Boat Jokes (we need a few laughs)

Discussion in 'All Things Boats & Boating' started by brian eiland, Oct 29, 2006.

  1. Rurudyne
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    Rurudyne Senior Member

  2. ancient kayaker
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    ancient kayaker aka Terry Haines

    Re-reading this post reminded me of a job I did in the 90's. It wasn't an accordion, it was a robot. Yeah, that's what I did before I built boats. I traced one of them down to this video, I feel rather sad to see the three life-size Triceratops abandoned like this but I suspect they were a challenge to keep operational and the whole thing was closed down following an economical downturn. When I last saw one it was fully animated right down the the eyes with its varying size iris. I designed the control system. Surprisingly that was fairly simple considering it was running about 30 mecnanisms simultaneously, but the triceratops itself was definitely a technological tour de force, probably the most complex single robotic mechanism of its time.

    If you find the guy behind the camera a bit irritating fast forward to 4 min into the video to s4ee the actual beasts. Hard to scale them but they are each about 30 feet long and 10 feet high, weight around 10 tonnes and had a 70 HP hydraulic power system. I think the technology was just too much for the maintenance guys of a theme park to keep going; looks like several of the eye and eyelid mechanisms are missing - they were pretty delicate, more like watches than robotic parts.

    Triceratops Encounter Remains

    I still have some pics of early development - thought I'd tossed 'em - the eye is about the same height as a tall human's -
     

    Attached Files:

  3. Rurudyne
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    Rurudyne Senior Member

    Bummer. It may truly be said that the long days of an engineer's life are wiped out in a moment by a bean counter's pen.
     
  4. philSweet
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    philSweet Senior Member

    file under weird coincidences -

    What are the odds that I encounter the phrase "life sized robotic Tyranosarus/Tricerotops" twice in one day, and that they are referring to two different robots??? The radio ads for the link below all hype the robots.

    http://www.discoverthedinosaurs.com/Events/greenvillesc.html
     
  5. RHP
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    RHP Senior Member

    True story happened just yesterday. I was flying back from Ho Chi Minh city to Singapore on sunny Vietnam airlines resting my bulk in the emergency row seats when the air stewardess came to brief us, or so I thought. 'This is the emergency exit......' ok, we all know the blurb that comes next about open, throw it out then get out etc.. but no, she simply said 'Don't touch' and walked away. The guy next to me and I rolled around laughing. 'Don't touch!' .... !!!!
     
  6. ancient kayaker
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    ancient kayaker aka Terry Haines

    True indeed, but I don't think it was just the economy that killed off these particular dinos.

    It was truly awesome, but I had the feeling we were creating something that was going to be a nightmare to maintain and the guys who were going to keep it running should have been working alongside the engineers. Instead the customer sent a bunch of executives to go "ooh, ah" at the demos. The guys making the decisions were movie people used to having their dreams interpreted by banks of computers, not hardware, but it wasn't my place to burst their bubble.

    As it was I got taken off the team at the 90% point before I completed the self-diagnosis subsystem - I doubt it got done. It was check the installation before initial power-up - which folk in that business used to call the blinding flash test . . .

    But now I've seen the light, I just design and build boats, with total control over the entire process.
     
  7. Rurudyne
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    Rurudyne Senior Member

    They took you off the team BEFORE you'd completed the self-diagnostics system (and obviously leaving none or insufficient manpower to finish, as per your comment)?

    ...

    I really wish I was funny enough a jokester to top that sort of decision in some passing comment. I really do.

    Did you send a brief synopsis to Scott Adams to use in his comic? (apparently that's how he gets a lot of his stuff)
     
  8. ancient kayaker
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    ancient kayaker aka Terry Haines

    The project leader liked my assistant and disliked me. The assistant was useless and quit after a week! I had been taken up on an Aerospace job and couldn't be spared so they had to take on 4 new guys to do my job. That was a large system to take over from scratch! Bit of a chuckle I thought.

    Hmm - that's a thought . . .
     
  9. philSweet
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    philSweet Senior Member

    Yes, I can see Scott Adams having some fun with a mismanaged robotic dinosaur project.

    "When you get it working, let me know so I can replace you with it.":D

    [​IMG]
     
  10. Rurudyne
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    Rurudyne Senior Member

    Reminds me of an observation I made a few years ago: why is it when some protesters start taking off their clothes and hanging from trees it is usually the people who simply should keep their clothes on?

    I believe the answer to this may be similar to one for observations I've heard about nude or topless beaches.
     
  11. ancient kayaker
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    ancient kayaker aka Terry Haines

    I always pray for snow on the topless days unless I'm in the South of France . . .
     
  12. rxcomposite
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    rxcomposite Senior Member

    What is worse than finding a worm in your apple?

    Half a worm.
     
  13. Fanie
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    Fanie Fanie

    So what you're saying is half an egg is worse than an empty shell :D
     
  14. rxcomposite
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    rxcomposite Senior Member

    Half a worm. You ate the other half of the apple and worm.:p:D:D
     

  15. rxcomposite
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    rxcomposite Senior Member

    Only if it is "balut" and the remaining half is the dead chick.:D
     
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