[R-390] Now *this* is a really nifty idea...

[Kim Herron]

Hi Gang!!
 
I have a funny short tale to relate to the group about a new, Pimply Faced
Youth, electrical engineer;
I took a PFY-EE out with me to a customer location where we were having a
problem with drop-outs and low BER on a microwave system. I decided that the
dish needed some slight alignment changes. The 10' dish was mounted on the
roof of a 30 story building. (this is a 48 dB gain antenna). I instructed
him to stay away from the front of the antenna, we had a pair of
handi-talkies to discuss what adjustments to make from the back of the dish
for azimuth and tilt.
As you know, making adjustments to antenna alignment you frequently need to
give a system a few minutes to settle in to measure data throughput on a
link. This can take a few hours to get the alignment right on.
All was well and we were at the point of making fractional adjustments to
the antenna (I was down at the receiver, watching statistics, RSL, SNR, BER
and data rates). Suddenly in the middle of a measurement cycle, performance
would drop into the toilet for 20-30 seconds at a time. Now we were chasing
our tails and trying to figure out what had changed, and what is so
intermittent. After an hour of this I went up to the roof to find out what
was going on.
I found my PFY-EE standing on the edge of the roof, admiring the view,
directly in front of the microwave antenna.
I have no idea if he noticed any effects from essentially sticking his head
in a microwave oven. It just reminded me how clueless and dangerous a newly
minted engineer is.



     I've noticed this for years and it's not isolated to EE's.  It's
everywhere and I'm not sure why.  It's a basic loss of common sense.  We
shouldn't have to remind/educate about such things, but you can't take
anything for granted anymore.  The word 'ASSUME' has taken on even more
meaning than ever


 
 

Kim Herron W8ZV
www.goldenradioservice.com
kim.herron at sbcglobal.net
1-616-677-3706 



-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://mailman.qth.net/pipermail/r-390/attachments/20090104/4e82fc1f/attachment.htm