With another hot summer approaching and now air condition, I decided it was time to mount another ceiling fan in my house, this time around, in my living room.
The model I chose is a Westinghouse (Chrome Cyclone model, 132 cm / 52 inch diameter, 7.1 kg weight). Their gentle breeze type cooling is really great and they are better for our environment than air conditioning would be. Besides, I like their look and feel. Furthermore, I had an unused ceiling socket for that.
The only problem was that I then had to get the device and mount it. Swiss shops usually sell nice products so I walked my butt down to Conrad Electronic and picked one up.
The device is delivered as a toolkit with parts. That means there is a fair degree of assembly to do before one can sit down and chill.
Wires
The easiest way to get the insulation from the wire was to fix it against a surface with the hook. That way, the wire could not escape as insane compression forces were not exerted as part of the hook’s grip force but as part of me pushing the hook against the table.
There is a learning point for prosthetic gripper or hand researchers here. Grip function – opposing surface A and surface B of any given gripper, hook or hand device – remains a widely available concept even after one starts wearing one. So that doesn’t mean I am restricted to A and B. Here, you can see me employing surfaces A and B (hook claws) as well as C (table protected by Westinghouse’s assembly instructions yielding both protection and a slightly deformable surface that is ideal for maximum grips). The wire cannot escape.
That means that prosthetic devices must withstand such forces. There is no use selling other material.
Blades
Getting these parts together was a bit of balancing work. The manual suggests to get the central machine parts together, hand these, and then assemble the rest such as the blades and the lamps.
I was not going to assemble the propeller blades on to the hanging fan machine block as my balancing skills with the prosthetic may be acceptable, but, too much is too much. So I did this sitting down, and that worked out extremely well. I sat down and placed the fan parts on the table, then, as the machine grew bigger, I put in my lap. One has to be careful to not scratch the fan or the blades, but then, that was no problem here. The real challenge was in micro balancing all the connectors and screws into place.
Lights
The Westinghouse fans I have both have three lamps, each of which feature GU10-type bayonet lamp bulb sockets. Now conventional halogen light bulbs generate lots of heat. Also, these rather small and elegant sockets are not built to contain massive porcelain sockets that would be necessary to prevent long term damage caused by excessive heat. So in my experience, there is a real risk for heat damage of both the lamp socket and the connection between light bulb socket and lamp. There is nothing more awkward than having to fix ill conditioned lightbulb socket fittings after managing to hang a 7,1 kg fan – so I went straight for LED light bulbs.
Here, you can see my GU10-LED bulb fitted Westinghouse Cyclone ceiling fan, breezing away and into the summer.
Where to buy
These devices are ubiquitous. They are also available via Amazon.