The lightning rod threads are now read only. If folks want to wail about it, wail at me as its largely my doing. The rational is as follows:
1. To meet the LR thread's stated goal ('for 23 pieces, how many of each have rods and how many don't') would require approx. 126,500 messages. Applying our usual guideline of closing a thread when it reaches somewhere around 50 messages, that means we'd have 110 threads for each of the 23 models that have rods. If the rate of posting continued at its current 1-2 messages per day it would take over 7 years to gather all the data and consume approximately 194,304,000 bytes of disk storage. And to be successful it assumes everyone who has one of the 23 pieces posts a message - the likelihood of this is slim as many collectors are not on line. Using the forums to gather this data imposes a considerable amount of storage and indexing overhead on the BTN forum which impacts threads posted by others.

There are more efficient ways to get the information and I have discussed some of these with Art. A monumental, but noble task, and I encourage Art to continue with his data gathering and share its results with us on a timely basis.

2. A considerable amount of information about pieces with lightning rods is already contained in the 'Greenbook' for HL. For each of the 23 models, the book lists the highest numbered piece known to have a lightning rod and not have a rod and gives a breakdown by the origin of manufacturer. For example, it shows information such as:
Canadian w/Rod last # known is 1061
Malaysian w/Rod last # known is 2127
Malaysian no rod lowest # known is 2469, etc.



None of this is to detract from Art's attempt to acquire LR data and we should expect him to post information on his findings thus far and how further data can be submitted.

Rgds,
__
/im

Deja Vu!

Thanks Tim.

I will summarize the data collected to-date, then open a new thread. Additions to the new thread will be solicited under a by-exception reporting rule: I will lay out what we know, and if anyone has a piece that contradicts that, then I will update the thread. Perhaps e-mail will be the mechanism, rather than another long string of postings. Give me a week or so to get organized.

Thanks to all for the support in concept, if not method.



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-Art