What I did today -instead- of Rocketry.

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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?
OK, here's the professionally produced one. There's a few bits from the politicians, but they mostly got clipped out. Some of that was probably because one of the candidates was about 50:50 calling the yard Gunderson (correct) and Gustafson (not correct). 😬 You can get a better idea of the scale of the cargo area by seeing the people walking around on deck.

 
OK, here's the professionally produced one. There's a few bits from the politicians, but they mostly got clipped out. Some of that was probably because one of the candidates was about 50:50 calling the yard Gunderson (correct) and Gustafson (not correct). 😬 You can get a better idea of the scale of the cargo area by seeing the people walking around on deck.


What moves the barge between Seattle and Hawaii?
 
I finished a reproduction of the instruction sheet that is glued to the inside door of a Western Railroad Supply Company
Model 222 railroad crossing bell. The first 2 images was all I had to go by and the drawing is the finished product. The "W"
gave me the most problems as I had to "wing" it

square wrrs bell.jpegburnt square.jpgalmost done burnt drawing .jpg


location.jpg
 
It'll be towed behind a ~120', 5200 HP tug that's also our design. Incidentally, between the two it's one of the most efficient tug/barge combinations in the world. It's transport efficiency (ton-miles/gallon of fuel) is 3+ times that of rail.
And one should bear in mind that rail is amazingly good.* Three times that is just astonishing!

* Usually. Rail between Seattle and Hawaii is not so good.
 
It'll be towed behind a ~120', 5200 HP tug that's also our design. Incidentally, between the two it's one of the most efficient tug/barge combinations in the world. Its transport efficiency (ton-miles/gallon of fuel) is 3+ times that of rail.
Wow 3 times!! You get an award for that?!

Ps what is the most efficient?!
 
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Bought some bits and bobs to fix up that old glow plane I bought. The fuel is a bit low of a concentration for me, but it’s what they had that had a high enough oil content. Hopefully the igniter will show up, and the backup glow plug might too.
Should run either way.
 
SO.... it's been cold and no need for the AC. but just the past few days were warm... and we had the family over last saturday.. well with all the people, warm weather and us cooking.. the house was hot.. so put on the AC.

so i'm baking now as is everyone else.., take me handy-dandy temperature gun and point it at the vent.. 73 degrees..

well it's lookin' like a new AC unit. GRRRRRRRR!!! 10 years old and the outside unit needed basically everything, a switch, the coil, reverse pump valve, AND the condenser. :eek:

DARNIT!

ron-
 
And one should bear in mind that rail is amazingly good.* Three times that is just astonishing!

* Usually. Rail between Seattle and Hawaii is not so good.
Big ships are better, but not much else. It's really hard to beat the efficiency of water transportation.

Funny thing: the same owner runs a rail-on-barge service between Seattle and the tail end of the Alaska Railroad in Whittier. They have trainspotters come by every so often since it's one of the few rail-on-barge lines in the US. Very occasionally, they have stowaways on the barge, who usually find out around Ketchikan that the romance of stowing away is vastly overrated. Then they get dropped off for the USCG to charge them with federal crimes.
Wow 3 times!! You get an award for that?!

Ps what is the most efficient?!
No awards, but we get repeat work* which is more valuable. :D I don't know of any more efficient barges, but it's possible they're out there. Unlikely, but possible.
Do you have picture of the tug?
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* One of the folks in the video says that Gunderson built 26 of the company's 30-odd barges. We designed 24 of those. Hoping to make it 25 soon!
 
No awards, but we get repeat work* which is more valuable. :D I don't know of any more efficient barges, but it's possible they're out there. Unlikely, but possible.
I hereby declare you, TRF’s best boat builder! :p On the subject of more efficient barges I guess you could make a solar powered one, but maybe not for Seattle…
 
Y'know, it just dawned on me that there is another means of transport that has a much better efficiency in terms of tonnage-miles per gallon of fuel: sailing ships.

And they are actually making a partial comeback, for just that reason.

I hereby declare you, TRF’s best boat builder! :p On the subject of more efficient barges I guess you could make a solar powered one, but maybe not for Seattle…
I doubt that would work well. Consider the power needed to move at the required speed, surprisingly low but far from trivial, then figure out the panel area and weight needed to provide that power. Consider the energy needed to continue proceeding at speed overnight (the power above multiplied by the time it's needed), then figure the volume and weight of the batteries. Also, add recharging the batteries into the power demanded from the panels. The panels have to be sized to provide that power in bad weather on winter days. The size and weight added by a big solar array and the batteries will increase the power (day) and energy (night) needs.

