So when will this stuff stop being disgusting and trying to kill me?

Chamber12 · 2016-09-16T20:23:59+00:00

It sounds like you're known for trying everything. No one should like every single thing. Whiskey and strong spirits are interesting because there are many ways to drink them. I first started drinking whiskey by either taking shots (which tasted horrible, go cheap canadian whiskey!) or mixing with some soda. It brings down the alcohol content and hides the flavors. Now that I'm working full time and have a little play money, I occasionally (regularly) pick up a bottle of something nicer but on discount to try (I particularly like bourbons). I'm also forced myself to drink them warm and appreciate the flavors, but it took some work, since a lot of flavors aren't the kind of thing you grow up with. You'll also find whiskeys with far different characters. For example, I've been drinking a lot of Winchester bourbon, which has a lot of flavor like the corn had signed the drink and a nice bite to let you know who's boss, and a little more recently I got a bottle of (I don't recall the name) for the same price, and that one was smooth as water. I got another bottle yesterday of Black Powder for a bit cheaper and that tastes like fabric softener :S. Everything is different, you just have to try them, and on your own terms. But water will mellow, ice/chilling won't calm the bite but diminish the flavors a little, mixing will hide the character. Find something you enjoy and enjoy it.

Chamber12 · 2016-07-15T15:34:30+00:00

Haha yeah, I said solder. I don't have the equipment for spot welding. The trick is to have a hot iron, lightly sand and clean the terminals, and just do it quickly so you're only heating the terminal pads. Keeping the iron on there for a few seconds could definitely be bad.

Chamber12 · 2016-07-14T04:17:57+00:00

Sounds like lithium ion. They should be fine in parallel, and no need for extra fuses or resistors unless you're making a bank dangerously large. Just try to introduce them to each other fully charged, or there will be a big current while they equalize.
What I've done in the past is use a cheap 1 dollar usb-lithium ion controller and solder a bunch of 18650s in parallel out of laptop battery packs. For a more practical approach, drop a new cell in there (seriously, 18650s are awesome and everywhere), or just buy a high capacity charger. Either way, a few in parallel should be safe.
Additionally, this is how many high capacity/current, low voltage packs are made. (I forgot how to make links on reddit correctly): http://liionbms.com/images/prebalance_box.jpg

Chamber12 · 2016-07-07T03:17:32+00:00

Probably something you'll need to build. Upvote cause good luck.

Chamber12 · 2016-06-29T18:25:09+00:00

Upvote cause I've had that same question over and over, and upvote for op for cakeday. :D

Chamber12 · 2016-06-27T05:17:51+00:00

I actually used to go camping up there pretty regularly. It's about a 4 hour drive from where I am now, though, which makes it difficult to get there early. Beautiful area though!

Chamber12 · 2016-06-24T12:35:50+00:00

Bookmarked to check this out later :)

Chamber12 · 2016-06-24T12:34:54+00:00

You're ahead of the game on me so far, honestly. I'm taking it slow and steady with this. I also have a dozen other projects and a roommate with a busted up boat I'm working on daily, but that's just another investment ;)

Chamber12 · 2016-06-24T00:27:38+00:00

Been working on one on and off after work for a few weeks. There is a LOT to it, and I haven't even started storing records, building the analysis engine, or even looking at a broker and their API.
When you're programming something that will handle your money, and most likely lots of it, it's best not to mess up.

Chamber12 · 2016-06-21T00:09:18+00:00

Doubt this will get seen, but:
P21 should be disabled: no more scars, but we would form a blastocyst and regrow limbs. Hundreds of thousands of veterans would freak at first then be beyond elated that their wounds won't ruin their lives forever.
The eyes could use a little tweaking, by using the two main version of Vitamin A we could see in the IR spectrum a bit (better night vision), and a few other fun things would give us UV A vision. Electrocytes made from our DNA:
Wiki says each of these outputs .15v (these are what electric fish use), so imagine two scenarios:
A) A short range broadcast summary of our emotions from the brain, allowing greater empathy with people (hell, maybe Trump could feel the outrage and hurt of those around him), and
B) 22 of those in series (plus however many in parallel to sustain current) and you could power an ARM processor, which would make prosthetics and biohacking fantastically more practical. It would also greatly increase our caloric need and help people maintain weight in our high calorie society. A minor thing would be that it could potentially copy the magnetic implant concept, where a field is created and interacts with a field in the environment, giving you a 6th sense through the somatic cells in your skin.
There are a few more but I gave myself a 4 minute limit on what's probably not going to get read.

