Sandy

The storm came and went.  Fortunately, for us, it was just some strong winds and heavy rain.  Power stayed up, largely due to last years wet snow having already brought down anything likely to fall.  It looks like we'll have rain from the storm for another two or three days as the storm track loops around the NE.  All in all though things are good.

Coffee roast at home - Part 2 121020

I decided to roast another batch of coffee.

Modified popper with 1/4 in. screen to keep beans from flying out.  The screen generally works well.  Beans stay in and chaff escapes.  Some minor adjustment will likely be needed.  Screen held in place with a copper wire.

Screen to keep beans in popper.

Dropped 78g of green Mexican.  This is enough to fill popper to popcorn full line.

78g green Mexican

This time I put the popper and chaff collector next to the stove with the hood running.  This is a considerable improvement but the area still smelled of something burnt or so says BB.  Paper towel is wet to catch chaff and that works extremely well.

Setup next to stove with wet paper towel to catch chaff.

I ran the roast as follows:

• 1:40 Beans showing color but uneven.  Some beans definitely appear burnt.  Had to shake the popper to improve agitation.  Not a big issue but I'd like more agitation. 
• 2:16 1st crack starting.  There is PLENTY of heat in this roaster given the air flow.  Would like more air flow so 1st crack is 6 to 8 minutes and second around 10 to 12 as we run at Karma.
• 3:20 Smoke visible with extended cracking.
• 4:00 Crack running solidly.  First to second crack happened instantly.
• 5:00 Dump.  Serious smoke.  This machine runs WAY TO FAST with 78g of beans.  More air flow needed and likely more beans.

Plastic cover was VERY hot and I slightly deformed it when I took it off to dump beans.  I'll need an insulated handle.

The yield was 62g. That's a 16g roast loss, 20.5%.  At Karma we drop 16 lbs and get 13 yield for a roast loss of 3 lbs, 18.75%. 

62g finished roast

The wet towel chaff collector worked well.

Chaff on wet paper towel.

Here's what the coffee looks like.  Solid dark with uniform color.  Post roast smell was good.  I'll cup it Tuesday.

Beans, Full City + perhaps ++

A couple of things of note on this popper:

• More air flow to float a larger load since there is plenty of heat
• Insulated handle on plastic so it can be more easily removed.  I suspect replacing the plastic with a glass chimney makes a lot of sense though I'll need to work out some way to catch the chaff.

First coffee

Two days ago I roasted some coffee (Mexican).  The beans have oiled up nicely so this mourning I decided to try the coffee in a Latte.  I ground 23g fine and fired up the espresso machine.

This is a VERY inexpensive machine I've had for some while.  It makes an OK cup of steamed coffee, not really espresso as there's no crema (foam).  Still I like the coffee.  I steamed some milk and in short order had a sort of latte. 

Yum - tasted very good.

All in all I'm entirely satisfied with the first roast.  I'll roast again tomorrow so I'll have coffee for a filter brew Monday.  Meanwhile, I'm going to work on the screen to keep the roasting beans in the roaster.

Coffee roasting at home - Part 1

I've been working for some time at Karma Coffee in Sudbury, Ma.  Great coffee!

My original hope was to work there and learn how to roast coffee.  While I've learned a bit most of my time was spent reconditioning a Probat roaster.  While it's been interesting I'm still interested in learning how to roast coffee.

To that end, I've decided to try to roast coffee at home.  Sweet Marias is the go to place for home roasters.  They've a section on home roasting.  After a bit of reading and searching the net I decided to try a popcorn roaster as a first effort.

I ordered a Orville Redenbacher by Presto hot air popcorn popper which just arrived.  Karma provided some Mexican beans, chosen because they are uniform due to water processing and generally easy to roast.  I've also ordered a high temperature oven thermometer, coffee roast to about 450F, and a book on home roasting that Dave at Karma recommended.  Those should be here early next week.

Meanwhile, I decided to try roasting.  Here's  what the popcorn popper looks like.

I put some beans in to the roaster's fill line and plugged it in, there's no on/off switch so I'll have to think about adding one.  The first thing that happened is that beans started to fly out!  The hot air entrance to the heating chamber is rather small and I suspect the air flow/pressure is high with the result that beans fly out.

I tried adding more beans but all that did was stop the beans from moving at all.  Not good!

I have some 1/4 inch screen on hand so I took a small piece and used it to shield the cooking chamber.  Now no beans come out and the screen is course enough that most of the chaff escapes.  I set a large bowl with a damp paper towel in it underneath the spout and that seems to be reasonably effective at catching the chaff.

I was rather lax about timing but the Mex beans got to first crack in 4 to 6 minutes.  I suspect that I had to many beans to get a decent suspension.  Second crack started at about 10 minutes and by twelve there was much smoke and I stopped the roast.

I used a large pizza pan to cool the beans and that seemed to work well.  The beans were solidly in second crack as I dumped.  That said, the roast color was a bit uneven (to many beans?).

The only other issue is that roasting coffee smells like, well, roasting coffee.  I neglected to turn on the exhaust fan to begin with with the net result that the entire house now smells of roasted coffee.

