More fiddling on the solar side

I do an awful lot of thinking and testing. I test everything at least 5 times and think it over several days beforehand too.

I never get much done on a Saturday as I'm still recovering from the week. This is the crowning glory of what I did today though. I put my battery saver plus two switches into a used aluminium box I bought on eBay for $6. I'll have to rivet a bracket to each side in order to bolt it to the bus but that's absolutely doable. It's purple because that's all the paint I had.

The two switches are...

• Top switch is for the solar panel. This works mostly off the rear external plugin solar panel. With the switch to the left the power from the solar panel input on the side of the bus goes into the unit. With the other switch in the up position, solar power feeds through the control unit (shown) and directly into two extraction fans. That allows me to have constant ventilation without bothering with my battery or even touching the rest of my solar setup.
• The top switch in the off (central) position means the external input is disconnected. Nothing will happen if some moron decides to put 25,000 volts through the solar input. 
• The top switch turned to the right, power from the external solar panel will be put straight into the onboard house batteries. 
• The bottom switch in the down position means the fans will run straigh from the timer and the batteries as currently they do.
• The controller just stops the fans when the battery gets below 12v. My solar charge controller is set for a slightly lower power level. This means the ventilation will cut off before the power to my shower, my handbasin or my lighting.

While I was at it, I made up an extension lead for my solar panels since I cut the cords short. I could do a second extension cord too. That would enable me to position my solar panels much further from the bus if required. 

Tomorrow I want to test the functioning of the control unit in my box in combination with the fans and solar panels. Placing the panels in full sun I should get 60W. That's 5A. We've already established those fans actually use 3.7A between them despite claims that they're 2.5A each. I'm hoping that the charge controller on my panel will be able to stop the fans when the panels get obscured and restart them when the sun is back.

One of the things I bought on eBay was a panel-mount ATO fuse holder. I'd had the idea of including it on my purple box. Since then though I looked at the wiring and found it would be way easier just to insert an ordinary inline ATO fuse holder. 

Today they're holding a work dinner for all the drivers where I work. The idea of heading to work on a day off to meet people I work with is just not very appealing. My work colleague isn't going either. I would love to be a fly on that wall to see just how few drivers actually turned up. I mean, honestly - I see enough of my workmates at work. They're fine people but two things area against it - keeping it professional (IE No social functions) and I just don't do crowds - not after Ligo (but that's another story).

I haven't actually completed a bus project for a while. I have several nearing completion though. I'll have to see which gets completed first. I have a feeling that if I plug on with what I did today, tomorrow then that will be completed first.

The CPU fan I ordered has a heck of a long delivery period. I might just use the battery-powered desktop fan I bought together with the voltage reducer I bought on eBay. That would work quite well though it makes more noise. Whether it shifts more air is debatable. I have very much the feeling that the CPU fan is another one of those orders that will not arrive. Speaking of which, I ordered a surveillance camera which never arrived and where the seller is now listed as not a registered account. I filed a dispute so it'll probably be another week before I get a refund.

I paid for a new turn signal switch for my bus. That's not yet arrived. Thank the Lord I was not in a rush! I know I've been charged but when it will arrive is anybody's guess. I don't want to bug the fellow because I'm sure he's legit and it's all above board.

One of the things I looked for this week was epoxy putty. I didn't find any, sadly. I'll have to look again. I have an idea that since I replaced the cigarette lighter inlet outside, I'll do the same inside. As there are no inlets for Anderson connectors, I might get a couple of Anderson connectors and set them in a big chunk of epoxy putty so they can be used as if they were inlets. 

I tested my rear solar inlet today and it worked just fine. I put my brand new extension cord made up of some leftover dual cable and the two ends of an Anderson 1 foot long extender into the inlet I installed. Then I connected a solar panel to the other end, placing it in direct sunshine. Then I tested where the power came out of my rectifier and it was fine. I even checked it with my new power control box and read 18.7 volts coming in from the panel.

Remaining to do on the current plan...

