My Desultory Blog

Posted By RichC on March 10, 2014

I love these kinds of  school projects …

An English fisherman got an unexpected greeting from a Morristown [New Jersey] school this week, when a five-foot unmanned sailboat — at sea for a year and a half — made its way down the English Channel and caught his eye.

The Crimson Tide, a sailboat launched off the coast of South Carolina in December 2012 by Morristown Beard teacher Lisa Swanson’s sixth-grade class, was recovered Sunday by fisherman Paris Broe-Bougourd off Guernsey, an island in the English Channel near the French coast of Normandy.

MORE or the story in the BBC

Category: Education, Sailing | No Comments »
Tags: atlantic, boat, filler, morristown, ocean, sailboat, school

Posted By RichC on March 9, 2014

Keith Thomas, writer, pastor and good friend of mine, has been using his “small group” expertise to help teach others how to lead Bible studies and to be more effective disciples of Christ. His writings and excellent Bible teaching materials are available at groupbiblestudy.com for all who are interested … share the Good News!

I’ve been helping Keith with hosting and building his WordPress based website for a few years now and have been encouraging him to try a little video on his site … starting with  a few lectures from an evening series he is currently teaching on the Parables of Jesus. Let’s hope these first few videos are well received.

Keith is originally from England and is currently living in Cincinnati, but by utilizing the reach of the Internet his “small group”  study materials can be easily shared worldwide, and the interest is amazing. It is rewarding to see the Gospel and Christian leadership training making it into unwelcomed and more oppressed areas of the world. Originally we expected most visits and downloads to come from English speaking countries in North America and the United Kingdom, but by far the most interest has come from China, southeast Asia and the Arab countries in the middle east and Africa (working on translations).

So if you are interested in supporting a small but worthy Christian ministry outreach, consider Keith Thomas Ministries or enrich yourself by reading, watching or downloading a series from groupbiblestudy.com.

Category: Faith | No Comments »
Tags: bible, christianity, keith thomas, missions, study, teaching, website

Posted By RichC on March 8, 2014

We’ve changed the Federal DST law quite a few time (surprised me) and I learned a few more things about Daylight Saving time this week … starting with that there isn’t an “s” on the end of “Saving” … duh!

Daylight Saving time, or its abbreviation "DST" was an idea first proposed by Benjamin Franklin in 1784. Through his research overseas, he discovered that the United States may be able to cut back on the number of candles being used for light, simply by adjusting our clocks.

The idea of DST never went without controversy, because although many people liked it, many people did not!!

There were many attempts to create a uniform use of Daylight Saving Time here in the U.S., but it wasn’t until World War 1 that any real significant action was taken. During the final year of World War 1, DST became a federal law… but it was repealed right after the war and became optional.

The same thing happened during World War 2!!

After that, the whole thing was a mess of different states (and even different cities and towns) choosing to, or not to participate in Daylight Saving Time.

Finally in 1966 the Uniform Time Act was established wherein DST would begin at the end of April and end at the end of October. States could opt out of DST as long as the entire state went along with it.

In 1986 DST was changed to begin on the first Sunday in April, but in 2007 that was changed to the 2nd Sunday in March. The end of DST was also changed to the 1st Sunday in November.

Today Daylight Saving Time is observed by every state in the U.S except for Arizona and Hawaii.

LINK

Category: History, Misc | No Comments »
Tags: change, dst, government, History, spring, time

Posted By RichC on March 7, 2014

It seems as if I’m spending more time looking for parts and pieces that actually getting repairs done these last few days. Besides testing Raymarine components for Encore, I’m spinning my wheels looking for a shut-off solenoid for the propane locker, liquid silicone and port visors to seal a couple challenging water leaks (hatches and ports), marine grade wire for new 110v outlets, new gaskets, sheet Lexan as port light replacements, an adhesive to repair a weathered plastic engine control panel and some marine plywood for the lazerette shelve/step … but at least I have an excuse to go to the hardware store.

