AAA Drafting Blog

Solid bronze signs that wont break the bank

2017-04-03T14:45:00.000-04:00

One modern day problem that sign companies face is having their expensive Bronze, Aluminum and Copper signs stolen. A solid metal sign is worth a good chunk of change in the wrong hands. Another problem is that these signs can be really heavy.

Fusioncast, a Canadian manufacturer on Oakville, Ontario have these problems pretty much wrapped up with their innovative combination plastic and metal casting process that leaves a thin veneer of Bronze, Aluminum or Cooper on the outside of the sign but leaves the inner core lightweight plastic.

This has been a boon for golf courses all over North America who love Fusioncasts expensive looking signs on their fairways. They also love how easy they are to install and of course the cost, which is dramatically lower than a solid metal sign.

Add to that Fusioncasts sign builder which lets website visitors design their own signs. All around it makes the whole process a getting a terrific looking sign far easier than it ever used to be

You should be working on the railways

2015-11-21T10:40:00.000-05:00

If you are looking for a job, I have always thought that the best strategy is to look to the companies that are doing well. Even in locations where all seems to be doom and gloom, there is always a company that goes against the trend. In that light one company I would suggest for potential job seekers is Canadian National Railways.

Rail transportation is big business. Rail is the most efficient way to ship goods from the Orient coast to coast in Canada. And with the cancellation of the Keystone XLoil pipeline to the USA, there will still be plenty of CN tank cars being sent down to Texas refineries. CN Rail has caught the attention of Microsoft's Bill Gates who recently purchased 12% of the railway company.

If you are an engineer or technician I think you could do well to get into the rail freight business. Tracks need maintenance and replacement, there are electronic signal control systems to maintain and design, the freight cars themselves need handling systems, dust control and a myriad of other technological support services to make them competitive and ecologically compliant.

Sketching on a SolidWorks drawing

2012-12-03T09:09:00.000-05:00

If you are new to SolidWorks, there can be times when things are a little frustrating. One of those simple things is adding notes or sketching lines on an exisiting drawing with several views.

You add your note or centerline and then move one of the views but the note you added stays where it is and you end up having to move it seperately.

Or you have a note that belongs somewhere else in the drawing that gets moved when you are rearranging views when you dont want it to.

The solution to these problems is found in these excerpts from the SolidWorks help section.

Lock View Focus.

Allows you to add sketch entities to views, even when the pointer is close to another view. You can be sure that the items you are adding belong to the views you want. You can also double-click views to lock the focus.

So if you want to add a note or a line to views and have them move when you move the view, click in the views, right click and lock the view focus, then add the items you want.

Once you are finished just click the views and unselect the lock view focus. Now your items should move in lock step with the views.

What about notes that you want to be part of the sheet. Say you have some general material or heat treatment notes that you dont want to have moved when views are manipulated. You need to use lock sheet focus.

Lock Sheet Focus.

Allows you to add sketch entities to the sheet. Otherwise, the sketch entities belong to the view that is closest to where you begin sketching. You can also double-click a sheet to lock the focus. Lock Sheet Focus is available when at least one drawing view is present. When Lock Sheet Focus is enabled, the drawing sheet border is pink.

Finally if you are in a situation where you want to lock certain projections in postion use lock view position. I find this useful when I want to use a single projection to show an open or closed position by superimposing views on top of each other:

Create two views of the same part or assembly. Align them horizontally or vertically as required. Right-click anywhere in the desired view and select Lock View Position. Then you can line up the copied views right over top of the original, making it look as if both are the same.

Following these directions should help so that notes and sketched lines dont end up where they are not supposed to be!

Indiegogo and the Bully Busters

2012-06-23T09:56:00.000-04:00

The story of the bullied school bus monitor Karen Klein receiving $600,000 in donations is a fascinating one to me. It speaks to the turbocharging of social response on so many levels. Not the least of which is how people now view so called crowdsource funding sites such as Indiegogo.com, the site used to raise the enormous donations for the bullied grandmother.

