My original Prusa Mini has been one of the printers I have been fighting with for awhile. It kept having issues with poor quality prints and even complete jamming in some cases. I have taken the hot end apart multiple times trying to tweak things to resolve the issue without success. The other day I was doing a recollection of the timeline of the problem and I realized that the issues seemed to start when I began using a brand of PLA in the Mini that I had not used previously, even though I use this brand in all of my other printers, including the Prusa MK3s printers. The Mini uses a bowden tube set up instead of direct drive where filament is pushed instead of pulled for most of it’s journey to the hot end.
To test my theory I ordered some different filament that I have been using without issue on one of my other Minis. I threw that into the problem printer last night and got a clean print. I was a bit frustrated with myself that I didn’t come up with this simple resolution earlier and I still need to do a few more prints until I can officially declare it as fixed. I still have one more Mini to get working and then I can turn my attention to my CR10S Pro which has been sitting partially disassembled for at least a month.
After dinner last night I went out briefly on the Sherman to see how well the light worked. I was very surprised at just how bright it was, throwing a long beam of visibility in front of me. It’s simple mount on a hinge allows you to adjust it’s angle in seconds to accommodate riding situations as needed. It was yet another reason I am feeling an interest in swapping the Sherman into my EUC line up.
I started the long weekend out with a live stream on Thursday evening. I had received my two new suspension wheels during the day so I thought it would make for some good conversation. I had some tech issues that took some time to work out but overall I think it went ok.
On Friday I was productive. Right after cleaning the chicken coop I pulled out the ladder, a bucket, and a brush. I used it to scrub the layer of scuzz off the chicken roof that I covered with Flex Seal over a year ago. The product actually has held up well, much better than my prior painting attempts which were falling off in a year. I bought another gallon of Flex Seal to really seal the roof in so washing it first made sense for maximum adhesion. Unfortunately the entire four days following this it either looked like or was raining so I never got to actually apply the Flex Seal.
During the day I got to add one final cross support to the new orchard structure and also got to weed whack the property during the afternoon even as some light rain started to fall. It was a good start to my list. Sally made getting much else done outside a challenge for the rest of the weekend.
On Saturday morning I went out early to do a range test on the Sherman. Unlike recent range tests where I tried to keep my speed at a pretty steady 20mph, I did no such limiting on the Sherman, this wheel just wants to go fast. I commented during the ride how 30MPH on this wheel feels like 20MPH on other wheels due to it’s balanced battery pack and immense weight, checking in at over 80 pounds. Despite going over 30MPH for most of the 35 mile ride I still arrived home with almost half of the battery pack remaining. I also set a new personal speed record during the ride of 39.3 MPH, sheesh.
Because of the onset of over 24 hours of rain Saturday afternoon most of our activities were pushed indoors. I made a video regarding setting up my two suspension wheels, neither of which I have been able to actually get out on the road as of yet.
Cindy and I watched a Million Little Pieces Saturday night a movie about the horrors of drug addiction. It made me glad that I never considered myself to have an destructive addictive personality. If you are into seeing penis on screen you get that too. B+
Sunday just sucked. It rained all day long, absolutely drenching the property in the process. On both Saturday and Sunday I spent time on the phone with Directv trying to get my Sunday Ticket reactivated. Once again it was a huge hassle just like it is every year, despite my account having specific notes in it on how it is supposed to be handled. One Indian phone rep got me particularly mad when she refused to transfer me to to the department that handled the Sunday Ticket. She repeatedly kept telling me she had to add notes so she could do a “proper transfer”. She talked in circles for 15 minutes until I hung up on her after saying “thanks for nothing”.
I did eventually get the channels to work but I may have been better off if I didn’t. The Eagles game was very frustrating to watch as they jumped out to a 17-0 lead and proceeded to allow Washington to score the next 27 points, unanswered. The two biggest culprits were the offensive line and Carson himself. The line was porous and overmatched giving up 8 sacks during the game. However Carson compounded the issue by holding onto the ball way too long in many situations instead of just throwing the ball away. It’s a tendency he has had from day one and he just can’t seem to change it. The game left me feeling very blah about the Eagles outlook this year but luckily there is a lot of time for things to brighten.
