Portside Aft Steering Gear Compartment on the Battleship Iowa

Some of the tour today covered things I'd already seen and wrote about, like the Barbershop, Brig, and Laundry areas, so I won't go over them again.

We started in the Crew's Mess, as the passageway we would take was off the Museum Store.

While the steering gear compartment is armored, it's outside of the "Armored Citadel", which runs from just forward of the #1 turret, to just aft of the #3 turret.

The blue painted area shown below is the top of the aft end of the armor.

As you can see, it's really thick:

After we went down one deck, below this first armored deck, we passed by a hatch leading down to the 4th deck. The stainless steel door to the right leads in to one of the "reefer" areas where refrigerated foods were stored. If you look carefuly at the ladder going down, you'll see some "flaps" mounted on the sides of it. When these were moved to cover the steps, it made them into a ramp so boxes could be easily slid up and down the ladder.

Pretty clever:

Here's another ladder going down to the refer area, and still another hatch under that, with grating on the bottom:

Now, the good stuff!

Getting closer:

One more armored hatch to go through, and we're there:

This is the control panel for running all the pumps and servos, and a place-of-last-resort to steer the ship from.

 Notice the two bronze mounts in the picture. There are where the handwheels were located to manually (with hydraulic assist, of course) steer the ship.

The closer of the two got cut off in the picture, but in the one further away, at the bottom of the bronze mount, you can see a stub shaft with a white tag hanging on it. These were the stubs the wheels attached to.

The wheels were removed for some reason, and are "MIA" for the time being:

How do you know you're on the Port side? Well, besides the yellow painted designator with the frame number, there's a red stripe painted on the wall, red just like the Port navigation lights on the ship.

And notice the rows of rivets overhead. This was the top of the localized armored box the steering gear is in:

Rudder position indicator:

Aft end of the hydraulic rams that move the rudder. The large round plate in the left foreground is the top post of the actual rudder, and the "dogbones" on either side connect to the rams:

Close up of the brass tag on the dogbone:

Another view looking forward:

The hydraulic diagram of the system. Sorry for the flash hot-spot:

And a drawing listing all the lube points, and what type of grease/lube to use:

So, that was today's behind-the-scenes tour. While we were sitting in the barbershop, the question of "Turret Tours" was brought up. Turret #2, where the accident occurred, is absolutely OFF LIMITS, as it's a memorial to those who died in it. Current plans are being discussed for turret #3, and include putting in a plexiglas "bubble", where people could at least climb partly in to the turret, and look around, and a Virtual Tour" of the turret, being put together by one of our volunteers who's extremely good at taking panoramic photos, and stitching them together, giving views similar to what The Smithsonian does for some of it's aircraft interiors.

I've seen his panoramas of the radio room, and some of the superstructure areas, and their amazing.

Actual tours of the turret, and it's inclusion on the tour route, will require getting all the HAZMAT items out of the turret, and cleaning it up and painting the inside.

Hang on, it's on the "TODO" list for this year!

Engineering Spaces Tour on the Battleship Iowa on Sunday

For the crew only, and I'm taking my camera!

Some of it I've seen before, but we're going to see the steerage area where the rudders are controlled, and some other things on the 3rd deck.

 Pix to come Sunday evening......

And then on the 27th, I'll be taking a crew only tour of the superstructure.

Pictures will, of course, be posted following that tour......

How's About a Little ZZ?

One of my favorites.

Those Who Cannot Remember The Past.......

Got this from a friend's email.

I think it says it all.....

"Unbroken" - A Movie of Courage and Valor

We went to see "Unbroken" tonight, and I recommend it to all.

It's the story of Louis "Louie" Zamperini from Torrance, CA, and is based on the book "Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption" by Laura Hillenbrand.

My wife bought the book several months ago, and was waiting for the film to come out.

I haven't read the book yet, but I'll get started on it in the next few days.

It's a stirring movie, and doesn't pull any punches concerning the treatment of Allied POW's in Japan.

Highly recommended, and take a box of Kleenex with you.

Loud Music, A Laser Light Show, and Fireworks Going Off

At 2245 local time, that's the extent of New Year's Eve madness in La-La Land.

I suppose things night get a little more nuts, but I'm going to bed.

Hope you all had a safe and sane New Year's Eve, and wishing you all the best for 2015!

Wonderful "Christmas Present" for Us Radio Guys on the Iowa

God bless the guys at PCS Associates!

During the process of troubleshooting the URR-74(v)2 receivers in the radio room, we've been terribly hampered by a lack of usable documentation.

