This is topic Is this an intermittent? in forum Film Handlers' Forum at Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE.
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Posted by Arthur Allen (Member # 969) on 04-08-2002, 09:20 PM:
As seen outside the Sunset Drive-in of Othello, Washington a year or two ago. The device on the lower left corner of the photo looks like a giant intermittent, but seems too big to be one. What else could it be? 
Posted by Bob Maar (Member # 763) on 04-08-2002, 09:50 PM:
Looks like an old hose holder to me...not a part of a projector.
Posted by Darryl Spicer (Member # 711) on 04-08-2002, 10:23 PM:
Way to big for an intermittent. the rim part sort of looks like the rim around a woofer or something. It could be anything. What is that large dark grey thing.
Posted by Paul G. Thompson (Member # 655) on 04-08-2002, 11:36 PM:
I would think it is an old woofer frame, since it has holes in the rim.That dark grey thing looks like an old arc lamp. Probably an Ashcraft.
Posted by Jerry Chase (Member # 660) on 04-09-2002, 08:12 AM:
Just guessing, -
Old washing machine transmission? Maybe.What keeps coming to mind though is an old spring loaded contactor used at my dad's radio station. I vaguely remember something having a star wheel like that that made a HUGE racket making high amperage contacts. The contacts had to be made super fast to avoid arcing, and there was a mechanism to build up spring tension and suddenly release it to move the contacts.
Is that what this is? I dunno, but the frame looks too heavy to be a speaker frame. I'd be more inclined to think it a PTO device of some sort from a tractor attachment than a speaker frame.
Then again, those notches would be good places to wrap wire to create a magnetic field... perhaps to help stabilize the arc?
Nah, I got it. It is part of ET's phone home machine.
ET has left the building.
Posted by Barry Floyd (Member # 385) on 04-09-2002, 09:13 AM:
The large dark grey thing is an old Ashcraft Lamphouse. I've got two of them that have the same chrome detail trim across the top. Dang things are heavy as lead, and would make a really nice gas grill!! 
------------------
Barry Floyd
Floyd Entertainment Group
Nashville, Tennessee
(Drive-In Theatre - Start-Up)
Posted by Barry Hans (Member # 477) on 04-09-2002, 09:15 AM:
It does look like a speaker basket. Could it have been to hold the reflector? What lamphouse is that?
Posted by Barry Hans (Member # 477) on 04-09-2002, 09:17 AM:
Barry Floyd- Which model Ashcraft?
Posted by John Pytlak (Member # 331) on 04-09-2002, 09:28 AM:
Here's a link to some similar Ashcraft lamphouses. Note the similarity:
http://www.daytonsbluff.org/MoundsTheaterProjectionBooth.html
------------------
John P. Pytlak, Senior Technical Specialist
Worldwide Technical Services, Entertainment Imaging
Research Labs, Building 69, Room 7525A
Rochester, New York, 14650-1922 USA
Tel: +1 585 477 5325 Cell: +1 585 781 4036 Fax: +1 585 722 7243
E-Mail: john.pytlak@kodak.com
Web site: http://www.kodak.com/go/motion
Posted by Barry Floyd (Member # 385) on 04-09-2002, 04:35 PM:
Both of my Ashcrafts are "Core-Lites". I picked them up from an old dead drive in about 2 years ago. The rectifiers for these things must weigh a ton !! The only way we were able to move the rectifiers was to use a hydraulic lift gate. I've had several people offer to buy them, but for now I'll hang on to them. I know I will not be using them in our drive-in, but I may put one of them on display in the lobby.------------------
Barry Floyd
Floyd Entertainment Group
Nashville, Tennessee
(Drive-In Theatre - Start-Up)
Posted by Mark Gulbrandsen (Member # 72) on 04-09-2002, 06:18 PM:
Perhaps this was the first attempt by the 8 perf company that is trying to build a working 15 perf projector.....
Mark
Posted by Per Hauberg (Member # 529) on 04-09-2002, 08:31 PM:
Nice tidy place, Washington 
Posted by Paul G. Thompson (Member # 655) on 04-09-2002, 09:16 PM:
Per: You should see the crap laying in the old logging roads. Junk cars, washing machines, hot water heaters, tires, and just about anything else you might think you would find in a landfill.
The Great Fathers of Washington State are partially to blame. There are so many goofy laws and regulations on the books that makes it almost impossible to dispose of most junk. Up here, you have to "Pay" sometimes big money to dispose of junk. Many low and medium income familys don't have that kind of money. So they just haul it off and dump it on an old abandoned logging road.
It really jacks my jaws.....we have a small community park and a small woods to go with it, and when I walk the little Poopers, I find screen doors, garbage, and tires that were tossed into the woods from the road. 
At the theater, I have 2 junk ice heads I can't get rid of. Dumps won't take them. The city will, if we pay them some ungodly fee.....
The enviromentalists strike again! I am sure there are many states in this country that share the same problem with us.
