Apps for Life

Posted on by Elena Kramer

Apps
The Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, the leading trade fair of the consumer electronics industry that took place at the beginning of the year, made one thing more than clear: 2011 is going to be the year of the Apps. You think that 2010 has been the year of the Apps? Well, that was just the beginning… Tablet PCs, Smartphones and the continuous hype around all apple products make sure that Apps stay on top of the list for every mobile enthusiast. Because they make life so much easier…

In what way? In pretty much every way you can imagine…because these days there is hardly anything that a smartphone cannot do!

Here’s just a little selection of everyday items that you can leave at home from now on – assuming that you have the right app! Read More

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You don’t need a dehumidifier – or do you?

Posted on by Alfred Austin

Dehumidifier next to easy chair in front of bookcase in elegant roomDehumidifiers don’t necessarily come top of many people’s shopping lists. Why should they? There are probably dozens of more desirable things that you would sooner spend your money on and there are scores of far more urgent purchases which you or your family think you should make.

Or are there?

Perhaps you first need to know what a dehumidifier can do and what affect it can have on your indoor climate in order to understand why you and every home or office should have one.

A dehumidifier is more than just an electrical appliance. It can transform the climate of your home, workplace or office – almost instantly. This may seem like a mild exaggeration, but you would be surprised to see just how much moisture a dehumidifier like the TTK 30 S can extract from the air in your room, bathroom, cellar, walk-in wardrobe, basement or holiday home in the short space of only 24 hours. A bucketful. That’s right – up to 10 litres of water in only one day. It is this excess moisture that lingers in the air which can not only damage your possessions and property, it can seriously affect your feeling of well-being and even your health. Read More

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Cooking pasta and saving energy: A Test

Posted on by Elena Kramer

Boiling water (and money) on the stove

On our German Facebook page, we just ran a little competition in which we asked our fans to post their best tips for saving energy. In the course of this contest, they shared a lot of useful advice and proved that there are quite some things you can do to save not only precious energy from being wasted, but also a nice amount of money from being spent in vain. A lot of useful, amusing and surprising tips were collected, but then a little dispute emerged between two of our fans. The point of issue was:

Is it energy-efficient to boil the water for pasta in an electric kettle before proceeding to cook the noodles on the stove?

The question is whether this really saves energy (because an electric boiler is not only faster, but also needs less energy) or maybe even consumes more (because two single appliances must be heated). Since we were the ones who had raised the question in the first place, we thought it is kind of our responsibility to clear up this confusion. Or maybe we were only looking for a good excuse to meet up with some colleagues for a little reunion outside the office… and after all, we at Trotec have the means to find the solution to this dilemma. That is, we have the right equipment: The BX 11 is a handy little device that allows you to measure the energy consumed by any electrical device you decide to plug in – and even gives you the exact amount of money spent. Read More

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Watch Out For One Of Our Work Tents – Wherever You Are

Posted on by Alfred Austin

indoor work tent with connected hose and workman doing a thumbs upThere are a fair number of sites and places where you would expect to find one of our multipurpose, pop-up work tents. Outside in foul weather sheltering utility workmen from the driving rain while they are fitting or fixing a section of pipe, outside in gusty, wet winds protecting service technicians while they carry out work on electric cabinets or traffic control boxes or outside in the sleet and snow shielding construction workers while they perform outdoor work which would otherwise have to be put off until the weather relents.

But if there is one place where you would surely not expect to find them, then it would have to be inside.

That’s right – inside. Work safety plays a huge role nowadays and protecting workers and the other occupants of buildings from clouds of dust and dangerous particles caused by work such as grinding or sanding has become a top priority. Read More

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The Comeback Of Genuine Wooden Furniture

Posted on by Sarah Peschges

Wooden Dining-Room TableIf you start thinking way back you can certainly remember the old, dark and bulky wooden furniture which dominated lots of the living rooms of the generation of our grandparents or even parents. Usually they were used to accommodate the exclusive china set, the crystal glasses or the sterling cutlery. Unfortunately, these pieces of furniture often turned the living-room into a dark and rather unwelcoming place and the younger generation just thought they were hideous!

