Good evening ladies and gentlemen, welcome to SDA Late Nite Radio. Michelangelo once said: “To create a sculpture just remove the unnecessary material”. Tonight, for your delectation, here is a Matsuura MAM72-63V machining a V8 engine block ¤ from a solid rectangular prism of aluminum (10:58). The cylinder-honing phase just cracks me up. I’ll tell you what, honey, they didn’t compute those trajectories by hand 😉
Your Reader Tips are, as always, welcome in the comments.
Solid aluminum, but okay, still cool.
I finished C.S. Lewis’s Abolition of Man last night, but I feel as though it is speaking to the sort of eugenicists and technological triumphalists who aren’t really around any longer. However, the point about values being impossible to arrive at by deductive means is still highly relevant.
Thanks for the correction, Matt, I’ll fix it.
Great guy stuff Vit.
Technological triumphalists are a pain in the asp, Matt, yet essentially all the advances that have carried our species into a uniquely separate space (compared to all other species) have been technological. After all, if we had not mastered fire, we wouldn’t have been able to divert all that energy, that would otherwise have been spent digesting uncooked food, into developing larger brains and supporting longer childhood intellectual development periods. And, where was I, oh yes: fire is technology.
Lastly, Matt, on the matter of arriving at values via deductive means: surely said means being inadequate per se should not entirely disqualify them from the field of discourse; to me it would seem that deductive considerations are both simply and importantly yet another arrow in our quiver of tools and techniques with which we can work to approach, explore, and master axiology.
I see that casting is not about to become an obsolete technology any time soon.
Nice machine, though. ~:D
Aye, Phantom.
That’s really cool, Vitruvius. Thanks for that.
I’d like to see a giraffe, or a monkey, or a sociologist try to build a machine like that.
You are right about technology and what it has made us, Vitruvius. Lewis’s point is that human mastery over Nature implies human mastery over humanity itself. The next step would be permanent enslavement through perfected propaganda and genetic manipulation. I just don’t hear people talking much any more about Progress and the ultimate liberation of humanity through technology, so the book seemed a little dated in that sense. Except for Ray Kurzweil and the rest of the Singularity dorks, I guess.
And regarding values – yes, we can use reason to work out the errors we make in elaborating our principles, and better arrive at means of fulfilling our values. What I meant was(to take an extreme example), if someone decides that there is no point in preserving humanity, it’s not a position they can be reasoned out of(nor could they have arrived at it by rational deduction in the first place).
HI , guy’s …there is some really cool mini gas engine stuff to …there is a blown chevey v8 and it is about the size of a real blowr on a full size v8 it is soo cool ..there is also a v12 merlin engine there to …also on youtube for your veiwing pleaseure type in ripsaw !!! awsome …i love americans they are sooo crazy !!
vit
I went and checked out my “hone” and didn’t see anything like it in the vid, so what were you refering to with “The cylinder-honing phase “:-)))))
Happy Birthday goes out to Lise Bacon. Who is Lise Bacon? Why she it the Canadian Senator for De la Durantaye, Quebec. Why mention it? Because tomorrow Senator Bacon turns 75, which means she must retire. Soon the Liberal Majority in the Senate will be down to 1 member after her retirement. The Conservatives will have 37, the Liberals will have 53 and 9 vacancies. There are also 2 Progressive Conservative Senators and 4 independent Senators. I expect Prime Minister Stephen Harper to appoint 9 Senators before the fall session of Parliament.
With a few more retirements, on January 1, 2010 there could be 50 Conservative Senators, 2 Progressive Conservative Senators, and one former Conservative Senator (Anne Cools). That adds up to 53, a majority.
I expect Senator reform to soon appear as a discussion in Ottawa now that the Conservatives will soon have the numbers to change the rules.
Does anybody know the attendance of the Senate? A few absent Liberals could speed up the process.