• Test the twin solar panels on the new control box before installing the control box. 
• Complete the wiring to the bathroom sink.
• Complete installation of my shower fan.
• Install the new roof vent.
• Install the new fuse box inside the control console in order to tidy things inside. Then add a switch for my front USB panel.

If the solar panels and the control box don't work out then my last resort will be to install a 3rd battery. That will go in the battery compartment in a box made up to contain also the free-floating power switch. 

I have to install the turn signal switch when it arrives. Other than that I'm considering the bus once again complete when all the above have been taken care of. I can't realistically think of any further additions other than perhaps a GPS tracker in case somebody steals the bus.

More issues and more solutions

Those with longer memories than the standard short-term memory human will recall I purchased from Walmart an angle adapter for a screwdriver that also worked well for drills. Needless to say after having done the couple of holes that needed doing, it stopped working. Today I tried forcing it and yes it would still go all the way around but was very stiff at certain points.

Being clearly no further use for what I wanted to do, I carefully cut the casing off using my angle grinder. I found exactly what I expected inside, namely two crown wheels and the problem was exactly what I thought it would be. Look carefully at the crown wheel inside the casing on the left and at the crown wheel in the middle of the picture. There are teeth missing from the crown wheels. That will cause the stiffness and jamming I experienced. The only thing that will cause that is imperfections in the steel. Given that all steel is recycled, I would hazard a guess that some contaminant was in the steel that caused those two crownwheels to be a little too brittle. Hence teeth sheared off, jamming the mechanism.

I put the voltage controller into a box that I purchased secondhand via eBay. Cutting the hole was easy enough using the angle grinder. I did get it crooked. Oh well - it's not the only crookedly built thing in the bus. I'd sprayed it purple since I had no white spray paint. Well, actually I do but it won't come out of the can. There's a blockage inside the valve stem of the can which is really annoying as it's an unused spray can.

With the adjustments I had to make to make room for the clip attachments on the sides of the unit, I accidentally scraped the paint on the ends of the box. Needless to say I'd run out of purple spray paint by then. Not entirely welcome but I will install it as is when I get the switches I need.

In order to complete the unit I had to order two switches - both double pole. One is two way and the other is two way with a central off position. The aim is to put the two way switch so that the extraction fans can be run directly from solar power or from battery power via the timer controller I have already installed. The other switch will control the solar panel. It will either supply power directly to the other switch, add power to the general solar power supply side or be in the off position, isolating the external solar input.

When I was under the bus the other day, I put the strap over the battery that's not strapped down but found that my turnbuckles were way too big. I'll have to get some smaller ones. Clearly I'd forgotten that I'd used a smaller size when I built the other battery strap and cage.

It's irksome having to order so much stuff from eBay but it seems just about all the local electrical and electronic suppliers went out of business. That's largely due to the oversales of warranties - people buy the extended warranty then when the warranty expires they sell the item and buy new. They never have to think about fixing it hence the parts are not available. When was the last time you saw a TV repair shop?

As I have a redundant phone, I downloaded a webcam viewing app. I couldnt' get the thing to work though as it needed a login etc and I really didn't have the slightest inclination toward registering on some website or other for something that should just work right off the bat. The aim was to see what I could see on my front webcam. I guess I'm just going to have to shoot video and watch the video on my computer after transferring it from the memory card.

I stuffed the side vent on the bus with plastic bags a few days ago. After the torrential rain of last night there's still water entering and dripping inside. I'm baffled as to where exactly that is coming from since I've sealed everything I can think of. There's probably some moisture coming from the roof vent so I'll have to set to and replace that. That can wait a few weeks though. I am officially off work for the summer on June 5th. That's approaching rapidly. Three weeks and two days is all that's left. I'll be honest - I want to do something different next year. I loved driving schoolbusses for the three years I've done it but it's time to move on to something else. I achieved my goal of learning how to drive my own bus.

