tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2515622009-08-10T11:07:35.373-07:00Chaos TerminalYou thinkin' lobster? Heh! I'm thinkin' Burger King.Mikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09453608116212023909noreply@blogger.comBlogger1096125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-251562.post-9037021453309720032009-08-10T11:06:00.001-07:002009-08-10T11:07:06.326-07:00My blog has moved!I'm now posting over at <a href="http://www.bibik.org/blog/">http://www.bibik.org/blog/</a>. I may or may not keep the Blogger area alive.<div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/251562-903702145330972003?l=www.bibik.org%2FCT'/></div>Mikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09453608116212023909noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-251562.post-72006481899591793122008-12-31T12:22:00.000-08:002008-12-31T12:27:06.843-08:00Cable cleanup!Spurred by the addition of a lovely Blu-ray player from my lovely girlfriend, I decided to finally clean up the rats nest behind my entertainment center:<br /><br /><img src="http://photos-d.ak.fbcdn.net/photos-ak-snc1/v1973/215/11/2221438/n2221438_46340411_2593.jpg" /><br /><br />Using about 40 velcro cable ties, I was able to reduce the 37-wire rat nest into this simple arrangement:<br /><br /><img src="http://photos-g.ak.fbcdn.net/photos-ak-snc1/v1973/215/11/2221438/n2221438_46340414_3485.jpg" /><br /><br />I'd be able to get rid of 14 of those wires if I went to HDMI. I can't afford a new receiver just yet.<div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/251562-7200648189959179312?l=www.bibik.org%2FCT'/></div>Mikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09453608116212023909noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-251562.post-58093354435683248952008-12-17T15:53:00.001-08:002008-12-17T15:55:20.312-08:00Beautiful sentiment from Hemingway:<div><span ><p style="font-size: 13px; font-family: Arial; margin-top: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px; ">INTERVIEWER<br />Could you say something of this process? When do you work? Do you keep to a strict schedule?</p><p style="font-size: 13px; font-family: Arial; margin-top: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px; ">HEMINGWAY<br />When I am working on a book or story I write every morning as soon after first light as possible. There is no one to disturb you and it is cool or cold and you come to your work and warm as you write. You read what you have written and, as you always stop when you know what is going to happen next, you go on from there. You write until you come to a place where you still have your juice and you know what will happen next and you stop and try to live through until the next day when you hit it again. You have started at six in the morning, say, and may go on until noon or be through before that. When you stop you are as empty, and at the same time never empty but filling, as when you have made love to someone you love. Nothing can hurt you, nothing can happen, nothing means anything until the next day when you do it again. It is the wait until the next day that is hard to get through.</p></span></div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/251562-5809335443568324895?l=www.bibik.org%2FCT'/></div>Mikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09453608116212023909noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-251562.post-86531327473633560372008-09-26T11:56:00.001-07:002008-09-26T12:13:15.801-07:00I love Craigslist but I abhor their search and categoriesCraigslist is a bastion of depravity and deals, home of the creep and the cheap... I've sold quite a few items on CL, mostly items that would be prohibitive to ship and thus I wouldn't want to put on eBay. I've sold mostly furniture and gave away a few things like a queen bed frame. Selling items is easy, especially if the buyer can use keywords properly. If someone is looking for an IKEA dining table, using "IKEA dining table" as your search terms would bring up perfect results. The problem hits when you are searching for something without clear-cut keywords.<div><br /></div><div>My example would be my current search for an inexpensive road bike. Sure, CL has a "Bicycles" section. Sure, I can set a maximum price of $400. Sure, I can only pull up results with a picture. Beyond that, my hands are tied. What terms do I use to narrow the results? Right now, that search brings up 855 results. I'm looking for a road bike, so what happens if I add "road" to the search? I'm down to a manageable 98 results but I have LOST potential bikes. The most basic of posts would just say "Cheap bike - $40" and boom, I wouldn't see that bike. </div><div><br /></div><div>How would I fix that problem? Since I'm only looking for bikes that have pictures, an image view for the results would be handy. I can quickly determine if the result is a BMX, mountain, cruiser or road bike. CL could also use categories, but most sellers would be too lazy to categorize properly. Having "bikes" versus "bike parts" would help tremendously though. Another solution would be the proper use of negative keywords so I could explicitly exclude the bike types I do not want. CL seems to only support a few of these keywords otherwise a "-mountain -BMX -kid -kids -women -womens -cruiser" search would work just fine.</div><div><br /></div><div>The second issue is sizing. Some people use the proper frame sizing in their listing, others give a random dimension or even state the height of the person they believe the bike would fit. If you search for "56", results that list "56cm" would not come up. Again, this is a seller issue, not a CL issue.</div><div><br /></div><div>Third-parties have provided solutions, but CL blocks almost every single one. <a href="http://pipes.yahoo.com/pipes/">Yahoo Pipes</a> had amazing results for CL searches, but BAM blocked. CL is not making money off these searches, but come on. They are basically just taking their ball and going home. They could easily partner up with a service like Pipes, having those search results also link to their for-fee services. </div><div><br /></div><div>I'm just frustrated and want a cheap bike.</div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/251562-8653132747363356037?l=www.bibik.org%2FCT'/></div>Mikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09453608116212023909noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-251562.post-80393662194683817912008-09-10T12:32:00.000-07:002008-09-10T12:59:00.985-07:00Learn to love your car againIs your car losing that new-car smell/feel/taste? Are you simply bored with it? Have you lost appreciation for the subtle nuances simply because you drive it every day? I have a great way to learn to love your car again. Drive something worse for at least a few hundred miles. That's all it takes!<div><br /></div><div>While in Paris, we decided to rent a car and go bomb around the countryside. We visited numerous chateaus, putted around quaint towns and circled about 60% of Paris. Renting through Europcar, we were graced with a fairly-new (~6,000km on the odo) petrol Peugeot 206 5-door. Some highlights:</div><div><ul><li>75 horsepower!</li><li>0-60 in just under 15 seconds!</li><li>44 MPG!</li></ul><div>Filling up in Europe is deceptively expensive. "Oh, hey, somewhat over a euro per liter, under four liters per gallon, not terrible!" This is sort of like the "Roughly how many piano repairmen are in Chicago?" type problem; estimates here and there can compound how far off you are from the true total. After driving about an hour and a half, the refueling bill was about $70 USD. This is for a sub-compact! I looked a less-efficient cars in awe for the rest of the trip. I saw a GTO a day after my return to the States and thought to myself "That car gets 16 MPG; my equivalent fuel bill would have been almost $200!"</div><div><br /></div><div>When I slipped behind the wheel of my car, everything was right with the world. The clutch wasn't a hilariously-light affair with a three-inch engagement point. The steering wasn't so light that I felt as if I was steering with a soggy baguette ring. The engine could accelerate! Acceleration is banned in France. I like accelerating. I really did enjoy the shifter in the 206. The 6-speed Getrag in my car is getting a bit notchy at only 50,000 miles. </div><div><br /></div><div>My car is nowhere close the the optimal configuration for automotive enjoyment. It's an open-diff, nose-heavy FWD with a funky rear suspension (Ford ControlBlade). If I was coming home to a mid-engine RWD vehicle, my appreciation would be that much greater.