Kids Should be Engineers

[SoulWinner]

On a recent thread the subject of kids success at fishing was brought up. It is my belief that kids catch fish because when you put a rod and reel in their hands they full expect to catch fish. They haven't learned yet that fish only bite at certain times, they don't know about tides and wind direction, they just think that they are SUPPOSED to catch fish.....therefore they do One of the greatest blessings of childhood is that you don't know limitations.<br /><br />I remember when I was kid, before I was educated and told all of the things that can't work, don't work, aren't supposed to work etc,. I could build anything out of garbage. Soap box cars, tree houses, stuff like that. When I was 9 or 10 I built a suite of armor, when I look back on it I'm amazed....I couldn't do that good a job today, and now I have all the proper tools for the job. Back then all I had was a claw hammer, metal shears and a stump to use as an anvil. Once I built a cross bow that worked. I used a broom handle for the stock, a piece of fiberglass for the bow, and hand formed the firing mechanism. I was no more than 12 at the time and the power and accuracy of my little bow freaked my dad out so bad that I'm sure he is behind it's mysterious dissappearance. Once I made a bong out of a light bulb (I was a little older then) <br /><br />I'm just curious, what miraculous feats of engineering did you all pull off when you were kids?

 

[SeaMasterZ@aol.com]

Re: Kids Should be Engineers

lets see, three story tree house with sun deck, had running water (at ten or so, many houses threw out old sinks and tubing, I was a junker, lol ... first soldering burn, first fire caused by soldering (unrelated with burn, lol) put it out with hose that was nearby JUST in case that a fire started, lol), chopped into dads garden watering hose to hook up water yeah, I was in trouble a LOT, lol<br /><br />made a triple gang mower, three junker mowers I brought home, got running and bolted together, did mowing jobs in less than half time cause it would make a true 44 inch cut (and inadvertently, one of the first mulching mowers, the duct was blocked on the the left hand rear mower) and would tow around on a trailer I made for my ten speed 20 inch banana seat bike(towed it easy, low low first gear!), which piissed the local rich kids off cause they only had five speed Orange Krates (Schwinn dealership was right around the block, always throwing junk bikes out, I would drag them home, fix em, sell em, and certain ones I adopted for my assorted projects, like the ten speed Red Raycer) also, a three speed banana seat bike with ten foot chopper bars (soldering/brazing didnt work, burned the paint off the old forks, wound up drilling and bolting them on)<br /><br />I made a racing tractor long before Tim Allen did on Tool Time, by putting a bigger pulley on the engine, and put a chrome exhaust stack on it like a big truck (chrome lamp post)<br /><br />also made a raft from plywood and some honda shipping crates (styrofoam), broke apart more and more with each use, but the honda dealer was right up the street, about five mins by bike, just get a new set of foams)<br /><br />too many things, lol, I was constantly trying to improve things, initially went to college for engineering, and hated math so much I bombed it<br /><br />aced philosophy and especially psychology tho, and some 20 years later, Immmm BACK!!!<br /><br />come to think of it, the engine stand I made came from wood the nieghbors up the street had thrown out from doing a project of their own, all it cost me was a few bucks for casters and paint (and a cracked 2x10 I got for 2 bucks, used two feet of it, four more feet will be used on the big dual motor stand)<br /><br />Ah well gang, duty calls, that dammned AC unit over at moms bar burnt its motor up, have to go see if I can transplant the squirrel cage motor from her furnace into the ac stack, hey, good thing I am great at making junk into gold, lol<br /><br />gonna be hot and sticky tomorrow, no AC, no customers!<br /><br />sheesh!

 

[rolmops]

Re: Kids Should be Engineers

Hi Ray.<br />Still using this board to write your life story I see.<br />pas de quoi.(never mind my french).<br />When will you take my advice and seriously start writing your biography in a book?If not for the world at least for your descendants,for a character like yours should be made immortal.

