Tag: General activity

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DNS issue on Samsung Tablet and Logging onto GMail via Outlook

I try to avoid IT issues.

I am not an expert but just have an accumulated veneer of knowledge of what goes on under the hood.  I have also had enough of ‘my printer doesn’t print’ during my working life to not want to expand this limited knowledge.  However when my wife has an IT problem it is in my best interest to try to fix it …

First problem was her Samsung Galaxy Tab A (2016) would log onto the house WiFi network but would not be able to make internet connections or was unreliable.   This did not seem related to whether the connection was to the router direct or via the various extenders we have running.

Logging into a WiFi connection OK but not allowing internet connection smelled like a DNS issue.   The WiFi was running under DHCP so the DNS was being passed out from the router to each device.   I had Google’s DNS servers entered as DNS#1 (8.8.8.8) and DNS#2 (8.8.4.4) on the router.  All other devices were quite happy with this … except the Tab.  My solution was to change all the Tab WiFi settings for each of our nodes as Fixed instead of DHCP and used 208.67.222.222/4.2.2.5 as the new DNS servers.   

This seems to have fixed it but you have to ask why was this needed just on this single device ?

Second one was a bit more difficult.   

She runs GMail on all portable devices and uses Outlook 2007 on her desktop set up with her GMail accounts.  Yes I know it is a bit dated but it works (usually) so who cares if the GUI isn’t quite so sexy as Office 2040 or whatever the latest version is ?

Logging on yesterday to her desktop it came up with demand to login before allowing access to GMail on Outlook.   It is one of those infuriating dialogue boxes that just keeps on popping up even though you and it knows the answer given is not correct …. except it was correct but was not being accepted. Logging into GMail via Chrome all worked fine so it was something to do with Outlook and Chrome suddenly not being best buddies for some reason.

I did some digging around on the Net and it seems that GMail can for various reasons decide that it is not going to allow access to ‘Less Secure Apps’ and this includes Outlook.   They go to great lengths to tell you it is a potential security risk. 

In order to re-enable this you have to log into GMail in Chrome, go into the Security settings in the left hand side pane and find the ‘Allow Less Secure Apps’ section and click this back on.   

This fixed the problem and all is now sunshine and joy with domestic peace restored.

Have you ever stopped to consider how much of your life dribbled through your fingers while suffering IT related issues ?

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A Spanner in the Works – or simply a Stick

From previous posts you will be aware of my involvement maintaining the local church clock.   Over the past months my colleague and I have been nibbling away at various little problemettes with the movement and things are now looking quite good.   For the past two weeks it has run sweetly and maintained +/-1 second over that period.

Then last night it stopped.

This morning we wandered round to see what the problem might be.  The first thing we do on arrival is look at the front dial to see at what time it had stopped.   This time it had stopped at around 10.35 last night. We climbed the tower and inspected the movement.   

There did not seem anything obviously wrong so we decided to swing the pendulum and get it working again. We had arrived at just before 10am and our inspection took us over the hour and the front the dial was showing 10.35.  Because we were now ‘within the hour’ it was acceptable to wind the hands back to the correct time which was now just after 10am.   

I pulled out the motion work locking pin and began to move the hands (which were now independent of the movement) in a backwards direction to set the time. Except the hands would not move backwards.   There was resistance.  Something bad had happened to the motion work.   

We checked the mechanism to both the front and rear dial but there was nothing obviously wrong but the hands refused to go backwards under light pressure and I did not want to force anything at this stage.

We went outside again and this time checked the front and now also the rear dial and this is what we saw : –

church clock with stick jamming the mechanism

Our feathered friends had built a nest on the belfry window ledge and a stick had fallen from the nest and jammed itself in the dial.   The odds of this happening must be pretty thin.

A careful waggle of the hands back and forth broke the stick free and we then reset the time and hopefully all will now be well.

The interesting observation was that the stick was only brushing the hand in the forward direction but in reverse it was pushing against it.    The forward resistance was still sufficient to reflect back through the motion work into the main mechanism to stop the escapement and therefore the clock.

Another bit of knowledge gained.

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Droning On and another Toy

Another drift to the dark side I am afraid.

I bought a drone.

Yes I know ….. Lots of reasons why I justified it to myself and I went through the prior post decision making process and got a ‘yes’ as a result.

Seriously I have been considering one for sometime.   In France the house sits looking out over a valley and we often see deer and foxes (but not yet a wild boar) and I have always hankered for being able to get up close to them.  France aside my work on turret clocks often needs a close view of the clock face without the hassle of ladders and scaffolding.   So two good reasons (in my book anyway).

