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Serviceman's Log
08 September 2008
There's an old saying that "one man's trash is another man's treasure". Personally, I think it's all treasure so you can imagine my overwhelming joy when a friend recently found an old valve car radio for me to fix!
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Versatile LED/Lamp Flasher
05 September 2008
The LM3909 was a legendary IC, which the designers (National Semiconductor) modestly described as a "LED Flasher/Oscillator". Its popularity was surely due both to its great simplicity and versatility. It could flash a LED off a wide range of voltages, at a wide range of frequencies. It could also flash LEDs in parallel, could produce a tone in a loudspeaker, trigger a Triac or pulse an incandescent bulb - among other things. Sadly, though, the LM3909 has been discontinued and is now very difficult to find.
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Railpower Model Train Controller
03 September 2008
This ultra-high performance model train controller features infrared remote control. We believe it's the best build-it-yourself train controller ever published!
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The Basslink High-Voltage DC Power Link
01 September 2008
Back in February 2000 a tender was granted for building a high voltage DC power link between Victoria and Tasmania. It was finally commissioned in April 2006 and now feeds power in both directions between Victoria and Tasmania, depending on demand in those states.
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LED Strobe & Contactless Tachometer
15 August 2008
This versatile LED Strobe & Tachometer can be used to observe and measure the RPM of rotating machinery. It offers three different measurement methods and the readout is via a 2-line LCD module.
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Circuit Notebook
13 August 2008
Interesting circuit ideas which we have checked but not built and tested. Contributions from
readers are welcome and will be paid for at standard rates.
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Serviceman's Log
11 August 2008
Occasionally, when I am allowed out by myself, I wander off to the auctions for the day. I always enjoy the experience but I have learnt that what you might gain is at the expense of a day's lost wages and if you do buy something, it's often a pig in a poke with no guarantees.
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Ultra-LD Mk.2 200W Power Amplifier Module
11 August 2008
This new amplifier module supersedes both the Plastic Power module described in the April 1996 issue and the Ultra-LD module presented in the March 2000 issue. It produces high power at very low distortion. In fact, as far as we are aware, it is the lowest distortion class-AB amplifier that has ever been published.
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Printing In The Third Dimension
08 August 2008
Imagine a colour printer that outputs images not just in the two dimensions we're all familiar with - width and depth - but adds the third dimension, height, so that the "printed" images can be physically held, picked up, turned, inverted . . . just like any other 3D object.
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Planet Jupiter Receiver
06 August 2008
How would you like to try some basic radio astronomy - listening to the bursts of noise originating from the planet Jupiter, or from the Sun? You don't need a lot of fancy equipment to do this, just the simple shortwave receiver described here. ItÂ’s hooked up to a basic dipole antenna (which we describe as well) and to the sound card in your PC, so that you can print out "chart recordings" of the noise signals.
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