On Monday the rain finally relented although it looked like it could resume at any time. I used the break to take the Sherman into the swamp. I figured all the precipitation would flood out areas of the swamp and it did. Luckily the big knobby tire on the Sherman allowed me to ride through several completely submerged areas. I didn’t want to push my luck too much so I only rode a few miles into the swamp but the wheel performed the best of any non-suspension EUC I have taken in there. The performance of the Sherman overall has got me considering buying one myself however doing so would only happen if I sold another wheel in my collection, I can’t justify the expense any other way.
The rest of Sunday was filled with various things keeping me busy. Cindy was babysitting DJ so I got to spend some quality time with my little buddy. He is so funny. I also spent a lot of time in the 3D room trying to fix printers which overall did not go great. I currently have three printers that are out of commission for one reason or another. Hopefully someday I have all machines running at 100%.
Despite the undeniably shitty weather I still enjoyed the long weekend overall. I feel amazed and somewhat jealous of people at times that I hear talking about “being bored” with nothing to do. My personal treadmill of tasks just never stops spinning.
We have hit one of those wet season stretches where there seems to be just no relenting on daily hard driven rain. The property has hit max flood stage where standing water will reside for days, in areas that we did not elevate this past year. The thousands we spent on raising ground level does indeed appear to be working as intended at least. The one area we didn’t address was a low spot between the house and chicken area, meaning every trip out there requires a pair of boots.
It’s going to be a busy day with deliveries at the house today. My two suspension wheels are due to arrive at the same time as well as a number of other items. Maybe I need to convert the garage into a loading dock. Today is my last day of work until next Tuesday. My head is already full of things I need/want to do during the 96 hours. If this precipitation dominant weather pattern continues it could make the list arduous to complete.
Since I have not one but two new wheels arriving Thursday and a demo Veteran Sherman already sitting in the house I decided to give myself a second consecutive long weekend. I put in to take Friday and Monday off. I figure the extra time will allow me to dig into the wheels as well as getting stuff on the fresh list checked off.
I also have yet another piece of camera tech that showed up, an Insta360 Go camera. Despite it’s name it does not record 360 videos however it is the tiniest motion stabilized camera out there weighing in at only 20 GRAMS. It’s a specialized use device that is used to capture short, unique perspective clips with it’s various mounting options that allow you to place the camera almost anywhere. It’s yet another thing I hope to play with over the four day weekend.
I had my weekend list all ready to go. It wasn’t overbearing considering I had an extended three day weekend to accomplish my tasks. The problem was the list evidently wasn’t enough for me. Saturday morning after I got the weeding done Cindy, Elsa and I went to my office. I had some after hours work to get done. Cindy spent that time cleaning my office which was nice. Elsa seems to like going to my office as well as she repeatedly ran excitedly up and down the halls, it was very cute. We also hung a shelf in my office to give me a better spot to display stuff like some of my cars and 3D prints which de-cluttered some other surfaces in the office which I liked.
After the office visit we went to Home Depot and picked up three 2 x 6 x 16 pressure treated boards. Getting those home in the Tacoma that has a six foot bed was a delicate operation since the boards extended a full 10 feet beyond the bed of the truck. When we got home Cindy and I worked on getting the boards hung across the orchard. I did this to add some more rigidity to the structure. This took awhile and this was the first of two rather large non-list items we did over the weekend. On Sunday I bought some more 2 x 6 to put in the intermediate supports you see in the picture.
Saturday afternoon it started to seriously look like rain but I started to mow anyway as it was one of the larger list items. I had some light rain drop on me for periods of time but nothing strong enough to make me stop. The new bahia sod we put in grows like weeds, in one weeks time it is already 7-8 inches high at spots.
Sunday was again a busy day. As I continued tending to my to do’s Cindy was tirelessly out in the orchard working on stuff, it is a very large area. She has been working on landscaping the spot for now going on three weeks. Sunday evening I finally got out to ride the demo Veteran Sherman wheel I was sent, the EUC with the biggest battery pack on the planet. All those batteries also make it the heaviest wheel around, tipping the scales at more than 80 pounds. I was immediately impressed and just how stable at speed the wheel felt.
I was originally hoping that by Labor Day I would have the list items mostly done, and I did, so I came up with other stuff to do. I did get to go out on an early ride to DD first thing which was the quickest round trip I ever had. The top speed I recorded was 36.5 MPH and the wheel felt like it had plenty more to give if I asked it to.