I had been watching the market trying to decide when to jump.  The two big players for the semi professional market are DJI and Parrot.   Both these run out expensive.   Then in January I got a mailshot from Banggood about a new device to be launched by Fimi called the X8 SE.   This seemed to be only available from Banggood and was on back order status.    I missed out on the first delivery but finally my toy arrived last week.   

It is amazing.  And at a fantastic price.

Not ever owning a drone before I cannot compare with anything but it is so easy to drive and has so many automated flying routines.   Battery life is around 30 minutes and range is stated as 4km and it can skim along at 18m/s speed (yes that is 65km/hr ….).    It does 4k video and 12M stills.

So that is my entertainment sorted for summer, should summer finally arrive.

fimi x8 SE drone and controller
Fimi Drone and associated controller.

It is worth watching Dustin Dunhill on YouTube if you want a serious review of the device.  He does tech reviews and there are 3 or 4 Fimi videos on his platform.

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The Gravity of the Village Clock

Some time ago I made mention of getting involved with the running of the village clock.   There was an added incentive as this was a Cooke of York movement dating back to 1869.  Anything associated with the  City of York is always of high interest as it was my birth place.  That is except the soccer team but I try not to get drawn into that discussion.

Back to the clock.  Myself and a colleague in the village have been working on the clock to bring it back to time.  We were getting pretty close.   Then it stopped.   Despite a few restarts it refused to run for any length of time.

We rolled up our sleeves and gave it a thorough visual inspection.   We were just about to leave it for the day when we spotted that the pins on the pin wheel on the gravity escapement arbor seemed very tight to the arbor supporting bracket.   Closer inspection revealed one pin of the five seemed to be slightly at an angle.  Even closer inspection showed a visible witness mark on the bracket where the pin or pins were rubbing on the bracket.   There was no mechanism to centre the arbor away from the bracket.   

We decided to remove the arbor complete with pin wheel, fly etc.   This was fairly straightforward.  A single screw at the opposite end to the escapement arms could be unfastened and the arbour came free.  Except it wasn’t that easy to unscrew as the screwdriver slot was very narrow.

Having got the arbor assembly back to my workshop I discovered two of the pins were lose, one of them to the point of falling out.   It seemed to have been held in place from coming out any further by the support bracket.   

I marked and numbered the escapement legs and removed each pin in turn, shortened each by 0.5mm, degreased the threads on each pin and its associated mounting hole and then refitted each one with a dab of Loctite to hold them in place. 

Spinning the arbor in my hand I could now see that all pins looked parallel and the length was much more consistent.  Hopefully the pins will now comfortably clear the mounting bracket.

The gravity escapement arbor showing the five escapement legs and the five pins that needed shortening

To make refitting easier I made a small hand tool to fit the slot on the mounting screw and used a hacksaw blade as a pseudo screwdriver blade to more easily turn and tighten the screw.

Since refitting the arbor the clock was running slightly slowly so we removed a penny from the weight tray and it now seems pretty much spot on.

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A Lazy Cable Clamp using 3D Printing

This is nothing magic but worth a mention.   Being fundamentally lazy I don’t like to assemble and solder electronic multi-way connectors.   There is never enough room to work on the contacts and the cables never lay up how you would like them to.  This could have course be a function of my eyesight ..

I am currently working on boxing and installing the Tormach USB Expansion Board which has a USB connector interface.   I wanted the cable to pass through some form of gland into the box but didn’t want to cut a standard USB cable and remake the connector at one end of the other.   

After some head scratching I came up with the following simple cable gland/cable grip.  It is nothing revolutionary but made life easy and the parts only took 20 minutes to design in Fusion 360 and then 3D print on the Sindoh 3DWOX.

It has two identical semicircular halves that hold the cable and there is a ring that pushes over these on the outside of the box.   A small flange holds these in place on the inside of the box. The hole in the box and the ring inside diameter are both 16mm to allow the USB connector largest dimension to pass through.   This is also one of the standard cut rings on a cone cut hole drill which makes cutting the hole in the box very straightforward.

The component parts (two halves and the retaining ring)
Inside view of the gland showing the retaining shoulder on the two halves
Outside view of the cable gland showing the retaining ring

Not rocket science but you never know it might come in useful and the dimensions can be tweaked to suit other cables and connectors. Similar or related subjects : –

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