My Dream Bicycle Commute Captured with a Helmet Camera
Having done this same bicycle commute to work for 25 years and enjoying every mile, I decided to record and share. I made the recording starting out at 6:30am on November 11, 2019. You might want to get on a stationary bicycle and ride along with me!
Be warned that it is a 30 min long, but you can watch at 2x speed and not lose much. During the audio track I talk about speeding it up, but decided not to do it because some viewers might want to ride along on their stationary bicycle for a 30 minute work out. Please don't attempt to watch on your cell phone while riding a real bike! ... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vob0yEurDeY
I demonstrate an easy to build pinewood derby track that features mechanisms to release the cars and to designate the winning car. I only purchased a 1/4 inch sheet of plywood and used scrap wood for the rest. I looked and couldn't find anything similar so a am sharing my original design with the Boy Scout community. I had 3 boys in Boy Scouts so I built many cars over the years, but this is only my second track. Much more interesting than building cars:)
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xIO0C0_3CBs
Our dryer vent is right next to our patio table which was spewing lint on the table and chairs. I solved the problem by building a simple box with a low cost fiberglass air filter.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WzxREv-NkAw
We used 4000K ballast bypass LED tube. Bypass tubes allow you to remove the bypass and save energy, but they do require rewiring. Fortunately, the wiring is very simple compared to wiring up a fluorescent bulb. Here are the tubes I used. They use 18 Watts which is less than one half the power of the old Fluorescent tubes which were 40 Watts. Also, no ballast or tubes with toxic chemicals. These particular tubes are frosted glass, but they are available from other manufactures in clear as well as plastic. At this time they are only $4.35 each in packs of 20. The 4000K gives you a nice warm light. If you want a whiter "outdoor" light, you might want to do with 5000K. The T8 just means they are 0.8 inches in diameter which is pretty standard for LED tubes.
https://amzn.to/3Uvv6Rd
Push in Wire Connector
https://amzn.to/3UskPpc
Wire Stripper that I really like:
https://amzn.to/3JMyORG
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R5XKlws3WNU
Ed is 90 years old in this video, but can recall WWII like it was yesterday with amazing details.
Update: My beloved Uncle Ed passed away peacefully just before Christmas and his 95th birthday in 2019. He never forgot his WWII memories. In 2019 this diary was found:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B08KJ553MJ/
https://www.draeger-langendorf.com/obituaries/edward-kaprelian/
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DOGkG-jt2Ow
Replacing a kitchen faucet can be a very difficult task because the basin gets in the way and access is difficult. Typically, the hardware is rusted and very had to unscrew. I seem to need to do it every 6 years or so because these "Lifetime" faucets are junk and barely make it to 6 years despite costing about $200. After doing it about 5 times now I finally discovered a good way of doing it. The faucet I had the time before last I actually gave up on and one of my son's flexible body builder friends went under the sink and just snapped it off with a wrench. The problem typically is because the metal seizes or corrodes due to cheap materials and bad designs. This is a Kohler facet which is what they sell at Costco, but I assume other designs have the same 4-inch threaded pass-thru.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8-lGWRE2g_0
Best to stay inside and avoid people, but if you do need to go outside you need the best mask you can get! Besides not being readily available to consumers, the N95 mask is not all that good of a design. They are not comfortable to wear for long periods of time and medical professionals typically burn through dozens a day. it is very hard to get a good air tight seal with an N95 and they don't protect your eyes. I wanted a filter with a large surface area that would last along time. It had to have a good seal and be comfortable. I ended up combining a standard snorkel mask and Hepa filter. With a stoke of luck I was able to easily combine the 2 off the shelf parts together within minutes. This is the mask you want to be wearing if someone with Covin19 sneezes in your face and not a cloth mask or even an N95. This filter is rated at 99.5% for particles down to 0.3 microns and has a huge surface area so it will last a very long time and is easy to breath through. (an N95 mask is only 95% so this mask lets in 0.5% instead of 5% and is, therefore, 10x better). This mask also protects your eyes. Unfortunately, it is not compatible with prescription glasses, but my earlier version is.
My newest version adds a microphone so you can be heard while wearing.
https://youtu.be/gpuzoHv17eU
materials:
Mask $35
https://amzn.to/2WVmIN4
Filter $7 (because so many are doing this supplies are now running low, please let me know when they are out of stock and I will attempt to find other sources)
https://amzn.to/2SYHSc8
https://amzn.to/3kDKk3u
PVC coupler ( This is the only one I could find on Amazon. Much cheaper at Home Depot)
https://amzn.to/2RREKOF
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wWQxapflZoA
I was frustrated finding an AC unit to meet our needs so I came up with a new type that I am very happy with and want to share my idea.
Basically, it is a "portable" outdoor air conditioner made from a Window Unit. Existing portable AC units are housed indoors and blow hot air out a plastic hose. This creates excess noise and heat indoors as well as taking up living space. My unit is outside and blows cold air into the house. The noise level is very low in the house as the duct has a bend in it which I lined it with sound absorbing foam.
The AC unit is a 10,000 BTU 110v LG model from Home Depot. This window AC unit comes with a remote control which in general would be a waste to me, but it was absolutely required for this unique application.
I used conventional construction of 2x4 lumber, OBS and Hardi siding to weatherize the unit. This is not shown in this early video, but I feature in a part 2 video.
Most of the DIY AC units on Youtube consist of ice in a chest which have problems on many levels. No reason for an insulated chest as the idea is to melt ice to cool the room and the insulation just slows down that process. If you make the ice in your own frig that only heats up the house. If you buy the ice you will pay about $1 a pound and there is only 200 BTU of energy in a pound of ice. My unit puts out 10,000 BTU for only about 20 cents in electricity (mine is free as I have a solar system that has fully paid off after 6 years). My unit would still be 250 times cheaper than using ice if I had to purchase electricity at market rates.
Other way to look at the problem with using ice is to realize that a 1 ton AC unit is defined as 12,000 BTU/hr (so my unit is about 0.8 tons). What the industry defines as 1 ton comes from how much ice it would take to give equivalent cooling! Yes, it would take 1600 pounds of ice to match my unit in performance.
The best alternative is probably a split system, but I didn't have a good way to install and they require more technical knowledge to install because you need to deal with a vacuum pump and Freon. Mine unit only requires basic woodworking skills. The duct that come from my unit is all out of wood so there is no sheet metal to cut or form. The window AC units are mass produced and highly refined and optimized.
Even if you didn't build the enclosure yourself, but hired a carpenter this unit might still pay off because carpenters are easier to hire than AC technicians when it is really hot.
A commercial version would just be a simple metal box with a hose coming out that would plug into a plastic duct that would fit in a window opening or a hole in your house wall. I have written several manufactures and no one so far is interested. I wrote LG first and got a letter back saying they don
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q8aR52DqFWc