Harbor Freight Thunderbolt Solar Panel Kit – Not Recommended

Harbor Freight Thunderbolt Solar Panel Kit – Not Recommended

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September 2017, I purchased a Thuderbolt Solar 100 Watt Solar Panel Kit for $154.25.  This kit seemed really clever but the controller failed to work.  I measured the voltage from each solar panel with a volt meter and each panel put our 22 volts.  When all the panel were connected to the controller, nothing happened.  I could not get the controller to turn on.  It was dead.  I waited too long to contact Harbor Freight to get this resolved.  I expect products to work out of the box.  This product, for me, failed this expectation.

Both Thuderbolt products and Harbor Freight are not recommended.

They Don’t Deserve Democracy

They Don’t Deserve Democracy

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I received the following e-mail message from an Indivisible activist:

“I’ve moved from despair over not being able to get the goods on Trump to despair over the Republicans and people who don’t want him impeached in the face of ALL the IRREFUTABLE evidence of multiple illegal and impeachable offenses we now have. Sometimes I just get angry and say to myself that THEY don’t deserve Democracy, but of course they take us all down with them!”

My reply follows with some edits:

What you outlined has bothered me a lot also. I am trying to research why about 30 to 40 percent of the electorate support Trump. I do not think there is a single reason. I do think this is rather complicated matter for us to understand. Here are just some of the possible reasons I am trying to put together. They all boil down to prejudice and ignorance. Remember that individuals are naturally self serving.

A significant number of people have given up with this form of government and thus no longer vote. This just might be a partial reason why Trump became popular because he is not the establishment and obviously was going to shake things up. Some citizens do not like this form of government!

White supremacy is an obvious factor probably coming from ego needs and fears of the lesser class taking my job away.

Family influence can be a strong factor where the parents are conservative and instill that viewpoint into their children.

Racism, especially in the former slave states is very powerful. (i.e. red states vote Republican)

Advancement of corporate and rich class interests work against what is best for the nation some times. A prime example is the United States withdraw from Paris Accord for controlling global warming. The oil and gas industries support Trump.

Some religions are against abortion, mixed marriage, and just love the concept of placing Trump into the throne of the chosen one.

Catholics also seem to mildly embrace singular powerful men as rulers. This explains, a bit, why Latin American countries are mainly dictatorships.  And, President Donald Trump is definitely a pending dictator.

Poor education at grade school level is apparent in the United States. Approximately 32 million adults in the United States can’t read, according to the U.S. Department of Education and the National Institute of Literacy. The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development found that 50 percent of U.S. adults can’t read a book written at an eighth-grade level.

It is increasingly harder to pay for education beyond high school. For some reason, students who enter junior college fail to enter a four year college and graduate. While about 80 percent of entering community college students indicate they want to earn a bachelor’s degree or higher, only 29 percent of community college students who started in fall 2011 actually transferred to a four-year institution within six years.

Communities that are rural can be backward. Just look at the past elections in England where Brexit was voted for in rural but city dwellers voted no. Look at Turkey where Recep Tayyip Erdogan has support in the rural areas but not in the cities. Cities push people with different backgrounds, different educations, different ethnicity, different views together way more than rural areas. Also, rural typically is singular economic enterprises where cities have way more businesses that throw people together.

There are social media platforms that wish to propagandize. Fox “News”, Wall Street Journal, YouTube. A major new study of social media sharing patterns shows that political polarization is more common among conservatives than liberals.

I think there are more factors but these come to mind right now. I am pessimistic too for the reason that facts fail to matter that much to a lot of people.

Take care,
Do not despair. We have a difficult job to do to save this Democracy.