I, like many people, have been known to underestimate the capability of solar powered systems in the past, but I'm highly skeptical of this application all the same.
 
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Y'know, it just dawned on me that there is another means of transport that has a much better efficiency in terms of tonnage-miles per gallon of fuel: sailing ships.

And they are actually making a partial comeback, for just that reason.
True but I have to imagine that they can’t compete with a regular ship. Can you source the come back claim?
 
I hereby declare you, TRF’s best boat builder! :p On the subject of more efficient barges I guess you could make a solar powered one, but maybe not for Seattle…
I don't build boats (well, except for the canoe). Best boat designer, maybe? It can be a very specific industry, so I have very little experience with, say, small sailboats. Best tugboat, barge, and fishing boat designer? Quite possibly. :cool: My client on this project asked about putting solar panels on the barge. After looking at available space, I said that it'd be more useful to put the panels on their warehouses in Seattle. The power density of solar panels is low enough that it's really hard to get useful amounts of power on a ship scale.
Y'know, it just dawned on me that there is another means of transport that has a much better efficiency in terms of tonnage-miles per gallon of fuel: sailing ships.

And they are actually making a partial comeback, for just that reason.
At the moment, it's just sail assist, with the sail used sometimes on some routes to allow the ship to reduce power from the main engines.
True but I have to imagine that they can’t compete with a regular ship. Can you source the come back claim?
You start running up against economics and the laws of physics. You can't really make a decent sailing ship that carries anything like the cargo that modern cargo ships are expected to carry. And you also tend to need more crew, even with powered winches trimming the sails. That makes the economics of the ship really difficult, even if you aren't paying for fuel. And all of that ignores the question of whether you can conveniently sail in the direction you want to go. The trade winds are named that for a reason, and they don't necessarily advantage trade on the great circle routes between China and the US or Europe.
Sailing ships achieve finite tonnage-miles using zero fuel. Do the math.
Strictly speaking, any modern sailing ship would use some fuel for generators to power creature comforts, hydraulic power units for sails, etc. Even with efficient systems, it would be really hard to do that off of solar panels without getting in the way of cargo storage.
 
At the moment, it's just sail assist, with the sail used sometimes on some routes to allow the ship to reduce power from the main engines.
I did say partial comeback for a reason. And I didn't say that true, old time sailing ships would be practical. But there's no denying that their tonnage-miles per gallon is (OK, almost) infinite for what little they can carry and you receive really late.

You start running up against economics and the laws of physics.
@NTP2, here we see how engineering is very often about the economics as well as the physics, the cash balance as well as the energy balance, the money as well as the tech. Just something to look forward to in your career.

Strictly speaking, any modern sailing ship would use some fuel for generators to power creature comforts, hydraulic power units for sails, etc.
Indeed. In my head, I segregated the creature comforts, nav and comm equipment, and so on into gallons/day rather than gallons/ton-mile, so left that fuel use out. I should have used the ship's average speed to convert the per time use to per mile use and then included it. (That is, if I had any actual numbers to convert, but I should have conceptually made that shift all the same.) And I totally forgot to include power for motorized winches, which would be a direct per mile use. So the efficiency, by that one measure, not the practicality, would be huge but not infinite. (Even in the old days, you'd have some whale oil on board for lamps, and coal (probably not wood, I would guess) for cooking, heating, the smith's forge, and stuff; so even then it was not truly infinite.)

But enough of this. What I did today instead of rocketry is come to work to earn money for rocketry.
 
@NTP2, here we see how engineering is very often about the economics as well as the physics, the cash balance as well as the energy balance, the money as well as the tech. Just something to look forward to in your career.
That was why I didn’t think that they could compete, at a certain point you start having diminished returns. Like the massive HR cost, I once sailed a small boat only about 20 feet but it took 2 people to sail, one with the rudder (me) and one with the lines (my brother).
 
How small? I've handled a 15 footer alone with the sheet in one hand and the tiller in the other. It's not hard once you get the hang of it.
yours was probably meant for one person this one had lines that made you go to the front every time you needed to tack.

To bring the thread back on topic, my cold is actually a sinus infection, discovered that when in English my head was practically split open, went to the doctor and got some fungus juice (my name for antibiotics).
 
