Hoverboards & Segways

[Tim Watts]

Yes - you could build a *lot* of useful things with a 555, 741 and some CMOS or TTL logic.

I made (own design unless said):

Tacho for the car (contact breaker spike suppression was actually the hardest part).

Kitchen timer that was intuitive and was used for years by my Mum.

Heathkit alarm clock that was still the nicest clock I ever had.

Heathkit freezer temperature/door alarm (we were always leaving the door not quite shut).

Touch dimmer switch;

Caravan Aquaroll water level indicator - *that* was really useful!

These days, the tacho is standard and no CB to pick up off anyway, the freezer alarm is standard on many units, no one with a smartphone needs a kitchen timer, dimmer switches are 2 a penny.

Only my water level meter was probably still better than most of what's on sale today.

and for everything you'd use an AVR or PIC and write some code...

[damduck-egg]

Floating boats seems an apt term as 50 years ago Radio Caroline had already been on air for over a year and Radio London was coming up to its first birthday and a host of other pop stations were soon to join them. Kids unless they were very square or whatever the term of the time was would be more interested in the output from a small portable Transistor radio than the technicalities of the equipment itself, A crystal radio was probably too far divorced from their world even then.

G.Harman

[tabbypurr]

Yes. But it did at least have some reason to exist: radios were expensive, and you probably wouldn't have one in the bedroom. Today a smartphone delivers far better and all kids seem to have them.

NT

[tabbypurr]

Do you still have the circuit for the timer?

NT

[Andrew Gabriel]

A 15 year old boy died this week when his hoverboard took him in front of a moving bus in London.

[ARW]

Dream on.

It's a wonder the shower of s**te leaving school these days can even manage to tie their own shoelaces or wipe their own arses without a smart phone app.

[tabbypurr]

sadly too often true. What were we like back then?

NT

[Fredxxx]

I think our elders thought we were. It's a sign of age when you start chastising school leavers!

I suspect many here have stopped thinking policeman are getting younger by coming to terms with this fact years ago? :-)

[News]

In message , Fredxxx writes

I went to son's parents' evening last week. I thought at least one of the teachers was a pupil. Seriously.

[charles]

At my school the pupils wore caps. A new member of the teaching staff was told off my another master for not wearing his cap. That was nearly 60 years ago. nothing changes.

[News]

In message , charles writes

Nothing changes indeed - except that now, it is ME getting old :-)

[ARW]

It's a pity that you cannot chastise people that are still at school without a police officer turning up at your door 24 hours later.

[pamela]

The kids these days seem to know all about the rules and regulations. Plus imagined "human rights". Some of them will make good lawyers one day!

[The Natural Philosopher]

Some of them will die at the wrong end of something like an AK47, still protesting that its illegal to shoot total idiots, as they are a protected species.

[ARW]

This one was not smart enough to realise that he had been chastised for assaulting a smaller and younger child. Ran home to his "parents" and they called the police after he was chastised. The police went back to the idiots house with an assault allegation.

[Vir Campestris]

First thing I see is a power amplifier module. Not exactly a single part.

I've worked on 'phone chips, and I don't understand a lot of them. I understood a crystal radio, and I remember having an old Grundig FM/LW/MW/SW radio with a circuit diagram that I could understand. These days? No chance.

Andy