| Blowing Hard |
 Many of your will recognize the picture as "Satchmo" Louis Armstrong, arguably the most famous jazz trumpet player the world has known. Starting up from very humble beginnings in New Orleans (his father was a laborer and drifter while his mother was a part-time prostitute), he was determined to work his way out of the poverty that he grew up within.
In a strange twist of fate, he was arrested at the age of 12 for discharging a firearm in public and sent to a "waif's home". It was there that he met Peter Davis who sparked the young Louis' interest in music and taught him to play the coronet.
Hard work and considerable talent eventually brought the young Mr. Armstrong the fame and fortune that he sought, but he remained humble and mindful of his roots throughout his career. To read more detail of this remarkable man's life, just click the picture. Below you'll find some quotes that reveal the inner workings of his mind and work ethic.
"What we play is life."
"There is no such thing as 'on the way out' as long as you are still doing something interesting and good; you're in the business because you're breathing"
"Never play a thing the same way twice"
"I don't let my mouth say nothin' my head can't stand"
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Can You Solve This? |
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As we've expanded our product offerings over the years, the variety and number of application questions that we handle has gotten more challenging. Fortunately we like a good challenge around here since the more we learn, the more help we have to offer our customers. This month's issue concerns the use of our Swiftcomm wireless interface. A customer had just installed the system in an overhead crane application - saving him the time and expense of running cable through the cable festoon. This was a really nasty environment and he was happy to simplify the installation and operation of his feedback system. Shortly after he had been running successfully for several days, he started having encoder signal dropouts which would shut down his system and he wondered if the wireless interface might be the culprit. We asked him to double check all the wiring and then check both the "Status" and "Link" lights on the front panel of his Swiftcomm transmitter and receiver boxes. He reported back that the Status light would blink about once a second and that the Link light was on steadily. What does this reveal? Answer: The Status light is designed to blink every time there is a lost packet of data. Since a complete packet is sent every 600 microseconds, and the Swiftcomm firmware has built-in recovery algorithms for lost packets, occasional blinking of the Status light is normal operation. The Link light indicates that the the transmitter and receiver are in communication and as long as it was lit, there is good communication. Having determined that the Swiftcomm radio link was operating normally, he then pulled the encoder off the motor for a bench test and found that it was producing an intermittent output and needed to be replaced. It turns out the the timing of the encoder failure just happened to be coincident with the installation of the wireless interface and was a completely unrelated event. |
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Yikes Strikes!
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 Something extraordinary happens when you take common events that normally happen very quickly and then capture them with a high speed video camera. Suddenly they are revealed in fascinating detail and the character of the event is dramatically different from what you ordinarily experience. Many web sites are dedicated to the art of slow motion photography, but one of the most intriguing ones that I found is footage of lightning strikes as photographed from an airplane. Click the picture to visit the site and watch as the lightning "grows" and branches while it seeks to equalize it's electrical potential. You'll never look at this phenomena in quite the same way again.
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As August comes to a close it's starting to look like the slow industrial market recovery may be starting. In addition, schools are getting their classes underway, and the long days of summer are noticeably shorter. It feels like a time of transition and with a little luck, some new beginnings and business opportunities.
