fri nov 2
A year or so ago, I accidentally killed my entire worm farm when I closed the spigot and the farm filled up with wet worm waste. Every last one of my worms drowned. I smelled a problem when I came downstairs one day, and I remember I poured the whole stinking mass into a trash bucket, topped it off with about 4x of nice, fluffy sawdust, put a lid on it, and said a little prayer for the worms. It stopped stinking, so I forgot all about it, and it gathered dust.
The other day, I was cleaning the shop and I found the bucket. When I opened it up, zero insects flew out, and it smelled pretty good, so I put it in a pile in the garden. Now ….
I have ruined soil by adding too much sawdust, and
I have ruined soil by adding too much compost, too fresh, so ….
You tell me: did I ruin this soil?
Dead or alive? Find out this Spring.
tue nov 6
Originally, I was just going to clean off the bench. Then, while I was at it, I decided to do a little organizing. Next thing you know, I’m re-arranging the whole shop. Long story short: it’s coming out good. Remember last month when I consolidated all my electrical junk, and I speculated that I could put “a box on every stud” without visiting a hardware store? That’s more or less what I’ve been doing. Hey, it’s free, and you can never have too many plugs.
Before I could remodel, I had to move stuff out of the way, and this is some of my seldom-used stuff, out of the way.
While going thru the boxes, I came across an old, broken (but perfectly fresh) fortune cookie ….
So true.
fri nov 23
My web site’s been down for about 2 weeks. Didja notice?
Freed from the grinding drudgery of blogging, I spent the last 2 weeks being busy instead.
I was driving home from the hardware store, kind of day-dreaming as I drove, and I drove past the gas station in Johnson, where the big LED sign was reading:
Unleaded $2.83
And what filtered through to my brain was not ‘gas prices,’ but: “Christmas colors.” Even the gas stations seem to be bracing themselves.
In my shop remodel, I can honestly say that I spent zero dollars on electrical supplies.
Then I decided to put in a sink, and I hoped that I might raid my many boxes of plumbing supplies and spend $near-zero on the project. Sadly, that’s not how it worked out.
I also spent zero dollars on paint.
It is, I’m sure you’ll agree, a shade less ugly than the spray foam insulation.
I am turning into a talented machinist. Not too long ago, if I’d tried to make some of the parts I’ve made lately, I’d have had to make them twice: Once to fuck it up, and once to get it right.
Nowadays, I seem to get it right more than I fuck it up.
Like this piece here, for example.
It’s a stepper-shaft to CFtube adapter, acme threaded for limit switches, and hollowed out to save weight. Very nice, if I do say so myself!
Last time, I spent 6 weeks making a corrugated carbon fiber cone for c3pr’s forearm.
This time, I spent 6 days making this.
At times, I marvel at my own cleverness!
This dicey-looking work-holding solution worked perfectly.
Crooked, poorly-secured cuts make me nervous, and I ‘stood back’ to watch it cut, waiting for a disaster that never happened.
Say what you want. Think what you will. This thing is built like a 40 year old motorcycle.
Mary cleaned out the fridge. Most of this didn’t make the cut.
(Thanksgiving) Dinner is served.
fri nov 30
I made two horrible mistakes this week, working on my robot.
Nothing dangerous. Nothing I couldn’t fix with a careful re-think and a couple extra hours of work. But stupid. Embarrassingly stupid. Just plain dumb. And it makes me want to re-assess whether I’m still as sharp as I like to think I am. So if you ever see a 5 degree angle right next to a 9 degree angle and you ask yourself: “Why didn’t he just use a 14 degree angle?”, it’s because Reid blew it.
We’ve got more heavy, wet snow on the ground than I’ve ever seen at this time of year.
Carbon fiber paddle mount. This is the one I didn’t screw up.
For months, I’ve been showing you individual parts, and you’ve been scratching your head, with no idea how it all fits together.
This is how.
Sorry if this month’s posting is kind of a dud. When my web site went down, I didn’t feel like messing with it. Maybe next month will be better.