Harbor Freight has a battery for my cordless drill for $13. A new drill with a battery is $20. I'm almost minded to see what Walmart has since they're so much closer. Harbor Freight is a good place but the distance means that any saving has to be more than the $5 in gas it would cost to get there and back. For many single items, it's just not worthwhile. And looking at the site, for $19 they have just that - a rechargeable drill with a new battery. My $13 battery would cost me $5 in gas so that would be $18 and that's only a single dollar advantage. It's just not worth it in time alone.

Progresso on el busso, not progresso on el soupo

Today not being a workday, it was time to get some work done on the bus. The forecast was for rain, rain and more rain with the chance of yet more rain. It didn't arrive which proves my point when I say weather forecaster speak with forked tongue.

I fed the cables that I'd attached last week, through the floor (only one of these cable bundles is new) and caulked around the edge of the hole pretty thoroughly. I don't need any critters coming up through my cable holes. I had enough of that with rats in the house coming through the dryer vent hole which is why the dryer vent hole now has an old car number plate screwed down over it. I finally caught the last rat this week, took it outside and dispatched it.

On the side of the bus I installed the second of my Anderson two pin recepticles. This can now receive energy from solar panels placed on the ground. I figured that if I'm parked in the shade then I can put a couple of solar panels on the ground in the sun. That gives me the best of both worlds! As can be seen - the cables are hanging down.

I attached the wires from the Anderson inlet to the cable from inside the bus. That part is now fully functional though there is nothing connected as yet to the cables on the inside bar a half-wave rectifier. The plan is to put a switch on the power from the rectifier and a fuse then to have power from the panels going either to the extraction fans or to the general bus power supply. The aim is to keep the fans running in sunny weather which will keep the inside of the bus cool.

The underbus cabling for the solar input is completed. The other line to the water pump in the bathroom is not yet completed. That was where I ran into a snag. The black Harbor Freight cordless drill has run out of power. I believe that the battery while it still turns the drill fast enough, does not have as much power as it used to. I really need to buy a new battery. I'm not sure how long it has lasted but it has lasted reasonably well. The corded Harbor Freight drill does work but the cord is uncomfortable to lie on and is not all that convenient.

So, at the moment I am on stop with some cabling left to be attached to the underside of the bus. I probably have about ten to fifteen feet of cabling to attach, heading toward the handbasin. I'll have to drill an entry hole but that's no problem.

I would love to have done more today but I get quite exhausted quite quickly. I put this down today to three factors. The first is work really wears me out since I started doing 52 hours a week. The second is the heat - it really is getting warm outside. The third is my Dickies overalls that I wore today as they're poly-cotton. They don't breathe as well as pure cotton so they are a bit too warm to wear in a warm, humid climate.

Part of what I'll be doing with the fans is putting a voltage controller on the fans. If the input voltage is below 12v then the fans will be turned off. It will be the same if powered by bus battery power or by solar power. That way the motors are protected from burn out. The problem is if a low enough voltage is applied, the coils will heat up but the motor won't turn and won't therefore produce enough air cooling for the coils.

Thus I purchased a plain (used) box on eBay. It was clearly some kind of modem box originally. I cut a hole in it for my voltage controller switch as it's supposed to be panel mounted. There are a few holes where LEDs would presumably have been mounted that I can just fill with rivets. There's a switch hole where I will put a switch.

There are quite a few projects underway at the moment. There's the roof vent that'll be done sometime soon. The underbus electrics are still underway for the wire to the water pump. The fan in the shower is on hold until I receive a CPU fan from China. The turn signal switch will be replaced soon too. I ordered one a few days ago. That's going to be $117 plus probably $14 postage. I have no idea when it will arrive. I ordered it from Mike Lamb of Midwest Transit Equipment of Illinois. Very helpful fellow and I can thoroughly recommend him.

Another thing I'll do is complete my plan for putting a solar maintainer on my starting batteries. Just about all the bits are there - I just have to complete some underbody wiring. Yet another idea hit me a few days ago - to put a high power cable from the main junction between the batteries toward the battery compartment.

