What I did today -instead- of Rocketry.

[boatgeek]

They would have to be pretty cruddy to get me back up on my 2 story roof. I washed mine after they had been up for three years, they were pretty dusty. Never saw where that it improved their production. The wet tile was a challenge! Not going back up there unless we get a mud storm....
We did have one panel fail back in 2020. Our solar company that installed them monitors our system, they noticed it before I did, called us and scheduled a replacement. All covered under warranty.
Pull the trigger teepot, you won't regret it. Back when we bought our system (2016) we refinanced our home, got a good rate and paid the mortgage back down to the previous balance in about 2 years. The refinance dropped out interest rate by a few points, which was WAY below what you can get now. Even a 9.9% loan is ok if you pay it off early, that's how you can reduce the interest rate. You will probably be saving that $511 on your electric bill anyway.

I can wash them (carefully) every other year on our one story roof. In not very long it’s going to be a hired out job.

 

[OverTheTop]

I put a 10kW system on our house back in 2019. We currently pay $0.33/kWh for electricity, and get $0.092 per kWh feed-in rate when we are generating. They are really pulling back on the feed-in tariffs here, with some companies down below $0.03. We got some zero bills last year, when the feed-in was at 12.2cents, but no zero bills this year yet.

For the new house I am looking at a 15kW system which was quoted at around $26k.

 

[jqavins]

Our annual bill is $7200, $600x12. $7200 x.85=$6120. Maintenance is a good question. Hadn't thought of that. As you said why deplete our investments. It's a 25 year loan. I'm sure we will pay it off a lot sooner than that. 9.9% interest and no fees. I know that's high but a 4.9% rate means we would pay $13000 in fees. Monthly payment would be $511 for the loan. I expect we will pay it off in 5 or 6 years and that's after we refinance it when the loan rates go down.

Today I did next to nothing. Looked at the computer. Made dinner. Watched Jeopardy. Computer. Cat boxes. Computer.

So, if 80% is the figure (but it seems likely to be better) you would still be paying $120 to the utility, plus the $511 on the loan, makes $631, or $31/month more than you're paying now. Which is not so bad for a while, then in five or six years you're paying $480/month less than you are now.

Now, if you reduce the utility bill by the whole $511 so that it's a break even until the loan is paid, that's about 85%, which some are saying is not unreasonable. But let's stick with 80% for the moment.

Six years at $511/month means you're paying a total of $36,792. But didn't you say the cost would be $51,100? I guess that's 100 month financing, so the rest is what you save by paying off early?

Fine. Total cost of $36,792 and the utility bill goes down $480, that gives a 77 month payoff. I could break it down by before and after payoff, but I think it should end up the same.

What does being negative for six and a half years mean to you in order to to save big thereafter and reduce your overall pollution footprint from day one.

If I were you, I'd do it.

 

[Charles_McG]

Turned these


into these.

 

[boatgeek]

Barge launch yesterday, followed by a test today to measure the weight and longitudinal CG. Video to follow when better stuff is available from the yard.







This was basically all new structural design inside a pre-existing hull shape. In about two weeks, she will start up a regular run from Seattle to Honolulu and back every two weeks. Because of the nature of cargo to Hawaii, most construction materials going to Hawaii (including material used to rebuild Maui) go on this barge or her two mostly sister ships.

 

[Cape Byron]

Bought a lottery ticket. I have plans…

 

[tsmith1315]

Had a wonderful afternoon listening to old friends play music with my brother. It's been a very long time since I was able to do that.

 

[OverTheTop]

Busy weekend. Re-keyed a lock that didn't match the rest of the locks in the current house. I am a bit OCD about keeping keys to a minimum. Took about three hours, including drilling and tapping M2 threads to pull out some plugs.

Videoed the walls and ceilings of the new house so I have a record of what is in the walls and ceilings before plaster goes on (scheduled for 11MAR). Also put up a new WiFi camera out the front there, and got it connected to my network.

Spent quite a few hours fixing a sprinkler valve that wasn't working. Still working on getting it going. Tracing wires from garage, to house, to valve. Opened the sprinkler valve box to find it full of dirt. Dug it out with the shopvac. Need to get back to that in the next day or so. Still trying to get to the fourth valve...

Repaired the sway bar links on my daughters 2008 Honda CRV.

We (daughter and I) recently replaced both O2 sensors on that car. It was still showing fault codes for the after-cat sensor . It was easy to get to the plug whilst doing the links, so I removed the plug and sensor and had a look. After a bit of digging through the service manual, the part I was sold (eBay) had both pairs (sensor and heater) swapped, and also connected to the wrong pins on the 6-pin connector. Neither part was in circuit at all . After a bit of disassembly I got the pins in their correct location, the plug reassembled, the sensor back in the car, and the Check Engine light is gone (after clearing it with the scan tool). It really shouldn't have been that hard.

