Excel Trick

If you need to add the current data and/or time in Excel, there are two ways. One is to use the now(), date() or time() functions if you want the date and time to always be your current PC time (i.e. a dynamic date). However, if you want to just enter a static current time, such as a manual time stamp for an entry, you can use Ctrl and “;”. As per the manual:
Current date - Select a cell and press CTRL+; Current time - Select a cell and press CTRL+SHIFT+;Current date and time - Select a cell and press CTRL+; then SPACE then CTRL+SHIFT+;

Password recovery for Windoze NT, 2000, XP, 2003, and Vista

If you need to recover a computer password try http://www.loginrecovery.com/. A friend bought a used laptop recently that was demanding an Admin login; he used this site's service and they e-mailed the password within a couple of days.

Jogging Stroller Handle Mark II

Tina and Dale witnessed the failure of my home-made jogging stroller handle when they visited. Today I did a retrofit with a different design shown below. It hasn't been road tested yet but I have high hopes!

Hello, World

Today I managed to wire up and program my AVR microcontroller based POV to control a lcd display. Hurray!

A little trivia for you, when you take a beginner's programming class, one of the first things you often learn is to print "Hello World" to the screen. I haven't figured how to print a space yet, so the comma was substituted.

Converting a bike trailer to a jogging stroller

Kirsten wanted a jogging stroller so I did this quick mod to our bike trailer for her to try out. I Simply made the handle with some aluminum tubing and UHMW supports screwed to the trailer frame, and I repladed the trailer hitch boom with the salvage bike fork. The bike fork was the right size, I just drilled one hole for the pin.

Part Deux

Success on the secord LCD, even after reversing the power polarity and creating a puff of smoke. Lucky, lucky!

mwuh-ha-ha-ha!

How Sweet it is

I am sure this picture is unimpressive to most of you. Just an LCD module with some question marks on it. Well, it is very sweet to me. I was interested in an LCD display to interface with an AVR micro-controller to potentially use in a number of projects including Grant's camera timer.

Retail for a LCD like this is over $20 US plus shipping, but through handy Ebay, I can get them for $3 US plus $3 shipping. $3 to ship from China!

So I got it within 2 weeks and today I tried to test it. Can I just say it took a lot of research and I was stumped about 5 times. Then, as with many of my projects, presto, it all came together and I have ??????????????????? on the screen, and on purpose!

Of course it all seems somewhat elementary now...

Sign Language Help

I just found this cool site that has video clips of sign language. Ok, potentially not earth shattering, but cool none the less.

Born 2 Sign

Hummer Hybrid

I have always been facinated with spoof ads so tonight I took a few minutes to create the ad I had been joking with Kirsten about. Not super high quality, but fun. Stole a pic of an H2 from their website, did a color replacement to make it green, masked and cut out the "mountain meadow" exhaust.

hehehehehe

linux, laptop, wep, wireless..

I am now sitting at my kitchen table writing this blog post. This is significant to me for several reasons:

1) My computer is at my desk, so thus I have got my laptop connected to the internet
2) I connected my laptop wirelessly, thanks to the card Tina gave me!
3) The laptop is running Xbuntu (linux). The laptop can now boot linux or Win98 (which I need to run my CNC.

Ironically I have been putting off doing this for a while, I would start researching it, then get bogged down in the details... Tonight I sat down and was trying AGAIN to test the set up while booting linux from a bootable CD, but that is 2 slow. So I decided it was time to bite the bullet and actually install linux. I went to back up some files only to discover I had done it already. Then, as it turned out I just had to put in the Xbuntu CD and start the laptop and wait... that's it! Eventually I had to turn the WEP off on the router to connect, but nothing else...

go figure

Gates and Roller Blade Wheels

This weekend I built a new gate to keep the kiddies from running away. Notice the garage sale roller blade wheels on the end of the gate!

Metal Detecting and Light Boxes

What do metal detecting and light boxes have in common? Let me tell you a story.

