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Bino Thoughts #3 (1 Viewer)

Thanks for the clarification.

I found it hard to believe that “BBs” were an American concept, only. So, I looked up, “BB guns in England.” It seems they are sold throughout the country. The first attachment shows a few of the bigger BB gun dealers in the London area—"Only BB Guns," "Just BB Guns," "BB Guns UK." The second attachment is of a packet of them. It would seem that British kids—some of whom have grown to adulthood—had/have access to them, as well. BB guns have been around for 134 years! (attachment #3)

Please enlighten me; if they are not called BBs in the UK—and Lee has to offer a “clarification”— what are they called? And, if they are NOT called BBs there, why would the universally used Internet allow me to so easily find, “BB guns in England” on the first try? It would appear that, once again, I’m being held accountable for what SOME others don’t know. Am I wrong?

Also, Anon2020, if you will look at the first attachment on post #1 and the attachment on post #12, you will see what I mean by “experts,” or at least who some people believe to be experts.

I have been ridiculed—sometimes severely—for saying that, “100% of the ‘collimation tips’ currently on the Internet are wrong and deal with CoAl (conditional alignment) only and not clinical 3-axis collimation.”

I said it. I meant it. I stand behind it. It is true, and I am not responsible for what others THINK they know. After my 2012 lecture to the optical engineers of SPIE (The Society of Photo-optical Instrumentation Engineers), the concept was published for the world in the October 2012 edition of Proceedings. It took me fighting the battle for 36 years to allow the OBVIOUS (to the experienced) a place in the doctrine.

Last month, Patudo was out of line with his attack on me. BUT HIS ASSESSMENT WAS ACCURATE!

This time, however, I have the high ground and feel no need to apologize for the truth—universally understood or not. But I have been doing this long enough to know that if you know what you are talking about and aren’t afraid to stand up for it without the need to candy-coat it, you will likely be vilified. Been there; done that. And I will stay the course that I might save others from facts that ... aren’t. :cat:

Finally, the best thing about this memo is that the “delete” and “quotation” keys are working again. I hope they will continue until I get my new keyboard.

Cheers,

Bill

PS In American English, the Commas and Periods go INSIDE the quotation marks.
 

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Internet allow me to so easily find, “BB guns in England” on the first try? It would appear that, once again, I’m being held accountable for what SOME others don’t know. Am I wrong?
Wut?! |:S| Don't overreact. I (we) was (were) just wondering what you meant by bb, that's all. I've heard the term bb gun but don't know anything about guns (and don't want to) so they're guns that shoot ball bearings? Funny. And didn't know the term is used to point to stacking “risky“ claims (right?). English nor American are my first language. Learn something new everyday :t:, Thanks!
 
Wut?! |:S| Don't overreact. I (we) was (were) just wondering what you meant by bb, that's all. I've heard the term bb gun but don't know anything about guns (and don't want to) so they're guns that shoot ball bearings? Funny. And didn't know the term is used to point to stacking “risky“ claims (right?). English nor American are my first language. Learn something new everyday :t:, Thanks!

Hi, Ries,

I am frequently seen as over-reacting when I am not. I must say, however, that I have been ridiculed for saying things that I know to be true. The rattles on a rattlesnake have NEVER killed anyone. However, they are inextricably attached to something that will. Having spent 21 years talking every day to customers with false beliefs (please see the attachment to understand) and who often came to the store with their own magazine or local expert in-tow, I have learned to rattle. ‘Just a warning for those smart enough to understand. And for this mode of operation, I had repeat customers from out of state. If you were in town, I’d take you to lunch so that you could see that I’m just a short, fuzzy little 69-year old gnome who has made a career of standing up for things that most “snowflakes” won’t ... even if they could.

I don’t know if the House of Outdoor sells BB guns. But I do know there are places in and around the Hague that do.

Cheers,

Bill
 

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Bill

I believe that what we in the UK call air guns are the same as what in the USA are called BB guns. To 'cock' the gun a lever is used to compress a spring which when released powers a piston along a cylinder, compressing the air in it until the air pressure pushes the pellet out of the breach and along the barrel.

