From: gary@ke4zv.uucp (Gary Coffman)
Newsgroups: rec.radio.amateur.misc
Subject: Re: Tinkering vs. engineering (was Re: QST Content Revisited)
Date: 15 Aug 92 12:45:38 GMT
Reply-To: gary@ke4zv.UUCP (Gary Coffman)
Organization: Gannett Technologies Group

In article <1992Aug13.200001.1195@NeoSoft.com> jreese@NeoSoft.com (Jim Reese) writes:
>'scuse me for butting in here, but I know the individual in
>question...
>
>In article <1992Aug13.033623.1507@ke4zv.uucp> gary@ke4zv.UUCP (Gary Coffman) writes:
>>...noise and Nintendo games on their digital display. There's a certain
>>elegance to a HT200 that's missing from today's digital scanners that
>>try to masquerade as *radios*.
>
>The only elegance an HT200 has is that it takes both hands to hold it
>up! :-)
>
>I think what Jay is trying to say is that some "engineering" is done
>simply for the sake of engineering, not to make the product any
>better, only more elegant.

My dictionary says that elegant means refined, free from coarseness
or excessive ornamentation. Thus I contend that many of today's
radios are not elegant because they are mostly flash with little
substance, excessively ornamented.

>I see the same effects in the broadcast world.  I've got two shiny new
>25kW transmitters that have neat CMOS controllers.  When the lightning
>flies, these units choke big time...while my 20 year old klunker
>backup full of latching relays comes up every time.  Is the CMOS
>controller better?  Probably.  Is it more elegant?  Definately.  Is 
>it more reliable?  No.
>
>The point is, there's a place for elegant engineering, and a place for
>brute force and ignorance.

Brute force certainly, ignorance, I hope not. My old transmitter supervisor
used to say "two wires make a light." Meaning that you kept the number
of items that could fail to a minimum in a transmitter plant. Then when
one of those items *did* fail, repairs were simple and quick. Lightning
is definitely *not* your friend and delicate solid state control equipment
has no place in a broadcast transmitter plant. Unfortunately, it's there
anyway and we have to do our best to protect it.

We're currently recovering from a massive lightning strike at our Atlanta
plant. Lightning came in on the power company's wires and thought our
station ground was much nicer than the power company's eight foot rod.
Now we practice safe electricity and have a ground window and suppressors,
$60,000 worth on the input 480 that are now vapor. This was a *big* one.
One of our transmitters had fist sized holes blown in the 8 kV HV power
choke and exploded filter caps. Now that wasn't a big deal. We just fired
up the forklift and installed spares, the choke weighs over half a ton. But
lightning also broke down the 480 three phase step start contactor and
said hello to our 24 volt solid state control ladder. Nothing survived.
We're still operating with clip leads bypassing the safety devices and
hand switches wired in to do sequencing while Harris makes replacement
boards. Meanwhile, our old RCA, complete with big stepper relays, just
keeps humming along. I'd say the RCA was a more elegant design for it's
intended purpose. Too bad RCA was murdered. (David Letterman and I see 
eye to eye when it comes to GE corporate management.)

Gary KE4ZV