productive Sunday morning
dog park
Since I can drive now I took Muffin to the dog park this morning. She was playful and gentle as usual. There was a gorgeous dark gray pit there but he was shy and I only got to touch him once. We stayed until I started to get sore and doggo started laying down instead of playing.
absentee voting request
Did my absentee ballot request to Polk County, my official county of residence. It was a PDF that has to be printed and physically signed so the little thermal printer came in clutch again. Really happy with it.
I printed the request on thermal fax paper. I got a box of 4 rolls at a thrift shop for $4 on the chance that the paper hadn’t degraded; either I got lucky or thermal paper is more robust than I thought. I printed the address labels with a roll of peel-and-stick label/sticker paper. My handwriting was rough before, and it’s both difficult and indecipherable now with my spinal cord issues.
scooter battery maintenance
It’s already been 5 weeks since I’ve ridden the scooter and I imagine it’ll be sitting unused until I’m taken off all medical restrictions. I had some spare bits around that I used to connect a solar maintaining setup:
10w 12v panel1 -> spare PWM controller2 -> SAE-terminated wires coming off the controller’s BATT terminals -> existing SAE-terminated extension coming from the scooter battery3
The panel’s Vmp of 19.8v isn’t a great match for a PWM controller but, hey, I did it with stuff I already had on hand.
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not sure what project I bought the panel for. Meshtastic? Maybe for this battery-maintenance use? ↩
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I usually keep a PWM or two around for backup and for loaning to others in the field. Having a PWM backup saved my butt once and a loaner saved a friend-of-a-friend in the Mojave desert. Having some solar harvest is better than no solar harvest while you source another MPPT. ↩
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I use the SAE port to maintain the battery when the scooter is on the carrier, and to power the 12v heated vest I got used off eBay. ↩