This message is for Dave Cornwell really ,where did you buy your solar
powered fan Dave ?

RonB

"Ron Button" wrote in message
...
This message is for Dave Cornwell really ,where did you buy your solar
powered fan Dave ?

RonB
Well Ron
The only solar powered stuff I've ever used that were purchased from one
of the 'innovations' catalogues many years ago. One product was the 'Solar
powered Garden path light'. You stuck these things in the soil along your
pathway-the idea being that they would turn the suns mighty rays into stored
electrical energy, and you would switch them on as dusk fell.
They were absolutely hopeless, any light that they did manage to emit was so
weak the gravitational pull of a slug could absorb it. You'd switch them on
and had to check and recheck that you'd actually had, you needed a torch to
find your way back down the path. In fact the only word that can capture the
ingenuity of these devices was *PATHetic*

The other star, or should I say black hole, in the illustrious firmament of
solar energy were the self powered fountains. You float these things on
your pond where they floated gently absorbing the sun and converting it into
a fountain that would help oxygenate the water for your grateful little
fish. Fantastic and it's all for free with no pollution.

Well the fountain that this things managed to dribble out was akin to a man
with a severe prostate problem who hadn't drank for two weeks and with a
knot tied in his todger for good measure. These solar fountains were so dire
that they made the "solar garden lights" look like a miracle in energy
production.

Another rubbish products that I've tried was the 'Battery free torch's. I
saw this just over a year ago in Homebase, it was a magnet that passed
through a copper coil all you had to do shake the torch up and down and the
magnet would pass through the coil creating a current that was stored in a
tiny capacitor.

Now over the years with Hi-Fi gadgets technology I've always had what I call
a 'mug factor', this meant that say every time I went to say, the Hi-Fi news
show, there was always an inflation-linked amount of cash that I was
prepared to part;with just to see if the gadget actually worked.

This torch was well within my mug factor but blimey it was worse than the
pathlights and the solar fountain combined. I actually tried to use this
stupid torch in the garden one dark January night last year. I was trying to
find something in the bushes and shaking the torch via it's shaft up and
down like mad a neighbour saw this through her curtains and called the
police. I was later questioned and cautioned for carrying out an indecent
act in public.

So my experience with solar, renewable energy devices has so far been very
negative., not positive and that neatly leads me on to the rechargeable
torch that I also purchased from Homebase several years ago.
"TWO HUNDRED THOUSAND CANDLE POWER" it said, just charge the thing up and
away you go. What that didn't tell you was that after charging the thing for
eight hours and confidently walking up the dark garden path, that the two
hundred thousand candles would diminish to half a bleedin' candle by the
time you reached the bloody shed. So after initially on a fresh charge
lighting up the night sky the battery lasted about two useless minutes.

Nope rubbish the lot of them. Now how about that wind-up torch I saw in
Homebase the other day? Only twenty quid hmm....

Lawrence Jenkins wrote:

Nope rubbish the lot of them. Now how about that wind-up torch I saw in
Homebase the other day? Only twenty quid hmm....


The wind up radio I use is brilliant!
We need innovative ideas not negative ones...

--
Gareth Slee
http://www.meroffice.com

In uk.sci.weather on Sat, 27 Jan 2007, Gareth Slee
wrote :

Lawrence Jenkins wrote:

Nope rubbish the lot of them. Now how about that wind-up torch I saw in
Homebase the other day? Only twenty quid hmm....


The wind up radio I use is brilliant!

Wasn't it Trevor Bayliss who came up with that? I bet that made him
rich!
--
Paul Hyett, Cheltenham (change 'invalid83261' to 'blueyonder' to email me)

After reading Lawrence's in-depth and incisive analysis of solar powered
instruments ,and whilst I await Dave Cornwell's reply to my request,it
reminds me of two adverts I saw in an old copy of Punch magazine (ah sadly
missed).
One offering a bowler hat with a solar panel built in,which powered a fan
inside
'to keep your head cool during the hottest part of the day '
The other , a similarly powered
'carpet mower ,mow your carpets in the comfort of your own home'
..
What more can one ask ?


RonB
"Paul Hyett" wrote in message
...
In uk.sci.weather on Sat, 27 Jan 2007, Gareth Slee
wrote :

Lawrence Jenkins wrote:

Nope rubbish the lot of them. Now how about that wind-up torch I saw in
Homebase the other day? Only twenty quid hmm....


The wind up radio I use is brilliant!

Wasn't it Trevor Bayliss who came up with that? I bet that made him rich!
--
Paul Hyett, Cheltenham (change 'invalid83261' to 'blueyonder' to email me)

In message , Lawrence
Jenkins writes
This torch was well within my mug factor but blimey it was worse than the
pathlights and the solar fountain combined. I actually tried to use this
stupid torch in the garden one dark January night last year. I was trying to
find something in the bushes and shaking the torch via it's shaft up and
down like mad a neighbour saw this through her curtains and called the
police. I was later questioned and cautioned for carrying out an indecent
act in public.

Getting a bit off topic but this reminds me of a tale told to me by one
of the secretaries where I worked many years ago. Her grandfather was
having his hair cut by a young lady. She went off for a minute leaving
him wrapped up in the shawl. He decided to clean his glasses so he
reached out from under the shawl and took them off and brought them
under the shawl. He got his hankie from his pocket and started to clean
his glasses. The young lady came back, saw the movement under the shawl
and jumped to a very wrong conclusion! She shouted "You dirty old
bu***r" and swiped him over the head with a hair drier. The end result
was that he sued her for assault. I never did find out if it actually
went to court.

To get back on-topic, it has suddenly turned sunny here in the past half
hour after a cloudy and grey start to the day. The cloud has evaporated
very quickly.

Norman.
(delete "thisbit" twice to e-mail)
--
Norman Lynagh Weather Consultancy
Chalfont St Giles 85m a.s.l.
England

"The wind up radio I use is brilliant!

Three things:-
1.PC cpu and case fans work well with a 12v 2W solar panel (have pm'd Ron)
2. Solar garden lights are much brighter now due to the use of white L.E.Ds
3. Can you buy a wind up Lawrence - no sorry, he already is a windup. ;-)

Dave