Yesterday I was able to capture and archive 11 DV tapes. There are 29 tapes in total. Some are full, some aren't, but in either case capturing the video is tedious as I have to capture in realtime (a 45 minute tape takes 45 minutes to capture). Lucikly, the new computer was powerful enough to also let me archive a slew of old video game CD-ROMs and DVDs, some old software on disc, and an archive of old projects. These, plus some personal tapes were additional archives I decided to create to elimiate the possibility of loosing the data due to tape and disc degradation. Today, I continue to archive. I'm hoping everything will be finished by end of day tomorrow. I'm also going to start researching how to properly insulate the garage doors today, which is the next house project.
Month: August 2020
Some Rest and Some Fun Work
Tonight I begin a 10-day time off stretch. I need the downtime from the craziness of the day job this year. I bunch of rest is in store for me over the next few days but that doesn't mean I'm doing nothing. Tonight I installed an inexpensive Vantec Firewire 400/800 card in the new computer and hauled the old Panasonic PV-GS150 out of retirement so I can re-capture a ton of old footage back onto the computer. The project in question was shot in 2005 and 2006 and, if I recall correctly, was about 12 total hours of footage. I mainly want to recapture so I can make sure that all of the tapes are in a digital format in case they deteriorate, etc.
Buildup to PCB
Now that the Weather Station ISD prototype is breadboarded and working, I've decided to start designing v1.0 of the printed circuit board. The Fritzing drawing, and schematic are complete. These will be used as reference for transferring into Eagle. Weather Station ISD Fritzing drawing.Weather Station ISD Fritzing schematic.Weather Station ISD Fritzing part design (Illustrator). All new work was added to the internal GitLab server with commit SHA fad61e9e.
Slow Day
Was a busy week at work, so I didn't get much done. The only thing creative that was accomplished was in Minecraft. I created a redstone circuit that allows me to turn on and off the iron farm I built a while back. The massive output of that farm was making so I had to tend to it every few days, whether I wanted to play or not. Now, it's off until needed. I've been relaxing all day today, and will likely be doing a bunch of reading to catch up on some magazines. I have five flight magazines, three Raspberry Pi magazines, and another miscellaneous one on the docket (won't read them all today, of course). Added to movie library today: Big Trouble in Little China, Enter the Dragon.
Flower Planter
The planter is finished. This past weekend, I spent a grand total of about 5 hours in the garage cutting, sanding, and assembling. Here's what it started like: The front yard flower planter, in raw-board form. And it evolved into this: It's about 8' 7" long, 12" wide, and 12" tall. Oh, and I think I forgot to show what the drill bit holders look like hanging on the peg board in the garage, so here's a picture of that.
Weather Station ISD
Last year I picked up an electronics kit for building a miniature weather station. I finally built a prototype of it tonight on a breadboard. It's fully functional and I believe I can consider the codebase release v1.0. OLED display showing current date and time.OLED display showing current weather.OLED display showing 3-day weather forecast.ESP8266-12E module.l. to r., DHT11 temperature and humidity sensor, BMP180 pressure sensor, and BH1750FVI light sensor. The next step will be to design a custom PCB for this, which I've never done before. Should be an interesting challenge.
Adding Car Parts
Tonight I cleaned up my desk and workbench area in the studio, and added the four most recent issues worth of parts to the DeLorean. Issue 35 parts.Front passenger's side wheel well.Front driver's side wheel well.Issue 36 parts.Assembled pontoons.Issue 37 parts.Driver's side rear wheel well and pontoon assembly.Passenger's side rear wheel well and pontoon assembly.Issue 38 parts.Transmission cover.Driver's side wire harness.Driver's and passenger's side wire harness.
Aquarium Update
All's right so far in aqua-land.
Overdue DeLorean Update
I've been chipping away every month at building out the model, but have neglected to post on my progress. I felt it was time, as a big box arrived yesterday. More on that later. So far, the entire car's chassis, frame, and engine are complete. Front end. Rear end. Engine close-up So, as you can see, a bunch of work and a lot of parts so far. All of this is the result of the first 34 issues. And, it looks like I'm just at the beginning of the electrical parts. There is a wire harness that connects to the battery compartment (which is mounted under the car in the front), but so far there's nothing to plug the harness into. So, what about this delivery from yesterday? A big mystery box from Eaglemoss. Normal boxes from Eaglemoss are about the size of a sheet of paper and about 4"...
Making and Catching Up
Yesterday I spent three hours cleaning up and organizing in the garage. A lot of the worked centered around putting away all of the spare aquarium supplies and equipment back into their proper places on the shelves. Then, I took the time to finally break down a ton of cardboard boxes and put them into the recycling bin in preparation for next Monday. Because of COVID challenges, Hillsborough county has moved our recycling pickup to every other week for now. That means all cans and plastic containers need to be smashed down flat and all cardboard needs to be cut up to smaller pieces so we get efficient, compact usage of the bin. Anyway, I also put away and re-organized several tools and finally did a big cleanup of the workbench area. One of the little organization things I've been wanting to do is to get my drill bits into...
