Monthly Archives: January 2011

Thoughts on the T-Mobile G2

Posted on January 27, 2011 by jwk

For the first time in my history of buying cell phones I decided not to pay the early adopter tax and just waited until the phone I wanted, the G2, became free with a contract extension. That happened this month, … Continue reading →

Posted in Commentary, Gadgets | Tagged , , , | 1 Comment

Neon Lamp Project: Continued

Posted on January 26, 2011 by jwk

Continuing the Neon Lamp Project that I started a few months ago, I’ve put some more thought into it. I’ve decided to merge the Neon Lamp project with my Chronulator project. I’m planning to sell Chronulators constructed in vintage wood … Continue reading →

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Custom Field Multi-Select in Bugzilla 3.4.2

Posted on January 25, 2011 by jwk

I administrate a Bugzilla installation used by the software-development arm of our company to track their progress. I never touched it before being given the task of upgrading a 2.14 installation to 3.4.2. The previous maintainer manually added fields to … Continue reading →

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Refurbishing a Capacitance Tester

Posted on January 20, 2011 by jwk

Parts Express sent me an advertisement for a $45 capacitance meter today. This actually a pretty good deal, and it’s a useful thing to have around if you’re doing electronics work. I’d probably have bought one myself, if I didn’t … Continue reading →

Posted in Electronics, Radios and Tubes, Vintage | Tagged , , , , | 1 Comment

Cost Engineering in 2011

Posted on January 18, 2011 by jwk

While the power transformer in my previous post may have lasted for years, it ultimately still succumbed to poor design and the transformer is widely regarded as a weak point in Zenith sets. Cost engineering to pick the exact right … Continue reading →

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Cost Engineering in the 1930s

Posted on January 15, 2011 by jwk

It looks like cost engineering was already happening back in the 1930s: In the foreground, the destroyed original power transformer from the 1939 Zenith 7-S-363 radio; the rear, an equivalently rated replacement built in October 2010 by Edcor Transformer. In order … Continue reading →

Posted in Commentary, Radios and Tubes, Vintage | Tagged , , , | 3 Comments

Web Reading Goes Full Circle

Posted on January 15, 2011 by jwk

In the early days of the Internet, if you wanted to read a web page, you had to go to that site. If there were updates, you needed to check it manually as often as you wanted to know it … Continue reading →

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Repairing a Vintage Radio (Coronado 907)

Posted on January 13, 2011 by jwk

As I’ve mentioned, I like to repair vintage radios. Nothing quite compares to the experience of hearing a piece of engineering history once relegated to the trash bin crackle to life with the sweet sounds of the 1930s-40s. It’s also … Continue reading →

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