Miniature Craftsmanship Museum

[mklotz]

As a resident of Los Angeles county I can fully sympathize with your wishes for a less intense, nay, hectic place to spend your vacation time. LA county has a larger population than 43 of the 50 states and every one of those people owns two cars and both are on the road all the time. Well, OK, a bit of exaggeration but it does feel that way any time you're on one of the 515 miles of freeways in the county.

Nevertheless, if someone does force you at gunpoint to visit LaLa land, there are a couple of places that folks who frequent this forum should be sure to visit.

The Petersen automotive museum has one of the finest collections in the world...

https://www.petersen.org/

And the Nethercutt collection extends beyond rare classic cars to include musical automata

The Nethercutt Collection

[jjr2001]

Indeed...We made many trips to Disney and Knots when the kids were in school. (Yep, up through high school) and then on band trips in High School.
Then the grand kids. Boy did we ever visit Disney and the kids and grand kids still love it.
There is this store in Pasadena C&H Surplus I believe. Man, I could spend a day in there. Great store. I also like Army Surplus stores but they are hard to find.
At least the ones with real Army surplus stuff.

My son in law is a visitor to the Peterson Museum but I don't think he knows about the Nethercutt...He does now!

Thanks again Marv,

Cheers, JR

[mklotz]

My son in law is a visitor to the Peterson Museum but I don't think he knows about the Nethercutt...He does now!

If your SIL is an auto aficionado, then you should alert him to two other nearby museums in Oxnard (Ventura County)...

Welcome to the Murphy Auto Museum

Mullin Automotive Museum

[jjr2001]

Thanks Marv, I am sending him the email now.

[PJs]

I think the pocket would be even much bigger than the Jolly Greens pants!
In the past on eBay I had seen some 4' class room demonstrators for sale but this one is the king.

Well inertial platform eh? That was my AFSC in the Air Force. Worked on the one for the F4 Phantom but then had the opportunity to go
back to school for the F111A. Spent 5 months in Denver at Lowry AFB...Great duty.

I still have a small collection of slide rules which includes one 6" pocket similar to the one that was on Apollo 13. That one will go to the grand kids.
Yep, they know what a slide rule is since I bring up the subject from time to time.

Well hope you get to the Museum PJ, a day or more would be great.

Cheers, JR

JR, Dunno how big the Golly Green actually is but the demonstrator appears to be about 5' long...so I assumed it might fit in his pocket.

Interesting about your AFSC and Thank You for your Service. The Aardvark was pretty cutting edge at the time and could carry much more than the F4's and way better avionics and more versatile. INS has always interested me and good on you for getting to work on the F111A's Litton AJQ-20. Dad taught Instruments back on the first squadron of the F86's at Sheppard 1950, before OCS. He was always interested in avionics and instruments and what got me interested.

I'm kind of a collector of mechanical and early electronic calculators (TI 1200 and such). I still have my original Pocket Picket from the early 60's that I mowed a bunch of lawns to get, as well as my Picket Electronic (Belt Hanger) I used in college. I loved those, used them a ton and could read to almost 4 decimals without trifocals and preferred the metal Pickets over the plastic (have a few) and laminated wood ones. Plus I have a bunch of circular and barrel types I've picked up over the years. Also have a mechanical binary calculator machine Kit (Digi-Comp 1) that my folks got me in the early/mid 60's for Christmas or Birthday. Tough to assemble at the time but works like a charm. Maybe the Grand kids will get a kick out of where we came from some day. And hence my interests in the Harmonium!

Hopefully in the next year or so I'll get down that way again. Thanks again for the great pics and starting the thread!

PJ

[jjr2001]

Now that brings back memories. I too mowed lawns for income in the 60's. Bought stuff from Fair Radio Sales and Meshna. Great surplus bargains.
I "needed" a slide rule when I was a freshman in HS and found the perfect one advertised in Popular Electronics. Cleveland Institute of Electronics special slide rule with a 4 lesson course in how to use it. I think it was about $20.00 for the whole thing. That would be about 30 hours of mowing lawns for me but I sprung for it. Never regretted it and even used it in Air Force tech school. That was my favorite Pickett.

Cheers, JR

[PJs]

Funny you've mentioned surpies a few times. In HS, I used to go down to the City (SF) on 8th and Market with my buddy where there were 5-6 Electronics Surpies to buy stuff at penny a pound prices. Also got quite an education at the Market St bus depot going and coming. Once in a while we got in on Naval shipyard auctions and got a pallet worth for $20-$30 and a half tank of gas.

I got my Pocket Picket locally in 8th grade and used it through college and then some until I got my 15C through a friend that worked for HP. My TI-85 died after I left corporate when I dropped it in the shop, Doh! Now I have a couple of TI-36X Pro's I keep handy (which you can actually use to solve 2 variables, kirschoff's if I need to and runs off PV for <$25)...or my phone.

I remember CIE that was big time cool and think I took one of their correspondence courses in HS to supplement learning from the Radio Amateurs Handbook and everything else I could get my hands on...ended up at "Dervy" Tech in your neck of the woods.

One of the things that awes me about the Miniature Craftsmanship Museum is the hundreds, thousands and sometime man years of diligence, patience, precision and skills those people dedicate to the art, engineering and craftsmanship of their builds. And seeing a miniature radial engine running on fuel...just Rocks my world...let a lone a micro 1911...wow!

Thanks JR!

[jjr2001]

Ham radio was another of my hobbies. I had a call WA7RTX, another from Mississippi (Keesler AFB but I dont remember that call) and KB7BW in Arizona was my last one. I liked building the gear better than communicating! (how many wx reports do I need?)

I really liked the hand gun miniatures also. The Luger was my stand out since my dad brought back one from WWII. He gave that to me and I have now passed it on to my son. Very shootable but we just kinda look at it now! The pistol range has a nice cover over the shooting positions but the Luger ejects straight out the top and the casings end up hitting the gun or my hand. I don't mind them hitting my hand but when they hit the gun.....that's a big no!

Cheers, JR

[PJs]

I only dabbled in Ham but did try twice to get my First Class license, just couldn't pass the bloody key test (45wpm was my best) for some reason, but aced the written both times. Did pick up and still have a pair of TCS's out of a naval auction, restored the receiver and built a PS to run both. Love to restore and build also. My buddy and I built a 2KW (833's iirc) out of stuff we got from RCA Agate Beach (longer story) and Surpies, but almost got busted...little van with an antenna driving around and a Chicken Bander that got P'd off because we blew him off the air and probably called it in. Also had a pair of old aircraft AN/Arc-?? (CRS) with acorn tubes and a 400hz generator to run them. For me the TCS receiver was all about WWV and Ship to Shore as SSB was coming on strong then and tough to dial in on CW. Fun times and learned a lot!

Roger that, all the mini hand guns are very cool indeed and ran a few rounds through my buddies Luger years ago, and never have understood the reason for the top ejector. While back I found the blue prints for the 1911 and really started to appreciate handgun tolerances and odd-ball threads for something that was built like a Dodge Powerwagon and last through anything. So if that thing was blue printed, my hat's off with a deep bow to that guy! Either way, Hat's off for all of them!

Cheers to you JR,

PJ