See more at the gallery or movies Did I mention I race rally cars? Red Rocket Rally

Charger - Flash - Rally

Friday, June 24, 2022
	Moulting in Action by brian @ 12:41:48 - [perma-link] I was watching the dwarf crayfish just now and one of them was looking weird. It was laying on its side, rocking back and forth. I thought it was sick, then noticed the shell peeling away from the head. It very slowly pulls the head back out of the front, then it seems to jump out the back between the head and tail. If you pause the video and step through at the end, you can see it pop out, swim a stroke away, pause and then jump out of view with another stroke. So cool!
movie (click to play)
Sunday, June 19, 2022
	New Addition to the Small Tank by brian @ 10:19:14 - [perma-link] A Brazos Dwarf Crawfish! The pH in this tank doesn’t promote the blue color. I am setting up another tank for a lower pH (and higher maintenance), but this critter arrived sooner than the tank cycled. I don’t know if this one is male or female, but, uh, it’s one of a dozen (I ordered 10, which is kind of a lot, it turns out), so I probably have some of each. I’ll figure it out in a few weeks when they are big enough to distinguish. This will turn into an informal pH experiment eventually. I really want some blue ones. I think I’m going to need a bigger tank. Ooooh! Upside down thumbnail, so its not just a landscape portrait thing! There must be an EXIF for phone orientation, because I had my phone flipped with the lenses on the low side (shutter button to the left) to take this pic at the bottom of the tank. Width and Height used to be enough on the Danger Sidekick!
Friday, June 17, 2022
	Organized the Print Farm by brian @ 17:33:52 - [perma-link] I’ve had this on the back burner for a while, only using the 3 printers I had hooked up, and dealing with the loose cords tripping up the robot vacuum. Now all 5 printers and 3 Raspberry Pis running Octoprint are connected and usable. The Anycubic is printing great with the 0.8 nozzle. Maybe .567 layers needed too much volume. I lowered it to 0.486 and the problems seem to have vanished. Prusa was working fine, but I haven’t been using it for the last few weeks. I got more food-safe filament, so I’ll get it going again. The MPMD up top still runs like a champ. I had a firmware scare and thought I had bricked it. It turned out to be the wrong formatting on the SD card. I’ll load it back up with flexible filament and put it to work again, too. “Reilly and Jonesy” on the bottom, both controlled by the raspberry pi “Katy-kat”, probably need some maintenance. Extruder calibration (because I finally did that on the others and wow what a difference), and software upgrades. And recalibrate the beds.
Wednesday, June 15, 2022
	Morning Roast by brian @ 11:02:14 - [perma-link] I’m roasting some Sumatra Lintong Pak Joner coffee beans from Sweet Maria’s. This is the next to last pound of beans from the order I did last summer. 15 lbs of beans lasted me almost a year! I have another 450g of Espresso Monkey Blend to roast in a week or so, but I think it is time to order some more. I’ve been roasting beans with this contraption for about a year and a half.
Monday, June 13, 2022
	Meet the Heathers! by brian @ 19:19:41 - [perma-link] Like from the movie. I got 4 Emerald Eye Rasboras today. One of them wasn’t schooling with the other 3. I thought these 3 were just being snobby, but the 4th one died after about an hour, so maybe I was being judgemental. Anyway the name sticks, and I’ll have to go get another Veronica. The fish store is getting more “nano” fish next week, so I’ll go back and get another tiny school. These ones are about 3/4 of an inch long and won’t get much bigger. I can have (relatively) lots of them in my 10 gallon tank!
Friday, June 10, 2022
	Algae eater doing its thing by brian @ 11:14:13 - [perma-link] I got an algae eater fish (I forget the species) for my 3 gallon aquarium. A while back I moved the tank near my 10 gallon aquaponics setup, and the grow light let algae go wild. After a filter change and a little bit of cleanup, that fish keeps the small tank spotless. Yesterday I decided to clean the mush neglected 10 gallon tank. I took an algae covered marble from that tank and put it in the 3 gallon. The algae eater took to it pretty quickly. Now the marble is clean! The algae eater also has a buddy, a Mexican dwarf crawfish (Cambarellus Photobombus, or something like that). The 10 gallon got a good cleaning. I removed all the decorations and soaked them clean, then rinsed and dechlorinated before putting some of them back in. The gravel bottom got a good vacuuming, after I watched some informative YouTube videos (thanks Aquarium Co-op!), and I wiped down the glass. I think it looks great! I hope the little algae eater can keep this one clean, too!
Thursday, June 9, 2022
	Is this on? by brian @ 18:02:29 - [perma-link] I decided to revive my photoblog, after bailing on Facebook. The backend needed a few changes, and I need a new way to submit posts, since the old way doesn’t work anymore. I guess it is working!
	Chihuly by brian @ 18:21:35 - [perma-link] Testing multiple images. Looks like I have a bug in the thumbnail generator that does not rotate images properly. I'll have to look into that. But happy that this is working well enough for now.
Tuesday, April 12, 2011
	The Red Rocket Rides Again! by brian @ 22:18:24 - [perma-link] Dan, Sam and I worked long into the night, then Dan came by again today. The engine is in and runs. Brakes are (probably) still good from a few days ago. It has bumpers, wheels, HotBits suspension and its not leaking. Tomorrow it gets lights, a windshield, seatbelt, rear windows (one plexi, one glass) mudflaps, and ... an alignment, and maybe i'll fix the speedo if i don't think of something else. Look for us at the Global Rallycross this Friday and Saturday on ESPN3.com!
Saturday, February 12, 2011
	Brewing with Bre and Jonathan by brian @ 19:23:35 - [perma-link] Our friends in Walnut Creek have made an accelerated foray into brewing beer. He's made 8 batches in just about 2 months. And they're pretty good. Rebecca and I helped bottle and IPA and brew a batch of "Jamil's Chocolate Hazelnut Porter. In a few weeks it will be beer.
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