Quantum Leaps

Grumpy Bear · May 3, 2019

So, while the wife's Terrain is getting new shoes today I'm leafing though a trade rag in the waiting room. You know the one. The "How to Bilk your customers" rag. In it was an article concerning GDI carbon deposits in the intake system and cleaning those deposits with chemical cleaners.

I had no idea that the EP additives in oil make carbon link in so many different ways and each oil and fuel carbon requires a completely different chemical to remove those various deposits for all the different additives used. . In addition a very specific nozzle is required and the cleaner added post throttle body to be effective. And lastly that the most potent of these cleaners causes of all things testicular cancer. I kid you not. This isn't a grab for catch cans mind you. This is a sales pitch for chemical cleaning stating your world will end if you don't do this highly dangerous procedure every 30K miles. Forget aerosol cleaners and forget walnut shells. Hey, forget sanity.

Seriously. I laughed so hard I nearly peed my pants and then I checked my shoes for the strong smell of dog crap. C'mon man, now we're just making things up.

Grumpy Bear · May 3, 2019

Selling Ice to Eskimos

This just keeps getting better. In that same Trade Rag is an article on using turns of phrase developed by the....get this...FBI...Military (CIA) and SWAT negotiators to upsell products and services. This could be Subtitled:

"Selling the most expensive product or service the customer does not need".

Wait for it. A section of this article concerned selling it first to your employees. Seems a convinced tech is a great TOOL.

Going to the way back machine when my shop was run out of my garage there were no such rags By the time my brother and his wife opened their conventional store front these rags centered on teaching techs about what was new coming from Detroit such as the latest trends in brake piston seals and the tools and methods to repair them. Now, in this 100 page collection of crap was ONE four pager on using your O-scope as a timing light and explaining what a timing light was to those who had no idea that motors use to have distributors.

PS, I rapid posted twice. Sorry.

Grumpy Bear · May 8, 2019

Even a Caveman can do it.

Inside my head is a dangerous place but it is never boring. I’m quite entertained. Stupid, ignorant and unwise come to die there.

That’s the plan anyway. I’m still ignorant, stupid and unwise on the absolute scale and literally unsure about where I would be on the relative scale.

That said I would venture a guess that anyone who spends a great deal of time mulling, studying, experimenting and taking and organizing notes and actually actively applying what they study on any one topic just might have an advantage over someone who doesn’t give it a second thought. It might also be a pretty good indicator that your squared away on the topic if people, corporations, are willing to spend a lifetimes worth of wages exploiting what you’ve learned to advance their own interest. Even more so if they have you train and write the training manuals. They could literally hire anyone they wish. From that springs confidence and yet oddly confidence to one who does not study the topic looks allot like conceit and arrogance. I get that. In this world the look of a thing is everything. No photo? Didn’t happen!

So how does this look?

Even if a human hasn’t a seconds worth of formal education they have observed that heat and time are the enemy of the physical world. Everything decays. Heat accelerates decay. Even a caveman knows that; as the commercial says.

So this caveman buys a new truck and reads on a bottle of oil that this mystery oil is magic and licensed by the trucks manufacture so has been tested to take like a billion degrees and will last for millions of miles or a lifetime whichever comes last. The manufacture however also says follow the books OCI and gives multiple tables for you to decide which applies to your case. Then programs the truck OLM to max out at 7,500 miles regardless.

Lastly the caveman observes he can’t find a used truck lot anywhere full of marketable 500,000 mile trucks.

What he can find, however, are individual trucks bought and maintained that look and run like new that have over 500,000 on the clock. Rare but findable. As rare as a mint unrestored 40’s Chris Craft. Still findable.

Caveman asks how this is possible and the fellow actually is willing to tell him. Use the best, Keep it cool, Keep it clean, Keep it full, Keep it changed and don’t abuse it.

Caveman thinks to himself. YIKES! I need a cooler and a good filter, some instruments and I need to buy well formulated oil and change it and I need to treat it well.

“But the bottle says I can abuse it; it will take a billion degrees for millions of miles or a lifetime whichever is last’. He will cry.

Then he will ignore the facts, go about his life, it will fail and he will conclude that science is a theory and anyone who says other is an arrogant, ignorant, conceited know it all. 150,000 is all it can last.

