Cleaning windows

Originally uploaded by karavshin.

Tantalizing clue,

“The choice of plane was also a baffling one - a Bellanca Citabria Super Decathlon, which, according to risk assessor Robert Davis said was constructed from a steel and wood frame, but actually covered in fabric, making it easy to dismantle.”

The Civil Air Patrol’s quote  wasn’t as comforting as he probably meant it to be:

“It’s not like we didn’t have our eyes open. We found six other planes while we were looking for him. We’re pretty good at what we do.”

Does that mean up to that point there were already six planes they hadn’t found?  Or in the time they’ve been looking for Fosset, six more planes have crashed?

UPDATE:  And Mistresses!

Their inquiries have revealed that Fossett, married for 38 years to childhood sweetheart Peggy, had at least two mistresses and was living a double life.

Driving, biking and bickering Saturday

Originally uploaded by karavshin.

Riding his bike and driving his car.

Some of my favorite purchases were vintage physics equipment or old military control panels.

I ran into this jaw-dropping collection today:  a guy in the Netherlands reconstructed a fully-functioning guidance system from a British WW2-era bomber plane.

Now THAT is a treasure.

Into that went a masala-like mixture of nutmeg, clove, cinnamon, and freshly-toasted Arbol chillis. These things are hot and fierce.

Finished it with a bit of sugar and some vanilla.

Hmmmm odd taste. Matilda (the insane chilli-eating Myanamar lady) encouraged me to pile on the arbol.  The result was a bizarre drink that, when it wasn’t searing your throat, tasted sort of like masala tea mixed with hot chocolate.

My throat was numbed from drinking the hot chilli, and my forehead had a sweat.  I don’t think I’ll make this a regular drink.

Uploaded with plasq’s Skitch!

Swinging

Originally uploaded by karavshin.

Had a busy weekend with Luke before I’m off for a very brief trip to the US.

Used a new IXUS 860IS camera. It’s essentially like my very dependable, very nice Ixus 700, except a few bells and whistles. Biggest bell? Face Recognition Focusing, which allows shot like this - an in-motion shot where Luke’s face is perfectly focused inside a relatively narrow depth-of-field (check out his toes and my feet, both out of the focal plane). Pretty neat. (and accidental; we only realized why this happened when Woei mentioned the face-focus)

Click on the photo for many more Sunday photographs.

So I did exercise more and when I changed jobs I dropped 95% of the meat and fish from my diet. It seemed to give me more energy and I lost some incremental weight.

For amusement, I got a retest last week. I was betting with myself how much better the results would be.  Both sides of my brain lost. My cholesterol was terribly worse!  It was so bad, I sought a second test from another doctor I’ve known for several years. I made sure to thoroughly fast before the test etc.  Unforunately, same horrid results.

Quite bad enough that she prescribed  Zocor, a cholesterol reducing drug.  Good grief!!!

This photo sequence proves the concept is valid:  I can pack a full bicycle into a 26″x26″x12″ case.

Now the question is implementation.

Clearly the S&S Torque Coupling is key, but it’s almost irrelevant to the project because it is so solid and so dependable.

My question is what should the rest of the bike be.

Absolute simplicity comes in screaming First Place.  That’s why my initial instinct is to have only a single Shimano Nexus internal 8-speed hub in my rear, and just a single chain ring in the front.   The  Nexus works so beautifully on my Dahon that I am delighted if I can incorporate it into another bike.

One question is, “is eight speeds enough?”  I mean it would be nice to have a front derailler.  Of course the packing picture above showed a three-speed chainring.  Then it dawned on me: forget the derailler system.  I can always just move the chain by hand.  So I could reduce the derailler into just have a simple chain tensioner. I lose the ability to shift front gear on the fly, but I probably can live without that capability.  The Nexus gives me enough flexibility  in general around my main chainring.  If I am about to embark on a major epoch change (say I’ve pedalled across a valley, and now about to ascend the hills) I can always hop off and in twenty seconds flip the chain over to the granny chainring.  I have to find out more about chain tensioners, though. I don’t know about that technology, but it clearly should be simpler than a derailler system.

I don’t think I can do anything with the English bottom bracket or spindle.  The 68×116mm spindle doesn’t have any provision to adjust left or right.

Alignment on the rear wheel. Cog to centerline.

Crank arm alignment. Chain to centerline.

Hack to move the Chainring close to centerline.

I did a few experimental hacks like putting the chainring on the inside of the crank, but it still wasn’t enough.

Tomorrow I’ll add some spacers between ring and crank, but I fear that won’t be enough.  The only remaining things will be to jam the rear wheel further right, re-dish the spokes, and if all that still fails, find a new, shorter spindle for my bottom bracket.  I need to check my diagram again, but I’m pretty sure there was no alignment capability on that spindle last time I took it apart.

I turned the stupidly-expensive, yet garbage quality, “shelving” planks into a three-sided squat bench/worktable.   Luke hammered in nails with some of Pa’s old ball-peen hammers, ranging from a few ounces to a heavy oak skull-cracker.

After he tired of nailing, we got out my Bosch hammer drill and  drove holes into the worktop.  I put on the auxiliary second handle so he could manage more easily by himself.  He got sick of the 1/4″ drill, migrated to a bigger one, and wasn’t satisfied until he’d run the 1″ spade bit.  He was endlessly curious why the wood was hot after drilling through it.

Matilda was anxiously watching the whole affair. I don’t believe she thought playing New Yankee Workshop with Luke was the greatest idea.  And she jumped when I let Luke drink the last of my brewed black coffee left sitting under the Snap-On. haha

Oh, and a little African one-mand-band kit arrived for Luke from Aunt Megan today.  I’m trying to figure if the Pie Bird will double as a ceramic flute. Thanks Gemini

So on Saturday, I woke up at the crack of eleven thirty.  Then found that TR Bikes, which ’specializes’ in singlespeed bikes didn’t have the parts. All he could offer me was a 49cog Campagnolo crankset “that ought to fit” and which cost $190. Too expensive and wasn’t even new (had a big chain-tear in its armpit), and it seemed sort of goofy putting an expensive Italian crank on the bike. It’s not period and not authentic. For 190$ I can buy a lot of interesting bike parts off ebay instead.

So I bailed out and went to Koba electronics at Peoples Park Complex. I handed them a list of parts for a simple regenerative receiver. After all, my Czechoslovakian numbers bike isn’t much good for an agent if it doesn’t include shortwave receiver to listen to infamous numbers station OLX.

Twenty minutes later I had most of the parts and headed home.

I didn’t really know where to start, so I spent half an hour identifying the parts to familiarize myself. Then I wired in the audio LM386 audio amplifier and started building out each of the components from there. I stopped when I’d get to an external device, like a speaker jack or a pot. I am missing a critical device, an air-dielectric variable capacitor for tuning. I also haven’t found a case to build into yet (I want something in a nice vintage bakelite). So I’m a bit stuck right now. Once I get it all together, hopefully it just works.

Uploaded with plasq’s Skitch!

Uploaded with plasq’s Skitch!

Uploaded with plasq’s Skitch!

Does anyone have, or where can I get, a 150-350 pF air-dielectric variable capacitor?

My bread skills remain  lame.  I’m still fussing with poolishes as starters.  I made one stab at a wild sourdough starter and brewed up a noxious bucket of swamp slime.