Today I had a set of lock pins and key blanks arrive, for when I need to re-key the new house eventually.

 

[teepot]

Bought a lottery ticket. I have plans…

View attachment 633823

There is a book I have that is about moving of the first SR-71 from Palmdale to Groom Lake. Pahrump is in the book. It's a very interesting book. The truck and trailer used both lanes and then some. Just like the picture above. The book has a lot of pictures.

Other than sit at the computer. I washed the car. Fixed a lamp. Swapped 4 overhead lights with brighter LED floods in the kitchen. Changed two lights in the guest bathroom. Made dinner and watched Jeopardy. Then back to the computer. I saw a video of people stealing cars that have keyless entry. They bring a blank key fob and a device that plugs into the OBD port. To get into the car a guy walks up near the house and holds up a collapsible antenna. The antenna picks up the signal from the fob and relays it the car. The car thinks the fob is close and they open the door. Program the blank fob and are gone in 2 minutes or less. I watched several. Amazing.

 

[jqavins]

We (daughter and I) recently replaced both O2 sensors on that car. It was still showing fault codes for the after-cat sensor . It was easy to get to the plug whilst doing the links, so I removed the plug and sensor and had a look. After a bit of digging through the service manual, the part I was sold (eBay) had both pairs (sensor and heater) swapped, and also connected to the wrong pins on the 6-pin connector. Neither part was in circuit at all .

Possibly a good thing. If the sensor had been in the heater circuit, who knows how that would have turned out.

 

[CalebJ]

Spent a good portion of Saturday/Sunday swapping out the timing belt on the new to me 2010 Honda Crosstour. No major hiccups, but my 600ft-lb impact wrench couldn't break the harmonic balancer bolt loose. Eventually got through that and the myriad bolts with tight clearance and had it back together last night. Now I need a day or so for my body to forgive me. Car projects didn't use to hurt this much!

 

[Cl(VII)]

Spent a good portion of Saturday/Sunday swapping out the timing belt on the new to me 2010 Honda Crosstour. No major hiccups, but my 600ft-lb impact wrench couldn't break the harmonic balancer bolt loose. Eventually got through that and the myriad bolts with tight clearance and had it back together last night. Now I need a day or so for my body to forgive me. Car projects didn't use to hurt this much!

Nothing use to hurt this much! I don't know about you, but I am long out of warranty, and I can tell.

 

[Antares JS]

Solved a 6x6 rubik's cube. I also bought a 7x7. I'll try it tomorrow.

 

[bjphoenix]

Spent quite a few hours fixing a sprinkler valve that wasn't working. Still working on getting it going. Tracing wires from garage, to house, to valve. Opened the sprinkler valve box to find it full of dirt. Dug it out with the shopvac. Need to get back to that in the next day or so. Still trying to get to the fourth valve...

I have more problems with sprinklers than I think I should. I've used a multimeter at my timer to see which valves are completing a circuit. If it reads a reasonable resistance then the solenoid is connected, if no connection then there is a wiring problem. At my current house whatever wiring they used is prone to breakages underground so I've had to run new wires to a couple of valves. My sprinkler company has a sounding device that can find the wire to a valve even if there is a break in the circuit. This is the 3rd house I've owned with a crappy head layout so I've had to add a few heads. When we first bought the house we had to replace a valve that leaked all the time. Later I had a broken fitting in a main line and had to dig it up and fix it. And after all that I had a valve that started leaking. Our city has cell signal doppler water meters and they sent me an email that I have a leak. I bought a big package of flags from Home Depot, turned on the system circuit by circuit and marked every head with a flag. I turned off the master valve for a couple of days then turned it back on and after 30 minutes I checked every flag until I found a head that was seeping some water. I had the sprinkler company replace that valve and haven't had any more leaks.

 

[boatgeek]

A (not entirely professional) video of the barge launch got posted. As a bonus, it doesn't include the speeches from the politicians who were invited. You're welcome. The clattering at 1:20 is the latches being released, and the barge goes in a few seconds later. For size reference, the flag on the side of the barge is about 23' high and 14' wide. The overall barge is 438' long. Stay to the end for the bagpipe band and the BSA color guard. Those kids were /cold/--it was 35, windy, and very wet snow earlier in the morning, though the sun came out for the launch.

 

[teepot]

That was Impressive. Liked the pipes too.