 

Posted December 16, 2019
Updated December 17, 2019

SECOND IN SERIES FOR NEST LEARNING THERMOSTAT REPAIR

SECOND IN SERIES FOR NEST LEARNING THERMOSTAT REPAIR

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This is the second post in a series for repairing the NEST.  This second method should not be attempted by anyone who does not understand electronics.  If you feel unsure of your capabilities or your understanding of this repair, please call a professional repair person who understands NEST products.  It is strongly encouraged that you shut down all power to your heater and air conditioner prior to making this repair!  Typically this is done by turning off your circuit breakers for these devices.   Please call a HVAC qualified repair person to check your wiring prior to energizing the system after this repair is made.

A few months after putting up a post describing my repair of the NEST thermostat we encountered another problem. We started getting errors showing the NEST was not connecting to our WiFi.

In the evenings after the AC has been on for hours we begin to see battery error. (This error is because we had NO C wire connected which I will explain to you shortly).  We only had power from furnace and air conditioning wires powering the thermostat.

At night, after the air conditioning runs for a long time during the hot months, we get low battery resulting in loss of WiFi connection. Battery should be 3.8 or higher.

 

Note in the image above that the battery voltage is a bit too low (3.848 V).  We still have a problem.  The battery should be 3.9 or higher.

In the morning, after the AC has been off for hours, the battery is back to normal as seen in the image below (3.926V) and the system works properly.

This is obviously a power supply problem. My guess is power from the heater and air conditioning wires is not providing enough power to the thermostat. We need a better solution. I then added my own 24 volt transformer as the supply source but that failed because the wiring did not “see” a complete circuit. The final and best solution was to connect the C wire! I found this was the problem by finding this web site: https://smartthermostatguide.com/thermostat-c-wire-explained/

 

Prior wiring that failed to work properly as seen in the picture above was because the NEST was getting power from the heat and cool circuit wires and not from a dedicated power source.

I then turned OFF the whole furnace and AC unit at the circuit breaker box. I know electronics but I am NOT an authority for HVAC systems. I really do not want to take down our HVAC system by making any mistake.  I will only add new circuit wires to the system when the system has been turned off!

I looked carefully at the thermostat wires and found an unused wire at the thermostat and at the furnace unit. Prior installers had spun this extra wire backwards around the the other wires to keep it out of the way.  It took me a while to find this unused wire.  At the thermostat end, I had to pull the whole set of wires out of the wall to find this unused wire.  I stripped the thermostat end of this prior unused (blue) wire and attached it to the C connection at the NEST thermostat as seen in the image below.

 

 

I then went to the furnace and found that unconnected same wire color and connected it to the “C” terminal at the furnace.

ALWAYS MAKE SURE THE SAME WIRE COLOR CORRESPONDS TO THE CORRECT CONNECTOR AT THE FURNACE END AND AT THE THERMOSTAT END!

I then called a HVAC repair person that knows NEST products and told him I would pay to have him make sure this new thermostat wiring was good to go. He came over and took a look and said it was good. I turned the circuit breakers back on. I then did a thermostat reset.  We have not had a problem yet with the system.

Summary: This method adds a single wire connection between the thermostat and your heater/air conditioning units to complete a new “C” or common circuit between the two devices.

If you do not have your NEST wired for C and are having problems with your NEST, research this option by going to this web site: https://smartthermostatguide.com/thermostat-c-wire-explained/ This web site is a bit technical.

When I tried to find a HVAC person to come over and check my wiring I found the Internet did show vendors that service NEST thermostats and I did call that qualified person.

I find it rather odd that the NEST Thermostat worked for over a year before having power supply problems.

I just love the NEST as I can see the house temperatures and adjust them even when on vacation.

 

Posted December 5, 2019

Making Soap From Scraps

Making Soap From Scraps

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I used to buy my hand bar soaps from Crabtree & Evelyn.  But that business appears to me to be making mistake after mistake to survive as a business.  They no longer offer men’s soaps.  What they do offer is women’s only items. Their web site really is quite awful.  They no longer take phone calls.  My client log in failed to work which really tells me how stupid they seem to be. 

Crabtree & Evelyn said it had suffered “significant losses” due to the rise of e-commerce, the decline of traditional retail traffic and changing consumer demand (we are ALL to blame).