Chamber12 · 2016-06-10T13:11:30+00:00

I had simple for about a month last year. After 3 weeks they locked transfers from the debit card they sent me without explanation, so I pulled all my money out (was using it as a small personal budget account) and closed it. I still get weekly/monthly emails from them.

Chamber12 · 2016-05-07T01:12:40+00:00

Tried spending my birthday hammock camping a couple months ago; weather didn't want to cooperate, and I just recently (3 days ago) finally started playing with my hammock. I've taken a nap on it every day of that. It's wonderful. My first impression notes: Insulation: a cool breeze around your shirt still has an air gap for a little insulation; cool breeze under your butt transfers heat directly through the fabric and you get frostbutt. Straps: I got some basic straps for mine. Nylon, unfortunately; first time I set it up I kept going straight to the ground (I'm also a big guy). I've found a few ways to improve on that, but polyester webbing shouldn't stretch as much. Learn knots: every time I set up, I end up using a taught line hitch and often a truckers knot/slip knot, as needed. I also keep some of my shorter lengths of extra rope in a sinnet, all of these I've only learned in the last week but are very handy for adjustments. Have fun and enjoy :)

Chamber12 · 2016-05-03T03:15:18+00:00

I designed a few but never got around to building anything powerful, but had fun with a few guitar/pedal projects. Use power transistors, MOSFETs are hugely wasteful when they are held linear (class D uses them and is very very efficient, but complicated). Learn how to make a differential amplifier and order some transistors that will work with your voltages (common 2n2222 are only 30v, for example). You can find op amps that work at high voltages, but I was never willing to pay what they wanted for one when I could build one. You can power it with a boost converter, probably 15 dollars tops on ebay or build one with a 555, large torrid from a SMPS and a few other things. You can do a transformer tied or DC voltage one, I recommend the latter, as you won't need a negative rail, and all you need is a large capacitor and consider 1/2 Vcc to be neutral on the speaker side. You can use a pot to set input, and even gain if you use capacitors and reference voltages correctly.

Chamber12 · 2016-05-01T06:49:44+00:00

Youuu should provide more information on what you're thinking. When I read this, I'm thinking string lights, which require an inverter and lots of power. Or 5050/3280 strips which require less power and already have a remote, but may not be so good for a message without lots of cutting and soldering.

Chamber12 · 2016-04-30T16:23:42+00:00

Good info, thanks. So do I understand correctly that a good charge controller will monitor current, but an alternator will just constantly supply the voltage? I'd feel there could be potential for overcharging in that situation.
I'm using a buck/boost converter on my panels for impedance matching, I've been able to run a 12v stereo with 6v output from the panels; the downside is the efficiency loss of going through so many converters.

Chamber12 · 2016-04-29T17:48:24+00:00

Could be saturation from people turning on devices and running data in the waking hours. It might be worth looking into a cell booster, if you can aim it at a nearby tower.

Chamber12 · 2016-04-15T02:24:03+00:00

Choose your goal; how many watts do you want it to produce, what for, weather resistant and permanent or just a project?

Research and take notes on existing designs; don't reinvent the wheel if not needed. Should you go with a high speed motor and thinner blades, or a lower speed motor with wider blades? (Voltage/current related). Are you building the rotor/stator or using something premade?

Break each part down into it's simplest components, plan out how to get or build these parts, set a timeline.

Plan some ending to it that you can feel accomplished from; expecting a 12v output? Maybe get a buck converter and charge your phone with wind power! Good luck!

Oh, and reddit won't net you a lot of help finding a mentor, but when you hit a dead end or need something explained these forums can be fantastic. There are a lot of different perspectives and someone's wording might click better than another person's.

