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General Vintage Technology Discussions For general discussions about vintage radio and other vintage electronics etc. |
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14th Mar 2018, 3:11 pm | #1 |
Banned
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Bygone Technology and Useless Items.
Thinking of what we all love to repair, preserve, restore, I thought what items of old technology would we not want or be able to restore.
The scrapping of Concorde was possibly the first retrograde development in the history of flight and aeronautic engineering, but given massive resources it could still be flown. The analogue mobile phone? Is it a completely dead, useless item? The filament light bulb is going the same way. We seem to have saved the valve for now. The iron lung, developed for polio victims? Any use now? Golf ball printers? Mercury barometers? Dolly blue and cream? What have we left behind in our rush to Armageddon? Anything we should save now? |
14th Mar 2018, 3:24 pm | #2 |
Dekatron
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Re: Bygone Technology and Useless Items.
I'm truly happy to see the back of carbon-paper!
Likewise the nasty 'spirit duplicator' things with type-on-wax stencils that produced copies in purple which got less and less distinct with each copy. Fax-machines, too. [Though as a just-out-of-university student during an early-1980s postal-strike I made a vast sum of money selling/installing fax-machines to small/medium-sized businesses.] And finally - the "Rabbit" pseudo-mobile-phone. An idea which was rendered instantly obsolete by proper mobile-phones becoming spectacularly cheap to buy and use. Last edited by G6Tanuki; 14th Mar 2018 at 3:33 pm. |
14th Mar 2018, 3:30 pm | #3 |
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Re: Bygone Technology and Useless Items.
Wet photo copiers.
The office managers used to complain bitterly if you did not take a book apart to stop the edges wasting toner. I used to have to wait till the office manager went to lunch before doing a manual. |
14th Mar 2018, 3:58 pm | #4 |
Nonode
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Re: Bygone Technology and Useless Items.
Although polio is largely a disease of the past, iron lungs are still used for other conditions that paralyse the breathing muscles.
Modern machines are more sophisticated, but the old sort if in working order could still be used. Filament lamps still work as well as they ever did, but are less used due to the availability of alternatives. |
14th Mar 2018, 4:04 pm | #5 |
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Re: Bygone Technology and Useless Items.
Maplins gift cards! On a more serious note pagers.
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14th Mar 2018, 4:10 pm | #6 |
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Re: Bygone Technology and Useless Items.
Modern tech. (of any age) is transitory, all we need is a roof, warmth and food.
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14th Mar 2018, 11:59 pm | #7 | |
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Re: Bygone Technology and Useless Items.
Quote:
Cheers Nick |
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15th Mar 2018, 12:20 am | #8 |
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Re: Bygone Technology and Useless Items.
Polaroid cameras. I have a bolt-on 'scope camera, Polaroid back, I last used in 1996, works very well... except film is not available!
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15th Mar 2018, 12:57 am | #9 |
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Re: Bygone Technology and Useless Items.
Hi Nick
They were referred to as bandas as the trade mark of the manufacturer Block and Anderson was BandA. Everybody remembers the purple transfer sheets, but the big advantage of the spirit duplicator was that you could also get red and other colour sheets, and at the time it was the only machine that would let you duplicate financial documents which included 'red' figures. The copy quality was rubbish though, after the first few copies. The fluid came in gallon cans, and was either Methanol or Ethanol, - I cant remember which. I dont think H & S would stand for that today! Kind regards Dave |
15th Mar 2018, 1:21 am | #10 | |
Octode
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Re: Bygone Technology and Useless Items.
Quote:
Thanks for the information All the best Nick |
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15th Mar 2018, 2:17 am | #11 |
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Re: Bygone Technology and Useless Items.
The default Banda colour was purple and other colours were "posh" and more expensive.
I worked at a place that had an A1 blueprint copier that used to smell of gun powder in the R&D department. Circuit diagrams were very cumbersome on a single huge sheet. |
15th Mar 2018, 9:04 am | #12 |
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Re: Bygone Technology and Useless Items.
And that lack of availability is going to cause knock-on effects for products that use incandescant lamps as low-power heaters.
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15th Mar 2018, 9:09 am | #13 |
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Re: Bygone Technology and Useless Items.
Presumably, it is still usable as a landline 'phone. I have one as a display-only item, but really ought to power it up to check that is the case.
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Mending is better than Ending (cf Brave New World by Aldous Huxley) |
15th Mar 2018, 9:43 am | #14 |
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Re: Bygone Technology and Useless Items.
Ammonia "printers". We used them in seismic back in the day. I forget the exact mechanism but it involved the item being developed over an ammonia bath. Very smelly.
gmb |
15th Mar 2018, 9:44 am | #15 | |
Nonode
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Re: Bygone Technology and Useless Items.
Quote:
In twenty years' time, I'll advertise it in the 'For sale' section of the by-then-thriving vintage lighting forum ... Paul & mods, an opportunity here maybe? Having said that, it may also be that by then, ownership/operation of incandescent lamp equipment will be considered a civil offence, enforceable by ASBO and resulting in a resistance movement ... ... aww, heck ... my coat's zip fastener's stuck again. Cheers Guy
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"What a depressingly stupid machine." [Marvin: HHGTTG] Last edited by Nymrod121; 15th Mar 2018 at 9:50 am. Reason: cynical SoB mode |
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15th Mar 2018, 10:20 am | #16 |
Hexode
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Re: Bygone Technology and Useless Items.
How about dot-matrix printers?
Very noisy things for which soundproof enclosures were available. These made useful cold frames for use in the garden once laser printers came along. |
15th Mar 2018, 10:25 am | #17 |
Hexode
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Re: Bygone Technology and Useless Items.
Your school seemed to do a better job than mine. Perhaps they had better quality machines, serviced them more regularly or replenished supplies more often? Ours were often barely readable when new and quite unreadable by the end of the course when required for revision.
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15th Mar 2018, 10:54 am | #18 | |
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Re: Bygone Technology and Useless Items.
Quote:
It [and the department that ran it] was known as Ozalid, as in "take this third-angle projection over to Ozalid and get me two copies, will you?" Only copies were ever allowed to go out to the pattern-maker or machine-shop: the originals had to stay in the drawing-office or the fireproof store-room. The condensed ammonia from the machine was saved, and the cleaners would use it on the canteen floor! |
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15th Mar 2018, 11:16 am | #19 |
Octode
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Re: Bygone Technology and Useless Items.
Regarding Banda, my word-association leads me to NIG-Banda and then NIG-Mason. I think these must have been associated companies or later incarnations of the original. All dissolved now I think.
Dot matrix printers still used for multi-sheet printouts at tyre dealers and builders' merchants. Squarials(?) Graham
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15th Mar 2018, 11:23 am | #20 |
Heptode
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Re: Bygone Technology and Useless Items.
You probably need to differentiate between bygone technology and useless items.
Filament bulbs may be bygone technology, but can still be used as originally intended. Likewise AVOs, valve radios and much else. I have a Psion 3 (several!) pocket computer from 1995 which I use every day, and a HP 95lx from the same era which is a fantastic calculator, especially for finance calculations (e.g. TVM with all variables visible), but a laptop from a decade later is almost as useless as an analogue mobile phone. Then I suppose there are things like a Model T Ford, which can be used, but are not really an everyday "go to" item. I won't mention 405 line tellies on this forum. Oh b****r. |