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The About page has got a new, up to date section reflecting my outlook these days.

I’ve just moved to a new WP-theme, “Grey Matter” in favor of the old customized K2 with custom header and background that I thought vaguely reminiscent of some Louis Vuitton pattern. Or something. Benefits: nice fresh clean design, and THREADED COMMENTS!

For posterity:

And even further back in the wayback machine- my first header ever:

And second:

Ah, just lovely.

We’re coming up on 52 posts in 52 weeks (we’re at 51 in 51 currently)- let’s look at a few of last year’s highlights- posts that I think stand the test of time best:

• My classic review of the rental Grand Marquis, as compared to the gold standard of automobiles. March 2009.
• Generating radial SVG clones- why would you need expensive graphics programs when you can just procedurally generate your art using open source tools? April 2009
• And in the other corner- generating art in a backwards, goofy, totally analog fashion. April 2009
• I proudly used my JB-Welded cell phone for a whole six months before the plastics just started breaking apart around the JB-Weld cast. May 2009
• The first ever drive of the EV Miata. May 2009
• More automotive tomfoolery- installing a Jaguar tach in the dash of the ‘68 Dodge, in a soup can no less. May 2009
• The EV coolant bottle struggle- with two flavors of Nalgene water bottle. Good thing REI’s right around the corner. June 2009
• My photo gallery from the Wayland Invitational EV drags up in Portland. August, 2009 (taken in July)
• The Electric Skateboard Trilogy. To be continued…
• My goofball car-roof-mounted solar power system, used primarily to power a subwoofer on my Northwest roadtrip. September 2009
• Banzai Lemon- an insane paint job. September 2009
• I finally edited the first car run video from back in May- October 2009
• My most recent writing, inspired by the University of Delaware and Chrysler- January 2010

And on we go- Stay tuned for some really neat new posts I’ve got planned, on some really wild new projects.

As to traffic- in the last year we’ve seen almost 13,000 pageviews, over 5,000 unique visitors. About 70% of those visitors in the last 3 days. Thanks to Hackaday!

Here’s to another good year!

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Browsing BoingBoing today I saw this article. I clicked through and looked through the photos posted on the auction website. It’s worth a look. Here’s the story: wikipedia Chrysler’s Newark Assembly plant in Newark, Delaware built tanks between 1951 and 1957, and cars between 1957 and 2009, including LeBarons, Town and Countrys, and most recently Dodge Durangoes. The property and facility was bought by the University of Delaware for $24.25M, as it is adjacent to campus. They plan to re purpose the property for research and future expansion. The sale was made in October 2009, now they are auctioning all the industrial machinery, tooling and fixtures that made the plant run. $24.25 seems like really a pittance for such a facility- 3m sq. ft., chock full of everything needed to run a production car manufacturing operation.

The pictures really struck a chord with me. Usually when pictures are available of a closed factory, or other “urban relics”, they’re in rough shape- they’ve been looted and explored, the roof leaks, flaking paint and light filtered through broken windows illuminate scenes of decay and rust. Not here- this factory is fresh and clean. The pictures could have been taken over a holiday when the workers were at home, aside from the acres of empty stock shelves. And indeed- the emptiness is not due to flood or famine or disaster, but just the management deciding to close up. The employees cleaned up one night, and never came back. They’re still around- but not working here anymore.

And equipment! What equipment! Mills, lathes, a Haas VMC and toolroom mill, stock racks and bandsaws, in the manual machine shop alone. All installed in a solid, spacious, well lit facility. Not to even mention any of the production facilities, or testing/QC areas. Auto lifts, toolboxes, spacious rooms with everything needed to do anything with cars.

It’s hard to put my finger on what I’m trying to get at, because the screw-up represented here is so fundamental to the issues I see at play in the world here. Simply, it is insane that everything Chrysler built here is being taken apart and auctioned to the highest bidder. The “service economy” or “knowledge economy” that America has been and is still purposefully heading towards excludes manufacturing. And here we have a university taking over an American manufacturing facility and instantly liquidating everything they can, including facilities that could be used in industrial engineering education programs, and demolishing it, ready to build whatever fits their vision. Research space and future expansion. In order to crank out more B.A.s who don’t understand how the food gets on their table, and B.S.s who don’t know what to do with a wrench or drill.

