Zel's Fleet Blog - BX, Jag XJ-S, Sinclair C5, Mercedes 208D & 230TE, AC Model 70.

[myglaren]

Perhaps one of his Ozone generators too.

[bobins]

.....Made of finest Chineseum so there's the added bonus of a possible electrical fire

[Gibbo2286]

I can say that in all my long life I've never seen a grain mite, possibly ate a few in my wartime breakfasts though.

[Dormouse]

We have been plagued with tiny, black fruit flies. We have been using vinegar too. Been at it for 3 weeks now! LOML is demented cleaning every day, and we have been into every nook and cranny. The house has never been so spotless. I might have to use the nuclear option - Raid insecticide.
Not connected to your source of pests, but, I have noticed very much higher numbers of plant infestations in the garden this summer. Hate to use insecticides but it looks like my gardening might have to include it (and soapy water) from now on. I have even started bleaching the wheelie bins every time they are emptied.

[myglaren]

I hose my wheelie bins out and then spray them with Jeyes fluid. Pongs but deters all but the boldest of snails.

Never even heard of grain mites never mind seeing any.

[mickthemaverick]

Two years ago I detected the appearance of bugs in the bedroom. Over the next six months I used 18 cans of bug killer, 3 smoke bombs, steam cleaned everything inch by inch and they were still around in March last year. I found possible egg sites in the bed frame so I removed the bed through the window so as not to drop anything in the rest of the house, installed a new metal framed bed and then followed the advice of a very old lady who lives nearby. Having resteamed the carpet I then laid a trail of Diatomaceous Earth as a complete ring around the perimeter of the room. Since then, 18 months ago, I have not seen a single insect or spider at all. Not one!! I thoroughly recommend it for preventing the little buggers. Apparently it works by destroying them from inside out but I don't care, all I know is it works!! I still have it in place in order to prevent any further occurrences as you can see here:

Own work

Own work

[Armidillo]

We have been plagued with tiny, black fruit flies. We have been using vinegar too. Been at it for 3 weeks now! LOML is demented cleaning every day, and we have been into every nook and cranny. The house has never been so spotless. I might have to use the nuclear option - Raid insecticide.
...

Errr - those little fruit flies are most likely Drosophila melanogaster (look very closely & you'll find they have red eyes). The thing is, their common name is "Vinegar fly" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drosophila_melanogaster), and they are attracted by the smells of ripe or decaying fruit, alcohol, and vinegar!

So clean up any rotting fruit in the garden (obviously there's none in the house ), use disinfectant on the garbage bin(s), and clean the house with just about anything as long as it doesn't contain alcohol or vinegar .

[Dormouse]

Oh well! so much for Google! I suppose my penchant for cider doesn't help either.

[Dormouse]

Just tried to read the Wiki entry and it appears I have been invaded by the miniature version. There is no plates, tins or foods left out now. All scraps are going straight out to the bin and we have cleaned out just about everywhere except under the dishwasher but even there has been sprayed more than once. Persistent little beggars!

[Dormouse]

We have been plagued with tiny, black fruit flies. We have been using vinegar too. Been at it for 3 weeks now! LOML is demented cleaning every day, and we have been into every nook and cranny. The house has never been so spotless. I might have to use the nuclear option - Raid insecticide.
...

Errr - those little fruit flies are most likely Drosophila melanogaster (look very closely & you'll find they have red eyes). The thing is, their common name is "Vinegar fly" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drosophila_melanogaster), and they are attracted by the smells of ripe or decaying fruit, alcohol, and vinegar!

So clean up any rotting fruit in the garden (obviously there's none in the house ), use disinfectant on the garbage bin(s), and clean the house with just about anything as long as it doesn't contain alcohol or vinegar .

This pandemic has stopped things like speaking to your neighbours for any length of time. However, a lengthy chat with my neighbour's dad ( it was his wife's funeral we were at during the week) has elicited the information that we are not the only household plagued by these little blighters. Indeed, the warm spell we have experienced this summer has indeed produced more garden pests than normal and the conditions have been near perfect for the little black blighters lately. This has relieved LOML no end as she knows now it is not because she has allowed her house to become ground zero for the blighters! Getting rid of them! Well, according to what I have been told, it is not going to be quick.

[Zelandeth]

Tiny black flies are a permanent fixture around here every summer. We've ascertained that they seem to be coming from an area of greenery that backs onto our garden that the council just leave to grow wild. Being literally opposite the gates to a school all manner of rubbish gets thrown in there and is left to rot. Really wish the council would do something about it as A: it's a favourite meeting point for drug users and B: the trees keep knocking panels out of our fence. However they're utterly disinterested and as usual any attempt to contact them in writing never gets anything beyond the automated "we've got your enquiry" reply. This appears to be absolutely standard for Milton Keynes Council as I've never got an actual reply out of them since the day we moved in, in 2014. Having worked for a local authority I used to be pretty proactive about reporting issues but have basically given up now. There's some very offensive graffiti just around the corner from our place which has been there for over two years now. Streetlight opposite our driveway failed just after last Christmas.