The WJ 8718 receiver is very close to the URR-74, and we were able to find manuals for that receiver, BUT all the freely downloadable manuals were poor copies made into pdf's.

The worst part was that the schematics were copied with the copier magnification improperly set, resulting in a 1"~2" "gap" in the schematic between the two pages it was spread over!

You couldn't get them to overlap so you could tape them together and get a complete schematic, and in some cases it was cut so badly that complete components and/or circuit blocks were missing.

This makes it rather difficult to follow signals on the schematic, as you're never really sure where they're going between the two pages.

I finally found a place that still supports the Watkins Johnson receivers we have aboard the Iowa, and sent an email asking how much it would cost us to BUY a real, correct copy, stating that we weren't looking for a freebie, and would gladly PAY to get the manuals.

Well, this morning I received an email from a very nice gentleman containing the details of the ftp account he set up for me so I could download the manuals they have available!

I grabbed the manuals, and have been looking at them part of the day.

They manuals are crystal clear, and all the schematics are complete, and not butchered up.

I notified our Grey Radio Gang, and we're going to be working up a nice, official "Certificate of Appreciation" for this gentleman and his company.

Merry Christmas, and God Bless Us, Every One!

Hope you all have a very Merry Christmas!

And here's one of my favorite stories from years ago.

"The Star" by Arthur C. Clarke


Forgot to add that we had a Christmas card signing project aboard the Battleship Iowa this year.

We signed and delivered 3051 personalized cards to our troops serving overseas.

"Old School" RTTY Equipment on the Battleship Iowa

Sorry I didn't take more pix of the gear, but I snapped these few after I finished photographing the six HF antennas on the ship.

I took the pix of the antennas so I could document them by their nameplates, and we could compare the what and where of them to the scanty drawings we have.

ANYWHOO....this is a representative of one of the four or five AN/UGC-48A machines abord the Iowa.

This particular one is working perfectly, and has an almost full roll of paper in it.

I am NOT an expert on these by any means, so I can't tell you much about it. In one of my older posts about the equipment in the Comm Center I have a ton of pictures of the RTTY gear, the printers and reperferators, and the CRT-based Data Terminals, which I found out the other day are in working condition. We're trying to find some of the magnetic tape cartridges for them, and supposedly there is a box or two of them stored somewhere on the ship, but this equipment is not on my "TO-DO" list, as I'm more concerned with getting our last non-functioning Watkins-Jenkins AN/URR-74(V)2 receiver working, and learning to replace the chain drives in the 1051 receivers, and the ART-23 exciters.

Nameplate:

Top covers opened:

Close-up of Print Head:

Paper Tape Mechanism:

2nd Tape Mechanism:

2nd Tape Mechanism:

It's definitely neat stuff, but not really in my "knowledge base"!

A Day at the Workbench

Spent the day catching up on some stuff.

*Cleaned my Kimber 1911

*Cleaned my wife's TRR-8 revolver

And started building the little "Digital Modes Sound Card Interface" for the Kenwood TS-940 we use on the Iowa for CW. The guy who donated it used to be a RTTY operator "Back In The Day", and was blown away when I told him you no longer need a "HAL Interface"
 

and a lumbering Model 19 Teletype machine to operate Radio Teletype ("RTTY") any longer.

These days, a PC is used to generate and decode audio frequencies corresponding to "Mark" and "Space", and the audio signals are sent to/received from the audio circuits of the radio.

The "nice" thing about doing it this way is that you're no longer limited by the hardware you have to just RTTY. You can also transmit and receive Slow Scan TV, PSK-31, WEFAX, and many other "Digital Modes" on the ham bands.

After I finish and test the little interface, I'll post a few pictures of it.

Earthrise 45 Years Later

I still remember watching this live.

5 Years here?

Just looked at my settings page, and it indicates I started this blog in January 2009.

Gee.....where'd the time go?

Damn Blogger and Google!!!

*Something* changed the other day, and now all the comments I make on other blogs are going to my gmail account, which I NEVER look at.

And I can't figure out how to switch it back to my real email address.

Freaking IDIOTS......



*****UPDATE******

Figured out HOW to do it.

Just go here and follow the instructions.


Too bad it nuked all the post replies, but now I'm rid of the ##@@!! gmail address.

Finished My RF Safety Report

Had a really nice one about 90% finished that I'd been working on for three days.

Then I was editing a section of it this morning (no coffee!), and I NUKED the whole damn document..............RATS!

Just finished a frantic 6 hour push to get at least something presentable printed out.

