tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-44796624125401428712024-03-10T23:15:50.088-07:00An Engineer in DCThoughts from a rationally thinking person in a politically driven town.TheEngineerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06509880062494209346noreply@blogger.comBlogger102125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4479662412540142871.post-62502509230004338222014-12-08T18:23:00.003-08:002014-12-08T18:23:48.017-08:00Introducing #2...Kelsey Catherine!<br />
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Born on July 10, 2014, at 8:29am. She was 6 lbs, 13 ozs, and 20 inches long. Everyone is doing well.<br />
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I readily admit I'm pretty far behind in announcing this. "Posting to blog" has taken a serious back seat to "taking care of family," which is the correct priority, in my book. :) Bethany, now 3 years and 8 months old, is a wonderful big sister.<br />
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Having a second child makes the logistics significantly harder, but there isn't the same level of panic as there was with #1; you know that sometimes, they're just going to cry all night. And sometimes, as happened this morning (for instance), they're just going to spit up on you. It's all part of the growing process.<br />
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And, of course, big time credit to my wife Bonnie, who even managed to complete a triathlon in October. Below are Big Sister and Little Sister cheering her on for the bike portion.<br />
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TheEngineerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06509880062494209346noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4479662412540142871.post-3932689404221493172014-05-26T17:41:00.000-07:002014-05-26T17:41:36.564-07:002 Bikes and a Bike Trailer in a Honda FitMy wife has been the proud owner of a 2007 <a href="http://www.edmunds.com/honda/fit/" target="_blank">Honda Fit</a> for the past 7+ years. We have taken it from San Antonio (where it was originally purchased), up to DC, all the way up to Maine, and lots of places in between.<br />
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It's truly an amazing car. Honda really did something right when they set out to design a small hatchback with a premium on cargo space. For example, they <a href="http://www.blork.org/blorkblog/2007/07/09/i-bought-a-honda-fit/" target="_blank">moved the gas tank under the driver's seat</a> (similar to the Jeeps of the 1940's) -- giving you as much room as possible in the back.<br />
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This Memorial Day Weekend, we did a family trip to a nearby park for a bike ride: me, my wife, and our daughter Beth. This included my road bike (a 58 cm <a href="http://www.bikesdirect.com/products/motobecane/ventnoir_xii.htm" target="_blank">Motobecane Vent Noir</a>), Bonnie's road bike (a 53? cm <a href="http://www.specialized.com/us/en/bikes/road/ruby/ruby-sport" target="_blank">Specialized Ruby women's road bike</a>), and Beth's bike trailer (a <a href="http://www.nashbar.com/bikes/Product2_10053_10052_556152_-1" target="_blank">Nashbar bike trailer</a>). Oh, and of course, Beth's child seat, and all associated wheels, helmets, gloves, and backpacks for a picnic lunch.<br />
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Here's everything OUTSIDE of the car, ready to go on our picnic bike trip.<br />
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... and here's everything IN the car, as we were leaving for the morning trip:<br />
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Not to worry, Beth had plenty of room for herself:<br />
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Loading takes a little bit of care: Bonnie's bike goes in first as it's the shortest. Then my bike goes in, and its handlebars fit neatly between the driver's and passenger's seat, as you can see in the above photo. I also place a towel over the greasy chain to avoid greasing everything up. And then the Kid Karriage II fits nicely in next to that. Strap everything to the handy fittings on the driver's side of the car, and voila! You're all set for a picnic. Total load time takes a little over 5 minutes.<br />
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On a bittersweet note, we will be selling her trusty orange Fit soon. Daughter #2 is due in July, and we need to move to a bigger car that can safely carry all kids, associated Stuff, and we'd like to have room in the car for a Friend if we ever have to carpool. Although fitting 3 kids across <a href="http://sulali.blogspot.com/2013/06/fitting-3-car-seats-in-honda-fit.html" target="_blank">can be done in a Fit</a>, we are blessed that we have the financial ability to purchase a larger car.<br />
<br />TheEngineerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06509880062494209346noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4479662412540142871.post-62489337897472649832014-05-03T19:29:00.002-07:002014-05-03T19:29:30.418-07:00How Much Does the World Value You?Doing things on your own can be a difficult and humbling process. Such is the case for me and <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Skywriting-Alexander-Enders-ebook/dp/B00H8GA8HO" target="_blank">my first self-published book</a>. Below is a screenshot of book sales over the past 90 days:<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjlYyyvBMJkEphkyAKz-FFT7VODnpb3ChnjaZvS6uBj4mew4n2rn1W4MTyS9vIDaV5eRMFuBmWA9K601DcqzIZI0i-jfc7I0pc-Q2p2ugjUTi4LTuLJggDDByGEI3W1Tq9jUww_2_Uc9HDl/s1600/BookSales.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjlYyyvBMJkEphkyAKz-FFT7VODnpb3ChnjaZvS6uBj4mew4n2rn1W4MTyS9vIDaV5eRMFuBmWA9K601DcqzIZI0i-jfc7I0pc-Q2p2ugjUTi4LTuLJggDDByGEI3W1Tq9jUww_2_Uc9HDl/s1600/BookSales.jpg" height="249" width="640" /></a></div>
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Sorry if that's tough to read. The x-axis goes from February 2 to May 3, 2014. The y-axis has a maximum of 5. All told, I think I have sold about 60 copies of my $0.99 book since I first published it in mid-December 2013. At $0.35 cents profit per book, that's a little over $20 profit for my efforts. That doesn't quite cover the cost of beer while I was writing it.<br />
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Now, please don't misunderstand me, I had no illusions of grandeur here. (Ridiculously distant daydreams, maybe, but illusions, no.) I published it myself. My attempts at marketing have been a few posts to LinkedIn, emails to friends and co-workers, and the occasional line-dropping in conversations at the office and elsewhere ("Hey, have you heard I published a book?"). In the grand scheme of things, my marketing efforts have been pathetic. I'm an engineer, not a advertising specialist, and these kinds of things really don't come naturally to me.<br />
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But it's kind of humbling: if you told all your friends and all your contacts and all your acquaintances to buy / support / spend money on you, could you still put food on the table? In my case, the effort required of friends was: 1. Have an e-reader of some type and be willing to by an e-book, and 2. Spend $0.99 on me.<br />
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I was surprised at the number of people who said, "Nope, I don't have an e-reader" and/or "I don't do e-books." Wow. With a few notable exceptions -- like when I'm doing research and want to write notes in the margins or highlight things to come back to -- I really prefer e-books for their portability.<br />
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But to take this to a more general level, society is quick to celebrate and remember the victories and NOT the vast majority of failures. The <a href="http://hosted.verticalresponse.com/816983/a51c51c65d/1497631705/5208980dd7/" target="_blank">Kindle Direct Publishing Newsletter</a> is just such a vehicle. To read their monthly newsletter of people extolling the virtues of KDP and how they have been able to "sell more books than they ever thought possible..." The sentiment and the rhetoric are <i>as addictive as crack</i>. The managers of KDP know it, and man, are they good at selling it.<br />
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And of course, it's all hogwash. There are only 14 people in the "<a href="https://kdp.amazon.com/help?topicId=A3OG0G04TL5KMG" target="_blank">Kindle Million Club</a>." Almost half of all startups <a href="http://www.statisticbrain.com/startup-failure-by-industry/" target="_blank">fail within 3 years</a>. (<a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/fact-checker/wp/2014/01/27/do-9-out-of-10-new-businesses-fail-as-rand-paul-claims/" target="_blank">another similar source</a>) The <i>overwhelming</i> majority of participants never win the lottery, and it's only the winners that are celebrated. Perhaps that's why we take a perverse pleasure in reading about those who <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/lottery-winners-who-lost-everything-2013-12?op=1#!HZqgw" target="_blank">won, and then lost, everything</a>.<br />
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The deck is stacked. People fail every day, probably far more than we realize. But it's a blessing that the human brain tends to hold on to those slim chances of victory and persevere, even when the odds are overwhelmingly against us. For, if we didn't try, the world would be a much more boring place. <br />
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So treasure and value the successes that you do have ... and keep trying. Statistically, you can't miss every time.TheEngineerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06509880062494209346noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4479662412540142871.post-57106417485608054302013-12-25T13:38:00.003-08:002013-12-25T13:38:53.382-08:00Merry Christmas! - A financial tracker for 2014Shortcut: you can find the expenses tracker template <a href="https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AlezV0j74T7fdDY5b3RuaFBiUnliel9TdmhmV08yQVE&usp=sharing" target="_blank">here on Google Docs</a>. (The link will be updated when Google publishes the template.)<br />
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The US Navy commissioned me into service as an officer in May of 2000. They then moved me to Washington, DC, and finances were tight. My annual salary was <a href="http://www.navycs.com/charts/2000-military-pay-chart.html" target="_blank">under $25,000 per year</a>. (Side note: military pay raises were pretty good after September 11th. A newly commissioned officer in the Navy today, in DC, <a href="http://www.military.com/benefits/military-pay/calculator" target="_blank">will make about $4800 per month</a>, or $57,600 per year, including the housing allowance.)<br />
