What have you Built Recently

[AnalogPackrat]

After moving cross-country last year I've built my lab into one corner of my new mancave.

 

[PermO]

I love to see work places people made for themselves...

Here's mine;

It's a 2x2 meter room and almost all of it is deskspace (90cm deep desk)... Time just flies when I'm in that room, and because of the lighting system my sleepcycle does not get triggered..... oh my, is it that late allready ?

 

[AnalogPackrat]

Nice setup. I have a near new set of metal lab bench legs/braces that I scavenged from a lab clean up at my former job. Need to build a nice top for it. Will be 36-38" deep. Good quality birch ply is hard to find now and $$$ compared to pre-pandemic.

 

[PermO]

Yes, this was a pre pandemic build, I did this room a couple of years ago with the help of a friend of mine, I settled to buy the cheaper plastified multiplex sheets to build the desk and the day we went to pick these up they got some nice oakwood sheets at a discount price so I got those right away, put an extra strip around the edge to make it look thick and poored a bucket of linseed oil on it.

I got hired for some period at a broadcast workshop that was designed in the late 60's ... oh man, that place had just everything right, the benches, the lighting, the tools, the storage... so I copied as much of that as I could to apply it in my own little room.

I'm using real fluorescent tubes for lighting, Philips, 2x warm 1x cold mixed... I can read color codes on every dodgy old resistor.

I found the Sony industrial macro camera at a outdoor surplus sales event for cheap, it's analog NTSC out only, but I happened to have that input on my old monitor so it just works great, magnification is beyond any lens lamp.

 

[grid_stopper]

recently finished up one of the various studer 169 builds floating around, and got a chance to test out a 3 rail PSU, and true bypass relay switching board i designed. Both PCB's I came up with had some footprint issues, and required some creative off board wiring but other than that everything worked great!

 

[Whoops]

After moving cross-country last year I've built my lab into one corner of my new mancave.

Looks good, you just need a better (comfortable and with wheels) chair

 

[analag]

Yes time flies when you're in the Man Cave. I'm told I spend too much time in there, lol.

 

[AnalogPackrat]

Looks good, you just need a better (comfortable and with wheels) chair

My Aeron is at the computer/music desk. Wheels suck on carpet. Upgraded flooring is a future project. The old wooden chair isn't bad. Came from my grandparents' house, so sentimental value. Better than the folding chair i used to use.

 

[JohnRoberts]

I decided to step up my spraying game so purchased a 12V powered sprayer and strapped it to my zero turn.

It is kind of disappointing how optimistic they all are about their specifications. They claimed it would spray 25' vertical. It was not even close. I just replaced the 60psi pump with 120psi pump and now it makes the 25-30' vertical, but still not high enough for my trees. You will notice the pump is mounted at an odd angle because the higher power pump had the goes-in and comes-out ports reversed. I was able to grab 2 of the original 4 mounting screws.

My next step is to mount the short sprayer wand to the top of my old extension pole ( in the picture above) with spray hard wired on. I just ordered 30' of hose tubing, and an in-line cut off valve, so I can control the flow from the bottom of the extension pole. This won't get me to the top of the trees but more than half way there..

JR

PS: A commercial sprayer to do the job from the ground would cost thousands of dollars and I'm still cheap.

I continue to tweak on my tree spraying rig... I replaced the stock 80PSI pump with 160PSI. I replaced the stock sprayer wand with one capable of handling more pressure.

I originally tried strapping the spray tank to my zero turn mower and grab 12V power from the mower but that a lot less less convenient to use than expected. My new plan is power the rig from a deep discharge marine battery. My neighbor has a boat and this was his old one. It took a full charge so works well.

I have already changed it twice since this photo. In this photo I had moved the nozzle that I cut off the spray wand 1/2" tube up to the top of the 20' extension pole connecting it to the spray wand trigger st the bottom of the pole through 1/2" tubing. The flow resistance from the 20' of 1/2" hose hurt my vertical reach.