All in all, as a first effort I'm reasonably satisfied   Yield was 75g of roasted coffee (not sure about the input weight but it should have been about 90g).

Tomorrow I'll get some Mex from Karma and then brew and taste both the Karma and my roast to see what is what.

When the thermometer comes in I'll put it into the roaster.  I'll also find a timer and a better screen (the current one is galvanized and I'd prefer stainless).

Setting up VNC server to support multiple users

I've needed to run multiple users recently on one of my Ubuntu machines.  It looks like the way to do so is to install VNC4SERVER.  Here's the link I'm playing with: http://www.torrent-invites.com/operating-systems/49945-how-setup-config-vnc4server-linux-debian-ubuntu.html.

Wood bike project update

The wooden bike project continues as I've time to work on it.  Lately it's been more active as I've developed tennis elbow from riding my diamond frame bike.  A recumbent would take pressure off my elbow and should allow it to resolve.  So, I'm trying to make a push to finish the bike.

I've received a couple of emails from others interested in building a wooden frame bike.  With as many good sites as are available on the net in this area I'm a bit surprised to be noticed but for whatever it's worth here are some hopefully useful thoughts on what I've learned so far.

• Look at what others have done/experienced.  Really look.  Really look carefully.  Then look some more.
• Sites I found useful include
• The Design and Construction of a Wood Framed Recumbent Bicycle, 
  Built by Eddie Grant
• Woody
• Mistress Links
• Get your seat/leg length right early on.  Eddie Grant's approach makes a LOT of sense.
• You'll need to size the bike to the parts you have and your height/weight.  One size does NOT fit all.  I'm fairly big (6', 200 lbs) and require something appropriate to my size.
• I found it very useful to lay the original diamond bike on a large sheet of plywood and trace it's entire layout as a reference.  This allowed me to measure various things after the original bike was broken down.
• You will need to work some metal for dropouts and possibly steering.  Hand tools are generally adequate but will take time.  I also found a Dremel tool very useful to grind/shape.
• A table saw and drill press are very useful but not essential.  I have neither one and have managed though I've wished for both.
• Chain routing has a major effect on layout.
• Likewise brakes, steering, deraillures, etc.
• Getting the headset mounted is more difficult than I'd expected.  The headset takes considerable pounding when riding and will break free if not properly mounted to the wooden components.

Max BD party

BB and I went to Max's BD party.  Great fun!!



Link to photos.

Bike ride to Ericsons

BB & I took advantage of the cooler mourning weather to ride over to Erickson's for ice cream.  We took our usual route to the Assabet wildlife refuge then along the lake to Erickson's, about 20 miles round trip.  Unfortunately, in an effort to beat the heat we arrives over an hour before they opened!  We hung out in the shade for a bit then BB went around to the order window and charmed the young man setting up to sell us our mourning ice cream fix.  Score another one for attractive women in tights!

I finally got a reasonable picture of the road along the pond.

Roasting coffee at Karma

We are fortunate in Sudbury to have an outstanding coffee roaster, Karma!  Karma is an artisan small batch roaster.  Karma roast  roughly 30 different coffees and will roast to order!  In addition to a modest retail store, Karma sells online and wholesales to select local retailers and restaurants. 


After I retired, I began talking with Dave, the owner, about roasting coffee with a view to a part time job.  A couple of weeks ago we spoke and I'm not learning how to roast coffee!  There's rather more to it than I would have thought with considerable subtlety in running the roaster to consistently produce a top tier roast.  One of the great things about working at Karma is the chance to try different coffee and roasts.  I'm learning that there is a rather big of world of coffees.


Here's a brief video about Karma.

Ice cream and Russian Ural motorcycle

BB and I went out for ice cream on this rather hot Sunday.  With temps in the 90's it's a bit over hot for a bike ride to Erickson's, one of the best ice cream shops near us.  Anyway we drove over for a fix.

How hot was it?  The ice cream was soft so Erickson's was giving a cup with each cone!

While there a couple drove up on an interesting motorcycle with a sidecar.

It looked like a WW2 German military motorcycle, the sort seen in period movies.  Intrigued, I went over to have a look.  The owner explained that it was, in fact, a brand new Ural motorcycle.  He went on to say that when the Russian military overran the German BMW factory during the end of WW2 they took the engineering drawings and samples of this classic back to Russia where they began to manufacture them.  Ural motorcycles of Russia  continues to make them today and the largest dealer in the world is in Boxborough, Ma near us.

Adventures are clearly where you find them.

Sansa Clip Plus

Bought a Sansa Clip Plus and almost immediately had some issues.  Important safety tips:

1. I deleted songs from the clip+ without emptying the "trash" bin and

2. I removed the clip+ from the usb port without selecting the "remove safely" option first.

This corrupts the DOS file system.  In particular the .Trash folder.  Fix is to delete the .Trash folder.

Bike ride with BB - Erricson's again ... Ice Cream

We made another bike run to Erricson's today.  This time we choose a route that is roughly 9.5 miles each way.  As always the ice cream was a treat and the ride along the lake very nice.