During the afternoon, with my list pretty complete I looked at the pool cage and was disgusted by how green the rails looked. I grabbed the electric pressure washer and did a speed pressure washing session. This was not one of my full sessions which takes hours when I use the gas pressure washer, I didn’t pull anything off the deck, I just moved stuff around. I also could not reach the highest parts of the pool cage as the electric washer doesn’t work well with extensions and is also about 1000 PSI less than the gas model. The “speed” run still took two hours. It was good enough to buy me a few months until I do a full session once the temperatures finally start to drop. My aching lower back did not approve of the task.
After I got done Cindy and I headed for an afternoon run to DD. As we did we drove through some hard rain. However when we returned a deluge event began, dumping at least 3-4 inches of rain on the property in a couple hours. The familiar standing water spots returned instantly and the pool was filled to the brim. It’s crazy how intense yet isolated these rain events in Florida can be. When I checked with some co-workers today they said they hadn’t seen a single drop.
I’m very much looking forward to the upcoming three day weekend. Many people would be focusing on what sort of recreational activities they are planning for the holiday weekend. I find myself first focusing on what I would like to get done over the three days, with a focus on completing those things as quickly as possible so I can then start thinking about recreational activities. Part of the weekend will include a trip into the office to get a few after hour tasks done. It’s never fun working after hours but I plan on having Cindy and Elsa with me so that always makes it feel less like work.
Yesterday the county commissioners voted to extend the mask wearing mandate which was due to expire. The order has now been extended to October 22. The general feeling is the mask mandate has coincided with a steady decline in infection numbers so it should be continued to perpetuate that trend. I personally don’t have a problem with it but there is definitely a very vocal minority that acts like you are asking them for some supreme sacrifice to wear a mask.
I get it that people don’t like being told what to do but hell you can no longer smoke wherever you please, you can’t get service at many establishments with no shirt or shoes, and seat belts have been the law for decades. I expect that more people wearing masks in the US will from this point forward will be a thing. It won’t get to the point it is in some Asian countries but I don’t think it is ever completely going away. Hell if the Rock and his family can get Covid 19, anyone can.
With eight printers in my hobby room it feels like there is always one or two that are in need of some sort of attention and/or repair. I just got my one Prusa Mini working again and one of my others developed a problem yesterday. It’s like being a hamster on an exercise wheel, it never stops spinning.
Evidently I was really tired last night. I somehow slept through my alarm this morning. We use one of our Alexa devices as an alarm clock so to turn off the alarm requires me to give it a voice command. I must have given it the command to shut up and immediately fallen back asleep. I have no recollection however of my doing so. I didn’t awake until a couple minutes after 7. Cindy and I sprung out of bed and put our morning routine on fast forward.
I bypassed my my normal egg and toast breakfast and opted for a Pop Tart speed meal, something I do less and less often nowadays. I didn’t shower or shave either, luckily my recently buzzed head doesn’t require a shower to be ready to go. I was only about 10 minutes late getting to the office which isn’t bad, all things considered. I attribute my tiredness to playing some old school WoW Classic last night till almost 11PM.
I have been in tunnel vision mode at work lately. I have been trying to get something implemented at work that is outside my area of expertise. Because of my lack of knowledge and experience I am bumping into all sorts of challenges along the way. I finally think I am onto a solution which should work thanks to getting some direction through various sources. I am far from an IT genius, I think my strength is actually more as a troubleshooter. In most situations I can dig through an issue until I finally come up with a resolution, even if it takes me a long time to get there. I don’t give up easily.
Last night I hoped to fix a problem with my one Prusa Mini which was the one list item I had not had a chance to cross off over the weekend. My goal was to replace the heat break in the printer to solve heat creep issues I have seen now and then which results in filament jamming eventually. I bought a new and improved part and ripped apart the hot end to install it. The old part removed easily but the new part had much more resistance, so much so that I could not fully seat it. When I tried to remove it to try again it was more or less stuck. I eventually got it out through brute force where I grabbed the end with a pliers, destroying the new part in the process. The failure left me frustrated and back on a web site to order another one to try again.
