikeF90
BTW computer memory and storage prices are dirt cheap,

My relatively ancient laptop is giving me issues, so I bought a new one.  So far, so good, although the external CD/DVD drive won't work with W11 without some hacks.

The machine came with 8GB RAM.  I upgraded it to 64GB for a song.  Won't regret that.

LarryWhistling
Resident Microferroequinologist (at least at my house) 
Everyone goes home; Safety begins with you
My Opinion. Standard Disclaimers Apply. No Expiration Date
Come ride the rails with me!
There's one thing about humility - the moment you think you've got it, you've lost it...

  • Member since
    May 2003
  • From: US
  • 25,292 posts
Posted by BaltACD on Friday, September 22, 2023 10:10 PM

tree68
 
MikeF90
BTW computer memory and storage prices are dirt cheap, 

My relatively ancient laptop is giving me issues, so I bought a new one.  So far, so good, although the external CD/DVD drive won't work with W11 without some hacks.

The machine came with 8GB RAM.  I upgraded it to 64GB for a song.  Won't regret that.

Mechanical or Solid State hard drive?

Never too old to have a happy childhood!

              

  • Member since
    December 2001
  • From: Northern New York
  • 25,020 posts
Posted by tree68 on Saturday, September 23, 2023 2:11 AM

BaltACD
Mechanical or Solid State hard drive?

Solid state.  The thing is so thin you'd never get a mechanical hard drive in it.

LarryWhistling
Resident Microferroequinologist (at least at my house) 
Everyone goes home; Safety begins with you
My Opinion. Standard Disclaimers Apply. No Expiration Date
Come ride the rails with me!
There's one thing about humility - the moment you think you've got it, you've lost it...

  • Member since
    May 2003
  • From: US
  • 25,292 posts
Posted by BaltACD on Saturday, September 23, 2023 9:40 AM

tree68
 
BaltACD
Mechanical or Solid State hard drive? 

Solid state.  The thing is so thin you'd never get a mechanical hard drive in it.

Earlier in the year my W10 laptop had a cooling failure that wouldn't let the screen go dark at rest.  Took it too a computer shop in Jacksonville - tech found a faulty fan and sensor offerered a SSD for $100, SSD doesn't generate the heat that the mechanical drive did.  Got the mechnical drive back with the repair and purhased a housing for it and use it as a external drive.

Never too old to have a happy childhood!

              

  • Member since
    December 2001
  • From: Northern New York
  • 25,020 posts
Posted by tree68 on Saturday, September 23, 2023 5:45 PM

BaltACD
Got the mechnical drive back with the repair and purhased a housing for it and use it as a external drive.

I always keep the hard drive when I get rid of a computer.  Got one sitting here with the desktop computer right now as an external drive.

I kind of predicted the state of things today some 40 years ago when I conceived of a computer with internal memory, a modem (wifi was way in the future) and a flat screen display.   I saw it as something a salesman could use, instead of carrying catalogs.  Everything would be available to display, and items could be ordered right then and there.  I saw it more as a business thing than a consumer thing.

These days we've got the laptop, but the travelling salesman is a rapidly dying breed.

LarryWhistling
Resident Microferroequinologist (at least at my house) 
Everyone goes home; Safety begins with you
My Opinion. Standard Disclaimers Apply. No Expiration Date
Come ride the rails with me!
There's one thing about humility - the moment you think you've got it, you've lost it...

  • Member since
    May 2003
  • From: US
  • 25,292 posts
Posted by BaltACD on Saturday, September 23, 2023 6:35 PM

tree68
BaltACD
Got the mechnical drive back with the repair and purhased a housing for it and use it as a external drive. 

I always keep the hard drive when I get rid of a computer.  Got one sitting here with the desktop computer right now as an external drive.

I kind of predicted the state of things today some 40 years ago when I conceived of a computer with internal memory, a modem (wifi was way in the future) and a flat screen display.   I saw it as something a salesman could use, instead of carrying catalogs.  Everything would be available to display, and items could be ordered right then and there.  I saw it more as a business thing than a consumer thing.

These days we've got the laptop, but the travelling salesman is a rapidly dying breed.

Replaced by direct ordering off the internet.

Never too old to have a happy childhood!

              

  • Member since
    December 2001
  • From: Northern New York
  • 25,020 posts
Posted by tree68 on Saturday, September 23, 2023 6:47 PM

BaltACD
Replaced by direct ordering off the internet.

Yep. 

I know someone who sells medical supplies to doctor's offices.  He rarely visits them these days, although he does spend a lot of time on the phone.  Some of that stuff still needs to go through "channels."

LarryWhistling
Resident Microferroequinologist (at least at my house) 
Everyone goes home; Safety begins with you
My Opinion. Standard Disclaimers Apply. No Expiration Date
Come ride the rails with me!
There's one thing about humility - the moment you think you've got it, you've lost it...

  • Member since
    July 2009
  • From: San Francisco East Bay
  • 1,360 posts
Posted by MikeF90 on Saturday, September 23, 2023 9:17 PM

tree68
I always keep the hard drive when I get rid of a computer. Got one sitting here with the desktop computer right now as an external drive.

