Dah-di-dah-dah Dah-Dah-di-di, Earlie. (That's as far as I ever got)
OT What kind of plane did you build?
I visited a place at our local airport where they mail out kits for a riveted all-metal one-seater that has performance beyond WWII's best prop-driven fighters. But I lacked the money, patience, motor skills, and courage even to consider the idea of putting one of those together. But it was a neat-looking machine. I didn't see it fly and that was about eight years ago and I have even forgotten the name and don't know if they are still in business. It was at the GSO airport (Piedmont Triad, North Carolina--Winston-Salem, Greensboro, High Point).
I started out with vacuum tubes, too, but my interest soon veered towards what used to be called Hi-Fi instead of radio. Assembled several Heathkit amplifiers, built speaker enclosures, etc. I did have a short-wave receiver I salvaged somewhere, and years later when I took up astronomy I actually managed to make my own variable-speed 110-volt AC power supply for the telescope motors, using a center-tapped power supply transformer in reverse to take 12 volts up to 110. Of course now that looks primitive, when at Sam's Club even you can buy a computer-controlled telescope that will slew automatically to any coordinates in the sky.
When personal computers came along, I just thought they would be like personal telescopes--for which the market, though much larger than it once was, is still quite limited.
Back to topic, though, have you got any ideas about the next big tech thing? Usually what happens is that something makes life easier or more satisfying, often by improving either transportation or communication. I guess what I overlooked in home computers was the communication possibility. |