</div></div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/251562-8039366219468381791?l=www.bibik.org%2FCT'/></div>Mikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09453608116212023909noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-251562.post-11608011361029114702008-08-10T12:26:00.001-07:002008-08-10T12:27:24.902-07:00Great primer on Flash AS3, especially if you've coded in AS1/2 before: <a href="http://gskinner.com/talks/as3workshop/">http://gskinner.com/talks/as3workshop/</a><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/251562-1160801136102911470?l=www.bibik.org%2FCT'/></div>Mikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09453608116212023909noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-251562.post-2413039748664760912008-07-28T12:00:00.001-07:002008-07-28T12:22:05.412-07:00Mystery Meat UI in BlenderAs a certified masochist, I'm trying to teach myself the basics of 3D modeling. Blender has quite the large userbase and it's free so that seemed like a good place to start.<br /><br />I'm trying to follow the various online tutorials and while comprehensive, they are occasionally tough to follow. Most are based on older versions of Blender so some of the functions are different. The biggest flaw is not in the tutorial specifically, but the explanations of some of the odd windowing concepts of Blender itself. For example, <a href="http://wiki.blender.org/index.php/Manual/User_Preferences">this tutorial</a> has a great explanation of all the various settings you can tweak on the User Preferences panel. The issue? It doesn't explain how to GET to this panel! You need to find out on a different page that you need to "click and drag the area between the 3D window and menu header". What? They have basically put the preferences panel ABOVE the menu bar, hidden by default. You have to drag the menu bar down to find it.<br /><br />This is impossible to find unless you read the documentation. This is silly:<br /><br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://www.bibik.org/CT/uploaded_images/closed-792073.png"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="http://www.bibik.org/CT/uploaded_images/closed-791948.png" alt="" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://www.bibik.org/CT/uploaded_images/exposed-792727.png"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="http://www.bibik.org/CT/uploaded_images/exposed-792559.png" alt="" border="0" /></a><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/251562-241303974866476091?l=www.bibik.org%2FCT'/></div>Mikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09453608116212023909noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-251562.post-43770863528765210712008-06-27T15:36:00.000-07:002008-06-27T15:42:10.323-07:00Adobe Help, you're on notice!Adobe Help, especially for Flash CS3, is invaluable. I have learned Flash much faster due to the quality of examples and organization. Unfortunately, some of the help articles can be hundreds of pages and Adobe has decided not to hook up Page Up or Page Down. What? No, it's not a case of the wrong window having focus. I can use the up and down arrows to move a bit. Even weirder, pgup, pgdn work on the Help table of contents!<div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/251562-4377086352876521071?l=www.bibik.org%2FCT'/></div>Mikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09453608116212023909noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-251562.post-76198165810993280572008-06-26T13:46:00.000-07:002008-06-26T14:22:35.811-07:00Hey Apple, what's wrong with Backspace?Navigating in iTunes, you'd think they would use Backspace to navigate backwards. It's used in almost every application that has a concept of "backwards". What does iTunes use instead: <br /><br />"Go to the previous page in the iTunes Store Control-Left bracket ( [ ) "<br /><br />Yep, it's so easy to ctrl-[ my way around!<div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/251562-7619816581099328057?l=www.bibik.org%2FCT'/></div>Mikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09453608116212023909noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-251562.post-85243931629702237572008-06-20T11:34:00.000-07:002008-06-20T16:44:50.957-07:00Direct ManipulationThe iPhone didn't bring touch screens, gestures or a great internet experience to phones. The iPhone brought the idea of "direct manipulation".<br /><br />Most mobile phone platforms are <b>list and menu driven</b>. Items are presented in a list and then you're offered a menu (yet another list) of actions you can perform on these items. This is confusing because the action may be performed on any of the following:<br /><ul><li>The selected item</li><li>The list as a whole</li><li>The application itself</li><li>...act as navigation, leaving the menu or the list or the application<br /></li><li>...or it might add a new item to the list</li></ul>There is no real way of knowing what is going to happen when most labels are under 20 characters with little explanation. To put this in context, if you select a contact on one of the latest builds of S60, you get TWENTY-NINE different menu items. Some of these include "Print". When's the last time you printed from your phone? Hell, when was the first time you printed from a phone? Yeah.<br /><br />When people ask me if I like my iPhone, I always say "What it does, it does very well." Apple took a different approach. You won't see long menus offering actions you may never need and you won't even see some key applications like MMS and video recording. Instead, you have direct access to the content. Think of this in three applications:<br /><ul><li>Google Maps: You drag the map to scroll around, pinch and expand to zoom out and in, click on pushpins to start up driving directions. You also don't get a huge menu of things to do for each item, just a small list of actions at the bottom of the detail pane.</li><li>Safari: Double tap an area to zoom into it, double tap the same area to zoom out, the URL bar hides once a page is loaded, only a small toolbar is exposed at the bottom<br /></li><li>iPod: No file management, just different ways of looking at your media collection, use of CoverFlow to see all albums</li></ul>You can do "less" in comparison to S60, but you can do just about anything you'd really want to do:<br /><ul><li>Call</li><li>Email</li><li>View their homepage</li><li>Open Maps to their address</li><li>Text Message</li><li>Edit details</li><li>Add to favorites<br /></li></ul>It's more natural to click on an email address than to have to focus on a contact name, hit a softkey, scroll through a menu and then click "Email".<br /><br />Another reason why the interface feels so natural is the speed. Unless I'm doing something silly like running Safari with 5 tabs and trying to get directions at the same time, the interface is snappy. Every application is fast when running. The only slowdowns I ever see are switching applications, which is almost to be expected on a mobile phone. <br /><br />Navigation is still not as smooth as I'd like. You have the Abort button (AKA Home) and most applications have "Back" buttons built into their upper tool bars. This doesn't feel natural, so improvements can be made there. I have a few ideas, but nothing for public consumption yet.<div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/251562-8524393162970223757?l=www.bibik.org%2FCT'/></div>Mikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09453608116212023909noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-251562.post-16581205518347759382008-05-22T17:11:00.000-07:002008-05-22T17:13:33.108-07:00Xbox 360 #1 RIPIt was a trooper, purchased on launch from Costco. Why yes, I did abuse the Costco return policy, how'd you know? Walk in with the original box, a broken 360 and come out with a $550 cash card. Glorious.<div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/251562-1658120551834775938?l=www.bibik.org%2FCT'/></div>Mikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09453608116212023909noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-251562.post-62180935013230175232008-05-14T15:28:00.001-07:002008-05-22T17:10:11.569-07:00Altamont 24 Hours of LeMons 2008The Altamont running of the 24 Hours of LeMons has come and gone for 2008.<br /><br />As you might have heard, a horrific accident occurred on the first day of competition and we lost a racer. Court Summerfield was not a member of my team and I did not know him, but he will be missed. The racing community is always devastated, no matter the circumstances. I'd rather not write more about this and will leave you to click the Donate link on the <a href="http://www.24hoursoflemons.com/">home page</a> and let this <a href="http://www.autoblog.com/2008/05/13/tragedy-at-lemons-send-love-and-a-little-bit-more/">post</a> suffice.