“But all is not lost – according to the Straits Times, the company is moving its entire business online, and it has already launched e-commerce sites in Australia, Singapore and, yes, Malaysia.”

I started buying these soaps after receiving them for Christmas gifts.  They were not cheap.  I truly hope they survive and bring back the soaps I really love.

Toward the end of each bar’s use I found it rather annoying to keep trying to use the small soap bar fragments.  I started collecting the very small bars in the hope to put them together some day.  That day arrived.  I purchased a silicone mold from Michaels.  The mold I decided upon was Celebrate It.  My daughter helped me pick the mold out as I did not have a clue that I needed silicone mold.  She also helped me pick a good mold size for hand soap.  I was looking for a square shaped mold but the store did not have any that would work for me.   The mold label shows it is microwave safe which is necessary for the heating, melting, process to work.

I put enough bar fragments into each cup and then load the mold into a microwave. 

 

I discovered that I had to carefully watch these soap fragments get treated by microwave energy because they would puff up rather quickly as they were heated.  Because I had quite a few soap bar fragments from different soap bars, I found that some soaps would really puff up in size while other fragments would not. 

 

The trick was to turn off the microwave when the soap fragments really expanded.  Then open the microwave door and use the curved side of a spoon to press down upon the really puffy soap so the whole blend would be the same size.

I could also do some really crude soap bar construction to better make a good shape bar with the spoon while the soap was hot.  I found that I had to repeat this process at least five times to get the bars into the shape that was useful.  Repeat this process until you get a well formed and tight bar of soap.  Let the mold cool down before taking the soap out of the mold.   Because the mold is silicone, easily bent, it is real easy to get the soap bars out.

I am quite happy with the results. The bars look a bit ugly but they do stay together and they do  last as long as any soap bar of it’s size.  Please be aware that each bar piece had it’s own separate fragrance.  I found that putting a mixed batch of soap fragments together did not in any way diminish the resulting fragrance.  But, I defy anyone to identify the soap fragrance I wear with using these bars.

 

Posted December 4, 2019
Updated December 5, 2019

We Need You – WORK FOR PRESIDENT TRUMP!

We Need You – WORK FOR PRESIDENT TRUMP!

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(Opinion)

We are looking for energetic, willful individuals to work for the president of the United States.  You will be working for our President Donald Trump in a fully dedicated capacity where your existence is subordinate to the leadership of the party and the presidency in every way.
Your duties will vary depending upon the needs and whims of the president. Your own concerns over any issues are of no consequence.  You are to offer blind obedience to our leader.  You are to flatter our leader in every situation you find yourself with him.  You are never to contradict our president.
If you are very willing to work in an environment explained in the text above then we want you to consider joining us to make America Great Again.  We need a few really good followers to totally bend to the wishes of our leader so we can move ahead with his plans.  If you think you might qualify for employment with us then look over the following list of requirements that we require.
Here is a list of expected qualifications for employment:
  • You must not be concerned with the truth.
  • Devotion and flattery toward our leader and also step in unison with lower ranking leadership is a requirement.
  • Accept and continue to function with willful ignorance of any contrary facts to those presented to you by our leader and party officials.
  • You must be willing to act according to the values, beliefs and principles of our leader and not your own.
  • If you did poorly in school that does not matter, having a low IQ is preferred.
  • You must prove to us that you have a low interest for the facts.
  • You must accept, with blind obedience, the decisions of people who have offices of authority above you.
  • Being a part of an alleged corrupt organization must not bother you.   We ask for devotion not intellect.
  • If asked to create media propaganda, you must be willing and able to create a believable fiction.
  • Working for Russia is a side function requirement which must not bother you.

 

Posted December 4, 2019

Extended Stay America Hotel – Seattle – Everett – Silverlake Area Review

Extended Stay America Hotel – Seattle – Everett – Silverlake Area Review

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1431 112th St SE, Everett, WA 98208
(425) 337-1341
Room being evaluated: 217

I have been in hotels and motels that look to be above the norm. They look this way entering and the lobby and front desk areas but as you progress to you assigned room the experience diminishes a bit. You might find your room to be a bit smaller than you expected.

