Starting to push it on how long I want to leave alkaline batteries in these lights, they don't get much use and I really don't want to find leaking batteries. Printed some spacers and adapters to use 1 18650 battery in place of the C cells.
Tried swapping rye flour for some of the bread flour (90g out of 390g total) and had some pretty good results with this no-knead loaf.
Notch needed to be a bit bigger to fit the current tweezers. Added a logo with the MMU and used a carbon fiber textured build plate.
First test printed in cheap PLA. Waiting on replacement tweezers and toothpick to make sure the slots fit as expected.
The curves on the end aren't a simple right angle fillet, needed a few tweaks to get right. The mounting posts work well with a simple hole in the model and then just press fit to install.
tsarolion.com/@tsaro/11543...
Clear ice just looks fancy especially in clear drinks, compared to normal cubes. There's fancy clear ice makers and machines but I just use a small 6-pack cooler to encourage directional freezing and then carve up the resulting slab.
Realized that my new compressor camp cooler fits my small cooler while testing some solar capacity this weekend. The applications were obvious.
One big game changer was learning how to coil cord so that it unfurls without tangling (usually). I wind in a figure-8 then wrap backwards to bundle. When it's time to deploy, the loose end typically just pulls free and pays out.
Clear evidence that ancient earth was visited by Kzinti.
Teardown-basically reverse of deploying but I try to make things as tidy as possible. Usually I'm breaking camp with at least a few damp pieces of gear so they need to dry. anyway. The farrimond friction hitch shows one huge advantage here, during teardown just pull the tail out and it comes apart
Adjustments - After everything is up, I get in the hammock to check how the lay angle feels and adjust, tighten any loose guy lines on the tarp etc. theultimatehang.com/2012/06/29/t... has a pretty good overview, laying diagonal in the hammock is a lot of t
Hanging the tarp: Depending on the tarp, there's a few different ways to do this. My current tarp is reinforced so that I can't hang my bug net so I need a separate ridgeline for that. I attach lines to the tarp with a bowline and use a farrimond friction hitch to tension the tarp and guy lines.
Hanging the hammock: (Assuming fair weather, otherwise I start with getting the tarp up first)Ideally I'm looking for trees a little over 10' apart (room for the tarp and a good hang angle) Broad straps protect the tree from damage and typical hanging straps have a few loops to easily adjust length.
To anyone following along on bsky, I'm cross-posting this to my mastodon server as well, sometimes with a bit longer posts than bsky allows.
My standard hammock loadout:
-Hammock (get a 'double' size)
-Hanging strap kit (usually included with the hammock)
-Bug net (integrated into my hammock)
-Underquilt (absolutely essential for cooler nights)
-Sleeping bag or camp blanket
-Parachute cord
-Hammock tarp kit (tarp, cord, stakes)
I'm trying to keep a few more knots memorized, the alpine butterfly loop is great for making loops that are easy to remove and I highly recommend learning the marlinspike hitch and all variations this video covers.
youtu.be/TfpzRE9sgRY?...
Before going out to the campsite with a hammock, knowing a few basic knots is really important, practice them so you can do them in the dark in the rain while getting your tarp up The two I find essential are the bowline and the farrimond friction hitch, guides at www.animatedknots.com
Still getting some visible thermal drift throughout the day on the TDS meter but plenty accurate to keep the levels where I want them, still spot checking with the handheld meter periodically, neat to see the graph spike when I add a scoop of fertilizer to the system
I think I've camped on the ground once since getting into hammock camping, I find I sleep much better and its really nice to wake up and not need to climb up off the ground. It's a bit more effort to rig and planning is needed to make sure trees at your site will work.
Progress update on the garden, we've had some great sunny warm weather these last 2 weeks and been getting some great growth. Needed to top up the fertilizer a couple times to keep the TDS up, not sure how much of the drop has been uptake into the plants vs drying on the growing media, etc.
Went to my first furry con in VR this past weekend, Furality: Somna,
(furality.org) absolutely beat my expectations and first time I've had serious PCD in awhile, photos and video really can't capture the experience of being there so here's a photo attempting to do just that.
I run a dripper line similar to the buckets but with a couple right-angle fittings to hook over into a hole at one end of the trough, with a drain hose at the other end, this drains back into the nearest bucket and recirculates with the rest of the system.
2" Net pots, a hole saw of the same size and some scrap vinyl gutter downspout. Found some 3d printed end caps on amazon but decided to print myself in ASA for better UV resistance.
The nice thing about running a system with a circulator pump is I can test other systems. System is primarily a Beto/Dutch bucket system but we had some scrap gutter downspout so decided to also test doing a nutrient film technique section, (acronym widtheld for obvious reasons)
Pretty good growth progress on the garden, had to top up the nutrients a bit after a week, they're not very big so I suspect most of the nutrient loss is deposits on the growing media and other places out of reach to rinse out.
Still getting some deviation on the TDS meter throughout the day, tweaked a temperature compensation variable and seems to be much closer than the original settings, getting within about 50ppm so at least enough to see if something is really off and see changes as I add water or feed.
This year I'm testing monitoring my nutrient levels in real time, built a weather proof enclosure for a TDS meter that I can integrate with Home Assistant.
This year's system follows a beto/Dutch bucket system which moves to a main reservoir with a fountain pump that feeds each pot via a drip irrigation system. The pump runs every 30 minutes and ensures all plants get an even feeding. (The old system would dilute pots closer to my feed bucket)
