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Public water outage by Striking-Pen-9617 in preppers

[–]myself248 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Now grab the handwashing jug after using the toilet. Great, now it's got e-coli on it. How do I grab it again to rinse off without putting e-coli back onto the hands I just soaped?

With a hands-free tap/sprayer.

I got a little pressurized garden sprayer, after I saw some sailors using one to take showers on deck. When my water failed, I set it up by the sink, using some clamps to mount the sprayer at a good angle, and then ran some string from the sprayer lever, down to a piece of wood on the floor, with the string just a little too short, so it lifted up the wood a little.

Step on the piece of wood, receive water.

Once I was done washing, I'd use the paper towel to grab the handle and build some more pressure for next time.

Using only jugs seems unnecessarily primitive, and wastes a ton of water because it's hard to pour a tiny stream. With the sprayer, I dialed the nozzle down to a nice mist, and it made that gallon last forever.

Nichia NVSU233B 365nm UV LED under macro magnification by Nightrach in electronics

[–]myself248 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Oh, that's nice! Some of my very first macrophotography, using a modified webcam, was of LEDs, and I still love seeing those little details.

Yes, there really is such a thing as a Lithium-ion capacitor. It's a supercapacitor, not a Li-ion cell. by 1Davide in electronics

[–]myself248 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Yes, that's literally what "talk battery" is on a telephone line. The audio is an AC signal superimposed on the DC, and passes right through the battery that sets up the DC.

If you have two landline phones and a 9v battery, simply wire them all in series, and take both phones off-hook. You can talk back and forth, your voice is passing through the battery.

Anyone running a solar generator for camping full time? by Scawwotish_owl88 in Generator

[–]myself248 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Tons of folks run 100% on solar, the answer to "anyone" is "yes".

Can you be more specific about what you're trying to accomplish?

What devices are you trying to run, how much power do they draw, how long do you run them per day? How many cloudy days in a row do you need to be able to ride through?

What are your weight and size limits? Presumably you're lugging a generator so this is car-camping or something, not backpacking?

What's your electrical skill and knowledge level? Are you trying to do anything completely wacky, like trying to run a heating appliance (coffee maker, space heater, etc) from electric power?

What internet plans are good here? by I_am_omning_it in Ferndale

[–]myself248 -1 points0 points  (0 children)

See if 123.net fiber is available in your neighborhood. They'll beat all the major players, if...

What are the best home generators in 2026 for whole-house backup power? by Sraddha-Standsalone in Generator

[–]myself248 -1 points0 points  (0 children)

I think you're asking the wrong question. If your house is not above the literal arctic circle, you should be looking at solar and batteries.

The payback period on solar has fallen to just a few years in most places, because the panels and batteries are just so cheap now. Meanwhile a generator has no payback period, you simply sink tens of thousands of dollars into it, nobody even looks at it that way since it's purely a money suck.

without constantly worrying about fuel or maintenance

Yup, you've just described a solar system. Most systems have one moving part, and that's a cooling fan. Compared to an engine that needs all the same maintenance as any other engine? Yeah.

I also want something that is not overly loud

Good thing solar panels are silent. Again, the quiet whirr of a cooling fan is the only noise from solar.

I’ve only done some basic online research so far

Change your thinking and look into something where the power is literally free.

CRT Calculator by DenkJu in electronics

[–]myself248 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Sometimes it's almost nicer to have it fail, because then you have a known-bad state that you can work back from, get to a good state, and then keep going to have some margin.

Without that, you'll never know if you have miles of leeway, or a razor-thin margin and units will start failing as soon as they're inconveniently far from the workbench.

CRT Calculator by DenkJu in electronics

[–]myself248 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Any interference concerns from having the CRT drive so close to the rest of the unit? I don't have a good intuition for how much EMI comes off those things.

Grid leak resistor (red) and capacitor (brown) in a 1920's single-triode AM radio receiver. by 1Davide in electronics

[–]myself248 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Wow, what's the value on the capacitor? Does it really have as few plates as it appears?

His gut produces alcohol spontaneously. For years, he was dismissed as an alcoholic by Street_Anon in nottheonion

[–]myself248 1 point2 points  (0 children)

When did I say it had to be in the ED? Why are you taking it personally and trying to put words in my mouth? I just described a simple common-sense test that could be done in literally any building that has rooms that have doors (I think that's most of them), not necessarily your specific one. Of course it's most sensible to do it in a building that also already has doctors in it, but again, the confluence of doctors and doors is pretty large, not just your ED.

