Black Box Down

There are three modules beneath the front dash:

1. Controller
2. Charger
3. Power Wire Board

The PWB (Power Wire Board) handles a number of functions. Last Fall, as previously mentioned, it was upgraded under warranty.

Now it seems that it may have failed since I lack any accessory power. So, no signal lights, wiper or headlights. Suzie is no longer street legal.

What called my attention to the problem was a sudden drop in performance. The batteries dropping drastically so that range was very limited.

I have called the service person twice about the problem. As yet, no follow-up.

Today, I re-scheduled a doctor’s appointment from this Wednesday to Halloween Tuesday. I have driven Bonnie’s Toyota a couple of times, but she needs to use it and I would rather avoid taking the bus if at all possible.

 

You’re in Good Hands with Vito

I had an appointment at the Independent Living Center today, which created an ethical conflict.

“You lied about Weapons of Mass Destruction to become a war profiteer?”

Well, no. But it did entail breaking the law.

“Oh, more illegal wiretaps?”

No, no, driving without a seat belt. You see the seat belt retractor on the driver’s side seat belt had jammed, which made the seat belt inoperable. And, two technically minded people, who I asked for help, were disinclined to tackle the job, as it was a great deal of trouble to get to the retractor.

So, the proper thing to do was to get jounced around by B.C. Transit to get to my appointment today, but as the message left for beloved spouse read:

Missed bus.
Took GEM.
The Leopard Gang rides again, sugah!

“The Leopard Gang?”

Yes, we only recently had watched “Bringing Up Baby” together.

“What about Vito?”

Well, since I had futzed around enough so that the bus drove past as I was walking to the bus stop…

“Ah, hah! In direct violation of New York State Traffic Law.”

I was forced to take Suzy. Previously, I had asked if I could re-charge at the ILC while at my appointment and Vito had told me to page him. Which I did upon my arrival this morning. He opened a side door by the parking lot and plugged in my spare extension cord.

He then asked if there was anything else and I told him about the problem with the seat belt. He fiddled with it for a while and got it unjammed. Then sprayed lubricant to reduce the possibility of further jamming. I thanked him.

Vito: “Anything else?”

Me: “Er, yes.”

Vito: “What?”

Me: “You are Russian, yes?”

Vito: “Yes. I am from Russia.”

Me: “Where? Where in Russia?”

Vito: “Bretsky.” I shrug. “You know, the Bretsky sea.”

Me: “Oh, the Bretsky sea. Well, I have been having this discussion with some other people on the Internet who think that America needs to build many more nuclear reactors.”

Vito (straightening up): “I disagree with them.”

Me: “So do I.”

Vito: “Do you know… Do you know that the world has enough nuclear weapons to destroy everything 64 times.”

Me: “Yes, I know.”

Vito: “64 times.”

Me: “Yes. Destroy everything and everybody. And, yet…” I take up a pugilistic stance and start shadowboxing, “we want to fight with Iran about their nuclear weapons.” I slap myself on the side of the head and looked momentarily stunned. “What are we thinking!” Vito nods.

 

Where It is Warmer

I returned Suzy to storage today. It was cold. The person who drove it into the storage area needed no instruction. He works on GEMs at Binghamton University. “We’ll have to talk,” I yelled out as the cold wintry wind blew me down the street.

I have found a way to tie down the walker on the back, which seems to work. It was necessary for me to find a warm place before I had walked too far from the warehouse. The proprietess of Chinese restaurant that we frequent kindly let me wait for the bus.

 

Attitude Check

I have scheduled Suzy to visit Tony on Thursday for repair of the driver side rear view mirror, which means a successful locomotion test prior to the luncheon appointment.

 

Something about Which to Worry

I got Suzy from storage. The driver’s side, rear view mirror, support had been snapped. I ordered a cheaper, CIPA replacement from Auto Barn. (The originals were $100).

When I drove it the next day, it seemed the front passenger side was listing. I returned to the neighborhood auto service center and a covey of mechanics checked Suzy out. No apparent problem.

The main concern is that the outside temperature has dropped from 54 degrees Fahrenheit to 14 degrees, which certainly compromises driving range but also risks damage to the batteries.

 

I should have returned it to storage when the temperature started to drop. I was stubborn and wanted to wait until the replacement mirror arrived and could be installed. 

 

 

Beta Everything

I am trying to determine when, in the course of human events, did the adage, “The Customer is Always Right” get thrown out the window and substituted for “We’re So Smart and You are So Dumb”? Was it pre or post Microsoft?

 

A Change in Plans

I took the power cord over to TK “Nobody Stores More Cars and Boats” Storage and plugged in the charger. When it completes a full charge, one of the personnel said that he would turn the main switch to the Off position.

In that way, Suzy's batteries should stay charged until I retrieve the gemcar from storage at the end of March. Otherwise, it would mean that someone would have to water the batteries once or twice during the storage period, if, as I previously planned, the extension cord would have been attached to the timer that I just ordered. I still can use the purchased timer upon Suzy's return.

 

Hot Legs

One day after Bonnie dropped off Amalaki (the Linux tower) at Advanced Computer Solutions for the replacement of a power supply, I received a call that the computer repair was done.

Maybe, the quick turnaround was partially due to my telephone call this morning. I was calling for advice on what hardware the store recommended for backup. I had upgraded from Firefox 1.0.7 to Firefox 1.5. The upgrade wiped out my selection of searches and Mycroft.mozdev.com was unavailable. (Probably it was overloaded by others who had encountered the same problem.)