Crowdsourcing is fundraising for the 21^st century. Put your request for money on a well established, well connected website and hopefully enough visitors will see your request and feel compelled to donate funds. Even if only a dollar or two is given, the total return can be mind boggling when multiplied across all the social networks.

The request can be a compassionate appeal to fund treatment for a cancer victim, a vacation for a bullied grandmother, a new band that needs money for equipment, a start-up brewery looking for venture capital, a new product or anything really. Indiegogo caters to all of this.

Indiegogo is in the fundraising business. They provide the merchant credit card account and collect the money people donate after being motivated by your appeal. They typically charge a 4% fee as long as your appeal is successful. An additional 3% is charged to cover the credit card transaction fees. In the case the of the grandmother, the appeal was for $5000 to be collected in 30 days.

As of this writing the bullying video has attracted $600,000 and still has 28 days to run ! It is likely to be the largest amount of money Indiegogo has raised to date as far as I can tell. It is likely that $42,000 will be charged in fees and the remaining funds will be deposited in the bank account of Max Sidorov. The Toronto man who manages the fundraising account. Mr. Sidorov has promised to pass all this money along to Karen Klein to use as she chooses.

Signup for Indiegogo is free and you can do so using your Facebook account. You also need a valid bank account where the funds you collect will be deposited. There are no limits or restrictions on what you can raise money for. Indiegogo allows you to choose different collection methods. If you do not reach your funding goal, you can opt to have all the money returned to those who donated or you can choose to keep the money regardless.

Indiegogo uses an algorithm, much like Google's search engine, to determine the ranking or wow factor of your particular appeal for money. That algorithm took immediate notice, when millions of visitors paid attention to he bullied grandmother video on YouTube

Indiegogo is originally launched in 2008 by wall street analyst Danae Ringelmann at the Sundance Film Festival with the idea of atracting funding for independant movie projects. Now based out of San Francisco, California, It recently received $15 million in venture capital funding making it one of the worlds largest crowdfunding sites.

Now a well respected and well connected website with over 200,000 visitors per month. Alexa ranks it the 3544 th most important site on the internet, Indiegogo has over 18,500 influential websites linkng to it . The site won a “Webby award” for excellence and for setting the standard for innovation and creativity on the internet. in 2010. Having access to such a powerful website for free is extremely compelling for the budding fundrasiser.

Aside from all the wonderful things they do for fundraising, Crowdsourcing sites do raise some ethical concerns. For one thing, what if a campaign turns out to be scam ? There are no checks and balances to make sure if a request for money really is valid especially when these requests are mixed of “for profit “ ventures.

Government registered not for profit charities must abide by strict rules and regulations but sites like Indiegogo face no such restrictions outside of public pressure. It is possible for compassionate people to be taken in by others pretending to be sick or dying simply by how polished the appeal is and by the peer pressure of friends and acquaintances.

Regardless, Crowdsourcing does put funding right at the fingertips of the individual, it totally democratizes the process of raising money. If you want to be altruistic, and offer support to causes you truly believe in such as Bullying, its totally up to you.

Crowdsourcing is here to stay.

Yuuuuup - Auction Websites in Ontario !

2012-04-29T11:08:00.004-04:00

Perhaps its because of the hit TV series "Storage Wars" going to auctions of all types has become very popular. Both for personal and for business purchases. Visiting auctions can be a great way for a new business to get started. If you are looking for office furniture and factory equipment there are always great bargains to be had.

Be extremely careful when computers, flat screen TV's and other technology items. You must know the value of these items before bidding. People go crazy about these items and auctioneers know it. In the heat of the moment people often pay more for a used computer that is several years old then they would brand new in a retail store.

Bear in mind you are buying items as-is where-is and there is always the possibility that the item you are buying wont work or be damaged in some way. Take advantage of the inspection days that most auctioneers provide and factor the risks into the maximum price you are willing to pay for an item. Record this information and have it handy when the auction starts and you go to bid.

Auctioneers often will refuse to sell an item if it does not draw a high enough price, they will withdraw the item and list it in a future auction where they hope it will gain more more attention. In general it pays to find an item you are interested at an auction where the majority of bidders are not looking for that kind of item. You want to be the only person bidding on it.

