Bloody Hell!

They actually arrived! The two heatsinks I ordered for my Peltier cooler arrived today! I had serious doubts as to whether they would actually arrive, having ordered everything on November 8th and everything else having arrived very quickly.

Unpackaged, this is everything. Two heatsinks, the Peltier element and the heatsink glue.

It was pretty inexpensive - under $10 for the lot. Anyway, I glued it together and when the glue dries (which might take a few days), I'll be able to test it all.

The theory is that putting power through the Peltier element will transfer heat from one side to the other. The problem is, this is electronics and I generally find electronic gizmos have a very high rate of being junk. It's not worth spending more unless it actually works.

So, I'll wait for it all to cure then perhaps hook it up to a solar panel, mount it into a box - perhaps a plastic sandwich box and put a thermometer inside. Then after a while, check external and internal temperatures. If it works, fantastic. If not - its expected.

Meanwhile I looked more into lithium batteries for my bus. I found that only the most expensive were rated for 100A continual output. That's a major problem that makes a generator more attractive. There are other options though.

I looked at supercaps because if a supercap can hold 10ah then be recharged slowly from a traditional lead acid batterry I have a potential solution. The capacitors could release 8ah at 100a quickly then recharge slowly from a deep cycle lead acid battery.

I also looked into building my own lithium ion or nickel metal hydride batteries. Lithium ion cells seem to be 3.7v only. Looking at the costs, both lithium and NiMH seem excessively expensive.

The supercap solution looks the most economically promising but again, it's electronics and they so rarely seem to perform as advertised. I would use a supercap engine starting battery if I could find out their full specifications.

One of the problems if not the biggest problem is that nobody ever seems to publish full usage specifications on anything. It's like trying to sell shoes without mentioning important things like sizes!

Frustrations

Today started with my laying conduit on the ground from the outside breaker box to where I was going to have my plugin. Then I was going to erect a stake for the socket. The plan was to have the electrics completely done today but as with plans, little was actually accomplished.

The blower swiftly removed fallen leaves and the conduit was layed over the ground. The next stage will be to insert the cable and bury the conduit. I can certainly do better than the Dish Network people that didn't bother burying their cables. An ants nest was revealed and the scurrying ants blown away too.

When it came to cutting a point on the metal stake intended for use with the outside socket, I hit my first big problem of the day. My angle grinder stopped working. After some tinkering, I gave up on it as a lost cause and zoomed off to buy a new one. They're cheap enough at Harbor Freight for $15.

After returning home with my new angle grinder, I proudly plugged it in and it didn't work. Nothing I did could make it work. Putting it away and cursing Harbor Freight, I pulled out a hacksaw and completed the task. Then I drove the stake into the ground.

By then, the light was beginning to fail but I took another look at the angle grinder and found how to dismantle it properly. It seems one of the carbon brushes on the motor had broken. Looking around as I recall there had been spares, I found some that didn't fit.

Clearly either I found spare brushes for another device or Harbor Freight put the wrong brushes in the box. This is rather disappointing and frustrating!

As tomorrow is a party day, nothing will be done. Friday being shop til you drop day, should be good. Everybody will be out on the roads hunting non existent bargains. A good time not to go to Harbor Freight!

Even without an angle grinder, I can complete my wiring in order to run my welder. I fully intend to be welding by Sunday night!

In other news, the Peltier cooler arrived. The glue that fixes it to cooling vanes arrived a few days ago as did the solar panel to power it. I'm still waiting for the cooling vanes.

I've ordered a long permanent magnet to use with a home made coil for my door opening device. Failing that I did see a likely looking solenoid but I'd rather try building something myself first rather than going to a last resort of buying somebody else's junk.

This bus project is taking longer than anticipated. Were I starting again, I would definitely take a different route. Meanwhile I'll have another hunt for the right carbon brushes. Harbor Freight surely can't have been dumb enough to supply the wrong brushes?

Plastic planks and other thoughts.

Now the shower base is not sitting in the drivers seat, its possible to see the seat! There's stuff left to move before I can drive it though.

Speaking of driving, a letter arrived from my insurance company reminding me my bus insurance is due in September. The problem is that it was sent to my old address. I have no idea how many times I will have to tell Progressive that I've changed address. I have told their head office, adjusted it on their online system, told their local agent and yet they persistently get it wrong. Perhaps I'll change insurance companies?

Meanwhile, I cut up my remaining plastic plank to use for two of the four sides of my shower base. I need to make the base solid enough to hold the shower pan in place. The idea is to use plastic planks and simply glue them together and glue them to the floor.

As the plank is not wide enough at 7 inches, I had to cut it into 7.5 inch sections to glue together to make a 7.5 inch wide section. I thought after that since I need more plastic plank to complete the mount, it might be better to buy a treated wood plank. If it rots then I can replace it but that might be a long way in the future. PVC planking is most definitely not cheap! Wood, on the other hand, is far less expensive!

I glued almost 3 feet of plastic plank together. At 7 inches wide, that's about 28 inches. I have reservations about the strength of the glue. Indeed, I'm giving serious consideration to simply using wood planking, painting it and hoping for the best. The plastic wasn't wasted as it was all offcut anyway.

I might pick up wood plank tomorrow, together with some 30A cable, 15A cable and some conduit. It's time to get the electrics completed so I can get my bus registered as a motorhome. The original idea had been to have 50A cable but it seems hard to obtain. I can always change cables later!

Interestingly, Eric in Canada has found that there are a lot of homes now being registered with no electricity. http://lesguis.com/wp/?p=4927 That's interesting and makes me wonder how much of an issue my incomplete plumbing and electrical system will be in terms of reregistration.

Ooh, look at her drawers!

It was fairly straightforward carpentry and something I'd prepared for, weeks ago. To be honest though although I'd already built one drawer from 1x4 planks, the prospect of building drawers was a little off putting.

It all went well enough though. As I had correctly surmised, the metal washers worked perfectly as spacers. Way cheaper than plastic spacers and I didn't need anything quite as thick as the plastic spacers.

The plywood cut beautifully with the circular saw. Aside from a little trimming on the edges, the drawer bottoms all fitted. One drawer is a little tight but I'm not worried. It'll loosen in use.

I'm using metal runners (cheating) and just to make life easier, after getting it all to fit, I slipped some silicone glue onto the lip that holds the shelf bottom and silicone glued it together. When I work on those drawers next, I'll simply screw the runners to the drawer. The tops I'll like as not just glue together.

Tomorrow I have to rescue a damsel in distress so its unlikely that I'll get to do much on the bus. If I do then I'll probably start putting the other four drawers in.

This bus conversion is a most massive project and my insistence on partitions, doors and privacy has added a lot to the complexity of the task. Had I just slapped paint on, put up window film and hung blinds over windows things would have been faster and simpler. A lot less satisfactory though.