Model Boat Mayhem

Please login or register.

Login with username, password and session length.
Pages: [1] 2 3   Go Down

Author Topic: Basic boating errors and assumptions!  (Read 10317 times)

Stavros

  • Guest
Basic boating errors and assumptions!
« on: October 21, 2007, 07:22:11 pm »

Right heres the best yet,well I think so.I was at Blackpool over the weekend and a little story emerged from a well know trader who for legal reasons I can not name but have had his permission to tell it.The telephone conversation lasted by THE way fro over 20Min's with the trader trying to help the guy who had glitching problems with his radio set so trader was trying to be helpfull.The trader said to the customer the only way you will be able to find out if it's any of your fellow modelers sets that are causing you problems is to go to a field or large open area away from power line etc and switch THE boat and the set ON and check it with your wife or whoever and do a range test.Oh said the customer it does not happen when the SET IS SWITCHED ON to which the trader was totally flabbergasted that this IDIOT had wasted his time for over 20Min's with such an IDIOTIC complaint.

THE MORAL OF THIS LITTLE TALE IS SIMPLE THINK BEFORE YOU COMPLAIN

STAVROS

Topic renamed - Admin.
Logged

SteamboatPhil

  • Full Mayhemer
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 2,762
  • Location: Dieppe, France
Re: Idiotic Modeler
« Reply #1 on: October 21, 2007, 07:41:34 pm »

It seems the gene pool needs updating again, even us humble no radio straight runners had worked that problem out !!!!!!!!
P
Logged
Steamed up all the time

Supersonics Son

  • Guest
Re: Idiotic Modeler
« Reply #2 on: October 21, 2007, 09:18:13 pm »

BE WARNED they come in all shapes and sizes......he he....
Logged

Ghost in the shell

  • Full Mayhemer
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 2,704
Re: Idiotic Modeler
« Reply #3 on: October 21, 2007, 09:42:30 pm »

that is hysterical stavros!
Logged
Go Nuclear!  you'll love it

Marks Model Bits

  • No Mustang Mark
  • Full Mayhemer
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 827
  • http://marksmodelbits.com/
    • Marks Model Bits
Re: Idiotic Modeler
« Reply #4 on: October 21, 2007, 09:46:27 pm »

Good job he doesn't fly model planes and lets hope he doesn't have a drivers license.
One born every minute I suppose!!!

Mark.

Logged
I HAVE NOT FAILED, I HAVE FOUND 1000 WAYS THAT DON'T WORK.!!!!

http://marksmodelbits.com/

Shipmate60

  • Global Moderator
  • Full Mayhemer
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 5,800
  • You bark - I will bite!!!
  • Location: Fareham
Re: Idiotic Modeler
« Reply #5 on: October 21, 2007, 09:46:50 pm »

OH, do I have to switch the Radio Gear on for it to work then?

Bob
Logged
Officially a GOG.

Ghost in the shell

  • Full Mayhemer
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 2,704
Re: Idiotic Modeler
« Reply #6 on: October 21, 2007, 09:49:58 pm »

something like that!
Logged
Go Nuclear!  you'll love it

Colin Bishop

  • Full Mayhemer
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 12,171
  • Location: SW Surrey, UK
Re: Idiotic Modeler
« Reply #7 on: October 21, 2007, 10:04:41 pm »

What bothers me is that it probably isn't stupidity but ignorance. Too many people these days have no idea of the principles on which the technology they use works.

I wonder how many understand the basis of Freeview and digital TV for example? (and the implications that their conventional DVD/Video recorders will only be able to record the channel they are currently watching.)
Logged

FullLeatherJacket

  • Guest
Re: Idiotic Modeler
« Reply #8 on: October 21, 2007, 11:17:34 pm »

"Hello - I'm ringing from *********"
"Morning, ****"
"I've got one of your steam sound units, and it says that if I want to use separate batteries for the motor and the sound unit then they have to be the same voltage"
"Yes - that's right....."
"And it also says that I have to connect the negative terminals of the two batteries together or it won't make a noise when it's supposed to"
"Yes"
"So what do I connect the positive terminal of the second battery to, or is it just not connected?"

I get one of these calls every week. Craig never warned me..................