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I was living in an apartment on Columbia Pike with 2 other Navy officers who worked with me. This was the first time I was <i>really</i> out on my own, and I wanted to make sure that ends would meet. So a drew up a spreadsheet and dutifully recorded every penny that came in and every penny that came out. Every night I would open up the spreadsheet program and enter in what I had spent. Once per month I would enter in the money that Uncle Sam direct deposited in my account.<br />
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When moving to a new apartment ... when buying a boat to live aboard (and negotiating interest rates and monthly payments) ... when buying Christmas gifts ... it was great, because I always knew exactly where I stood. Sometimes I didn't like it, and in those cases, it motivated me to be patient or to change some habits to make it work.<br />
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I have been doing that faithfully for the past 13 years, and the spreadsheets (1 for each year) have evolved, to be a little simpler, a little more flexible, a little more concise. When Google Docs came around, it became very easy to access the file from anywhere and to share with my wife. (Second side note: she has been remarkably cooperative about also keeping track of expenses in my slightly-OCD-way.) I decided to give a (small) Christmas gift to the internet and publish my template for 2014 as a freely available Google Docs template. <a href="https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AlezV0j74T7fdDY5b3RuaFBiUnliel9TdmhmV08yQVE&usp=sharing" target="_blank">Here's the template for 2014</a>.<br />
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The template has 12 tabs, one for each month. Each day is a row, and the days are numbered for 2014. The columns are various categories: Groceries, Meals, Gas, Tithe/Donations, Play, Medical, and Other. I've found those categories to be pretty good for the things I spend money on. (Hint: I didn't get it right for the first few years. Your mileage may vary.) <br />
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On the bottom are fixed expenses: mortgage, electricity, internet, insurance, etc. I also left rows for various activities that have regular, monthly expenses like gym memberships or day care. Then there's a column for "Random Income," because, well, sometimes money comes in randomly. Then there's a column for fixed income. Paychecks go in there. The nice thing is that this bottom section (except for Random Income) is nearly identical from month to month; fill in those values for January, then paste into the next 11 months.<br />
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The spreadsheet adds things up in a variety of ways: by day, by category, and sums everything up in the Red "Monthly Savings" cell. I have a target savings number for each month.<br />
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I hope this may be of use to some of you. It certainly won't work for everyone. In my case, the need to follow this rigor stemmed from <i>fear</i>: living in an expensive town on a relatively small income forced me to be diligent. And then it became habit. And it's stuck ever since. <br />
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And that's one thing I'm thankful for this season.TheEngineerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06509880062494209346noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4479662412540142871.post-76528890461747413432013-12-20T20:24:00.001-08:002013-12-20T20:24:21.735-08:00Skywriting - My first book is published!<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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It's been about 4 years in the making, but it is now finally done. <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Skywriting-Alexander-Enders-ebook/dp/B00H8GA8HO/" target="_blank">You can download it in Kindle format for $0.99 from Amazon</a>.<br />
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Some thoughts:<br />
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<ol>
<li>It's about 28,000 words. Novels are traditionally considered at least 40,000 words. I intended to make it a full length novel, but I just couldn't meaningfully stretch things out, and I didn't want to "pad" the story with extra fluff and slow it down. So, a novella it is.</li>
<li>It's meant to be inspirational to scientists, engineers, and other technical folks around the world, but the audience isn't limited to technical people. In no way am I comparing myself to him, but John Grisham has written a lot of very good stories about the judicial system, and they're engaging. Similarly, Tom Clancy was fantastic at writing about the military, but all kinds of people read his books. Why can't a similar genre exist around good engineering?</li>
<li>I did the publishing and cover art myself. Adobe has a fantastic deal where you can download a free version of their software (Photoshop and Illustrator, in my case) for 30 days.</li>
<li>Since it's my first book and it's not THAT fancy, I can only justify charging $0.99 for it. The downside is that, at this time, I'm stuck with 35% royalties. If you charge $2.99 or more for your book, Amazon will give you 70% royalties. That would be great, but I'm too sheepish to try and charge that much for my story.</li>
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Happy reading this holiday season! The best compliment you can give to an author is to promote it further in social media: Twitter, Facebook, Google+, wherever. And, unfortunately for my semi-cloistered self, I'm not that connected in social media, so I have a hard time reaching out to 10,000+ people at once. And, if someone could give a review of my book on Amazon, I'd really appreciate it.......</div>
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<br />TheEngineerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06509880062494209346noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4479662412540142871.post-30275096844426194662013-10-15T19:11:00.001-07:002013-10-15T19:23:40.811-07:00A Permanent Fix for the Budget CrisisUnlike most politicians, engineers are normally paid to provide solutions to problems. After witnessing the antics of our government over the past few weeks -- and even the more concerning way in which they <a href="http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2013/10/07/debt-limit-denial/2937087/" target="_blank">offhandedly dismiss the threat of a default</a> on the US debt* -- I'm really not sure what US politicians are paid for.<br />
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I have a solution. It's not new, it's not novel, it's not particularly ingenious. But, based on its implementation elsewhere, it's probably effective.<br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"><b>If Congress can't pass a budget, the senior leadership of both the House and the Senate are removed from their positions.</b></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><b>And Congress can't go home until a decision is reached.</b></span></div>
This means the Speaker of the House, the Majority <i>and</i> Minority Leaders of the House, and the Majority and Minority Leaders of the Senate. We'll leave the <a href="http://www.senate.gov/reference/Index/President_Pro_Tempore.htm" target="_blank">President pro Tempore</a> alone for this one, for some semblance of continuity.<br />
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The basis for this is in Australia's constitution; <a href="http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/cth/consol_act/coaca430/s57.html" target="_blank">Section 57 to be exact</a>. The actual language is a bit wordy, but here's the summary: if their House passes a bill, and the Senate refuses to pass it ... and that process happens <i>again</i> after three months ... then the Governor-General is allowed to dissolve BOTH houses of Parliament.<br />
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Yes, dissolve. Both. Houses. Every bum is thrown out (except, notably, for the Governor-General and the Prime Minister.) And <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double_dissolution#Summary" target="_blank">it's happened six times</a> since 1910. Leave it to the Australians to be thorough about things. <br />
<br />
While it would be tempting to throw out everyone in the U.S. Congress (all 535 of them) if a budget isn't passed ... I ... I ... I just can't bring myself to recommend a measure that sweeping. (I also don't believe it would be adopted.) Although it's tempting. And then, we'd be like the United Kingdom, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Kingdom_general_election,_2010" target="_blank">who conducts all of their campaigning for a new government in a 3-week sprint</a>.<br />
<br />
Warren Buffett has offered something similar in the past: he said that <a href="http://www.snopes.com/politics/quotes/buffett.asp" target="_blank">any sitting Congress that passes a budget</a> that is more than 3% of the Gross Domestic Product should not be eligible for re-election. <br />
<br />
There's another basis for this: other than public perception, there's not enough impetus to force a decision in the U.S. Congress, either for passing budgets or for raising the debt ceiling. Congresspeople are too comfortable -- <a href="http://blogs.rollcall.com/wgdb/senate-adjourns-until-2-p-m-monday-because-of-course/" target="_blank">flying home to their constituents for long weekends</a> even when weighty matters are at hand; <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/kenneth-d-ackerman/congress-calendar_b_2219870.html" target="_blank">never scheduling a single 5-day work week</a> in 2013; <a href="http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/09/30/how-congress-will-still-get-paid-in-a-government-shutdown.html" target="_blank">still getting their paychecks</a> even when the government is shut down -- that they're not truly motivated to make a decision. When Congress has a job to do that's mandated by the Constitution (<a href="http://www.usconstitution.net/xconst_A1Sec7.html" target="_blank">pretty clearly in Article I, Section 7</a>) , their living and working conditions need to start degrading pretty rapidly, frankly, when that job isn't getting done.<br />
<br />