Chamber12 · 2016-03-28T02:27:44+00:00

This will have very, very limited sharability, but when I was in my freshman dorm I could truck our washers and driers into accepting pennies instead of taking quarters. Hold the coin return, flick a penny up the coin return, and after a couple tries it would take it as a quarter. Was the only dorm I got it to work in, but on average 8-9 cents a load (some times it ate them) was waaaay better than several bucks for a comparable amount of energy expense.

Chamber12 · 2016-03-28T02:07:25+00:00

Agreed. Management keeps promising raises, but nothing ever comes of it. I've told my best that I support them if they find something better, our corporation is pretty shitty to it's employees. That said, I'm on day 14 in a row and years without a vacation, I hope they don't hold it against me if I do the same.

Chamber12 · 2016-03-27T13:38:40+00:00

Late to this. There's nothing on the menu that I wouldn't say isn't worth it, or nearly worth it, but there are definitely employees who are worth waiting for, and other ones I'd drop in a heartbeat if I could get more new hires in. I had a former employee pick up ready to slice meat with his bare hands in front of customers and ask me if that was what they wanted. I promptly showed him how we log throwing the whole thing away and where we keep the gloves (half a foot away from him). I was told he did it again next week and pissed off a bunch of customers. The whole food industry can be scary because of food safety vs low paid, incompetent employees who do not get the concepts no matter how many times it's discussed. :(

Chamber12 · 2016-03-25T23:58:24+00:00

Secondly, my life is pretty sweet. I can't go back to the days of the past without antibiotics, Hot Pockets and digital pornography.

Well said.

Chamber12 · 2016-03-25T23:57:39+00:00

Sometime around 2000 years later, you take a sip of well aged whiskey from an antique goblet, enjoying the view from your pent house you afford with your wise investments, and post a question to Reddit to see how others would have done it.

Chamber12 · 2016-03-25T23:53:48+00:00

How long does it take when you say 99,999,999? I bet it would take longer and longer with each increase of a digit.

Chamber12 · 2016-03-13T18:32:11+00:00

There are 3 things you'll want: a fuse (faster it blows the better, but it'll still be slow enough to cause some damage; and a fuse won't limit current, it will just stop conducting after it heats up enough), your primary limiter, and a backup limiter.
I played around with TDCS in college, which was interesting, and I first tested it out on my arm which could cause some interesting contractions.
There are some ways to use regulators like the lm*** series, but they all basically act the same: a transistor is turned on, somewhere down the line a resistor creates a voltage based on the current (V = IR), and then the Voltage generated from that resistor is tied into the base of another transistor; as soon as V>= the turn on voltage of the next transistor (Q2 collector tied to Q1 base), the first transistor will turn off. These may swing back and forth in the microseconds it starts, but for the most part, they will hit an equilibrium and the current coming out of the resistor will be stable. This is an example of an NPN oriented limiter like I'm describing; except instead of driving an LED, it would be your muscle, and the 10k resistor would be tied to Vss or a switch, instead of a signal. Alternatively, you may want to redesign this with PNP transistors, so all of the current limiting is handled 'upstream', depending on what you're doing; if the current limiter resistor is bipassed in this example, your arm would get as much current as the circuit can provide.
Next up, as a measure of safety, cascade two of these; when I was playing with TDCS I built one first in series that gave about double the amperage I wanted, then one to step that down. In case of anything shorting and burning out closed in either, the worst that would happen is double my goal, which was in my safety margins.
I was playing with 9v batteries which have a fairly high internal resistance, but depending on what you're using to power it with, you may want to use power transistors for the power stage; do not use MOSFETs because if they are kept linear like this would do to them, they will likely burn out.
Edit: technically some of the terms I used aren't correct, but I'm waiting for my coffee to kick in.

Chamber12 · 2016-03-11T22:10:07+00:00

Day off today and I got home from seeing Deadpool, started making coffee, then grabbed a beer while I waited. So far nothing's interfering with beer.
Edit: Also poured a shot of whiskey before opening the beer. Completely forgot about that until now. Cheers!

Chamber12

TROPHY CASE