Sac's random observation thread

Sac Arrow

Sac Arrow

Touchdown! Greaser!
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May 11, 2010
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Snorting his way across the USA
Thread for totally random observations few if any care about.

valves.jpg

When I go on long walks in the morning, because it is too cold to ride and all the gyms are closed, I start to pick up on little things. Like the paranoid household to the left and behind the photo, who has more cameras on his house and fence than Fort Knox. I counted at least five. But no, the subject matter is...

Pipelines!

Yes. You will see a valve cluster in the above picture. Those are water valves, but you knew that. As you can see, no two pairs of valves are lined up with the streets, which indicates that they are butterfly valves with offset operator screws. Usually, the cutoff between using gate valves and butterfly valves is 12 inches, and 14 inch pipe is rarely used, so they are probably at least 16 inch pipes. By the way, it's considered bad practice to put three or four way valve clusters at every single intersection. They went way overboard in this area. Just a few blocks behind me, they went way overboard and there are several T intersections with no valves at all.

I'm bored. Carry on.
 
I didn't know those were water valves, around here they are round.

Judging from your picture though, I would guess that the water department didn't raise their valves in time for the repaving job and had to come in later to level them to the surface of the street, hence the patch. That seems pretty universal, always someone messing up a paving job.
 
<TROLL>Since the covers are triangles rather than circles, does that mean that they can fall through the hole?</TROLL>
 
Triangular shaped covers?? Where was this taken?? Soviet Russia??

In 'Murica, our covers are round!
 
Deelee said:
Triangular shaped covers?? Where was this taken?? Soviet Russia??

In 'Murica, our covers are round!
Click to expand...

What gave it away? The Cyrillic letters on the other side?

It just depends on the water agency's preference. Some are round, some are triangular.

asicer said:
<TROLL>Since the covers are triangles rather than circles, does that mean that they can fall through the hole?</TROLL>
Click to expand...

What makes a circular manhole cover from falling through is the beveled seating surface on the rim. Same applies with the triangles.
 
Where are they in relation to the the approach course?
 
Only 5 cameras.??

My mom has 8 outside cameras. Now the dog can sit in the office and bark at people without having to go outside....
 
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Sac Arrow said:
What makes a circular manhole cover from falling through is the beveled seating surface on the rim. Same applies with the triangles.
Click to expand...
Not understanding geometry.
asicer said:
<TROLL>Since the covers are triangles rather than circles, does that mean that they can fall through the hole?</TROLL>
Click to expand...
Understanding geometry.
 
asicer said:
<TROLL>Since the covers are triangles rather than circles, does that mean that they can fall through the hole?</TROLL>
Click to expand...
No, being a shape of constant width, like a circle, an equilateral triangle such as those covers can't be rotated such that the width is smaller than any width of the corresponding flanged hole. Take an equilateral triangle and measure it with calipers- no matter which way you rotate the triangle (or any other regular polygon with an odd number of sides), you'll find it is the same width.
Edit- the information in this post is incorrect. I left it because it was quoted below before I could fix it.
 
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Cap'n Jack said:
No, being a shape of constant width, like a circle, an equilateral triangle such as those covers can't be rotated such that the width is smaller than any width of the corresponding flanged hole. Take an equilateral triangle and measure it with calipers- no matter which way you rotate the triangle (or any other regular polygon with an odd number of sides), you'll find it is the same width.
Click to expand...

FTW booyah!

Hmm, just learned something new.
 
Cap'n Jack said:
No, being a shape of constant width, like a circle, an equilateral triangle such as those covers can't be rotated such that the width is smaller than any width of the corresponding flanged hole. Take an equilateral triangle and measure it with calipers- no matter which way you rotate the triangle (or any other regular polygon with an odd number of sides), you'll find it is the same width.
Click to expand...
What if you consider it in 3 dimensions?
https://www.pilotsofamerica.com/com...-gendered-words-na.120111/page-2#post-2761106
 
Sac Arrow said:
FTW booyah!

Hmm, just learned something new.
Click to expand...
Actually, I'm wrong and was going to edit my post. Silly me. I was thinking of a Reuleaux polygon based on an equilateral triangle (or a regular polygon with an odd number of sizes).
Take an equilateral triangle with sides of unit length. Bisect one of the angles to split the original triangle in twain. The new triangles will have sides of 1, 1/2, and (3/4)^0.5 - that last length is the height of the triangle and is less than 1. So the equilateral triangle can fall through a hole just slightly smaller than itself.

Sorry about that!
 
Sac Arrow said:
What makes a circular manhole cover from falling through is the beveled seating surface on the rim. Same applies with the triangles.
Click to expand...
There is nothing preventing a designer from using a triangular cover in a triangular recess to cover a round hole or a triangular hole that is much smaller than the cover, so in a sense this statement is quite correct.:yeahthat:
 
asicer said:
There is nothing preventing a designer from using a triangular cover in a triangular recess to cover a round hole or a triangular hole that is much smaller than the cover, so in a sense this statement is quite correct.
Click to expand...
MUCH, much smaller
 
Cap'n Jack said:
Actually, I'm wrong and was going to edit my post. Silly me. I was thinking of a Reuleaux polygon based on an equilateral triangle (or a regular polygon with an odd number of sizes).
Take an equilateral triangle with sides of unit length. Bisect one of the angles to split the original triangle in twain. The new triangles will have sides of 1, 1/2, and (3/4)^0.5 - that last length is the height of the triangle and is less than 1. So the equilateral triangle can fall through a hole just slightly smaller than itself.