Enter the Catholic Church, and the notion of Conclave. The idea here is to make it suck so badly that the Cardinals are <i>forced</i> to make a decision. The need for this was crystallized in 1268, when the <a href="http://abcnews.go.com/WNT/Pope/story?id=681429" target="_blank">Cardinals took two years and eight months</a> to make a decision. See, the Cardinals were enjoying their time in the lovely village of <a href="https://maps.google.com/maps?q=Viterbo,+Italy&hl=en&ll=42.419401,12.10968&spn=1.57341,3.282166&sll=35.870618,-84.178607&sspn=0.107945,0.205135&oq=viterbo&hnear=Viterbo,+Lazio,+Italy&t=m&z=9" target="_blank">Viterbo</a> in Central Italy. A lot. And the locals got upset. So, they locked the Cardinals in the local church. Still no decision. The locals tried starving them out, but food was still snuck in. The locals then <i>tore the roof off the church</i>, and a decision was finally reached: Gregory X would become the next pope. In 1996, Pope John Paul II relaxed the Conclave rules a little bit, but they're still stuck in the Sistine Chapel for most of their days.<br />
<br />
You may note that, in the solution I propose above, the President is notably absent. This is unfortunate -- the President is supposed to be a leader, to participate in the negotiations, not an armchair quarterback -- but I can't think of an appropriate punitive action for the Executive Branch in these scenarios.<br />
<br />
So, I think there needs to be some drastic, swift consequences when Congress doesn't perform its Constitutionally-mandated responsibilities. The above action is probably most easily implemented as a House Rule and a Senate Rule. It would be ideal if it were implemented as a Constitutional Amendment -- but such a movement <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constitutional_amendment#United_States" target="_blank">would have to come from two-thirds of the states</a>, and a national convention like that has never been successful. <br />
<br />
<br />
*This kind of reckless, off-the-cuff prognosticating about: 1.) an issue that is so immensely important to the everyday lives of the working people and, 2.) something that the Congressmen clearly has no idea what he's talking about, is incredibly offensive to me. If this were any professional society with a shred of accountability and responsibility, people who make such ridiculous claims would be disbarred, excommunicated, tarred and feathered, or worse.TheEngineerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06509880062494209346noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4479662412540142871.post-85972455366384309312013-10-06T17:43:00.001-07:002013-10-06T17:43:17.349-07:00A Bug in the Gas PumpI think I found a bug in the gas delivery system ... or maybe it's in their pricing scheme ... I'm not sure.<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgiqsFq4b3QumDs59L5f3vDMJ7FbghgmAIg0NoWSEhgtcuknU888ldYH9aS8rwdyMi7ax6Fl3vvBKGa7_P0wNrdQqoOkeekNj9U3RZBdS7HFfoeeFwKmVewRoh3lFkp1rZKD6zmJPDXVKU3/s1600/Bug.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="462" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgiqsFq4b3QumDs59L5f3vDMJ7FbghgmAIg0NoWSEhgtcuknU888ldYH9aS8rwdyMi7ax6Fl3vvBKGa7_P0wNrdQqoOkeekNj9U3RZBdS7HFfoeeFwKmVewRoh3lFkp1rZKD6zmJPDXVKU3/s640/Bug.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
<br />
Yes, I checked, and that bug really is INSIDE the display. I have no idea how it got in there.<br />
<br />
(For you math nerds out there, that's $3.17 per gallon.)TheEngineerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06509880062494209346noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4479662412540142871.post-77846182338294599692013-10-02T19:33:00.000-07:002013-10-02T19:33:27.818-07:00Government Shutdown and ... Jon StewartI've been thinking a lot over the past few days about what to intelligently write about with the government shutdown, and how to succinctly express my views.<br />
<br />
No need. Jon Stewart has done it <i>excellently</i>. Please watch the following 7 minutes:<br />
<br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="360" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/3Q-OyhPDobY?rel=0" width="480"></iframe><br />
<br />
Don't forget -- Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert led the "<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rally_to_Restore_Sanity_and/or_Fear" target="_blank">March to Restore Sanity</a>"-- and <i>thousands</i> of people showed up on the national mall to support their middle ground approach. Where has that ethos gone?<br />
<br />TheEngineerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06509880062494209346noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4479662412540142871.post-87647015396148843272013-08-19T19:48:00.001-07:002013-08-19T19:48:05.724-07:00Yucca Mountain Spotted Fever #4I've been writing <a href="http://www.anengineerindc.com/2010/02/yucca-mountain-spotted-fever.html" target="_blank">off</a> and <a href="http://www.anengineerindc.com/2010/11/yucca-mountain-spotted-fever.html" target="_blank">on</a> about some of the developments at Yucca Mountain over the past few years. While the average citizen probably doesn't know much or care much about it, it is still a $15 billion+ program that gets fewer headlines in the mainstream press than it probably should.<br />
<br />
I had a good summary of the state of things in late 2010 in my <a href="http://www.anengineerindc.com/2010/11/yucca-mountain-spotted-fever-2.html" target="_blank">Yucca Mountain Spotted Fever #2</a> post. To summarize:<br />
<ul>
<li>Way back in the 1980's, Congress said, "<b>Thou shalt bury nuclear waste in Yucca Mountain</b>." The US Department of Energy was tasked with making it happen, including getting approval from the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission. </li>
<li>The US Department of Energy said, "Eh, this Yucca Mountain thing is too thorny; we can't continue with it." </li>
<li>The NRC said, "Uh-oh, DOE is giving up. Hey, group of smart folks here at the NRC, what should we do?"</li>
<li>The Smart Folks said, "You have no statutory ability to give up. Congress has directed; you must follow."</li>
<li>The NRC said, "Ummmm ..... we'll get back to you."</li>
</ul>
<br />
And that's about where it has stayed for the past two years. Then-Chairman of the NRC, <a href="http://atomicinsights.com/jaczko-comes-out-as-avowed-antinuclear-activist/" target="_blank">Gregory Jaczko</a>, was in no hurry to continue the analysis, presumably due to his ties to Senator Harry Reid, who has stated his <a href="http://www.reid.senate.gov/issues/yucca.cfm" target="_blank">vociferous objections to completing Yucca Mountain in his home state of Nevada</a>. (Quoth the Senator: "I am proud that after two decades of fighting the proposed Yucca Mountain nuclear waste dump, the project has finally been terminated.")<br />
<br />
So, the "smart guys" told the NRC to GET ON WITH IT, but the NRC kept dragging its feet. Some members of Congress wrote sharply crafted letters to goad the NRC into action. An important point to make here, though, is that no additional funding has been provided by Congress to complete the review. The NRC has about $11 million to finish the review, which -- while a lot of money to you and me -- is a pittance to the NRC. Every hour of every person working at the NRC is charged out at something like $276 per hour. Novice, experienced, subject matter expert ... they're all $276 per hour. For the record, my charge out rate is $178 dollars per hour, and I'm paid comfortably in an organization with more overhead than I care to admit.<br />
<br />
Well, the DC Circuit Court of Appeals <a href="http://www.nucleartownhall.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/130813.Yucca-Mandamus-081313-11-1271-1451347.pdf" target="_blank">issued its ruling</a> last week: The NRC does not have the power to stop reviewing the Yucca Mountain project. "As things stand, therefore, the Commission is simply flouting the law." Another judge on the court noted that "former NRC Chairman Gregory Jaczko, who has since resigned, orchestrated a systematic campaign of noncompliance."<br />
<br />
The <a href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324085304579010743875400898.html" target="_blank">Wall Street Journal then added</a>, "If Mr. Jaczko worked on Wall Street he'd be indicted."<br />
<br />
And so the NRC must continue down its path of evaluating the DOE's application to certify Yucca Mountain as the single geologic repository for nuclear waste, although everyone knows that the remaining $11 million is not enough to complete the review and Congress has little incentive to continue to fund it.<br />
<br />
I feel sorry for two groups of people: the electric customers in this country who have been dutifully paying the 0.1 cent per megawatt-hour fee (which Congress <i>continues to collect</i>) and received nothing but waste in return, and the handful of NRC engineers and reviewers who must review the application with the knowledge that it's basically dead on arrival and their work will be forever shelved.TheEngineerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06509880062494209346noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4479662412540142871.post-32329381828890692482013-07-29T19:48:00.002-07:002013-07-29T19:48:55.414-07:00Driving a TeslaI got to drive a friend's Tesla this evening. Actually, it wasn't even his Tesla; his Tesla was in the shop for some buffing / detailing work, so he had a loaner Tesla. And, of course, <a href="http://www.teslamotors.com/models/options" target="_blank">they loan the Model S Performance</a>, which will do 0-60 mph in 4.2 seconds.<br />
<br />
I have never driven a car with that much power, and frankly, probably never will again. My current car is a 175 hp 2009 Nissan Altima, and the car before that was a ~110 hp 1998 Subaru Legacy. <a href="http://www.edmunds.com/car-reviews/track-tests/2013-tesla-model-s-track-test.html" target="_blank">The Model S is equivalent to a 416 hp car</a>. And without gears to shift, the ability to put all that power directly to the wheels -- even from a standstill at 0 RPM -- is mind-bending. The slight pause that we have all come to expect from traditional engines and transmissions just isn't there, and it keeps dumping torque to the wheels. The best analogy is that it's like getting launched from an electromagnetic roller coaster. Except you're <i>driving</i> this one.<br />
<br />
I was admittedly a little nervous about driving around the streets in DC for fear of getting cut off or not seeing someone in the slightly-larger-than-I'm-comfortable-with blind spots. (The C-pillar is jagnormous.) But all worked out okay in the end, and I had a fun drive. <br />
<br />
Three more observations:<br />
1. I'm told BMW's are set up the same way, but I kept hitting the cruise control lever instead of the turn signal. It's very annoying to set the cruise control on HOLYSHITGO!!!! when you're accelerating and trying to merge into the next lane.<br />