The question of RF Safety on the Iowa is something that's a bit overblown, as getting to the Disc/Cage antenna on the bow means going through a locked gate that only authorized people have the key for. The public can't get within 50 feet of it.

The Trussed Monopole antenna at the stern is located on top of the Helo Ops shack, and is a good 10' above the deck.

Assuming ZERO feedline loss (we don't have a clue what the line loss is, but I'll bet it's at least 2~3dB), the fact that we run *maybe* 100 Watts out of the transmitter, and the fact that the Duty Factor for SSB is 20%, and CW is 40%, the minimum safe distance for the "Uncontrolled Area" (where the public is allowed) is FIVE feet.

There's just no way we're pumping out enough RF to do anything to anybody.

Got Those "Term Paper" Blues......

Well, not exactly a "Term Paper", but it makes me glad I wrote all of them in high-school and College.

I've been asked to do a short report on RF Safety, and how it pertains to the Amateur Radio operations aboard the Iowa.

Actually, I was asked to do a full report, and oh, by the way, can you have a short one available for our meeting this Wednesday?

Now, all the Hams I know are quite conversant on RF Safety, and we've all performed our FCC mandated RF Evaluations of our stations.

I don't know a single Ham who has not done this, and nobody I know has a station that doesn't meet the requirements.

The "problem" arises when you say "RADIATION" around most lay people, who don't know the difference between an X-ray, cosmic ray, a sun ray, or even a "Ray of Hope". All you have to do is mention "RADIATION", and people start thinking of giant ants, giant grasshoppers, or Big Things We Accidentally Created/Let Loose/Got Pissed Off.

Since Radio Frequency radiation is NON-Ionizing, it's extremely unlikely to cause gigantic tomatoes and bugs to start appearing under your antenna. It just doesn't work that way.

The primary harm the high levels of RF can cause, are thermal hazards, similar to sticking something into your microwave oven and cranking it up.

And even that has requirements to be met before the object will heat up.

It's true that in the "Olde Days" Diathermy used a frequency in the vicinity of 30 MHz, but the patient was positioned in almost direct contact with the antenna, and the antenna was designed to concentrate the RF field into a very small area.

They weren't having people stand under a half-wave dipole and applying 100 Watts to it.

So, I'm writing this with the LCD principle, trying to make it simple so non-technical people can understand it, while keeping it technically accurate, and not boring the people that actually understand it.

I just hope it doesn't get picked apart by the people who are "just too busy" to take this task on themselves, but yet not so busy that can find the time to read it, and nit-pick it to death.....

More Rain on the Way

We probably won't get as much as Wirecutter will, but still, they're predicting at least an inch, and probably more.

The bad thing is that this time we're going to get it all in about 24~36 hours.

Hopefully the backyard won't flood too bad, as all the dirt is still wet from the last rain that came through.

And for an AAR on Saturday's "NRA First Steps" class, it was another winner.

We had 22 students, the max the classroom can hold, and 4 assistant instructors.

The lead instructor handled the three people who had prior experience with firearms, but wanted to get some training, and the rest of us handled the 'balanceof the students.

Everybody listened, was safe, and we saw some students go from Can't hit the paper", to scoring 80% or better on the last 10 rounds on target session.

Another great day ay the range!

December 7th, 2014 on the Battleship Iowa

Spent all day on the Battleship Iowa today, mostly in the radio room working HUGE pile-ups calling us.

Everybody we talked to thanked us for getting and keeping the Iowa on the Ham Bands, and manning it so often.

We operate NI6BB every holiday, except Thanksgiving and Christmas day when the ship is closed, and almost every Wednesday, during the hours the ship is open.

We talked to the Missouri, the Lexington, the Hornet, the Midway, several of the museum submarines, and heard the Wisconsin, but couldn’t get through to them.

We had an elderly man at the morning ceremony who is a Pearl Harbor Survivor, and a wonderful gentleman.

Later in the day I was honored to meet and talk to a 93 year old woman who was a nurse on a hospital ship stationed at Pearl during the raid.
 
And they both told everybody they met to never forget what can happen to Our Nation when it gets complacent.

Quite a somber day.

Busy Weekend Coming Up

Well, let's see....

Saturday morning I have the "First Saturday Of The Month" breakfast with the radio club I'll be bailing out on (long rant, check the older posts), and then I'll be helping with another "NRA First Steps" pistol class, then a reunion party for a bunch of my former work mates from the satellite launch place I retired/got laid-off from, and then I'll be on the Iowa all day Sunday for the Pearl Harbor Memorial.

