This week has been full of contrasts. the very sad days around Sam’s memorial date, the bittersweet mix around Thanksgiving for us.. Few obligations, decent weather.. snow  and sun.. lots of sleep. I’m doing my best to keep work thoughts at bay.. so.. I’ve had lots of time to think . .. and to putter.. It’s been a good time to refocus on a few of my adjusted personal goals.. after good talks with both Max and Gabe I’ve decided to try:

• make more stuff – I just love figuring out how to make things…. but I usually don’t make enough time to do it.  I’m not actually that good at it.. but I love doing it anyway..
• finish more projects before starting others  – I generally have a half dozen or so big projects going at any time.. I usually finish what I start.. but it can take time.. I’m committing to finish things  more quickly before taking on new projects.. My goal is to divide my time a little less.
• more making, less talking – it’s very exciting to talk about new projects.. telling people what I’m going to make.. It’s not always as much fun doing the hard work to get soemthing really working.. I am trying to build things then talk about them.

In that spirit.. it’ s been a very productive week..  I’ve finished lots of projects.

• With Scott’s help, I got my solid state tesla coil working again, I added a feature to let it play to music. I wrote some code to let it play old school telephone ringtones, now I have sparks to Black Sabbath’s ‘Iron Man’.. Sam would have loved it.

(I’ll post a movie of that later tonight)

• For work, I figured out how to program a wireless NXP chip that we build here in Vermont so that it can talk to IBM’s MQTT pub/sub protocol. Doesn’t sound like much of a project.. but it was no easy task.. 4 operating systems, two types of wireless networks, two wired networks, three hardware platforms.. but IT WORKS !..
• I figured out how to use a cheap cell phone and an arduino processor to allow me to control anything by txt message..  (Unfortunately.. that’s the key elements of an  IED roadside bomb)  I hope to make a a statue that shoots fire when you txt it like this one I saw in Krakow Poland a few years ago.
• Gabe, Diane, Deb and I finished a few pieces of furniture we’d hoped to make.. We had two slices of an old maple tree that we had to take down a few years back. Thanks to Deb’s finding the slices, sanding them and helping us think through the stand.   Gabe and I welded the stands ..Diane and I finished assembled them on Wednesday

  

• Deb also had a cool slab of maple.. she also found an old sewing machine base…  Diane and I put them together to make a table for plants to replace the table we’d been borrowing from Deb.

Here they are ready for those plants.

• Today I made some good progress on the touch controlled musical instrument that Homer and I are building for freind Mike. I managed to figure out the source of an unacceptable delay in the touch sensors.. I haven’t completed the fix.. but at least I now know what to fix..
• Finally, today Chris and I worked on his jet pack sculpture. It’s a very cool steampunk piece made out of old copper and brass.
  Chris wanted a detachable feature that  detects when someone approaches the piece.. He wanted it to queue a recording of a jet engine, start a smoke machine and simulate flames with colored lights. I made an arduino based sequencer, hacked a smoke machine and a simple recoding memo taker and an ultrasonic distance measurement device. Chris and I did a first pass integration today.. we still need to adjust the timing , better duct the smoke, mount the sensors.. but the effect is pretty good.. looks sort of like real flame..no ?

 

I appreciate the patience of family and freinds as I got back to my maker roots.. it felt unbelievably good…

ok. that’s it for now..
nite all, nite sam
-me