Spent the last three days fixing and remodeling stuff and getting some repair guys to check out the “burnt” up stuff for the insurance report. So far no report from them, will check on it Monday. First off the damn door bell stuck , over a year ago, and burnt up the “ding dong”… I swapped the wires to the “dong” but just didn’t seem to be enough. Being cheap, and I never got a response to what kind of door bell do you want? I found a replacement set that was supposed to work with our door bell, just swap out the back stuff and put the cover back on… well, they lied… it was quit a bit bigger than our original door bell so the cover would not fit on the new back side. That meant that I either ordered another one or swapped the guts from the new one to the old one… I looked it over and it looked swappable although I would have to do some trimming and rework to make it fit in… Good thing I got a temporary dremel last week to finish the airplane project, cause I used it to cut and trim out some unneeded plastic pieces… pulled the guts form the new back, put some holes in the metal sides, and then mounted it with screws into the old back… once the old guts were removed… it came out ok and now goes “ding-dong” like it should…
I know we should of gotten some fancy sound doorbell but “ding-dong” works for me…
I also got a new dryer hose and some of that metal tape and replaced the old dryer hose that I couldn’t keep on the dryer… this time I got some 4 inch clamps, had to cut the plastic ends I had been using down so they would squeeze on to the outlet and the dryer… got the hose into those ends, and taped it up good… and clamped it onto the dryer and the outlet… now that damn hose better stay put… it is pretty tight now… amazing how full that old hose was, even after I cleaned it out several times so replacement was a good thing.
Couple of days ago I was passing by the west parking lot… they had been putting up more signs, stating that the west end was “staff only” parking… and with the new dorms being attached to this lot on the east and not all the east side of the lot done, there had been a lot of cars parked to the west… I guess the warning period is over… because the whole front row or about 80% of the front row had tickets on them…
Some had multiple tickets so they hadn’t been out this way in days… they will be super happy with that initiation… today the west end was mostly cleared out… I also think a lot of the tickets were for vehicles that had not gotten a parking permit or had not put one on…
After Fridays fiasco with Braums for Sherrie, we are cutting them off, for awhile….
With that we went to Whataburger… but it was late enough , I just had lunch… from there I had to go back to Lowes, been there several times this week, getting parts… but my costs are pretty cheap so far… today it was $2.70 for the right sized screws to finish up my power supply project… In the old days and for the past 20 years I have used a power supply like this.
Open face, just solder on a plug wire and hook it up at the terminals on the lower right… Never had a problem with that but figured that maybe, with my recent run of great luck… I better put a good cover on it so I won’t end up sticking something down in there that isn’t supposed to be there like finger or drop a tool into it… so yesterday and today I finished up the ends and top covers for that supply… and added a switch and plug on the back and a volt meter on the front… still need to order and install a temperature controlled fan for the top… but it turned out ok…
making end plates that stick out 1/4 inch for air flow up from the bottom.
Ready to drill holes and cut a slot out for the volt meter on front and switch/plug on back…
Back end done, attached with switch and plug… using some left over computer cables… also note the top is on and screwed down…
Now the front is on with the little volt meter inset in the Plexiglas… I may still put a fuse block outlet on it , not sure what I want beyond this, hooked up to the battery and power line to the radios. .
I had the Plexiglas from some old , old project that never got done… not sure why but had a nice big sheet of 1/4 inch plex and it worked out great for this seal job… I know the power supply looks old and ratty but hey, I had 5 of them back in the day (late 80’s) and they will run 13 volts at 40 amps 24/7, or almost that much… I also put feet on this one that the others never had… I may have to try and fix the one that got zapped? so I can have a spare… looked them up and they still make this model but it is $350 bucks for a new one.
No need to polish and paint it… it sets down under the cabinet, hidden other than the digital read out is now visible.
Yesterday I got some replacement parts for my radios that were zapped last week, and spent some time working on that little problem… the easy one worked fine ( replaced the HF antennas tuner) … just swap out the old for the new and plug it in and it worked fine… but the replacement preamp and power unit for the magnetic loop… failed. I spent 3 hours swapping out the preamp (that antennas is out in the back yard)…testing the coax, checking the power cubes and various other tests and it would not come up, then I also realized that something was wrong with my RCV antennas relay unit… it turned on, the relays would click , like they should, but it never swapped off the main antenna… suspect that the relay contacts are welded onto the main antennas port, so one more items added to the burnt up list… Until I get another computer I won’t be doing much HF work. I prefer digital modes and that requires some computer hook up… although I may get antsy and hook up the laptop at some point, but not yet…
I am also finding that the old laptop that had been running the security cameras is acting flakey… or maybe the one of the cameras is causing some problem? not sure… but it looses connection at odd times and recently it just shuts it self off… it will start back up and run fine for a day or tow then poof… will shut off… so it may have taken some hit via the network? geez, just keep adding little things that appear ok but in the end are not.
So more later as I continue to work through all this. Seems the fun never ends.
WD0AJG