Benchtop power supply
January 6th, 2012
ATX Computer power supply as benchtop power supply. These are quite common around the net, but this is mine with my favorite twist.
Switch mode voltage regulator 34063A
December 12th, 2011
I just discovered these handy voltage regulators while trying to get an LM317 circuit to work. These regulators are switching type, which means they do not regulate by wasting the excess voltage in a resistive manner as do the LM317 regulators. Rather, they turn on and off rapidly, and use an inductor to store and release energy for theoretical 100% efficient operation. Read the rest of this entry »
Burster Plugin in Ubuntu 10.04 64-bit
November 23rd, 2011This is a little report on running the blender3d burster plugin in Ubuntu 10.04 LTS 64-bit. It runs, but has an annoying flickering problem.
Wood Gasifier
November 15th, 2011
Nice, pure blue-purple flame of woodgas
I’ve successfully completed a stage of my wood gasifier project–firing the swirl burner. This is just a basic test of the hearth, grate, cyclone and cooling stage. I got lots of nice gas, some water, and some tar.
Magic Jack blocks some phone numbers
November 4th, 2011
I wanted to contact a mechanic friend of mine and couldn’t get through with my free long distance telephone service, magic jack. Actually it’s not free, but very inexpensive. I got a recording instead with some legal mumbo-jumbo. Then I contacted their tech support. Here’s the story. Read the rest of this entry »
Salvaged and Surplus
September 24th, 2011
Salvaged and Surplus
I’ve lately realized how many boxes and boxes I have of this stuff. Probably a hundred or two hundred pounds, not sure. Old PC motherboards, printed circuit boards, video cards, sockets, wires, capacitors, components galore. It seems like over the years people have gotten the idea that I collect this stuff, so then they contribute more to it. Or maybe I shouldn’t blame others. It’s probably just me… Read the rest of this entry »
Solar Panel Hot Water Heater
September 22nd, 2011
Solar Water Heater
This is a solar panel I made with some big glass panels I scrounged. It measures about 10 feet long by 3 feet wide. It saves on the propane bill big time, during the summer months. Sorry for the blurry photo, I used my aging Palm treo 650 camera. So this is certainly renewable energy, the sun comes up pretty much every morning like clockwork.
Burn Barrel Grate
September 14th, 2011
Since building my own welder, I’ve had many opportunities to save money and be resourceful by using it. Today is no exception. I went to my local D.I.Y. supplier, and purchased for $10 a twenty foot piece of 5/8 rebar. It was difficult to bend, so I enlisted the help of my log splitter to bend the curved sections. Many blacksmiths would pooh-pooh the use of this metal. Read the rest of this entry »
Peace Canoe
September 14th, 2011
A peace canoe that I built this summer. It’s not tippy. We christened it “banana split.”
Breadboarding modules
September 4th, 2011
This is a followup to the article Breadboarding adapters . Recently I noticed a post on makezine about somebody that was making plug-in modules for solderless breadboarding, and thought I would share my creations as well. I also made a battery “juice bridge” a while before I noticed this. Great ideas. Read the rest of this entry »