FLJ
Logged

Bunkerbarge

  • Full Mayhemer
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 2,510
  • Location: Halifax, UK
Re: Idiotic Modeler
« Reply #9 on: October 21, 2007, 11:52:50 pm »

It's very easy to make fun of someone who has never worked out exactly what is going on and has never had the luxury of having someone to guide him.

Let's not forget the responsibility though of the unmentionable trader here.  When you are talking to someone who you think could be lacking in experience don't forget the responsibility to "Ask the right question"

It's a simple process of logic to start with the most obvious and work up from there, but few people rarely do.

The first question should have been along the lines of "Is the set switched on" closely followed by"Are the barreries charged" etc...etc...

If the trader had followed such a procedure he could have saved himself a lot of wasted time.
Logged
"Dirty British coaster with a salt-caked smoke stack, Butting through the Channel in the mad March days"

Colin Bishop

  • Full Mayhemer
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 12,171
  • Location: SW Surrey, UK
Re: Idiotic Modeler
« Reply #10 on: October 22, 2007, 08:55:54 am »

Dead right there Bunkerbarge. When I was running our departmental computer system I frequently had to provide information for the top brass. For exampleTB: "How many offices do we have?" Me: "120". TB: "And how many libraries?! Me: "50".  TB: "Right, so that's 170 buildings then." Me: "No, just  165". TV: How's that then - I can add up you know!" Me: Five buildings host both an office and a library". TB: "Ah, never thought of that!".

So, when anyone asked me for information, my response was always  "Why do you want to know?". Top Brass didn't always take kindly to getting a complicated answer to what they thought was a simple question! One factor in allowing me early retirement I suspect ...
Logged

Faraday's Cage

  • Full Mayhemer
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 328
  • Change is inevitable, except from a drinks machine
  • Location: Staffordshire
Re: Idiotic Modeler
« Reply #11 on: October 22, 2007, 09:31:10 am »

There was a case some years ago when a guy building a kit rang the manufacturer to complain that it wouldn't float.

Apparently, the instructions stated that he should cement the prop shafts into place.

I'll leave you to guess what he had done. Consequently the instructions were modified to glue the prop shafts into place.

Terry.
Logged

FullLeatherJacket

  • Guest
Re: Idiotic Modeler
« Reply #12 on: October 22, 2007, 09:58:34 am »

It's very easy to make fun of someone who has never worked out exactly what is going on and has never had the luxury of having someone to guide him.

....and it's even easier to sit back and pontificate about responsibilities etc when you're not the poor s0d on the receiving end of the phone, matey. I can appreciate a really dumb question most of the time - I can at least have a giggle afterwards - and I'm not noted for sneering at customers because they won't then come back for any more goods. I am sympathetic to people who get themselves into a situation where they are out of their depth (e.g. trying to program a computer radio) or who have "panicked" themselves into a corner for no good reason. I'll give them whatever help I can but, at the same time, I do think that if someone is taking up a hobby then it's HIS responsibility to use a modicum of common sense before he starts pestering suppliers. In these cases, the ideas that you can leave the Tx switched off or not connect one terminal of a battery to anything are plainly just stupid, and any ten-year old schoolboy could tell you so.
 
I'm afraid I'm going to climb on my favourite soap-box again............If only folk would RTFM then at least half of the silly questions which are  asked just wouldn't happen.  What's with this "real men don't need manuals" cr^p, anyway?

FLJ
Logged

kayem

  • Full Mayhemer
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 159
  • .....excellent!
Re: Idiotic Modeler
« Reply #13 on: October 22, 2007, 10:43:19 am »


....and it's even easier to sit back and pontificate about responsibilities etc when you're not the poor s0d on the receiving end of the phone, matey.

FLJ


Very well put Mr Jacket, and I couldn't agree more. Like Dave, I am generally sympathetic when customers phone with 'strange' problems, I've never been rude or dismissive to any of them either, at least as far as I can remember, but some of the questions these people ask beggar belief. We aren't holding them up to public ridicule by identifying them in any way, but please allow us to share a laugh with Mayhem after they've gone away to annoy some other model manufacturer. I try to pass most of my problem customers onto Barry at Westbourne, and now he's on the verge of retirement, I'm trying to persuade him to write a 'taking the lid off' book, mainly on the subject of difficult customers.

