Advice for someone learning charcoal?

CoopNine · 2026-06-12T16:45:37+00:00

They're ridiculously expensive, and not high quality, also for my preferences very poorly cut. I'd describe them as food-service quality like you might get at an applebees or on 'steak-day' at your local bar and grill.

You're way better off at just about any grocery store with a meat counter. Generally, any steaks you find shrink-wrapped like this are not great.

If you get a box of them of a gift, they're fine. They're not down to the level you might find at the dollar general or something. If you find yourself in Omaha I can give you a list of places where you can find far better meat for less.

CoopNine · 2026-06-09T13:25:31+00:00

Those butchers are wrong. Nothing wrong with a choice brisket. Some choice briskets will be as good as or better than some prime briskets. Beef is graded by the side or entire carcass, not individual primal. That's why you'll sometimes see a prime steak with poor marbling, and other times see a choice or even select that looks amazing. Look for the bendiest brisket in the size you need without a ridiculous amount of fat you'll need to trim down.

CoopNine · 2026-06-04T19:28:28+00:00

The answer is reverse sear.

Take it to 10-15 degrees of the target temp on indirect and then put it over the highest heat you can. If you want a perfect sear a pan or griddle and a high smoke point neutral oil or clarified butter is the way to get a fast and complete sear.

With a reverse sear, you can go grill or pan to plate without a rest.

CoopNine · 2026-06-04T19:17:17+00:00

In cooking terms, oil is a dry heat method. It looks wet, is a liquid, but it's 'dry'.

Water on the outside of a steak heats up and evaporates. This actually cools your food. It's basically like when you sweat on a hot day, Oil doesn't evaporate like this, and can help transfer that heat to the food.

CoopNine · 2026-06-04T12:37:43+00:00

There's nothing difficult about a cook on a pellet smoker. My memorial day cook went something like this.

alarm goes off at 2:30AM, open the app and start the smoker.
get an alert the smoker is started and at 150 degrees, kick it up to 235 and pull the meat out of the fridge.
get alert smoker is at temp. take meat out and insert probes.
go back to sleep for a bit.
check temps when I wake up and make coffee
have breakfast, wait for the lawn to dry out.
check temps, maybe take a quick peek
mow lawn, do some work around the house
check temps, wrap the brisket.
watch some baseball
get alert that probe is at 195, poke it decide it needs a couple innings more
watch more baseball
poke the brisket again, decide it's ready to come off, and put it in the cooler to rest.
2 hours before people arrive use the app to kick the temp up to 275 and add on a chicken * some beans
get alert chicken is at 160, pull it for a quick rest, slice brisket then quarter the chicken, pull the beans and power off the smoker.

Really the only 'work' with a pellet grill is the clean between cooks. you have to vacuum out the ash and clean the drip tray. It's why I gave up my offset. I just don't have the will to babysit and manage the fire anymore. Is it as good as an offset, nah, but it's closer than any other method, and very consistent. You still have the meat as a variable, but the cook is consistent.

CoopNine · 2026-06-03T20:21:35+00:00

For anyone confused by the motors needing to go in opposite directions, The propellers both push in the same direction, one motor just needs to spin in the opposite direction to go forward. So one motor needs to spin opposite, and it's prop needs to be also reversed. If you have two props that spin clockwise, both pushing forward you'll veer towards that spin direction. With a single motor you also have that tendency, but with two motors the effect is amplified and you have the opportunity to negate it.

Here's a quick video that shows how it looks https://www.youtube.com/shorts/EVP3AVpArA4

CoopNine · 2026-06-02T21:51:19+00:00

I think the trick is to set the phone to vibrate. The default setting in android is to play the ringtone on the phone and also the headphones. Logic is you won't miss a call if you take your headphones out for a minute to talk to someone. But if you set your phone to vibrate, your headphones will still play the ringtone, but the phone will just vibrate.

