troyunrau
@troyunrau@lemmy.ca
Centrist, progressive, radical optimist. Geophysicist, R&D, Planetary Scientist and general nerd in Winnipeg, Canada.
troyunrau.ca (personal)
lithogen.ca (business)
- Comment on The Onion buys rightwing conspiracy theory site Infowars with plans to make it ‘very funny, very stupid’ 2 days ago:
Probably the money paid for whomever Alex Jones lost lawsuits against – so like Sandy Hook victims.
- Comment on Alan Wake 2 still hasn't quite made its money back, according to Remedy's latest financials 2 weeks ago:
Considering how well received this game was, perhaps it is more about marketing or misunderstanding the genre appeal?
- Comment on Candy is distributed boo-nomially 2 weeks ago:
Needs imaginary component
- Comment on Stop whining. Do it yourself. 2 weeks ago:
Counterpoint: Sometimes you can kickstart a community that you want to see just by consistently posting content. !science_memes@mander.xyz is my favourite example – it was essentially one person who created that entire community (and it’s since been diversifying somewhat – at least there’s traction in the comments).
But to reinforce your point: I did !spacemusic@lemmy.ca and tried to do the same thing, but it sort of petered out. But it’s way way more niche.
Rome wasn’t built in a day. Just engage with the content you like and build some places for content you’d like to see.
- Comment on That chicken's name? Joe Rogan 2 weeks ago:
Excerpt from Oryx and Crake, by Margaret Atwood:
“This is the latest,” said Crake.
What they were looking at was a large bulblike object that seemed to be covered with stippled whitish-yellow skin. Out of it came twenty thick fleshy tubes, and at the end of each tube another bulb was growing.
“What the hell is it?” said Jimmy.
“Those are chickens,” said Crake. "Chicken parts. Just the breasts, on this one. They’ve got ones that specialize in drumsticks too, twelve to a growth unit.
“But there aren’t any heads…”
“That’s the head in the middle,” said the woman. “There’s a mouth opening at the top, they dump nutrients in there. No eyes or beak or anything, they don’t need those.”
- Comment on Boston Dynamic show off their brand new Atlas 2 weeks ago:
So much uncanny valley creepy vibes when it does that. Like you’re anthropomorphizing and suddenly it snaps you out of it haha.
- Comment on Trick OR Treat 2 weeks ago:
Add flavoured salts for more variety. I’m partial to Tajin or Montreal Steak Spice.
- Comment on Linus Torvalds reckons AI is ‘90% marketing and 10% reality’ 2 weeks ago:
Git is a sort of proto-blockchain – well, it’s a ledger anyway. It is fairly useful. (Fucking opaque compared to subversion or other centralized systems that didn’t have the ledger, but I digress…)
- Comment on Workbench tale: Resurrection of a dead Emlid Reach RS+ due to extremely low battery 3 weeks ago:
Yeah, there is risk of some chemistry happening at really low voltages which cause irreversible changes to the structure of the material. Given how the battery responded to tests afterwards, I can only presume that these didn’t happen. Short of dissecting the cells and putting them through XRD. Mind you, I do know a few people in the lab…
- Comment on Workbench tale: Resurrection of a dead Emlid Reach RS+ due to extremely low battery 3 weeks ago:
Oddly enough, it’s probably one of the best and most affordable devices in this sector. You can buy 10-20x units compared to the brand leader (Trimble). So I think they assume that this is how most people will operate.
- Comment on Workbench tale: Resurrection of a dead Emlid Reach RS+ due to extremely low battery 3 weeks ago:
They’re lithium iron phosphate chemistry, which typically draw down to 2.0V without problems, and tend to be a bit more forgiving. I agree 0.9V is low, but the cells were relatively new. Furthermore, no sign of damage or other typical faults associated with a failing battery, and my battery analyzer (from my drone batteries, same chemistry) approved it. According to my gantt chart, they’ve likely been charged and discharged 75 times since I brought them back to life.
Sadly, because they are a manufacturer device integrated battery pack, and the manufacturer doesn’t sell replacements, my only options would be installing a third party battery pack or buying another device at $1500 or more. I’m happy with the battery recovery process though in this case.
- Submitted 3 weeks ago to electronics@discuss.tchncs.de | 6 comments
- Comment on Ah yes, regression 3 weeks ago:
How can you argue with a word like "best’ anyway ;)
- Comment on Should you trust that doctor? 4 weeks ago:
It’s never lupus
- Comment on Honey 4 weeks ago:
I rarely judge someone for ignorance unless it is wilful. I pretty harshly judge people who cannot assimilate new information. Over time I think I might be evolving from INTP->INTJ as I age. I used to have more patience and would try to encourage people to learn and adjust.
- Comment on Don't fret, check your spam folder 4 weeks ago:
I run a small business. People in my spam folder have really high opinions of my business. They all want to invest or something… Mostly harvesting my LinkedIn profile for keywords.
- Comment on Expedition 33 Dev Confirms $50 Price Is Correct, '30+ Hours of Main Game' 4 weeks ago:
If it’s a game I’m going to get hundreds, or sometimes thousands of hours from, then I’ll pay more. If you look at price per hour spent on entertainment, it’s hard to compare. However, you often have to wade through a bunch of shitty overpriced games to find those gems.
Okay, back to EU4 now ;)
- Comment on Problem? 4 weeks ago:
We could award a certain percentage of grants and grad students should be able to get degrees doing replication studies. Unfortunately everyone is chasing total paper count and impact factor rankings and shit.
