What Did You Do Today???

Geena

Staff member
Looks like Oklahoma is in for all sorts of weather starting today....


The color table bars on the far left represent rain on the top, then sleet/mixed precip just below that, ice is next and snow is the bottom colortable. The lines with 4 tick marks, are the directions the cells are going in according to the radar, ignore the upside down triangles, they are false TVS signatures due to problems with the radar returns. The numbers across the state ( in various colors ) are the temps in F.


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That looks scary! I hope you guys don`t get any dangerous storms.
 

RandyDSok

Well-Known Member
That looks scary! I hope you guys don`t get any dangerous storms.

We got several days of ice with that one... there was a lot of lightning and you wouldn't have wanted to be under any trees with how many branches ( and trees for that matter ) were coming down. In 2007 we had a bit more ice in this area but the trees had already lost their leaves, this time the leaves hadn't hardly started to drop so I think it was about as bad or worse with power outages, downed trees and limbs ... etc. They don't expect to get everyone's power back on until later next week, possibly longer.
 

Tony

Staff member
They are for the camera that I use for the stream.

 

Tony

Staff member
It's an absolute mess right now until I figure out what to do with everything that I had to move to make room for the new rig lol.
 

Rob Lancaster

Active Member
Hi everyone,
Well I got bad news, bad news for me that is..
After nearly 6 months and broken promises from Revolectrix, I decided to cancel my order. Besides I NEED the money!.. I still have all four of my old chargers so for now they will have to suffice.

In the mean time bro Tom and I have made great strides with the VHF beam antenna. Right out of the gate, the tuning is almost dead balls on! But not too zeroed in for our taste so we're going to continue to try to tune it further. Common babee! Just a little more!!.. LOL!!!

Oh hey, I forgot to mention that when we were working up on the roof after dark I slipped into another problem, DEW!! One second it was dry and the next wet! We have a silicone coated roof so when it's wet there's zip for traction. I slipped and fell on my ass and then began to slide to the edge! Just as my feet got to the edge I stopped! WHEW!! It was my cloth shorts that saved the day. You talk about a skid mark; inside and out, WOW!.. Word to the wise; a silicone coated roof has zero traction at any angle when wet!.....

I did suffer a major blow to my lower back and neck area. However a problem I had for months was instantly cured, LOL! It did switch over to the other side but is no way as bad. Go figure!.. Folks I hit hard, I thought I was a cripple in the making.. Anyway, glad I lived to tell about it, lol..

The adventure will continue after some mounting parts and a upgraded mounting plate arrive.. We found after the first RF tests that the mounting hardware had to be doubled up to properly secure the offset load that's present. As suspected, that figures. Vertically polarized antennas can be a real pain because they need to be offset from the mast. These photos show the antenna only supported by the stand off. The final design will have an upper truss that will aid in the over all support of the antenna. Cuz its going to need it when the wind blows, ha!...



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Rob Lancaster

Active Member
What's the antenna for?

That antenna will be used for 24 hour monitoring of WWG75 162.40 MHz weather radio. The only station in Hawaii we can catch because of our location here in Haiku Valley, is repeater station WWG75. It's located atop Haleakala on Maui. That's 113 miles south east of us here on Oahu. And that explains the big bad ass bitchen beam antenna, LOL! Brother Tom LOVES his new tuning toy. (MFJ-226) At this very moment he's working on the radio receiver's 50 Ohm input from the antenna. Everything needs to be matched up for maximum efficiency..

After we finish the tweaking of the antenna. Tom's going to redesign a couple of the printed circuit boards in the radio. That should fix a couple of glitches that developed after a year of continuous service. I don't understand all he tells me about how radio really works but it is very fascinating and I do learn some stuff. Imagine life with no radio.. No RC, no cell phones, no GPS, no radar, no communications, no internet, no weather satellites, no nothing.. What a depressing thought. Fortunately that's not the case and we all can play around with it.. Happy radioing!... CDR (2).JPG
 

sneezy007

Active Member
Ordered stocking stuffers online, drilled holes for the motor on my glow to electric project.
I promise pictures coming soon. Hope to go for a walk today as well. Got the Christmas lights up this week. I won't turn them on until the last week of November. Having said that, there are lots of homes in our neighbourhood with Christmas lights already turned on. Retirement life is good.