Auctions most often charge a fee over and above what you pay for the item. This is called a “buyers premium” and usually goes to cover the cost of the auctioneers services. You have to factor in this cost. As well, You also have to pay all applicable sales taxes.

The internet has revolutionized the auction business. Many auction houses use the services of www.bidspotter.com which allow users to view the auction live and bid online without actually being at the auction. This increases the bid frenzy dramatically and drives up profits for the auctioneers. But its great if you want to log on as a guest and get a feel for a live auction and see how the auctioneers work the audience.

Registering with Bidspotter is simple and is no different than registering for an auction in person. The main difference is that you can bid in auctions across the continent. Just bear in mind that if you win a bid you will have to pay to arrange shipping and delivery to your location if you are unable to pick the item up your self.

List of auction websites May 2012

Fair warning !, Auctioneers websites are sometimes not exactly what you would call user friendly. Some like to hide their latest auctions and make it a challenge for you to figure out where they are. You can always throw your hands up in frustration and find the local auction listings in the Toronto Star any Sunday. With dilligence, you can plan out your next auction excursion

Abco Food Equipment

www.abcofood.ca

This company sells primarily restaurant items and with the frequency that restaurants go bankrupt, its got to be a great business. A great place to find ultra expensive espresso machine you have always wanted. Many auction houses also double as sales outlets for brand new equipment.

Asset Services, Auction and Appraisals

www.assetservices.ca

Mostly industrial sales of machinery. If you are intimately familiar with the equipment, you can find great bargains if you are willing to tolerate the risks.

Auction Advertiser

www.theauctionadvertiser.com

A directory of mainly estate auctions taking place throughout Ontario. Click on any day in the calendar to find auctions taking place.

Corporate Assets

www.corpassets.com

Upcoming auctions are listed in the Toronto Star on Sunday if you get frustrated with their website.

Danbury Sales

www.danburysales.com

Up until recently had a retail store location on Lakeshore road in Oakville where you could buy items from their auction sales. Now they seem to have returned to their core business of industrial and commercial auctions.

Hilco Asset Sales Canada

www.hilcocanada.com

URL redirects to Hilco Industrial auction site in the USA which does list auctions in Canada.

Infinity Assets Solutions

www.infassets.com

Mostly company equipment auctions. You can use bidspotter.com to join in the bidding without being there.

National Surplus

Hamilton based business selling industrial items from auctions and bankrupcies

http://www.nationalsurplus.net/home/

Northern Auction Service Inc.

www.northernauctionservice.com

Hold regular sales at the sherwood auction sales in Milton, a nice room used by several auction houses where you sit in old church pews while you bid on items. Even if you dont buy anything, the bacon on a bun they serve in the back is worth the trip.

Principal Liquidators Inc

www.principalliquidators.com

Wildly popular auctions every Tuesday in Mississauga go on until Midnight. Principal Liquidations are also well known for their hardwood flooring material auctions.

Studio 1 Auctions

www.studio1sales.com

Sparse website but do show pictures of upcoming auctions.

If you have any comments or suggestions for great auctions in Oakville, Burlington and the surrounding area, feel free to post them !

HP's new Z1 CAD Workstation - Power without the tower

2012-02-29T20:23:00.004-05:00

Will Hewlett Packards new Z1 workstation turn the companies fortunes ? Meg Whitman, HP's new CEO and former chief executive of eBay certainly hopes so. Meg wants everyone to know that HP is and always will be a company with great engineering.

Hewlett Packard has introduced a new workstation called the Z1, which seems to mimic the format of Apples iMac computers in many respects. To be fair HP has produced a number of all-in-one designs for its consumer market, but my first impression of the Z1 was more that it looked for all the world like a black iMac.

Being a workstation means that this computer is a purpose built workhorse for graphics and CAD applications. HP worked closely with nVidea to develop special video cards for the Z1. The base model has on board video while a special Quadro card is available for higher end models.

