And what did we buy today?

Disabled Account
Joined 2002
Shops pay VAT that is charged to them but get it back from the state by means of tax reduction. I am not sure if it resembles your system but it is not easy to explain. Since the tax office is checking bookkeeping things are tightly done according rules.

With regards to private persons (the true tax payers): not yet although chances are likely that it officially must be reported. Solution: cash money will go away in a few years. NFC chips have been invented for a reason. When people can pay private deals directly with their smart phones, i.e. like paying with cash but the digital and thus verifyable way, the road is clear for taxes on these items too. Stopping "black money" as it is called here was the intention from the start. The technology already works. My prediction is that people will start trading services between each other i.e. the painter painting your house while you as a gardener maintain his garden etc. "With closed wallets" so to speak.

Since the tax burden is high here people become quite inventive and the black money circuit is therefor quite large too. IMO you can see this as a kind of balance. Electricians, house builders, plumbers etc. often work after office hours without charging VAT for private persons. Common thought is that when you pay such extreme amounts of tax money one deserves some price discount. It differs between Germany and the Netherlands though where the latter has a large unofficial circuit where many people offer their professional (black) services with the same quality level. The standard phrase is: "Do you want a price with or without receipt?" ;)
 
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Disabled Account
Joined 2017
Speaking of which I just had a pair of Phillips OEM LED replacement taillights BAY15D globes confiscated by australian customs. :(

You can buy these locally from auto stores, so not sure why they were confiscated???

I guess someone needed a christmas present.
 

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In posts 820 and 835 I bought a Hammond M3 organ which works good.....still not sure how to get it into my basement lab though. The basement doorway (with the door removed) is only 2 inches wider than the organ. Some disassembly will be required.

In post 875 I bought 750 reed relays for cheapo from a surplus place. Today I got another box from the same place. This one contains 1000 2N3903 transistors ($36 shipped) to drive those relays. My initial thought was to build a MIDI in for the organ, but the ADHD inside me keeps telling me other things to do with them. Any thoughts / votes?

1) MIDI in for the Hammond....major project.

2) MIDI control for the modular synth that I'm slowly building to eliminate patch cables and allow instantaneous repatching. The synth IS a major project, but adding MIDI repatching at design and build time is far easier than retrofit.

3) MIDI control of a vacuum tube guitar amp. This would be a new design, but the simplest of the three.

Number 2 and 3 could be accomplished with the relays I have , but number one would consume most of them making number 2 and 3 impossible unless those relays go on sale again.
 
1) MIDI in for the Hammond....major project.

2) MIDI control for the modular synth that I'm slowly building to eliminate patch cables and allow instantaneous repatching. The synth IS a major project, but adding MIDI repatching at design and build time is far easier than retrofit.

3) MIDI control of a vacuum tube guitar amp. This would be a new design, but the simplest of the three.

I think (1) is the coolest but (3) is the most practical.

As for what I bought, more of the same for my main project of setting up TV, internet, and phones for the new house.

On top of the previous stuff I mentioned, bought some RCA plugs on ebay and a 70 ft hand coil of RG11 off of online classifieds for $7 to attempt over-the-top composite video cables. It's ridiculously thick and stiff, with the older outer jacket material of 15-20 years ago. It's a cheap experiment and I will fall back to RG6 if it simply doesn't work.

Expanded the satellite effort, now that the subscription stuff is installed by a tech, will move to also set up a free-to-air dish so my mother-in-law can watch Chinese TV for free. She won't watch state news channels though, so if that fails might have to point the dish elsewhere to watch some free soccer.

Bought a bunch of RCA and BNC jacks and some RG179 so I can fit coax outputs to my subscription and FTA receivers which only have TOSLINK outputs right now.
 
Disabled Account
Joined 2017
Bought 8x bluray discs for $3.00 AUD each at the local video store.

Hot Fuzz
Sucker
Mall Cop
Hybrid 3D
Saw VI
Saw V
A Nightmare on Elm Street
Lethal Weapon 2

Not a bad score considering I only paid $24 .

I will be ripping the discs to hard drive for backup and keeping them stored in a 500 disc wallet and tossing out the covers.
 
The pop-off valve on my water heater let go again.

I have 125 yards+ of water line down hill to my house. Every time a valve is shut quickly (like washing machine) I get a water hammer.

I'm going to install a 2 gallon diaphragm tank near the hot water heater and install it on the water inlet. Hopefully this will help.

Water hammer travels at the seed of sound over the length of the water supply piping. Water hammer happens when the water comes to an abrupt stop at the offending fast acting shut off valve, most often a solenoid valve.

The water hammer reflects off the suddenly closed valve and travels the other direction at the speed of a tsunami. Placing the WHA at the water heater will do no good protecting the pipe that runs down the hill. The sound may be attenuated in the house; however the sound in the house is not what will damage the pipe that runs down the hill.

The tank that you show in the photo is for thermal expansion and contraction and prevents excessive pressure caused by heating water in the water heater. Yes you will normally see that tank as shown at the water heater.

A Slow Closing Solenoid Valve,

https://www.asco.com/ASCO Asset Library/asco-series-221-slow-closing-catalog.pdf

would be a far better solution.

If you want, this is a real water hammer arrestor and should be installed at the supply pipe at the offending fast acting valve.

WHB Series - Stainless Steel Bellows Type Water Hammer Arrestors

DT
(30 years a plumbing instructor)
 
Prescription for blood thinners. :(

Actually this is very good news. What we've been thinking was the flu, or pneumonia, turned out to be a pulmonary embolism (multiple blood clots in the lungs). Left untreated, it could've been much, much worse. As it stands, there's no permanent damage, full recovery expected. :)

Feeling pretty damn lucky tonight.
 
Whooof, glad you're with us Jim! Do take care, blood thinners are serious business, and hopefully the clots break up quickly so you'll be done roughly around the 6 month mark and can go on the baby aspirin diet. Don't know what your diet/exercise routine is, but this is a good time to look carefully. (And smoking)

I'm not that kind of doctor, but work with them pretty regularly. Take care of yourself. :)
 
Almost $200 worth of parts from Mouser, the Electronic Goldmine, and Amazon, some of which will likely be sacrificed to the fire gods.

After avoiding these experiments for nearly 20 years based on past explosions, burnt parts, and one minor fire, I am going to venture into the world of off line SMPS again. My last line powered experiments ended when I blew up all the mosfets I could get free from the Motorola / ON semi reps.

My direct from car battery experiments went a bit better, but I quickly learned to place an inverted coffee mug over the mosfets on power up. I did successfully make a 240 watt (1X 100 and 4 X 35 watt) car amplifier for my senior design project in college (1993), well before such things were common at Walmart. It took a large pile of silicon, much of which was sacrificed to get the DIY transformer right.

The integrated solution chips of today are much better than the wimpy mosfets of the past. Today we have simulation tools and processing power that should allow me to do much of the "smoke testing" in the virtual world.....and the "line voltage" will come from a current limited power supply.