Brian’s Morning Newsletter July 2nd 2009

Good Morning
The Google group Brian’s Morning Newsletter is finally closed. It served us well through our transitions. In a unceremonious tap of the finger, BMN GG is gone. I imagine I’ll be hearing from some of you as the group was being used as an email server for some of us, myself included. Anyway, it was no big deal, I simply open my Thunderbird address book and put an email address back in the BMN mailing list, which by the way, is moving back toward fifty, yet still a far cry from the 150 is was a month ago. Where did the other hundred addresses go? Hmmm, good question. We haven’t heard from them in a while, so I dropped them, simple as that. I figure if they want back in they can write me and ask.

The point is we are back to having one place to write in to the group. http://outfitnm.com/forum We still have a few holdouts for the old way of doing things. Joe VonRodeck for instance sends links to great music videos almost every day, I wish he would share them with the group and post on the forum. You can make your own topic Joe, if you need help please let me or Hugh know and we’ll be happy to set you up a place to archive you work. Mike Kitts still sends me stuff which is informative, I wish he would post it on the forum. There is a place on the forum for everything, unlike the BMN Google group I’m not going to limit the forum to any particular subject.

Always wanted to rant? We have a place to do your thing, The Outfit > General Category > General Discussion
Here is a sample of the subjects being discussed in the General Discussion forum section as of this morning:

Subject	Started by	Replies	Views	Last post
		Health care Reform	eric	6	35	July 01, 2009, 03:29:38 PM by Wesley Sandel
		150 years!	Wesley Sandel	4	6	July 01, 2009, 02:21:32 PM by Wesley Sandel
		Forum Tech Talk	lololma	9	67	July 01, 2009, 05:39:12 AM by boss
		We’re the real Americans	Wesley Sandel	4	11	July 01, 2009, 05:12:57 AM by boss
		Time stamp off?	nickjandrews	4	6	July 01, 2009, 04:34:59 AM by boss
		Cap and Trade	Steve	3	14	June 30, 2009, 09:20:05 PM by JDogger
		For-profit-health-care, why not for-profit fire departments?	boss	7	26	June 29, 2009, 03:04:04 PM by boss
		BMN Google Group go Bye Bye	admin	4	31	June 29, 2009, 02:50:03 PM by boss
		Kevin	mbkcrs	7	47	June 25, 2009, 06:02:52 PM by admin
		Bike lanes for everyone!	admin	4	18	June 25, 2009, 04:54:48 PM by Wesley Sandel
		What’s with the stars and ratings?	eric	6	17	June 25, 2009, 03:07:29 PM by Steve
		Re: cars killing as much as smoking?	admin	0	11	June 20, 2009, 01:58:23 PM by admin
		Hitch ‘em up	mbkcrs	3	9	June 19, 2009, 06:31:28 AM by admin
		Algae energy comes to NM	mbkcrs	1	14	June 09, 2009, 05:20:24 AM by admin
		A Round of Thank You « 1 2 »	JDogger	16	83	June 08, 2009, 09:18:21 AM by JDogger
		Outdoor kitchen	mbkcrs	10	85	June 01, 2009, 09:47:38 PM by JDogger
		Gotta new thread	mbkcrs	1	34	May 12, 2009, 06:35:39 PM by JDogger
		So if ya wanna start a new thread…	JDogger	1	29	May 12, 2009, 12:30:37 PM by mbkcrs
		Welcome to SMF!	Simple Machines	5	79	April 09, 2009, 07:47:14 AM by lololma

I borrowed my brother Jackson’s camera for this mornings photo-survey of the local wildlife  but the timing was off a bit. I woke later than usual, and we have neighbors in their remote adobe cabin across the valley visiting so no elk this morning. We played with Jack’s camera last evening while sitting on the old park bench overlooking the garden. It has a fairly decent zoom function combined with a ten fold increase in mega-pixels we should be able to get better pictures for y’all.

I’m still waiting impatiently for word on the turbocharger repair. I sent them a letter yesterday, but received nothing in reply. This is making a knot in my stomach, but today I go to town and work with Louie laminating boards for the next set of turbine blades. Lou has the idea to use three different types of wood for the next generation of wood blades. One of the problems we have is the knife edge of the blade is so thin the wood is weakened. Louie and I hope Maple on the trailing edge will be stronger where it is thin, and in the middle we’ll use Douglas fir and for the leading edge Lodgepole pine. I’ll meet him at his shop on Valencia and together we’ll see if we can create our first custom lamination from multiple wood varieties.

We are still hopeful that Kevin will make an appearance after the Rainbow Gathering next week so he can make a few modifications to the CAD software. For one thing I have been thinking of building a longer set of blades to give us more lift and gain more power from the wind.  I’ve spent considerable time watching our wind turbine work and it seems like it gets up to speed then slows even though the wind is picking up. Apparently the alternator never reaches optimal RPMs. The output of our wind turbine remains dismally low, indeed, almost 25% below rated output. I’m determined to fix this issue and hopeful that a new set of blades will make all the difference in the way our homemade wind turbine make electricity.

Okally dokally, I better let you go, I hope we see what you have to say over on the forum
http://outfitnm.com/forum

Oh boy good comics this morning

Political Comics