The bus driving battery compartment is big enough to install three type 31 batteries. Two is all that is required to start the bus. In fact it might even start using a single battery. I've got a switch on the circuit right now that's just lying in a plastic tray. I might build a little box to hold that switch that's about the same length and height as a type 31 battery. Then I could mount the switch properly and not bother with the plastic tray. While I'm at it, if I built that box to hold another U1 sized battery then I could wire that into the circuit and have a total of 105ah. That would mean in turn that I don't need to run the fans off solar all the time. The two 35ah batteries don't produce enough power to run the motors without dropping the voltage. In time I suppose the three could be replaced by a single type 31 deep cycle in the battery compartment.

Meanwhile I'm heading into the last 3 weeks of the school year. After this I will be quite happy not to drive a work school bus again for quite a while. My day starts with a 4AM alarm. Then about 4:30 I roll out of bed then leave the house at 5AM. At 5:20AM I arrive at work and at 5:30AM I'm sailing out of the front gates at the wheel of a 30' special needs schoolbus. At 8:15AM I'm back in the bus yard. At that point I could go home but rather than put 20 miles on my car, drive for 40 minutes total and spend just an hour and three quarters at home, I take a nap in my car. Then at 10:30 I'm off again in the work bus. I'm back by 1:15 which gives me half an hour for lunch so it's whatever can of food is in the car. Then at 1:45 I'm back on the road again, returning at 5pm. By the time I have returned to the bus yard I have completed about 200 miles of route driving. By the end of the week I am utterly exhausted.

Now you can appreciate why during term time very little actually gets done on the bus. In fact I'm lucky most weeks to do anything as I don't really recover until Sunday. As there's a lot of bacteria under the bus and mold, I can only go under there on Saturdays as it takes 24 hours for the bacteria and mold to have its usual effect on my digestive tract. Better to have that on a Sunday than when I'm driving a bus. Perhaps I should bottle the sand on the ground here and sell it as a laxative?

Bits and bobs weekend.

It was another of those weekends - the kind of weekend other weekends deny knowing and about which regular days deny knowledge. It rained a lot. In fact more than a lot. It rained very heavily - the kind of torrential downpour that caused Noah to build his ark. Between rainstorms I went to the bus and found most of the rain had stayed out of the bus. I still saw a few drips but I think those might have come from the side vent. I'll still probably replace the vent with the vent I bought as it doesn't look that great.

A few days ago a little 12v to 3v voltage regulator arrived. I'd ordered that after finding the 12v CPU fan I'd been using was not that great. I'd had an idea that I might use the cheap D cell powered desk fan I have lying around as a replacement for the shower fan. Meanwhile of course, I have another smaller CPU fan on the way. I could probably use either but I'd rather use the CPU fan as it's quieter and likely more reliable.

Originally I'd put a cigarette lighter socket as my 12v power inlet for the bus. That was so I could plug solar panels in while leaving them in an ideal outdoor location in order to get the most sun. The cigarette socket and plug proved quite problematic. The plugs are very flimsy and poorly made while the sockets are pretty good and almost indestructible. They also tend to have a problem with water penetration.

My solar panels had come with MC4 connectors. Those are pretty good but have a huge flaw in that they're very difficult to separate when required. I was also less than keen on the fact the cables were separate and not a figure 8 or dual cable. Given that I know these panels to work and the warranty has probably expired I had no qualms about snipping the cables short and replacing them with dual cables ending in Anderson two pin connectors.

This is one of the panels - it's possible to see that the cables are cut to different lengths. This is so that in the unlikely event that the solder connections fail (even in their shrink wrapped insulation), the two conductors should not be able to touch.

One of the other issues with the existing cables was that they were too short. They were something like two feet long which might be ideal for some situations but which were not for mine. My new cables are both four feet long which is ideal inside the windshield of the bus. If I need them further from the bus than four feet I can use an extender. That is not a problem.

That's what the back of the bus is looking like now. Some of the wires could go into cable wrap. I'll probably do that just to make it look tidier. The rest will just have to stay as they are. It looks complicated and it is complicated as it's a system that has grown organically.