Sorry about that!
Click to expand...

Well, carp. The Internet is going to suffer immensely from me over that.

I joke. I already forgot it. These days I'm happy if I can remember my own name.
 
Nobody mentioned how close the garbage can are in relation to the car. Could be view parallax, could be a PO'd garbage collector.
 
Timbeck2 said:
Nobody mentioned how close the garbage can are in relation to the car. Could be view parallax, could be a PO'd garbage collector.
Click to expand...

The garbage collectors don't even get out of the truck. The side mounted can grabbers slam the garbage in to the top of the truck. It takes about three seconds per house. Also, it wasn't even garbage day.
 
Sac Arrow said:
The garbage collectors don't even get out of the truck. The side mounted can grabbers slam the garbage in to the top of the truck. It takes about three seconds per house. Also, it wasn't even garbage day.
Click to expand...

That's what I was getting at. Trucks are the same here and if something is parked too close to the can, they don't take it.
 
Timbeck2 said:
That's what I was getting at. Trucks are the same here and if something is parked too close to the can, they don't take it.
Click to expand...

Technically, it's 'at which you were getting' but yeah. I assume that the cars (or the cans) have moved prior to garbage day on Monday. Which, is today in fact.
 
Let's focus on what really matters, people: I don't think they are triangular.
Specifically, it looks like a Reuleaux triangle, as I think someone posted before (but I'll say it again, louder).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reuleaux_triangle
This is very similar to the shape of the rotor in a rotary Wankel engine. Which is what Ted has in his new racecar. Perhaps he will soon be "Thinking about a new kind of triangle..."
 
3tci-1.jpg
This should bring some clarity in to the discussion. It's just an equilateral triangle with rounded corners. Why some public works specifications call for triangular boxes I don't know. Probably to make them readily identifiable as a water valve (a cast iron sewer cleanout can look a lot like a circular valve box. I have however seen triangular sewer force main valve boxes.
 
Sac Arrow said:
It's just an equilateral triangle with rounded corners
Click to expand...

The picture helps. I like the triangle. Now I sorta wish we had triangles here. All we have is boring old round covers. Some squares. A few rectangles. But no triangles. I want triangles.
 
Holy guacamole! Check this out... In Japan, nearly 95% of the 1,780 municipalities in Japan have their very own customized manhole covers. The country has elevated this humble, practical object to its own art form. The designs depict everything from local landmarks and folk tales to flora and fauna and images created by school children.

https://www.gwarlingo.com/2011/drainspotting-61-amazing-manhole-covers-from-japan/

US needs to step up its manhole game. Or is it peoplehole? Personhole? Theyhole?
 
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Deelee said:
Holy guacamole! Check this out... In Japan, nearly 95% of the 1,780 municipalities in Japan have their very own customized manhole covers. The country has elevated this humble, practical object to its own art form. The designs depict everything from local landmarks and folk tales to flora and fauna and images created by school children.

https://www.gwarlingo.com/2011/drainspotting-61-amazing-manhole-covers-from-japan/

US needs to step up its manhole game. Or is it peoplehole? Personhole? Theyhole?
Click to expand...

Wow, that is pretty elaborate. Most of the larger municipalities around here actually do have customized manholes with their name and logo on it.
download.jpg
 
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So the latest drama...

Roughly two blocks away from the original posted intersection is a short stretch of street fronted only by fences. There are a few cars parked on either side. The gray minivan has had a flat tire for some time now, and someone had left a bag of dog crap by the front tire.

It got picked up. Two days later, another bag of dog crap in the same place. Then a third appeared. Okay, that van is being targeted. Well, yesterday, the tire got inflated but the van had not moved (you could tell from the dirt pattern from the flat.) But, guess what? The Suzuki Samurai on the other side now has a flat rear tire!

I'm not sure whether our dog poo serial dropper/tire deflator is a slasher or a valve opener. The minivan's tire was either repaired with a plug and inflated, or just inflated. The Samurai however didn't appear to fare so well, as it was riding on the compact spare.

I'm going to hazard a guess that someone is assed up about cars being parked on the side of the road, and probably doesn't live very far away. In fact, that person probably lives within a few houses of the poopy vandal targets. If it were me, I'd rig up a security camera aimed at the vehicles.
 
At least they left the dog poo in baggies?
 
Sac Arrow said:
suspect that was more for ease of handling than out of altruism
Click to expand...

Good point. There is nothing altruistic about leaving poo near another person's vehicle.
 
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v1.jpg
So there is a new paved trail going in the middle of nowhere along the creek. Pretty random? Nope. It's a sewer force main alignment. We got all kinds of pipes joining in to it.

p1.jpg
The area used to be an orchard, like a hundred years ago. This riveted iron pipe probably dates back to the 1800's.
 
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