Over my lunch break today I’m going to see if I can find something similar to this:

Category: Sailing, Shopping | No Comments »
Tags: encore, hardware, repairs

Posted By RichC on March 6, 2014

Earlier this week I used a term in the title of a post, “Jury rigging SeaTalk connections on marine electronics,” and was sent an email questioning me about using the term Jury-Rig instead of Jerry Rig. Jury-Rig is the term used in my nautical books and magazines and I’ve adopted that, but  I like the description from Professor Paul Brians at Washington State University best:

“Something poorly built is “jerry-built.” Something rigged up temporarily in a makeshift manner with materials at hand, often in an ingenious manner, is “jury-rigged.” “Jerry-built” always has a negative connotation, whereas one can be impressed by the cleverness of a jury-rigged solution. Many people cross-pollinate these two expressions.”

The etymology of these words is interesting and obviously preceded the term macgyvered – loved that TV show. The phrase was supposedly appeared in John Smith’s a Description of New England in 1616, but the nautical use peaked my interest as referring to making repairs with miscellaneous spare parts at sea was called “jury-rigging.” One of the repairs was to “rig” a broken spar or mast which needed to be held up with makeshift lines … a knot was created for this purpose and called the jury mast knot (above). The center portion of the knot was looped over the spar or mast and fastened so that it would not slide down. Lines or stays were then fastened to the three loops in order to hold the mast in position as well as the other two free lines … 5 points of support. The knot is relatively easy to tie … take a look at my attempt below (although holding my iPhone steady between my knees was not as easy!)

Category: Archive, How-To, Misc, Sailing, Video | No Comments »
Tags: etymology, jury-rig, knot, nautical, sailing, ships, terms, tying

Posted By RichC on March 5, 2014

Another one of my Ebay winnings came in yesterday so I plugged it in on the workbench to make sure it would work. I think both Raymarine ST60+ instruments are in good shape and will be great replacements for the older defective Navman displays. I’m still hoping the depth transducer works with the new display, I but will replace the broken speed/log transducer with a new Airmar DST800 … although I’m not sure the temperature probe will work?

I took a quick video of the instruments working after using a hair dryer to spin the impeller.

Category: Sailing, Technology | No Comments »
Tags: encore, instruments, raymarine, sailboat, speedtest, testing

Posted By RichC on March 4, 2014

Another electrical project for Encore on the top of my list is trying to convert a couple of my defective Navman instruments to older used Raymarine ST60+ series instruments (made an Ebay purchase). After talking with a pretty sharp supplier to the marine industry, he convinced me that if I wire them correctly the ST60 display should work with with the transducers currently in the boat. Worst case scenario … I’ll have to replace the transducers with standard ones that work well with the ST60.

Of course the connectors are entirely different from the proprietary and expensive SeaTalk connectors from Raymarine, so I’m looking for some small micro spade connectors. At some point I “might” want to add a SeaTalk backbone in order to feed data from and two other Raymarine items, like the ST4000+ autopilot, and maybe someday a Brookhouse Multiplexer … since I’d like to have all my instruments talking together and sharing data with a chart plotter, computer and iPad. First things first.

Category: Sailing, Technology | 1 Comment »
Tags: electronics, encore, instruments, navman, raymarine, sailing

Posted By RichC on March 3, 2014

The snow has returned again to stretch out this already long and cold winter. March has always been one of those questionable months, but one I generally associate with “spring” … so far not this year.

Katelyn and Drew were home for the weekend and we had a great time together as usual. Besides talking about moving (they move to Minneapolis this summer), we congratulated Katelyn on accepting a position with a practice in Wayzetta, MN. Very exciting.

Another topic that came up is that of selling her beloved 2001 Volkswagen Jetta TDI. As much as she loves the only car she has ever owned (learn to drive on it), the cold winters of Minneapolis and new job makes for an appropriate time for her to replace it (dad is no long within a fix-it drive away). Too bad in December 2013 she put a new “dealer installed ($$$)” alternator and battery in – someone else’s gain!