Lee
 
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Bill

I believe that what we in the UK call air guns are the same as what in the USA are called BB guns. To 'cock' the gun a lever is used to compress a spring which when released powers a piston along a cylinder, compressing the air in it until the air pressure pushes the pellet or BB out of the breach and along the barrel.

Lee

Hi, Lee,

We call them air rifles he too. But, since they were invented, the projectile was called a BB. You have several stores in the London area selling "BB guns." :cat:

Bill
 
It's funny, I've known about BB guns since boyhood (though one couldn't have them in the city) but never thought "BB" stood for anything. I don't think ball bearings are called BBs unless one is shooting them, and doubt those have to be made of the same quality metal. I had never heard of "stacking BBs" until meeting Bill, although it is a nice image, like angels on pinheads.

Criticism should not be interpreted as "attack". I maintain that the passage in question is incomprehensible, and more generally, that effective pedagogy involves simple clarity not bluster, allowing the student/reader to recognize and correct any previous misunderstanding themselves, and have the joy of that -- and not worry about any they didn't have.

[Edit: by the way, this sentence isn't very clear either: "When the eye is squeezed closed, the pressure on your eyeball temporarily changes its shape and makes it focus differently." Presumably you meant to say one eye and the other eyeball? Even I had to re-read that.]
 
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It's funny, I've known about BB guns since boyhood (though one couldn't have them in the city) but never thought "BB" stood for anything. I don't think ball bearings are called BBs unless one is shooting them, and doubt those have to be made of the same quality metal. I had never heard of "stacking BBs" until meeting Bill, although it is a nice image, like angels on pinheads.

Criticism should not be interpreted as "attack". I maintain that the passage in question is incomprehensible, and more generally, that effective pedagogy involves simple clarity not bluster, allowing the student/reader to recognize and correct any previous misunderstanding themselves, and have the joy of that -- and not worry about any they didn't have.

[Edit: by the way, this sentence isn't very clear either: "When the eye is squeezed closed, the pressure on your eyeball temporarily changes its shape and makes it focus differently." Presumably you meant to say one eye and the other eyeball? Even I had to re-read that.]

Hi, Tenex,

I think a thorough reading of the attached—and realizing it is a tiny tip of a tiny tip of a big iceberg—may help you understand more concerns and frustrations. I recognize trash when I see it. It's those who don't, I'm trying to help. :cat:

Cheers,

Bill
 

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Wasn't it that air rifles shot slugs (and usually had a rifled barrel) and BB guns shot little balls (and didn't have a rifled barrel)?
Another question re diopters though - while the binocular is pulled into focus so one eye (the left) is fine, then the difference between the eyes is compensated with the diopter (the right)....who decided - and why - it was that way round?
Are there binoculars where the diopter operates to compensate the left eye?

Perhaps it's just tradition, but in this wacky world where some binocular focus wheels operate clockwise and others anticlockwise, why hasn't someone been punk enough to put the diopter in a more convenient place for us lefties?
 
Wasn't it that air rifles shot slugs (and usually had a rifled barrel) and BB guns shot little balls (and didn't have a rifled barrel)?
Another question re diopters though - while the binocular is pulled into focus so one eye (the left) is fine, then the difference between the eyes is compensated with the diopter (the right)....who decided - and why - it was that way round?
Are there binoculars where the diopter operates to compensate the left eye?

Perhaps it's just tradition, but in this wacky world where some binocular focus wheels operate clockwise and others anticlockwise, why hasn't someone been punk enough to put the diopter in a more convenient place for us lefties?

Hi, Paddy,

It IS tradition. You get on the Bike on the left side ... usually. The same is true for the horse.

Why are all of our space shots based on moving the vehicles on railroads based on the tracks being spaced at 4 feet 8 and ½ inches apart? It was based on the ruts in a road centered at 4 feet 8 and ½ inchs. Which was based on wagon tracks. Which was based on Roman chariot tracks. Which was based on the separation of the two horses’ butts being 4 feet 8 and ½ inches center to center. :cat:

Some things are slow to change.