2. The car is fighting pretty hard to engage regenerative braking. I know why it's doing it, and I applaud the efforts to eke out every mile possible (as well as to recharge the battery at a voltage that actually does something), but it takes some getting used to. My Subaru was a stick (yes, I drove a stick for many years in and around DC), and the Tesla slows down as if the car was in 2nd gear the whole time. This is adjustable, but of course, everyone wants the best mileage and range they can eke out.<br />
3. My friend showed a picture of when he was charging at at <a href="http://www.teslamotors.com/supercharger" target="_blank">Supercharger station</a> when the battery was almost empty and "drinking" from the Supercharger as fast as it could: 226 amps at 371 volts. 226 amps at 371 volts is about 84 kilowatts. That's about 14x more than your average house draws at full power. Or, to put it another way, if you charge at 84 kilowatts for about 3 hours, that's roughly the same as your average house will drink in a week. <br />
<br />
I bring this up to compare to my previous calculation <a href="http://www.anengineerindc.com/2012/10/power-at-pump.html" target="_blank">that about 20 megawatts of power (equivalent)</a> is flowing through your gasoline hose when us ordinary folk fill up at the gas station. So, there's a tremendous amount of electricity flowing through the wires, and some very talented engineers found a way to safely transfer all that power, but it's still two hundred times less power (equivalent) than is flowing through your gas hose at the gas pump.<br />
<br />
[Nerd note on that last item: for any technically minded folks out there, I acknowledge that electric vehicles are <a href="http://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/evtech.shtml" target="_blank">about 3x more efficient that gasoline powered vehicles</a>, thus making the "equivalent power" flowing only about a factor of 70 less than the gasoline pump. But still. 70x. Wow. Gasoline is pretty energy dense.]<br />
<br />
At this point, I would like to close with a picture of me in front of said Tesla but, alas, no pictures were taken. You'll just have to take my word for it.<br />
<br />
And thanks for the ride, Greg.TheEngineerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06509880062494209346noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4479662412540142871.post-28527778707672599102013-07-21T12:25:00.002-07:002013-07-21T12:25:25.382-07:00Pandora's Promise - A Critical ReviewLike a lot of other nuclear engineers, I went to see <a href="http://pandoraspromise.com/" target="_blank">Pandora's Promise</a> last night. It's a documentary about the benefits of nuclear power, and is touted as an "Official Selection" at the 2013 Sundance Film Festival. (I'm not sure what that means. It doesn't appear on <a href="http://www.sundance.org/festival/stories/award-winners/" target="_blank">the list of award winners</a>, for instance. Perhaps it's a fancy name for "participant"?) There were lots of other fellow geeks and nerds in the audience, and people were glowing about it afterwards.<br />
<br />
Unlike a lot of other nuclear engineers, I was disappointed.<br />
<br />
Saying such a thing is a bit of heresy in many circles. I admit, it's a nice, entertaining, and enlightening 86 minute documentary. But as for its intended purpose? It misses the mark, guys.<br />
<br />
The director, Robert Stone (a previously anti-nuclear environmentalist who changed his mind about nuclear and <a href="http://pandoraspromise.com/faq/" target="_blank">decided to do something about it</a>), is quoted as saying:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
For the past three years I have devoted almost every waking moment to taking these ideas and shaping them into a documentary about what is perhaps the biggest and most unwieldy subjects imaginable: how do we continue to power human civilization without destroying the environmental conditions that has made modern civilization possible?</blockquote>
Look, there was an impressive amount of momentum behind this thing. Just two years after the Fukushima nuclear accident, here was a movie that potentially could appeal to the masses and change the public opinion on the importance of nuclear power.<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
This was intended to shape the dialogue. I don't think it's going to move the needle a bit.</div>
<div>
<ul>
<li>Where are the pithy one liners?</li>
<li>Where are the memorable moments?</li>
<li>Where are the quotes that people will re-use in everyday conversation?</li>
</ul>
</div>
<div>
The documentary may sway a few open-minded people who happen to see the show and perhaps question some previously held beliefs. But its message will not get across to other folks at the water cooler, at the lunch table, at the sidelines of a soccer game as parents are watching their kids play; the documentary provides no entree into those areas. <i>Those</i> are the elements that will really shape the dialogue today. And it missed.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
The projections of energy use in 2030, 2050, and 2100 were interesting, and the CGI graphics of the earth spinning and lighting up more and more were neat. The pie charts of fossil fuel use vs. everything else were instructive. And the pictures of Hyman G. Rickover explaining to the world the basics of how nuclear power propelled a submarine were memorable.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
But we've had all those before, and they just don't seem to gain much traction. The movie was entertaining, but it didn't tell a story that was any more compelling than <a href="https://flowcharts.llnl.gov/content/energy/energy_archive/energy_flow_2012/2012new2012newUSEnergy.png" target="_blank">Lawrence Livermore's Sandkey charts</a>. </div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgxN6C5HFlZ-LyecBcqw3JLbZmHsOQfEnae-YdxK6dLQD-cyiV-sO3CepG2IqIenGCbX1VEfRMIsf_JYc-xoT13sR2M_KjjtTz2JLAlNpWJLiyN40xVOcQ5z9TttHJCawyAWC8sF7gmvgMG/s1600/Screen+Shot+2013-07-21+at+3.10.51+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" border="0" height="209" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgxN6C5HFlZ-LyecBcqw3JLbZmHsOQfEnae-YdxK6dLQD-cyiV-sO3CepG2IqIenGCbX1VEfRMIsf_JYc-xoT13sR2M_KjjtTz2JLAlNpWJLiyN40xVOcQ5z9TttHJCawyAWC8sF7gmvgMG/s320/Screen+Shot+2013-07-21+at+3.10.51+PM.png" title="LLNL Energy Flowchart" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">LLNL's Energy Flowchart. Seriously, take a minute with this one. The amount of energy we <i>lose</i> is staggering.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div>
(It's also easy for me to be a critic here; I'm not the one who has funded and produced a pro-nuclear documentary. I should take a lesson from <a href="http://www.anengineerindc.com/2012/05/inspirational-quote-1.html" target="_blank">Teddy Roosevelt.</a>)</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
At the end of the day, each new nuclear power plant will take <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vogtle_Electric_Generating_Plant#Units_3_and_4" target="_blank">approximately 10 years to build and $7 billion to construct</a>. There is <i>no way</i> your "average" utility can sink those kinds of resources into power generation -- and that's $7 billion that has to be sunk before you can pull rods and start generating power. It's a tough sell to put $7 billion worth of eggs all into one basket, and only then can you begin making money. It's just an insurmountable up-front cost.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Which is why I'm a little more hopeful about <a href="http://www.nrc.gov/reactors/advanced/mpower.html" target="_blank">small modular reactors</a>. As a nuclear engineer, I hope that SMR's can provide a lower up front cost as well as get political support because the entire thing can be made domestically. (Admittedly, it remains very much unclear if the resulting product can generate power at a reasonable cost.) Pandora's Promise talked about energy executives deciding to build a new nuclear power plant over a golf game; they could do that because the things were so cheap and easy to build in the 1950's and 1960's that many utilities could afford them. Fossil fuels will continue to be favorable until either the cost of generating CO2 goes way, way up, or the cost of building nuclear goes way, way down.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
But, despite all this, go see the movie. It's at least worth the price of admission.</div>
TheEngineerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06509880062494209346noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4479662412540142871.post-70750799925203453382013-07-17T17:41:00.004-07:002013-07-17T18:27:09.194-07:00Beat the Heat with a Cheap, Indestructible Water TableA <a href="http://www.accuweather.com/en/weather-news/worst-of-east-coast-heat-wave/33632" target="_blank">pretty severe heat wave</a> is gripping most of the east coast about now. With the help of some other internet sites, I modified a design for a kid's water table that makes a great, cheap way to have hours of fun and stay cool at the same time.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJecubFNWCmaP2M3OdzODVWT4C6NPJ289Q_3HRy6_N1TWZrbMVewyWnxFBPF1Gqf9D0cLltaPNEiEmAShA3fHE8tgvcjaKuz2OkyyDpIPF50QjpozBmP25jzYak0RPXuHRjhgLOhU8FQtt/s1600/Screen+Shot+2013-07-17+at+8.20.16+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="283" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJecubFNWCmaP2M3OdzODVWT4C6NPJ289Q_3HRy6_N1TWZrbMVewyWnxFBPF1Gqf9D0cLltaPNEiEmAShA3fHE8tgvcjaKuz2OkyyDpIPF50QjpozBmP25jzYak0RPXuHRjhgLOhU8FQtt/s320/Screen+Shot+2013-07-17+at+8.20.16+PM.png" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
Total cost: about $30<br />
Time to assemble: about 2 hours, maybe less with this guide<br />
Tools needed: a jigsaw. You could probably do it with a hacksaw, but it would take a lot longer.<br />
<br />
Supplies:<br />
- 2 ten-foot lengths of 1" diameter PVC pipe<br />
- 8 1" T-fittings<br />
- 8 1" 90-degree elbows<br />
- A 41 quart Sterilite tub.<br />
<br />
Other tubs are certainly usable, but they would change the dimensions from what I'm about to describe. The 41 quart tubs are great for water tables, moon sand, regular sand ... the possibilities are endless.<br />
<br />