 Links: Beyond a Billion, New Tires, Fuel economy, Bumped, Rust

I mentioned her car to family and on our local TDIClub’s CinciTDI group list before going public and have already received a few inquiries … yes these older little diesels are still in demand. Below is a snippet of an email I sent to a friend who sent me an inquiry:

… the car isn’t perfect as it has a few points of maintenance that I’m more than happy to point out to a CinciTDI member. The front fender has the normal Jetta cancer (rust) just above the wheel arch and the squeaky struts will bug you until they are serviced … bushings would help, but if I were keeping it, doing the struts would make the most sense. I’ve replaced the brakes/rotors a couple times, but assume pads are probably needed sometime this year. Our CinciTDI gurus have used her car for a few workshop videos and we’ve improved a couple items under the hood. There have been performance tweaks Rocketchip, Kerma 520 fuel injectors, glowplugs, aluminum CCV, intake manifold cleanings, MAF replacement and different CAT fuel filter improvements … although I think we’re back to stock fuel filters again? The 2001 Jetta TDI is a 5-speed manual, has black leather seats, an after market upgraded radio with mp3, upgraded taillights, sunroof, winter floor mats and an aluminum Panzer skidplate underneath …

If interested, let me know.

Totally off subject, but here’s a question regarding Amazon Prime memberships.
Do any of you “share the ordering” of gifts on one account in order to maintain free shipping? A family who all travel in order to be together over Christmas ordered from a shared Amazon Wish List and had all the gifts shipped “free” to one location where they all travel. Neat idea … especially when using a 30-day free membership.
🙂

Category: Automotive, Diesel, For Sale, Personal, Photos, Volkswagen | 7 Comments »
Tags: for sale, jetta, katelyn, tdi, volkswagen

Posted By RichC on March 1, 2014

I’m intrigued with marketing and advertising when it comes to what makes people tick. We see something and then decide to buy it.

My education is not in marketing per se, but I know that I respond just as the advertising agency intended once in a while. Sometimes it is a newspaper or magazine ad and sometimes a catchy radio or television piece. Certain ad campaigns trigger the “buy” impulse while others seem like a waste of money. I’m going to have to sit down with a neuroscience friend of Taylor’s (he works for Neilson) the next time he is here and ask him which recent marketing campaigns have been the most successful.

For me, one of the most effective has been the Get Crackin’ campaign by Roll Global’s Wonderful Pistachios … I can’t remember when I “had” to purchase pistachios prior to the catchy and creative commercials … but now I can’t get out of the grocery store without looking at the well positioned pile of nuts! (see video with PSY from the 2013 Super Bowl below – or ALL the videos – if you need a reminder)

What advertising campaign has recently worked on you?

Category: Business, Financial, Marketing, Video | No Comments »
Tags: advertising, Marketing, pistachios, psy, wonderful

Posted By RichC on February 28, 2014

Once upon a time it seemed smart to host only light content on my own blog. In the early days it was easy to store larger files like video, audio and photos “for free” with content hosts like YouTube, Flickr and Posterous (among others). The plus was that I didn’t fill the “out of pocket” server with multi-megabytes sized files and was able to offload bulk and bandwidth. It seemed like a win-win.

The downside was that when something went wrong, repairing the links and attempting to salvage the files became a challenge as times changed.  For example, I posted many of my original videos along with a few encoded television snippets (don’t do it) to YouTube, only to find my account was shut down and all the video content including my own personal videos removed … no appeal …no warning. They were just removed due to the complaint of a copyright infringement (Oprah has clout, even though the snippet and links all pointed back to her 2009 program).

For Flickr, they were purchased by Yahoo and changed some of their terms and linking … breaking some of the links to images that I used on my blog. My final lesson was the demise of Posterous in 2012. It was shut down after the acquisition by Twitter and with plenty of warning, eliminated every post. Unfortunately I used Posterous as my mobile blogging setup which posted both to Posterous and my blog by email (from my phone). Thankfully I was provided and downloaded an archive unfortunately all the links were broken and file names changed … so each post much be manually corrected and images saved – tedious and hardly worth the effort (although I occasional fix a few).

Lesson: If you host your own blog, try to control most if not all of your own content, and then back everything up regularly.

Category: Advice, Blogs, Technology | No Comments »
Tags: blog, flickr, posterous, techfriday, youtube