Summer!

Basil on the right, tummaters on the left.

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Summer is here (and pretty hot so far)
It's been a warmer than usual summer, although it's not uncommon to hit the 90-degree mark in Michigan a lot. After the warm winter we had, I was hoping we wouldn't then take the higher-than-average temperatures into summertime. But that's how it goes.

We've been busy here doing some fun things - swimming lessons, playing tennis, getting outside for some fresh (and sometimes heavy) air. The kids have a list of chores they're supposed to do each day, including watering flowers and veggies, keeping the gardens weed-free, and keeping the mess in their rooms below DEFCON 5 levels.


Either we're having work done on our kitchen, or we've been hit by a marauding band of cabinet thieves. I should probably ask J about this.


Fun Links
Restoring a Triumph 4-cylinder engine

Robot night lights. Yay, robots!

Be careful you're not too close to the sink when you use this toothbrush/water fountain. You'll get your face wet.

Everything you need in one place.

Elevator: Screw Drive, or Not?

Elevator with Screw Drive

Proof of concept of using a screw-driven elevator. It works, but it may not be the right solution.

The first garage door opener we had at this house had a long threaded rod that turned when the door opener was activated. The door was hooked to the threads and as the rod turned, it moved the door up or down by pulling the connector down the threads. I thought for the elevator I'm working on that I should borrow from that idea. I attached a threaded rod to the shaft of the motor, and glued some nuts to the elevator car. My hope is that using a screw drive will help me avoid something more complicated, like using pulleys and counterweights or some other complex system. And as a bonus, all the parts are easily found at the local hardware store.

I bought some 1/4" rod with 20 threads per inch, and a half-dozen nuts. I put the nuts on the rod first, then glued them to a small piece of wood. I glued a few more nuts to help square up the wood as it moved on the rod - otherwise, it might have twisted sideways and not run smoothly.

The good news is that it works; the motor runs, turns the rod, and the test "car" moves up or down depending on the direction of the motor.

The bad news? Just as the garage door opener produced a horrible amount of vibration when it ran, this setup also produces quite a bit of vibration. Without anchoring the end of the rod to something, it vibrates plenty, which is not good for the motor. And if the rod doesn't line up pretty well with the motor's shaft, it makes the motor work too hard.

I might be able to solve the vibration problem by using a rod with fewer threads per inch. This would allow the motor to run more slowly, and would reduce the vibrations. It's not easy to find threaded rods with (say) 16 TPI at the hardware store, so I might have to see if I can make one. I think I'll have to make the rod's diameter bigger, though, to get that low number of TPI. I have a few dies that have 10 or 12 TPI, but they're 7/16" or 1/2" diameter.

As much as I'd like to go with the screw drive, I am starting to think it's not going to be a practical approach, and I'm going to spend some time looking into pulleys and chain systems.

Speaking of pulleys and chains, this place is fun to look at. They have a huge catalog which also shows how to calculate various setups for chains, pulleys, etc. You can download the catalog as a PDF, but it's pretty big.

Made In Brooklyn
I like these videos by Dustin Cohen about people who make things (jewelry, violins, and watches) in Brooklyn, NY. There are only three right now, but I hope there will be more soon.

Happy Father's Day!

K, after splitting some bumpy cake with his mom


M, full of diner pie.

Happy etc. and so on
If you're a father, Happy Father's Day! If you're not a father, Happy Father's Day anyway.

We went to Henry Ford Museum today to see the Titanic exhibit. It had a lot of stories about the ship, the people, and there were hundreds of artifacts on display. Every time I hear about the Titanic, I'm really glad I wasn't anywhere near it when it went down.

The museum recently remodeled their automotive history section. We didn't see as much of it as we would have liked, but we'll go back soon and see the rest.


He's several years away from driving, but M has already picked out his first car.


I want one of these - not because they are comfortable or easy to pedal, but because I want to ride it somewhere and fold it up while everyone watches.

