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Hi, long time fan of the show here, decided to join

Pentium100

By Pentium100, User

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Pentium100

Pentium100

My Favourite Mane 6 Pony

twilight-sparkle

How did you find MLP Forums?

Google

How you became a fan of My Little Pony

A long time ago (I think it was around the end of Season 2) I noticed the pony pictures posted on the internet (I later found out that this was when the bronies were really controversial), liked the design style, kinda liked Twilight (her design appealed to me) and decided to watch the first episodes to find out. I liked them and continued to watch the show.

Hi, I am a long time fan of the show, I also read a lot of fanfics - I think MLP actually got me into reading fanfics. Unlike a lot of other fans of the show I have zero artistic ability. In addition to MLP, I like SciFi shows, especially Stargate and Babylon 5. Other than TV, I am interested electronics and old technology in general (steam engines, vacuum tubes, stuff like that). I have some servers as well.

I have watched the show since season 2, but have stopped for a few years (but continued to read fanfics), then came back to season 8 I think. That gave me a lot of episodes to watch instead of waiting for each one. I am usually OK with spoilers and will sometimes go looking for them, so not having seen some episodes, but having them referenced in fanfics was not a problem.

I do not know how active I'll be here, but we will see I guess.

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Splashee

Splashee

Hi @Pentium100! Welcome to the forum :fluttershy:

 

Well, I am sitting next to a perfectly working Pentium II 400, but I also have a Pentium 200 MMX somewhere reachable. I also repair old telephones, maybe not vacuum tubes, but copper oxide rectifiers are used for getting AC to DC.

I am of course here for the MLP FIM show too :P

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Pentium100

Pentium100

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Thanks for the warm welcome, it will be nice to be able to discuss the show with someone (my friends don't like the show).

 

@Splashee copper oxide rectifiers - I'll have to look those up, as I only know mercury vapor rectifiers (have never seen one from up close), selenium (some of my radios have them) and vacuum tube (the amps I built have them), well, in addition to the modern ones.

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Pentium100

Pentium100

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(edited)

Such a cute picture...

I agree that Jack was the best in SG1, I like his style of humor. The alternate reality people dying was a bit weird, but then again, "original" reality was the best - they overcame all problems, I guess the alternate realities were what would have been if something failed. Though there probably were some alternate realities where everything was even better, but they had no need to contact the "original" reality.

 

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Splashee

Splashee

18 hours ago, Pentium100 said:

@Splashee copper oxide rectifiers - I'll have to look those up, as I only know mercury vapor rectifiers (have never seen one from up close), selenium (some of my radios have them) and vacuum tube (the amps I built have them), well, in addition to the modern ones.

[Incoming nerd-mode, I can't help it!]

 

The copper oxide rectifiers are used in the 1950-1970 ringer wall box for the special intermediate station telephones here in Sweden, which I do not only collect but also repair. They caught my attention when I was little (they were still in use in the late 80's).

The rectifier is in there together with two capacitors, a relay with a slow on-to-off state, and the bell. Back in those days, the ringers in all telephone instruments had coils with a total resistance of 1000 ohm (compare to today's, lol give or take a few decades, of 8100 ohm). That meant the bell was only connected to the line in series with the blocking DC capacitor when the instrument was on-hook, and never when it was off-hook. But the intermediate station with its L1 line coming from the station, and its L2 line going to the sub station had two bells, one inside the telephone like normal (to ring when L2 was calling), and one sitting in the wall box (to ring when the station was calling). The wall box ringer was always connected to L1 (in parallel) and it's constant -48 Volts DC from the station. A 1000 ohm bell that only responds to AC would make an annoying ding sound every time the handset leaves the cradle (going off-hook) or the rotary dial is used (fast on-hook to off-hook in a sequence), because of the capacitors (either blocking the line DC or used for spark quenching during dial) discharging the stored line Voltage into the coil in a short AC looking burst.
The solution was to have a relay coil that only allowed the bell to function when enough Voltage was applied, but that ringer Voltage which is AC with an irregular non-sinusoidal waveform needs to be converted into a steady DC voltage for the relay coil to constantly stay on during ringing, and hence the copper oxide rectifier is used.
The result is that the DC Voltage from the station, back then being -38 Volt, and now -48 Volt cannot activate the relay (being 2100 ohm), but the ringer AC Voltage of 90 Volt at 20-25 Hz will activate the relay to let the AC Voltage through to the next stage: The bell's coils to ring it.
In the 70's, the copper oxide rectifier was replaced by two diodes, and a weird looking yellow blob with two legs, which seems to have a very high resistance (I can't tell if it is a capacitor or a MOV, or what its function is). But most wall boxes had the copper oxide rectifiers and they are working perfectly today! (they age really well)

I would guess that copper oxide was better for lower Voltage, and selenium for higher (like rectifying from the mains). :twismile:

 

 

 

Yea, SG1 is an awesome show. On of my favorites to rewatch every other year :P

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Pentium100

Pentium100

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@Splashee that's interesting. I usually do not have anything to do with phones, actually it's been a while since I last saw a rotary phone. I have taken some phones apart when I was a kid, but I was mostly interested in the earpiece and the dial mechanism. Normally it's radios, tape decks, amplifiers and an occasional computer power supply, TV or UPS for me :). I prefer stuff with vacuum tubes, it's always interesting to see how they managed to get good results with so few active elements.

 

I rewatch B5 and SG1 every once in a while. I agree with @Twilight Luna that B5 is under appreciated for some reason.

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