I'll be wearing one of my "NRA Certified Instructor" shirts to the breakfast, which will probably pop the fuses in the one Ultra-Liberal, Politically Correct member we have.

Oh, well.....no use trying to please everyone.

Rainy Day on the Iowa

Spent today aboard doing Grey Radio stuff, mostly reading the manuals, as yours truly has been "appointed" as the Lead Technician to get the original transmitters fired back up.

So, after helping the 70 and 80 year old guys go down to Broadway in search of some replacement parts for one of the "Red Phones", I spent some reading the manuals on the exciter, power amplifier, and the auto-couplers.

I learned that the exciter only puts out around 100 mW (+20dBm), and the high voltage in the power amp is 2250 Volts.

The amps are capable of running up to 1500 Watts output, but the manual cautions to not go over 1250 Watts, which is a kick because EACH of the power tubes is rated for about 5kW plate dissipation!

Man, talk about OVER designed!

And then I helped the Old Guys (I'm a youngster there!) work on the "Coke Machine", which is this beautifully built rack of equipment (Hughes Aircraft in Irvine, CA built it) that basically a switching matrix to route secure and non-secure communications around the ship.

I ponied up for a big 24VDC power supply so they could get parts of it working, but ALL of the circuit cards were pulled from it while it was in the Mothball Fleet, as it's a system still in use.

None of it's classified, and we're having a hard time finding stuff for it.

Anybody have any "1149570 TIM Manual Patch Cards", or "1149565 LIM Manual Patch Card" spares just sitting around?

Sure would make it easier to set up the manual patches we need to make so we can route audio from the "Red Phones" to and from the Radio Room and Transmitter Room.......

A Little Rainy Day Music

By Bachman Turner Overdrive.

This is one of their lesser know songs.

Has some really nice guitar work.

Enjoy!

Rain!

And boy, we need it!

It started raining about 0500 this morning, and is supposed to keep up through Wednesday morning.

So far it's been a nice, steady rain, with the rain gauge showing .39" since this storm began, but it's starting to pool in all the low spots in the backyard, and the scanner has a lot of traffic about road closures due to flooding.

No word on any mud slides, though.

And the dog, who doesn't like to go out in the rain, is in "Max Bladder Hold Mode" right now. She'll go scratch at the door, I'll open it, and she sticks her head out the door, looks up at me, and heads back in the house.

As soon as it beaks a bit, I'll grab her and get her to go out, whether she likes it or not.

AND, we're up to .93" since midnight, which is quite a bit for us to get all at once.

Visio 2010 Is A MAJOR PITA!!

God, I can't believe how freaking AWFUL this software is.

I've been using Visio for over 10 years, I've mad over 100 drawings with it, and it seems like every single time I stop using it for a few weeks, I have to learn it all over again.

Even doing something simple like changing the default line weight is cumbersome, and the changes you make don't carry over to the individual stencils/shapes stored in your library.

The earlier versions at least had the menus laid out in a logical manner, but nooooo, that wasn't good enough for Micro$oft, and they changed everything around, and I can't find sh1t in their newer structure.

IfI have to bang my head against the keyboard until Its bloody learning this POS software again, I'll just take the time to learn one of the Linux vector drawing programs I have, as they don't change things around on a whim.

Either that or I'll just make the damn drawings by hand, scan them, and convert them to a pdf for distribution.

Gawd.......what a pain this little project has become!

UPDATE

Did the entire project in about 35 minutes using "gschem" on my Linux box, and I'd never used the program before.

It reminds me a lot of the free software (Windoze only) that PCBExpress gives you to do your boards.

Since this will be hand-wired, and I don't need boards produced, I just wanted a nice looking schematic to go into the operating manual.

The project is an interface board from a sound card on a PC to a Kenwood HF radio so we can do "Digital Modes" on the Iowa.

Here's a copy of the schematic, but it didn't render very cleanly when I did a quickie rendering from PostScript to PNG format.

Rain On The Way....YAY!

Heavy overcast this morning, and I can smell rain on the wind.

NOAA forecast is for scattered showers today and tonight, haevy rain starting Monday night through Wednesday morning.

We sure need the rain, and hopefully we'll have a wet winter.

It's been extremely dry out here the last 5 years or so, and the reservoirs are down to their lowest levels in 20 years.

This afternoon's satellite view:

Happy Thanksgiving

Hope you all have a very Happy Thanksgiving!

Fairly Quiet Out Here In La-La Land

Been listening to scanner most of the night.

Well, actually THREE scanners.