Especially after the second world war, during the time of the economic boom such heavy wooden furniture was very popular. It satisfied the need for security, tradition and coziness. Besides, it was a way to express the pride of having overcome the time of austerity after the war. Nevertheless, roughly since the 1990s, there emerged a counterculture which supported interior trends determined by a lot of glass, chrome and straight-lined design. Furniture made of natural materials like wood, cork or felt were labeled as old-fashioned and unhip.

However, during the last couple of years a new movement has started which implies more naturalness and comfort concerning furniture and interior trends. This new interior concept was also presented at the international furnishing show, IMM Cologne, which took place in January 2011. Due to the climate change people tend to once again set a high value on the use of ecological materials that are not treated with toxic paint or other surface coatings. The new interior trends 2011 have melodic names like “Emotional Austerity” or “Re-Balancing” and they all focus on sustainable and natural materials, modern design and state-of-the-art technology.

Long gone are the times in which you would be embarrassed to own those pieces of wooden furniture and you felt the need to hide them! Read More

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How to Create the Right Climate for Your Prized Orchids

Posted on by Alfred Austin

Orchids are among the most popular and widespread flowering plants in the world. Their often tall, slender stalks, their exotic and extravagant form and their delicate petals and magnificent colours inspire and fascinate orchid lovers and growers around the world and fill the hearts of those who share their passion and pleasure with wonder and awe.

Orchids are most commonly found in the tropics of South and Central America and also in Asia. For the Aztecs they were holy, which is why they grew them in their splendid antique gardens, and for Confucius, the wise Chinese thinker and philosopher, they embodied grace, purity, beauty and elegance.

close-up shot of pink orchidBut there are several hardened species which can flourish as far north as the Arctic Circle and as far south as Antarctica. Of the 30,000 or so different species of orchid known to man there is a small number which are deemed especially collectable. Rothschild’s Slipper, an orchid that takes as long as 15 years to grow, can fetch prices upwards of 5000 US dollars per stem.

Most hobby gardeners would not be willing to pay such a considerable price for a single example, but they are prepared to invest quite substantial sums in order to be able to nurture their passion. Read More

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A passion for shoes

Posted on by Elena Kramer

A dehumidifier of the TTK S series in a wardrobe
Ballerinas, sneakers, boots, sandals, peeptoes, stilettos – the women among our readers will know the problem: whether they are intended to be comfortable, practical or quite simply stunningly beautiful, if there’s one thing you can never have enough of it’s got to be shoes!  Yet once you’ve bought them, there never seems to be enough closet space to accommodate the whole collection. Maybe that’s because in the course of a life-time the average woman will accumulate around 200 pairs of shoes – and that’s only a rough estimate!

And of course these little treasures will want to be stowed away properly …

First of all, it is important to not just pile up all your shoes into an enormous heap or simply chuck them into a huge cardboard box. This is not only a rather confusing and messy way to store your shoes, it also inevitably leads to ugly marks and bumps, especially with the most sensitive models. Wooden shoe stretchers are a great help when it comes to preserving the original form of your favourite shoes as long as possible, especially if they have been neglected over a longer period.

But can you just put your shoes in the wardrobe? Doesn’t that – well – smell?

The biggest problem concerning the storage of shoes is that no matter how often you wash your feet or how much foot deodorant you use, you can’t stop certain smells from evolving. But who would want such a smell to spread to their freshly washed laundry? The reason for the typical, slightly musty smell of shoes is mostly moisture, and if they are not dried sufficiently, they can quickly take on a rather unpleasant smell. If you have been wearing your shoes all day, you should therefore make sure that you air them well afterwards. And if they are soaked from the rain, you should dry them thoroughly for at least 48 hours before putting them back into the closet. High levels of humidity can easily lead to unpleasant smells developing  in your wardrobe – smells which linger in clothes and which are extremely hard to get rid of, even when you bring on the big guns like lashings of perfume and room scent to cover them up or drown them out.

One of the best and most efficient ways of combating excess humidity in small rooms or walk-in closets is to install a dehumidifier. A basic model, like the TTK 30 S for example, is most well-equipped to do the job. These ultra-compact appliances are not only really economical, they are also particularly well suited for continuous operation in small and heated rooms.