Bill
 
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Pellets are easier to stack and worked better than BBs, (actual penetration). When I was very young, trial and error you know.

Andy W.
 
Wasn't it that air rifles shot slugs (and usually had a rifled barrel) and BB guns shot little balls (and didn't have a rifled barrel)?
Another question re diopters though - while the binocular is pulled into focus so one eye (the left) is fine, then the difference between the eyes is compensated with the diopter (the right)....who decided - and why - it was that way round?
Are there binoculars where the diopter operates to compensate the left eye?

Perhaps it's just tradition, but in this wacky world where some binocular focus wheels operate clockwise and others anticlockwise, why hasn't someone been punk enough to put the diopter in a more convenient place for us lefties?

Yes Paddy, the Swift 8.5X44 Audubon roof model # 828.

Andy W,
 
Thanks - interesting replies!
1. Yup - pellets was the proper name for air gun ammo - as kids we always called them slugs though.....i've still got my Original .177 and a tin of pellets...
2. Bill - i get on a bike from the right, but had never thought of it before. I don't know about horses - i've got a car. I get into that through the door.
3. I seem to remember reading about train track distance being based on cart-wheel width
4. And at least one binocular with a left-hand diopter! It's no big deal, as i tend to find you just get used to whatever you're presented with, but it was something i was musing about - how something just becomes a norm through everyone copying everyone else where it becomes an industry tradition.
 
Hi, Lee,

We call them air rifles he too. But, since they were invented, the projectile was called a BB. You have several stores in the London area selling "BB guns." :cat:

Bill

Yes Bill I find you are correct and BB guns are sold over here now, but you are mistaken to believe airguns only fire BBs. The traditional ammo over here, and as far as I know from my owning a Webley 0.177" calibre air rifle when I was a lad in the early 1960s, was a pellet. This was a moulded lump of aluminium (I think) with a flared skirt at the back end that was gripped by the rifling in the barrel.

The main point is for decades airguns here fired pellets, not BBs, and so, of course, they were not called BB guns. My brother in law in recent years took up target shooting with a German air rifle (the brand was Weihrauch, and apologies to them if I spelled that incorrectly) and his rifle and all of the competitors fired pellets not BBs.

However it seems you are right and BB guns have arrived over here but I hope you can forgive us for being more familiar with the traditional pellet-firing variety.

Do engineers in the States routinely abbreviate ball-bearing to BB? In the 1990s I sold seals for rotating shafts (to keep oil in and dirt out) for use in equipment as small as car gearboxes, to truck axles and right up to huge steel rolling mills (so the seal was usually adjacent to a bearing, frequently a ball-bearing) and the engineers never referred to BBs so perhaps this terminology is a States habit.

BTW in later years I took the shoulder stock off the Webley and filled it, drilled it and fitted a Swift Telemaster scope on it for birding and later it accomodated several other scopes until I got fed up of being stopped and questioned by gamekeepers in Scotland who thought I was toting a firearm.

Lee
 
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BB or not BB?

While necessarily getting off topic, to clarify . . .

A) Traditionally in the US context, a BB refers to a specific size of lead shot - a sphere - used in a shotgun cartridge
US pellet sizes run from the smallest of #12 (0.05") to #1 (0.16”) and then B (0.17”), BB (0.18”), BBB (0.19”) and T (0.20”)
(and there are even larger sizes known as buckshot)
To see tables showing the details, Google ‘shotgun pellet sizes’ and go to the images


B) Again in the US, a BB is one of the three traditional sizes of projectiles used in air and spring powered guns - along with .177" and .22"
BB guns are typically low cost entry level models, firing a simple .18" ball. They are a feature of many childhoods, which may explain the relatively common American usage of BB
- and which makes sense of Bill's expression about stacking BB's

In contrast, as Lee indicates, .177’s (and .22’s) use more sophisticated shaped pellets: longer, often more aerodynamic and with better gas sealing


John
 
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...It IS tradition. You get on the Bike on the left side ... usually. The same is true for the horse...