What she doesn’t realize is that the French, too, would love to have such a system. Paretsky’s adventure is a parable based on a false assumption: that health care can be public, reliable, and free. It may indeed seem free, or close to free, for an American tourist receiving treatment in an emergency; as a French taxpayer, however, I paid a heavy price for Paretsky’s husband’s treatment. And you, my American reader, did too.
http://www.city-journal.org/2009/eon0824gs.html
“The cylinder-honing phase”…….no such process in an aluminum block without cylinder liners of a different metal…….. Chevy Vega Chrome excepted!
not your dads chevy small block that’s for sure. Clients of mine are machinists for the oilfield and they have CNC machines too the amount of detail work on some of the tongs theybuild for Downhole use is astounding. Sometimes whenthey do a run it goes on for 24 hours straight or more and they have to watch it non-stop. They are very well paid and deserve every nickel.
Honing: The process of removing a relatively small amount of
material from a cylindrical surface by means of abrasive stones
to obtain a desired finish or extremely close dimensional tolerance.
It’s a fascinating language, English is.
Can you even do that to aluminum, Vit? My (limited) experience with aluminum leads me to think the hone would clog pretty much instantly.
You can -polish- aluminum quite handily, but hone it?
The Phantom… I’d have thought so too.
http://www.mmsonline.com/articles/how-to-hone-an-atypical-aluminum-alloy.aspx
Did the Olds F85 have the first mass produced aluminum engine block ?
Wasn’t it a disaster ? how is it done differently now ? Alloys ? Liners ?
What Was Really Behind the Lockerbie Bomber’s Release?
by Soeren Kern
The mass murderer’s release may have been motivated by lucrative oil deals and anti-Americanism rather than compassion for a dying man. (Also read Claudia Rosett: Libyan Grotesqueries.)
http://pajamasmedia.com/
There was a very bad economic article in today’s Globe and Mail. Arthur Donner and Doug Peters claimed that while it’s logical that individuals want to save during the recession to help guard against an uncertain future, it’s bad for the overall economy. This is known as the “Thrift Paradox”. But the reality is that it’s not a paradox, it’s nonsense. Sadly, the paper has propagated it repeatedly.
Economic growth comes from savings, not from spending. It is only when people don’t have to consume everything they produce immediately that some can invest time and effort into developing more efficient ways to produce, whether through searching for new grounds with natural resources, inventing machinery, etc. It is possible for a society to consume more than it produces – temporarily – and the surest way to go down this bumpy road is for government to butt into economic decision-making that should belong to individuals.
The proper way to deal with the economic problems today is to let them run their course, to let the economy adjust to the re-evaluation of the worth of securities and other goods and services, and find its equilibrium again (although equilibriums are always changing too). Say’s Law states that supply creates its own demand, or supply equals demand, i.e., you can only buy stuff with stuff you already have (or expect to have). An economy should be run by consumer demand, which means the value of goods and services should be decided by the free market, and not by government fiat that creates distortions that can only lead to a lower standard of living.
The authors claim that investment in roads, schools, hospitals, etc., will have strong multiplier effects on job creation and economic growth. It’s true that some infrastructure spending, particularly on transportation, may unclog bottlenecks, which can improve the lives of the locals. But the “multiplier” is a myth. What there is is turnover – dollar bills changing hands more quickly because more goods and services are being produced. But to facilitate this, again you need a situation in which individuals can use their judgments as to the value of what they have and what others have that they want, and to act upon them – that is, a free market. The only “product” government has is coercion, and that is desirable only to protect the rights of individuals who are already victims of coercion from their fellow citizens. All other government coercion fouls up people’s lives.
Thus when Donner and Peters argue that an expanding government sector will be essential for years to come, they’re really calling for slower, not faster, economic growth, and perhaps even a decline. Of course, they’re Liberals, so they’re hoping to get people to buy into the Big Government swill that constitutes the party’s electoral platform, and they likely want to push more unfortunates into social programs that “define Canada”, even at the cost of thousands of jobs.
Vitruvius, re fire is technology
Love that statement. I went to the Aviation Museum in Ottawa with my dad, and he said “the history of aviation is the history of the powerplant”. Similar statement.