<br /><br /><span style="font-size:130%;">Preparation</span><br /><br />Another year, another car. Along the lines of the first Festiva, we picked up another one from the same dirt trackers. This was an '88 Festiva using a carbed 1.6L from a 323. It supposedly had a bad coil but would work just fine after that! After the replacing first the coil, then the plugs and wires, then the cap and rotor and finally the distributor itself, we got the bugger to fire up. We had NO idea what else was in store for us though.<br /><br />Thankfully, another Microsoft friend decided to join in on the mayhem. I've told him twenty times so far but I'm going to say it again. If it wasn't for Dan, we would not have made it to the race. Without going into all the build details, which would take pages and bore most of you, here's the list of everything we did:<br /><br />Priority 1<ol><li>Fire extinguisher</li><li>Refill transmission fluid</li><li>Repaint car</li><li>Trim/install front fenders, hammer out dents in rest of car</li><li>Rebuild inner joint on driver side half-shaft</li><li>Replace steering rack</li><li>Wheel bolts + rear wheel spacers from Nat</li><li>Alignment</li><li>Troubleshoot radiator fan</li><li>Check transmission fluid</li><li>Lengthen/relocate fuel tank vent line</li><li>Troubleshoot oil pressure light</li><li>Patch oil pan gasket</li><li>Bleed brakes</li><li>Replace pass control Arm</li><li>Gather spares</li><li>weld/rivet panel over old fuel filler location</li><li>Tighten shoulder straps</li><li>Hose: Thermistat housing to intake manifold</li><li>Relocate gas filler neck</li><li>Cover for + batt terminal</li><li>Wink mirror</li><li>Floor panel</li><li>Seat</li><li>Harness</li><li>Window net</li><li>Battery tiedown</li><li>Change oil</li><li>Insp t-belt, water pump</li><li>Mount new gauge cluster</li><li>Exhaust (if too loud)</li><li>Fix throttle return cable</li><li>Reconnect radiator fan</li><li>Tie down wiring</li><li>Air filter / box</li><li>Spark plug wire</li></ol>Priority 2<ol><li>Vacuum crap out of car</li><li>Re-center steering wheel</li><li>Steering wheel</li><li>Windshield</li><li>Install vacuum caps</li><li>Add choke cable</li><li>Replace thermostat</li></ol>Priority 3<br /><ol><li>KYB struts</li><li>Cut springs</li><li>New Aspire rotors</li><li>New Aspire front pads, rear shoes</li><li>Used Aspire hubs/spindles, outer tie rod ends, calipers, brake hoses</li><li>Replace radiator</li></ol>There are other things that we didn't capture, but just look at all of that! This was probably 50 hours of work and Dan did innumerable other tasks in between our meets. By this point, the car was purring like a kitten, was quite stable in turns, braked as well as we could expect and decently reliable. In addition to all of that, we cobbled together a bunch of spare parts, including front struts with the springs pre-mounted. We were not going to face the same issue that took us out <a href="http://www.bibik.org/CT/2007/07/concept-of-course-id-heard-of-inaugural.php">last year</a>!<br /><br /><span style="font-size:130%;">The Cast</span><br /><br />Let's step back and outline the cast of characters:<br /><ul><li>Me, whom you should know.</li><li>Sanjeev, friend, coordinator extraordinaire and previous LeMons racer (PLR)<br /></li><li>Dan, MSFTie that I've autocrossed with before, works in Jeev's department, owner of a FIVE CAR GARAGE and more knowledge of mechanics than I thought possible</li><li>Jeff B, S2K owner, known in the PNW S2K circles</li><li>Jeff C, S2K, S4 and 911 owner</li><li>Richie, PLR</li><li>Nat, Festiva expert, PLR, the reason why we were able to race last year</li><li>Dale, experienced racer from Austin, PLR</li><li>Jack, AI superstud, PLR</li><li>Randy, experienced racer from Austin</li><li>Craig, good friend of Jeev's</li><li>Becca, photographer and friend of Nat's</li><li>Heather, friend of Richie's</li></ul><span style="font-size:130%;">Before the Race</span><br /><br />The cars were trailered down using a gutted 1974 Holiday Rambler towed behind a rented 1-ton truck. This greatly overshadows the open one car trailer towed behind Nat's beat up truck last year. Nat, Becca, Richie and Heather made the tough trip this year and I heard it wasn't the most enjoyable. Everyone but Jack made it to the track well in advance of necessary. We had tons of time to set up the pits, check on the cars and more. Jack's luggage was delayed and I'm still not sure what ungodly hour he arrived on Saturday morning.<br /><br />Friday night, we all went out for pizza and my god, did we all get along well. I had spent quite a bit of time with Dan, Jeev and the Jeffs fixing up the car but it was great to see the PLRs and the new faces. A couple pitchers of beer, some mostly fluff race preparation and a bit more drinking and we were all ready for the race. I spent quite a bit of time trying my hand a t-shirt iron-ons, using this cheeky design of my own creation:<br /><br /><a href="http://bibik.org/gallery/Random/Shirt_006.png.html"><img src="http://bibik.org/gallery/24932-2/Shirt_006.png" /></a><br /><br />I wanted to make shirts for everyone, but I couldn't find enough iron-on transfers and then I the directions didn't explain one crucial aspect of the tools, yadda yadda. I was only able to make five shirts, but we might get them printed up for real later.<br /><br /><span style="font-size:130%;">The Race</span><br /><br />The two race days were pretty much a blur. You get bullet points:<br /><ul><li>We finished 60th and 71st of 82 entrants.</li><li>The blue car made it to day two and then failed spectacularly! Dale caused most of the damage but Jack was in the car when oil just started pouring out. Turns out, the bearing cap blew a three inch hole in the block. No way to fix that easily!</li><li>The yellow car was having cooling issues for most of the first day. We replaced the radiator cap and fashioned an air director and had no problems the second day. We took two big hits, the first bending a strut and the second shearing an inner tie rod. Luckily, we had a hot swap strut with spring already mounted ready, so the first hit wasn't so bad. The second hit required us to replace the steering rack and while we had a spare, it took about 45 minutes.</li><li>We were hit for a penalty this year. Jeff C took a shortcut and instead of spending 30 minutes in the pits, we spun the penalty wheel. He hit the Al Gore Award and thus had to don a tie-dye shirt and dig a hole to plant a tree, all while being pelted with tofu!<br /><br /><a href="http://bibik.org/gallery/2008/LeMons_2008/DSC_0104.jpg.html"><img src="http://bibik.org/gallery/25558-2/DSC_0104.jpg" /></a><br /></li><li>We've already got plans for next year and more people than we need. We are going to focus on reliability and a bit more grip.<br /></li></ul><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/251562-6218093501323017523?l=www.bibik.org%2FCT'/></div>Mikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09453608116212023909noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-251562.post-31578730461597822572008-01-09T16:10:00.000-08:002008-05-15T07:48:19.782-07:00Auto Shows 2008It's auto show season and I'm already lusting after a few of new concepts:<br /><br /><img src="http://www.motorauthority.com/wp-content/uploads/Saab/Odds/9_4x/9_4X_hr_4.jpg" /><br />The new Saab interior is very Saabesque but gorgeous. This just goes to show how numerous, minor, incremental tweaks can improve a design from acceptable to breath-taking.<br /><br /><img src="http://www.motivemagazine.com/emAlbum/albums/Manufacturers/Cadillac/CTS-V/2008-Present/Interior/019.jpg" /><br />The press pictures are contrast-deprived and reduce the visual punch the CTS-V should have, but again, the interior! I would gleefully slip into the luxurious folds of those seats, caressed firmly yet gently as I forced my will upon the highway with 550 HP.<div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/251562-3157873046159782257?l=www.bibik.org%2FCT'/></div>Mikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09453608116212023909noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-251562.post-41017665383695380702007-12-21T13:15:00.000-08:002008-05-15T07:49:00.972-07:00Chugging along in traffic, but in controlI think I've figured out the perfect automotive combination for performance-minded people in Seattle. Many of us spend upwards of 1.5 hours every day driving between Seattle and the Eastside, usually in stop-and-go traffic. The side streets of Seattle experience congestion as well and our hills are second only to San Francisco. Sounds like a terrible place to own a manual, eh? It is, to be honest. I've got 39k miles on it now and I'll be damned if my clutch makes it past 50k. You know those people that get 300k miles on a single clutch? Their daily commute takes them from Bumblenowhere, Ohio to Flatsville, Kansas. Clutch longevity isn't about miles, it's about clutch engagements and how rough the engagements are. I digress.