Logged
"Outside of a dog, a man's best friend is a book; inside of a dog, it's very dark" Groucho Marx

Colin Bishop

  • Full Mayhemer
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 12,171
  • Location: SW Surrey, UK
Re: Idiotic Modeler
« Reply #14 on: October 22, 2007, 10:53:41 am »

FLJ & Kayem, you obviously understand the fine line between ignorance and stupidity and I would agree that some people are not willing to spend their own time thinking things through but prefer to waste other people's instead. Thing is, can you spot 'em a mile off or not?
Logged

kayem

  • Full Mayhemer
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 159
  • .....excellent!
Re: Idiotic Modeler
« Reply #15 on: October 22, 2007, 10:56:21 am »

I'd guess that the response would be the same for FLJ, and after many years in the retail business, the answer is usually 'yes'.
Logged
"Outside of a dog, a man's best friend is a book; inside of a dog, it's very dark" Groucho Marx

Ghost in the shell

  • Full Mayhemer
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 2,704
Re: Idiotic Modeler
« Reply #16 on: October 22, 2007, 10:59:21 am »

I think that a flow-diagram is in order here, so thats something to do for the future and put up in the electrics section, but really, how complicated is it to check that you have charged batteries in a radio and ti turn it on??? ???
Logged
Go Nuclear!  you'll love it

BlazingPenguin

  • Guest
Re: Idiotic Modeler
« Reply #17 on: October 22, 2007, 11:08:38 am »

While in no way being 'trade'....when a new guy turns up at our pond, he's immediately pointed in my direction.
And yes....I get all the 'dumb' questions, and thats my problem, there is no such thing as a dumb question.

"Whats a crystal ? "
"Whats epoxy ? "
Whats a skeg ? "

What may be common knowledge to one, is rocket science to another!

We have a new member at our club who will go through every question you can imagine, but you have to be patient until he arrives at that particular situation that leads him to ask the next question, after which he's educated just a little bit more. Gradually working through a range of 'problems' which through simple question and answer he will eventually educate himself, gain confidence and procede onto more complicated matters.  He has been told 'up front' that we are telling him whats what in the simplest terms possible, not because he's a moron, but because we dont want any ambiguity creeping in.

Oh....and he was at Blackpool at the weekend!

Im sorry, but in my opinion to giggle & sneer at someone less informed than yourself in this manner is plain arrogance.
Logged

kayem

  • Full Mayhemer
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 159
  • .....excellent!
Re: Idiotic Modeler
« Reply #18 on: October 22, 2007, 11:20:51 am »


Im sorry, but in my opinion to giggle & sneer at someone less informed than yourself in this manner is plain arrogance.


You're missing the point, and as Colin said there's a difference between ignorance and stupidity. Not knowing what a skeg is comes into the first category and is perfectly excusable, but not knowing (apparently) that electronic items won't work unless you switch them on, is very definitely in the second.
Logged
"Outside of a dog, a man's best friend is a book; inside of a dog, it's very dark" Groucho Marx

Ghost in the shell

  • Full Mayhemer
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 2,704
Re: Idiotic Modeler
« Reply #19 on: October 22, 2007, 11:25:44 am »

very true!  I wander how many have lost model yachts because they have turned on the tx but not the boat and its sailed out of range before they have realised that they have not armed the boat
Logged
Go Nuclear!  you'll love it

BlazingPenguin

  • Guest
Re: Idiotic Modeler
« Reply #20 on: October 22, 2007, 11:33:47 am »

No.....YOU are still thinking like a seasoned modeller.

How many other items do you turn on twice?
Our boats to the uninformed might work like your telly, video or dvd player, all of which work by turning on the main appliance, not the "remote"...with me?
So as far as that particualr case is concerned he's turned on the boat and simply expected the controller ....to control?

To us: Epoxy two things together = mix equal parts of resin/hardener,apply and clamp/tape/screw together and wait till it goes off?
To them: glue only ever came out of a tube, why would he know to mix two glues, goes off?...what does that mean?

