04-06-2010, 02:57 PM
David,
I'm still chuckling over the fellow getting on the hot wire! I can almost see it happen.
My dad was fascinated with "radio" as we called it back then, not having yet invented "electronics." In the late thirties we lived on a corner and our neighbor behind and across the street had a hound he let run loose. The hound cut across the corner on his way home and always "marked" our small cedar tree at the corner of the house. He was turning the lower branches brown, slowly killing them. Dad spoke to the neighbor, but he shrugged, "He's a dog, dogs do that, How can I stop him?"
Dad thought he could. First he drove some stakes into the ground around the tree and stapled some chicken wire to it. But Dog had more range than Dad figgured.
He went to plan B. He clipped a wire onto the chicken wire, and brought it through the front door to a 300 volt transformer. He took a wire back out to a metal rod driven into the ground. Then he waited for the dog. He was not sure how potent the transformer would be. Much depended on how good a path to ground the hound got through the grass. He was aware he could electrocute the dog and was prepared for quick action in case he did, to make the "evidence" disappear. Which was entirely out of character for Dad, he was scrupulously honest, besides, he had no desire to actually harm the animal, just, shall we say, "educate" it? Yet there was that possibility.
But it worked perfectly. Hound's leg went up, water works started up, AND they never shut off! Switch went ON, hound bounded from his stand with the most mournful distressful bay ever heard from such an animal. All the way down the road he left a wet streak in the dust. He was still howling his distress as he ran into his home yard, and around to the back of his house. By then, Dad with a satisfied grin, had removed his wires and swore us all to silence about the entire proceedings.
He didn't fry a dog, really didn't hurt him that much, just surprised him. But he did teach him a lesson that he never forgot, that hound never cut across our corner again, and Dad had correctly figured all the factors. He was espcially proud of that. He studied and eventually even got an amateur radio operator's license.
~Wayman
I'm still chuckling over the fellow getting on the hot wire! I can almost see it happen.
My dad was fascinated with "radio" as we called it back then, not having yet invented "electronics." In the late thirties we lived on a corner and our neighbor behind and across the street had a hound he let run loose. The hound cut across the corner on his way home and always "marked" our small cedar tree at the corner of the house. He was turning the lower branches brown, slowly killing them. Dad spoke to the neighbor, but he shrugged, "He's a dog, dogs do that, How can I stop him?"
Dad thought he could. First he drove some stakes into the ground around the tree and stapled some chicken wire to it. But Dog had more range than Dad figgured.
He went to plan B. He clipped a wire onto the chicken wire, and brought it through the front door to a 300 volt transformer. He took a wire back out to a metal rod driven into the ground. Then he waited for the dog. He was not sure how potent the transformer would be. Much depended on how good a path to ground the hound got through the grass. He was aware he could electrocute the dog and was prepared for quick action in case he did, to make the "evidence" disappear. Which was entirely out of character for Dad, he was scrupulously honest, besides, he had no desire to actually harm the animal, just, shall we say, "educate" it? Yet there was that possibility.
But it worked perfectly. Hound's leg went up, water works started up, AND they never shut off! Switch went ON, hound bounded from his stand with the most mournful distressful bay ever heard from such an animal. All the way down the road he left a wet streak in the dust. He was still howling his distress as he ran into his home yard, and around to the back of his house. By then, Dad with a satisfied grin, had removed his wires and swore us all to silence about the entire proceedings.
He didn't fry a dog, really didn't hurt him that much, just surprised him. But he did teach him a lesson that he never forgot, that hound never cut across our corner again, and Dad had correctly figured all the factors. He was espcially proud of that. He studied and eventually even got an amateur radio operator's license.
~Wayman