Even if the plant was built to make cars and the car market has been pulled out from under it doesn’t mean that the established manufacturing facility it left behind is worth most as empty land for a university. Considering capitalism, a plant full of machines should have more earning potential, and should be worth more than a plot of land. And from a “doing what’s right for the world in the face of impending energy crisis that will destroy every foundation of American life” perspective, that plant should be building wind turbines, or electric motorcycles or electric cars or anything to prepare for a post-petro world, regardless of profitability. I would pack up and move to Delaware right now, plus give my right kidney for the chance at using 1/100 of that facility to work on things that I think are important for the future of the world. It really kills me to see this kind of an opportunity taken away. As well, America does not need everyone to go to university, many of the kids “served” by the University of Delaware would be better served by the opportunity to work in the trades, in a facility like the one that is currently being destroyed.

Here’s the list of items to be auctioned (189 6-axis robotic arms. Jeezus).

And here is a mirror of all the images on the auction page.

P.S. 50th post! Woo hoo!

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Basically- I noticed this aggressive driver in a black Passat with frat letters on the back when they passed me on the right. Drifting around in the lane, uneven acceleration. Decided to give them wide berth. As I followed directly behind them in the left lane, but with 2-300 yards distance I saw them brake suddenly, realized they had failed to slow down with traffic. They then swerved sharply into the right lane, where there was some space. It was a misty day, with moisture on the road but no standing water. The driver then lost control of the car, skidding side to side, then sliding into the embankment on the side of the road, probably at 50+ mph. The car rolled onto the roof. I pulled into the median and crossed the road, helped the driver out of the car through the rear driver side window. The driver’s side front corner of the car was crushed worst, although the airbags didn’t deploy, the driver was lucky not to get more hurt.

After a couple minutes I realized the engine was still running, despite having lost all the oil, and being upside-down (obviously). I reached through the drivers window and steering wheel and moved the key out of the ignition position. The radio kept playing. Couldn’t shut the key off and remove it as the transmission was not in park. Before I shut it off the engine sounded like a diesel, and was beginning to smoke. It had lost all the oil when it first hit the embankment- the oil pan was shattered.

I found it a bit impressive how well the car held up, for the safety of the driver and running upside down with no oil for a good little while.

Despite having seen it unfold right in front of me I’m still not exactly sure what happened here. It was pretty shocking, unreal. Puts into perspective how the way we use cars and roads can quickly, in just an instant go from the disconnected, comfortable, predictable way we are familiar with into a real display of heavy objects in motion, subject to all the misunderstood, unprepared-for physical realities that aren’t a part of the road culture. Racing LeMons, even autocross is also a good way to get in touch with the car as a physical system- find the limits where surface predictability disappears. And cheaper and safer than flipping your car on the highway.

No one was badly hurt, only one car was totaled, but not only our distracted driver friend got a bit of a reality check seeing this crazy scene unfold.

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Something strikes me as pretty funny about the car in this picture. Probably because I expect the driving experience in a diesel rabbit has got to be pretty wretched. Hey- I’ve got nothing but respect for terrible econoboxes boldly proclaiming their worst attributes!

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Photo M. Macor/The Chronicle

On Bad Engineering

On Tuesday (10/27/09) I was driving back from Laney College up to my home in Albany. A ways in advance of where 880 splits off for (I guess) 80E and 80W (Bay Bridge) I realized we were merging out of the left lanes for the Bay Bridge- with flares and cones. No Caltrans trucks, flashing arrow signs, hundreds of cones, just a smattering of flares and dingy cones. And then headlights, coming toward me out of those lanes- wait?? huh? They had apparently rerouted traffic “out the in ramp”. I’m still not sure exactly how it worked- but by the time we got to the Y it was quite clear that something funny was going on with the bridge. Then over the flyover I could see the “parking lot” in the toll plaza everyone has been talking about.

When I checked 511.org and sfgate.com at home I learned that the “saddles and rods” fix that the contractor CC Myers had installed on a cracked “eyebar” beam on the bridge had come apart, smashing a couple cars, and the bridge had been shut down indefinitely. The cracked eyebar had been found during Labor Day’s planned festivities- the replacing of the approach to Yerba Buena island with a temporary section to allow construction of the new bridge approach- and the weekend closure was extended another day to set up a reinforcement for the cracked beam. The contractor finished up a half-day early to the lauding of the general bridge-going population, and the bonus-granting of the local governments. The apparatus they devised lasted seven weeks before high winds on Tuesday caused one of the four long rods under tension holding the parts of the reinforcement together to snap. The forces in the assembly were then became unbalanced and the rest of it pulled itself apart, flinging massive hunks of steel across the roadway.