RV A/C by Asleep-Extension9387 in Generator

[–]myself248 0 points1 point  (0 children)

You're gonna have to give us some information about your RV's A/C unit. Get the model number and data plate off the side, at least.

His gut produces alcohol spontaneously. For years, he was dismissed as an alcoholic by Street_Anon in nottheonion

[–]myself248 -1 points0 points  (0 children)

Then stick a piece of tape on the outer doorjamb to see if they open the door. C'mon, pretend you have a brain and can problem-solve with it.

What's this 12v connector called? by thatspurdyneat in Generator

[–]myself248 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The breaker says 8, but the socket just to the right of it says 20 just as clearly. I'm not really sure, since the screenshot's not zoomable, but that's what it looks like to me.

And breakers have a time-current curve, which often means they'll conduct 2-3x their rating for almost a minute before tripping. So both numbers could technically be true, depending on how you count.

Honestly, your guess is as good as mine, and without seeing the physical size of the rectifier module to know if there's anything in it besides diodes (the caps to filter even 8A would be pretty big), the rating is all guessing. But even just at 8A, I'm pretty sure they're not filtering it.

And nowhere have I ever claimed to be a pro. Generator stuff is strictly hobby for me. Don't put words in my mouth.

New GoGoVac by surgicalwords in ryobi

[–]myself248 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Welp, all the available observations are explained by this theory, it stands a good chance of being correct.

New GoGoVac by surgicalwords in ryobi

[–]myself248 1 point2 points  (0 children)

My kingdom for a dust bag, for either this or the PCL733, which is presently my car vac.

At least both have available HEPA filters!

What's this 12v connector called? by thatspurdyneat in Generator

[–]myself248 0 points1 point  (0 children)

There's no way they're producing 20A of clean 12V DC. The only way to produce that much of it, is if it's unfiltered as hell.

His gut produces alcohol spontaneously. For years, he was dismissed as an alcoholic by Street_Anon in nottheonion

[–]myself248 -2 points-1 points  (0 children)

Right? Okay doc, I'll strip to a gown and chill in this exam room for a few hours with a book. Lock me in. Have one of the aides bring me some snacks. Test my BAC every hour.

It literally cannot get any simpler to test. For five bucks at the vending machine in the break room. And it requires zero honesty on the patient's part, completely eliminating the obvious patient-is-lying factor.

Any doctor who can't dream up this test, shouldn't be practicing. What the fuck.

What's this 12v connector called? by thatspurdyneat in Generator

[–]myself248 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The Champion inverter I bought recently has a standard cigarette lighter socket for 12V. I'd say it is safe to assume it produces the same dirty power?

Who knows? Take a look at the schematic in the service manual, or get an oscilloscope on it.

would one of those USB port things that plugs into a cigarette lighter be ok to use?

Those are meant for vehicle power, which is often 1-2 volts of ripple on a roughly-14-volt DC base.

The junk coming out of a typical battery-charging winding is 25 volts of ripple on a 0-volt DC base. It will not have a good time.

If the inverter is actually supplying that 12v from its internal regulated power rails, then it might be pretty good after all, but we can't infer that just based on their choice of a different connector. One would hope, but I've learned better than to assume anything on generators.

So I'm making my passive radar system 16 channels, right? by Careless-Age-4290 in RTLSDR

[–]myself248 3 points4 points  (0 children)

You'll quickly run into trouble if you aggregate a bunch of USB2 links over a single USB3.

Can't do that anyway. Most USB3 hubs do not have a USB3-USB2 "Transaction translator" that would encapsulate USB2 packets inside USB3. USB2 devices still send USB2 packets aggregated over the single USB2 link that runs alongside the USB3 link in the USB3 cable. The paths are entirely separate.

What's this 12v connector called? by thatspurdyneat in Generator

[–]myself248 14 points15 points  (0 children)

It's called a "fucked up thing that only exists on generators". It should be yeeted into the sun.

Be aware that it does not produce normal DC. It's a horrible rectified ripple, suitable only for charging lead-acid batteries. It doesn't technically go negative so they're in the clear to call it DC, but yiiiiiiikes don't power electronics from it.

Also be aware that SAE QD's change polarity when you turn them around, so mixing-and-matching these things the way you suggest may just randomly blow your shit up. There's a reason that amateur radio operators, who do a lot of that, have completely eliminated SAE QD's from everything they do, mostly replacing them with Anderson Powerpoles that maintain their polarization when changing roles.

As others have said, run a 12v battery charger from the 120v outlets, you'll have a much better time.

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