Unless you own a pickup truck, it's unlikely that ten-foot sections of PVC pipe are going to fit in your car. <b>Have the store cut each ten-foot section for you at the 54.5" mark</b>. That way, it'll more easily fit in your car and it saves you a cut at home. See the below figure for where to make the cuts:<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhs8LxUqc0ynzRBnFRahdAgkGxWqKG0K7ciUgtT-8FZTJX1bQ2ooFRTEXAfxbf5UznIZEqiY0E1vh0xwd0gpxMivi_tV2-BeIC0KFhSGdYnDNa9gh8hKQ7a9EiUbEHDY10PF9chE7FVABYD/s1600/Screen+Shot+2013-07-17+at+8.32.05+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="153" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhs8LxUqc0ynzRBnFRahdAgkGxWqKG0K7ciUgtT-8FZTJX1bQ2ooFRTEXAfxbf5UznIZEqiY0E1vh0xwd0gpxMivi_tV2-BeIC0KFhSGdYnDNa9gh8hKQ7a9EiUbEHDY10PF9chE7FVABYD/s640/Screen+Shot+2013-07-17+at+8.32.05+PM.png" width="640" /></a></div>
<br />
It really helps to make two lines on the PVC pipe as you're marking it for cutting; it gives you a better line to follow when you're cutting.<br />
<br />
Here are the pieces, mostly cut:<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_nisdh5T8mgB_uGfK4SAfYuNb7wETsRrClMeojBWBNU-YXS3Ta0w01576P7QAXAXGVZA4ESXs_q1BYuFZNhlThMog_QplzYwd79YJiVo3qvD6YWSSzNtrUF5Y56LdDpk81VwwNxWq0vQo/s1600/Screen+Shot+2013-07-17+at+8.36.16+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="210" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_nisdh5T8mgB_uGfK4SAfYuNb7wETsRrClMeojBWBNU-YXS3Ta0w01576P7QAXAXGVZA4ESXs_q1BYuFZNhlThMog_QplzYwd79YJiVo3qvD6YWSSzNtrUF5Y56LdDpk81VwwNxWq0vQo/s320/Screen+Shot+2013-07-17+at+8.36.16+PM.png" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
It helped me to label, with a piece of masking tape, the 11 and 14.5" pieces. They're close enough that they're easy to confuse. The 11" pieces make the legs, and the 14.5" pieces make the "ends" that hold up the tub.<br />
<br />
Lastly, don't throw away the spare pieces. We need to cut them into 8 small pieces (total), each 1.5" long. These will act as little connectors between the T-fittings and the elbows. You can see some of them jutting out of the T-fittings here, and 6 others stacked on-end:<br />
<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgkCc6MhOGdavvygI94xRu1W6SIKJKi1Gynq5lF9-9qtxHMfy78bBpK9Gb_qLkhMwl5nGWtUgl1JVHvj3ky_LVlVGQCuFM2sB5XGWRfT4u4u4b2GcijtXa5J2tRb76xHF18UMriaeq4pLic/s1600/Screen+Shot+2013-07-17+at+8.38.25+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="385" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgkCc6MhOGdavvygI94xRu1W6SIKJKi1Gynq5lF9-9qtxHMfy78bBpK9Gb_qLkhMwl5nGWtUgl1JVHvj3ky_LVlVGQCuFM2sB5XGWRfT4u4u4b2GcijtXa5J2tRb76xHF18UMriaeq4pLic/s640/Screen+Shot+2013-07-17+at+8.38.25+PM.png" width="640" /></a></div>
<br />
Theoretically, there's supposed to be 1" of overlap between a fitting (like a T or an elbow) and a pipe, meaning the little connectors could theoretically be 2" long. But friction really works against you when cramming PVC together, and 1.5" is plenty of overlap.<br />
<br />
Assemble everything together, and have fun with your new water table!!!<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMMdMPzQsEHBNoO2HpcaMBNmhZ01EH-05KCAGi3q7wrUsIJpDEvvbmrmmEFxM0-ZGLk9vorj_BL2nPVml7ewhB_7UprQ7W-ziYBjg0dU30Kp2ItTaiYRPj4UM2WhLm6qV2TbBeGvu2yvMQ/s1600/Screen+Shot+2013-07-17+at+8.20.16+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="566" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMMdMPzQsEHBNoO2HpcaMBNmhZ01EH-05KCAGi3q7wrUsIJpDEvvbmrmmEFxM0-ZGLk9vorj_BL2nPVml7ewhB_7UprQ7W-ziYBjg0dU30Kp2ItTaiYRPj4UM2WhLm6qV2TbBeGvu2yvMQ/s640/Screen+Shot+2013-07-17+at+8.20.16+PM.png" width="640" /></a></div>
<br />
Some notes:<br />
<br />
<ul>
<li>You could glue the PVC together for added stability and permanence. But as it is, it's rock-solid and I like the possibility of taking it apart someday.</li>
<li>The 11" legs are just barely tall enough. You could go to 12 or 13 inches and it might be better for bigger kids.</li>
<li>If you're really fancy, you could cut the 11" legs about 1/3 of the way up and add in another 4 T-fittings, thus giving you some ends that could make a shelf for storing stuff. Maybe I'll do that as a modification in a few weeks...</li>
<li>The setup was sturdy enough to easily support Beth lying in the tub (before we filled it with water), and she weighs about 28 pounds now.</li>
</ul>
TheEngineerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06509880062494209346noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4479662412540142871.post-52203669204277797412013-07-11T17:05:00.001-07:002013-07-11T17:05:33.086-07:00A Bad Credit Card DealI got a notice in my inbox today from one of the credit cards I hold. It was advertising the special deals they have with some vendors:<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgjB6bNlBphNSwnzlWeVvSqu5Gxa6Ar335k0gRXZ3Wgv4CUWVROItvifLYSPu_FOhUnyb64IbY0vPZ5Dao_kyTgsBx-sgfOujQdgtcMhkSVcbJie3zbzWCHOi7JOr5PFiQFNlnVjD3Y095N/s1600/image001.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="464" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgjB6bNlBphNSwnzlWeVvSqu5Gxa6Ar335k0gRXZ3Wgv4CUWVROItvifLYSPu_FOhUnyb64IbY0vPZ5Dao_kyTgsBx-sgfOujQdgtcMhkSVcbJie3zbzWCHOi7JOr5PFiQFNlnVjD3Y095N/s640/image001.png" width="640" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
Wow, I get 1 point per $1 I spend at Walmart and Lowe's! <br />
<br />
Wait a minute ... look at that last paragraph: "And, don't forget you can earn 2 points per $1 spent on your everyday purchases."<br />
<br />
Suddenly, this seems a very bad deal. While I normally get 2 points per dollar spent at other stores, I get HALF that reward at Walmart and Lowe's. What??! Why on earth would I want to do that?<br />
<br />
Nowhere in the email does it state these are <i>bonus</i> points, or that these rewards are earned above and beyond what you normally earn. The terms and conditions the email links to are <a href="https://www.choiceprivilegesvisa.com/app/japply/lp/TnCs.jsp?prodidreq=CCVVS34704&cpc=CHO&source=EMV112N" target="_blank">here</a>, and they don't spell anything else out, either. Thus, I have every reason to believe that this is a disincentive to shop at Walmart and Lowe's. <br />
<br />
Crazy.TheEngineerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06509880062494209346noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4479662412540142871.post-69273888646515063812013-06-27T19:17:00.003-07:002013-06-27T19:17:50.020-07:00Cheap GasA confluence of things happened today that resulted in my filling up my tank for $2.12 per gallon:<br />
<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjr2i_XKTsbGc0C97ehGb78b43W1N7dTHm2avN8Xdfe6x8VE3V5PswMu6RhdKjADzg5mQA14iJ4qIegsK9tNLU1B1iZZbxj_cNSbjCJtioozxNXGNaXOLdWCs25oJOevk3igwKA8zUKv0TT/s382/Gas.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjr2i_XKTsbGc0C97ehGb78b43W1N7dTHm2avN8Xdfe6x8VE3V5PswMu6RhdKjADzg5mQA14iJ4qIegsK9tNLU1B1iZZbxj_cNSbjCJtioozxNXGNaXOLdWCs25oJOevk3igwKA8zUKv0TT/s320/Gas.jpg" width="256" /></a></div>
<br />
An area with cheap gas to begin with, coupled with a grocery store's 90 cents off per gallon incentive, made the total price $2.119 per gallon. I doubt I will ever see gasoline that cheap again in my lifetime.<br />
<br />
Four years ago in 2009, I was on a ski trip to Salt Lake City, Utah. Oddly, there are a bunch of oil refineries in Salt Lake City, and the gas there is exceptionally cheap, too. I was awestruck at the $1.29 gas for sale there. So much so that I took a picture of THAT, too:<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJ7Ozf6EH0f1t442tKmR99KoMx4lKyRIFRspksVOTavf0hSzRshCarzzm2mDQv5NWBdvu_kgmULRJdqQwpXKlwdMDL2MqDdp7vEI59Y_bIhUQJx1hweya4-9WsBgZuWV_xhUYhj3atk6oH/s1280/Utah+Gas.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJ7Ozf6EH0f1t442tKmR99KoMx4lKyRIFRspksVOTavf0hSzRshCarzzm2mDQv5NWBdvu_kgmULRJdqQwpXKlwdMDL2MqDdp7vEI59Y_bIhUQJx1hweya4-9WsBgZuWV_xhUYhj3atk6oH/s320/Utah+Gas.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
THEN, I was watching Die Hard on a plane trip for work not too long ago. THAT gas was really cheap:<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgka9gKMFb4y5VVuGBquadzVJzAZQ574lYjn-lkrsEgcVdD05wrVshQu-CjpzOtZJhTDa2hhJDWuoJNAZttOUzHfgidlJeIfUYCENHfXfN5do9OINOkeYHWhji74DTi7CXKk-nY3WU9Ysfb/s538/Screen+Shot+2013-06-27+at+10.14.24+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="173" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgka9gKMFb4y5VVuGBquadzVJzAZQ574lYjn-lkrsEgcVdD05wrVshQu-CjpzOtZJhTDa2hhJDWuoJNAZttOUzHfgidlJeIfUYCENHfXfN5do9OINOkeYHWhji74DTi7CXKk-nY3WU9Ysfb/s320/Screen+Shot+2013-06-27+at+10.14.24+PM.png" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
(46:16 for those who really care.) Those were the days, weren't they? When the gallon dial rolled by faster than the price dial? Alas, even with <a href="http://energy.gov/articles/egallon-how-much-cheaper-it-drive-electricity" target="_blank">the eGallon now toted by the DOE</a> and electric car manufacturers, only a few states are lucky enough to have cheap enough power to still be less than $1.00 per gallon (equivalent).<br />
<br />
Happy driving.TheEngineerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06509880062494209346noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4479662412540142871.post-34921812817654001262013-04-17T19:45:00.000-07:002013-04-17T19:45:07.136-07:00Solid State Hard Drives, and 15 year old memoriesAbout two weeks ago, I installed a solid state hard drive in my computer -- a SanDisk Ultra Plus 128GB that I got on super sale for $85 -- plenty big enough to hold an operating system and a bunch of commonly-used files.<br />
<br />
Bootup time, from the end of the BIOS screen to the computer on and all applications available, was 11.3 seconds. Holy crap that's fast.<br />
<br />
Almost as fast as my computer was 15 years ago, in 1998.<br />
<br />
Allow me to take a long and extremely nerdy stroll down memory lane. You see, when I was a sophomore in college, I decided to go off the reservation ... way off the reservation, and buy a Macintosh. Not just any Macintosh, but a <a href="http://www.everymac.com/systems/powercc/powerbase/powerbase240.html" target="_blank">Power Computing PowerBase 240</a>. <br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjc7pCkokFK7ghreI1f0aZwtILoXpPRKFrt4ftNJsnE7Mil-Pc3tpJTIxEJwu6Zu3ZQ2iEL4ItUX4W6UxJfWjSlEhomB40dx-YLoe9k2Go0Mc0ma6PUvp9vDLC-NOaux3PKWEdPLzRiRqV9/s1600/powerbase.gif" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjc7pCkokFK7ghreI1f0aZwtILoXpPRKFrt4ftNJsnE7Mil-Pc3tpJTIxEJwu6Zu3ZQ2iEL4ItUX4W6UxJfWjSlEhomB40dx-YLoe9k2Go0Mc0ma6PUvp9vDLC-NOaux3PKWEdPLzRiRqV9/s1600/powerbase.gif" /></a></div>
<br />
This was a computer that would run the Mac operating system (OS 8.1 at the time, I believe), but was not sold by Apple. This system and its ilk became known as the Mac Clones, and they were killing Apple's business line: clones, generally cheaper and more powerful than the hardware Apple was offering, were selling much faster than Apple's wares.. Although I didn't like it, Steve Jobs made a very smart decision when he stopped licensing the OS and effectively killed off the clone market. It came with a <a href="http://www.cpu-world.com/CPUs/PowerPC-603/" target="_blank">Motorola PowerPC 603e CPU</a> running at a whopping 240 MHz and a 40 MHz front side bus and 16MB of RAM. The 603 chips were generally slower per MHz than the 601 generation of chips they intended to replace, but the 603's (including the 603e and 603ev) could run at much higher clock speeds.<br />