<br /><br />Though it is not available in many vehicles as of yet, the <a href="http://www.bwauto.com/products/ts/dual-clutch/dualtronic_clutch_system.shtml">DualTronic </a>transmission from Borg-Warner seems to offer the performance benefits of a manual with the ease of an automatic. The DualTronic, known to many as the DSG in various WV Group products, is a computer-controlled, dual-clutch transmission. Since it uses clutches instead of torque converters, you get none of the parasitic loss of an automatic transmission. The two clutches can independently engage different gears, the algorithm of which can be changed on the fly. If you're on a Sunday drive, gently accelerating while in third gear, fourth gear will be pre-selected. Well below red line, the first clutch will disengage and the second one will smoothly grab onto fourth gear. Looking for performance? The system can be put into full manual mode. The algorithms can be changed such that if a potential downshift situation is detected (sudden reduction of the throttle with concurrent application of brakes, for example), the second clutch could pre-select a lower gear instead and rapidly snap to it as decelleration is detected (8 milliseconds is the publicized shift time). Good compromise, eh?<br /><br />Even better than just having the option of throwing your DualTronic into automatic mode would be the inclusion of Bosch's <a href="http://rb-kwin.bosch.com/en-NA/start/fb_prod_index_kt2.html">Adaptive Cruise Control</a>. Available on various luxury makes such as BMW and MB, the latest version is capable of full stop-and-go control. I'd absolutely adore being set a maximum cruise speed of 65 MPH and then let the car get me across 520. I'd definitely be attentive and not place full trust in the technology, but this would allow me to relax my left foot and frustration after a hard day of work.<br /><br />I bet that the 2009 BMW M3 will be the first vehicle available with this combination of technologies. BMW have announced they will offer a DSG-style transmission at some time for the M3 and sources say it is coming in the spring of 2008. BMW already offers adaptive cruise control as an option so they may incorporate the latest stop-and-go system by then as well. It'll be years before this combination is available at a reasonable price.<div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/251562-4101766538369538070?l=www.bibik.org%2FCT'/></div>Mikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09453608116212023909noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-251562.post-53372539639665470542007-11-27T11:25:00.000-08:002008-05-15T07:51:42.389-07:00Pictures are back up!It only took a few months of calendar time and about twenty hours of actual time, but my <a href="http://www.bibik.org/gallery/">photo gallery</a> is finally available at bibik.org! It has been updated with numerous pictures from this year, as well.<div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/251562-5337253963966547054?l=www.bibik.org%2FCT'/></div>Mikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09453608116212023909noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-251562.post-20934488551020737382007-10-31T13:19:00.000-07:002008-05-15T07:53:20.996-07:00Home Theater PlansWhat I have now:<br /><ul><li>Audio/Video<br /></li><ul><li>Onkyo TX-SR504 7.1 110W A/V Receiver</li></ul><ul><li>Onkyo Front / Centers : Dual 5" woofers and 1" tweeter</li></ul><ul><li>Onkyo Surrounds: 3.1" woofer, 0.75" tweeter</li></ul><ul><li>Onkyo Subwoofer: 230W 10" woofer</li></ul><ul><li>Westinghouse 37" 1080p LCD</li></ul><ul><li>Xbox 360 Premium (no HDMI)</li><li>Composite-only set-top box<br /></li></ul><li>Crappy speaker wires from the Onkyo HTIB</li><li>Wooden speaker stands for fronts and surrounds<br /></li></ul>During the move to the condo, <span style="font-style: italic;">all</span> of my surround speaker stands broke so I'm currently running 2.1 audio. Since I finally own a place, I figured I can finally do something decent with the surround speakers. Since I'm in a condo, I can't run the speaker wires completely hidden in the wall (no access to ceiling or floor and no desire to rip open the wall at every stud!). I looked into a few different ideas for hiding the wires:<br /><ol><li>Under the baseboard</li><li>Under the carpet</li><li>Using flat wire and painting over it</li><li>Run cable raceway along either the baseboard or crown molding<br /></li></ol>The only solution that seemed to work would be to use raceway so I picked up a few hundred feet of corner raceway from <a href="http://cableorganizer.com/surface-raceways/cornerduct.html">CableOrganizer</a>. The room with the home theater has a bay window, a few hallways, et cetera so the only way to run the cable is as such:<br /><ol><li>From the receiver down to the baseboard</li><li>Over to the bay window wall</li><li>Up the wall to the ceiling</li><li>Across to the wall parallel to the TV</li><li>Along that wall to the wall parallel to the bay window</li><li>Part way along that final wall</li></ol>The raceway was just delivered last night and I'm quite impressed. It's attractive, well-sized, durable and not too heavy. Installation shouldn't be a problem at all. Based on this fairly annoying <a href="http://www.dolby.com/consumer/home_entertainment/roomlayout2.html">Dolby site</a> and the fact that I have to mount the right surround at a certain spot, I've found what I would consider the optimal positioning for the four surrounds. I'm going to get some cheap wall mounts that offer some adjustability.<br /><br />Here is where I'm not quite so sure as to my plan. I know the speaker wires will be run along the ceiling and then will have to drop a few feet to the speakers. I could try to make it look extremely clean by running the wires behind the wall for that short stretch but that would require putting EIGHT holes in the wall. I could make very small holes; just enough to fish the wires. I could install keyhole plates but if I'm running the cables to the exact location of the speakers, why bother? I could also just run more cable raceway down the wall. I think I'm just going to run the wires bare for now while I contemplate these options.<br /><br />I am going to toss the included speaker wire, get some bulk wire and do this right. I'm pricing wire out from Blue Jeans Cable, Parts Express and Monoprice; looks like PE is winning. I'll run bare wire at the speaker and use banana plugs for the receiver side. Using those plugs will alleviate the headache of trying to do side-entry screw posts for 18 connections of 12 gauge wire! Just getting these speakers finally mounted and using some quality wire should help immensely.<br /><br />But what about after that? The TV is currently sitting on an ugly IKEA TV bench, the 360 is hiding behind that, the cable box on the other side and the receiver is the only thing in the bench. Unfortunately, the only place for the center channel is under the bench! Highly suboptimal. My desire would be to wall-mount the TV, wall-mount the center channel just beneath the TV and hide all the cables. Hiding the power for the TV would require something like a <a href="http://www.powerbridgesolution.com/aboutpowerbridge.html">PowerBridge</a> and right now, the TV itself is doing all the video switching. It has to deal with the 360, cable box and the PC I have just off to the side. Running all of those cables up the wall sounds terrible! The receiver I have now can do 3x component and 3x composite in and does composite out. That would cover everything but the VGA (or DVI) in from the computer, which I can deal with for now.<br /><br />An HDMI-switching receiver would be a great investment as I could just have the single HDMI cable run up to the TV. I could even use a DVI-HDMI cable to connect the computer to the receiver. I'd also replace the TV bench with an open component rack, for better cooling. The receiver and 360 both get extremely hot! Since I would have space on the rack, I'd probably get either a HD-DVD or Blu-Ray player to enjoy the setup. At that point, I might try to upgrade the speakers but they seem fine to me. I'm not an audiophile by any means. <br /><br />Ah dreams, oh for the want of time and money to make them true.