It's honestly embarrassing having worked in the field and is precisely the sort of service that gives local councils a bad reputation.

I am now utterly, completely and totally fed up of cleaning. There is an astonishing amount of "stuff" in a kitchen! Especially when you have to clean every single item before moving it to an alternative location.

Think we're nearly done at least. At a guess probably around £300 worth of food supplies have been binned - either things they had clearly got into, it wasn't clear either way or were packaged in a way which couldn't be cleaned.

Still seeing the odd one or two, but still a few areas to clean, and it is the odd one or two rather than them being here in great number. There's literally no food products left in there now at least so hopefully they shouldn't last long.

[myglaren]

Write to your local councillor, much more likely to get a response if an individual is handed the responsibility.
Or go and meet them if they are still having their 'surgeries'.
Or your MP - same approach.

[Zelandeth]

Write to your local councillor, much more likely to get a response if an individual is handed the responsibility.
Or go and meet them if they are still having their 'surgeries'.
Or your MP - same approach.

Been there, done that, they've been copied into pretty much everything when I've been pressing for a response. Never even acknowledged receipt of any of it.

As for meeting them, maybe sometime down the line if it ever feels safe to do so. Though I don't really have high hopes for being taken seriously.

[Zelandeth]

Hopefully we've now dealt with our insect infestation now and I can actually get back to doing something useful tomorrow or Monday. Which would be nice. I'm kinda hacked off at having lost three days to this mess. Had hoped to be putting things back together on the Merc by this point. Oh...well...aside from the fact that the head gasket set hasn't turned up yet. Apparently it's stuck in customs judging from the parcel tracking. Where it's been since Thursday. Oh what fun.

Just to add to the fun the leisure battery on the van appears to have packed in given it was showing under 9V despite having been charged only a couple of days ago. That'll be cheap to replace I'm sure...110Ah capacity if I remember right.

Oh, and water is peeing in somewhere in the upper offside rear corner. Right where I sorted last year. Blarg. That's probably just getting silicone sealant thrown at it along the edging strip for now as I simply don't have time to go pulling the coachwork apart right now (nor dealing with the can of worms that is opening) and we can fully investigate and do a more permanent fix in the spring.

[Zelandeth]

Ugh...my head gasket set which has been stuck in customs since the middle of the week apparently is now on its way back to the sender according to the tracking. Deep joy. Fine, will go see if Motorserv can get the necessary bits in tomorrow. If I can find any petrol (or diesel) anyway. Despite it sounding like the situation is easing off in many areas it's still a mess here.

In slightly less depressing news a little parcel arrived this morning. Buried within an improbably large amount of bubble wrap was this.



As with many things which arrive in the post for me this falls under the heading of "was very expensive when it was new."

Around £140 - in 1973. That equates to somewhere around £1500 in 2021.

So what is in the case then?



A calculator...you probably guessed that already. Albeit a very expensive one for such a basic feature set. This is the important bit.



This is a Sharp EL-805. The first pocket calculator ever to make use of a liquid crystal display. Rockwell actually got there first to use an LCD in a calculator the previous year, but they were AC powered desktop units...which didn't really take advantage of the low profile nature and low(ish!) power consumption of the technology. Sharp were the first to really take that step.

Yes, I do have the three models using the Rockwell design on my eBay saved search list, because I absolutely want to get hold of one of them obviously!

This isn't the LCD technology you're used to. This was the first commercially applied form of the principle, a dynamic scattering mode (DSM) panel, rather than the twisted nematic displays which took over after only a couple of years. The more modern displays use polarisation changes to block or allow the passage of light, whereas DSM displays simply are totally clear when unpowered or are opaque when power is applied. These early displays were very fragile and used an order of magnitude more power than later display technologies.

While they had their limitations they are extremely striking looking things.







The EL-805 was particularly noteworthy in that the whole calculator more or less is built on the same panel of glass which the display is constructed from. You actually view the display *through* the circuit board which is quite unusual. This turned out to be a technological dead end really but nevertheless was an interesting approach back in the early 70s. I will of course get some photos of that setup with the case off when I get a chance.

Very glad to have finally got hold of one of these, it's a model which has been on the radar for quite a long time. The last few I've seen have sold for well into three figures so I was quite surprised that the cheeky offer I submitted through eBay was accepted...not complaining though!

The big brother to the EL-805 was the EL-808 which I managed to get hold of last year. This was a far larger portable desktop calculator which was clearly designed to showcase the new display technology at its best.



If such things interest you, some more information on that one can be found over here.