My situation has always been replacement of a small, almost full HDD with a larger one. The smaller one is useless for a backup sizewise so I forked over for an even larger portable one (that also fits in my small safe deposit box).

I have two used HDDs that await destruction - platter removal or a drilled hole through the case. NEVER give them away - few people will take the time to overwrite the storage enough for safety and bad guys will Always scan the HDD on received hardware.

  • Member since
    January 2019
  • 1,686 posts
Posted by Erik_Mag on Sunday, September 24, 2023 12:40 AM

tree68

I kind of predicted the state of things today some 40 years ago when I conceived of a computer with internal memory, a modem (wifi was way in the future) and a flat screen display.   I saw it as something a salesman could use, instead of carrying catalogs.  Everything would be available to display, and items could be ordered right then and there.  I saw it more as a business thing than a consumer thing.

Sounds like an Osborne or Kaypro in a more compact form factor. First description of something like a laptop was a December 1972 article on computers where someone (Andy Kay??) proposed a "Dynabook". This was supposed to be a keyboard folding up with a flat screen.

The first luggable comuter that I saw was an IBM model 5100 (PC was the 5150) at a U.C. Amateur Radio Club meeting (UCARC's call sign was W6BB, where BB was Berkeley Bears) circa 1976. Subject of the meeting was RTTY (radio teletype).

  • Member since
    May 2003
  • From: US
  • 25,292 posts
Posted by BaltACD on Thursday, November 16, 2023 10:58 AM

Erik_Mag
 
Gramp

What is it about LI batteries that causes them to ignite and be so difficult to extinguish? 

In addition to what Balt said about Lithium being a very reactive metal, Li-Ion batteries typically use a flammable electrolyte. Li-ion battery fires are often started by lithium dendrites (whiskers) forming during charging that then short out the cell. The cell can provide a lot  of current which then can cause the short to get hot enough to start a fire.

N.B. 13 deaths so far this year in NYC due to e-bike battery fires.

Lithium batteries when crushed

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t1j9TUV5coc

 

Never too old to have a happy childhood!

              

  • Member since
    December 2001
  • From: Northern New York
  • 25,020 posts
Posted by tree68 on Thursday, November 16, 2023 3:47 PM

BaltACD
Lithium batteries when crushed

Saw a video where someone drove a nail into a flat-pack battery.  It wasn't pretty.

Among the options FD's have for e-car battery fires is submerging them until they quit burning.  Yep - the whole car.  Dumpster-style containers are being configured for just that purpose.

LarryWhistling
Resident Microferroequinologist (at least at my house) 
Everyone goes home; Safety begins with you
My Opinion. Standard Disclaimers Apply. No Expiration Date
Come ride the rails with me!
There's one thing about humility - the moment you think you've got it, you've lost it...

  • Member since
    May 2003
  • From: US
  • 25,292 posts
Posted by BaltACD on Thursday, November 16, 2023 4:09 PM

tree68
 
BaltACD
Lithium batteries when crushed 

Saw a video where someone drove a nail into a flat-pack battery.  It wasn't pretty.

Among the options FD's have for e-car battery fires is submerging them until they quit burning.  Yep - the whole car.  Dumpster-style containers are being configured for just that purpose.

Lithium batteries are much like welded rail in railroads.  We have achieved a working ability with both technologies, however, we have not mastered them to the point they are safe under every circumstance.

Never too old to have a happy childhood!

              

  • Member since
    April 2003
  • From: Defiance Ohio
  • 13,318 posts
Posted by JoeKoh on Thursday, November 16, 2023 4:37 PM

evening

Guessers say a possible white thanksgiving?? Put the lights up outside but won't turn them on until Turkey Day.Need to go back to eye doctor Saturday.New bifocals are not in focus.Going to check on brother too.Glad tomorrow is Friday.

stay safe

Joe

Deshler Ohio-crossroads of the B&O Matt eats your fries.YUM! Clinton st viaduct undefeated against too tall trucks!!!(voted to be called the "Clinton St. can opener").

 

  • Member since
    December 2001
  • From: Northern New York
  • 25,020 posts
Posted by tree68 on Thursday, November 16, 2023 11:03 PM

JoeKoh
Guessers say a possible white thanksgiving?

We have weather of interest upcoming.  Mostly rain, though, with the possibility of snow at the higher elevations.

Off to the railroad for Polar Express Friday night, then to the PBS station Saturday night to be floor director/camera operator for the fall gift auction.

Might set the groundwork for my "skeleton" tree in the front yard.  A pole with lights draped from it.  Looks good at night.

LarryWhistling
Resident Microferroequinologist (at least at my house) 
Everyone goes home; Safety begins with you
My Opinion. Standard Disclaimers Apply. No Expiration Date
Come ride the rails with me!
There's one thing about humility - the moment you think you've got it, you've lost it...

Join our Community!

Our community is FREE to join. To participate you must either login or register for an account.

Search the Community

Newsletter Sign-Up

By signing up you may also receive occasional reader surveys and special offers from Trains magazine.Please view our privacy policy