<div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/251562-2093448855102073738?l=www.bibik.org%2FCT'/></div>Mikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09453608116212023909noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-251562.post-42608202198552684362007-10-15T10:44:00.000-07:002008-05-15T08:09:19.567-07:00Kitteh! Snorgle snorgleClare and I just found the cutest cat in the whole world and he's turning out to be quite the lover!<br /><br />We had been scouring petfinder.com for the last few weeks, toying with the idea of getting a cat. I'm pretty much settled in to the condo, Clare is staying with me every night and we both wanted a pet. She's more of a dog lover but my little condo just couldn't support a dog lifestyle. We've sent each other tens of petfinder.com links but none of them seemed like "the one". Finally, Clare sent a link early one morning titled "HHHOOOOOOONNNEEEYYYYYYY!!!" and a wave of realization hit, here was the one! <br /><br />I had a few criteria in mind when picking out a new cat. These criteria were not of the "must have" variety, but more of the "must not be" variety:<br /><ul><li>Cannot be a kitten. Everyone wants a kitten. Kittens only temporarily end up in shelters; they get snatched up immediately.</li><li>As a corollary: cannot be fairly young. No one wants an older cat, so the older, the better I would feel about adopting.<br /></li><li>Cannot be in perfect shape. A healthy, pretty kitty will be adopted over time. There is little chance a healthy, well-behaved cat would have issues being placed in a wonderful home.</li></ul>The cat that Clare linked to was six years old, had a teratoma removed from his neck and needed a tooth removed. On the other hand, you could tell he was so sweet and once healed up, would be beautiful! He's a Siamese mix: mostly a domestic short-hair body but with blue-points and the cutest blue cross eyes! We ran through a few name ideas but since he's mostly a light cream color with blue points, I came up with the name Roquefort, or Ro for short. Here he is:<br /><a href="http://umichigan.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=39134378&id=2221438"><img src="http://photos-438.ll.facebook.com/photos-ll-sf2p/v142/215/11/2221438/s2221438_39134378_3675.jpg" /></a><br /><a href="http://umichigan.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=39134379&id=2221438"><img src="http://photos-438.ll.facebook.com/photos-ll-sf2p/v142/215/11/2221438/s2221438_39134379_3906.jpg" /></a><br /><a href="http://umichigan.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=39134380&id=2221438"><img src="http://photos-438.ll.facebook.com/photos-ll-sf2p/v142/215/11/2221438/s2221438_39134380_4125.jpg" /></a><br /><a href="http://umichigan.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=39134381&id=2221438"><img src="http://photos-438.ll.facebook.com/photos-ll-sf2p/v142/215/11/2221438/s2221438_39134381_4347.jpg" /></a><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/251562-4260820219855268436?l=www.bibik.org%2FCT'/></div>Mikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09453608116212023909noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-251562.post-73340063614246244862007-09-07T10:14:00.000-07:002008-05-15T08:11:35.867-07:00Oh god how did this get here I'm not good with DellsI'm a bad dork. For the first time since my parents bought a Tandy 1000 and then some Acer with a Pentium 60, I've purchased a computer instead of building my own from parts. I've been running my last homebuilt computer for over five years now and loading a simple video now takes five steps:<br /><br />1) Shutdown all other programs<br />2) Fire up Task Manager<br />3) Kill any rogue process that is taking up more than 10% of the CPU (I'm looking at you, trustedinstaller.exe! Hey, svchost, pipe down!)<br />4) Fire up the video and pause it after it thrashes for 20 seconds like a fish outta water.<br />5) Promote the wmplayer.exe priority to High, but NOT real-time. High allows the player to suck up enough resources to play a video properly, real-time seems to override the scheduler causing... problems.<br /><br />After watching the first four seasons of The Sopranos in this fashion, I decided enough was enough and started trolling for deals on new computers. After realizing that buying a pre-made system was cheaper than assembling one, I focused on Dell deals. Finally, I picked up this system for only $520:<br /><ul><li>Core 2 Duo E6550 (2.33 GHz)</li><li>1 GB RAM</li><li>80 GB SATA drive</li><li>DVD-ROM</li><li>20" LCD</li></ul>That processor stuffed in a mini-tower with those other components sorta seems like stuffing an AMG 6.2L V8 into a Festiva (...if only engines were free, I'd have a great LeMons car there) but my old computer has a DVD burner and I'll upgrade the new computer over time. That processor retails for $200 on its own, same with the monitor!<br /><br />I barely booted the computer before reformatting the drive and installing a fresh copy of Vista Ultimate. So far, I'm happy with the box and the 2 GB of RAM I have coming my way will only improve the situation.<div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/251562-7334006361424624486?l=www.bibik.org%2FCT'/></div>Mikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09453608116212023909noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-251562.post-16616194265632835142007-08-31T12:34:00.000-07:002007-10-15T11:13:48.000-07:00Last night, Kendra and Brendan invited me out to Bleu to meet a coworker, Aric and his wife, Cherie. He's a well-read, activity-focused editor for Amazon, she has rapier-sharp wit and a knack with words to the point where she's a highly-proclaimed author. She has a large following and I'm assuming he does as well, considering how engrossing his blogs are. It felt good just to be in their presence.<div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/251562-1661619426563283514?l=www.bibik.org%2FCT'/></div>Mikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09453608116212023909noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-251562.post-5911100636035847962007-08-31T11:21:00.000-07:002007-10-15T11:13:11.681-07:00I do not understand how to live life for myself.<br /><br />I'm so afraid of what other people think that I never challenge myself, I focus my energies into characteristics and abilities that come naturally and I spend too much money on trinkets (some of which <a href="http://mbibik.dyndns.org/gallery/v/2007/Braeburn+08_02_2007/">costing hundreds of thousands of dollars</a>) to bring more positive attention to myself.<br /><br />I'm trying to get over this. Paying attention to the attention only causes anxiety, reducing my abilities and making me look worse to other people. 'Tis a silly cycle but it's a roundabout with an a single entrance that closes behind you. I've spent numerous years fearing failure to the point where I've been paralyzed into doing nothing certain nights but reading (and not posting to) internet forums. I'm going to beat this.<div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/251562-591110063603584796?l=www.bibik.org%2FCT'/></div>Mikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09453608116212023909noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-251562.post-33142387131794382232007-07-25T20:02:00.000-07:002008-08-28T08:53:48.470-07:00Travel pack list:<br /><ul><li>Clothing</li><ul><li>Shirts</li><li>Undershirts<br /></li><li>Pants/shorts</li><li>Underwear</li><li>Socks</li><li>Shoes<br /></li><li>Special requirements?</li><ul><li>Swimming<br /></li><li>Rain</li><li>Formal function</li><li>Hiking</li><li>Exercising</li></ul></ul><li>Toiletries</li><ul><li>Toothbrush</li><li>Toothpaste</li><li>Shaver</li><li>Shaving cream</li><li>Hair brush<br /></li><li>Hair product</li><li>Deodorant</li><li>Cologne</li><li>Medicine<br /></li></ul><li>Electronics</li><ul><li>Camera</li><ul><li>Memory cards</li></ul><ul><li>Charger</li></ul><li>Cell phone charger</li><li>MP3 player</li></ul><li>Travel-specific accessories</li><ul><li>Passport<br /></li><li>Book</li><li>Pillow</li><li>Snacks</li><li>Sunglasses<br /></li></ul></ul><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/251562-3314238713179438223?l=www.bibik.org%2FCT'/></div>Mikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09453608116212023909noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-251562.post-48450165684732536302007-07-11T10:25:00.000-07:002008-05-14T15:46:22.693-07:00<span style="font-weight: bold;">The Concept</span><br /><br />Of course I'd heard of the inaugural running of the 24 Hours of LeMons; the concept reeks of genius. What is LeMons? Teams of 4-6 drivers race a car for 14 hours with a slight catch. Any costs not related to safety have to come in under $500. The classification for "safety" is painted with a wide brush as it includes the obvious items but also allows for items like tires and brakes. Here is the full list of items that are not included in the "under $500" umbrella:<br /><ul><li>Roll bars/cages</li><li>Driver's seat</li><li>Fire extinguisher</li><li>Harness</li><li>Window net</li><li>Braking system</li><li>Wheels</li><li>Tires</li></ul>EVERYTHING else must be acquired and installed for under $500. Labor you do yourself is free, if someone else does it, that goes against the $500 total. There are two checkpoints that are used to try to keep people honest. First, the organizer can buy any car after the race for $500. That set of custom coilovers that you attempted to make look used by covering in dust, dirt and oil then set to bake in the sun for five weeks? Hopefully someone notices your ability to pirouette on apex and calls you out on it. Second, after the car clears the tech inspection, the BSF judges come though. For every estimated $10 you spend over the $500, you are awarded one Bullshit Factor point. Each point will take a lap off your final total. Considering how much we ended up spending on the car and how over-prepared other cars seemed, I wouldn't be surprised if the average per-car-cost was closer to $1,200 - $1,500. More on that later.