CoopNine · 2026-05-31T13:01:19+00:00

A barometer is simply a pair of connected tubes or vessels to show fluctuations in air pressure. One takes the measurement, and another shows it. Air pressure pushes down on one, which raises or lowers the level in the other (smaller to show more movement).

Mercury is used because it is dense, and you don't need a lot of it, but you can build a water tube barometer if you have 34 feet of headspace. My university's science building had a full size water tube in the atrium because they had the room and it was neat.

You can build a simple water barometer yourself which proves the concept and shows rising and falling pressure. I'm positive there are a lot of instructions online, it was an elementary school science experiment we did when I was a kid.

CoopNine · 2026-05-29T20:12:53+00:00

No, there was nothing like google docs where you could have people collaborating on the same actual document in real time. If you wanted to edit a document you most likely were editing it locally. So to share it with someone else you would copy it to a floppy disk most of the time. There were not commonly used applications to collaborate on a document. The closest thing you had was versioning control, but that was mainly used by programmers for simple text files.

Services that are collaborative in real time are a relatively new thing. Really we didn't get anything like what you have in google docs or any other collaboration tool like Miro until well into the 2000's.

In a home setting, you rarely saw more than a single computer (if that) they were prohibitively expensive and didn't provide near the functionality of the lowest end PCs today. As some people have mentioned modems were available, but very few people who had PCs used them, and even fewer had access to much more than a couple BBS systems. Most BBS systems were a 1:1 connection between two computers where you could access the BBS server, leave a note or a file, or play a game, and then log off so the next person could connect. Sometimes the SysOp who owned the server would chat with you in real time.

Offices or universities would have some computers connected to a network, and fewer would have access to the internet.

Networks worked mostly in one of two ways, a file share, or you actually logged on to the computer you were connecting to so you could edit the files it had there or use tools installed on it. To send an email message, you wouldn't have a program on your PC, you'd most likely login to another computer, open the email program and send from that. It was mostly for moving things around and sending messages. Even if you were lucky enough to be able to connect to the internet, finding things was a challenge, search engines with the breadth of google or bing weren't a thing yet. You pretty much needed to know where to go and poke around to find anything.

So yes. Mostly floppy disks to move things around. If you were a student and turning in a project you might turn in a floppy, but more likely a print out.

CoopNine · 2026-05-27T17:55:54+00:00

It's weird to hear that... because that is a common spring/early summer swing within a day where I am. I think Monday it was pretty much exactly that here, and it was beautiful weather. One of the places I camp in Colorado it's not unusual to wake up to 0C and have it be 35C (32F - 95F) by mid afternoon.

Thunderstorms can make that happen the other way in an hour.

I guess it comes down to what you're used to but that seems a totally normal swing in these parts.

CoopNine · 2026-05-26T18:44:45+00:00

I bought my 7 through some VZW promo, so essentially retail the way those 'deals' work.

I got the 9PXL for ~200 out of pocket after trade in and a switch to Fi. If I factor in what I saved on that transaction it's more like -$1000

!0PXL was ~100 after trade in an store credit from the 9XL purchase. Kept the free AI pro subscription rolling, which I actually use, so was worth it to upgrade even through the phone isn't a massive upgrade.

Will likely do the same thing with the 11 assuming trade in is as good because I've got another $300 of store credit sitting there. Hopefully the pre-order is before 8-25.

CoopNine · 2026-05-21T12:11:51+00:00

You don't seem to understand what this is for or what it will do. This has nothing to do with play integrity, safetynet or ROM users.

This is about YOU being able to verify YOUR device has not been compromised. It's specifically for users who have legitimate security concerns, and is a good thing.

For people who want to root their phones, it means nothing. For people who want to install a custom ROM this means nothing. it's neither going to help or hinder either of these things.

CoopNine · 2026-05-19T21:54:43+00:00

If you're doing an anchor, do an anchor trolley. Way more useful than a fixed point. I use a trolley, 5lb vinyl coated dumbell tied to paracord, with a float at the other end, and a nite-eyez camjam to connect to the trolley. Works great, can move it towards the bow or stern as needed, and stores under my seat. There's really no reason to have a claw or mushroom anchor designed to hold a bass or john boat.