The on-site diner, which formerly did not serve food, presently serves food. We had cake and diner pie for a snack in the afternoon. We cleaned our plates (J and K split a dessert.) M and I had our own pieces of lemon meringue pie.



What's left of the diner pie.

I love looking at the industrial equipment there - the steam engines that drove the belts that powered the machines, the milling machines, lathes, and so on. This drill press looks like it could drill through anything, but was actually created to make holes in donuts. Before it was retired to the museum, it was used by Hostess to hollow out Twinkies (to create space for the creamy center). The rumors that it was used to drill holes in steel panels used on the Titanic were neither confirmed nor denied by the staff at the museum, mostly because I made up the rumor.


So many uses for this drill press...

Beef: It's What's For Dinner
We came home to an All-American meat meal of steak and steak kebobs, using some grill kebob cookers that J and the boys bought me for Father's Day. Dinner was, as you might expect, beeflicious. (It's a word, look it up.)

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It is my understanding that even though everyone is done with school for the summer, I am still required to return to work on Monday morning, as I do every Monday morning. I'm going to have to look into that. I'm not sure who to ask, though - maybe my congressman?

Everyone have a fun, safe, and father-y Father's Day!

Yes, Someone Does Work Here

Wow - the guy who runs this place has been invisible lately. Maybe some pictures and various news tidbits will help get him back on track.

In the past few weeks, we've been pretty busy - the elementary school's Ice Cream Social, some trips to the pool, M's school tennis match, several floor naps, and a quest into the world of electric motors (torque vs. speed). Here are a few pictures to sum up some of our activities:


K is living the good life at the pool (Not shown: the haircut he got shortly after.)


The boys and their piano teacher, Mrs. Waller, at their annual recital. All of the students did a great job - I'm always impressed.


K pursues the ball at his last soccer game of the season.


M playing tennis for Slauson's Sixth Grade tennis team. He's the top-left player. They played their matches against the other Ann Arbor sixth-grade teams at the U of M tennis facility, which was gorgeous.


Our new Yamaha piano, complete with a lot of music. All of us have been playing lately. It even makes me sound good.



In search of a motor for the elevator project, I decided to go with a configurable gearbox whose speed and torque can be adjusted by adding or removing sets of gears. It was harder to put together than I thought it would be, although my Japanese language skills have improved. (Actually, there are enough English instructions inside that I finally got it working.)

A Few Other Notes
Today we went to the Food Gatherers "Grillin'" picnic. We've been going for quite a few years now, and always enjoy the food and entertainment.

The kids and J have one more week of school and work, respectively. My work continues and continues without end, regardless of season, so I hope the three of them appreciate their time to do some new things, and will allow me to live vicariously through them.

Disappearances

The Great Disappearing Blue Spruce

This tree recently disappeared

M was partly responsible for the disappearance of the tree

A lonely stump, which was removed later in the day. There wasn't much to the roots.

A tree tipped over last fall, as previously reported here, and it has been staked up ever since. We knew the time was coming when we would have to take it down, especially since we figured it had the same poor root structure as the other one that came down.

This morning, M and I finally cut it down and sliced and diced it. There are still some branches needing to be cut smaller, but the trunk and the roots are already taken care of.

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Baseball Disappearances
We all had a first last night - we went to a U of M baseball game. The Wolverines were playing Nebraska, and we took over a chunk of the stands with our neighbors. The neighbors across the street one way are U of M fans, and some neighbors the other way are Nebraska fans. So we had a colorful group. In the fourth inning, a Nebraska player made a ball disappear over the left-field wall, but the Maize and Blue got the win, 6-4.

A little later, Justin Verlander's bid for a no-hitter disappeared with one out in the ninth. That's OK, though - he'll have plenty of opportunities to get his no-hitter.

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Late birthday present?

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To everyone in my family who is traveling, or soon to be, please travel safely!