<br /><br />In the light-hearted vein of the race concept, LeMons also featured quirky qualifying events and mid-race punishments. We completely missed the announcement for the extra credit qualifying so I have no idea what the events were. Anyone? The punishments were proposed to keep people from racing like maniacs or making this a demolition derby. If the corner workers noticed you were blocking people from passing, making unsafe passes yourself or intentionally hitting people, you were black flagged. Off to the Wheel of Misfortune! Other punishments are for specific transgressions. Some of the punishments I remember:<br /><ul><li>Eggman: A hole is cut in your roof above the driver and crates of eggs are attached all around the hole. You turn, brake or accelerate (you are accelerating, right?) and eggs are dumped on your head. Don't forget, it's roughly 110 degrees on track!</li><li>Grill of Damocles: It's no sword, but imagine a steel plate with eight spikes protruding. Using some additional steel bars, the plate is welded to the front of the car with the spikes pointed inwards. Ram yet another car and feel the sweet taste of release as the spikes penetrate your radiator, expelling life force and your chances at winning this race.</li><li>Al Gore Junior: Belching bluish smoke lap after lap? Time to pay penance! Black flagged, off the course and handed a shovel? See that baby tree over there? You get to plant it pit-side and water it before your car is allowed back on track.</li><li>Legion of Odor (Amulet of Aroma would have been better): Looks like both you and your car need accessories! In addition to the necklace of unwrapped putrid cheese, your car's exhaust manifold is also coated in the stuff. Guess what? You get to wear that amulet all weekend. Even in the pits. In the heat.</li><li>Chin Music: Boom box with an automatically rewinding cassette player and Norwegian sea chants on full volume, zip-tied into the car where you can't reach it.</li><li>Train in Vain: Training wheels are welded to the sides of your car. How is this a punishment? Some teams may have benefited from not cornering on their doors.</li><li>Barnyard I and II: The outline of a barnyard animal in steel plate is welded to your roof decreasing your glorious 0.48 cd.</li></ul>The rest of the race details are less interesting and are covered on the main site.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">The Crew</span><br /><br />Our team was formed on <a href="http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=2263971">Something Awful</a>. Team OMGWTFestiva is comprised of four goons from Seattle that knew each other from autocrossing, one of the more active racing goons from TX and a TX friend. The Seattle goons would take care of the car and getting it to the race while the TX guys were going to fly in for driving duties. I concentrated on pictures of the car and race so I don't seem to have pictures of everyone individually. Here's a group shot from after the race:<br /><br /><a href="http://www.bibik.org/gallery/2007/24+Hours+of+LeMons+07_07_2007/24+Hours+of+LeMons+07_07_2007+166.jpg.html"><img src="http://www.bibik.org/gallery/22229-3/24+Hours+of+LeMons+07_07_2007+166.jpg" /></a><br />From L to R: Sanjeev, Dale, Richie, Nat, Mike and Jack (Our only dedicated pit crew member, Shawn, took the picture)<br /><br />Nat is the Festiva expert and did 95% of the necessary work on the car. He also trailered it to CA and back so REP++ to him. Dale and Jack have track experience, are knowledgeable about repairs and were much faster than the rest of us. As for the rest of us, I guess that makes us just tagalongs!<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">The Car</span><br /><br />Nat found the car, a dirt-track-prepped Festiva with a roll cage already installed. The Festiva came stock with a 1.3L engine but this came with the 1.6L long block, very similar to the engine in the '90-'94 Miata. Here she is as picked up:<br /><br /><br /><a href="http://www.bibik.org/gallery/2007/Festiva+04_01_2007/000_0155.jpg.html"><img src="http://www.bibik.org/gallery/22432-3/000_0155.jpg" /></a><br /><br /><br /><a href="http://www.bibik.org/gallery/2007/Festiva+04_01_2007/000_0156.jpg.html"><img src="http://www.bibik.org/gallery/22436-3/000_0156.jpg" /></a><br /><br />The chassis, transmission and cage were just fine. The suspension, brakes and radiator were all well-worn. Here is the list of what we had to do to get the car ready:<br /><ol><li>Strip decals</li><li>Install seat mount</li><li>Install seat</li><li>Install harness</li><li>Replace brakes</li><li>Replace radiator</li><li>Install drain plug in radiator</li><li>Replace rear suspension</li><li>Install lexan windshield</li><li>Install window net<br /></li><li>Replace wheels</li><li>Replace tires</li><li>Remount battery</li><li>Replace all fluids</li></ol>Nat found better brakes, radiator and rear suspension at the junkyard for very cheap. Since the car was purchased for $350, we (Nat) did all the work ourselves and only used junkyard parts, we were definitely within the $500 bounds.<br /><br />In the end, she weighed about 1600 pounds and could spin the tires in 1st and 2nd easily. There was so much low-end torque and 1st gear was basically on the "Liquefy tires" setting, I used 2nd as the lowest gear for almost the entire race. I only needed 1st during a yellow flag while on a slight incline. Since the suspension was worn-out stock, body roll was hilarious. Any force was met with an equal and humorous opposite force. Accelerate and the nose shoots to the sky, turn side to side and wallow around, brake and you'd occasionally touch the front bumper to pavement. The tires we used were fairly tall, increasing the ride height which didn't help in the least. The brakes were sufficient... until something I'll tell you about later.<br /><br />As one of the taller members of the team, I was quite worried about the seat and pedal positioning. The dirt trackers must have been 5'9" or lower as the roll cage harness bar allowed for very little leg room. Our first attempt at mounting the seat had my knees bent tighter than 90 degrees. The pedals also had excessive height so I was practically putting my left knee through the window to get to the clutch. We adjusted the seat mounts lower, putting the seat back a little bit at the same time. I didn't even notice the cramped position during the race. If you're comfortable, it's not a race car, eh? Here is how she looked once at the track:<br /><br /><a href="http://www.bibik.org/gallery/2007/24+Hours+of+LeMons+07_07_2007/24+Hours+of+LeMons+07_07_2007+045.jpg.html"><img src="http://www.bibik.org/gallery/21962-3/24+Hours+of+LeMons+07_07_2007+045.jpg" /></a><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Preparation</span><br />After Shawn, Sanjeev and I made a detour from Oakland to San Francisco specifically for a trip to H&M (shout out to my <a href="http://forums.somethingawful.com/forumdisplay.php?forumid=179">W&W</a> buddies), we all met up at the hotel in Livermore to discuss strategy. Jack and Dale talked about race basics while the rest of us tried to figure out how long we could last in a hot tin can with no fan, let alone any sort of cooling, in a full race suit on a hot track. We figured we'd start with 20/30 minute shifts and move toward 1 hour shifts as we got comfortable. We worried about hydration and figured we would need a glass of Gatorade every hour for the whole day. 15 gallons of Gatorade mix would at least hold us off for awhile.