The box mounted to the ceiling to the right of the light switch and lamp assembly is a half-wave bridge rectifier. That takes input from an as yet to be installed solar input on the side of the bus at the back. When the wires are installed, they will go to the new bridge rectifier below.

The black box in the center at the bottom is new. That's a half-wave bridge rectifier. I don't actually need a rectifier there but for the fact it adds excellent anchor points for my connectors. There are three solar sources combining into one via that little box. Before that was installed I had a couple of diodes between contact strips. That had worked excellently for years but now I need more wires so it needed updating.

The plan is to get the solar inputs combined and then to tap into the solar input to give an alternate power supply for the ventilation fans. If you remember, I bought a voltage regulator a while ago and the plan is to use that so that the fans take their power from the combined solar panels when there's enough power.

Just so you know - that's the power regulator. It's set to turn off the power at 11.5v and back on at 12.5v. This is basically so that the fans are not supplied a low voltage - too low to turn the fan but which will heat up the wiring and end up burning the internal fan wiring out. It'll be a fair bit of work but I think it'll be worthwhile.

Currently things remaining to do on the bus...

• Replace the broken turn signal switch. Thus far I've contacted four places. NAPA who have not responded to the order I put in on their website for instore delivery. It doesn't look like they're going to either so scrub NAPA. Carolina International doesn't seem to bother with their website which really doesn't surprise me. I find many companies throw websites up then ignore them which of course backs up my view of the internet as being a waste of time. W.W.Williams can get me the part but it's going to be $140. One of the online school bus suppliers wanted $117 but weren't quite sure about whether it would fit. It's looking a lot like going local is going to be the answer.
• Completing the wiring to the battery compartment so that I can solar charge the driving batteries or at least keep them topped up. That's a very short job.
• Running the wires through the floor and under the bus to the handbasin and through the floor by the handbasin. That's probably going to take the longest as it's a long stretch and I'm going to have to work around the rear differential - which is massive.
• Running wires to and installing the rear solar input Anderson connector. That's not going to take too long but must be done in combination with the handbasin wire. 
• Replacing the roof vent. I have a roof vent and just need to get the old vent off and the new vent in place. Complicating matters, the new vent has a flat base and the roof is slightly curved. I'll probably have to use some Bondo before crimping my rivets but after the Bondo has cured.
• Install my new fuse box inside the control console.

I have a plan to resurrect the non-functioning horn button in the steering wheel. That came about because I noticed that the connections are loose on the yellow wire coming from presumably the horn button. It's not high priority but it would be nice to do.

A week or two back I looked at getting a louder horn. In the end I wasn't greatly impressed by what I saw and decided not to bother. The number of times I use a horn are minimal. It will be interesting to see whether I can achieve my goal. I might have to add extra wires and connections but it'd be nice to get things working properly. The fact that the speedometer and rev counter stop working makes me suspect a loose connection and I do see a connector swinging below the instrument panel. I'm thinking that water dripping on it could be the problem.

Lots left to do but I'm getting there. Once all that lot is done I might think about newer tyres. The rear tyres are not as essential as the fronts as it's perfectly possible to drive with a flat back tyre. I drove an entire morning bus route driving a schoolbus with a flat tyre on one of my duals - with the agreement of the work mechanic. I can't wait to go on another trip in the bus.

Not a lot got done today

It was a warm day and I just didn't feel like doing much. Yesterday I'd found I had two sets of 3 wire combiners so I decided to tidy up some of my wiring. This was perfectly good and perfectly safe - all soldered and wrapped in shrink wrap insulation. It just didn't look that great.

I'd bought my blue-snap on cable combiners in Radio Shack. Remember Radio Shack - it used to be a great place to buy overpriced electronic components and then it became an electronic toy shop before it lost its way and became an overpriced mobile phone store that didn't shine in any particular way before it went bust. Sad for the staff that worked there but it gave them an opportunity to get better jobs than the soul destroying retail jobs they were doing.