What to do? Ah… I will restore from backup. Nope — unrecoverable hardware error. The Seagate tape drive (Travan) finally had died.

The shop recommended an external hard drive, which required a USB 2.0 interface. Madika (the Win98SE tower) has the older USB interface. After brief consultation and being quoted a reasonable price, I decided to have them pull the seemingly dead, tape drive plus add the newer USB interface.

Bonnie was at work and had called to say that her supervisor had asked her to work late because a co-worker was in the hospital. I decided to drive Suzy even though the weather was chillier than yesterday. Yesterday was unseasonably warm, in the 60s Fahrenheit. Today was in the mid-30s with the appearance of possible rain or snow.

Mister Frontiersman donned thermal socks and Polartec fleece pants. No, there is another reason for the Rod Stewart title. He donned his trusty fleece jacket, cap and gloves; uncovered Suzy; and proceeded to the computer repair store in Endicott.

In as straight a line as possible since the BDI (Battery Discharge Indicator) started at 90; dropped quickly to 55 and, then, to 35 percent. Thankfully, it stayed at 35 percent and Suzy purred along at 29 MPH.

It was late afternoon and the drive was brisk. The drive took me past Union Endicott High School. After passing the High School, getting looks and shouts, I approached the McDonald’s. A group of students were walking along the sidewalk and one young, teenage girl laughingly was running ahead of the group. In shorts.

Okay, she was wearing a heavy jacket. It was open. From my brief glance in passing, I would say she was wearing a light shirt underneath the jacket. And, I thought of the Rod Stewart song.

When I got to Advanced Computer, the young clerk behind the counter was wearing a short sleeved, polo shirt. He swapped towers, taking the repaired Amalaki to the gemcar and returning with Madika for a USB upgrade, with nary an acknowledgement that I was driving a neon green, electric car with no doors, simply an observation that a slew of repairs had come in. (No promise on when someone might look at Madika.)

The displayed showed 80 percent when I left the shop, dropping quickly to 30 percent. I got home with the display showing 15 percent. (It is a good idea to keep the battery pack's capacity above 20 percent.) Actually, I stopped at the auto service center, to check and see how my friend the owner was doing and to request some air be added to the tires.

The man, the myth, the legend goes in for orthopedic surgery in two weeks. He will have one knee removed, to be replaced with a prosthetic joint.

When I started Suzy again to drive from his shop to my house, the display showed 60 percent.

 

Durable Medical Equipment

Far down on my problem list, and nonetheless important, is sleep apnea. The treatment is to use a respirator, which I have been doing every night for more than seven years. I quickly would be in worse shape if I lost this breathing support, which could happen if our house were to lose electric power.

Since getting Suzy and particularly after forking out $1300 for new “deep cycle” batteries I have considered getting an inverter that would enable me to draw power stored in the batteries. With an inverter to change DC to AC, the gemcar batteries could provide me with emergency, backup power.

Because the prime reason for using Suzy for backup is the respirator, I have avoided buying the inverter. Medical equipment is sensitive to the quality of the power. AFAIK, the inverter needs to produce a true sine wave, and such inverters are quite expensive.

I recently thought that I might try to get coverage for the cost. “No,” I was told, “backup power is a convenience.” However, when I inquired if the supplier had such equipment and its cost, the respiratory tech surprised me by saying, yes, it could be ordered and cost $60. Since the devices I had found were in the neighborhood of $500, I told the person to proceed with the order.

Yesterday, I received a call that the device had arrived. So, today I took a drive to the Durable Medical Equipment supplier. It was a very cold drive. I went up the ramp on to a 45 MPH dual lane, limited access road and over the bridge from Johnson City toward Binghamton University. Even though recently modified, the road had some nasty bumps.

It also may be illegal for a NEV. Nevertheless, it is the quickest way to Vestal. I now believe that I could get to Empire Vision for an eye exam and new glasses.

Anyway, after I asked for the $60 adapter to be ordered, I got on the Internet and found the same two pieces of wiring, each costing $25. The first had a small DC connector at one end and a cigarette lighter plug at the other. The second had a cigarette lighter receptacle at one end and jumper cable ends at the other to clamp to battery terminals. The $60 was for wiring, no power electronics.

Before going to the supplier, I checked. There was no receptacle for the DC connector on the back of my respirator, which meant that my respirator lacked inclusion of built-in power electronics that would allow one to connect directly to a DC source. I called the tech and told her. She asked me to bring the respirator to her for examination, which I did.

She: “That’s a very old respirator.”

Me (Thinking, well, so am I): “Yes, it was one of the first BiPAPs that Respironics made.”

She: “I thought you had the Plus.” (Points to the back wall beside the plug.) “There should be a DC receptacle right here. That is where the adapter would connect.”

Me: “I didn't think I had one, but was unsure if this” (points to a small button) “might have been something other than a way to change the voltage.”

She: “No, that just if you were to travel to England.”

 

Negative Reinforcement

Matt reports, “The slowness and problems of the last day or two have been resolved. Some of the new hardware that was set up for us had some configuration and OS issues that were causing a ton of errors, but that’s no longer an issue and things are back to normal.”

I had been developing a bit of momentum toward posting to this weblog. Unfortunately, losing a previous post and being unable to access the site for a couple of days discourages usage.