There was a great set of geology lectures on-line for a while – detailing how temperatures in smelting paralleled weapons development in history – and how this led to civilizational advancement. Fire is technology indeed – but it led to deforestation in the European countries, pre-coal use, also an interesting subject.
I corresponded with the geology guy for a while, he was super interesting, and said tongue in cheek that he wanted to be the new Jared Diamond, and write his book, and have money and women and a TV series. He was awesome. Sad to see his lectures go.
I hope George Wong doesn’t mind if I link here, but this set of lectures is similarly awesome, in that it provides historical bases for things such as the witch trials, the potato famine, etc.
The chestnut blight is also interesting, covered in the lecture about the potato famine.
http://www.botany.hawaii.edu/faculty/wong/BOT135/Botany135syllabus.htm
[quote]The mass murderer’s release may have been motivated by lucrative oil deals and anti-Americanism rather than compassion for a dying man [/quote] Reverant Dream
I think a message was sent to someone, it did not help Obama…. The OLD money in the UK may be cranky about something…
Nice vid Vit, but from what I could see that wasn’t a Union CNC; No breaks!
Under the headline “The thrill is gone for Obama and the media”:
“… Reporters who traveled with the Obama campaign tell horror stories about the organization — dishonesty, rudeness and abysmal access. But those reporters still served up the glowing coverage. …”
Not any more …
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/politics/The-thrill-is-gone-for-Obama-and-the-media_08_24-54389032.html
Good morning. Let me try this again, since I don’t think I did a very good job of it last night. In the classical sense, honing of engine cylinders was done with abrasive stones. That is not done with aluminum, as I understand it. However, in the generic sense, honing means removing material (or even attention) to refine (or even sharpen) a thing (or even situation). So a CNC mill can, in the generic sense, hone a cylinder using cutting tools instead of grinding tools. That is what, I think, is going on starting at about 6:38 in the video, and that’s the sense in which I meant honing. Oh well, at least no one got mad at me for the way I used trajectories 😉
“Officials at the Wikimedia Foundation, the nonprofit in San Francisco that governs Wikipedia, say that within weeks, the English-language Wikipedia will begin imposing a layer of editorial review on articles about living people.
“The new feature, called ‘flagged revisions,’ will require that an experienced volunteer editor for Wikipedia sign off on any change made by the public before it can go live. Until the change is approved — or in Wikispeak, flagged — it will sit invisibly on Wikipedia’s servers, and visitors will be directed to the earlier version.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/25/technology/internet/25wikipedia.html?th&emc=th
So, I wonder how this is going to work? More accuracy or more lib-left spin?
Vit,
Great vid. I’ve seen it before because I have more than a passing interest. I’ve been programming CNC machines since 1982 and I spent 5 years selling and supporting Matsuura in Canada for Elliott Matsuura, the Canadian distributer. Trust me, the programming technology has come a long way since ’82.
As a side note, I just wanted to mention that I had a call from someone this past week-end representing “the Prime Minister’s office” asking if they could count on my support in the case of a fall election. Support was clarified to include financial and voting.
My answer? Not one penny and not likely my vote as long as the CHRC continues their unabetted assault on the fundamental freedoms of Canadian citizens.
of course, I meant “unabated”
Martin says, Liberal “Iggy needs a makeover*”.
It’s not “makeover”; it’s redo; a Dionky redo**.
*”Iggy needs a makeover
It’s official. The Liberal party strategy is a dud. A new Ipsos Reid poll — Conservatives 39, Liberals 28 — is the latest signal. While no one should read too much into one opinion sampling, the downward trend has been apparent for months.
Michael Ignatieff’s Liberals are backpedalling toward the lows of Stéphane Dion — and they shouldn’t be surprised.”
urlm.in/cycz
…-
It’s not “makeover”; it’s redo; a Dionky redo**.
**Dionky redo:
“That Dion interview, in full – Andrew Coyne’s Blog Capital Read …
That Dion was unable at first to offer an answer has nothing to do …. M. Dion made all the time and broadcasters redo the taping. … Both men took swipes at Stéphane Dion on the stage during their ‘fire-side chat’. …
blog.macleans.ca/2008/10/10/that-dion-interview-in-full/”
“Granby, Que., bans power tools on Sundays”
Makita madness? DeWalt disorder?