Tonight I decided to try out my $10 garage sale metal detector at the local park, specifically in the sand around the climbing structures. I have only tried out this detector in front of our old apartment and then only found garbage. My goal is to find enough coins to pay for the detector. Even then, just to find one coin with a metal detector had been a bit of a life time goal. After about 20 minutes of nothing but a bottle cap, low and behold I found a 1969 quarter, my first find! That made my day. So when I got home I wanted to take a picture in our light box, but was unhappy with how the light box pictures were turning out. So I rebuild the light box, much better! Below are the pictures of my quarter and at the bottom a picture of the set up. Two halogen flood lights, a small halogen desk lamp in front and a small flashlight to light up the quarter a bit more. It was fun taking the pictures. I think the cars look good in the pictures too. Now, you are thinking, sure the cars make good eye candy, but what's the deal. Well, if you metal detect in the sand at a playground, chances are you will find more than just quarters... the cars are finds 2, 3, 4 and 5! I had a chuckle when I dug up the first one. Jack and Eric will be happy!

As Paul Harvey would say, " And now you know the rest of the story."

SLR Remote Trigger

This is the remote trigger I made for Grant's camera. I got the circuit off the inter-web, it is pretty simple and has buttons for the shutter and auto-focus, and a toggle switch to lock the shutter open on the camera's "bulb" setting. The mini-headphone jack just plugs into the camera. I couldn't decide how long to make the cable so I wired both ends for 4-wire phone cable so Grant can use whatever length cable he wants. If you were wondering, the case for the switches is made from a 35mm film case (not my idea but I liked the irony). I also got to use our spanky label maker I gleaned from work.

Concrete Counter Tops

Kirsten and I have been talking about what can we do in our house, specifically our kitchen, to spruce it up without spending to much money. One idea that has surfaced is doing concrete countertops. I am curious to try it and the cost would be minimal. Best of all if we don't like it, then in a couple years when we have the cash, we do something else. I think of it as the poor man's marble.

Sooo, anybody with any experience? Want some? Here's a link to get you started:

http://www.naturalhandyman.com/iip/author/dcn/conccounter-a.html

Air Horn in 5 minutes

Here is a link to how to make an air horn in 5 minutes with a ballon, straw and film canister.

http://www.metacafe.com/watch/352175/how_to_free_air_horn/

Webster's Online Dictionary

Wow, this is an amazing resource. Go to http://www.websters-online-dictionary.org/definition/dog and hover your mouse over the "Index" icon on the right-hand edge of the page. Check out the translations, for example. Oooo, I love a good language resource!

New Commute Vehicle

Well as you can see I finally bought a moto-bike. :) Sorry Tina you took to long with a price on your beamer. So this is it!

I got a brand new 2007 Piaggio Typhoon Scooter. Yep I go 60km all out lol. But It also saved me about $20 in gas the first week. (This is just to and back from work). It also gives Brenda a vehicle for the summer when the Terrors are not in school and she needs to farm them out some where to keep her sanity. At least that was the story I was using as a major selling point to get the bike.

It has been a week of commuting now and I've changed the route to work so I'm only on roads where possible that the speed limit is 60km/h. With the changes I have only added about 5min to my trip. I drive less kms but I stop and start more. Brenda also has a car during the week. Not to mention with gas at $1.10 a liter I fill about 2 times a week at about $4 a tank and I get about 100km per tank. My gas tank is just over a gallon. So I guess I get about 70-80 mpg. Did I mention that Brenda has a car during the week?

Bike specs:
Type: Single cylinder, two-stroke
Displacement: 49cc
Bore & Stroke: 1.57in X 1.54in (40.0mm X 39.3mm)
Fuel : Unleaded
Induction: Reed valve in crankcase
Lubrication: Separate with automatic mixer
Ignition: Electronic by capacitive discharge (CDI)
Start: Electric
Cooling: Air with forced ventilation
Transmission: Automatic CVT (Continuously Variable Transmission)
Clutch: Automatic centrifuge type

Sketchup Challenge Entry

I made two objects (obvious shapes). I drew a line to aid in lining things up. I grouped the pipe to aid in selecting. I moved the "keyslot" shape into position and pulled it through the pipe.

With the objects intersected as shown in the above image, select one object and "intersect with model" Do the same for the other object.

Delete the excess material. This takes very little time and is as precise as need be.

