helitool

Thanks for the suggestions! I PMed John and will phone him Monday.

I need to export a 20' container of machinery down to Arequipa, Peru around August. Could someone recommend a shipping agent here in Chiang Mai who could set that up for me?

When my wife and I shipped our household possessions over 2 years ago and decided to keep our 15 year old maytag appliances as well as bringing back a modern clothes dryer. I had to rewire both of the driers because all clothes driers in the us are designed to use natural gas first and then this design is modified to use electricity for heating as a retrofit. As a result everything in the drier is 110 except the heater coil which is 220. This was not a problem for me as I am very good at electronics and electricity.

These US driers have 2 hot legs and a neutral the heater coil is attached across the 2 hot leads for 220. The power for the clock etc. is across one hot and the white neutral for 110. I had to separate the 2 circuits and use a step down transformer to get the 110. you should get a polarity checker from Radio Shack before coming here so you can make sure that the polarity of the transformer matches the polarity of the main 220 circuit. otherwise the breaker will blow. If this happens swap the leads coming out of the transformer.

The old maytags are great they will probably be working away long after I'm gone but the modern appliances that are made off shore are worthless and so under built that the motors overheat on 50 hertz and shutdown. These driers have a schematic somewhere usually behind the control panel that will give you some idea as to where the mods need to be made.

If you are looking for a pug the neighbor just got one from a local breeder and I can probably get you the phone number.

Ray

For those of you who want to get rid of tookays an ounce of prevention is worth a ton of cure. First close up all of the holes that they might make a home in. If this is not feasible and the perp has a favorite hole that he always darts into when you chase him do the following.

1. get a pair of those fake sleeves the Thais wear to cover their arms that can be removed like gloves when they go inside out of the sun.

2. sew their big ends together and tie a knot in one end.

3 wait until the tookay is out doing his thing and use a stick to push the sleeves all the way into his hole.

4. Staple or tape the open end of the sleeve to the edges of the hole.

5. chase tookay back into his hole and tie a knot in the open end of the sleeve.

6. Pull the tookay up to the opening and leave the rest of the sleeve dangling outside the hole.

7 eventually he will crawl out into the outside part of the sleeve and the sleeve will drop to the floor with him inside.

8. Take him a minimum of 2 kilometers from your house before releasing.

This works very well as long as the hole is large enough to accommodate the sleeves. If not go to Rimping Market (if you are in CM) and get a package of the 10" Square plastic glue trays for mice and use two sided mirror tape to tape one of these outside his hole so that he has to step on it when leaving it. Unfortunately the glue on these traps is not water soluble and since lizards absorb chemicals through their skin very quickly using solvent to release the tookay will probably kill him.

Google "livestation" download the program and you can watch sky as well as 100 other TV stations around the world as long as you have the bandwidth to support it. I used it to watch the election coverage on cnn in real time on our 50" wide screen. You can also go to MSNBC and download most of their news programs in MP4 format. If you are using a mac computer use "igetter" as the downloader it is faster and more reliable than the native one used by OSX.

I was working at Erickson Aircrane in Oregon about 15 years ago and a bunch of us overhaul mechanics were standing around on break. One of them says to me "You've lived in Southeast Asia, do you know anything about gooks"? I didn't bat an eye just looked at him and said "I'm married to one" Didn't even slow him down he just went on and asked his inane question which I answered to the best of my ability while the rest of the guys tried to close their mouthes which had dropped open. This person's ignorance and stupidity were so over the top that we usually just gave him a free pass as it was more fun to see what idiocy he would come up with next. He seldom disappointed!

I went with the "not worried" option only because you loaded the "Happy" button with BS. The bush government in America tried to do the same thing as Taksin's. The neocons in America succeeded because of inaction on the part of the American population. What is happening here in Thailand is grassroots democracy at its best. If you are an American and do not understand this then read Thomas Jefferson's writings. If you are a Brit, ask an Irishman he'll explain it to you in more detail than you care to listen to. Thailand is not "falling apart" it is trying to do something about tyranny. God bless them I hope they succeed where we failed.

Does anybody know where I can buy some 15mm copper pipe in Chiang Mai? would be great if I could also get some push fit connectors for the pipe as well.It is for hot water and I do not want to drill a large hole in the wall for the blue plastic pipe which is probably not suitable for very hot water.

keithkarmann

There is only one shop in CM that I know of that has it and I do not know the directions to get there. They have all of the fittings as well. There is however only one tin of acid based solder flux for doing the joints in Thailand, I brought it back with me from the US last trip after trying to solder joints without it last year when doing my hot water system. Also we could not find the small hand held torches that are used to heat the joints. Be sure to get the heavy wall as it is about the same as the thin wall sold in western countries. Hope someone else is of more help.