You can mow the lawn but cannot use a drill ?!?
Perhaps someone should test the water in Granby asap.
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/montreal/story/2009/08/25/granby-power-tool-bylaw.html
[quote]I hope George Wong doesn’t mind if I link here [/quote]Erik Larsen
George Wong’s political(90%)conclusions Re: (10% Botany) the Irish potato famine, would be hilarious lampooned…. He is a wing nut; everyone else is an idiot…
“Granby, Que., bans power tools on Sundays”
Well, they’re Quacky Quebecers, non?
Phillip G. Shaw – to tie into the wikipedia discussion, George Wong’s essays are interesting from the scientific point of view, but I like to draw my own political conclusions rather than accept his 🙂
Liberal Iggy’s redo: From country hick to world-traveller, citizen-of-the-world,
aka rootless cosmopolitan.
Black tie Iggy:
“liberal-international’s photostream”
http://www.flickr.com/photos/40416683@N05/
One day a florist went to a barber for a haircut. After the cut, he asked how much he owed, and the barber replied,
“I cannot accept money from you. I’m doing community service this week.” The florist was pleased and left the shop.
When the barber went to open his shop the next morning, there was a ‘thank you’ card and a dozen roses waiting for
him at his door. The next day, a cop came in for a haircut, and when he tried to pay his bill, the barber again replied,
“I cannot accept money from you. I’m doing community service this week.” The cop was happy and left the shop.
When the barber arrived at his shop the following morning, there was a ‘thank you’ card and a dozen donuts waiting
for him at his door. Then a MP came in for a haircut, and when he went to pay his bill, the barber again replied,
“I cannot accept money from you. I’m doing community service this week.” The MP was very happy and left the shop.
The next morning when the barber arrived at work, there were a dozen MPs lined up waiting for free haircuts.
And that perfectly illustrates the fundamental difference between the citizens of our country and the politicians who run it.
Yeah, The Viggen, as if any cop is going to give away doughnuts. Pull the other one.
I expect those castings take a month of sundays to cool to avoid internal stresses in the block from throwing off the fine machining.
what make/model is the engine block for?
also:
“of course, I meant “unabated”
Posted by: Rob R at August 25, 2009 11:50 AM”
Rob R, if I may suggest, another correction also fits; change from unabetted to abetted and it still works. the chrc is indeed abetted unabated by agenda groups and individuals too numerous to count.
is there a pesticide for this infestation that has not yet been banned?
“I am not a lunatic,” pleads Canadian bomber:
Saad Khalid, the first of the so-called “Toronto 18” to enter a guilty plea following his 2006 arrest, spoke from a prepared statement at the start of his sentencing hearing at a court in Brampton, a suburb of Toronto.
“Everyone makes mistakes,” Khalid was quoted as saying in court by the daily Globe and Mail. “The reason we fall down is so we can learn to get up again.”
“I am not a lunatic hell-bent on destruction” of the West, he added. “I never wanted to hurt anybody.”
http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/afp/090825/canada/canada_attacks_court
EXCUSE ME.
“All” he was planning to do, with 17 others, was fill three rented vans with explosives — to result in deadlier explosions than the July 2005 London Underground and bus bombings that killed 52 people –, orchestrate three days of attacks on the Toronto Stock Exchange, CSIS, and an undisclosed military base in Canada and, apparently, behead Prime Minister Stephen Harper, in order to pressure Canada to withdraw from Afghanistan.
His plea that he didn’t want to hurt anybody is obscene, empty, self-serving, rhetoric.
I hope the judge throws the book at him.
“Everyone makes mistakes,” Khalid was quoted as saying in court by the daily Globe and Mail. “The reason we fall down is so we can learn to get up again.” A mistake is giving too much change back to a customer,or putting diesel in the tank when you’re driving a car that takes gasoline. Plotting to kill hundreds is not a mistake.The audacity of this self-serving crap is beyond comprehension. I too hope that he has the book thrown at him,repeatedly.