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

Charger - Flash - Rally

Tuesday, May 15, 2007
	Almost ready for Olympia by brian @ 15:17:09 - [perma-link] We leave for the Olympus Rally on Friday (I think). Josh and I spent tonight finishing up the roll cage and a few other required items. The Corolla now has a working horn, a license plate light, sill bars, a main-hoop V, and stronger seat brackets located to fit me, rather than the 6'2" previous driver. Tomorrow I'll figure out the gas tank skid plate and bleed the brakes and clutch. And about a dozen other things. It looks like we're going to make it!
Tuesday, May 8, 2007
	My First Rallycross! by brian @ 09:03:46 - [perma-link] A few weeks ago I found a rally car for sale on craigslist. I had searched for "go cart" and the description for the rally car said, "handles like a go cart". Good job on the marketing! On Sunday I raced it in my first Rallycross (ever!) at the Washington County Fairgrounds in Hillsboro. It was so much fun! And the car totally kicks ass. So many people kept coming up and asking, "is that the one that was on craigslist?" Its a 1988 Toyota Corolla FX-16 GTS. It has the good motor. Its front wheel drive. Cold air intake, free-flowing exhaust, fully caged (well, mostly caged... about 3 bars short of Rally-America stage rally standards), racing seats (welded into place for the 6'2" previous driver... gotta move it forward 2", hence the foam pads in the seat), and 3 sets of wheels with one good set of rally tires. I don't know much about Corollas, yet, but I'm learning more each time someone comes up and asks me what it is. Lots of them know way more about it than I do. It turned out to be a great find. I was only 1 second off the 3rd place time on my last run. I have to attribute most of that to the car, since it was my first time racing on dirt. I'm totally hooked now, so I should be competitive once I get more experience.
Wednesday, May 2, 2007
	What the Hail? by brian @ 14:22:28 - [perma-link] Flash and I just got back from our walk and were inside maybe 2 minutes before I heard the first shot of thunder, then the tik-tik-tik-tik-tik of hail on the roof. Flash is really confused. Now that it's just raining again, I let him out in the yard to check t out. He's running around like a crazy monkey.
Friday, March 16, 2007
	Looping forwards, revisited by brian @ 16:02:22 - [perma-link] This is even funnier. Because windows mobile sucks (i can't take the blame all to myself!), I forgot to attach the images. On the sidekick, I could select multiple pictures and email them. Windows mobile only lets me start a message with 1 picture. But I digress. Here are the pics...
Wednesday, March 14, 2007
	Looping forwards by brian @ 21:00:18 - [perma-link] This is too funny. I guess it takes 7 bounces before a letter gets too thick and gets booted out of the automatic sorter.
Monday, March 12, 2007
	Bonfire at Pete's wedding by brian @ 14:59:18 - [perma-link] Lesley and I are in Santa Cruz for a wedding. A couple of us just built a big bonfire on the beach. Congrats Pete and Donna!
Monday, March 5, 2007
	A Little Less Sunshine by brian @ 17:16:18 - [perma-link] I watched "Little Miss Sunshine" a couple of weeks ago. It was a little slow for my tastes, but the payoff at the end was worth the wait. I also enjoyed the troubles they had ith their VW Bus, so I had to chuckle (well, maybe not) when the next time I tried to drive my Vanagon the clutch pedal flopped right to the floor, and the shared brake/clutch reservoir was bone dry. It made great story for Oscar night. Today I replaced the slave cylinder for the clutch. It was just in time, as I found a warning from the Police under the wiper blade this morning. It was nice that Officer "V1" didn't peel and stick it. Now the clutch feels nice and firm, it grabs predictably, and the shifts are much smoother. I wonder what's next.
Friday, January 19, 2007
	The Vanagon has a new stance! by brian @ 14:47:30 - [perma-link] I've been wondering how the ride would feel with the twist-in spring spacers removed from the Vanagon for a while now. Today I decided to pull them. Just the front ones. I drove around the block and it definitely feels lower. It feels way lower than it actually, physically moved, probably since I'm looking slightly down when facing forward. I didn't notice much of a real difference in handling in the neighborhood. I'll see how it is on the highway tonight.
	Making things is fun by brian @ 15:01:01 - [perma-link] Last night I built this shelf for the table out in the garage. Most of the stuff that had been piled up on the table is now up out of the way, so I have a big workspace. I picked up a 4-foot 12-outlet power strip at Fry's, and mounted it across the back underneath the lower shelf. More accurately, I built the shelf unit around the power strip. Now I can plug in pretty much everthing, and all the plugs and chargers are out of my way. I ran the Roomba to pick up the sawdust while I was putting things away. About halfway through its job, I decided to start recording it with CoolCamera on my mobile phone. I had it doing motion-detect so it wouldn't snap shots when the Roomba was out of frame, and after a little while I got a clue and stopped moving the camera around to try to follow it.
movie (click to play)
Thursday, January 18, 2007
	Remote power button for the Mac Mini by brian @ 12:05:28 - [perma-link] For some reason (more in a bit) when I have my Mac Mini in my Vanagon, it doesn't power on when I turn the key like it should. I end up having to slide my seat back and squeeeeeeze my hand through the gap under the seat to reach behind the mini to press the power button. This little mod will save my knuckles. It may even solve the power-on problem. As it turns out, the old crimped connection between the itty-bitty wire coming from inside the Mac (its a Y-adapter from mp3car.com in the ...uh... Carnetix 1900 (the automotive computer power supply that I use) to Mac Mini connector kit) to the power supply jumper wire had broken loose, so the on pulse from the power supply was never reaching the Mac. The soldered connection should solve that problem, because it did work some of the time. If not, I'll have the red button hanging out somewhere I can reach it easily enough.
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