Google Sketchup Challenge

I was playing around with Google Sketchup last night and was teaching myself some Techneaks so I wouldn't be so frustrated. It is amazing how if you learn a few things, everything is so much easier. I seem to be in a challenge mood so here is another challenge: create the object below in 3D. Actual dimensions of colors not important, just a piece of pipe with a hole drilled through it and a notch cut out of it. If anybody expresses interest I could post a how to tutorial after. Here is my hint of the day: in Sketchup, sometimes it is impossible to select the center of a circle you already created. Simple draw a guide line from the edge of the circle ANYWHERE across the surface of the circle. Now you can easily select the center... must be a bug.

Anyhow perhaps everyone can post a comment to say if you like me posting "challenges" here.

Trike Jig Revisited

I thought I had better explain my trike jig problem. Observe the picture to the left. Observe that if you were trying to square it up (the 2 tubes relative to each other and the floor) then there really isn't any place you can put a square. And even if you could, it couldn't be near any of the tube bends, because the tube flares out-of-round there too. See my problem.





I did however stumble onto an interesting solution (I hope). I had this 3/4" melamine with copious amounts of holes for shelving. By screwing the 2 pieces to make the corner they are automatically perpendicular to the desk, and the main tube is very easily zip-tied in place via the peg holes. Thus the main tube is now correctly positioned! Now I have to do something similar with the cross tube to level it, square it to the desk surface and to the other tube. This all works nicely for being able to take the set up out to the garage later to weld it without much disassembly. Thanks to Grant for talking me through how to take the next step and Lara for giving me the peg board shelves!

Spring Gleaning #2

Well, it is another garbage eve on Kingston Row. Today's gleanings include one complete bicycle (an old Miele 10 speed) with flat tires, one Peugeot bike frame without tires, a pogo stick that will need a bit of TLC, and a DeWalt saw case which will not yet quite fit my saw. The bikes were within the first 500m!

Contest: Design a Jig

Here is a challenge for you Techneakians!

I need to weld my 2 main tubes for the Ruzter Trike! They have to be aligned square on about 5 different planes!

The contest is to suggest the easiest way to build a jig that ensures the tubes are square to each other and the ground! Assume you have a flat surface to work on.

Here are the 2 pieces and some pics of how they are supposed to fit together (they are not square in the pics). One note that might not be obvious. the cross tube (smaller V shaped tube) has 2 flat plates welded on the ends. Two of the edges of that plate will be perpendicular to the floor when properly aligned (look at the second pic), but the other 2 edges (top and bottom) are cut irregularly and can be used for aligning. The bolt holes in the plates are drilled exactly the same and are at 12 degrees to perpendicular.

Post your ideas in the comments, of if you have a drawing, post it as a separate post!

Thanks, questions welcome.

Tape Measures for Dummies

A friend of mine put me on to the tape measures they sell at Rona. Notice that the fractions of an inch are actually marked so you don't have to count the marks every time... I love it!

Saving Your Photographs

Here's a quick tutorial on fixing faded or under/over exposed photos using a photo editor. I received this photo in a group of family photos. Obviously it's seen better days, and while I can't restore the edges that are torn off I can fix the fading in it. Before I would have probably upped the contrast and tried to fix it that way, but this doesn't usually give you enough control: enter the curves tool. (Curves tools are common in many photo editing packages including Photoshop, Gimp, and PhotoImpact.) Basically what it does is let you control an input tone and stretch or compress it to give a particular output tone. In plain language, you can control if a certain shade of grey in your black and white photograph will become a darker or lighter shade of grey. Or if your photo is faded, if some of your darker greys should actually become black. I've also used curves to fix photos that were way too dark because of not enough light or flash, basically salvaging a photo where nothing was visible to make it fairly presentable. For a much more detailed tutorial you can check out this link. Curves can also be used on colour photographs to change the tone of the picture and the light in it. It's a very powerful tool, one I'm just starting to learn. Perhaps Grant will also be able to give us some pointers in this area?

Have Tricycle Will Travel

On the topic of gleaning, here is a picture of the tricycle I got at the recycling centre for the boys. They now have 3, but you can never have enough ticycles. I think I will weld on a trailer hitch so Jack can pull his wagon, not because he needs to, but because I can.