Being in technology for a long time, I have seen my fair share of disk failures. However I have never seen a single instance where SMART has issued a sufficient warning to backup any data on a failing disk. The following is an example of this in action. Here is
With the installation of the new diesel fired heater we’ve noticed a small problem – since the only heat source in the saloon is the stove, even with the diesel heater fired up the temperature doesn’t really change much, as the heat from the radiators in the both the cabins
Continue readingnb Tanya Louise Heating Upgrades – Saloon Heating
With some recent upgrades to the boat’s heating system, the hot water circulation pumps we’ve been using are becoming far too small for the job. After the original Johnson Marine circulation pump died of old age (the brushes wore down so far the springs ate the commutator) some time
Continue readingnb Tanya Louise Heating Upgrades – The Pumps
In a word, no they aren’t any good. As usual, cheap doesn’t equal good, and in this case the cheapo clones are a total waste of money. Read on for the details! I’ve been looking into using a cheap Chinese clone Honda GX35 engine to drive an automotive alternator as
For the latest big project, replacing the battery bank on the boat with 5 brand new 200Ah Yuasa heavy duty flooded lead acids, I’m going to need to make many short links from heavy battery cable to connect all 5 batteries into a parallel bank. Cutting cable as big in
Putting Together a Demonstration He-Ne Laser For a classroom introduction to lasers, it would be nice to have a safe setup that makes as much as possible visible to the students. Or, you may just want to have a working He-Ne laser on display in your living room! Ideally, this
I often find myself carrying by go bag up to the boat during trips, so I can do some radio. However at 16lbs it’s a pain on public transport. A fixed radio was required! Another Wouxun GK-UV950P was ordered, and the fact that the head unit is detachable from this
As there was no other online example of someone converting a glow/nitro car engine onto CDI ignition, I thought I would document the highlights here. The engine is currently still running on glow fuel, but when the required fuel lines arrive I will be attempting the switch over to 2-Stroke
While sourcing the main propulsion hydraulic system for nb Tanya Louise in the summer, we thought that it would be convenient to have an on board generator that didn’t require dragging off the boat & highly explosive petrol to operate. As the hydraulics were already being fitted, we decided to
Continue readingHydraulic Generators, Missing Valves & Liars
This is a late 90’s business timeclock, used for maintaining records of staff working times, by printing the time when used on a sheet of card. Here is the top cover removed, which is normally locked in place to stop tampering. The unit is programmed with the 3 buttons &
Here is an old chemical dosing system for industrial washing machines. These units are 4-pump models, with dual pumpheads. The motors are reversed to operate alternate pumps in the same head. From 2006, this is a fairly old unit, and made in the UK. Main controller PCB, with interface to
This is the teardown of a Zebra P330i plastic card printer, used for creating ID cards, membership cards, employee cards, etc. I got this as a faulty unit, which I will detail later on. This printer supports printing on plastic cards from 1-30mils thick, using dye sublimation & thermal transfer
This unit was bought from eBay to experiment with Magnetic Stripe cards, for little money. This unit is capable of reading & writing all 3 tracks, & both Hi-Co & Lo-Co card types. Interfaced to a PC through USB, this has a built in PL2303 USB-Serial IC & requires 3A
A bit of a shift from my usual content, but I thought this deserved a place for people to see. Only relevant for people of the UK though. “I’m a DWP worker sticking his head above the parapet and hoping not to get shot… I work in a busy Jobcentre
Continue readingThe Truth About DWP Cuts From A DWP Worker On The Front Line
Here is a label maker, bought on offer at Maplin Electronics. Full Qwerty keyboard with 1 line dot matrix LCD display visible here. Power is 4 AAA cells or a 6v DC Adaptor. Rear cover removed. Battery compartment is on the left hand side, space for the tape cartridge on
Here is a Sanyo tape recorder, with built in voice activation. Takes standard audio cassettes. Here visible is the speaker on the left, microphone is on the right of the tape window. The tape counter is at the top. Back cover removed from the unit, showing the PCB & the
An old IDE interface Zip drive. This fits in a standard 3.5″ bay. Top cover removed from the drive, IDE & power interfaces at the top, in centre is the eject solenoid assembly & the head assembly. Bottom is the spindle drive motor. Head assembly with the top magnet removed.
Here’s my prototype 455nm laser head, constructed from the front section of an Aixiz module threaded into a heatsink from an old ATX power supply. This sink has enough thermal mass for short 1W testing. Connection to the laser diode at the back of the heatsink. Cable is heat shrink
Connection The parts arrived for my adjustable laser diode driver! Components here are an LM317K with heatsink, 100Ω 10-turn precision potentiometer, 15-turn counting dial & a 7-pin matching plug & socket. Here is the schematic for the driver circuit. I have used a 7-pin socket for provisions for active cooling
Here is an old fish tank external filter & a few pics of the insides. Label on the front of the pump head. Fittings on either side of the motor are water I/O. Underside of the pump head, inlet is on the right, outlet from the pump is on the
This is a Western Digital drive recently removed from my laptop when it died of a severe head crash. Top of drive can be seen here. Here the cover has been removed from the drive, showing the platter, head arm & magnet. Yellow piece top left is head parking ramp.