Unlike other all-in-one computers the Z1 features a lift up screen. When you raise the hood, so to speak, you can get at all the necessary components underneath making it hopefully easy to upgrade. Whether or not the market that buys all-in-ones really want ot upgrade their computers is another question. As well, computer technology moves so fast these days that most of us replace our computers rather than upgrade them.

On the other hand, providing the ability to tinker with the inside should appeal to the engineering crowd, especially since you wont have to dive underneath your desk to do work on your machine. It certainly appeals to the geek factor when you can raise your hood and let everyone see what you are up to. Hopefully looking cool and not ruining it by inducing a blinding blue flash in the process.

The base workstation uses a Xeon i3 processor and can be configured to accept different multi core processors for more computing horsepower. The 27 inch display features.

Hewlett Packard has been facing stiff competition in all its market segments. Sales have been declining. To combat this they say HP will not try to compete on price which is something it has been trying to do in the personal laptop market. But it has had workstations before which certainly were not priced at the bottom of the market.

HP once had a great reputation for making great computing equipment. It seems to me that the focus should be on service so that people willingly choose to pay top dollar for their equipment. The cool factor of the new Z1 workstation seems like a perfect opportunity for HP to really connect with the engineering community and work with them to deal with computer problems. An initiative like that would likely encourage a lot of companies to standardize on HP workstations and embrace the concept of the power without the tower

Quirky Inventing and Black Ops at SolidWorks World 2012

2012-02-26T09:34:00.002-05:00

SolidWorks World 2012 featured Quirky.com founder Ben Kaufman, whose free service crowdsources the process of bringing new products to market. From invention right through to financing and marketing. Quirky uses SolidWorks at its head office in New York City.

The Black Ops twins also had an interesting presentation with their 80 mile-per-hour robot tank, built on a shoestring but adopted by the US Army. The story of the tanks invention is inspiring as is many of the new products the brothers are now creating using SolidWorks.

The overiding theme of the conference was inventing in your living room. The process of design and invention is becoming easier and easier and within reach of anybody.

Stop the Information Highway Robbery !

2011-01-31T12:01:00.002-05:00

Internet metering is something Canadians need to know about. We are all using the internet more these days and the CRTC (Canadian Radio Television Commission) has rubber stamped a ruling that would allow cable internet providers like Bell, Shaw and others to charge by the Gigabyte rather than the monthly fees most of us now pay.

We already pay more for internet access than our neighbours to the south. Subscribers in the USA also enjoy higher minimum usage levels. Some of their ISP's even offer unlimited usage. It makes no sense at all why we should have to pay more for less.

The CRTC ruling will rapidly become law if we dont speak up today. Sign this petition which will get sent to our MP's. Copy and retweet this message to your frieinds today and sign the petition. Dont let this ruling slip through because it will cost us all a lot of money.

Finding employees on Facebook

2011-01-23T09:24:00.001-05:00

Ever thought of using Facebook as a means of recruiting employees ? There are some compelling reasons why you might want to.

Last week an office manager told me about the success they had searching for a new receptionist using Facebook. Usually she would have placed a paid advertisement in a newspaper or might have considered using an employment agency. This time, however, the manager started from her personal Facebook profile and posted a listing in the Jobs section of Facebook marketplace.

In a matter of 1 week she had a wealth of responses. Even better, she was able to examine the Facebook profiles of every applicant to get a good idea of whether the person might be a good fit. How the person conducted themself online became a key element in her deciding to contact them for an interview. In short order she compiled a list of highly qualified applicants.

Advertising in the Facebook marketplace is free which is a huge benefit, considering the utility this service offers the small businessperson. Increasingly, people use Facebook as a starting point in their job search. When I last checked in on January 20^th 2011, there were 560,000 plus job listings open on Facebook.

Consider listing your next job opening on Facebook. It wont cost you anything and you might be pleasantly surprised at the results. As well, if you are looking for a job, consider Facebook as another place to look. Just be certain your profile shows you at your best !

AutoCad 2D and 3D exam results

2010-12-03T20:54:00.002-05:00

Here are the results for the AutoCad 2D and 3D
course at Metro College:

While most students took both courses, some were
signed up for 2D or 3D only.