The implication is that tradition is arbitrary, but I don't think that is true. Most people are right-footed and most right-footed people prefer to plant their left foot and do more elaborate movements and work (e.g. push-off pedal stroke) with their right leg. Left-right dominance (hands, legs, eyes...) explains many "traditional" design decisions.

--AP
 
Finnish railway gauge is, I think, 4ft 11 27/32 inches Russian gauge.
The trains are very comfortable, maybe because of the wider track.

.177 pellets were lead in the 1950s.
We had a pear tree with very tasty fruit.
I set up a proper target card, and within about a year unfortunately I killed the tree. I suppose lead poisoning.
Had I known what would happen, I wouldn't have used the tree as a target.
I stopped my bad behaviour.

There were also plastic .177 pellets.

B.
 
Finnish railway gauge is, I think, 4ft 11 27/32 inches Russian gauge.
The trains are very comfortable, maybe because of the wider track.

.177 pellets were lead in the 1950s.
We had a pear tree with very tasty fruit.
I set up a proper target card, and within about a year unfortunately I killed the tree. I suppose lead poisoning.
Had I known what would happen, I wouldn't have used the tree as a target.
I stopped my bad behaviour.

There were also plastic .177 pellets.

B.
"standard" gauge is 4' 8 1/2" There are a number of broader gauges including 5' 3" used in Eire, 5' 6" used in India and quite a few other places. The true broad gauge was of course 7' (or was it 7' 1/4") adopted by I K Brunel for the World's premier railway, The Great Western. This, alas, was all removed by the middle of 1892, although the Great Western Society at Didcot here in the UK has recreated track buildings and stock, including locomotive, to run a 21st century Brunellian broad gauge train. Had Brunel taken an interest in binoculars, he would have no doubt produced a masterpiece of optical innovation. His views on ball bearings have not been recorded for posterity.
 
My Nikon 8-16x40 XL zoom binocular (and probably other zooms) has the diopter adjustment on the left. The right ocular has the zoom lever. I was given an old Sears zoom binocular with the zoom lever on the right. Diopter adjustment on that one was done by rotating the right objective lens.
 
B) Again in the US, a BB is one of the three traditional sizes of projectiles used in air and spring powered guns - along with .177" and .22"
BB guns are typically low cost entry level models, firing a simple .18" ball. They are a feature of many childhoods, which may explain the relatively common American usage of BB
- and which makes sense of Bill's expression about stacking BB's

In contrast, as Lee indicates, .177’s (and .22’s) use more sophisticated shaped pellets: longer, often more aerodynamic and with better gas sealing

John

200904

While this thread has moved away from optics and binoculars, it’s doing something for an international understanding of low-velocity, miniature projectile discharge, i.e. ... BB stacking!

Thanks, John for that analysis on size. Its right on and illustrates that BB signifies a size/caliber and is not a shortened version of “ball bearing.”

My first BB gun was a 1958 Daisy “Red Rider” without all the preteen “Red Rider” gibberish on the stock, and my last was a multi-pump model 880—attachment BB4. While the 880 shot BBs AND lead pellets, at no time did I, or any of my friends in a number of states, have “lead” BBs. They were .180 (.177-inch, actually) steel spheres coated with copper. I have been told it was lead inside them. However, since I could collect them with a magnet and lead is non-ferrous, I have discounted the thought.

And, Alexis, I certainly support your getting on a bike from the RIGHT side. After all, I’m sure some people would use an auto-focus, VINTAGE, military, ZOOM bino with Rudy coatings. 8-P

And since my humor (humour) is often taken wrong, please note, Alexis, that comment was meant to be humorous. Now, if you will excuse me, I have to go get my muddy boots out of my boot and put them in my lorry so I can take my auto and go and buy several boxes of Girl Scout ... biscuits. My neighbor just had a baby. Well, actually it was his wife. And when I get back I am going to help him see to it that his new pram is prim, or shipshape, or shaped like a ship, or whatever. :cat:

We are two countries separated by a common language. — George Bernard Shaw, 1942 or possibly Oscar Wilde, 1887.

We now return you to BirdForum ... already in progress.

Bill
 

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