Cheerfully unhelpful suppliers

Here's an odd one:

I started setting off the alarms in Sainsbury's. The first time, I went to the loo and it went off as I and two others walked in. When I left, on my own, it went off again! Puzzled, I left the store to return to my wife and car. The exit alarm went off too - but nobody took any notice, so I shrugged my shoulders and carried on.

A few days later, I set off the alarms again in a different branch of Sainsbury's. This time, I was stopped by security.

It wasn't the shopping - only me!

I went through the contents of my pockets until I got to my wallet, which turned out to be the culprit. "Oh!", I said, "It must be objecting to my Tesco loyalty card!". The guy seemed happy, so I left.

A couple of weeks later, I was sorting out all the receipts and credit/debit card slips in my wallet when I came across an unused (protective backing still in place) RF ID tag, which was obviously the problem.

So, did the cashier think it would be fun to slip one of these in with the receipt and other bumpf I was handed - presumably at the first store where I had a problem?

I can't think of any other explanation ...

Reply to
Terry Casey
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The idea of using ground cereal as part of a moisture meter almost makes sense. But not in the context of the thread. Is that really how they work?

Andy

Reply to
Andy Champ

Maybe they've been used to measure the moisture content of cereal?

Reply to
Andy Burns

I used to use one of these in my lab to measure the moisture content of cereals and other ingredients of animal feedstuffs, and they were considered at that time to be the top of the range instruments for the job. Grind had to be right, compaction had to be right, and you used different scales depending on the actual material under test (ie barley would be different from wheat, which would be different from maize, etc, etc).

Nettie Smith (long since moved on to other stuff!)

Reply to
Nettie

I think so. Others may measure capacitance.

The post was to alert collectors to the disposal of some vacuum valves:-)

regards

Reply to
Tim Lamb

In message , Nettie writes

A lurker? Welcome!

The compaction was controlled by a spring press with an indicator enabling repeatable measurements. I guess oven testing would give more reliable results but not on a combine harvester in the field.

regards

Reply to
Tim Lamb

It's because AWEM is putting his replies *after* the signature separator dash-dash-space "-- " which makes your reading software think that it is part of the signature and grey it out.

"-- " should be at the end of what you write with just your sig text below it, if you have any...

Reply to
funkyoldcortina

The "-- " is fine, but you need to make sure it goes after your message (and maybe before the "AWEM")

Reply to
funkyoldcortina

I had something similar, but don't remember who made them now - it certainly wasn't Marconi. The ones I had were fitted with digital readouts, using Nixies (and given the driver ICs, I'm guessing early-to- mid 70s - later wouldn't have used Nixies, and earlier likely wouldn't have the chips).

I salvaged three of them, but only kept the Nixies and driver boards. They'll probably end up as something like this:

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Jules

Reply to
Jules Richardson

Favourite field method I seem to remember was a 'Speedy Moisture Meter' comprising an aluminium cylinder with a pressure meter in the base. You put a measured volume of grain (or in my case casting sand) into the cylinder with an excess of calcium carbide, and screwed the lid on. The moisture produced acetylene by reacting with the carbide, and the resultant pressure was calibrated on the meter in terms of percentage moisture. Easy and reliable to use. I have several as I used them in my home foundry measuring moisture content of green sand.

AWEM

Reply to
Andrew Mawson

As a lad I had the task of wandering aimlessly around a field and picking the odd ear or two or three or ...

These were deposited in a brown paper bag (I doubt the colour actually mattered but that's what we always did) and taken back to the barn where they were carefully winnowed and the grains mixed up before putting them through a hand driven coffee mill to get the flour. The flour was then placed into a short cylinder which was then placed between two jaws the top of which was screwed down tightly. The gauge was calibrated to ambient temperature and type of grain (wheat barley or oats for us) and automagically it gave the moisture content from which the decision was taken to combine or not.

The cake that came out was then greedily snapped up by younger children or dogs dependent upon who got their first.

Reply to
David P

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