One is set up to scan most everything out here.

One is set up to scan the "Media" frequency assignment, which are those channels the news crews and news choppers use.

And one to scan just the stuff for Long Beach and Signal Hill.

Why three?

Well, the "main" scanner has so many channels to scan that it might stop on something trivial, like a call about a burglar alarm, and miss something big, like a "peaceful protest" that turns ugly.

The "Media" scanner is interesting, as these guys talk to each other the way you and I would, and don't pull any punches about what's going on.

And the "Local" scanner, since it has fewer channels to scan, can rip through the entire channel list in nothing flat, and not miss anything close by.

So far the only signs of Bad Shit going on is the chatter on the LAPD and LASD channels about groups of people throwing stuff on to cars from freeway overpasses.

There are several "large crowds" marching around, but other than the people tossing stuff from overpasses, I'd say it's relatively quiet.

There has been an unusual amount of radio traffic down in the port area, though. Mostly vehicle stops, and most of the people stopped are from out of the area, so not sure if that means anything.....

Beem Busy Again.....

Had a ton of yard work to do this last week, along with doing some "deep cleaning" of various parts of the house, as we're having guests over for Thanksgiving.

And I dug out, scrubbed up, and tested some older radio gear that I'm giving to a friend who's just about ready to take his General Class Amateur Radio exam.

The gear is a complete Yaesu FT-310 with power supply/speaker, microphone, and an external VFO that was entrusted to me by my buddy The Wandering Minstrel, with the promise to him that's find it a good home.

This isn't the radio, but it's representative of the model type.

And the soon-to-be General Class ham was thrilled to get it, and thanked me profusely.

I mowed the back yard with my little electric mower, edged the driveway and walkways, and used the weed whacker to get all the stuff along the side of the house that the mower can't get.

I went to Home Depot and got six BIG bags of black dirt (next time I think I just have a half truckload delivered!), and filled in a bunch of low spots, and seeded/watered the areas. And I put out stakes with string between them and strips of yellow caution tape hanging on the string to keep Pebbles The Wonder Dog from "exploring" these new areas.

A couple of shouts of "NO!" has convinced her (so far) to keep away from them.

I really let the back yard "go to seed" this last year, hardly watering it, and it died out in big sections. When we had Swisher, he and Pebbles would chase each other around the yard, chewing up the dead grass, leaving bare spots that turned into mini-dust-bowls, so hopefully with some fresh dirt and grass seed, it will come back this winter.

Sad Puppy!

Well, Little Miss Pebbles had a vet visit on Monday.

She's had a mild case of conjunctivitis, which we thought cleared up from the eye drops given to us at the previous vet visit, but it came back, this time in both her eyes.

And she has these "bumps" on her back that look like insect bites, very unusual for this time of year here. I spray the back yard twice a year for fleas, ticks, and other critters, and we use Advantage flea treatment on her, so we weren't sure what was going on.

And the day before I took her back in, she started licking her left front paw, and would pull it back from me when I went to look at it.

Time to go see Dr. Grain over at the Evening Pet Clinic again!

I can't say enough good things about the pet clinic. They really care about their little furry (and feathered!) patients there, and treat you like family when you show up.

After I checked in and was waiting, I noticed on of the nails on her left paw seemed to be red, maybe bleeding a bit, and then I remembered what had happened several days before.

I was bringing in a bunch of stuff from the car, and couldn't see where my big feet were going, and stepped on one of her front paws! Normally this hasn't been a problem, as she's quicker on her feet than I am on mine, and the carpet cushions it some.

Well, this time I stepped on her when she was right at the door, on the hardwood entry area. She didn't yelp or cry or anything, and I dropped what I was doing and called her back, She wasn't limping, and didn't seem to be in any pain, so I apologized to her (apologize to a dog?) and didn't think much of it.

When I hoisted her up to the exam table. though, the Doctor and I immediately noticed one of her nails was broken right where the fur stops and the nail begins.

SO, he removed the broken nail, swabbed the area with Providone Iodine, and wrapped it up, saying to leave it covered for 5 days so it would "seal up" and not get infected.

And then we put "The Cone" on her, to (TRY and) keep her from licking/chewing/tearing off the bandage on the paw.

And the good Doctor says the bumps are most likely allergies to some type of insect bite, and to give a Benadryl twice a day.

So, here she is looking a bit upset over having a bandaged foot, AND a cone her.

Poor puppy.....

Belated Happy Veteran's Day

To all who have served, and are currently serving....

You my have deepest gratitude and respect for your service to our country.

