I use a PDA instead of a laptop when travelling – it makes my passage through airport security much faster – but I can’t seem to get the hang of writing with a stylus. Answer? a folding keyboard! I did have a folding keyboard – it lasted two trips away before the hinge broke. I was on a trip when this happened, so I looked around for a replacement.
I chose the iPaq bluetooth folding keyboard as I figured it would connect easily with my iPaq PDA, and it seemed a bit more robust than the other keyboard.
iPaq 2750 with iPaq bluetooth foldable keyboard – at Hotel Berlin, Berlin, Germany
Strengths
It connects easily with the iPaq PDA; the keyboard has a good strong feel to it – like a real keyboard – a good size for real typing; good battery life; and it folds up just a little larger than the PDA so it travels well in a small bag.
Weaknesses
The pullout holder works only in portrait mode – in landscape the angle is almost vertical. The solution I used was to trim the holder’s ‘fingers’ back with nail clippers – now the angle is great for landscape mode. Second weakness is that it feels only a little stronger than my previous keyboard, but so far so good.
Summary
This is a great portable keyboard. It is truly possible to leave the laptop at home on business trips and work comfortably on planes or in coffee shops or hotels. Yes you can use bluetooth devices on planes – after 20 minutes from takeoff and up to 20 minutes before landing. The keyboard is comfortable and responsive, and connects easily and reliably. It feels like a decent laptop keyboard on hard flat surfaces (use a book if on your lap). It is light and compact – easily fitting into a small bag, although it’s too big for most clothing pockets. Battery life is good – I used one set on a two-week trip, including flights from London to Australia, and the batteries were still good two weeks later.
Inspired by McCabe’s runners I decided to have a go at adapting one of McCabe’s designs using standard plumbing hardware and a few basic tools. I bought an ‘L’- join from a hardware store, and a brass screw cap for the valve chest. The one I modelled mine on was the ‘Paul-Zee’ design.
I smoothed the bore as McCabe suggests – using a dowel in a drill with some sandpaper wrapped round. With the bore smooth, I took a three-eighth inch bolt and mounted it in a portable drill and spun it against a grinder wheel – with the grinder going in opposite directions – that gave me a nice rounded bolt head ground to just fit the bore of the plumbing pipe. I then found a washer and ground it to fit inside the plumbing sleeve on the end of the joiner.
I cut off the threaded portion of the bolt and drilled a small hole near the end – this would take the connecting rod.
I then took a small bolt, cut off the head and drilled down through the centre to make a small tube with a thread. I then drilled a hole in the plug cap just big enough for the bolt and cut a thread into it using a tap and die, and screwed it in place, held by a lock nut to keep it in place. This is the steam inlet pipe.
Then I drilled a transverse hole through the plug in line with the body to take the slide valve. The valve is made from small diameter steel rod, with a hole drilled near one end for the valve connecting rod, and another hole drilled to line up with the steam inlet hole when the piston is about halfway along the cylinder.
I filed the valve flat about half a centimetre from the steam inlet hole so it would line up with the edge of the valve chest internal wall – as I hadn’t used a solid plug as recommended.
Then I made a wooden base for the engine
Then after scraping off the flux from a steel welding rod I then cleaned the rod and cut it to be a good length to make the crankshaft. I carefully bent it to make two cranks 90 degrees out of phase, then made short connecting rods from wire to connect the crankshaft to the piston and the valve. With lots of spray grease the whole lot rotated quite smoothly, and when spun in the chuck of my drill it made a very satisfactory engine sound.
Tomorrow I shall make a flywheel, and then hopefully I will know if I have made a fatal error in construction. Here is the current state of the engine, and an animation based on rotating the crankshaft.
Well the plane may be long gone, but it appears that the Besler aircraft engine has survived, and may be seen either at the Warner Robins Air Force Museum in Warner Robins, Georgia USA, or at the Savannah Science Museum (from where it was loaned). This came from the Tiny Power website – makers of model and marine steam engines. Tiny Power has now started making scale model replicas of the aircraft engine. Their site has versions of the following two photos. (I’ve tinkered to make them more legible). According to the museum sign, the engine is a three cylinder single-acting radial design, putting out 70HP at 300PSI steam pressure. Bore and stroke: 3.125″ x 4.125″, displacing 165.38 inches and the whole unit weighed 100lb including pumps and propellor.
The aircraft used a 150 HP V-twin engine and a steam plant designed by Nathan Price, a former employee of the Doble motor company (of the car maker fame). I believe it was designed as a test-bed to prove a concept of a light but powerful steam plant with potential automotive applications.
Presumably the aircraft itself was either scrapped during WW2 or perhaps it found its way into a collection somewhere. It would be nice to think this aircraft might have survived somewhere.
It was first flown on 12 April 1933 – the aircraft being a Travel Air 2000 biplane. It was reportedly so quiet that at low altitude the pilot could exchange words with people on the ground.
And there is some movie footage on YouTube – there is a segment after a demo of the Doble steam car, showing the aircraft taking off, flying and landing.
For those who remember travelling on steam trains as a kid and are surfing the internet now – here is a project that combines the two! Turner art prize-winner Jeremy Deller and Alan Kane have set up a steam powered internet machine to bridge the gap between the steam age and the digital age. This appeared in an article in The Guardian and was uncovered in the Makezine blog.
Cheers
Jerry
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