nitpicking FarOutRide's solar power page

In this article I will address some thoughts I have on this rather good page on FarOutRide’s site.  I wouldn’t talk about it but it is getting a lot of fawning attention on reddit right now. The whole first section is excellent all the way to battery types.   At that point I would not call

nitpicking FarOutRide’s solar power page

In this article I will address some thoughts I have on this rather good page on FarOutRide’s site.  I wouldn’t talk about it but it is getting a lot of fawning attention on reddit right now. The whole first section is excellent all the way to battery types.   At that point I would not call

Critter Sitting: Ivy comes out of her shell

saturday The big news from Saturday was that Ivy (the scared dog from the first sitting) has, with patience from staff and volunteers, gotten friendly with humans:   She’s still a bit jumpy but I think she will be adopted soon.  She comes to the front of the cage and interacts instead of hiding.  She

Davis Mountains state park

I spent today in the Davis Mountains state park, a short distance from old Fort Davis.  Here’s the view from my “office”; on an overlook a little below 6000′, I think.

Critter sitting, pit edition: Max and Scooby

Last sunday I came back from the Organ mountains a little early so I could get in a couple of hours at the shelter. This is Max: Pretty sure he was a fighting dog because of the scars on his face and the butchered ears.  He was pleasant, and responded some, but had a real

kangaroo rat

When I was at the Organ Mountain[s] national monument I had the sliding door open after dark.   The interior light was throwing a bit of illumination on the ground. One of these guys went scampering by.  Looked like a gerbil with a longer tail curved up and ending in a black tuft.  If they hop

shadecloth

I bought some shadecloth before going FT and finally deployed it this weekend. It’s commonly available in 90% and 80% shade, with 90% being more popular.  80% might be happier in very windy situations, although even 90% is much easier to deal with in wind than a normal tarp. I wanted shadecloth because I work

SSD upgrade

The Dell came with a 128gb SSD, which was business sexy several years ago when it was new. I’m dual booting win7 and Debian Linux on it. Enough room for that but I want to use it as a mythtv back end. It’s already running most the time lately, controlling a small cryptocoin miner ASIC.

abused GC2s finally died

I’ve mentioned that a year ago I bought some used 6v (golf cart) batteries for basically core price. I limped along with them since then, but the last month’s heavy use finally did them in. I’m shocked they lasted this long. When I got them they were watered but had been stored discharged for months;

Honeywell swamp cooler and a $100 mistake

Just before going FT I ordered a Honeywell CS071AE 176cfm evaporative cooler from amazon to help make summer in the desert bearable.  They humidity in the ELP high desert is quite low, a great candidate for evap cooling.  The vast majority of homes here have evap cooling units on the roof instead of A/C units.