The immediate response has been one of annoyance over the closure of the bridge, hope for it to open again soon, general sympathy for the situation. It’s been treated sort of as a natural disaster, something unexpectable that couldn’t be averted, and now must be taken care of. Sfgate.com published this editorial that captures some of my feeling about the whole matter, the fundamental “High winds should be anticipated on a bridge” idea. There has been other publicity of the possible half assed-ness of the “band aid fix” like here, and this editorial blathers a bit about Caltrans and the Chinese steel and “adulterated” concrete that has been used in the footings for the new bridge. Maybe “this country needs an ethics revolution”, but the problems here lie in engineering integrity, not solely in material quality or governmental dishonesty. But in general, the public and media response to this has, in my view, given the people responsible a bit of an easy time.

So, my thoughts:

Once you find something like the cracked eyebar on the bridge you can’t pretend it doesn’t exist and do nothing about it. Even though the bridge still is intact, and was showing no signs of coming apart destructively. Once something like that is known, it must be fixed. But in critical situations, the quality of the fix must not be affected by the perceived importance (or lack thereof) of the problem it’s fixing. Is it possible the engineers in charge of designing the “bay bridge band-aid” realized that the bridge wouldn’t come apart if the eyebar snapped and therefore weren’t very careful about the design of the fix? Did they say well, it’s really not going to break, and even if it did, people probably wouldn’t die, and the bridge is going to be demolished in a few years anyways, so we’ll put together this simple thing that will take the static tension load of the eyebar and forget about it? Not taking into account that the thing they slapped together was in fact just as much a part of the bridge as the rest of the bridge once it was installed on the bridge and just as likely to be subjected to the adverse conditions often found on the bridge, and in just as much a position to injure people in its own failing? Would they have designed this part differently if the eyebar weren’t cracked, but was gone and their fix would actually, for sure have to bear the load of the beam it replaced? It doesn’t take an engineer to see that high winds should be part of the assumed conditions in designing a part for a bridge, just like salty spray, dynamic loads from passing cars and whatever structural role the part fulfills. I think it’s pretty telling that the “band aid” whipped up in a few day’s time to “take care of” the cracked eyebar problem was the only thing that failed. That it destroyed itself, and in destruction posed as a potentially fatal hazard to people driving on the bridge. Truly an example of bad, bad engineering.

Like, the bridge was designed so that if an eyebar failed, the bridge would not fall apart. This “fix” that was installed was designed in such a way that when one part of it failed, the whole thing explosively came apart. Right. I think it’s hard to argue that that couldn’t have been foreseen, or was unavoidable.

An analogy: If a drug company wants to make a drug to help people grow bushier eyelashes (which they HAVE, another WTF for another day) it’s morally not OK for that drug to cause cancer and death in 1% of the population. It’s not OK to put out a drug that has a chance of really hurting people under natural, “foreseeable-for” conditions. Bridges rarely fail. Nor do jet planes, or high speed trains, or even cars fail dangerously under a wide range of natural operating conditions. That’s due to the complex, slow moving, expensive process that has evolved for designing stuff that doesn’t fail catastrophically. There are protocols and known things to take into account when you’re building a bridge, or anything else. When you get a blitz engineering job that generates a failure like we saw on Tuesday, it shows that that everything that needed to be taken into account wasn’t.

There’s a place for designing stuff that pretty much works, not all engineering has to be perfect. Stuff you build for yourself, or stuff that will not see a lot of abuse and isn’t in a position to hurt people can be designed with less engineering skill and thoroughness. I’m pretty familiar with making “good enough” stuff myself. But when you start selling a product that people rely on, or designing something that is as critical as a part for a bridge, there’s no excuse for inadequate engineering.

If anyone knew that the fix was going to fail, that intensifies the practically criminal nature of this engineering oversight. Back when BART was brand new the train tracking system would periodically lose track of trains as they traveled around autonomously on their routes. They weren’t willing to acknowledge the problem or take any steps to remedy it. It took the constant hassling and publicity efforts of a third party group to get BART to fix the problem, which could easily have led to a disastrous accident. Making an engineering mistake in life-critical systems is unforgivable, it should never happen. People have been building these sorts of things long enough to know what needs to be designed for. Leaving a known dangerous piece of engineering in place while the critical system it is a part of is in service is downright criminal. Knowledgeably endangering people.