Science Olympiad and Flag Football

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K triumphantly holds his school's trophy aloft triumphantly*

Science Olympiad
The 2012 Washtenaw Elementary Science Olympiad was held yesterday at Pioneer High School, and, usual, K and his fellow competitors from Lawton did very well. K earned two gold medals. His first was for Straw Towers, in which straws and straight pins are used to build a structure that is both tall and able to support a certain amount of weight. His second was for Write It, Build It. In that event, two students write a detailed description of an object, and two other students build the object with only the writing to guide them. The objects are typically collages of foam, paper, and other materials, with no particular order or pattern.

Lawton, for which I am a co-head coach, received the overall second place trophy for the 2nd and 3rd grade events, and the overall first place trophy for the 4th and 5th grade events.

I'm so proud of K and his teammates, who studied and practiced very hard, and I am really grateful to be a parent at a school where so many parents devote huge chunks of their free time to coach and volunteer.

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M's flag football season has come to an end. His team did well, finishing 4-2, although their last game was a loss in the playoffs. Mark had an outstanding year on offense and defense, and he (and I) liked the coaches and the other players. It was another good experience for flag football.


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Now that Science Olympiad is complete, I have to figure out how I'll spend some of my free time. K's soccer season has already started, so I know I'll be spending Thursdays and Saturdays at practices and games.

We're going to do some work in the basement one of these days. Some painting is in order.

It's also time to get back to the small-scale elevator project, as I've neglected it long enough.

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I hope everyone is having a great spring so far - our lawn almost needs to be mowed again. I'll put that off for a while. Maybe it will stop growing.

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* Yes, I know I wrote "triumphantly" twice.

Washington, D.C.: Several Million Tourists Plus Us

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I know it's unusual for visitors to Washington, D.C. to take pictures and then share them with friends and family, but you know me - I'm so unique and unpredictable.

The boys outside the Thomas Jefferson Memorial. They're wearing their sweatshirts and jackets because it was pretty cold and windy that day.

They get really ticked off when you climb over the barrier and play this piano. I mean, it really gets them riled up. (Smithsonian American Art Museum, more information can be found here)

The new Martin Luther King, Jr. memorial, near the FDR memorial. It's quite imposing, and can be seen across the Tidal Basin from the Jefferson Memorial.

The party-time tradition of a beautiful woman jumping out of a giant cake was begun by the unlikely suffragist trio of Lucretia Mott, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and Susan B. Anthony, who emerged from an 800-pound loaf of whole-wheat bread at the 1851 birthday celebration for then-president Millard Fillmore.

The capitol, as seen from the front of the Rayburn House, an office building for U.S. Representatives. We met an intern for John Dingell in Rayburn House, who led us underground to the capitol for our tour.

After our tour, given by a different intern from Dingell's office, we were given the rare opportunity to ride this mini-subway train from the capitol back to Rayburn House. Had any of of our representatives been working that week, we probably would have had to walk.

You have to go? Get your own! These are mine.

The interior of the amazing Library of Congress.

This is the famous view of the Washington Monument, as seen from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. There's nothing more beautiful than the reflection of the Washington Monument in the reflecting pool when it's not under construction. If you want a picture of that beautiful reflection, you'll have to come back when the renovations are done. A good portion of the mall was dug up, with piles of dirt and construction equipment. It wasn't quite as majestic as we've seen it in the past. (Little known fact: The Washington Monument is 555 feet tall because George Washington himself was 555 feet tall. His portraits show him as normal size because showing him at actual size would have required more oil paint than was available at the time.)

Here are the boys outside the King Street Metro station, across the street from our hotel. We parked the car when we got to Virginia and didn't get into it again until after we had checked out - the subway got us everywhere.

On our way back, we stopped in Pittsburgh to visit J's grandmother, who just turned 98. She's still as sharp as ever and it was good to see her again. We celebrated with a small cake at dinner, courtesy of her retirement community's dining hall.

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