In the southern parts of the USA, the defination of a Microsoft Spreadsheet is an inventory of the number of dead cars that are sitting on someone's property.
Posted by Greg Mueller (Member # 17) on 04-09-2002, 09:23 PM:
Definitely looks like it's part of a "geneva mechanism", but those are used in other places besides "intermittents". They're just power transmission gizmos like gears or chain drives, except they transmit power "intermittently" instead of continuously. Maybe a piece of farm machinery?------------------
Greg Mueller
Amateur Astronomer, Machinist, Filmnut
http://www.muellersatomics.com/
Posted by Jerry Chase (Member # 660) on 04-09-2002, 11:09 PM:
Barry, how about opening the back of yours and taking a look at the reflector mount? The 18" basket looks like an older version of the one shown on page 41 of the .pdf manual for the ashcraft lamphouse. I didn't find the geneva shaped (fibre?) plate in the .pdf document, but I think I'm now remembering something like that used as part of the mirror adjustment on some lamphouse I've seen or used. (Then again, my remembering could just be another brain fart.)And, Arthur, please don't post puzzles like this. They drive me nuts and I don't get my work done!
Posted by John Anastasio (Member # 607) on 04-10-2002, 06:37 AM:
It might have been part of a rotating display, like a sign.
Posted by Ken Layton (Member # 133) on 04-10-2002, 09:12 AM:
Could be the guts of a popper kettle.
Posted by Sam Hunter (Member # 1119) on 04-10-2002, 01:21 PM:
Its part of the O ring assembly from one the booster rockets off the space shuttle.
Posted by Dave Macaulay (Member # 813) on 04-10-2002, 03:54 PM:
Could it be the brush holding end cap from a motor-generator? I just saw one of those in pieces yesterday and the outer diameter looks about right... there were (are?) the long skinny type generators and the short fatter type that this may be part of. Salvaged the rotor for the copper and left that part maybe?
Posted by Randy Stankey (Member # 64) on 04-10-2002, 04:54 PM:
That thing is about 3 feet in diameter and about a foot tall if I read the picture right.Those things that look like the slots in a starwheel couldn't possibly be any part of a Geneva. The center piece is actually diamond shaped, almost. I'm betting those are lugs that a center post gets bolted onto.
Since this is an old, defunct drive in we are talking about I'm going to guess and say that this thing was part of the playground equipment. Did this drive in have a playground? If so, I'd bet it is the base to an old merry go round or a whirly-gig of some sort.
Posted by Mark Gulbrandsen (Member # 72) on 04-10-2002, 05:46 PM:
I'll second the motor-generator idea but I still think is could be a 15 perf star wheel.
Mark @ GTS
Posted by Jerry Chase (Member # 660) on 04-10-2002, 06:56 PM:
I was able to find a picture of the same spot a few days before...I think it solves the mystery.
Posted by Arthur Allen (Member # 969) on 04-10-2002, 11:27 PM:
For the record, the outer ring is about 14 inches in diameter. I remember it was a little larger than an lp record.
Posted by Aaron Sisemore (Member # 145) on 04-11-2002, 02:04 AM:
I'm gonna join Mark and say its probably the end bell of an M-G set.Any way you can get back out there and get pics of the item from different angles?
-Aaron
Posted by Arthur Allen (Member # 969) on 04-11-2002, 07:29 AM:
It's about a hundered miles away, so that makes casual visits difficult. If you want to find the place, I hope this Terraserver image helps.
Posted by Paul Cassidy (Member # 951) on 04-11-2002, 07:37 AM:
If you look closely in the last picture it does look abit like C3P0's head (though abit burnt)
Posted by John Pytlak (Member # 331) on 04-11-2002, 08:02 AM:
Paul Cassidy wrote: "If you look closely in the last picture it does look abit like C3P0's head (though abit burnt)"Nope. It's the remnants of a small "Death Star":
http://www.starwars.com/databank/location/deathstar/index.html
------------------
John P. Pytlak, Senior Technical Specialist
Worldwide Technical Services, Entertainment Imaging
Research Labs, Building 69, Room 7525A
Rochester, New York, 14650-1922 USA
Tel: +1 585 477 5325 Cell: +1 585 781 4036 Fax: +1 585 722 7243
E-Mail: john.pytlak@kodak.com
Web site: http://www.kodak.com/go/motion
Posted by Don Sneed (Member # 955) on 04-11-2002, 04:51 PM:
I vote with John, it is the death star !!
Posted by Paul G. Thompson (Member # 655) on 04-11-2002, 06:53 PM:
I have a tendency to agree with the idea it is an end cap from a MG set. The Geneva device was either tossed in there, or maybe it was a brush holder support. Could it be from an old Hertner MG set?
Posted by Paul Cassidy (Member # 951) on 04-12-2002, 05:28 AM:
Just beyond the Death Star looks like half of C3PO's Head of cause it is the remants of a Lamphouse