One year ago today: August 4, 2013, food, property, women.
Five years ago today: August 4, 2009, long-winded.
Ten years ago today: August 4, 2004, the real space station.
Oh no, household expenses. My hot water tank is leaking. I removed the access panel from the exterior wall and noted the tank has already been replaced once. The base was shored up with plywood and that has gone soft from water damage. Dang, I gave Enrique my other hot water tank in great condition. Time for the robot club to do a home repair.
I'm pointing at the access panel, cut into the side of the trailer body. The original tank was installed under the kitchen cupboards and impossible to replace economically. If I move, I only have to get a few grand out of this joint to break even. It is too small for me, but there was a couple living in it before me. So, it can be done. I didn't think I'd be here long enough to start making repairs, but remember, it was this place that let me afford the Grand Canyon. I know others who live so expensively they can only talk about travel.
It’s confirmed, that Kodak camera is another piece of junk. Once more, we have a highly-touted camera that fails the first time it gets damp. Not wet. It was inside my jacket as I walked home on Saturday. It sprinkled a little. I returned to test the scooter without success. Remember Professor Oz? He’s been visiting in some place called Halifax, which I only know from that school game. The one where somebody has to start a city with the last letter of the previous answer. No American cities start with X.
And my Honda won’t start until I find that ground wire. Dang, ordinary electrical you just trace it down but ground faults could be anywhere. I just know it is under the gas tank where I can’t get at it. The Oz offered to help, but he’s help like Wallace. Not much help at all. But the Oz keeps his word. You know, I have a theory of why Canadians don’t keep promises. Goes like this. (A repeat, but bears repeating.)
It is actually quite easy to sue people in Canada, it costs a couple hundred bucks. But the judicial system strives to discourage personal lawsuits and this is done by favoring the defendant. Thus, they purposely drag out proceedings for years, a lengthy delay where a single missed document or deadline can have your case dropped. Thus, the average Canadian quickly learns he won’t get sued for lying. Soon, even ones who don’t lie on purpose learn it is safe to do so.
At street level it is not like outright lying, but more like the Canadian will say anything he pleases to get what he wants. This most often takes the form of failure to deliver. A Canadian will promise to do something in the future, but takes no precautions against breach by frustration. He doesn’t want to understand, for instance, if he promises to give you a ride in a month, that entails a responsibility on his part to maintain a vehicle in running condition until after the promise is met.
If that sounds like a weak example, it is because you don’t know how often they pull this stunt. This sweet little rodeo gets played out in Canadian courts all the time. A Canadian does not always understand that when he makes a promise, that is also a commitment to arranging his affairs to be able to keep the promise. But the bastard will neglect his vehicle as if no promise exists until just before the due date, then if it breaks down, well, round you go. What's he supposed to do, pay for a taxi? Yes. But he don't see it that way--because he's never had his ass sued off. After all, he didn't promise you that he wouldn't sell his car while still owing you a ride and that's how the courts look at it. The car, not the promised ride.
Worse, it has a secondary effect. After a few generations, the entire nation begins to use the words “accident” and “apology” in the wrong ways. Even when totally to blame (say for negligence), a Canadian will insist if he didn’t do something on purpose, that automatically makes it an “accident”. See the Catch-22? Since he will never admit responsibility, it must be an accident and you are just a troublemaker for trying to place the blame. To a Canadian, “accident” means nobody is to blame, while in reality, in most accidents, somebody is 100% to blame. Think about it.
Meanwhile, here is the living room of a guy I know who just bought his retirement home. I actually told him it looks like an art studio. Man, my place is totally different. Tools, guitars, computers, everywhere. And my yard is full of stuff, too. And my shed. I guess a lot of it depends on what one means by "retirement".
ADDENDUM
Another relaxing evening of bench testing and I’ve learned some valuable information. Valuable, because it will save money, okay? First, don’t use 9V batteries to drive any kind of motor. I always wondered why small tape decks and such had packs of regular cells in multiples. Because for any kind of inductance (such as a motor), the 9V style are useless. The AmpHr rating is so low they are never connected in parallel to boost the amps. I never lost sleep over it, but I’ve wondered at times why you never see banks of 9V cells.
Question, what battery is required to power the motors of the robot hand? No straight answer available. What data is posted is poor. The on-line Einsteins pretty much avoid any topic that requires real research. Batteries connected in series add the voltages, but you should never connect different voltages in parallel. The link here is that I would like to chain old cell phone batteries together, but once again we stumble on an original and useful topic so forget finding any help on line.
But several warnings added together tell me never to connect up too many batteries in general. Not even supposedly identical cells from the same factory. It is now clear that the most powerful and enduring batteries are still lead acid. I’m looking for the smallest lead acid battery that is commonly available. Another useful topic that draws blank stares from the Internet peasantry.
I think I’ll take a tour of a hobby store. As I do my robot hand research—of which I’m certain all the rest of the Nova people are also doing in a dedicated fashion—I’ve come to regard the robot hand as not a true robot. It is more akin to a tethered remotely controlled mechanism. Plus, the model these guys chose (without consulting us) has no feedback mechanism. It blindly follows a program.
Nor am I convinced the complication of an anthropomorphic object is the best introduction to robotics. Too many core concepts have to be patently accepted from strangers and unknown sources. Yes, my model was crude and simple. But I designed and built it myself. Last meetup, not one of the others knew the corresponding proper anatomical terms for the hand parts. In fact, they did not react as if that was even necessary. Duh-yuck.
Thus, I alert the reader once more that my goal is to gain access to 3D printers and other resources that my own club does not possess. This has been a miserably slow process at Nova, where we still have no access to labs, cutting machines, tools, or anything really except a vacant room once per month. That’s hardly progress. Worse, the only path these guys have left open is to continue building the rest of the skeleton, learning very little new in the process.
Return Home
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