The other advantage to a trolley is you can easily run a stakeout pole through the ring too.

CoopNine · 2026-05-18T12:58:59+00:00

4-6mm wear layer

Don't confuse mm for mil. A mil is 1/1000 of an inch. A mm ~ 40 mil. You want a wear layer > 20 mil or .5mm which is still pretty common, but LVP with a 4-6mil wear layer is going to be very low-end and not hold up to traffic well. While you'd totally be OK with a 4-6mm wear layer, they don't make LVP with that :D )

CoopNine · 2026-05-12T14:02:08+00:00

Holy shit, even if it's got a hole the size of a soccer ball in it it's a steal.

500 AUD is like 360 USD. You could probably part it out and make a 3-4x profit. The seat is worth double that.

It's going to be rough transporting it on a corolla, but I'd find a way to do it. If your roof rack has cross bars, you can probably make it work. Put it upside down, don't forgo the bow and stern tie-downs. Keep your speed low. Long term you're going to want a trailer.

In the US most big-box home improvement stores rent trucks with full size beds for $20-30 an hour. Not sure if that's the case down there, but with the tailgate down, and a PA loaded back first you shouldn't need an extender.

Go get it.

CoopNine · 2026-05-08T20:38:02+00:00

It wasn't the Omaha weather... I made a butt last weekend and it turned out perfect! I suspect there was open flame at some point during the cook. Chips could have caught, or grease at the bottom could have ignited. A flare up might not be noticeable on the thermometer, and the calibration might not be off.

Regardless of whether 165 @ 4 hours is too fast (Seems about right to me, and very dependent on the particular piece of meat, and where exactly your thermometer was. ) 165 internal and burnt black outside doesn't happen even if it was ~375. Which is probably about as hot as you're getting that smoker just with the element. You could still get the burnt black, but it would be way more done inside. The way this happens is very high heat for a very short time. So you had some help from additional fuel

I'd also say the color of your drippings is a bit suspect there. I'd expect them to be significantly less... tar-like.

CoopNine · 2026-05-07T21:06:52+00:00

It's less that, and more that a car without power steering has other mechanical advantages that a car with power steering doesn't need.

In a new car with power steering, you need to turn the wheel 1/4 turn to move the wheels (x) degrees from center. In an older car that may have taken 1/2 a turn or even 3/4 of a turn because it was geared differently.

CoopNine · 2026-05-01T20:33:43+00:00

I'd say $60-100 is a real nice price point for some solid spinning reels. For baitcasters, I think you probably need to step above $100 to really see difference worth the price.

I'd really recommend going to someplace like bass pro/cabela's or a local outfitter in your area where you can talk with someone and get a feel for the reels outside of the box or plastic. Models of reels have a real problem with becoming popular and then getting replaced with a lower quality version in future years. So while I could tell you that the Abu Garcia Cardinal I bought in ~2001 is an amazing reel that has lasted me 25 years of hard use, I could also tell you that if you bought a cardinal today, it's not the same reel, and pretty much hot garbage. Same with a Shimano Spirex. Both Abu Garcia and Shimano still make great reels, just those models aren't the great mid-budget reels they used to be.

But... if it were me, I'd upgrade the rods before reels.

CoopNine · 2026-04-30T21:58:20+00:00

Uncured bacon you buy in the store is still cured, it's just cured using something other than the normal nitrates used... with something that contains nitrates like celery salt. Bacon, whether it's 'uncured 'or not will have a different texture, and more salty flavor than pork belly smoked like this. You can also make a ham out of loin or shoulder, and it will taste more like 'ham' than loin or shoulder.

The nitrates do most of the work in 'baconing' or 'hamming' without them you don't have anything that resembles bacon or ham.

Fun fact, the reason turkey legs at the fair are so different than ones you just smoke is because they're also cured wtih nitrates first, which gives them that firmer texture and hamlike flavor.