Mine had a jib that you had to go forward to set, but you could mostly set it and forget it until the wind came from the other side. Since you should have the wind crossing your bow, you've got a moment that the main sail is slack and you can move forward just long enough to switch the jib over then get back to the tiller. For optimal performance you'd have wanted two people, but for gently tooling around, even it a pretty good breeze, one person was enough.
 
Following on from the recent broadband problems, a tech was scheduled to attend here Tuesday morning. I got a message on Monday that they had cancelled him so I immediately jumped onto my provider and escalated the situation. We had 122 dropouts over three days and they cancelled the tech :questions: . So the visit was reinstated. The tech turned up first thing in the morning and went straight to the pit across the road. He found corroded connections, and a 3dB attenuator that tested as 6dB. He changed connectors and removed the attenuator. Our broadband connection has been good since, but I have still seen three dropouts :(. Will monitor for a while and get back to them.

I also got a message from them that they want the smart TV box I have had for many years back. Something else they didn't mention when swapping me to a new plan. Not happy, and have told the case manager as much. Signing people up to new plans without explaining details like that is dodgy. I really don't care much for the box anyway, as it takes an inordinate amount of power, even when "off".

Finally dug the sprinkler valves out of the dirt. Three valves, but couldn't remember which did what. I turned each on, using the manual knob on the valves, in turn. First one was front garden beds and driveway. Second one is an unused spare. I was sitting on a toolbox near ground level as the valves are in the ground. Turned on the third valve and a pop-up sprinkler sprung up between my legs and pressure-washed my nether regions :shocked:. Luckily it was a warm day and the shorts I had on took most of the sting out of the water jet. Not doing that again in the near future I can tell you.

In other news the new house is virtually totally bricked after three days :goodjob:. They are one pack of bricks short so will come back in a little while to complete the window sills and three brick columns. Here is a pic from yesterday, but today has all the walls complete.
20240313_081218.jpg
Now waiting on electricians to complete their rough-in, and then plaster (drywall). Apparently drywall is done in a day :eek:.

Yesterday I planned the workshop layout so I can organise a crane to move the mill and lathe to their final locations during the move.

Also, the house next door has just completed frame stage. That will block a bit of light in our existing house. Could be worse though.
20240313_194213.jpg
 
Finally dug the sprinkler valves out of the dirt. Three valves, but couldn't remember which did what. I turned each on, using the manual knob on the valves, in turn. First one was front garden beds and driveway. Second one is an unused spare. I was sitting on a toolbox near ground level as the valves are in the ground. Turned on the third valve and a pop-up sprinkler sprung up between my legs and pressure-washed my nether regions :shocked:.
Buster Keaton lives!
They are one pack of bricks short...
Be nice! They don't sound too dumb to me.
 
The tech turned up first thing in the morning and went straight to the pit across the road. He found corroded connections, and a 3dB attenuator that tested as 6dB. He changed connectors and removed the attenuator.
Many years ago, actually 3 houses ago, we had very bad cable service. We would call to complain and they would say that the signal is weak in our area and when can they schedule a visit to our house. I was thinking if the signal is weak in our area then you need to be fixing that which would not require us to be home and would't require coming into our house. We never could get it fixed and finally they installed fiber in our neighborhood so we switched to that.
I also got a message from them that they want the smart TV box I have had for many years back.
We still have a cable box but in the U.S. I think those things are on the way out. Cable companies are becoming streaming companies so you get your internet service and then you subscribe to the streaming service you want, streamed through your computer, smart TV, roku, firestick or whatever. I recently got a Roku to try.
Turned on the third valve and a pop-up sprinkler sprung up between my legs and pressure-washed my nether regions
Oh a "yard bidet"! Could come in handy under certain circumstances.
 
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The filling is 1.5 lb of frozen blueberries, 1.5 lb of frozen red raspberries, a half cup of sugar, an unmeasured approximate 1 cup of water, boiled for about two hours (that's why I added water). I expected to need to add corn starch at the end, but it reached the jam stage without help, just from the pectin in the blueberry skins.
 
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The filling is 1.5 lb of frozen blueberries, 1.5 lb of frozen red raspberries, a half cup of sugar, an unmeasured approximate 1 cup of water, boiled for about two hours (that's why I added water). I expected to need to add corn starch at the end, but it reached the jam stage without help, just from the pectin in the blueberry skins.
Update: the filling is a little runny, despite gelling as it did. I should have used some corn starch after all, so it would be thickened two ways. Oh well, it's still good.
 
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