[AT] Update: '47 B - First starting attempt

[szabelski at wildblue.net]

I live in Cottrellville, near Marine City, north of Algonac, south of East China. I was born and raised in Detroit, leaving in the mid 70’s when the city used emanate domain to buy our house to allow GM to build the Poletown pant. The lighting is getting better. They still have issues with people stealing the wiring out of the bases, and the fact that a lot of the light poles are so old. Can’t imagine what it would cost to replace all the lights. Some of the ones they did replace didn’t last more than a few weeks, believe they were LED that were supposed to last for years.

Carl


----- Original Message -----
From: Mike M <meulenms at gmx.com>
To: at at lists.antique-tractor.com
Sent: Thu, 17 Dec 2020 11:21:01 -0500 (EST)
Subject: Re: [AT] Update: '47 B - First starting attempt

Carl, you and I must be pretty close, now Detroit is lucky to have one
working street light per block.

Mike M

On 12/17/2020 10:20 AM, szabelski at wildblue.net wrote:
> Back in the late 1890’s, the entire city of Detroit was lighted with 31 “moon towers”. These were very tall towers that held six carbon arc lights each. The lights were so bright, and the towers were so strategically located, that nighttime did not exist when they were turned on, it looked like the middle of the day. At that time Detroit was called the best lit city in the world. They were expensive to operate, and people complained that they couldn’t sleep because it was always too bright. They were eventually taken down and replaced with standard street lights once incandescent lights were perfected by Edison. The towers were sold to other cities and 17 of them are still in use in Austin Texas, where they're considered part of the city’s heritage. I did an internet search on them a few years back and found plenty of references to them, even pictures taken at night when they were turned on. I also remember there being a u-tube video done by one our local Detroit news stations on them, I think it was when Detroit was celebrating an anniversary and everybody was doing historic stories about the city.
>
> Carl
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Steve W. <swilliams268 at frontier.com>
> To: Antique Tractor Email Discussion Group <at at lists.antique-tractor.com>
> Sent: Wed, 16 Dec 2020 22:54:56 -0500 (EST)
> Subject: Re: [AT] Update: '47 B - First starting attempt
>
> szabelski at wildblue.net wrote:
>> It’s a good welder for doing small jobs, like those done by somebody
>> doing artsy craft things, which is what I believe it was probably
>> intended for. You can’t really do a large deep weld since it doesn't
>> have a lot of power, only about 50A. It also doesn’t do a good weld
>> if you try to use too large of a stick. I went and took a look at it
>> again and it indicates using a 1/16 stick for up to 1/4 inch thick
>> metal and 3/32 stick for up to 1/16 thick metal. My primary welder is
>> also a HFT welder that I purchased from them when they used to sell
>> refurbished welders. Got it for about half price. I figured that if
>> it was returned because something was wrong with it, that they had
>> already fixed it and I wouldn’t have any further issues with it. It’s
>> worked without any issues for over 15 years. The only thing I don’t
>> do is use their wire. I found that it has a tendency to splatter a
>> lot and not do that good of a job. I switched over to using something
>> like Lincoln or some other name brand wire. The price difference
>> isn’t really that much different.
>>
>> Carl
> That is a carbon arc torch. Have two of them. They still get used now
> and then for brazing and heating stuff. You can weld with them but they
> are touchy to get the "flame" just right. They are still around in other
> forms today as well. The old "arc lights" used in theater and movies are
> the same basic principle, as are modern vehicle HID lights and many
> other HID types as well.
>



--
This email has been checked for viruses by Avast antivirus software.
https://www.avast.com/antivirus

_______________________________________________
AT mailing list
AT at lists.antique-tractor.com
http://lists.antique-tractor.com/listinfo.cgi/at-antique-tractor.com