A computer repair tech came over to fix our printer. The printer said it was offline. I tried all the recommended fixes. But no joy. It took him about 45 minutes to fix it. Mostly because my wife and I were talking with him. He's been out before. When he was here the first time he sat at the desk and saw the book shelves I built. It's 12' high and 10' wide. Then my wife started talking about books. She recommended a couple. When he came by today we talked about The book he had read. Then more books. He is a very interesting man. He's my age, 68. He worked for Samsung. Ended up as a Vice President. Retired at 52. Takes a cruise every month. This cruise coming up is for 30 days. He manages 200+ web pages. And here he is fixing our printer. Amazing. After the printer was fixed I went to Vegas to pick up a prescription. 50 mils each way. 55 minutes each way. Left the house at 2:13 and was back at 4:13 on the dot. When I got home I started a war with the weeds. Because of the rain the weeds are coming up every where again. I don't want a repeat of last year. I'm going to get them while they are young.

 

[NTP2]

A (not entirely professional) video of the barge launch got posted. As a bonus, it doesn't include the speeches from the politicians who were invited. You're welcome. The clattering at 1:20 is the latches being released, and the barge goes in a few seconds later. For size reference, the flag on the side of the barge is about 23' high and 14' wide. The overall barge is 438' long. Stay to the end for the bagpipe band and the BSA color guard. Those kids were /cold/--it was 35, windy, and very wet snow earlier in the morning, though the sun came out for the launch.

A quick question, how do you get it back? Is someone on board to take it to port or do they have to swim over? Also how often is a ship launched if political people and bands feel the need to show up?

 

[jqavins]

After the printer was fixed I went to Vegas to pick up a prescription. 50 mils each way. 55 minutes each way. Left the house at 2:13 and was back at 4:13 on the dot.

Can't you get those by mail? Or is a controlled substance?

 

[boatgeek]

A quick question, how do you get it back? Is someone on board to take it to port or do they have to swim over? Also how often is a ship launched if political people and bands feel the need to show up?

There’s a dozen or so people on board to catch lines from a tugboat. Nobody needs to swim! They launch 3-5 barges a year, so each one is a pretty big event.

 

[NTP2]

There’s a dozen or so people on board to catch lines from a tugboat. Nobody needs to swim! They launch 3-5 barges a year, so each one is a pretty big event.

That must be quite the ride from the looks of it!

 

[jqavins]

Those launch videos never get old. At least, not for me. I suppose when you see three or four a year in person it might be different?

 

[Greg Furtman]

View attachment 633771

This was basically all new structural design inside a pre-existing hull shape. In about two weeks, she will start up a regular run from Seattle to Honolulu and back every two weeks. Because of the nature of cargo to Hawaii, most construction materials going to Hawaii (including material used to rebuild Maui) go on this barge or her two mostly sister ships.

Do they carry anything on the return trip? If so, what?

 

[boatgeek]

That must be quite the ride from the looks of it!

I do have the opportunity to volunteer for the ride. Sometime I’ll take them up on it.

Those launch videos never get old. At least, not for me. I suppose when you see three or four a year in person it might be different?

I hope never to be so jaded that it loses its charm.

Do they carry anything on the return trip? If so, what?

There’s a little cargo back, but most of it is headed there.

 

[NTP2]

I do have the opportunity to volunteer for the ride. Sometime I’ll take them up on it.

Why not every time! You probably can’t hear the speeches from their

 

[boatgeek]

Why not every time! You probably can’t hear the speeches from their

It involves an early arrival, a late departure, and you still have to hear the speeches, just from 25 feet higher in the air.

 

[jd2cylman]

There’s a little cargo back, but most of it is headed there.

Garbage? Recycling? Surely on Hawaii, options for those waste disposals are limited.

 

[Bravo52]

Went and slipped Shirley's bonds safely to see the melting snow caps. Not much left for the year but there is still some skiing in the area. Got a little choppy in the upper levels of the lowest levels around 10k. But, that didn't stop me from finishing two cups of coffee on the flight. It wasn't quite "clear and a million" but there was a line...

 

[Sandy H.]

A (not entirely professional) video of the barge launch got posted. As a bonus, it doesn't include the speeches from the politicians who were invited. You're welcome. The clattering at 1:20 is the latches being released, and the barge goes in a few seconds later. For size reference, the flag on the side of the barge is about 23' high and 14' wide. The overall barge is 438' long. Stay to the end for the bagpipe band and the BSA color guard. Those kids were /cold/--it was 35, windy, and very wet snow earlier in the morning, though the sun came out for the launch.

Very cool. Thank you for the post. I loved the look of the acceleration and it hitting the water, with the resulting wave. I imagine its very impressive to see something that size and weight accelerating away from you on purpose. I would love to see something similar in person someday.

Sandy.

 

[Antares JS]

Solved a 7x7 Rubik's cube. Took about two hours, with one major session of just fixing mistakes when I messed up an algorithm.

 

[teepot]

Can't you get those by mail? Or is a controlled substance

The med has to be refrigerated. They sometimes melt in the mail box. Or on the way here.