I had a post scheduled, but must have messed something up, as it didn't post.

I would have posted this morning, but I spent the entire day on the Iowa helping with tours, and assisting a film crew, but mostly operating NI6BB.

We had a very nice memorial service and wreath ceremony this morning at 0900, before the ship opened to the public.

And since there's a film crew aboard, some of the tour route was changed, resulting in a few people getting "lost" a bit, and having to be shepherded back onto the tour route, and out of the areas not normally open to the public.

When I got to the starboard side hatch for the Communications Center this morning, the hatch was closed, but not dogged.

I didn't realize how heavy the hatch was, having never opened it before. It swings easily on the hinges, but has a lot of mass, so getting it moving, and stopping it again, took a bit of muscle.


Hope y'all had a great day!

Putin's Motorcade

Shamelessly swiped from Western Rifle Shooters.

No description required.....

Saturday Relaxation

Did all the yard work yesterday, except for trimming the tree in the backyard. The damn thing grows like a weed, and I'm going to have to rent a chipper to grind up what I'm going to lop off it.

Wife has a friend staying with us, so I also cleaned house Thursday and Friday. Had to put the dog outside while I ran "Mr. Kirby", or she goes nutso chasing it around.

So today I'm just kicking back tinkering on some radio gear that's been waiting to get on the bench so I can clean it up, check it out, and sell it on eBay. Over the last 5 years or so I've been grabbing radios at good prices, and stashing them in the garage, bagged up so they don't get all critterfied. I've got about 35 out there, with a total investment (so far) of bout $1800. Add another couple of hundred bucks for parts they might need (tubes and electrolytic/paper capacitor replacements) and I've got about $2k in them.  Considering their total worth once I'm done with them is about $10k, it's a nice way to pick up some additional cash to support my hobbies.

Project for the next few weeks is to get the garage cleaned up and sorted out so I have enough room to get the Supra in there for the winter.

I really don't want to leave a rust-free 1980's Toyota outside for the rainy season. They have a tendency to want to return to Mother Earth if they start getting soaking wet for long periods of time!

We Made Them An Offer They Couldn't Refuse

Well, way too early to tell if the election yesterday will have much effect on restoring our Constitutional Republic, but I found this cartoon a bit amusing.

I Voted

And so did my sweet wife.

I'm not sure how much good it does to vote conservative out here in Kommifornia, but hopefully our two votes canceled out two from the moochers and looters.....

Pardon Me While I "Take Five".......

Spent all day Wednesday on the Iowa troubleshooting a receiver/coupler/antenna issue, and then all day Thursday and Friday down at the Maritime Museum repairing the Amateur Radio station located on the second floor.

A week or so ago we had an Icom PS-30 power supply that went casters up, so one of my friends and I replaced it with an Astron RS-35. The original power supply had been installed almost 30 years ago when the station was built, so we definitely got our money's worth!

After we pulled the operating bench away from the wall, we were horrified at the state of the wiring. Cables had been run without any regard to wire management, and were crisscrossed every which way, and many were tangled knots of AC power, DC power, Coax, and control cables.

We also had FIVE plug strips that were daisy-chained all along the floor.

First order of business was to remove everything, trace it back, and label both ends of the cables. Then we mounted a Rig Runner DC distribution block, installed Power Pole connectors on all the DC leads, and remove all the plug strips.

There were already four plug strips mounted under the bench, and connected to master switches on one end of the operating bench, but I guess it was just easier to run new ones than use the existing ones.

All the AC distribution wiring was cleaned up, all the AC plugs were labeled, the existing (old) plug strips were labeled, and many feet of jumbled up coax and control cables were shortened, coiled up, and labeled.

And we also removed the original barrier strip that was used to distribute the DC power from the defunct power supply.

The original installation, modified (poorly!) over the last 30 years, would definitely be on my top five "World's Worst Wiring Kluges".

So it's finished, and I made up a nice 11"x17" Visio drawing to go into the station operating manual, and the archives we keep detailing (usually!) the modifications made over the years.

So pardon me while I kick back and "Take Five".......

Haloween Weirdness

While passing out the candy tonight, I had my Home Patrol scanner on so I could keep up with police activity.

While I didn't catch the area where this was going on, it definitely falls into the "YGTBSM" category.....

A guy wearing a hockey mask, and wielding a chainsaw, was chasing Trick-or-Treaters around!

I wouldn't have believed it if I hadn't heard the frantic scramble by the cops to find the guy......

BOOOOOO! Happy Halloween!

