Elevator shaft
Going up?
| 
~ pjvenda / blog
90% of the effort required to change this:
into this:
(which is awfully similar to this:)
was invested on a Cascade Style Sheet.
HTML+CSS can be about as good as LaTeX.
Moto Guzzi Griso 8V. A clever looking pure italian bike.
This is the first post in a "photo blog" style that I may start to introduce on this blog as well.
Cheers, PJ.
The stuff you learn as you go along ...
... needs to be shared with those that might not know yet.
When my Virago would not start two weekends ago, I and my friend jump-started it off his own bike. Once warm it would start again normally, so we set off for a 120 mile ride and I attributed the problem to myself: "I just flooded it when I first pushed "start" but now the alternator should get things in place again..." But that did not happen. Since then the bike did not start again without help, that is. It only fired up again with the help of the car's battery. I could jump-start it from the car, go for my ride and hope that it would start again (while warm).
Troubleshooting begins:
Seems obvious - it's a weak or half-dead battery.
Immediately I ordered a fancy charger (yes, it's blue! but in my defense, it was not my choice) to check and charge the battery, which failed miserably because it has not been delivered yet... Seems to be out of stock everywhere, I should have known better... Well, before the charger comes in, I figured I would do what I could to get more information out of the situation.
The exact model of the battery is Yuasa Yumicron YB12AL-A2. It's a lead-antimony type 12V 12Ah motorcycle battery. Yuasa kindly provide this very insightful document in their website summarising the technologies behind their ranges of batteries and how they fit into different types of requirements.
Before even taking it out, I noticed that no fluid could be seen around the MAX or MIN levels. Either because the plastic was too opaque or because the level was not even close to those levels. Next thing was measuring voltage levels in different situations: no load, loaded but engine not running, engine running. Results were approximately:
Aside from potential regulator/rectifier issues, I saw nothing particularly alarming here. So I took the battery out to have a good look at it. This visual inspection revealed the following:
All sorts of trouble may arise from semi-dry batteries, including quicker corrosion of internal and external materials due to increased acid concentration and electrical properties must change as well - from internal resistance, maximum current output, voltages, etc - nothing tolerable in the medium/long term.
What I cannot understand is how a completely dry battery could conduct *any* current, as it did. I would expect a battery to fail gradually before being completely dry which was not the case. A bit of misleading research led me to believe that this particular model of battery soaked the fluid (into some material) which would explain why it would not drip... True or false I don't know yet, as I could not find that information again. Oh, and there is also the little detail about: "Is the dry battery a cause or a symptom?" - I do not know yet.
If the battery was dead I would need to replace it. But it could also be brought back to life by filling it with de-ionised water and recharging. Having nothing to loose, I bought one liter of de-ionised water and (carefully) poured it in. [bloody filling holes must be made to be filled with seringes!!]
Immediately I measured a drop in voltage of about 1V. Back on the bike, I re-measured its voltage just to double-check that things were OK. Turned it on, re-checked things quickly, hit START and it fired-up promptly! Once more I measured voltages with the engine off and on, empty and loaded (lights on).
With the engine running, the electrical system should be mostly (or totally) powered by the alternator (stator/generator) through the regulator/rectifier, while at the same time recharging the battery for the next start-up (voltage at battery terminals should be >12V). This makes sense and my measurements are consistent. However, three things are still concerning me:
Battery is still good just needs maintenance. The least of my worries is buying a new battery.
Either the stator/generator or the regulator/rectifier (or both) systems are frying the battery. Not nice as the following might have to be replaced:
While at it, why not read a bit more about the whole charging system. Knowledge is power.
Bye for now.
[1]: "Dog's bollox' syndrome", autistic geekiness, paranoid overkill network admin, will to learn. Call it what you like, I don't care.
This is about my home network. I've been getting my hands on some Cisco kit because it has always been a technology I wanted to learn about. After gathering a few newer or older devices, I was able to re-do my home network, with separated user, management, service and DMZ networks - done with the good help of ACLs, NATting and inter-VLAN routing. Internal services are explicitly accessible or transparently proxied, external service are NATted into the DMZ network. I am even setting up a direct Internet access network as fall back. Most of this stuff is provided over Wired Ethernet and 802.11g Wireless. Why? See [1] (top of post).