A common strategy I have seen in the Trump camp is to show clips of Biden misspeaking or looking/acting confused. Don’t get me wrong, Joe does misspeak and act/sound confused at times but for Donald Trump, the most stable genius big league speaker of all time to use that as an attack vector is hilarious. Without a doubt Don has the smallest vocabulary of any president in US history, to match his, sue you if you try to get my school records, IQ. His collection of stupid and moronic statements is nearly limitless so for him to point out Joe’s gaffes in public speaking seems like pot calling the kettle black in spades. Joe has said many stupid things for sure but last time I checked he avoided publicly mocking reporters with disabilities, bragging about grabbing women by their genitalia, and other morally reprehensible statements.
Cindy has been working diligently over the last couple weeks converting the unproductive orchard into a big landscape feature. I made the suggestion to her that if we added some 4 x 4’s we could hang the sun sail that we have in the shed to provide some shade. Cindy loved the idea. On Saturday we bought the wood and cement. After I got done mowing the grass I jumped right into working on getting the posts mounted.
While I was mowing Cindy had been busy at work with the post hole digger, creating four two foot deep holes to sink the 10 foot long 4×4’s into. Her doing that made my part of the job much easier. I hoisted the posts into the holes and then backfilled with dirt and then concrete while Cindy held the post level. We left the posts set overnight so the concrete could settle.
On Sunday the plan continued to evolve. To add stability I screwed the base of the posts into the wooden 2×6 border around the orchard. We then talked about how it would be cool to add cross supports between the two posts on each side to create sort of a pergola look. We headed back to Lowes for the second time in as many days to get some 2x6x12 lumber.
The weather all weekend was melt your face hot but we just kept plugging away as we both donned our wide brim hats to provide at least some minimal relief. I got done with my portion of the project about 4:30 Sunday afternoon. We screwed in some eye hooks and strung up the solar shade. It looked cool and provided a significant temperature drop when hanging out under there. I think Cindy may be able to finish up the project this week.
After a weekend full of labor going on an EUC ride isn’t a great idea, at least for me as I was already feeling beat up before stepping on the wheel. Even small bumps in the road sent bolts of pain into my lower body and back, it honestly was not a fun experience. The biggest reason I wanted to ride was to test out my new Insta360 camera which shoots everything in a 360 field of view. I was curious how it would look and how tedious it may be to edit my videos using this style of camera.
The footage came out cool, having the ability to spin the perspective around in whatever direction you desire is very powerful. Unfortunately that power comes with a price, editing time. The 17 minute video I made consumed 2-3 hours of editing time. I had to first load all of the clips into the 360 software to set my camera angles. Then I had to export all 25 of these clips into flat video files and then reload them into my normal video editor where I combine everything into one video. To be quite honest, it’s tedious as hell which is what I was afraid of. I will be researching to see if there is something I can do to reduce that editing time because I just can not be spending that much time to construct a video. Take a look at the 360 effect below.
The list did not get completely crossed off yet, there are a couple items I will hopefully get to during the week.
Although I had not planned this during the day, when I got home last night I got on the Husqvarna to mow the back part of the property which gets done once a month or so during wet season. The fact that it was currently not that wet made me eager to take advantage of the situation and get this weekend list item crossed off early. It takes less time to mow the back so I finished up slightly before the sun dropped below the horizon.
As I drove around the perimeter of the yard I was reminded how a number of the fence posts are starting to show pretty significant rot/decay where they meet the ground. As I mowed I thought about various scenarios to replace them, weighing in the effort/cost with each possible solution. I need to to do a test run of popping out a rotting post and putting a new one in it’s place to see how arduous it is. The results of that test will affect my strategy going forward.
Yesterday I had my first dermatologist office visit since the pandemic began. I was masked for all but 30 seconds of the visit where he cut off two chunks of skin on my back and neck for testing. They are likely more basal cell cancer but surprisingly he suggested if they test positive he recommended I use the topical cream to dissolve the bad cells instead of his normal template of having me come in to get them scraped/burned. My only guess was he was trying to cut back on the number of patients requiring office visits which is fine for me but surprising because it equates to less dollars in his pocket.
This weekend will likely follow the standard template of working in high heat and humidity with small breaks in between where hopefully enjoyable things can be enjoyed.