Below is a link to the best article I have read thus far on the causes and lead-up to the crisis and why the governments are so ready to give money to these vermin. The main problem seems to be "over the counter" derivatives trading. This is where "private parties" are entering into derivatives trading with no brokerage house to mediate. Sort of the difference between casino gambling and shooting craps in a back ally!

www.marketoracle.co.uk/Article7487.html

Some of the newer software is DVD rather than CD and costs about twice as much and if it is on a double density DVD even more.

I am also interested in refreshing my German as well. anyone else?

Thirty years ago when I was teaching at AUA CM I would begin the class by translating the english on my students t-shirts into Thai. One day I got half way through and ran into a girl with a t-shirt that was gold color and said "Gold Flower" on it, (Dawk Tong is northern Thai for prostitute). I didn't translate it but the look on my face and skipping it were enough and the other students let her know and no one ever saw that shirt again!

Also there is a hackintosh version of Mac OS 10.5 that will run on wintel machines that you can download from the internet. Apple is not very happy about this development!

"Recently I have heard they have come down in price a lot, and you can even get a two button mouse now??? [what about the third, like in Ubuntu???]"

Actually mac mice are 3 button. If you push down on the scroll button on top that is the second one and if you squeeze the side hinge points that is the third. You can also program them to do what ever you want in the system preferences.

Cheers, Ray

The last act of every government is to loot the nation.

The most charming thing about the elites is that they never see the revolution coming, right up to the minute they are drug kicking and screaming to the nearest lamp post.

I personally have gone long the torch and pitchfork futures!

Sorry guys, it's all my fault I have had 79 torrent downloads going for the last couple of weeks at 130-200 KB per sec. I should be done with them in another week or so and you all can get back to using your internet.

Actually, when I left for the US 7 months ago my TOT service here in the luamchock market area on the main road to maejo was terrible. After returning a couple of months ago I am getting a steady 130-200 KBytes with only occasional modem resets needed. BTW if you go to the TOT office and remind them that they currently have a promotion going, they will double your bit rate if you are on the 500 baht service or if you have the highest rate they will reduce your payment from 1,000 to 500 baht. Go to the office near the rail station they provide excellent service for me. Cheers, Ray

I brought back fingerling potatoes with me a couple of months ago and gave them to our gardner to plant on some acreage he maintains for us. He says they sprouted but some of them have rotrd due to too much rain. It will be interesting to see if any of them make it. Don't know what season they plant them here. probably should have waited until the dry season. If you are every back in the west bring some varieties back with you and have a go at planting them they seem to like sandy soil.

Ray

"Privatize the profits, socialize the loses" Current US fiscal policy.

25 years ago air tickets were 1/2 the price here in LOS than in the USA. So when I needed a ticket to get back from there to Thailand I would call the wife and have here buy it in Chiang Mai and have the airline issue it at their terminal at LAX. Boy, was I PO'ed when they finally plugged that loop hole!

All of the advice you have been given is spot on. I can only add that in my case excercise and muscle development are the most important elements in my routine. I am fortunate enough to have an Octane Q37e elliptical machine in my house so I do 35 min each morning which burns 700 calories. I also do the usual pushups, setups and lift weights a couple times a day. There is a reason that you have fat deposits on your stomach, it is mother natures way of preparing you for the next ice age!

The most important thing that you can do (nobody ever listens to me on this) is to go to the pharmacist and get a bottle of keto-sticks these are used by diabetics to check their ketone level. If you are actually burning fat there will be ketones in your urine and you can measure the exact amount. If there are no ketones present in your urine you are not loosing fat.

If you will google "washing machine troubleshooting" you will find many sights dedicated to helping you diagnose and repair problems with American typ washing machines. I do not know if this extends to the Asian machines that are more commonly seen here or not.

Thanks to everyone for your answers. I have been to Amon and every other place sugested by various shop owners. I actually found one that was for converting NTSC to PAL (it was probably ordered by mistake by the shop owner). One owner said he has one and they work very well, unfortunatly the only one he had was hooked to his own wide screen TV.

Our TV is a 50" Toshiba purchased about 4 years ago that we have hooked a Mac Mini computer up to and use it to watch my wifes american sitcomes on that I download from the net. She now wants Thai stations So we got the UBC package for local chanels only and of course their satellite box puts out pal. We have a friend in BKK looking for one so maybe he will have some luck.

Cheers, Ray

Does anyone know where I can find a converter here in CM that will change the Thai type TV signal (PAL) into the type used in the USA (NTSC)? We brought a 50" wide screen over with us and while it works just fine for DVD's and computer downloads it will not accept the signal put out by the satellite dish.

My wife toke her first trip to the US 25 years ago. We arrived home there in California at 6 in the evening so I took her to see the Rocky Horror Picture show and review at the local cinema at midnight (jet-lag and all). When she asked about all the bizarrely dressed people going into the theater with us I looked surprised and told her they were just average American vampires out on the town looking for a good time.

I also told her that she had to take an apple to her esl teacher every day to insure that she got a good grade. This one worked out for everyone because her teacher would collect enough apples to make a pie and bring it in to share with the students!

I've never been able to figure out why people don't trust me.