For your scary viewing pleasure I present THRILLER!

Say whatever you will about Michael Jackson, he sure was talented.

Antares Launch Failure

This was the first flight of the Anatres Launch Vehicle using a new Russian built engine.

The vehicle and the Cygnus CRS automated cargo spacecraft were carrying just under 5000 pounds of supplies to the International Space Station, along with a whole bunch of "cubesats" for deployment

The engines are shipped to the US, and modified by Aerojet for the launch vehicle.

I've watched the video several times (and watched "other" videos of it), and it appears to be either a nozzle or perhaps a turbopump failure. If you watch the exhaust plume, you cab see a significant brightening and change of shape right before the vehicle explodes.

This is a major setback for Orbital Sciences, and the loss of almost 5000 pounds of supplies and experiments for the ISS.








And here's a very interesting aerial view:

Make Him Own It.......

As usual, Mr. Whittle makes perfect sense.

Get out there on November 4th and VOTE!

But then I doubt if any of the people who stop by here need to be told that.....

70th Anniversary of the Battle Off Samar

 

"In no engagement of its entire history has the United States Navy shown more gallantry, guts and gumption than in those two morning hours between 0730 and 0930 off Samar"

— Samuel Eliot Morison, History of United States Naval Operations in World War II, Volume XII, Leyte

Undoubtedly one of the most lopsided Naval battles in history.

6 escort carriers, 4 destroyer escorts, and 3 destroyers held off twenty-three ships of the Imperial Japanese Navy, some outweighing them by over thirty times!

The incredible story of Taffy 3 was published in "The Last Stand of the Tin Can Sailors" by James D. Hornfisher, and it's a gripping read.

The Battle Off Samar was part of the Leyte Gulf Campaign, and was the end of an operational Japanese Navy.

The story of Taffy 3 has also been covered on The History Channel, and The Military Channel.

For a detailed review of this Naval action, please go read the entire Wikipedia entry. It's just an amazing story of bravery and courage.

One of the Iowa volunteer crew was on the USS Hoel, the first American ship to be sunk, and I'm looking forward to meeting him.

New Phone

Well, my trusty AndroidX has been slooowly dying these last few months, and last night it finally got so bad I decided ti junk it.

The trade-in allowance was only $5, and it's worth more than that to me as a sledgehammer target after all the aggravation it's caused the last few months.

The touch screen was getting very hard to use and unresponsive, making it very hard to dial out or return a call. Last night it started ringing, and I was busy, so I ignored it. Looking at the incoming calls, I saw it was a friend of mine, so I spent about 10 minutes ( ! ) trying to call him back before I gave up. He called me back about 10 minutes later! I thought the call never connected, but it did, and when he asked what I needed, and I told him I was returning his call of 20 minutes earlier, he said he hadn't called me all day.

So, I went down to the Verizon store last night, signed in, and waited.

And waited.

And waited.

After about 45 minutes, I threw in the towel, and came home. The new Galaxy Note 4 went on sale last night, and the place was a zoo. I spent my waiting time looking at all the phones, and decided on a Galaxy S5, which I went back and got this morning.

Took about 20 minutes in-and-out, so that's one of the bennies from being "unemployed", and being able to do my shopping during the day.

I haven't played with it much as I want it to fully charge, and I'm busy reading how to root it so I can uninstall all the crapware it come with, and have FULL control over the GPS and camera/microphone functions.

When this one wears out, I'm going to seriously look into just getting a TracFone!

Inert 16"/50 Caliber Shells on the Battleship Iowa

Had a good day (as usual!) on the Iowa today. We gave the commercial radio test for the Marine Radio Operators Permit to two people, who both passed with 100%.

Then I took some pictures of the Inert 16"/50 caliber rounds, and went "back to work" on the AN/URR-74(V)2 radio receivers.

One of them appears to have a problem on the -15 Volt buss, as the regulator mounted on the back panel of the radio is getting too hot to touch after being powered on for 10~15 minutes. The encoder for the main tuning also has a problem, as no matter which way you turn the knob, the frequency increases. One of the other guys in the Gray Radio Group knows what the problem is, so it's on the punch list for that particular radio, along with troubleshooting what's making the regulator get so hot.