<br />
The computer hummed along happily for a year, <i>and then the G3 line of processors came out</i>. At the time, these were unbelievably fast and powerful chips.<br />
<br />
And my 603e chip, due to some brilliant design by the folks at PowerComputing, was located on a daughtercard and slid right out -- to be replaced by a <a href="http://www.everymac.com/upgrade_cards/powerlogix/powerforce_g3/powerforce_g3_300.html" target="_blank">PowerLogix G3/300 CPU</a>. And overclocking was easy: just turn some dip switches and crank up the MHz until either the chip or your memory couldn't take it any more. I had mine set to 363 MHz and it was fantastic.<br />
<br />
But there was one last trick up my sleeve that made this Mac clone way, way, <i>way</i> faster than anything else at the time. You see, the memory controller that supplied power to the RAM was of a unique design for those old Motorola 600 series processors: <i>it could keep the RAM supplied with power through a restart</i>.<br />
<br />
That's right: the contents of a RAM disk could be maintained through a reboot. You could set up a RAM disk, install the OS on it, and reboot. Your entire OS was running in RAM. For some reason, when Apple upgraded to the G3 chip (and all subsequent CPU's), the memory controller has been unable to maintain the contents of RAM through a restart.<br />
<br />
At this time, I think I had 96MB of RAM in the machine -- about as much as it could handle. The flagship OS at the time was <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mac_OS_9" target="_blank">Mac OS 9</a>, but there was no way the entire OS could fit in my 96 MB of RAM (and still have some RAM left over for, you know, general use). Thus enter the last trick up my sleeve for this rocket sled: the <a href="http://support.apple.com/kb/TA38399?viewlocale=en_US&locale=en_US" target="_blank">recovery disk for Mac OS 8.1</a> would fit on a floppy disk. It was stripped down, it was mostly in black and white (all icons were in black and white so the OS would fit on a 1.4MB floppy), but it would read the newfangled HFS+ file partition scheme, and holy crap was it fast.<br />
<br />
So, in the end, I had a Mac Clone (oddball #1) with an upgraded and overclocked G3 chip (oddball #2) running a recovery version of the OS (oddball #3), all on a RAM disk (oddball #4). Startup time, from the reboot chime to open windows was about 3 seconds. It was instant-on. Applications loaded nearly instantaneously, limited solely by the read speed of the hard drive. As long as the applications didn't need to touch the hard drive, the computer was <i>always</i> faster than you could think and respond. It was awesome. And it was only possible with the G3 chip because I had the original memory controller from the 603e chip.<br />
<br />
Today, solid state hard drives are making some serious inroads into computing again. They've been offered on laptops for a while now due to their small size, <a href="http://www.anandtech.com/show/6769/an-update-on-intels-ssd-525-power-consumption" target="_blank">tiny power draw</a> (2-3 watts under load), and crazy fast speed. And they're getting big enough and cheap enough now that they're serviceable for desktop computers, to hold the OS, a few applications, and important data. The speeds of SSD's are finally catching back up to account for the bloat that has become common now -- my work laptop (a not shabby Core i7 processor with a 7200 RPM HDD), running Windows 7, takes about 5 minutes to boot up.<br />
<br />
And yet I still pine for the days when my OS would fit on a floppy and everything could be crammed onto a RAM disk.<br />
<br />
Thanks for the stroll down memory lane.TheEngineerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06509880062494209346noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4479662412540142871.post-48929971346580580672013-03-12T18:57:00.001-07:002013-03-12T18:57:54.931-07:00Feeling Old in the Digital AgeWhen I went to college, email was still a relatively new and novel phenomenon. People's primary method of getting onto the internet consisted of America On-Line. AOL would flood your mailbox (your <i>snail</i> mail box, I should point out) with <a href="http://nowiknow.com/disc-jockeys/" target="_blank">CD's that offered 500 hours</a> of free online browsing. If you were particularly cheap about it, you could string together a whole bunch of those CD's and get free service for quite some time (having to create a new account and new email address each time).<br />
<br />
19.6 kilobits per second was a pretty good data transfer rate, because it was coming over your modem. Not your cable modem ... your <i>phone</i> modem. Then modem speeds went to 33.6 kbps and others offered 54 kpbs, but nobody could actually go that fast because the phone lines are just too skinny for that mode of data transfer.<br />
<br />
Yes, e-mail had been around since the early 1980's, and various bulletin board services and other "internet-like" pages existed, but email was just hitting the mainstream in the mid 1990's. (Anyone remember <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eudora_(email_client)" target="_blank">Eudora</a>?) And hence, my impression, my use, my behavior towards email is still shaped by those formative years when the mannerisms and etiquette of emails were still growing.<br />
<br />
Which is why, <a href="http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/03/10/etiquette-redefined-in-the-digital-age/" target="_blank">after reading this article in the NY Times</a>, I feel really, really old.<br />
<br />
The author talks about how he has largely eschewed conversing with his family by email, doesn't respond to voice mail (remember when it wasn't voice mail? when it was an <i>answering machine</i>? And even those things were cool?), and instead opts for the shortened forms of communication provided by texts and Twitter.<br />
<br />
The author claims that salutations and closings, such as Hello and Sincerely, are going by the wayside in the name of efficiency.<br />
<br />
And that many people in the digital age today are so swamped with electronic communications that thank-you message is unwanted. The author closes the piece with,<br />
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Here's hoping that politeness never goes out of fashion, but that time-wasting forms of communication do.</span></blockquote>
<br />
I'm not 100% sure how to interpret that, but from the tone of the article, he appears to include email as one of those time-wasting forms of communication.<br />
<br />
And that is why I feel old.TheEngineerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06509880062494209346noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4479662412540142871.post-64933295625175738492013-02-13T19:06:00.003-08:002013-02-13T19:06:34.178-08:00North Korean Nuclear Test, in plain EnglishThe fact that the North Koreans have tested their third nuclear device <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2013/02/11/world/asia/north-korea-seismic-disturbance/index.html?hpt=hp_t2" target="_blank">has</a> <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/un-security-council-to-hold-emergency-meeting-tuesday-on-north-korean-nuclear-test/2013/02/12/f67a854c-74dc-11e2-9889-60bfcbb02149_story.html?tid=pm_pop" target="_blank">been</a> <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/13/world/asia/north-korea-nuclear-test.html?hpw&_r=0" target="_blank">widely</a> <a href="http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/world/2013-02/12/c_132165682.htm" target="_blank">reported</a>, but I haven't seen much scientific analysis of it yet. Many of the headlines have been bumped by tonight's State of the Union address, which is understandable.<br />
<br />
<b>Aside</b>: Watching the State of the Union address can be fun, but it can also be excruciatingly slow. You can usually read the entire speech in less than 10 minutes the following morning, but that misses the whole pomp and circumstance of the thing. <b>End aside.</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
What is on everyone's mind is, How Big Was The Boom that the North Koreans made?<br />
<br />
I think it was big. Here's my guess, up front, and I'll spend the rest of the post explaining my answer: <b><span style="font-size: large;">20 kilotons</span>.</b><br />
<br />
I realize this is significantly larger than the <a href="http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/world/2013-02/12/c_132165682.htm" target="_blank">South Korean (early) estimate</a> of 6-7 kilotons. This also puts it larger than the 16 kilotons <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Boy" target="_blank">estimated by Wikipedia</a> for Little Boy but smaller than the 21 kilotons <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fat_man" target="_blank">estimated by Wikipedia</a> for Fat Man.<br />
<br />
Here's what we know:<br />
<br />
<ul>
<li>The pressure wave from the blast made it look like a <a href="http://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/eventpage/usc000f5t0#technical" target="_blank">5.1 magnitude earthquake</a>.</li>
<li>The location is <a href="http://www.ctbto.org/index.php?eID=tx_cms_showpic&file=uploads%2Fpics%2FDPRK_III_-_SEL_1_comparsion_01.png&md5=634df00dc5d79562c2abc08ce04cca1ba2b237e7&parameters[0]=YTo0OntzOjU6IndpZHRoIjtzOjQ6IjgwMG0iO3M6NjoiaGVpZ2h0IjtzOjQ6IjYw&parameters[1]=MG0iO3M6NzoiYm9keVRhZyI7czo0MToiPGJvZHkgc3R5bGU9Im1hcmdpbjowOyBi&parameters[2]=YWNrZ3JvdW5kOiNmZmY7Ij4iO3M6NDoid3JhcCI7czozNzoiPGEgaHJlZj0iamF2&parameters[3]=YXNjcmlwdDpjbG9zZSgpOyI%2BIHwgPC9hPiI7fQ%3D%3D" target="_blank">very close to where the other two devices</a> were exploded.</li>
<li>The 2006 explosion, estimated to be 1 kiloton or less, was a <a href="http://www.ctbto.org/press-centre/press-releases/2009/ctbtos-initial-findings-on-the-dprks-2009-announced-nuclear-test/" target="_blank">4.1 magnitude earthquake</a>.</li>
<li>The 2009 explosion, estimated to be 2-6 kilotons, was a <a href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124322074782250897.html" target="_blank">4.5 magnitude earthquake</a>.</li>
</ul>
<div>
<br />
Here's what we don't know:</div>
<div>
<ul>
<li>The design of the weapon. Was it all plutonium? Was it all uranium? Was it some mix? </li>
<li>The precise rock / sand / water makeup of the mountains around the test site.</li>