As this thread progresses, we will see some who prefer to have a giggle, others who can see through that to a simple problem that can easily be overcome, but will be a met again at some time in the future. There will always be some of us further down the food chain to others with respect to modeling 'nouse'.
Logged

malcolmfrary

  • Full Mayhemer
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 6,027
  • Location: Blackpool, Lancs, UK
Re: Idiotic Modeler
« Reply #21 on: October 22, 2007, 12:12:58 pm »

Any form of technology, sufficiently advanced, will be regarded as magic. 
I have an understanding of bipolar transistors. I scratch my head at FETs.  I/Cs are damn clever but useful boxes.  PICs........
Manufacurers (some, anyway) do try to help, but some members of the public are beynd redemption, like those who see a battery compartment with little pictures of batteries facing the right way moulded into the case and STILL get it wrong.
Logged
"With the right tool, you can break anything" - Garfield

BlazingPenguin

  • Guest
Re: Idiotic Modeler
« Reply #22 on: October 22, 2007, 12:23:19 pm »

I actually got interested in RC boats while the wife and I were courting....a long,long time ago.
Having come into a sizeable lump of cash I went into the largest model shop in the city and tried to get myself set up with whatever was needed.
Dressed in my finest building site attire Intimated that I wanted a large battleship with all the trimmings and required radio gear, spotty herbert behind the counter looked me up and down and said...."Well sir...you dont really look like you could afford this hobby, perhaps you should buy a nice Airfix kit?"
At which point I launched into him (verbally) and the manager came out all apologies etc, leading Henry Kissinger into the back shop by the lug, end result was, no boat but a nice lunch with my fiancee.

Im getting the feeling that things aint changed much in 30yrs eh?  ;D
Logged

Bunkerbarge

  • Full Mayhemer
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 2,510
  • Location: Halifax, UK
Re: Idiotic Modeler
« Reply #23 on: October 22, 2007, 12:25:45 pm »

Blazingpenguin, beautifully put and my point exactly.

A very common failing amongst technically minded people is an inability to see things from the perspective of non technically minded people.  As an engineer I find myself communicating with other engineers all day long, which is relatively easy, well supposed to be, however when talking to people from a non engineeing background I have to think completely differrently.  I have to look at things from the perspective of someone who hasn't got a clue where electricity comes from, apart from a hole in the wall, or who wouldn't have the foggiest idea where to start to fix something.  They are a completely differrent type of person with a totally alien thought process.

What you have to think though is that they might be able to create a movie set, stand and sing in front of an audience, dance for an hour and a half in a way that I couldn't do for 30 seconds but that doesn't make them any less of a person than we are.  They are just differrent and when you are talking to people like this you have to think of things the way they see them.  The TV set is a perfect example.  You don't turn the remote on so why should they expect to have to turn the TX on?

I think it makes us far better technically minded people if we can communicate with everyone else without dismissing them as stupid and laughing at them afterwards.  Strangely enough I have never come across an entertainer who laughs at engineers because they can't sing and dance.  To me that makes them better people.  

One thing I do here with my team of engineers is to get them to observe a show from behind the scenes.  They always come away with a completely differrent view of the entertainment team and when they come to them with a very basic technical problem my lads are a lot more sympathetic.

I'm sorry but people who do not realise that you have to turn on a TX are not stupid, they are simply differrent and we should pride ourselves ion the fact that we are able to help them so that they can do thier job.

I still maintain that the original fault was with the trader for not asking the right questions and if the story had been related to me I would have laughed at the trader for being stupid.
Logged
"Dirty British coaster with a salt-caked smoke stack, Butting through the Channel in the mad March days"

Colin Bishop

  • Full Mayhemer
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 12,171
  • Location: SW Surrey, UK
Re: Idiotic Modeler
« Reply #24 on: October 22, 2007, 12:39:16 pm »

It isn't altogether clear what the original circumstances were as described at the head of this topic. If the guy had just bought a RTR with sealed everything then the remote/device argument might hold true although I would presume that it came with instructions and the TX would have had a switch/button on it marked on/off. As FLJ says, one would expect the instructions to be read as first port of call if there was a problem.

I think there can be an attitude problem with some people (not just traders! ;)). They are simply not prepared to put any effort into trying to understand things themselves and would prefer to pass the "problem" on to somebody else.

We get newbies on here sometimes asking "where do I start" and unless they already have a reasonably clear Idea of what they want to do, the best answer is to recommend a couple of good model boating books, ask them to read them first and go on from there. Although it hasn't came out all that clearly in this thread, I think that the people Kayem and FLJ are getting at are the wilful time wasters and you get those in all walks of life.

Logged
Pages: [1] 2 3   Go Up
 

Page created in 0.117 seconds with 22 queries.