It all looks like this at the moment:
At the moment, the following devices compose and actively participate in this horrible wire mesh that I call "home network":
[A random network diagram I ripped off the Internet for illustration purposes only. Mine is hand-written.]
I also learnt that Cisco is a huge corporation in such a good market position that allows charging of hefty sums for hardware and licensing together with software limitations on their devices (dependent on licensing levels). This is not easy for me to swallow. But I must say that their documentation is terrific in every aspect! In particular the following guides are absolutely top-notch in content and references:
After about a month offline, I managed to bring my website back. It's now hosted in Canada attached to a nice big 100Mbit/s network pipe.
It's also been slightly updated with a nice little flickr photo of my collection shown in every page.
Other changes include a new domain registrar, DNS system and domain name to which my stuff will slowly be ported to. I will maintain the old domain indefinitely but things should redirect to the new one. So have a look:
My website is down. Sorry for that. I'm moving and at the moment about everything that I own is packed in a non-useable dining room. Including the server with my website.
I need to sort out some DSL service, pull a phone extension and plug things back to get the website back up. Should take a few days, though...
So bear with me, I'll be back.
Cheers, PJ.
Funny how I think of starting every post with an "I'm not dead" (like the old lady in the Quest for the Holy Grail...). But it's true, I'm not dead - I'm just not a good blogger, that's all.
Sure there are other news about me but the recent and cool one was that I test rode a Harley-Davidson Sportster 883R.
I took the oportunity of HD's marketing campaign "Judgement days" and signed up for a test ride of a Sportster 883 Iron. What I really wanted was to see how well I could handle its weight (the XL883 weights 251Kg whereas my XV535 weights 182Kg), how good was the riding position (me being 1.6m tall or 5"3'), and how strong was the Evolution 883cc engine.
So I got there, the guy literally asked: "so, which one do you want to try?" (which, I think, is something you don't get asked often...) and I signed the form that essentially said: "if you screw up, you're on your own. if you die, it's not our fault".
Then I was given the quick walkthrough over the controls etc and finally I was given the key: "get back within 45min. good luck and enjoy!". What a mixed feeling of "Ohhh boy!!" with "God, what am I doing?". I geared up, whilst mentally planning my route and pushed the starter. That was loud!
\begin{Jeremy Clarkson impersonation}- Would I buy it?
...
- Nnno.
It is too loud, the handlebars are too far, the tank is too small and that seat is rubbish.
\end{Jeremy Clarkson impersonation}Very quick post - only the news of the year!
I'm still lousy at this. But I'm taking a break from my stressful (?) blogging routine until sometime next month, in 2009.
Here's a short wish list of mine for next year:
* I would like to improve my photography technique. I would like to have a Canon EOS 5D mkII on my budget as well as a new tripod, at least two decent lenses and bibble 5 (which is proving to be a difficult birth). I will upload stuff to flickr.
* Some really exciting stuff is happening at the beginning of next year, which will be a worthy blog post when done. Until then, it's a surprise (even for me, to a certain level).
* I am also looking forward to book my leisure flight on a Cessna or a Piper somewhere in the UK - courtesy of my lovely wife. That will be amazing and bring me closer to aviation in a techie kind of way. A baloon ride would be excellent as well :)
* I will do a bit more of travelling around but that isn't well determined, yet. I know I'm going to Prague, but that's it so far.
* I *need* to do some go-Karting again as well as, perhaps, another track day experience.
* I should blog more often. I know that some of my friends read this sorry excuse of a blog so, it is in my best interest that they be informed of what's going on on this side of the channel that deserves being blogged about. But that's not always an easy task. Also my techie reviews and rants are sure to be useful for someone...
* I will update my website more often and, more importantly, with new interesting material. This includes interfacing with blogger and flickr.
So long. Back next year.
Until then: Cheers, PJ.
