The Sorcerer's Progress (Page 41 of 62)

Status: I just got a couple of reviews to do.  I spent much of Friday trying to to convince my body that it should either want me awake or asleep but not both.  Did some errands on Saturday, then started arguing with my body again.  Threw some stuff out and rewrote.  (How do some of the people here keep turning stuff out!  I hope that practice helps.)

Finished wiring the new version of the 12-volt LDO supply--and found that I made a couple of serious errors because I couldn't keep the thing straight working upside-down.  (Should have gotten sleep instead.)  Fixed it.

Then I realized that I used a larger heat-sink, and it wouldn't fit next to the LEDs epoxied into the case sides.  I cut the heat sink down--a really ugly hatchet job.

It worked perfectly--except that the voltage divider that sets the turn-off threshold was off.  The tolerances on the resistors in the voltage divider added in the worst possible way.  I replaced them with a 100k multiturn trimpot.
In the process I cut one wrong resistor lead (replaced the whole resistor) and somehow created a short circuit that made the whole thing go haywire.

With that fixed (and some heat-shrink over various twisted leads) I got it working nicely.  Then I discovered that the heat sink also interfered with the circuit board mount.  I used a composition cutoff disk this time.  It's still a hatchet job.

As I was wiring the circuit board into the box (with its strain-reliefed wires) I managed to sever the main ground line.  But I did the fix and a pigtail with the same piece of wire.

And then I discovered that the cover wouldn't fit.  I needed to clip off 1/10'' off two corners off the circuit board.

Oh, and one of the two ground contacts in the power plug isn't really connected.  They also make a VERY tight contact.

BUT the box works.  Nicely.  I can recharge my iSound boxes in the car now.

I have six tasks listed to get the next project finished.  Some are mechanical, some electronic.  Some are well-defined, some less so.

Meanwhile, some ideas came to me in the shower.  It will take me at least half an hour to reconstruct them and another to put them together cleanly enough to go in the notebooks.  BUT they may play a major thematic part and maybe help round out Melayne's thread in Book 2.  (And maybe it will show up back in Lifspynth as well.)

First, two reviews and one to reply to.  Then try for this next approach to my next (current project) chapter in B2.

Girl Genius has been running for 16 years.  The Dreamland Chronicles has taken 13 years (with a major interruption) to approach its final chapter.  Unfortunately, the author of Lovecraft Is Missing did not live to finish his story.

You're in much better shape than I am.

Notes more or less reconstructed, but not distilled.

Turns out there is another problem with my little box.  Aargh!  Okay, a couple more hours.  I have a pretty good idea of what's up.

After sleep and maybe 5 hrs of electronics, I'll switch back to the chapter,

Nope, not it.  Or not completely.  Sigh.  I'm going to have to breadboard this durned thing.
First guess is that the LP0701's transfer curve isn't as sharp as the datasheets indicate.

I can reduce the resistances.  I'll also try adding a 5.1v zener in for the voltage drop.  I've got a few in stock, courtesy of closeout sales at two local Radio Snacks.

And I got one and half of the other electronic tasks done.  Another one this evening.

One review just finished.  A longer, more difficult one next.

Got two important task items done on the one electronic project.  Mostly mechanical, quite simple, but it requires the kind of patient care I'm not good at.  Everything fits, or will when I trim away an unneeded boss.  I had to improvise a little, but the binding posts are well within tolerance to take a double banana plug.    They're off by 1/64" or so--just enough that the eye sees something wrong--but everything's workable.  And the holes for the mounting screws line up nicely.  There's only about 1/128" excess between the #8 clearance hole and the 11/64" bits I have.

I'm setting those notes aside to mellow and going back to Merran's arrival at the Acadamy.

Why oh why??

I'm telling President Trump you're making a tactical nuclear weapon in there

I thought it was before and after pics, before I realised it's above and below pics! It's been a while since I've played with electronics ... almost 30 years.

Hillary is not happy with this, K!!!!

Some days I could swear you're rebuilding the NJ power grid. PSE&G needs serious work. When NYC blacked out many years ago, the stories at the time were about how fragile the whole grid is and that it could have easily brought down several states. After a week or two, nobody gave a damn.

pft, where's the faith?! I think njc can take down the whole eastern seaboard!