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Pulser Cassette Recorder

I recently came across this cassette recorder with wires sticking out the side. I thought it was probably broken, but brought it home to look at. I opened it up and found a hack job with the wiring. Wires had been spliced into the original and covered loosely with tape.

After fixing the mess of wires, I tested it out by battery. It worked but the audio cut in and out when at full volume. I found out that one of the wires was getting pinched and after fixing that it plays great. I would like to get a 6V DC power supply instead of burning C batteries, but I have really enjoyed getting this vintage cassette recorder working.

Navajo Flute

I recently visited southern Arizona and bought a 6 hole Navajo Flute while there.

After playing with it for a week, I decided to oil it. The pamphlet I got with it said to oil it with olive oil or woodwind oil. I poured a small amount in and spun the flute around to coat everything.It took a bit to get everything oiled, but I did notice a difference in the sound afterwards. The lows were easier to sustain and the higher notes were more clear.

I looked around for a simple scale and there were lots of different versions that didn’t contain all the notes I was expecting. Here is my revised scale for my flute.

Ford Focus Block Heater

It is winter now and the weather is pretty cold where I live. My battery is weak and there is cold weather on the way, so I decided to test the block heater out. I was told by a friend to plug it in, and then unplug the block heater quickly. If the heat plug had any draw it would create a spark when I unplugged it. It did not create a spark so I figured that the block heater was not working for some reason. I traced the cable and found that it was just dangling at the back of the engine bay. After some research and feeling around the back of the engine, I found the block heater plug.

From the top of the engine looking to the right you can see the orange end of the block heater cable.

Because of the angle, I used a mirror to get a picture of the plug. It now works great, and I still test it regularly by checking for a spark when unplugging it.

Cleaning Lenko Snow Machines

I was recently introduced to two Lenko snow machines and was really interested to see them working. Because of the multitude of nozzles making a fine mist, they are supposed to make snow really well. Upon firing it up, however, most were dribbling, and many more were clogged up altogether.

I started going through the work of removing the nozzles. There were 450 nozzles per machine plus an inner piece that needed disassembling as well to make a total of 1800 parts that needed cleaning!

I used CLR and an electric toothbrush to slowly clean all of the pieces. They were very calcified and the o-rings were cracking. After cleaning, I found that they were quite tacky and gave all the parts a hot water bath. I put new o-rings on as I assembled all the nozzles.

The difference after cleaning was visually striking. We flushed the machines with no nozzles in them to try to blast any residual build up out of the rings. Then we put all the nozzles back by hand to avoid over tightening or cross-threading. The machines work amazing now, and produce a lot of snow.