So....how DOES that look?

Grumpy Bear · May 12, 2019

This is a throw away world. I'm not a throw away person. This is a world of Crows. Shinny things dazzle crows. Me? Meh. I can actually tell the difference between Gold and gold colored plating. Which puts us at odds more than on the same page.

I've taught. I've also dismissed entire classes of students who were there for any reason but the course curriculum. Let's say I'm teaching how to build a boat. What is the first thing I want to know about the class? ……..Do you actually have any interest in building a boat? IF so, lets get to it. But there are classrooms full of people there for any reason but building a boat. Like professional trolls. Disruptors. Those only there to be seen there. Those who show for credit hours. Bored people with nothing else to do. Any reason but boat building.

Forums are like this. Seems like a place to get help. Give assistance. Share experiences to a common good. They are not.

I don't get bored. Rarely mad. I get disinterested and occasionally I find no entertainment value in a thing. If it isn't teaching me or entertaining me ….well....it has a short self life. This thread has become a commodity that is past it's 'use by' date. In fact all those in Off Topic that I OP have become a un-useful...to me... Time to clean out the fridge.

Grumpy Bear · October 19, 2019

In the Lap of Luxury

Chrysler Pacifica Touring. I'm sitting in the second row behind my friend who is peacock proud of his new ride. Older couple and successful business owners. This thing rides NICE. It is quite and it reminds me of first class seating in air travel actually. Lots of connectivity. I can watch a movie privately. Screen, headphones mounted to the seat back in front of me. Adjust the climate control over head and a reading lamp PLUS this thing has an on board vacuum cleaner! Seat is pretty nice reminiscent of the captains chairs in luxury vans of days gone by. Neutral grays and black with a smattering of SHINNNNNNNNY.

After the "Shock and Awe" wears of a bit and right about the time he asks, "So...what do you think?", I get all uncomfortable because my mouth is about to say things I'm going to regret. Go figure.....Nice timing friend.

Under my feet is a short pile carpet of recycled soda bottles. Woven PETG. I'm sitting on what I would guess is nylon stitched "Pleather". Everything within the reach of my eye is either pebble grained, smooth mat, smooth shinny, smooth shinny foil rapped or clear plastics save of course the picture window sized door glass that is optically perfect that can be covered with plastic window shade. Cold, stiff and meant to hide behind the technology it surrounds.

"I miss leather or even just well made yard goods. I miss REAL fine woods. Wool. Linen/Cotton and silk. I miss lacquered steel and polished stainless and honest triple plate chrome, brass and accent gold instrument foil. I miss glass and incandescent light. I miss the natural world this IS luxury. I miss the look of it, the smell of it, the sound of it and the feel of it. I miss a door that sounds solid when closed and a crackly old AM radio. I'll be totally honest now that I've stepped in it. I even miss and perfectly balanced and ultra simple flat straight six with a three in the tree. Smooooooooooooooth. Quite. Honest Luxury. Mostly I miss the price tags you could buy them for".

It was a short walk back and I'm guessing dinner is off this Friday.

Grumpy Bear · April 22, 2020

Edward Gibbon Quote

“In the end, more than freedom, they wanted security. They wanted a comfortable life, and they lost it all - security, comfort, and freedom. When the Athenians finally wanted not to give to society but for society to give to them, when the freedom they wished for most was freedom from responsibility then Athens ceased to be free and was never free again.”

~ Edward Gibbon
(1737-1794)
Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, 1909

Grumpy Bear · April 26, 2020

Summary of Laboratory Testing Results Reported to CDC*
	Week 16 (April 12 – April 18, 2020)	Cumulative since March 1, 2020
No. of specimens tested	575,490	3,164,787
Public Health Laboratories	72,345	401,159
Clinical Laboratories	47,983	213,427
Commercial Laboratories	455,162	2,550,201
No. of positive specimens %	107,703 (18.7%)	581,622 (18.4%)
Public Health Laboratories	13,636 (18.8%)	62,686 (15.6%)
Clinical Laboratories	4,585 (9.6%)	20,555 (9.6%)
Commercial Laboratories	89,482 (19.7%)	498,381 (19.5%)