Cheers.
 

Tony

Staff member
Rob, I would be wearing Golf Shoes from now on if I get on a silicone roof lmao. Glad you are okay.

Sneezy, those that turn their lights on before turkey day..... yea... lol

I just wanted to thank everyone here for keeping the site going. I have been busy with work and streaming at night and admittedly I have not been on here as much as I should be. So for everyone that is posting in reply to questions, helping the others out and keeping this site going, THANK YOU VERY MUCH!!!! It really does mean a LOT!
 

Rob Lancaster

Active Member
Hey Sneezy, we got a guy on the corner that not only leaves his cheezie Christmas lights up all year long he lights them as well, all night. After a few storms their all waisted.. Very strange for sure.

Tony, the golf cleats idea ran though my mind the moment I regained my senses and was heading for the edge. Tom said, maybe a stuntman's airbag would suffice, lol.. The good news is, I finally feel better after a week of hell. Other than that, we're still waiting for a 1/4" X 6" X 6" aluminum plate to arrive. We need that for the upper support truss. After that we'll alter that rounded element you see a few millimeters. Hopefully we should get closer to our fundamental frequency's center tuning. Mean while Tom's working on the radio end. He ordered a SMA adaptor so he can he can use his line terminators to calibrate out all coaxial caballing used. This is necessary because you have to know the phase of the cable when taking measurements. Just when you thought cable was cable. Nothing could be further from the truth.

Stay tuned, HA! Sorry I couldn't resist.. :biglaugh:
 

RandyDSok

Well-Known Member
Roofs develop holes enough over time, I'm not sure wearing cleats is going to help with that issue. There are a lot of tennis shoe styles with aggressive treads that would probably make more sense and not damage a roof like a cleat would. I daily wear a Merrell moc primarily made to be used after a person is getting out of their snow ski's while still in the snow. The moc style makes putting on and taking off ( while wearing gloves ) easy and the aggressive pattern grips pretty good in most situations. They also have other styles like those for jungle use etc. The look of the shoe is classy and not as sneaker looking as most and being a moc, it's easy to get on and not have to deal with shoestrings. Of course I've seen other brands of this style, this is just the one I'm familiar with and can recommend as sturdy, good looking for daily use and has good support with a replaceable arch support.
 

D.O.G.

Goblin 380 Supporter
Let's see. I've been busy since this morning and will be till tonight. After taking my dog to the park, I went back to the park with my DJI Phantom standard. There're redoing their web site and the park manager asked if I can take some aerial pictures and recording. 3 batteries later, 20 minutes each, I gave him the sd card so he can view the pics and recording I did. Then I went to wally world, Walmart, for a few items we needed around the house. On the way there seen gas @ $1.92/gallon. Went home after wally world, grab 4=5 gallon gas can and filled them up plus the truck. When I got home, I did my final grass cutting and weed wacking of the year :). During that time, UPS showed up with my steering wheel stand for my XBox 1 racing wheel. I'll put that together tonight while watching fights on TV. I still have to program my wife Fire TV tonight also with apps that I can side load so she can have any channel her heart desires lol. After all it said and done, I'll be able to play my racing games with my new wheel and stand tonight after the wife, dog, bird and ferret goes to sleep. It's the only time I have to my self before morning.
 

Rob Lancaster

Active Member
Hey D.O.G. you got a ferret? Cool!..

The VAN'S sneakers are nice.. I wonder how well those rubber soles grip silicone? After all it's like Randy said, cleats would do a number on the roofs coating. The surface would look like a well docked pizza dough, lol!.. I may contact VAN'S and see what they say.

Other than that we got the SMA connector today and Tom has already finished all the cable calibrations. All we need now is the aluminum mounting plate and we can get back to the fine tuning of the antenna and the interlinks between the radio's PCBs..

Now's the time to wrap some titanium salutes for new years eve. It's a slow and time consuming process but a very necessary one for safety and so it fits the mortar tube right. I love fireworks!!! Lets rock!!...........
 

D.O.G.

Goblin 380 Supporter
It's not what I did today but what this induvial did the other day. I think this person is a bad ass but when your adreline is in high gear...there's no time to think
 
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