4th of July & Meat Slicer update

July 5th, 2009

P1020907.jpgI’ve made some progress stripping the paint off the base of the unit. I got a very aggresive wire brush for my angle grinder from harbor freight (not pictured, and and I can’t find the part on their website; came from a kit #90976) and that seemed to do a great job — though it litterally rips the metal and paint off together. I’m not sure how much “sanding” I’ll have to do get it smooth enough for painting — nor do I have a clue how to paint it yet. My best guess so far is to get some spray epoxy for appliances, though I’m uncertain how the finish will be. Powder coating is another option, but that might be expensive. There’s some more stuff I have to remove to fully strip the paint, but I’m not sure how yet — it’s a bit of a puzzle figuring out the order of parts to remove.

P1020892.jpg

So tonight was the 4th, and I felt as if I was in Iraq. Lots and lots of explosions all over the place. People launching fireworks at each other in the streets. Kinda fun, very dangerous, and pretty stupid. After setting off explosives for the longest time, the cops finally decided to arrest this one guy in my hood. Then 11 cop cars showed up. 11. Not sure what they wanted to do, but they just hung out. They managed to block a bus, whos driver was too stupid to drive around them (not electric one so they could drive on different streets). She’s in the middle of the photo trying to get the cops to move so she wouldn’t have to go around. And she was so rude and unprofessional in how she treated the passengers. It pisses me off how much protection they have with the unions — they know they can’t get fired so they treat everyone like shit.

Electronics , ,

Restoring 1940’s Hobart Meast Slicer

June 29th, 2009

I picked up a 1940s Hobart Meat Slicer from some salvage store in Berkeley for $120 last week. It was a mess so I’m the process of stripping it all the way down and restoring it. Part of the process is to remove rust from various parts, and to that end, I’ve fabricated a rebar based de-rusting electrolysis setup based on information from here. I’m waiting for the washing soda (used as electrolyte) to come in on Thursday, but it looks kinda neat how it’s been setup. I got 6AWG wire, which is overkill (for use up to 50A) but it adds to that industrial look that I like

Electronics, Personal , , , ,

Twitter Updates for 2009-06-25

June 25th, 2009
  • Just saw transformers 2. Worst movie I’ve seen this year. More cheezy romance and an add for the military than anything else. #
  • Trying new duvel green. Not impressed. Seems they want to compete with Stella. http://bit.ly/zTk9T #

Personal

Twitter Updates for 2009-06-24

June 24th, 2009

Twitter Updates for 2009-06-23

June 23rd, 2009

Personal

Twitter Updates for 2009-06-21

June 21st, 2009
  • 4 hours sleep, Kitesurfed, business meeting, Supenkoochenz, boot of beer. Must sleep. #

Personal

Twitter Updates for 2009-06-19

June 19th, 2009
  • pcbfabexpress does not know how to do any sort of assembly. wasted 2 hours before i realized they mounted the light sensors backwards. #

Personal

Random Comments

June 8th, 2009

So I’ve not posted in awhile, and I’m not going to try to play catch-up, but I’ll apprise whoever is reading this of some stuff that’s on my mind. First off, why do people fear using real tools to get a job done. Like what’s the point of a little duster when you can use a leaf blower. Cleaned out my computer case in 2 seconds and didn’t destroy the ozone or cause pollution.

Quick note that I have a talk at the Body Sensor Network conference last week. It went really well, and I met some cool people.

I’m going to be putting together some demos and new material in regards to my research shortly. I’m going to be creating a fork of the development effort to look into potential spin-off possibilities. I’m getting a license from the university for my code, and part of my royaltee payments will go back to me — funny how that works. I also migrated to Altium Designer, and now, Cadsoft Eagle looks like microsoft Paint. Bought year’s license for $130 given that I’m a student, normal price is $14,000. And I hate to say it, but after using it for some time, I think that’s a reasonable price given what it offers. The lab is coming together, and I hope to have a dedicated office space in the next 6 months. Anyhow, stay tuned for some updates.

Reza

HealthMonitor, Personal

Twitter Updates for 2009-04-14

April 14th, 2009
  • arg; must motivate to take dog out and go to campus. why can’t i be independently wealthy? #

Personal

Twitter Updates for 2009-04-11

April 11th, 2009

Personal