 

[SeaMasterZ@aol.com]

Re: Kids Should be Engineers

LOL, well mops, the parents knew they were in trouble when I took some of the old mans "brush pot" thinners and painted moms car when I was three ... just tryin to be helpful! most kids wanted gi joe and such like that, I wanted tools from as far back as I Remember, they got me a Handy Andy Jr kit that was crummy, I wanted Craftsman tools like dad had, and would always hound for his cast offs, lol<br /><br />last night, my back did its usual spasm thing while working on the AC stack, so I took a few percocets and then took the entire assembly out and put it on the dishwasher rack (immensely strong stainless steel commercial duty jobber, same one that I fixed a few weeks ago, sheesh, what a money pit that place is) <br /><br />the motor turned the wrong way, so I pulled it out AGAIN, switched the field wires and they were happy happy, just have to figure out how to step down the 220 wires coming into the box and run the 110 motor (not a dual voltage motor, 110.. well, 115 ... volt only) Im a thinkin bout tapping into the water pump feed (this is an old style water dissapation cooling tower, clever idea, has worked well for 60 years or so)<br /><br />I remember years back dragging home a washing machine and trying to make a manual hand pump merry go round into a power one with the washing machine motor / trans ... and was "agitated" when I couldnt smooth it out, it jerked around like a washer does, lol, which was kinda cool, but I remembered having to switch the wires to make it run in the right direction ... <br /><br />and in that little experiment came the odd dichonomy of a child genius, so smart they couldnt calculate my IQ, who reasoned, its a washing machine, its waterproof (mom had covered the motor part with a trash bag, TOLD me to keep it dry and NEVER use it when its wet ... but hey, what did moms know? )... and blew the garage circuit after the first rain storm experiment, motor was junked, ah well, more projects .. poor mom, always trying to keep the yard cleaned up, always getting calls from parents cause I sold their kid a bike that would skid its back tire at the touch of the brakes (we LIKED to skid out, it was cool, but the parents kept buying rear tires, blamed ME, lol) things like that, I always had some sorta thing going on that made parents unhappy and the kids delighted, lol<br /><br />(every winter I became The Fireworks King, I would buy a bunch of fireworks coming home from Florida and sell them in packaged "kits" at QUITE a tidy profit, mom could never understand why I only had a few bottle rockets and some ladyfingers left when it was fourth of july, lol)<br /><br />ah well ... should head back to the eagle, see how that motor is doing, its only got to last a month, but it is a 1/4 horse motor doing a 1/2 horse job - the old motor was so dammned old, I think Edison made it by hand, but ya never know ...

 

[SeaMasterZ@aol.com]

Re: Kids Should be Engineers

that 1/4 horse motor is hangin in there - dammn thing is hot as a two doller shotgun tho

 

[dhud64]

Re: Kids Should be Engineers

A bong out of a light bulb? Never heard of that one! <br />And I thought I had come up with some clever ways, of course that was a few years ago!

 

[SeaMasterZ@aol.com]

Re: Kids Should be Engineers

wellllll, I never thought of using a light bulb, but I did make a power hitter out of two and three liter bottles ... WOOF<br /><br />lol<br /><br />

 

[Duck Loads]

Re: Kids Should be Engineers

Everyone's done that, though.

 

[ndemge]

Re: Kids Should be Engineers

I've always been fasinated by electronics and such..<br /><br />I remember when I was about 9 or so I wanted to make a flashlight. duct tape, D batteries, old flashlight blub, and some supper thin copper wire.<br /><br />(my brother is an EE.. makes circuit boards.. so there was a spool of bare copper wire.. proabbly 28 awg or so.. supper thing.<br /><br />light worked.. for a few seconds until the wire melted and burned my hand...

 

[RICKRICK1]

Re: Kids Should be Engineers

I was always fixin things. people next door threw out an old lamp cause it didn't work. I got it brought it home and started trying to fix it. Mom came and told me not to work on that in the house as I was blowing the fuses and might start a fire. Smart me I ran an extension cord outside about 25 feet from the house and then tryed to fix it. Yep mom soon put that idea to rest after the extension cord burnt in half and blew every fuse in the house. These were the old screwin fuses, house had 6 fuses and we only had 4 that came in the box. Dad hit the ceiling when he found out. Made me mow not only our lawn but the two across the street where he had to go and borrow some fuses.