- Comment on Problem? 4 weeks ago:
Ewww - the whole point of peer review is to catch this shit. If peer review isn’t working, we should be going back to monographs :)
- Comment on 10001 4 weeks ago:
The author of this comic has a number of excellent coffee table compilations: www.tomgauld.com/comic-books-v2 (unaffiliated – I just like them :))
- Comment on Opened an old scientific instrument to see if it works... 4 weeks ago:
I appreciate your caveat about peak load. Fortunately for this device it is largely irrelevant. It’s so old school and analogue that there isn’t a standby draw – it’s either on or off. Its operational time is measured in days on a single 9V.
It might be interesting, so I’ll describe the instrument. Starting with some VLF background:
There are a number of VLF stations scattered around the world – for example station id NAA in Culter, Maine (24.0kHz) – used to communicate with their submarines while submerged. If they only transmitted when they had something interesting to say to the subs, that would be useful information to an enemy. So they have to transmit continuously (except for on scheduled maintenance days for the transmitters). These are very powerful huge antennas, often spanning entire valleys – after all, the wavelength at 24kHz is enormous. Different stations have different frequencies and we know about most of them.
At a sufficient distance away from these antennas, all incoming signals are polarized due to reflecting off the ionosphere. These radio waves pass over linear conductors in the ground which will distort the polarization. What we’re effectively measuring is the distortions in these incoming radio waves to map the locations (and orientations) of linear conductors (natural antennas) in the ground, up to about 250m below surface.
So this device is used to measure the incoming signal direction and polarization. It does so by setting up a harmonic oscillation on the device and emitting a tone. There’s a couple of magnetic coils on the device, and as you swing the device about, the received signal from the transmitter and the onboard oscillator will constructively or destructively interfere, changing the tone. You note the direction the tone is the strongest using a compass and inclinometer (both analogue) and write it down in a notebook. Then move to your next position and repeat.
Prospectors have been using this for five decades at least.
But as you can see, not a complicated thing from an electronics perspective. The only complicated thing is tuning the on-board oscillator properly.
- Comment on Opened an old scientific instrument to see if it works... 4 weeks ago:
Mild acids that are food grade are great because you don’t have to worry about occupational health exposure. A lot of people use vinegar. I use citric acid – which you can find in the grocery store in the spices section. Citric acid is what makes sour candies sour. You buy it as a powder.
I mix a little water and citric acid and let the part soak in it, then brush with a soft wire brush (not steel wire, as it’s too hard and will scratch the parts too much).
But, as a tangent, buying stronger acids is pretty easy, depending on the acid. Hydrochloric acid is sold in hardware stores as muriatic acid. Sulphuric acid is used to recharge lead-acid batteries. You’ll have a harder time finding nitric acid (because people can make explosives with it) or hydrofluoric acid (cause it is actually deadly as fuck), but industrial suppliers often have them. I wouldn’t handle any of these without some training. Even muriatic acid will off-gas chlorine and cause all the tools in your shop to rust if stored improperly. (From experience.)
- Comment on Opened an old scientific instrument to see if it works... 4 weeks ago:
I agree. However the Ah capacity of a modern 9V is pretty good compared to the 70s. Unless you buy the cheapest 9V crap you can find ;)
- Comment on Opened an old scientific instrument to see if it works... 4 weeks ago:
I use citric acid on a lot of connectors when the pins are corroded (for the same reason). Revived a lot of cables that way. Good advice :)
- Comment on Magic Mineral 4 weeks ago:
As with all research papers published out of China, you take their numbers with a grain of salt. They report approximately 2000 cases per year of mesothelioma, and of those, only 15% are definitively asbestos exposure related. So about 300 per year. Of those cases, over 80% are asbestos industry (improper safety measures for repeated occupational exposure).
Compared to fire related deaths prevented, it’s probably a good trade for China. Probably.
- Comment on Opened an old scientific instrument to see if it works... 4 weeks ago:
The whole battery mounting board is shot – entire traces corroded on it, and the contacts have effectively dissolved.
Fortunately, the machine was designed in 1977(ish) and batteries have gotten a lot better since. 6x AA batteries can now be replaced by a single modern 9V and it’ll deliver enough current. So I’ll mount a new 9V holder and solder it into the battery board wiring harness. I’ve already tested that solution on the breadboard and the machine appears to work.
- Comment on Magic Mineral 4 weeks ago:
I’m pretty sure we could go back to using it, with more precautions in place, better binders, etc. Hell, it’s still used in many parts of the world, and it occurs naturally all over the fucking place. But, alas, lawyers would have to stop salivating at every mention of the word.
In geoscience, we started using the word asbestoform to describe minerals with fibrous habits so we don’t get lawyers showing up to destroy all of our rock samples and turn every geoscience facility into a superfund site.
- Comment on Opened an old scientific instrument to see if it works... 4 weeks ago:
The instrument is fully analogue, designed in the late 70s. The serial number on the device implies it was manufactured in 87. I contacted the manufacturer and the last person who could service it has long since retired, but they sent me the calibration and tuning documents so I might be able to revive this beauty.
- Submitted 4 weeks ago to electronics@discuss.tchncs.de | 41 comments
- Comment on Temperatures 4 weeks ago:
It’s a system of linear equations that has an intersection point. It may not be exactly at 575, but they do intersect. Solving the equation gives 574.589, depending on how many decimal points you round to. So 575 is accurate enough within integer rounding.