AutoCad 2D & 3D Course results



DSP- 4250-0710-F196	88
DHR-4250-0810-F219	94
DHR-4250-0810-F221	87
DHR-4250-0810-F220	92
DHR-4250-0810-F228	92
DHR-3800-0710-F204	92
DHR-3800-0710-F213	91 (2D Only)
DHR-3800-0810-F247	92
DHR-4250-0910-F260	76 (3D Only)
DHR-4250-0910-F263	89
DHR-4250-0910-F267	92
DHR-4250-0910-F287	91
DHR-4250-0910-F291	88
DHR-4250-0910-F290	74
SDP-4250-1010-F304	97
DHR-4250-1010-F306	94 (2D Only)
DHR-4250-1010-F309	82
DSA-4200-1010-F317	66
DSP-4200-1010-F321	80
DHR-4250-1110-F329	79 (2D Only)
DHR-4250-0810-F251	94
DHR-4250-0810-F233	99
DHR-3800-1010-F298	89

Amazing 3D animation technique using iPad

2010-11-21T10:47:00.002-05:00

This video shows a pretty amazing 3D animation technique developed through dragging and iPad though space while it plays back a seemingly incoherent series of image.

Through stop motion photography the true nature of the images are revealed.

Go big or go home

2010-11-21T10:09:00.001-05:00

Dealmaker Peter Pocklington used to say that it takes just as mutch time, effort and energy to build a million dollar deal as it does to build one for several thousand dollars. The same could be said about the time spent making information based content websites to attract new prospects to your business.

Regardless of whether you are trying to attract prospects to buy screen doors or complete subdivision developments you still have to devote the same amount of time, effort and energy in developing your all important online reputation.

A few simple paragraphs about how wonderful your company and product is on your home page just is not going to do the job. You need to research the customer and find out what they are searching for, and create tens if not hundreds of pages trying to address the needs of those visitors searches.

Research is never one hundred percent accurate, no matter how powerful the metrics and software behind it. It will be necessary to over-deliver on content to make sure that a good number of your pages meet the needs of the visitors and subsequently get into the top ten search results at Google and other search engines.

This illustrates the time, effort and energy part of creating the website. Those pages will consistently deliver targeted prospects for your business as the prospects come to regard you as a trusted expert source of information. It's just that you have to put a lot of work into gaining that expert recognition.

Content based information websites are a great fit for industrial companies. The recognition you get from the internet can cut though old networks developed by companies who have wined and dined and schmoozed customers at yearly conventions. It can give the new players a fighting chance.

Once you establish your online reputation, prospects will call you directly and most times they will be already sold before you pick up the phone because they believe they know who you are. All because you put all that initial time, effort and energy to develop that all important online reputation.

Engineering Scales - How to use them in your drawings

2010-11-14T17:04:00.004-05:00

Engineering Scales is a short power point presentation with sound that I have put together to help drafters put together scale drawings.

Sometimes when drawings are created, objects are plotted onto paper at whatever scale they may fit, but this does not alsways help the people who have to read the drawings.

Drawing at accepted scales helps in the checking process as well as helping contractors and tradespeople interpret the drawings

Will free drafting software cause problems for AutoCAD ?

2010-11-12T18:20:00.001-05:00

For years AutoCAD has been the most popular 2D drafting software. AutoCAD's one program for everybody approach and backward version compatibility has always been appreciated by mechanical, civil, structural and architectural drafters and designers alike.

To compete with AutoCAD, other CAD software firms use the same file format that Autodesk created and even go as far as copying commands word for word in their software. I cant think of too many industries where the competition virtually duplicates the look and feel of an existing piece of software.

Companies such as Dassault Systemes are now giving away 2D drafting software for free. Their new DraftSight 2D CAD software product is a fully functional CAD drafting program. Google's Sketchup continues to enjoy wide acceptance by the architectural world and its 3D “push-pull” features are even being copied by AutoCAD in its latest 2011 release.

The key here will be whether Google and Dassault can maintain consistent releases of their free products and provide the support to keep their user base happy. To the extent they do, they will gain the trust and of the CAD community. Without that support, CAD users will probably stay with what they know best.