Our stay at Extended Stay, Everett, Washington was all mediocre all the way from front door to our assigned room. What is special is the cost, quite reasonable. Also, our room was rather large and had a near complete kitchen which includes a microwave, refrigerator, stove, sink, cupboards, dishes, and silverware. There are no pots, pans, and cooking utensils like graters, large stirring spoons, etc.

Our room also had a couch that could be turned into a bed. We did use this but had to ask for sheets, pillows and blankets which were provided rather quickly.

The TV was oddly placed between the bed and pull out bed but not facing either direction. I guess all you had to do is rotate the TV to watch it from the bed or the pull out sofa bed.

The closet, if you can call it that, had no coat hangers. The shower was ok but there was no heater in that room, as you some times find at some other hotels. The towels were adequate size for me but you might find them a bit small.

The two separate windows appeared to be double in that they looked to be two windows each with two pains of glass, four total glass. If you want fresh air, you must open both sets of windows. This attention to detail allowed me to guess that they also put in really good wall insulation.  The room did not seem to change temperature when we turned the heater off during our first two days (out of 4) even though the outside air temperature was very close to freezing.  We turned the heater off in the morning when we left and turned it on again when we arrived back at night around 10 pm.

Our room heater/AC unit was in the wall below one of the large windows next to the queen size bed. That heater was the main disappointment for a number of reasons:
There was absolutely no way to set the room temperature easily, accurately, and quickly. There was no thermostat to set a temperature nor was there any room thermometer to view the results.
The device had only a dial for you to set the temperature by guessing. So, you had to keep adjusting the temperature dial until you got a rather good room temperature. I tried to adjust the temperature at least a dozen times and never could get it set correctly.
The heater would cycle between shooting out warm and then cool air. This device was next to the bed so it was quite annoying to experience these temperature swings.
We stayed 4 nights but the third night the heater began to show failure. The last night the unit failed totally to heat. Only the fan choice worked. The outside temperatures at the end of November were below freezing at night and in the low 40’s during the day. The room construction seemed to be fairly good because with no new heat coming into the room, the temperature did not drop all that much.

The workout room within Extended Stay is pathetic, only two exercise devices. I am a member of LA Fitness and found the closest one about 1.27 miles away from our hotel. Each day, I walked to that facility by crossing over the 5 freeway bridge and then walking north along a pedestrian and bicycle path to the gym. That LA Fitness gym was huge and had way more workout devices than my gym in Orange County, Southern California.  I really do recommend LA Fitness in Everett.

Our last night at this hotel turned out to be quite amazing. We were returning from seeing a movie, about ten o-clock at night, and tried to turn into the long private driveway to Extended Stay but the roadway was full of police vehicles and a couple of private cars. I counted at east 15 vehicles blocking that driveway, none were moving.

We parked next door at a business and walked back to talk to a police officer to figure out when we could park our car within the Extended Stay hotel. We were told that they were waiting for a police officer supervisor to arrive as a police vehicle was rammed and that required a higher ranking office to examine the situation. The officer told us his best guess was about midnight. My son moved the car back to the hotel at midnight.

I decided to see if I could find out what this police action and this is a reply:

-Officers located a wanted suspect at the location. Upon contact, the suspect tried fleeing and drove down the sidewalk before colliding with a patrol vehicle.

-Due to the nature of the crime and the dynamics of the arrest, officers created a crime scene so the incident could be investigated. Ultimately, the suspects vehicle was impounded and a patrol car had to be towed.

Summary:  I do recommend this hotel because the price is reasonable and the rooms are quite doable but only if they fix the heater/AC systems for each room.

 

Posted Dec 2, 2019
Updated: December 7, 2019
Updated: December 10, 2019