My current plan is to reattach the nozzle end to sprayer trigger and move that to the top of the extension pole. I now use a pull cord to trigger the spray wand from down on the ground.

I notice that the 160PSI pump causes the hose to expand. The pump has a pressure cut off switch. I get my most vertical from briefly triggering the nozzle then letting the pump rebuild pressure inside the hose. When I had too long of a hose 40'+ the high pressure cut off would not cut off the pump. Yesterday I shortened the hose to only 25' and the pressure cut off switch now works.

I am still not reaching the very top of my old pecan trees, I am now reaching about 2/3rd of the way.

JR

 

[AnalogPackrat]

On the topic of agriculture...I rebuilt the tail wheel on my old bush hog. New hub, bearings, spacers, and axle. Repainted wheel and fork. Replaced broken zerk on vertical spindle.


Still working on restoration of old disc harrow. Rain slowing painting progress. Once the frames are complete I'll reassemble and put it to use.

 

[JohnRoberts]

I haven't mowed my yard for almost a month now, but the heat wave has finally broken, with nightly thunder showers.. Not much rain but enough to make the fire ants dig out. I am going to have to mow this weekend.

JR

 

[AnalogPackrat]

We've been very dry until yesterday. Got almost 2". I can hear the grass growing.

 

[JohnRoberts]

we have reverted to a typical pattern of hot humid days with evening thundershowers... not much rain accumulation, just enough to make the fire ants dig themselves out.

I can see my grass stop dying in the dry sections... I need to mow this weekend.

JR

 

[PermO]

Antennas...

 

[crazydoc]

Archtop acoustic bass (with underbridge piezo transducer) - coming along, but a long ways from being done.

 

[AnalogPackrat]

Archtop acoustic bass (with underbridge piezo transducer) - coming along, but a long ways from being done.

View attachment 96245

What woods are you using? Kit or scratch-built? I like the sound hole design.

 

[crazydoc]

Not a kit. The top is redwood, sides and back maple, fretboard cocobolo, neck I thought was alder but now I think is Doug fir (quartersawn - vertical grain). The tailpiece, bridge and headstock veneer will be cocobolo, though I may buy a rosewood bridge and put a cocobolo saddle on it - cheaper than buying the thumbwheels to make one myself. I made cat's eye sound holes because I was too lazy to make and bind f-holes, and they look OK.

 

[JohnRoberts]

Wow, our tomatoes and peppers are just coming on - very different growing seasons I guess.

They say you should have the water already boiling when you pick the corn - we weren't that prepared. I ate it off the cob for the first time in about 35 years - mmmm. I had to start cutting it off before eating - when I kissed her good night, one of my daughters told me my beard smelled like vomit after I ate corn. I had my wife smell it today - she said it was fine.

Sadly I have too hot to enjoy in this much quantity jalapeno pepper plants... I have a plastic bag with a couple dozen in my fridge and one plant still making too many.
==
My two cantelope plants only made 3 modest sized cantelopes total. This morning I noticed the last cantelope #3 grew legs and apparently walked away... There has been one homeless guy hanging around the neighborhood, picking thru garbage cans for food. If he took my cantelope I'll give him a pass, but if it was some neighborhood kid, "hey you punks get off my yard".

JR

 

[crazydoc]

We had a cool spring and late freeze, but it's hot as hell here now (105F today and more on the way.) Got tomatoes the last few days (many pecked by quail), and cabbage, carrots, peas, beans, chard, beets in the last month. Pepper plants are finally growing and blooming, no cucumbers yet and just a few squash. Planted watermelon late - starting to bloom but I doubt there's time for melons to grow.

 

[JohnRoberts]

My first flight of (6) tomato plants are played out, this weekend I am starting a second batch. this time I will plant 3 tomato and 3 cantelope plants.

Besides too many jalapenos to enjoy, my fig tree is making lots ripe now.

JR