Re: Preventative

On Sat, 25 Oct 2008 22:52:16 +0100, "Jonathan Morton"
<jonathan@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

"Robert Bannister" <robban1@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:6mf2mfFg5g9oU4@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Derek Turner wrote:
On Thu, 23 Oct 2008 15:51:12 -0700, Arcadian Rises wrote:


Is "preventative" interchangeable with "preventive"? Or is it an
obsolete form of "preventive"? Or an Alaskan dialect peculiarity?

I think this may be another 'pondian' difference: I'd never come across
'preventive' until I read this post. (BrE)

What about "preventive measures"?

They would be "preventative" in BrE, along with "orientated" and
"exploitative".

But not in the phrase "preventive maintenance" as performed on valve (vaccuum
tube) computers by me and my colleagues in the late 1950s and early 1960s.
(See the second quote below.)

OED:

preventive maintenance n. routine maintenance of a vehicle or other
machine, intended to prevent problems from arising.

1937 Times 16 Jan. 6/6 The booklet outlines a scheme of *preventive
maintenance, by which Morris owners may obtain periodical inspection and
adjustment services.

1953 B. V. BOWDEN [1] Faster than Thought iv. 86 The technique of
preventive maintenance..has considerably reduced the number of valve
failures which occur while the machines are running. [2]

1991 Mech. Engin. Sept. 49/2 The new control..is designed to accept future
developments such as improved diagnostics, expert systems, and preventive
maintenance packages.

[1] I knew B Vivian Bowden. He was a friend of the family who had been a
Physics PhD student at Cambridge in the early 1930s along with my father.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B._V._Bowden

[2] The main preventive maintenance technique we used was "marginal testing".
The voltage of the DC supply to the computer was manually varied to higher and
lower values than normal while the computer was running a test program. Any
valves that were approaching the end of their lives were likely to misbehave
under these conditions. They could be tracked down and replaced.

Because the voltage was varied by turning a large knob clockwise and
anti-clockwise, and the needle of the voltmeter swung from its central
position when the voltage was varied, we called the process "swinging the
margins".

One of the computers:
http://www.digital60.org/images/mercury.gif

The power unit with control knob is out of the picture on the left.

Obviously the non-reduplicated forms would be understood also.

The Romans did it too - "dedo" as well as "do" for give. The reduplicated
version was always first conjugation if I remember correctly.

I'm shocked, though, to find I have something in common with Sarah Palin - I
must switch to "preventive" at once.

Regards

Jonathan


--
Peter Duncanson, UK
(in alt.usage.english)
.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: Preventative
    ... Peter Duncanson (BrE) wrote, in ... preventive maintenance n. ... The voltage of the DC supply to the computer was manually varied to higher and ... Because the voltage was varied by turning a large knob clockwise and ...
    (alt.usage.english)
  • Re: Having table totals appear on form in bound fields
    ... simple to just add a new field to Staff Table for FullName so I used that! ... SELECT Computers.*, Staff.StaffName FROM ... The Control Source for my Computers ... maintenance, it is tied to the location. ...
    (microsoft.public.access.forms)
  • Re: Having table totals appear on form in bound fields
    ... SELECT Computers.*, Staff.StaffName FROM ... You can then bind StaffName to a textbox and make it disabled and locked so ... The Control Source for my Computers ... maintenance, it is tied to the location. ...
    (microsoft.public.access.forms)
  • Re: Having table totals appear on form in bound fields
    ... Your "Computers form" is a main form Yes ... You have a textbox in the footer of that subform named "Total ... Maintenance Cost" (BTW, ... On the main form you have a textbox whose control source is: ...
    (microsoft.public.access.forms)
  • Re: Having table totals appear on form in bound fields
    ... Your "Computers form" is a main form Yes ... You have a textbox in the footer of that subform named "Total ... Maintenance Cost" (BTW, ... On the main form you have a textbox whose control source is: ...
    (microsoft.public.access.forms)