3 ms·
As a boy in the 60's and 70's it was still pretty common to see these systems in department stores for handling receipts. I always found them fascinating. The c
by markbnj 12y ago
As a boy in the 60's and 70's it was still pretty common to see these systems in department stores for handling receipts. I always found them fascinating. The cashier would open the slide and you'd hear the suction, then a solid thunk as the container was sucked into the line. A few minutes later and you'd actually hear the returning container whoosh down the line before it thudded into the padded basket. The development of these systems strikes me as being similar to the development of canals, in that they solved a significant physical problem for a short time until much better technology (railroads, telephones) emerged. Interesting article and thanks for posting it.
- aembleton 12y agoI remember these still being used in a supermarket in the early 90s here in the UK.
- mapgrep 12y agoI still remember my mom using them at a "drive thru" at our bank in the early 1980s. Instead of a window you'd pull up to a tube station. Slips of papers would go in and come out. I think she even did withdrawals this way. (No idea how this was secure, given how far the observation window was from the farthest tube stations. Maybe there were cameras.)
- VLM 12y agoMaybe its a state law thing, but we have these tubes today at local bank drive thru and local walgreens pharmacy. They have cameras now of course. I've always been interested in building a tube into my house for the pure heck of it, because I can. Main problem is I believe PVC pressure rating for compressed air is 0 psi, so there "seem" to be enhanced modern materials that make the job easy, but things aren't as simple as they appear. Also its harder than you'd think to go bidirectional. Unidirectional with simple one way flaps and a timer hooked up to a valve (about a 5 minute arduino project) is pretty simple. Bidirectional is not so simple.
- masklinn 12y ago> The development of these systems strikes me as being similar to the development of canals, in that they solved a significant physical problem for a short time until much better technology (railroads, telephones) emerged. Later systems only cover parts of the use-case though. Some big-box stores have kept pneumatic networks because you can send small items (cash &al) through, not just raw data.