As can be seen, that blue snap-on connector (behind the white wire) is combining the white and the green and connecting to the green wire that's going into the timer. There were no instructions but it seems to be a case of stripping the wire then snapping a metal bar down then closing the plastic cover.

I tried moving my CPU fan and got no better performance out of it. It seems the bigger CPU fans just aren't as good as the smaller ones. I have a smaller one on order now. That could take a couple of weeks. I'm in no great hurry. As a backup plan I ordered a step down voltage converter so I could use one of the original Walmart 3V desktop battery powered fans. Remember those? I still have the remains of a couple of them. My smaller 90mm fans blow way better than the 120mm fan.

I had a look at the solar panels but felt disinclined to work on them. I have to ascertain which way around I need to put my Anderson connectors. Once I have them in place and done correctly I'll be able to use the panels without using those frightful MC4 connectors. Those things might be good for heavy duty setups dismantled rarely but for my setup they're not worthwhile.

I found I was short of a few things for my wiring harness yesterday so I'll have to try to remember to get them tomorrow:

• Eight, 8-32 one inch countersunk bolts. I have locknuts for them. These will be used to hold both my Anderson sockets in place.
• A pack of short self-drilling No 8 hex-head bolts. These I use for lots of things.
• A pack of 1.5-2 inch self-drilling No 8 hex head bolts. These I use under the bus to attach cable hangers.
• A pack of half or 3/4 cable hangers.

See - all simple stuff. I try not to go anywhere at the weekend in my vehicle because I drive about 200 miles a day or 1,000 miles a week and I quite like the rest from driving. I might even order some of those ready soldered heat-shrink sleeves. Those might make connecting cables faster and easier than those crimp things I've been using.

Well, that's it for another weekend. I didn't get under the bus but I have a feeling next weekend, weather permitting, I might be able to do just that.

Still exhausted from the week

I can't say I've had an uneventful work week with a bus running out of fuel, a bus not starting and a bus that shuddered violently due to (as it transpired) water in the government diesel. Working 12 hours a day is pretty shattering too.

I ordered a new vent for the roof. That arrived and today I climbed up to the roof and cleared the drain holes on my existing vent. I'll get around to replacing it later. That's not a priority right now. The priority is getting the underbus stuff done before the insects decide to make their presence known.

As can be seen, pulling the caulk out of the vent drain hole has probably done a lot. The next heavy rainstorm will tell the tale. I unblocked all 4 drain holes. I have a feeling I should get a rubber gasket to install the new vent. Aluminium rivets should be good enough for most of the riveting but there are four key rivets that would be best done with steel.

I started today by sitting quietly and putting a black twin wire and a single (orange) wire through some cable wrap. As I opted not to buy a tool to put cable into cable wrap, it takes a while. I decided that I really didn't need the tool since it was quite expensive and I can do it by hand anyway. Once that was done I installed a bridge rectifier on the ceiling. The other side will lead toward a junction for all my solar inputs before they enter the charge controller. At the moment that's a DIY rectifier but I'm thinking I should put a real bridge rectifier in instead. Just to keep things tidier.

Once all that was done, I attached the cable to the bridge rectifier but did not connect the single wire. The single wire will go to the fuse box but since the fuse box always has current going through due to the blown fuse indicator, I didn't.

Working on the cable installation I ran out of self-drilling screws and ran low on cable attachments. I could probably have completed the cable leading to the external solar input had not the battery drill run out of juice. Had I not been still utterly exhausted from the work week I might have done some other things as well.

I looked at changing the wires on my solar panels. They looked straightforward enough to change. I'll have to see whether any wire is left over from my wire routing to the external solar input. I know there will be plenty. When I've done with the solar input, I'll replace the wires on my latest solar panels thus switching the MC4 connectors over to Anderson 2-pin connectors. The Anderson connectors are much less fiddly to separate. I'm just so tired on a Saturday that I really don't want to do too much anyway so I left those as is for now. I'll get to them tomorrow or next weekend.

