Ed Nisley's Blog: Shop notes, electronics, firmware, machinery, 3D printing, laser cuttery, and curiosities. Contents: 100% human thinking, 0% AI slop.
Spotted in a soon-to-be-rebuilt rest area on I-87 north of Kingston NY, a chandelier stuffed with old-school CFL bulbs of various vintages:
NYS I-87 Rest Area – CFL chandelier
The yellowish dome on the far right might still house an incandescent bulb, but I can’t tell from here.
Judging from the high color temperature and even illumination, the chandelier next to it has 16 newish LED bulbs:
NYS I-87 Rest Area – LED chandelier
What’s of interest: both chandeliers have two dead bulbs and, perhaps, the center floodlight of the LED fixture had died, too. We don’t know how long they’ve been in place, other than that the LEDs are certainly more recent, but a 6% failure rate is nothing to brag about.
From what I’ve seen, the reliability of both CFL and LED bulbs is greatly overstated and certainly do not justify preemptive replacement of a working bulb of any vintage.
As expected, the internal battery does not last for our usual hour-long rides, so the cameras now operate in “car mode”: recording starts when we plug in the USB battery pack and stops shortly after unplugging.
I started with the waterproof case on my bike:
Tour Easy – SJCAM C100 mount – installed
Which (obviously) does not allow for an external battery, so they’re now in the “frame” mount. The hatch covering the MicroSD card and USB Micro-B connector (and a Reset button!) is on the bottom of the camera, but (fortunately) the whole affair mounts up-side-down and the settings include an image flip mode.
The ergonomics / user interface of this whole setup is terrible:
The camera’s flexible hatch is recessed inside the frame far enough that it cannot be opened without using a small & sharp screwdriver
The USB jack is slightly off-center, so lining the plug up with the camera body doesn’t align it with the jack
The MicroSD card is in a push-to-release socket, but its raised ridge faces the hatch flap and cannot be reached by a fingernail. I added a small tab that helps, but it’s difficult to grasp.
Extracting the video files from the camera through the app is an exercise in frustration. Having already figured out how to do this for the other cameras in the fleet, it’s easier to fumble with the MicroSD card.
I devoutly hope we never really need any of the videos.
Because the lamp has a big nut apparently holding the pole socket to the base, I figured a dab of threadlock on the pole or the base would solve the problem: lock the pole to the socket, then remove the nut to disassemble when needed. That turned out to be a Bad Idea™.
The socket is a plastic part separate from the base cover plate:
Miroco floor lamp base – socket
A pair of keys prevent the socket from rotating in the hole:
Miroco floor lamp base – socket in place
Four threaded bosses (two visible there) hold the rim of the cover to the weight, with the socket doing the hard work.
A fender washer atop the weight distributes stress from the pole:
Miroco floor lamp base – weight top washer
Another fender washer on the bottom of the weight lets the nut jam against steel, rather than soft plastic:
Miroco floor lamp base – weight bottom washer
FWIW, the nut is either a perfect 15/16 inch or, more likely, a sloppy 24 mm.
In any event, permanently locking the pole to that socket will also lock the pole to the base, with no way to dismantle the lamp when I must once again repair it.
Perhaps a wrap of PTFE tape on the threads will stiffen it enough?
Some drivers give us absurd amounts of clearance, which is what we thought the driver of the white Jeep was doing:
New Jeep Reckless Driving – Jeep passing
Some drivers give us very little clearance, either deliberately or though negligence, which is what I thought the driver of the silver Subaru was doing:
New Jeep Reckless Driving – Subaru close pass
Reviewing the videos revealed a different story that could have ended very badly for everyone involved.
Moving back in time, we crossed the bridge over the Wappingers creek, which has two southbound lanes. The left lane is dedicated to left turns onto Red Oaks Mill Road and the right lane is for through traffic southbound on Rt 376:
New Jeep Reckless Driving – Red Oaks Mill bridge
I had noticed oncoming drivers in the northbound lane were moving far over to the fog line, but (unseen by me) they were definitely swerving off the road:
New Jeep Reckless Driving – swerve 1
It seems the Jeep driver crossed the bridge in the left lane and continued straight through, passing the solid line of vehicles in the right lane behind us. You can see the top of the Jeep’s windshield peeking out behind the Subaru, with minimal clearance to the black car swerving out of the way:
New Jeep Reckless Driving – swerve 1 clearance
There’s not much shoulder on that side of the road, but the driver of the white Honda is using it all:
New Jeep Reckless Driving – swerve 2
With all the oncoming traffic out of the way, the Jeep driver now accelerates in the wrong lane:
New Jeep Reckless Driving – passing 1
And passes the Subaru just behind us:
New Jeep Reckless Driving – passing 2
The license plate looks like JAE-7751, early in the “J” plate series, so that’s a shiny new Jeep.
Being passed at close range in an obviously no-passing zone caused the Subaru driver to flinch in our direction:
New Jeep Reckless Driving – Subaru clearance
Unsurprisingly, the Jeep driver ran the red light at the top of the hill, presumably to avoid being stopped directly in front of us.
The Smell of Molten Projects in the Morning 