/288 - It's Sunday?

Spent the first half of today somehow thinking it was Saturday. What a harsh realization.

Had a first go at fixing the failing oled screen on my Axoloti. All I really did was reflow the board connections since that’s all I could get to without taking it all apart. No luck. Next step is dig in deeper and take it apart so I can check the header connections, and then replace it if that still doesn’t work. If it is broken then it’s my fault — when I was putting it all together originally a stray nut was under the screen when I tried to tighten it down so it flexed a bit. I don’t think it enjoyed that, but I’m honestly surprised it’s lasted this long.

Emi and I also got the building done on the platform bird feeder project. It’s glued and clamped, just needs some sanding and a finish before we can put it up. It’s turned out great so far.

/228 - Upgrade, Maintain

Managed to knock out 3 quick projects tonight:

Rewired 2 garage light sockets to outlets and hung new LED fixtures. It’s so much better/brighter in there now. Garage progress has otherwise stopped due to my broken toe, but it’s feeling more and more solid so hopefully I can get back to it soon.

Took the Organelle apart to retrieve the microSD card that fell inside of it. Also manage to NOT dump all the wooden keys out this time. Woof.

Last I replaced the broken string inside my VPjr volume pedal. The pedal is very sturdy, but when the strings break it is very fiddly to get the new one in. It requires lots of patience and hooks/tweezers and three hands. Volume swells coming up!

/173 - The End of An Era

This is inside of my trusty Presonus Firebox. My first interface, bought in 2010 and still working great until today when I smelled a smell and my monitors started screeching. So much of everything I’ve ever recorded has gone through this little box. I’m going to try to fix it, but the pad below the burnt end of the cap looks pretty bad. Can’t hurt to try but even if I can’t bring it back it has served me well and I definitely got my use out of it. I don’t imagine there are many of these around anymore, let alone computers with firewire ports!

/137 - Waste Not

One of the first projects I completed when I got the cnc machine was to make new handles for a large old cooking pot we had. I was so proud to get it all measured up and designed, cut them and have them fit. I was also very happy to extend its usable life instead of just throwing it away. This week the dishwasher destroyed them so today I made some replacements out of hdpe. These should last a lot longer, even if the wood ones were much nicer.

I could watch the cnc machine all day long. It’s mesmerizing.

/128 - Not Quite

Took another stab at fixing the old Electra reel recorder. Initially went down to make a list of parts I should order for it — machines this old almost always need a recap. Ended up playing around/taking it apart/greasing/oiling/deoxing and didn’t really get anywhere. Watched a video of a guy making a really sketchy demagnetizer that I want to try haha. Oh well.

/017 - Treasure

Well that escalated quickly.

As I mentioned, I wanted to find a means to play a few old (60’s) tapes that were correspondence between my wife’s grandmother and her family back in Japan. I sent an email two ads on Craigslist and both got back to me, so I went for it. $45 for everything (except the guitar) in the first picture. The Sony in the top left works, but runs slow. The speakers had some foam that disintegrated so I’m sure that the insides are full of it. Top center is an old record player. Powers up but has an issue with the drive so it jams after about 5 seconds. Passing that project on to someone else. The two tape units in the center don’t do anything when plugged in, but are both full of tubes so maybe there’s a guitar amp conversion project there for me some day. The Webcor unit (also tube) plays and records, and came with that wonderful old mic! Plugged my guitar in and that sounded great too. Looking forward to spending some more time with this.

/006 - It’s Alive

Left: The insides of old electronics remind me of tiny cities
Right: I’m at hospitals pretty regularly for work. There are always lots of glass blocks used in hospitals, which is very strange to me.

Dug into the unresponsive cassette recorder a bit more and found that the motor isn’t dead. That issue came from a broken bit of old plastic that was supposed to hold a switch in place to be activated by the mechanical buttons. It’s alive! Still doesn’t sound right though. Next steps: new belt and a thorough cleaning.