</ul>
<div>
The fact is, post-detonation, it's actually hard to tell "How Big Was That Boom?" The <a href="http://www.grainger.com/Grainger/wwg/start.shtml" target="_blank">Grainger catalog</a>, for instance, doesn't sell a "Boom-O-Meter" to tell you how many kilotons your blast was. You have to derive it.</div>
</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Seismic instruments can measure the <a href="http://eqseis.geosc.psu.edu/~cammon/HTML/Classes/IntroQuakes/Notes/waves_and_interior.html" target="_blank">P-waves and S-waves</a> and can make an educated guess at the <a href="http://www.usgs.gov/faq/index.php?action=show&cat=113" target="_blank">moment-magnitude scale</a> (more commonly, albeit imprecisely, known as the Richter scale). This is an estimate of how much power was transmitted to the earth in an earthquake, or in a nuclear explosion. These scales are logarithmic: a magnitude 5 quake is <i>10 times larger</i> than a magnitude 4 quake.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
What's critically important is the coupling factor: how well does the energy of the bomb couple with the earth? At the <a href="http://www.atomictourist.com/nts.htm" target="_blank">Nevada Test Site</a>, where the US has done much of its nuclear weapons testing, the coupling is pretty weak. It's sand. The bomb goes "boom" and <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gZbL_uKBQzY" target="_blank">a lot of the sand shifts</a>. In general terms, even a big bomb only makes a small "thud" in the earth.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Contrast that with the primary nuclear weapons testing site for the Soviet Union: <a href="http://www.novayazemlya.net/" target="_blank">Novaya Zemlya</a>. It was the site of 224 tests, and it's a giant rock. Here, even a small bomb makes a big "thud" in the earth's mantle, which is carried around the world for seismic devices to pick up.<br />
<br />
<b>Key fact #1</b>: the 2009 test was a 4.5. The 2013 test was a 5.1, from roughly the same area. If the coupling is the same, the 2013 event was 4 times larger than the 2009 event. Thus, if the 2009 event was estimated at 2 to 6 kilotons, simple math means this was an 8 to 24 kiloton event.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Naturally, there's an <a href="http://guests.armscontrolwonk.com/archive/2312/greetings-from-geneva-more-on-mb-to-yield" target="_blank">equation to describe</a> this coupling coefficient:</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: large;">Magnitude = A + B * log(yield)</span></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
where A and B are empirically determined constants. </div>
<div>
<ul>
<li>For the rocky environment of Novaya Zemlya, A = 4.45 and B = 0.75</li>
<li>For the sandy environment of the Nevada Test Site, A = 3.92 and B = 0.81</li>
<li>For Pakistan, which is thought to be similar to North Korea, A = 4.10 and B = 0.75</li>
</ul>
<div>
So, let's see that graphically:</div>
</div>
<div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMK5Qq22CcWBmt5KnJUKesmFxU1U4S6WaL0Y2oXVAqSnECVF4ndQyYv1zLmOaNEdb22hHf5gLbtNO3WD-s-kVawQNUrciEIoWGvpTr0pk1ZaYz98pmR04zX-PAJqRH30colXPLA9onOz4o/s1600/NuclearYield.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="290" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMK5Qq22CcWBmt5KnJUKesmFxU1U4S6WaL0Y2oXVAqSnECVF4ndQyYv1zLmOaNEdb22hHf5gLbtNO3WD-s-kVawQNUrciEIoWGvpTr0pk1ZaYz98pmR04zX-PAJqRH30colXPLA9onOz4o/s400/NuclearYield.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
The horizontal dotted line is at a magnitude 5.1 quake. At Novaya Zemlya (red line), since it's a giant rock and well connected to the earth's mantle, the black line crosses at 7.5 kT: a relatively small boom can make a big kick in the earth. At NTS (blue line), it's all sand, and it takes a very large boom (something like 29 kT ... off the chart here) to make a 5.1 magnitude quake.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
We don't know the exact rock makeup of the area that North Korea uses for testing, so we have to guess. The guessing is also why the estimates for the 2009 event are between 2 and 6 kT ... we know the ground is not as squishy as NTS, but probably not as hard as Novaya Zemlya. Hence, 2-6 kT for the 4.5 quake in 2009.</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
The green line is my North Korea estimate, based off of previous estimates for Pakistan. I will note that the green line estimate also lines up with the reported size of the 2006 test (1 kT or less for a 4.1 quake) and the 2009 test (2-6 kT for a 4.5 quake, and I show 3.4 kT); however, there is a lot of uncertainty there. One could draw a few other green lines that also match the reported data ranges.</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
But this one is big. Bigger than has been reported or hinted at previously.</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
Lastly, the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty Organization (CTBTO) has probably been going full-on for the past week or so. This is the stuff they live for -- to detect nuclear explosions around the world, by whatever means necessary. They picked up the blast; they're now sniffing around the world for xenon-133, in the hopes that some of it escaped from the mountain after the blast. Xe-133 is a fission product and is not normally found in the atmosphere; it's a telltale sign that someone has been doing some fission recently, and since it's a noble gas, it can leak through a lot of things.</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://www.ctbto.org/press-centre/highlights/2009/experts-sure-about-nature-of-the-dprk-event/" target="_blank"><img alt="" border="0" height="165" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-B2bU6o0qRaqmBs50xS4CQmGZpEudZsdN8qzMPO9Qf5SJRehNrKrwJu9dydMCtv0QjYdm0cxiBdzIZcERxckgRuXOe5khbqpNorigFQ1pLTsD3UhC8iddkez9_23dTegdQ1TiltbYr8Vw/s320/Xe135.jpg" title="" width="320" /></a></div>
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<a href="http://www.ctbto.org/fileadmin/user_upload/videos_for_the_media/pack%2006_ctbto.mov" target="_blank">CTBTO's Xe-133 transport modeling</a></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
Clicking on the above picture will take you to a 11MB movie that shows some modeling results of the 2006 event and how they think they detected the Xe-133 from it -- all the way in Yellowknife, Canada. Jump to 1:40 to see it.</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
Unfortunately, the 2009 event was buried deeply enough that <a href="http://www.ctbto.org/press-centre/highlights/2009/experts-sure-about-nature-of-the-dprk-event/" target="_blank">no Xe-133 was detected</a> ... at least, not by the CTBTO.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
For more reading: see <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6508116-caging-the-dragon" target="_blank">Caging the Dragon</a>, available as a pdf.</div>
</div>
TheEngineerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06509880062494209346noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4479662412540142871.post-86231947656980287112013-01-29T07:55:00.001-08:002013-01-29T07:55:12.395-08:00Redundant SafetyWhenever I see overt double redundancy, I'm immediately tempted to test the system.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5rRHljoUObVYoUKMrcOVrf7bOeSYTL3YqpkNzmMCPyDhA-1LKhBbt4b3Nl_WDwYxMsqsrnFZWl8Ic-BgnCMUa-aiRiKgCbGQHUVlztTQEV7vshxpZOvFt2pRLc61W3zatnfE9bHdMtWXp/s1600/plug.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5rRHljoUObVYoUKMrcOVrf7bOeSYTL3YqpkNzmMCPyDhA-1LKhBbt4b3Nl_WDwYxMsqsrnFZWl8Ic-BgnCMUa-aiRiKgCbGQHUVlztTQEV7vshxpZOvFt2pRLc61W3zatnfE9bHdMtWXp/s320/plug.JPG" width="240" /></a></div>
<br />
In this case, a ground fault plug, plugged into a ... GFCI outlet. I'm at a hotel this week, and I was seriously tempted to throw the hairdryer into the sink and see which one tripped first.<br />
<br />
In all fairness, there are good reasons why they did this. Per most building codes, a GFCI outlet must be installed if the outlet is within 6 feet of a sink (or something like that). And, of course, the hotel chain wants to be safe, so they only buy hairdryers that also have a GFCI plug. <br />
<br />
But seeing the two together hints at the <a href="http://www.anengineerindc.com/2011/11/every-accident-can-be-prevented-but-at.html" target="_blank">overbearing safety culture</a> that continues to run rampant.TheEngineerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06509880062494209346noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4479662412540142871.post-80563924814192472802012-10-15T19:24:00.002-07:002012-10-15T19:24:51.722-07:00Power At The PumpAfter a solid 6 hour brain-drain effort this morning worrying about non-technical details associated with configuration management, I decided to figure out something fun.<br />
<br />
<b>How much power is coursing through the hose as you fill up your car at the gas pump?</b><br />
<br />
Well, to be honest, I've been wondering about this for a while. The seed was first planted by colleague a few months ago who made an offhand comment, and it stuck in my head. So, I timed the flow rate when I was filling up a few days ago:<br />
<br />
<ol>
<li>It took 30.4 seconds to put 5 gallons of gas in the car.</li>
<li>According to the EPA, gasoline has 114,000 BTU's per gallon, or 33.41 kWh per gallon.</li>
</ol>
<br />
Item #2 up there is a measure of energy: to put it in layman's terms, 1 gallon of gas can be converted into a LOT of heat. 114,000 British Thermal Units. By combining #1 and #2, and making sure the units come out right, this is how much power is coursing through that hose:<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">20 megawatts.</span></div>
<br />
I couldn't believe it was that much. 20 megawatts is <i>a lot</i> of power. A typical wind turbine will produce about 2 megawatts of power.<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEipocD5h8w6Cs27gEZCfKT_-Zf9LgFrpkqyybQUDMxACxa-9AM0yYo80oMp5-PSF3_pr4O6x1FU6tqGJ-VCbhwmfimlHxrWLGF9u0WxqJTdWAbWu87pb4-22Zm8Wyju8SScKjS4Qt5lxRLD/s1600/Screen+shot+2012-10-15+at+10.22.35+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="199" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEipocD5h8w6Cs27gEZCfKT_-Zf9LgFrpkqyybQUDMxACxa-9AM0yYo80oMp5-PSF3_pr4O6x1FU6tqGJ-VCbhwmfimlHxrWLGF9u0WxqJTdWAbWu87pb4-22Zm8Wyju8SScKjS4Qt5lxRLD/s320/Screen+shot+2012-10-15+at+10.22.35+PM.png" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
That's right ... the combined power from every turbine you see in the picture, running at full capacity, is about the same as what's flowing through your gasoline hose. I think that just underscores how power dense gasoline is.<br />