New engineering drawing sizes video

2010-11-10T21:34:00.003-05:00

I have been experimenting with making Flash videos and made a new one titled
Drawing Sizes based on a power point presentation. I hope to add more videos in this way to create a series of tutorials for some of the more common tasks in setting up drawings.

Geometric Dimensioning & Tolerancing Course results

2010-11-08T20:37:00.002-05:00

My apologies to the students for not posting this information sooner. Here are the results of the recent GD&T course at Metro College.

Subject: GD&T
Start Date: 11/10/2010

#	Student Number	Test		Exam		Final Score
#	Student Number	1	30%	1	50%	Final Score
1	DSP- 4250-0710-F196	73	22	77	54	76
2	DHR-4250-0810-F219	96	29	95	67	95
3	DHR-4250-0810-F221	88	26	96	67	94
4	DHR-4250-0810-F220	75	23	89	62	85
5	DHR-4250-0810-F228	61	18	93	65	83
6	DHR-3800-0710-F204	57	17	89	62	79
7	DHR-3800-0710-F213	92	28	84	59	86
8	DHR-3800-0810-F247	39	12	91	64	75
9	DHR-4250-0810-F251	78	23	98	69	92
10	DHR-4250-0910-F263	69	21	91	64	84
11	DHR-4250-0910-F267	88	26	86	60	87
12	DSP-4200-0910-F282	100	30	98	69	99
13	DHR-4250-0910-F287	88	26	88	62	88
14	DHR-4250-0910-F291	71	21	91	64	85
15	DHR-4250-0910-F290	94	28	98	69	97
16	DHR-3800-1010-F298	78	23	89	62	86
17	DHR-4250-0810-F233	100	30	95	67	97
18	0	0	0	0	0	0
19	0	0	0	0	0	0
20	0	0	0	0	0	0

2010-11-04T14:05:00.000-04:00

Blueprint Reading exam results, October 2010

2010-10-31T18:15:00.005-04:00

Congratulations to all exam participants in the Blueprint Reading course at Metro College, Toronto. Here are the exam results:

#	Stdt #	Exam
#	Stdt #	Exam
1	DSP- 4250-0710-F196	98
2	DHR-4250-0810-F219	100
3	DHR-4250-0810-F221	100
4	DHR-4250-0810-F220	73
5	DHR-4250-0810-F228	93
6	DHR-4250-0910-F263	100
7	DHR-4250-0910-F287	95
8	DHR-4250-0910-F291	98
9	DHR-4250-0910-F290	98
10	SDP-4350-1010-F304	85
11	DHR-4250-1010-F306	90
12	DHR-4250-0910-F307	93
13	DHR-3830-0110-F028	98
14	DHR-3830-0110-F030	85
15	DHR-3800-0710-F204	85
16	DHR-3800-0710-F213	83
17	DHR-3800-0810-F247	83
18	DHR-3800-1010-F298	98
19	DHR-4250-0910-F267	98
20	DHR-3830-0510-F147	0
21	DSP-3830-0610-P166	0
22	0	83
23	DHR-4250-0810-F233	95

Next course will be AutoCAD 2009 starting this Monday. Hope to see you all again !

New Geometric dimensioning and tolerancing GD&T page

2010-10-17T13:04:00.003-04:00

Just this week I had a call from a gentleman in the USA about a geometric dimensioning and tolerancing course he was taking at a local community college. The course was being held by webinar and the instructor provided no means whatsoever for the students to ask questions. It was just lecture and listen.

By all accounts, geometric dimensioning and tolerancing, GD&T, is only used by at most 20% of the manufacturing companies in North America, despite the fact that it is supposed to be the national standard for drawing and dimensioning.

Its a tough subject to learn because it seems many instructors seem to dwell on esoteric definitions of terms and characteristics and say very little about how GD&T is actually used.

In my course at Metro College in Toronto, I try to put some real life examples into the mix. Its surprising how obvious and easy GD&T becomes when you use it to communicate a real world issue.