Bike ride with BB

Another wonderful spring day.  BB and I biked over to Erricson's ice cream in Maynard.  It turned out that there was a very nice route through the Assabet reservation.  Here's how we went:

It was a very nice ride of about 16.5 miles.  We stopped at Erricson's, of course, for ice cream then came back along the river before heading for home.  All in all a very nice loop.

This was the first chance I've had to use the new PN-40 software and maps.  All in all I'm happy with the upgrade.  Sadly, the USB cable continues to be a singularly doubtful proposition.  That said, the new software stores routes, etc. as conventional GPX files on a removable SD card so it's possible to just pop the SD card and use it directly.  Since it uses GPX files I can now use Google Earth to show the route, elevations, speed, etc.  I suspect it works both ways so I should also be able to store routes, etc from Google Maps, etc.  That opens up some nice options.

I took a video using the Flip camera Miriam gave me.  It's a bit rough but should give some idea.  Sadly, I fat fingered the return video via the river.

Recumbent wood bike

I've spent several days modeling the bike to avoid building and then changing things.  Along the way I spent some time learning a bit about Blender and Librecad.  Interesting but a bit of overkill.  In the end I mocked things up with Impress.  Here's the result:

The issue with this geometry is chain routing.  To get the chain to clear the wheel and frame an idler is essential.  Here's a commercial bike that illustrates the matter:

There is, however, an alternative ... drive the front wheel.  Curzbike makes a line of such bikes.  Here's one:

By driving the front wheel a number of problems are avoided including chain routing.  A bit of web research revealed several sites for home built versions.  This is the one I more or less followed.

RecumbentTV

Since this solves a number of issues, I'm going to switch to this design.

Bike ride with BB

Another great NE spring day!  BB and I went for a 10 mi bike ride.  My knee was a bit tender so we stayed in neighborhoods mostly on flats.

13.5 mi bike ride with BB

BB and I rode to Trombetta's Farm and back today.  Trombetta's is one of our favorite ice cream runs so on a nice spring day it was a good trip.  Here's Trombetta's and the route.

Trombetta's is a rather funky place.  There's ice cream, a nursery, a children's make your own toy shop, an indoor miniature golf facility, and an eclectic collection of stuff for sale.  The ice cream is good and there are some nice shaded areas to sit.

We did a stretch on rt 20.  It was surprisingly OK as there were good shoulders and sidewalks.  Unfortunately we were going straight into a strong wind.  On the way back we looped through some neighborhoods avoiding 20.  They were pleasant to ride in with wide well paved streets and no traffic.  We did have to cross a substantial 3%+ grade hill about 600m long to get there though.  Of course we got to coast for the next few miles.  I topped out at 30 mph coasting down hill!

We stopped briefly at Wayside Inn as they were having an antiques sale in a very large tent.  We looked at going in but at $10 per it wasn't worth it.  I must also admit to being a bit taken aback by the notion of having to pay to shop.

We're going to try to work up to 20 to 50 mile rides with a view to going touring.  My knee was a bit tender from the ride on Thursday but didn't trouble me and is no worse after today's ride.

All in all a great day for a ride.

Mixed day

Bit of a mixed day today.  AM rain but became nice in the PM.  After errands and a stop for ice cream BB and I took a 6.4 mi bike ride.

The vegetable garden is beginning to show some positive signs though the beans I'd started inside all died.

Saw several humming birds today.  The ones we have are rather plain but still neat to watch.

Recumbent wood bike

Spent much of the day working on the seat for the redesign.  The key here is to make sure I've good good seat measurements.

I rounded the seat edges and made a template for drilling holes to lighten the seat.  I also modified the seat testing jig to mimic the actual frame angles.

Using this test jig I was able to test the seating angles.

Here I've clamped the crank assembly to test the pedal position.

I've decided to reuse the drop outs from the previous design.

Here I've test mounted the rear wheel.

I'm generally comfortable with this redesign though it's in many ways a return to the original buckboard concept.  After the previous experiments I'm inclined to think that I was rather hasty in abandoning that design based on what I thought at the time was inappropriate seat angles.  The point behind experiments is to experiment so the effort was not entirely wasted.

Bike redesign

Given recent events it seems a good time to do a redesign of the bike.

I've used Freecad (unstable but still usable) to redesign the bike this time paying attention to dimensions so that there are fewer surprises during the build.  It looks like this now:

I used the sketcher workbench in Freecad so there are MANY dimensions, angles, etc restricting the design. One measure that's not visible is the fork to rear axle (~900mm).

I also prototyped a seat to check angles.  Here are some photos:

A seat back angle of around 30+ degrees seems comfortable.  I do need to work on the shape a bit as some of the edges dig into my body.  A bit of checking suggest the seat ought to be somewhere between 24cm and 32cm.

I also checked my leg length and found a seat back to pedal max of about 1122mm.

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Short bike ride with BB

A sunny afternoon prompted a short bike ride with BB.

I've put some handle bar extensions on my bike to allow a more upright riding position.  They work well but I think I've left/right interchanged.  I'll swap them and try again.  While I'm doing bike stuff I'll add a mirror to my bike and move BB's to her small bike.