In my hunt for spare screws I went into an old trailer used as storage and surprised a huge rat. Had I been in there with my air pistol, I'd have taken a shot at it. It glowered at me and scurried away. While I was there I found one of my collapsible water containers had leaked badly. Taking it outside I could see that a rat had chewed a hole in it. Clearly something needs to be done about the rat problem. Glue traps and mouse/rat traps seem to have no effect. Poison would but I'm loathe to use something that might also poison innocent creatures outside the trailer that might eat the corpse of a dead rat.

So I really need some 1 inch self drilling screws, some 2 inch self drilling screws and some 8-24 1 inch countersunk head screws to go with my existing 8-24 lock nuts. That sounds like a shopping trip. I really don't want to drive far on the weekends though. During the week I drive 30 miles a day round trip to work and 200 miles a day for work. That combined with a 12 hour day from 5:30AM to 5PM does leave me exhausted. By Sunday I'm just about recovered. I might delay the shopping until Monday after work and get as far as I can with the stuff I can do. I know I need to re-site the fan in the shower. That's not that hard to do. I might even complete the wiring for that and get that fully operational rather than notionally operational.

I suppose I need to get some aluminium rivets too - to fill the holes left by my self-drilling screws where I had the fan installed the first time. Then I'll have to touch up paint. I'll probably have to get a sample pot for each of the three main colors since the paints are pretty ancient.

While I was on the ladder to look at the roof vent, I also looked at the wing mirrors to see why the flat mirrors are angled downwards slightly. I see now what I did. I angled the mounts differently so if I line those up correctly, my mirrors will be straight as they're supposed to be. I don't need them angled now that I have my (almost) perfect mirror system in place. I decided to adjust them, of course, after I put the step ladder away and as you can tell - I'm just too exhausted to drag it out again.

Meanwhile if you remember last week's saga where I broke my worn-out indicator stalk, I found several people offering them new at prices that are pretty similar. $117 from Napa, $119 from School Bus Warehouse (or something similar) and $139 from WW Williams (where I had my bus serviced). As I'm at work when WW Williams is open, I can't go there. That leaves the website or Napa. Thus I used Napa's online ordering system to order it for instore delivery but thus far have heard absolutely nothing. I wouldn't mind betting that the website doesn't really work. I know quite a few websites that do not really work. I can fill in order forms and whatnot until I'm blue in the face and nothing ever comes of it. In that way, I suppose it's similar to those stupid job application websites. I've never had anything from them - I get all my work from personal contact. I suppose I'll have to physically go to Napa to order it as their website as I said, probably is just there to look pretty. In fact I remember years ago an attorney telling me writing letters, sending emails and phoning people was just a waste of time - one had to actually turn up and bang one's fist on the counter to get any service or attention.

One of the common complaints is that service in the USA truly sucks. Most of this is down to the way employment is organised. Initiative and thought are penalized and all companies want is low-wage slave labor that can't think. The kind of staff they can fire without the risk of them turning round with a lawsuit. Of course all that does is to grind the company even further into the mud.

Well, today didn't get much accomplished but it laid the roots for tomorrow. I probably won't get under the bus tomorrow but I might get ready to pass the cable through the floor and I might get the shower fan properly installed.

Ouch! That's going to be expensive!

I tried to fit the chain links into the holes drilled in the end of the battery clamp bar and the wretched things wouldn't fit. I had to drill the holes out a bit more yet again. Then I had to paint and wait for the paint to dry.

Once dried, the whole battery clamp assembled like this. The two chain links  connect to my turnbuckles which connect to loops welded to the base of the battery compartment. The links on the other bar must have been smaller - maybe between the size that was too small and the size I have. Without looking, there's no telling. 

That's the fan I set up in the shower. I tried it again today and again it produced very little air movement. I suspect it needs to come right out of that corner and go nearer to the aisle. That would give it more air to suck.

I started by drilling a hole to install a USB power socket for my GPS devices - my GPS speedometer and any GPS navigational aid I use. The step bit that I was using was worn out in the middle and as I could not locate the replacement step bit I had to persevere. Well, that worked just fine until the battery ran out in my cordless drill. That meant I had to use my more powerful corded drill which worked better. I did get the hole big enough but then disaster struck - the drill snatched and whacked my hand against the indicator stalk, snapping it.