One of the primary reasons for GD&T is to make parts fit together in an assembly. I have kept that in mind when putting together my own geometric dimensioning and tolerance page.

In the future I hope to put my own webinar together, and you be sure there will be plenty of real time communication between teacher and student. In the end is that not what GD&T is about, - Improving communication ?

How do you control traffic congestion in Toronto ?

2010-10-10T09:58:00.002-04:00

Toronto is no different than many large cities all over North America in its traffic congestion problems. For many city workers a 2 or even a 3 hour commute by car is not unusual.

There comes a point where you are spending so much money and time on commuting, that it starts to have an impact on how you make ends meet. We all have to work, but if you spend all your time getting to work, it gets counter productive.

Have you ever considered working in the town or city you live in ? If you look carefully, there may be highly successful companies right under your nose that you could work for, and probably get to by just walking or taking a short bus ride.

If you work locally, you can potentially eliminate the need for one vehicle. Eliminating one vehicle can save some people as much as $18,000 a year. Because this money is not being spent on transit, it goes straight in your pocket.

Look for the success stories about companies in your local paper, concentrate your efforts on finding out about the type of skills that these companies hire. Even in a bad economy, there are always companies that are doing well.

You can save a lot of money and time, just by finding out about them and applying there, getting work close to where you live.

The F-35, Joint strike search and rescue fighter

2010-07-18T12:14:00.003-04:00

The recent 16 billion dollar purchase of F-35 stealth fighters is a triumph in buying American . While Canada needs more search and rescue planes to patrol the oceans the Canadian government decides to purchase stealth fighters. One wonders what kind of a changing role the Canadian air force has up its sleeve for these high tech seek and destroy weapons.

Perhaps the stealth and speed will allow our pilots to sneak up on sailors before they even get shipwrecked. The pilot can launch missiles at the pesky shoals or reefs blowing them up, preventing any marine disaster from ever happening.

Canadian Pilots flying the joint strike fighter solo over the arctic are assured that the fighters engine is more “robust” and unlikely to fail. Much like the Titanic was unsinkable. It will be cold comfort to a our pilots, reflecting on their emergency manual which said “relax, your jet engine is robust” as they eject in 50 below temperature.

Worse, the purchase of joint strike fighters protect American jobs, not Canadian ones, as the purchase of Bombardier search and rescue planes would have. Unfortunately when the Pentagon barks, we have to pay attention. This was true in the days of the Avro Arrow and now again with the F-35 joint strike fighter.

Farmers feed cities, but not with solar power

2010-07-11T10:16:00.001-04:00

The McroFIT program scares me to death. This is the Ontario government program which promises to pay the owners of small scale solar panel installations 0.80 per kw/hr for power generated from their solar panel energy farm installations.

Just recently the Ontario Power Authority (OPA) adjusted the rate payable so that solar panel installations in farmers fields receive to only 0.58 per kw/hr. This after 11,000 farmers applied to the program in good faith, expecting to reap the benefits of electricity as a new cash crop.

To add insult to injury, the OPA retained the 0.80 per kw/hr rate only for city dwellers and maintained that they never expected the16,000 applications to come from farmers. Not suprisingly farmers had figured out you could get make good money generating power from an open field than any south facing city rooftop.

Theres a lot of things to be concerned about here, beyond the OPA slight to hard working farmers. As consumers, how can we afford to pay anyone 5 to 10 times more to produce electricity than we actually pay for it.

This scares me most because perhaps it gives consumers an indication of where the cost of electricity is ultimately going. Are we all going to be paying updwards of 0.80 to 1.00 a kw/hr for power in the not too distant future to accomplish a “sustainable” electricity supply ?

If the OPA could not figure out that small solar power producers were going to jump all over the free money they were offering, what were they thinking ? Was it just possible that this program was supposed to be purely for optics to show the world that Ontario was at the forefront of grass roots energy sustainability for cities ?

Worse still, the OPA is sticking it to the Ontario farmer, who honestly expended their time, effort and money spent planning and building solar panel installations. Not expecting their government would renege on an agreement to pay them 0.80 kw/hr.