<br /><br />On the day of the race, half of us went on a water, snacks and supplies run while the other half prepped the pits. Thank goodness I picked up folding chairs and a 10'x10' canopy at the last minute. The beating sun, dirt pit and sand storms would have knocked us out alone. After prep, Shawn and I went around to scope out the competition.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">The Competition</span><br />The first characteristic I noticed about the other cars? Almost all of them had a goofy paint job. What did we neglect? Paint. Luckily we kept the flames from the previous vinyl job and had huge numbers made up. Most cars had a theme or at least a garish coat of cheap paint. We had a stock color and some random decals but it didn't look so bad. Here are a few of the interesting designs or important cars:<br /><br /><a href="http://www.bibik.org/gallery/2007/24+Hours+of+LeMons+07_07_2007/24+Hours+of+LeMons+07_07_2007+016.jpg.html"><img src="http://www.bibik.org/gallery/21902-3/24+Hours+of+LeMons+07_07_2007+016.jpg" /></a><br />Mitsubeasty<br /><br /><a href="http://www.bibik.org/gallery/2007/24+Hours+of+LeMons+07_07_2007/24+Hours+of+LeMons+07_07_2007+055.jpg.html"><img src="http://www.bibik.org/gallery/21986-3/24+Hours+of+LeMons+07_07_2007+055.jpg" /></a><br />Canola Rollas<br /><br /><a href="http://www.bibik.org/gallery/2007/24+Hours+of+LeMons+07_07_2007/24+Hours+of+LeMons+07_07_2007+059.jpg.html"><img src="http://www.bibik.org/gallery/21995-3/24+Hours+of+LeMons+07_07_2007+059.jpg" /></a><br />Freak SHO<br /><br /><a href="http://www.bibik.org/gallery/2007/24+Hours+of+LeMons+07_07_2007/24+Hours+of+LeMons+07_07_2007+067.jpg.html"><img src="http://www.bibik.org/gallery/22013-3/24+Hours+of+LeMons+07_07_2007+067.jpg" /></a><br />Lemon Lappers<br /><br /><a href="http://www.bibik.org/gallery/2007/24+Hours+of+LeMons+07_07_2007/24+Hours+of+LeMons+07_07_2007+072.jpg.html"><img src="http://www.bibik.org/gallery/22025-3/24+Hours+of+LeMons+07_07_2007+072.jpg" /></a><br />Holy Rollers<br /><br /><a href="http://www.bibik.org/gallery/2007/24+Hours+of+LeMons+07_07_2007/24+Hours+of+LeMons+07_07_2007+074.jpg.html"><img src="http://www.bibik.org/gallery/22028-3/24+Hours+of+LeMons+07_07_2007+074.jpg" /></a><br />Wankel Wankers<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Day One</span><br />We passed tech and the BSF test without issue, the car was running fine, everyone's gear was checked out, we all had our competition licenses (though I had to wait over an hour in a 20 person line to get mine), the pits were set up with the canopy, chairs, drinks and snacks... we were locked and loaded by the 2:30 PM start time. Since he knew the car the best, Nat started us off. He did the recon/warm-up laps and then was out there for the green flag. Instead of deciding on positions and qualifying and griding, they put everyone on track, chose a random car and a random lap. When that car had completed that specific lap, they dropped the green flag and everyone was off! Starting with 90 cars on a 1.1 mile course is insanity. Imaging terrible traffic (think 520 W from 4 PM to 7 PM in Seattle), a dirty and dusty road and add the fact that everyone wants to get home first while no one cares about slamming into your car!<br /><br />Luckily, we made it through the initial scuffle relatively unharmed. Jack jumped into the car next and less than an hour into the race, we suffered our first bit of major damage. The #60 Fallen Angels car (women drivers!) were the first to play pinball with us:<br /><br /><a href="http://www.bibik.org/gallery/2007/24+Hours+of+LeMons+07_07_2007/24+Hours+of+LeMons+07_07_2007+028.jpg.html"><img src="http://www.bibik.org/gallery/21932-3/24+Hours+of+LeMons+07_07_2007+028.jpg" /></a><br /><br />We used up our first bit of luck for the day. All of that was body damage as we couldn't see any damage to the tire, wheel or suspension! Richie got a stint, I had my stint and then Sanjeev hopped into the car. The details are fuzzy; no one was watching the track for the following incident and Sanjeev was spun around and couldn't see the culprit. We aren't 100% positive, but various clues lead us to believe it was Freak SHO. At the hairpin, Sanjeev was following the correct line when another car came squirting in, tight to the apex. Sanjeev turned the drivers side front corner into their passenger rear. The car was knocked partially off course, the drivers side front wheel was very askew and the car would not fire up!<br /><br />Considering how light our car is and how fragile the completely untouched front suspension was, damage was expected. I don't think anyone has pictures of how it looked while being towed in because we were all rushing around trying to think of how to fix it. Basically, the leading edge of the front wheel was pointing outward. We jacked up the car, took off the wheel and Nat was able to quickly diagnose the problem. The hit had bent the lower mount of the strut and we were without a spare. Jack and Sanjeev immediately set out in the Chrysler 300 rental to find some glorious store that would carry a front strut for a 1991 Ford Festiva. We also had an issue of the engine not turning over to fix! The hit was actually so hard that the bent strut was pushing through the wheel well and pushed the engine flush against the passenger side wheel well. Once the bent strut was removed, the engine was freed and the little bugger fired right up. Here is the damage the pulley caused:<br /><br /><a href="http://www.bibik.org/gallery/2007/24+Hours+of+LeMons+07_07_2007/24+Hours+of+LeMons+07_07_2007+027.jpg.html"><img src="http://www.bibik.org/gallery/21929-3/24+Hours+of+LeMons+07_07_2007+027.jpg" /></a><br /><br />About an hour and at least four stores later, they found a new strut at Autozone. Just in case, they bought two. A little spring compression here, a few busted knuckles there and the car was back to whole in no time. ...or so we thought. Not too much later, the car is towed back to the pits and what is this? The driver front tire is off and sitting in the hatch! Our immediate thought was that we were in such a hurry to get the car back on track that we forgot to tighten the lug bolts. This is when I started to get frustrated. Getting knocked out because we sustained damage is one thing. Knocking ourselves out with stupidity is simply unacceptable. Luckily, the rotor was intact and very little damage occurred. Tighten the bolts, double-check all the bolts and back on track! ...ah crap, here comes the tow truck again...<br /><br />Courtesy of Autoblog:<br /><a href="http://www.bibik.org/gallery/2007/24+Hours+of+LeMons+07_07_2007/21_ford_2.jpg.html"><img src="http://www.bibik.org/gallery/21866-3/21_ford_2.jpg" /></a><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">We lost the same wheel again!? </span> We figured it wasn't an issue with the lug bolts. The hit we sustained that took out the suspension must have caused a hell of a lot of force to the bolts and damaged the threads in the hub. A little investigation and we could tell that the third set of replacement bolts just wouldn't catch. It was almost 9 PM by this point so we knew we couldn't find parts at this time. We'd either need to replace the entire hub (with a very slim chance that any store would have those in stock) or tap out the hub to accommodate bigger bolts. We adjourned for the evening, battered, bruised and deflated. Our plan was to get up early, hit all the stores we could and try to get a new tap set. We were also given a little bit of hope as one of the teams might have a big enough tap set early in the morning.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Day Two</span><br />We had to attend a mandatory drivers meeting at 8:45 AM so we figured that since none of the stores would be open before 9AM, we would just go check in, let the race start without us and we'd start the part search. Turns out the team with the tap was looking for us around 8 AM and then the guy with the tap set left. Periodic phone calls to the guys looking for parts showed they were coming up empty handed. No hubs were to be found and most tap sets only went up to 12 MM x 1.75 (the size of the current-yet-damaged threads). At the track, we found someone with a tap set but it also wasn't big enough. Using the other car, Sanjeev and I set out to find some more ice and pick up lunch for everyone. That only left Richie, Jack and Shawn back at the track with the car. My Spidey-sense kicked in and so I texted Shawn. Turns out, they decided to try tapping with the 12 MM x 1.75 anyway! Nat said it probably wouldn't work but the guys also scrounged up some longer lug bolts from another team. The original threads only went so deep. They tapped the whole hub and the longer bolts were as firm as a green cantaloupe (as firm as tightly torqued coarse-threaded metal-on-metal could be).