Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Overkill objects for everyday life

neil.computer

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

121–130 of 732 posts

Re: Overkill objects for everyday life

#121

Post by Gravityloss »

A local company, Varusteleka has been extremely successful and grown rapidly from selling military surplus equipment bought from here and there as well as "tactical" looking stuff made cheaply somewhere.

I've bought for example some Swiss army surplus towels for a bike trip. They were really good (small, durable, functional, beautiful) but a bit too small so you couldn't wrap one around yourself.

They probably get the surplus stuff almost for free, from all around the world. I think it's great, making something desirable out of waste.

Having served, I think a lot of military equipment is really bad, especially clothing. It's bought not by the users but by the organization.

Re: Overkill objects for everyday life

#122

Post by [deleted] »

tracedddd wrote: post #24
ClumsyPilot wrote: post #14

"I don't think corporations/businesses are to blame... The average consumer is extremely ill-informed." This is very unfair - the average cobsumer is purposefully mislead on a daily basis, for example applle forbids apps from informing consumer that 30% of their donation to a charity is taken. With industrial goods, there is a whole department who's job is proqurement and to know what they are buying. And lets not pr…

I agree consumers are misled but Apple is a poor example here. I know the App Store fee is a popular topic right now but they are one of the few companies making a consumer product that is bounds ahead of military or industrial versions.

[deleted]

Re: Overkill objects for everyday life

#123

Post by bob1029 »

joan_kode wrote: post #22

Love my infrared thermometer for steeping tea at exact temperatures. These things are terrible for medical purposes since they only measure surface temperature, but they're perfect for diagnosing industrial machinery and tea. Also more versatile than those expensive programmable tea-brewing contraptions!

I do this but for everything in my kitchen. I bought a very expensive HVAC-grade Fluke IR thermometer which can handle temperature ranges from -40C to 550C.

Being able to instantly & remotely measure the temperature of anything (with reasonable emissivity characteristics) is like a super power. There is nothing in my kitchen or grill area that can exceed the range of the IR sensor on this unit. There are only a few things that have problems with direct sampling. I cook almost exclusively with cast iron, so IR readings are always dead accurate.

The unit runs on a single AA battery, has a backlight, and somehow still hasn't needed a new battery since I bought it 4 years ago (used almost every day).

I had to cook in someone else's kitchen not too long ago, and found myself going insane at not being able to tell exactly how hot the oil was in a pot used for frying.

Re: Overkill objects for everyday life

#124

Post by ClumsyPilot »

tracedddd wrote: post #24
ClumsyPilot wrote: post #14

"I don't think corporations/businesses are to blame... The average consumer is extremely ill-informed." This is very unfair - the average cobsumer is purposefully mislead on a daily basis, for example applle forbids apps from informing consumer that 30% of their donation to a charity is taken. With industrial goods, there is a whole department who's job is proqurement and to know what they are buying. And lets not pr…

I agree consumers are misled but Apple is a poor example here. I know the App Store fee is a popular topic right now but they are one of the few companies making a consumer product that is bounds ahead of military or industrial versions.

They are a perfect example of a company that purposefully misleads, and forces other companies they work with to mislead, for example on the subject of repairs - to be authorised repair shop for apple, you have to lie to a customer that recovering their data is impossible, and is my view that shoupd be illegal.

They products might be good, but their methods are ruthless - they are wanna-be like mexican cartels.

Re: Overkill objects for everyday life

#125

Post by user3939382 »

dkdbejwi383 wrote: post #38
arpa wrote: post #28

"Military grade" has very different connotations if you have been in the service. So yeah, great conversation starter, interesting worldview; can't say I share it though.

Military grade = the cheapest product that meets the spec.

Just to offer a counterexample, I have a Cammenga 3H compass that I use for camping. The thing is a beast, one of the coolest things I own.

Re: Overkill objects for everyday life

#126

Post by divbzero »

user3939382 wrote: post #110
dan-robertson wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dishwashers are another example. You could buy a commercial one but it will come with no roll-out trays (you load up different plastic racks for different things and you can load a rack while the dishwasher is running) and it’s designed for an environment with lots of ventilation (you just open it when it is done and let the steam get ventilated away) which people are unlikely to have in their own kitchens. Other ite…

Tangentially related: if you do want an amazing electric coffee grinder, feel free to piggy back on my countless hours of research and go with this: Baratza Virtuoso+ It is excellent.

In the spirit of OP, the main navbar on Baratza’s website links to an article titled:

STOP! Don’t Dump It – Fix It!

https://baratza.com/stop-dont-dump-it-fix-it/

Re: Overkill objects for everyday life

#127

Post by cblconfederate »

ClumsyPilot wrote: post #14

"I don't think corporations/businesses are to blame... The average consumer is extremely ill-informed." This is very unfair - the average cobsumer is purposefully mislead on a daily basis, for example applle forbids apps from informing consumer that 30% of their donation to a charity is taken. With industrial goods, there is a whole department who's job is proqurement and to know what they are buying. And lets not pr…

> from informing consumer that 30% of their donation to a charity is taken

For me the biggest concern is that people want this to happen and even would go as far as say that people get a perverse sense of satisfaction from Apple's unfair behavior. Because it validates the widespread pessimism and 'everything is broken' mentality that is normalized nowadays

Re: Overkill objects for everyday life

#128

Post by fmajid »

joan_kode wrote: post #22

Love my infrared thermometer for steeping tea at exact temperatures. These things are terrible for medical purposes since they only measure surface temperature, but they're perfect for diagnosing industrial machinery and tea. Also more versatile than those expensive programmable tea-brewing contraptions!

The problem is the emissivity calibration, as different materials have different IR characteristics. For food, the best by far is the fast contact Thermapen (get the original British version rather than the heavily marked-up US licensee's).

Re: Overkill objects for everyday life

#129

Post by cblconfederate »

tracedddd wrote: post #24
ClumsyPilot wrote: post #14

"I don't think corporations/businesses are to blame... The average consumer is extremely ill-informed." This is very unfair - the average cobsumer is purposefully mislead on a daily basis, for example applle forbids apps from informing consumer that 30% of their donation to a charity is taken. With industrial goods, there is a whole department who's job is proqurement and to know what they are buying. And lets not pr…

I agree consumers are misled but Apple is a poor example here. I know the App Store fee is a popular topic right now but they are one of the few companies making a consumer product that is bounds ahead of military or industrial versions.

Does the us army or ISS use apple products?

Re: Overkill objects for everyday life

#130

Post by luma »

tootie wrote: post #59
notatoad wrote: post #4

I love to use professional-grade items where i can, but sometimes "overkill" means a worse product. like the professional-grade fan - it's not just designed for a high duty cycle, it's also probably designed to be operated in an environment where people regularly use hearing protection, so quiet operation is not a consideration.

I used to love browsing McMaster-Carr but pretty quickly realized there is nothing worth buying as a consumer. Anything remotely practical for personal use is cheaper on Amazon.

McM pricing heavily depends on how much business you do with them, if you're a commercial buyer you'll see much steeper discounting applied.
Post reply on HN