And as soon as you’ve got the problem of high humidity under control, then there is nothing to stop you from having a nicely orderly closet… because is there anything that could possibly be more delightful than having all of your favourite items of clothing lined up beautifully in one place? Apart from yet another pair of shoes, maybe …

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Happy Birthday, Trotec24!

Posted on by Elena Kramer

Happy Birthday - Trotec24 turns 3

Yesterday was a very special day here at the Trotec Headquarters: The Trotec24 Online Shop turned 3! We took that as an opportunity to celebrate our shop – an ambitious project that was launched January 25, 2008.

When the decision to start selling our products online was made, there were many sceptics. People doubted that in our field of business, with the majority of our customers being business clients, online was really the way to go. And although the Trotec Group offers a broad range of highly specialized, individual product and service solutions which traditionally require a considerable amount of service and consulting, we have ventured that step.

Because we have always believed that we can add even more to the service you experience when purchasing our goods.

Read More

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Fed up with your old folding rule? So are we! Win a new laser distance meter today!

Posted on by Alfred Austin

Man in a bowler hat carrying a folding rule in a binWelcome to the 21st century! You only have to look back in history – and not very far back at that –  to see that there comes a time when many objects and products which we have grown accustomed or even attached to have had to make way for new inventions which were not only far more convenient, easier to use and much more useful  – they simply knocked their predecessors into a cocked hat!

The way things are going it could well be that the good old folding or carpenter’s rule – that tried and trusted piece of measuring equipment – is about to experience that same fate. It may be tough on the folding rule, but how bad is that compared to the benefits its successor can bring to mankind?

There probably isn’t a soul amongst us – well in my age group at least – who doesn’t fondly remember their very first portable audio tape player. We loved them. Even before they introduced the buffering technology that stopped us from initially being able to take them with us on a hike or run. But did that stop us from buying those smart little MP3 players when they first hit the shops? No, it didn’t. And what about rotary-dial phones, video 8 cameras, typewriters, long playing vinyl records and video cassettes. They were all hallmarks of a new era of sophisticated, upbeat technology in their day. And they were all condemned to one day being replaced by something more contemporary, something more stylish, something quite simply better.

Time then to introduce the BD15, the new laser distance meter from Trotec. The BD15  is an extremely accurate and extremely easy-to-use measuring device that in years to come will be seen as the logical transition from the old-fashioned and outdated folding rule. The lightweight, pocket-sized BD15 does not only look an impressive piece of professional equipment – a point that could rank high on the list of certain crafts and tradesmen like builders, kitchen fitters, interior decorators and carpet layers who are all always keen to show their customers that they clearly have the situation well in hand – it is an impressive piece of professional equipment: there’s the modern-day laser which can measure distances unerringly in a fraction of the time and up to a fraction of an inch, a Pythagoras function with which you can even carry out indirect measurements, a backlit display, ergonomically-arranged soft-touch keys and a robust dust and splashproof housing which means you can even take it along with you and use it on building sites or anywhere else in the Great Outdoors.

Want one? Win one! Enter our competition and post your funniest, your most imaginative, your most surprising photo of you (or somebody else) and your (or their) old folding rule. Just go to www.facebook.com/trotec4u to see how it’s done.

Course if you don’t win, you could always buy one…

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Time to say goodbye to a heating myth or two – and save £££s on your next energy bill !

Posted on by Alfred Austin

Finding the best way to heat your house has become somewhat of a science nowadays – of course you want it to be nice and warm, but isn’t that easier said than done when you consider how prices for natural gas and heating oil have gone through the roof in recent months? And what about the moisture content of the air? If the relative humidity is too high then there’s a real risk of mould forming – mould that can seriously affect your health and damage your possessions. Too low and you can quickly end up with dry, itchy skin, chapped lips and a sore throat and a barking cough to go with it.

What many people do not realise, however, is that you can actually save yourself a tidy sum and more importantly perhaps protect yourself, your family and your property if you are prepared to say goodbye to one or two popular myths which are commonly associated with heating and ventilation: Read More

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