<br /><br />We rushed back to the track to see the lil' bugger out there, driving around just fine! We missed probably four of the seven hours from the first day and the initial two hours of the second day. Traffic was lighter and they were supposedly giving out more black flags. Being the smallest and possibly lightest car out there, this was definitely to our advantage. We traded off drivers without incident until about 40 minutes before the end of the race. I was finishing up my third stint and coming up the back sweeper when suddenly the car started to shake violently with a thudding sound from the passenger side front suspension. Luckily the back sweeper is where the pit entrance is so I just pulled off immediately. As I was unbuckling back at the pit, everyone was asking me what I hit! Nothing, but it turns out that both of the front tires were canted in with some extreme positive camber.<br /><br />We pulled the wheel and the ball joint had popped out in addition to the top bolt hole of the strut being completely ovaled out. Putting the ball joint back together was easy, but we weren't so sure about the strut. We had lent a spare tire to a BMW team and they repaid us by having the exact bolt necessary. We torqued it to Grayskull and back and tossed her back on track. No idea how it was possible but we finished the race, saw the checkered flag.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Aftermath</span><br />We placed 54th out of 83 cars, 316 laps completed. We missed maybe 2 hours the second day so we were on track (or doing a normal pit) for 8 hours (57% of the time). We figured that if we were on track the whole time, we would have placed closer to 25th. Not bad for a legally prepped car!<br /><br />What would we do differently? If we could start over completely, a tougher car would be excellent. With the smallest car, we were easily pushed around. With the Festiva, maybe we could have some sort of cage around the wheels, protecting the fragile suspension. We would also remember our spare parts! Of course we wouldn't have had everything to recover from the various maladies of the day, but it would have helped. Spare tools would be nice as would some sort of cooling for the driver.<br /><br />Are we going to do it again? Definitely. We have a sunk cost of the various driver suits, pit materials, the car itself (which could be easily campaigned again) and we have the knowledge. Prior entrants seem to be favored for application acceptance as well. Enough people have shown interest that I can easily see having two teams. A handful of teams ran multiple cars side by side, even the exact same type of car. That could be fortuitous.<br /><br />Do you want to do this in October? Let us know! Wrenching and track experience are highly desirable.<div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/251562-4845016568473253630?l=www.bibik.org%2FCT'/></div>Mikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09453608116212023909noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-251562.post-61344722462322415752007-06-12T12:02:00.000-07:002007-06-12T12:27:06.602-07:00Let's see if I can even make it a week on a diet like this:<br /><ul><li>2000 calories per day</li><li>30-35% protein from whole food sources (no shakes!)<br /></li><li>10-15% carbs like spinach, broccoli, green beans, asparagus, zucchini, cauliflower, different color peppers, carrots, tomatoes<br /></li><li>55-60% fat with an even mixture of saturates, polyunsaturates, and monounsaturates</li><li>Roughly: 200 lbs, 2000kcal, 150g protein, 50g carbs, 132g fat</li><li>Four meals a day, even split of macronutrients</li><li>Supplements:</li><ul><li>5g of BCAAs and 2.5g creatine 4x day<br /></li><li>Greens+ 1x day</li><li>Multi-vitamin 1x day</li><li>ZMA 1x day</li><li>3g fish oil 3x day</li><li>3 Hot Rox 3x day</li><li>Power Drive 2x day</li></ul></ul>The biggest issue I see here is creating the proper meals four times a day. It will probably take 1.5 hours per day in prep and cooking so this is definitely a strong commitment. I should probably just go to the store once a week and have a huge veggie chopping session. I could then portion it all out then so I don't have to think before each meal.<div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/251562-6134472246232241575?l=www.bibik.org%2FCT'/></div>Mikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09453608116212023909noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-251562.post-88335174167586237832007-06-11T20:56:00.000-07:002007-06-11T21:11:15.787-07:00<a href="http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Chicken-Satay/Detail.aspx">Chicken satay</a>? That worked. <a href="http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Chocolate-Covered-Cherries-III/Detail.aspx">Chocolate-covered cherries</a>? Also worked. <a href="http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Curried-Rice-Pilaf/Detail.aspx">Curried rice pilaf</a>? Fine. <a href="http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Persian-Kabob/Detail.aspx">Persian kabobs</a>? Not so good! I cannot make a tender beef recipe to save my life. They tasted fine, especially since I marinaded them for 48 hours in yogurt, onion and mint, but they were tough again. Does anyone have tips for tenderizing meat? I know it's not just the cut of meat I used as I have tendency to do this to every cut of beef. The pieces were grilled to a medium, medium-well state, so I'm sure that hurts it. I bet if I had a grill and a good marinade, I could do it right.<div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/251562-8833517416758623783?l=www.bibik.org%2FCT'/></div>Mikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09453608116212023909noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-251562.post-10591229315237656982007-06-05T16:44:00.000-07:002007-06-05T17:38:51.738-07:00Introducing the OMGWTFestiva.<br /><br />I figured I should start discussing my impending doom at the hands of an econobox racecar. As previously announced, I'm partaking in the 24 Hours of LeMons in a little over a month. We picked up a Festiva in track form for $350. The car spent the last two season dirt track racing down in Monroe and while being a little more than beat up, the decals also had to go:<br /><br /><a href="http://mbibik.dyndns.org/gallery/v/2007/Festiva+04_01_2007/000_0155.jpg.html"><img src="http://mbibik.dyndns.org/gallery/d/26118-2/000_0155.jpg" /></a> <a href="http://mbibik.dyndns.org/gallery/v/2007/Festiva+04_01_2007/000_0156.jpg.html"><img src="http://mbibik.dyndns.org/gallery/d/26113-2/000_0156.jpg" /></a><br /><br />Putting a roll cage into any other car would have cost about $1,000 minimum so we saved quite a bit of cash right there. The chassis, cage, engine and transmission were solid. The suspension, brakes, wheels, tires, seat, harness.... not so much. Here is the list of what we have done and will do:<br /><ol><li><s>Strip decals</s></li><li><s>Install seat mount</s></li><li><s>Install seat</s></li><li><s>Install harness</s></li><li><s>Replace brakes</s></li><li><s>Replace radiator</s></li><li>Install drain plug in radiator</li><li>Replace suspension</li><li>Install something in place of windshield</li><li>Replace wheels</li><li>Replace tires</li><li>Remount battery</li><li>Replace all fluids</li><li>Paint?<br /></li></ol>The suspension is halfway done, I believe. One of the other team members is doing most of this work and I do believe he has replaced the rear beam. The fact that the car was in "working" condition from the start was a huge benefit. It was obviously trailered home when purchased, but here is a video of it firing up: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oWNj6SeC9g8. Push button start what.<br /><br />Another requirement is that every team member must have a proper helmet and race suit. I have the helmet (three seasons of autocrossing, thanks) and I'm pretty sure of which suit I want: <a href="http://www.saferacer.com/gf545rasu.html">G-Force 545</a>, in blue of course. Clare calls this the moonsuit and strikes off into endless giggles anytime it is mentioned. I'm pretty sure I'll need to clean pee off the carpet when she actually sees me in it.<br /><br />We should be finishing up most of the car this weekend. I'll try to get a large number of pictures but those will wait until after paint if we decide to do that. Look back here in about six weeks for a huge trip report; I'm psyched!<div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/251562-1059122931523765698?l=www.bibik.org%2FCT'/></div>Mikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09453608116212023909noreply@blogger.com1