I am very glad and, in hindsight relieved that no one was killed by this mistake. I only wish that people were more aware of how this should have been foreseen, that there were people who should have kept this from happening, endangering lives and now, with this bridge closure, putting many people at risk of losing their jobs.

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First, get yourself a pack of these “TWIN DRAFT GUARD” (AS SEEN ON TV) “MAGNETIC VENT COVERS” from your local Bed Bath and Beyond – maybe walmart or target carries this or something similar as well-

They’re not very strongly magnetic, but I tested it on the freeway, didn’t go anywhere. And cheap! $9.99 for 3. Good enough.

Next, draw some numbers on them with a fat permanent marker- I decided on 1, so we can be 15, 51, or 5 using the 5 painted on the car. Drawing a 6 would give you the most versatility, as you can just flip it over and it will become a 9- tricky! UPDATE: I just thought of something else- even better. Since the package of magnets includes three sheets, cut one in half and make 1’s, then make 6/9s on the other two- then for $10 bucks you’ve got 1, 9, 6, 16, 19, 61, 91… seven unique number possibilities! That’s quite a bargain!

Simple as that! Indeed, they stick to cars! That is, as long as you don’t have a Saturn, or DeLorean, or Corvette, or……

But If you have one of those your paint will probably survive some masking tape.

The vaunted 1(doorhandle)1 Camry Race Wagon

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Painted the frame to keep it from continuing to rust, and for STYLE, obviously.

Added these 1/16″ thick HDPE strips to the middle bottom of the frame to reduce metal scraping when it bottoms out over curbs and stuff (long wheelbase, low clearance, it happens)

Cut out and attached a full-size solid deck out of this crappy shipping-crate plywood

Then stained it to reduce the show-uppiness of shoe marks, to the state in the first picture. I also reworked some of the component mounting strategy, extended and tidied the potbox-controller wire and adjusted the potbox lever. I have ordered a 4QD VTX40-24 controller to replace the Curtis 1208C, for the sake of being able to adjust the acceleration/deceleration ramp rates. Unfortunately that controller will not drop right in with the potbox setup, so I will have to set something up to make it work. I would like some sort of neat-o pistol grip style controller but I’ll probably just slap something together for now.

I have largely realized the concept I started out with. Pretty nicely indeed, if I say so myself.

The question I’m thinking about now is really where I need to take the concept- I don’t think what it is now is really there. I need to pick a direction for the project, and see if I can get something that really makes sense. In short, I don’t really like riding this thing. Sure, I’ve probably only put in maybe 20 minutes of “board time”, and I’m not a skateboarder by nature or history, but for me the design doesn’t really feel quite “there” or “right”.

This line of thinking can be expanded to address the state of “stand-up” personal vehicles in general.

• Scooters
• Skateboards
• Self-balancing 2-wheel Scooters (Segway-style)

Both Segways and Scooters have handlebars. Segways go 12mph, (non-seated) Scooters usually top out around 10-30mph, some of the electric skateboards on the market can hit speeds above 20. My machine doesn’t manage more than a tepid 6-8mph (estimated, limited by the voltage and gearing of wheelchair transaxle). Fast jogging speed. It steers like a skateboard but has a form-factor unlike any electric skateboard I am aware of. It’s taller, longer, wider. I think it could feel secure and stable at 15-25 mph. Not sure if I’ll be able to test that assertion with this motor transaxle I’m running now. It’s got more than enough power but is geared wrong. I really can’t put any bigger wheels on it.

Benefits of stand-up vehicles:

• Can be awesome
• Good visibility in traffic
• Hop-on, Hop-0ffness
• Generally reasonably compact, efficient nature

Downsides of stand-up vehicles

• High likelihood of falling on your ass
• Practically limited top speed

I don’t think you can safely go much faster than 25 or 30 mph on something without Butt-Support. The Segway is freaky enough at 12, not to mention the ever present “if this thing pukes I am going to be on my ass, hard” factor.

Despite the issues with this prototype, and stand-up vehicles in general, my concept has some things going for it.

