Well bugger!

A few weeks ago I ordered a backup monitor screen from eBay. Needless to say, when it arrived it did not work. In desperation, suspecting it might be the plug-in cable I cut the cable off and replaced it with a known-working wire and wired it straight to a battery. It still didn't work. Needless to say, after a certain argy-bargy I did get a refund off the seller.

Still wanting a backup monitor screen I ordered the above from Walmart figuring they wouldn't be selling trash and I made sure it was an order, ordered from walmart dot com rather than from some fly-by-night that peddles their trash via the walmart website.

Well, I connected the monitor power cable to a 12v battery and nothing happened. I checked the cable for connectivity with my handy-dandy meter and it checked out fine. Then I put the meter across the positive/negative on the monitor and read the resistance as infinite. That means there's a broken connection inside the monitor.

Walmart was very good and offered a replacement. I'm waiting for that now. How long has it been since I first ordered a screen? Checking eBay it seems I ordered it on November 24th. That was DOA so I ordered one from Walmart (different brand) and that also arrived DOA. I am really not feeling very encouraged right now.

All the screen is for is so I can complete testing the camera system I installed in October/November. Once that's done I can get on with turning the road traffic recording system into a security system. That was prompted by some wanton vandalism. An individual walked around the bus, flipped down both kick steps, tried to pry the battery door open by pulling hard on the latch - so hard that it was jammed and I had to unlock the battery door to unjam it. There was also damage to a solar panel.

Meanwhile I find Harbor Freight has quit selling 1/16th welding rods and that they're now fairly hard to obtain economically. I cannot now get 7014 rods in 1/16th and I think 3/32 is just too thick for my 70A welder. I can have a go though.

Over the process of a few weeks I cut a sheet of steel to fit exactly the recess in the back door where the window is. Yesterday I was hit with the sudden realization that if I welded a sheet of steel flush with the outside of the door rather than flush with the window aperture then I would have a substantial place where water could gather and promote rust. That's not welcome so the plan now is to cut another piece of steel vaguely the right size that I can trim to size after removing the glass then weld into the actual window aperture. That welding will be a lot easier as I won't have to worry about burning through the thin steel of the door as the steel where the glass is mounted is thicker.

I'm still getting water ingress in the cockpit and I still believe the roof vent is to blame. I have a new roof vent. It just means I'll have to get up there, remove the old vent, put in a seal and then tighten the new vent down - assuming all the rivet holes are the same.

Since the solar panel itself isn't damaged but the plastic it's built into is badly cracked I can probably recycle the panel into a new mount. Should that not be possible then there's a possibility of doing away with the front panel. The back panel is 20W which should be sufficient for powering just the digital door lock. In theory I could put up a fun destination sign board up in front.  In reality though I'd rather just put a new 15W mono solar panel up. That seems much easier!

At the moment it seems like one step forward, five backward.