August 13, 2014

Yesteryear
One year ago today: August 13, 2013, typically busy.
Five years ago today: August 13, 2009, the birth of bingo.
Ten years ago today: August 13, 2004, selfie, Wyoming style.

           What’s this? It is the Hotelicopter. And it is a hoax. My inventor buddy and I were talking about self-made millionaires and I say there really isn’t such a thing. Maybe in the days before income tax it was possible, but since then you at least have to know somebody. Now I’m not talking about those individuals lucky enough to be born poor but talented. That’s reasonably random. The rest of it isn’t. Something like 80% of all country music stars are distantly related.

           We were discussing Branson, the Sir Richard guy who owns the Virgin companies. While I agree he put the packages of his own success together, he did it while attending Stowe, a private English school with around a $20,000 price tag per term, not counting tuck allowance. I can’t accept anybody whose grandfather is a Privy Councillor "started from scratch". But the point my buddy makes is that the guy remains humble. Like me, I suppose.
           Privy Councillor. That’s an advisor to the Queen, or at least to upper government. The pay is only$40,000 per year, but it is for life and the fact that there is a stop-at-nothing demand for the job between millionaires tips us off the game is afoot. Like becoming a mayor in Florida.

           I’m staying indoors most of today to read and relax. We held an impromptu club meeting this morning to examine, of all things, the fan motor of a Mercedez air cooler. It came up on a search of 36V electric motors, which Agt. M insists he wants to put on his bicycle. So he can go 40 mph. One glance told us it was PWM controlled. Pulse Width Modulation, see addendum.
           This is something we know a lot about, but I say we have to destroy the control unit to find out what makes it tick. You cannot operate a PWM motor by connecting it to a current. It has a circuit board that requires a steady stream of pulses at a frequency of 20ms. I happen to remember exactly the page I saw a diagram of such a beast in a book two months ago, and if so, there is a slim chance we could drive the motor with an Arduino. That’s awful ambitious, but we’ve had good success with wiring stuff before without knowing the related engineering.
           Now, coffee and the Miami Herald. A London museum is offering robot tours. It is after hours and on-line, I’ll see if I can get there. I can, but it involves installing Google chrome on your home computer and I ain’t near stupid enough to do that. Up yours, Tate Gallery. People should not have to subject themselves to a shakedown search to view art. But, but, they protest, it is just Google chrome. That’s what I said, a shakedown search and an inventory of your hard drive. Don’t you read the news?

           Or how about this 94,000 people in Florida having to prove they are citizens to get government medical subsidies. Why, that’s “race-iss”, just “race-iss”. It is also a step in the right direction. Round ‘em up, send ‘em home. Permanently. And don’t give that crap about how long they’ve been here. We don’t want to hear it any more. And this tomb in Greece is supposed to be the biggest yet, but it’s been looted. Last, the Herald, inexplicably unable to publish a single issue without mentioning male homosexuality, today resorted to a story on Israeli immigration law concerning same-sex “marriage”.

           Wait, there is one more item, the Spanish enclave of Melilla is being invaded. True, the Spanish probably have no business operating a port in Africa, but then there was nothing there until they came along. Now look at the place. That fence is 25 feet high, but they’ve been practicing scaling it in less than one minute. Whose side am I on? Spain’s. These people don’t want their own freedom, they want to take away yours. Don't be surprised if this Spanish port eventually causes big trouble when the humanists move in with their television cameras.
           I cannot support those who want my lifestyle without adopting my value system. That is what is wrong with the world, they want our technology without any assurances of how they will use it. They want American plastic, but they don’t want to pay to recycle it so they throw it in the Pacific Ocean. The Great Pacific Garbage Patch. The world claims to hate America, but they sure want their grubby mitts on what we have.

ADDENDUM
           For a little background on Pulse Width Modulation, good luck. Such information is not easy to find. My personal estimate of on-line authors and engineers is that you have to read approximately 400 pages to get one page of useful information. And no segment of the 400 pages ever gives you a contiguous chapter you can really use. Basically, the motors are built to change speed depending on the width of an incoming pulse generated by a computer or micro-controller. This can be confusing to the beginner, because it is hard to visualize. It is the width of the pulse, not the frequency, which varies the motor speed. The frequency is 20,000 pulses per second. Lost? So am I, but it works.
           The thing is, I found a diagram of an ordinary timing chip that can emulate a computer clock. The good old 555 timer, which has been around since before the flood. It is a cheap timer chip that can be rigged up to chirp off and on, the so-called “astable” state. I’ve set about building one to see if, in fact, this will run a Mercedez fan motor. I’m taking a chance Mercedez did not incur the expense of making their motors different than the rest of the world.