<br />
Now be careful where you point that thing.TheEngineerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06509880062494209346noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4479662412540142871.post-7611993986628883802012-09-15T11:10:00.000-07:002012-09-15T11:20:23.359-07:00Petulant Politicians and their Piss-Poor PerformanceI've been pretty sick the past few days with a 103 degree fever, but the silver lining is that the time at home has given me the chance to catch up on some reading. An excerpt from Michael Grunwald's new book, "The New New Deal," boiled my blood far more than the fever ever could. Enough to get me back on the wagon again and start posting.<br />
<br />
The part I read focused on the time shortly after the 2008 elections, when Barack Obama won the presidential election on a platform of hope and change. The Democrats had also won strong majorities in the Senate (58 of 100 seats) and in the House of Representatives (257 of 435 seats). Understandably, the Republicans were humbled, and were nursing their wounds at a strategy session. The quotes -- not just the narrative, but the <i>quotes</i> -- that Michael Grunwald uses to describe the Senate Minority Leader, Mitch McConnell, make me furious:<br />
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The owlish, studiously bland Senate minority leader from Kentucky was the unlikeliest of motivational speakers. He was a strategy guy, cynical and clinical; he reminded his members to stay calm, stay on message and stay united. Obama had promised postpartisanship, and Republicans could turn him into a promise breaker by withholding their support. "We got shellacked, but don't forget we still represent half the population," McConnell said. "Republicans need to stick together as a team." Or as Ohio Senator George Voinovich summarized the strategy, "If Obama was for it, we had to be against it."</span></blockquote>
<div style="text-align: center;">
...</div>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But McConnell believed Republicans had nothing to gain from me-too-ism. He reminded his caucus that Republicans wouldn't pay a price for opposing Obama's plan if it succeeded, because politicians get re-elected in good times. But if the economy didn't revive, they could return from the political wilderness in 2010. "He wanted everyone to hold the fort," Voinovich later explained. "All he cared about was making sure Obama could never have a clean victory."</span></blockquote>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><i>Excerpted from </i>The New New Deal<i>, copyright 2012 by Michael Grunwald, published by Simon & Schuster, August 2012.</i></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><i><br /></i></span>
I cannot explain my outrage at this kind of philosophy using even marginally polite language. Is this how we teach our kids to play on the playground? That if you don't get your way, the next best thing to do is be obstinate and destructive until you get your way? I fail to understand why our Senators consider themselves above the most basic behavioral traits we try to instill in our youth.<br />
<br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">This. Is. Disgusting.</span><br />
<br />
This has nothing -- <i>nothing</i> -- to do with political ideology, or about Republicans vs. Democrats. There are many tenets of the Republican party that I find appealing. For instance, some elements of Representative Paul Ryan's budget plans are uncomfortable and different from what we are used to, but they are <i>required</i> to address the uncomfortable and different budget problems we face today. The Republican ideal of a smaller, less intrusive government is broadly appealing to many people. But Senator McConnell's uncompromising, obstructionist, screw-the-other-guys-at-all-costs is antithetical to everything that this country was founded on and stands for.<br />
<br />
When James Madison was asked, "<a href="http://fora.tv/fora/fora_transcript_pdf.php?cid=645" target="_blank">Are there any principles by which the American government works?</a>" he responded, "Yes, there are three: compromise, compromise, compromise."<br />
<br />
Look, dammit, you don't win your way back to popularity by being petulant and throwing a tantrum. You win your way back to popularity by proposing a compellingly better path forward; by being more in tune with what people want; by making a positive case that you can address the current administration's shortcomings. <br />
<br />
In business, in the military, and in engineering (and I've been involved in all three), you make your case for your position or your proposed path forward. Sometimes you win and sometimes you lose. The team's success requires you to execute the chosen task to the best of your ability, whether it was what you wanted or not.<br />
<br />
<i>That</i> is how I expect elected officials to behave, whether I voted for them or not. Anything less is disgusting.TheEngineerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06509880062494209346noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4479662412540142871.post-43366363480702263852012-06-11T19:12:00.002-07:002012-06-11T19:12:39.335-07:00Inspirational Quote #4Nike had a stroke of brilliance with their "Just Do It" slogan and campaign. I mean, what a simple, motivational, and utterly inspiring set of words? In that vein, I offer this sentiment ... in the spirit of "Just Keep Doing It."<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhnyhDAp3bmh8rLzmzBT5uGTqtdudqUUhw0dRz3FRVLNMmL2zsmoAzHKUw-44qnmGjjk9JUmFp6_FxIMOadcObVOBuEeUENbidKJ6V-z7iBXTcixlUVFDLhclqkwsVm3VxLiZbhhVlfYpxC/s1600/Screen+shot+2012-06-11+at+10.06.04+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="482" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhnyhDAp3bmh8rLzmzBT5uGTqtdudqUUhw0dRz3FRVLNMmL2zsmoAzHKUw-44qnmGjjk9JUmFp6_FxIMOadcObVOBuEeUENbidKJ6V-z7iBXTcixlUVFDLhclqkwsVm3VxLiZbhhVlfYpxC/s640/Screen+shot+2012-06-11+at+10.06.04+PM.png" width="640" /></a></div>
<br />
(Mr. Brooks is most famously known for writing the lyrics to "O Little Town of Bethlehem," but sadly, history has kind of neglected his inspirational preaching and writing.)TheEngineerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06509880062494209346noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4479662412540142871.post-19653241741551123082012-06-01T19:19:00.000-07:002012-06-01T19:19:00.501-07:00Inspirational Quote #3Traditional project management training (and almost all systems engineering) drills the concept of "stakeholder requirements" into your head. "Ask the customer what they want." <div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I really enjoy it when people are so smart, and have such a clear vision, that they can say things like this -- and be <i>right</i>.<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLzUWmaXj-b026koajtPAUdtf496QxrKO8XT5rHww-tvneXsklZaf8I8FMzDAEmMzNnXQAV_ufPmpYXBph1hm4ndXs5gGx00sbzL7PTgfDN8woKN3vq8Q9Tuwk6dpC-cFZzmV0gUy_Dcpu/s1600/Ford.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLzUWmaXj-b026koajtPAUdtf496QxrKO8XT5rHww-tvneXsklZaf8I8FMzDAEmMzNnXQAV_ufPmpYXBph1hm4ndXs5gGx00sbzL7PTgfDN8woKN3vq8Q9Tuwk6dpC-cFZzmV0gUy_Dcpu/s640/Ford.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
<div>
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</div>TheEngineerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06509880062494209346noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4479662412540142871.post-12049197812449071052012-05-31T07:04:00.000-07:002012-05-31T07:04:45.434-07:00Inspirational Quote #2When I first heard this quote back in 1997, I thought "Oh, how awful." The past 15 years have taught me that, at times, this philosophy is useful and motivational.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBNLE72nJ42fymD8QOVj-7e9cHG_5pUPnLjdD532zh-r1Iz902YDOOBqP46MWFanxITbaIm5tp4emf0t85jbAxoZw_N2P0tMXdpq67Wv81vXkCHlDU4zyPBO7j-M38ZUQTtQI7wjXXnICA/s1600/ChurchillQuote.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBNLE72nJ42fymD8QOVj-7e9cHG_5pUPnLjdD532zh-r1Iz902YDOOBqP46MWFanxITbaIm5tp4emf0t85jbAxoZw_N2P0tMXdpq67Wv81vXkCHlDU4zyPBO7j-M38ZUQTtQI7wjXXnICA/s640/ChurchillQuote.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
<br />TheEngineerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06509880062494209346noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4479662412540142871.post-2173735845457024792012-05-29T18:51:00.000-07:002012-05-29T18:51:08.875-07:00Inspirational Quote #1Back on the horse again, after a long hiatus. Sorry about that.<br />
<br />
It has become trendy on the internet these days to post pictures of famous people along with famous quotes those famous people said, all in the hopes that the original poster becomes famous.<br />
<br />
Okay, I'm in. And I plan to update a new quote each day this week, so check back here often.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8HzP1LUV0q1vrVUBU2RJz5DYFx6ve4mWkgR7K8cBbc_P-GMEHk1_K3iVAFB71auUsdzE1HMK-HYgmULnSmMVL5C1z6TvvVyTjAZNFwQVlHw8btLdji55X3T5Z_4nmKpYQuE8sEVP85l9y/s1600/RooseveltQuote.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8HzP1LUV0q1vrVUBU2RJz5DYFx6ve4mWkgR7K8cBbc_P-GMEHk1_K3iVAFB71auUsdzE1HMK-HYgmULnSmMVL5C1z6TvvVyTjAZNFwQVlHw8btLdji55X3T5Z_4nmKpYQuE8sEVP85l9y/s640/RooseveltQuote.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
<br />TheEngineerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06509880062494209346noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4479662412540142871.post-58881161639671878542012-04-24T18:59:00.000-07:002012-04-24T18:59:22.146-07:00The Peter Principle - An AddendumThe Peter Principle is commonly stated as follows:<br />
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">In an organization based on achievement and rewarding of merit through promotions, an employee will rise to his or her own level of incompetence, and stay there.</span></blockquote>
<br />
The principle was actually first formalized in a book, known as <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Peter-Principle-Things-Always-Wrong/dp/B000OEG5T2" target="_blank">The Peter Principle</a>. I was going to add a corollary to it, but I see there are already <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Principle#Solutions" target="_blank">a few corollaries</a> out there. So, I'll add an addendum:<br />
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Diligent, responsible employees will collect more and more responsibilities until they are paralyzed and ineffective.</span></blockquote>
<br />
I feel like that addendum helps describe why I haven't posted anything in nearly two months.TheEngineerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06509880062494209346noreply@blogger.com1