Here's a better view of the stacks of pallets with the shells:

And here's how they're packed, two per pallet:

Here's the label on the end of the pallet stating the weight. Since each shell weighs 1,900 lbs, the weight of a High Explosive shell, this would indicate that the pallet alone weighs 450 lbs:

Off to the end of the stacked pallets is this Shell Carrier. I'm sure there's a more correct name for it, but I don't know what it might be. I don't know if we already had this, or if it came with the shells:

The Rotating Band, which engages the rifling in the barrel, has sure seen better days:

And there's some damage to where the band is attached to the shell. It almost looks like it was deliberately cut away:

Some stenciling on one of the shells:

The pallet stack as seen from the other side. We sure did get a bunch of these:

I have no idea what this equipment is for:

Nameplate on the above equipment:

Looks like this one was NOT "Handled With Care":

Here's another one that tried to escape:

Here's some close-ups of the Rotating Band:

The tip of the shell:

Some markings on the strapping. 1947, maybe?:

Markings on the pallet itself:

And since I was outside, and it was a beautiful day, here's one of the whaleboats, and our BIG forklift:

The whaleboat's helm:

Not sure what these numbers mean, but they're not stenciled on; they're cut into the hull:

Always good to spend a day on the Iowa. I found out the other day one of the volunteers was on the USS Hoel during The Battle Off Samar.

I'm going to have to meet him!

Tuesday Already?

Well, I was out-of-it on Monday. Had some kind of stomach bug, and spent most of the day either in bed, or in the bathroom.

Feel a bunch better today.

I'll be taking my camera with me tomorrow and get some pix of the dummy shells at the Iowa.

Also have two commercial radio exams to help with, and we'll be doing some performance testing on the receivers in Radio Central.

Always good to spend a day on the Iowa, almost as good as spending a day at the range!

What a Drone Can See From 17,500 Feet

Pretty damn impressive.

And "they" say they have no idea what was going on at Benghazi.....

A Present for the Battleship Iowa

While I was there today running one of the HF stations for JOTA, I happened to notice numerous pallets of "dummy" shells down by the outdoor crew break area.

I'd read in out crew newsletter that these were being delivered, but hadn't seen them yet.

Each pallet had a tag stating that it weighed 4250 lbs, and we have STACKS of them:

These were freebies from the Navy, we just had to pay the freight.

And I don't even think about how much it cost to ship them from Indiana to SoCal!

Next time I'm there I'll have my Nikon with me, so I'll get some close ups of the individual shells.

And as soon as I get some pix of the JOTA event, I'll post them here.

Suffice to say we ran 130 Scouts, in four groups, through the 4 stations we had running, and got them all signed off for the "On-The-Air" portion of their Radio Merit Badge class.

We even worked W7BSA, and K2BSA, which made some of our Scouts really happy.

And they ALL had a great time exploring the Iowa!

250,000 Page Views!

Which aint bad for a little blog that's not updated regularly, doesn't run pr0n, and really doesn't have much to say.

Spent all day on the Iowa finishing up the three W-J 8718A receivers we have.

Next week we'll run some tests on them to determine if they all meet the sensitivity specs, and if they do, we'll call it a wrap.

*Most* of the 1051 receivers are working, but about half of them need the belts that connect the tuning mechanisms to the front panel knobs replaced.

We were able to contact the company that makes the drive belts, and they graciously provided us with enough spares to replace all the belts in all the receivers (we have something like 20 of them), along with some extra spares for the parts cabinet.

Now that we have the W-J 8718A's back on-line, my focus is going to shift to getting the original HF transmitters running again.

The first step will be to physically inspect each one to see if any parts or assemblies have been pulled, and "red tag" any we find that have had parts removed.

Then we'll pick a likely one that's easy to get at, and start running the "New Installation" guide in the back of the manual we have.

These are rated at 1000 Watts continuous (100% Duty Cycle) use, and could put out quite a bit more with a different power supply.

Spread The Word!

Busy, Busy, Busy!

Between the Honey Dew list, my time on the Iowa, and doing some "emergency" repairs on PC's for friends, I've been keeping pretty busy these days.

The last of the suspension parts came in for my Supra (new springs! I'm dropping the front 1.5" and the rear .75"), so I'm planning on getting started on her Real Soon Now.

Finished up rebuilding a PC I'll be taking down to the Iowa so we can do computer-based logging on, and that should help keep the records straight.

We're making several hundred contacts per week, and it was getting to be a chore filling out all the cards an envelopes for QSL cards.

AND........Friday was kind of a bummer for my wife and I. I gave one of her best friends a ride to and from the hospital for her colonoscopy, and she's got a major problem. She has an ulcer "the size of a nickle", and the Doctor who did the procedure is already talking chemo and radiation, so she and my wife are rather distraught.

She won't know for sure until the biopsy results come back, so we've got our fingers and toes crossed.