Personally I would rather see farmers paid to develop the answer to power generation problems than to see tax dollars soaked up by nuclear power development projects. At least you know the average farmer is far less likely to reward himself with outrageous salaries and perks and spend money with wild abandon building nuclear facilities that end up getting mothballed.

Poor quality plastic toilet hoses ruin bathroom renovations

2010-06-24T08:46:00.003-04:00

Have you ever checked the little braided hose that connects your toilet tank to your house water supply. Perhaps you should, especially if your bathroom has been renovated in the last few years.

A real problem has been surfacing with the plastic nuts that you hand tighten to connect the hose to the water supply. They have been breaking resulting in the flooding of bathrooms and thousands of dollars in water damage.

Apparently the hex nuts on these hoses use substandard plastic with high porosity which leads to premature unexpected failure. Normally these hoses would have to meet CSA (Canadian Standards Association) specifications would should prevent these types of problems from occuring.

Offshore manufacturers have been ignoring the specifications and as a result failed toilet hoses have resulted in lawsuits. Plumbers, Home renovators and hose suppliers are all being sued by homeowners with majors losses.

If this is a problem in Canada, it can only be worse in the USA, where not too long ago asimilar type of situation arose with imported drywall not meeting national standards.

For the sake of a few dollars, replace your toilet tank hose just to be safe. Make sure the packaging says it is CSA approved. You might be saving yourself a real headache.

Candian high speed rail just another let down

2010-06-17T20:00:00.002-04:00

Today Ontario premier McGuinty and Quebec premier Charest talked about a High Speed Rail Link between Montreal and Toronto. They proposed to do what all politicians do when faced with making a decision. They said they would study the matter.

A study might seem acceptable were it not for the fact that the same subject has been studied 16 times already in the past 20 years. McGuinty's study was just to “update” the previous results. As if to wash their hands further of any responsibility they opined that environmental assessments could still add 5 to 8 years to the project even if it were approved by the Provinces and the Prime Minister

As these two leaders procrastinate at taxpayers expense, Porter airlines shuttles folks back and forth from Toronto to Montreal 17 times per day, and has made a great business of it. Clearly another study is not needed to realize the obvious.

At the same time, Montreal based Bombardier rail has received one of the largest train orders in its history, from tiny Switzerland. Unfortunately the order won't benefit Canadians as it will be built largely in Bombardier plants in Europe, where the company has found governments more receptive to the idea of building rail transit.

Obama has earmarked eight billion dollars for rail infrastructure in the USA and is already funding improvements to rail transit in many american cities. Canada sits on its hands prefering to fund US automotive makers rather than create viable jobs for its own people in improving its own rail infrastructure.

Rail freight and travel is the greenest form of transportation, and has been proven successful in Europe and Japan, often with the help of superb Canadian rail engineering talent. If ever a country could benefit from high speed rail, its Canada. With its long distances and access to hydroelectric power, Canadian trains ought to be the most efficient, cleanest method to move people and freight around.

Bike racer Cancellara accused of using an electric bicycle

2010-06-06T09:47:00.002-04:00

Fabian Cancellara, a world champion cyclist, has been accused of using a tiny electric assist motor in his racing bicycle. His accusers claim these motors are used by cyclists in many cycling contests to gain an unfair edge over their competition.

This Italian YouTube video, apparently made with the cooperation of the company that makes the motors, shows how it is all accomplished. Notwithstanding all the controversy, its an interesting statement on the state of the art of electric bicycles.

Looking at the video, the builder claims a 50 year old would be able to compete with world class cyclists with one of these motors installed in their bicycles.

The video looks compelling. I can understand using a high current, high torque electric motor for short bursts of extra power. I dont think it could run continuously, because of the need for battery power and with overheating in the enclosed quarters of the bicycle frame.

The video does not show where they hide the batteries and I assume they would have to be installed into the bicycle frame and the frame brazed back together with a battery charger connection hidden somewhere on the bicycle. The batteries and the motor would have to add significant weight to the racing bike.

What do you think. Is this electric assist racing bike possible, or is the video just a very slick attempt at mud-slinging at a world class athlete ?