• Big pneumatic wheels soak up little bumps pretty well
• Big enough deck for two people (untested, I won’t be the one testing it), or stuff
• Massive undercarriage- you could put enough battery to go 40-80 miles on a charge in it, easily

That’s assuming you are comfortable enough riding it to want to go 80 miles on it. So far, for me, I don’t think that’s so much the case. It’s a pretty good ankle/knee workout.

The other big benefit of my concept in its scale/implementation is its nearly boundless versatility with permutations of design. Some big possibilities that have come up:

• Put toe hooks/clips onboard for better steering and stability leverage- this was independantly suggested by two skateboard afficianados who rode it.
• Put a handlebar on the (non-tiling) axle assembly- would take much of the trickiness and uncertainty out of riding it.
• Put a bucket seat on it. Particularly if you had your hands free I think you could generate plenty of tilting force to ride it sitting down

I’ve got an idea for a more elegant, reliable and adjustable axle-pivot/damper setup, and indeed it would be a good idea to get a powertrain setup that allows for more speed. These transaxle motors are built sturdily, and could be run over-volt, maybe even double voltage at the expense of brush life. I don’t think the windings themselves are at great risk of frying given the light weight of the vehicle. I haven’t monitored the cruising current draw of my motor at 24v, I suspect it is quite low.

I don’t envision trying to produce these things, or have them built. I think that I may just work on a second prototype to develop the things I just mentioned, then I might just make documentation and plans available. That would suit the flexibility of this design well, so that anyone can build it the way they would like it.

So- there is still potential and promise here, as well as a few issues keeping me from hopping on and cruising around town more. I’m still scared of the super-quick accel/decel from the current motor controller after getting pitched off of it. I’m still just not comfortable with the stability of the board (I think that’s more my problem rather than an issue with the machine). The top speed is boring. Also, while in some road situations it’s clear where to ride a thing like this, be it the bike lane, or in the street- on other streets it’s a bit more difficult to work out. I’m not sure how a vehicle like this is supposed to be allowed or prohibited. It’s too wide and slow to really play that nicely on bike paths or sidewalks, it shouldn’t be duking it out with cars on bigger roads though.

Indeed, my most imminent job is just to get it out and ride it more. I tend to avoid opportunities to hurt myself. Suppose that’s why this is not really such a good project for me… but I’m this far into it already, right?

If you are in the bay area and are interested in riding this thing and telling me what you think I would appreciate your input. Drop me a line.

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If you didn’t see it, take a look at the previous skateboard post for an idea what this is all about-

For now I’ll let the pictures tell the story:

Since the last post I finished welding up the frame, made a front axle on the lathe, acquired batteries and wired up the controls, assembled all the parts, and designed and implemented a return-to-center damper system.

The batteries can be seen on each end of the frame with the motor controller (beige) and charger (black) in the center. The deck is an old kitchen cabinet shelf out of the house my folks are currently renovating.

The “potbox” hand controller. One way on the black levers is forward, the other reverse. The E-Stop button cuts power and shorts the motor leads, slowing the vehicle down very fast.

The return-to-center damping action (provided in a skateboard truck by a doughnut-shaped rubber bushing) is here accomplished through the unconventional use of two rubber exhaust bushings, these were sourced on eBay, and are apparently designed for use with some models of Land Rover. I’m not sure how well they’ll last but at present they are very effective, they have about the right amount of resistance and are smooth through the entire travel. They are only placed on the rear axle presently, to double the resistance another set could be placed on the front axle.

So, how does it ride? Really nicely, in fact! The biggest problems right now are with the non-intuitiveness of the throttle control, and the excessive aggressiveness of the acceleration and deceleration ramps programmed into the Curtis 1208C controller that is in use. I was showing it to a few people at school, in a bit of a rush and hastily popped the throttle and was thrown right off the back of it as it lurched forward, fell on my wrist and sprained it pretty good. The steering and balancing action however is quite nice. A skateboarder at school gave it a test drive, he picked it up instantly with no hesitation and said it was really awesome. So there’s potential. I need to make sure I can’t adjust the accel/decel ramp on the 1208, if not I may shop for an adjustable controller (4QD VTX-40 maybe, something from Kelly maybe).

I made this video last weekend before the exhaust hangers arrived- My friends and I just bungee-corded some places on the frame and gave it a try.

My dad rolls it his own way:

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Click through for the HD version–

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