Removing the indicator stalk assembly was easy enough. It was held in by just two screws. So, International chassis users, it really is that easy. Feeling curious I dismantled the assembly to see what had happened. It turned out that the actual indicator stalk had snapped in two.

Fortunately on the base of the unit was a part number. I have a feeling this could be an expensive or hard to obtain part. On the other hand, it should be possible to make a similar part fit. There's no rule that says the hazard lamp switch has to be on the stalk. As a matter of fact the hazard lamp switch was constantly jamming and needed to be flicked to get it to turn off. The left turn signal liked to switch itself off too. 

Looking at the broken turn signal paddle, it's clearly broken at its weakest point. It might even have been cracked beforehand. So, it looks like I might need to get a whole new assembly.  Whether I'll be able to get an identical part remains to be seen. Thank Heavens it's an International part and not a Carpenter part.

If you recall, my horn didn't work the other day. I pulled the 10A fuse and found the fuse had blown. It was a pretty ancient looking fuse so I replaced it with a new 10A fuse. I gather most of these horns are about 5A so that'll give it plenty leeway. While I was looking at the turn signal assembly I also noticed what is probably the horn connector. As it was a little loose, I wonder whether that could be the problem with the steering wheel horn button. If it is, I will replace the connector. Similarly I noticed the connector from the console was a bit loose. I'm wondering if that and the fact that water clearly drips on it is the problem. If so, a quick wiggle will fix things when they're not working or maybe just press the pieces together and tape them with insulation tape.

Looking carefully at the console above, it's possible to see the switches I've added. On the top row from left to right I have a sockets switch that switches my three USB sockets and one 12v socket on that are mounted to the left of the panel. The switch labelled CB is pretty obvious - it powers the CB radio. The unlabeled black switch in the centre of the top row is for the new USB navigation power supply. The red switch on the far right lights up and is a reversing horn switch.  Straight under that is the horn switch - that's a momentary action switch. If I can get the main horn switch to work, that switch can go away. Moving to the far left of the bottom row, the silver switch powers my LCD screen for my backup camera. That is active only when the green switch next to it is illuminated. That is used to power the front and two rear cameras and the front and rear video recorders.

This is the new USB power connector. That allowed me to roll up the cord for my GPS speedometer so I don't have that cable dangling. When I use a GPS navigation unit I'll be able to coil that cable up so it's out of the way when I use GPS.

I ordered the new roof vent. It wasn't too bad at $25 but shipping from Ohio was $15. That'll probably take about a day to install since I'll have to clear up the mess the hillbillies left behind. I'll have to cut the rivets, scrape the nasty caulk they used and then treat rust, paint with my heat resistant paint and then install the vent. Now this vent is supposed to be white. That'll mean I won't have to paint it. On the other hand, if it was black, it would heat air and make the air rise and thus promote circulation.

Meanwhile I tried running my vents today. I timed over 5 minutes and with my 35w of panels on, the voltage dropped to 12.4 volts then rapidly rose within a further 5 minutes. I dare say that with the two 30W panels plugged in that the voltage shouldn't really drop. I'll have to see about putting the rear solar input in place.

My next trip under the bus will probably be Saturday so I'll put the battery clamp in place and might complete the second solar input and the wiring from the fuse box toward the handbasin water pump. Whether I complete that in a day remains to be seen. It could also be that on Saturday I have to run to Carolina International to pick up a new turn signal switch assembly.

When the turn signal switch broke, it wasn't exactly an almighty disaster. It was already not functioning correctly so a replacement was due. I'd already had it in mind, I'd just rather thought I might be able to get away with it as it was. That was not to be though.

My next big expense will be tyres - they're all pretty old and quite frankly I don't like remolds and I don't like that the rear tyres are over size. 6 tyres will be costly but then nothing about bus ownership is remotely cheap.