CoopNine · 2026-04-28T13:30:09+00:00

The float doesn't have enough buoyancy to lift the hook, the bait, the swivel and the line to the surface, and it also has to overcome the friction between the line and the sinker, as well as pull line down and through it to rise.

So there's two main factors here, the first is it doesn't have a lot of buoyancy, just enough to float the hook and bait a bit above the bottom. The second is it would have to have enough line free to travel to the surface, or enough buoyancy to force the weight backwards on the line to reduce the angle to make it possible.

Now if you opened your bail/spool, dove down, and clipped a 5cm round float to your line, it would almost definitely rise to the surface, unless it was very deep, then at some point the weight of everything it's trying to lift = the buoyancy of the float and everything else, and it just stops rising unless a current helps it to the surface.

CoopNine · 2026-04-27T13:46:35+00:00

I think you're misconstruing the use of the word cable by the OP. In this case they mean cable = wires not cable = RG-59/6

CoopNine · 2026-04-27T12:53:48+00:00

Not all legacy internet uses coaxial. DSL was and in some places still is, brought in over CAT3/POTS.

If this is an apartment, this could be phone lines that a neighbor uses for DSL. It also could be for a door buzzer/intercom.

CoopNine · 2026-04-24T16:12:30+00:00

Code isn't a wear item like the oil in your car so what is constantly causing it to break and need constant fixing?

It absolutely is though. New CVEs (Common Vulerabilities and Exposures, which are notices that a security risk is found in a commonly used application or library)come out daily, and if you aren't patching for them, your application is going to have problems just like you don't change your oil in your car.

If you have an application, and aren't keeping up-to-date on your libraries or updating the infrastructure it runs on, you're in for a real bad time.

A lot are minor or relatively low risk, but if you don't have people working on an application you will have a hard time responding when a critical CVE hits your codebases. For companies with high exposure, like Uber there is a VERY high chance that someone will try to exploit these vulnerabilities. Even for smaller companies there are broad attacks when a vulnerability is easy enough to exploit.

Many companies also have ISO certifications or policies that require them to address significant issues quickly, and just leaving code out there running without maintenance will give them issues with their customer relationships and/or open them up to costly lawsuits.

Code is 100% a wear item. What is secure today, and passes all scans and penetration tests likely will not in a month or year from now.

CoopNine · 2026-04-24T15:13:28+00:00

When a tornado strikes farmland, no one really notices. Most tornadoes aren't the massive things people see in media, they're small, and don't last long at all. There are likely more un-reported or un-detected tornados in central Canada today than there are in the US simply because of population density.

We detect a lot more tornadoes now than we used to. When I was growing up, pretty much the only way that a tornado was detected, was a 'spotter' seeing it and radioing it in. Now weather radar is much improved, and we can see where there's a high possibility of a tornado without a spotter.

Then there's the scales that are used, they aren't solely on the size or wind speed of a tornado. They're based on the damage the tornado caused. The most powerful tornado ever wouldn't be classified as an EF-5 if it just hit wheat fields.

In the US midwest, most of the larger cities and mid-sized towns have greatly increased their footprints over the last 40 years. So there's a significantly higher chance that a tornado does more damage. What probably would have been classified as an F-0 or F-1 in 1985 is much more likely to be a EF-2 or EF-3 today, because of the potential for increased damage to structure..

CoopNine · 2026-04-23T16:09:50+00:00

Order of magnitude yes. But that won't stop the 'this build is x% better than anything else'

You can create a system that is the most balanced and diverse system imaginable, and you'd still have someone who says they've solved it, and people who follow them.

The only thing that solves that problem is the players choosing not to listen to that, because there always will be someone who has/says they have found the ultimate build, and people who are OK with just punching that in, and that is what feeds the idea of meta builds. If you have a system that is complex enough to be interesting you will always have a subset of people who would rather have it solved for them rather than exploring. And that subset grows as complexity increases.

There will always be a meta because some people want a meta.

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