Rant for the Day (keep it clean)

[Biggkidd]

I bought 4 100AH 12 volt LifePo4 batteries on amazon for under $300 each, ($1200 total) delivered. I know @Biggkidd got some pretty interesting results, but he is solar charging his batteries. I would talk to him....

Okay my cells were doing awesome until dust got down between the cells and wore the coating till they shorted between the cells. I can't really blame the cell manufacturer for that. I do wish they let you know in some way how fragile the coating stopping electrical short is. Dust settled down through opening in the top of the battery box for the cooling fan and got in between the cells that way. I'm not talking about a lot of big dust particles either maybe a 1/4 teaspoon come out of the battery box but it acted like sand paper trapped between those cells and just ate the coating.

Learn from my mistake build a sealed box and let em run a little warm. The solar charging was working beautifully.

 

[havasu]

Okay my cells were doing awesome until dust got down between the cells and wore the coating till they shorted between the cells. I can't really blame the cell manufacturer for that. I do wish they let you know in some way how fragile the coating stopping electrical short is. Dust settled down through opening in the top of the battery box for the cooling fan and got in between the cells that way. I'm not talking about a lot of big dust particles either maybe a 1/4 teaspoon come out of the battery box but it acted like sand paper trapped between those cells and just ate the coating.

Learn from my mistake build a sealed box and let em run a little warm. The solar charging was working beautifully.

And right there is why I am concerned with using these in a golf cart, which is driven on bumpy, dusty roads, in weather that can range from 25 degrees and up to 130 degrees.

 

[Biggkidd]

And right there is why I am concerned with using these in a golf cart, which is driven on bumpy, dusty roads, in weather that can range from 25 degrees and up to 130 degrees.

I think 130 would be pushing their upper temperature working limit pretty hard. Boy did they ever wake my golf cart up though. It was a monster and will be again one way or another. It needs a lot of various repairs including the battery issue. As you so aptly stated rough farm ground and logging trails are hard on them, hard on everything!

 

[havasu]

I think 130 would be pushing their upper temperature working limit pretty hard

And why these batteries don't last more than 12-18 months.

 

[Biggkidd]

And why these batteries don't last more than 12-18 months.

Then it sounds like time for a cooler for them. I use to wear a shirt while racing that I made that had small water line sewn all over it with water being pumped through it to help keep me cool on those 100f race days. Something like that should work but use a radiator and computer fan to cool the water that circulates around the batteries.

 

[havasu]

I'm sure a 12v fan would at least circulate the air. Hmm...

 

[Supervisor42]

And why these batteries don't last more than 12-18 months.

Charger.
The voltmeter can be your best friend.
Trust, but verify.
If 6v FLA batteries are brought above 7.5v for very long in their charge cycle, they will not live very long.
They are very different from automotive/marine batteries.
Flooded lead-acid batteries don't get very hot during either their discharge or charge cycles.
Edit: If the charger is a "plugs right up " one for AGM batteries, it will fry FLA batteries to a crisp in a year.
<additional paragraph omitted so I won't be mistaken for Zannej> .

 

[zannej]

I think you can have solar powered fans too, I wonder if you can DIY/McGyver together a "bladeless" fan to cool the battery compartment somehow and have it solar powered. I've seen people make them out of plastic bottles on Youtube.

Not being able to leave a negative review is annoying. I had that problem on cars.com when I posted a negative review of a dealership that ripped us off and jerked us around. No reason was given for taking down the review, but it turns out that dealership was one of their sponsors so I can guess why. In exchange for paying $ to the site, they don't allow negative reviews to be posted.

 

[kenv1950]

Moms furnace ---In my county there is help for the elderly low income which is great , its called Delaware County Opportunity . About 5 yrs. ago they revamped her furnace , They came today to clean it and the guy said who installed these return pipes ,you can't change the air filter . I said YOU did the job. (blank look from him) Yes, its almost free (comes out of taxes). I did heating with my dad for yrs. so I do have a lot of knowledge . I told him you should use rectangular duct , He said thats to expensive , I said its cheaper than doing it twice , isn't it ? another blank look .
Pics are the walkway and back of furnace where the air filter door is . I've seen beginners do a better job.

View attachment 103115

 

[zannej]

Internet was out for well over 12 hours before I remembered to reboot the modem. Wasn't feeling great so didn't think of it. Today I cleaned litterboxes (and of course the pesky cats wanted to use the boxes while I was cleaning them).
I went to cook burgers in the air fryer but it wouldn't turn on. I checked the plug, moved it to other outlets, confirmed the outlets worked & realized it was dead. Must have been all those power surges. It lasted a few years though. Probably would have lasted longer if not for the power surges. Power blinked on and off rapidly multiple times. It's this air fryer if anyone is interested: Amazon.com

It's on sale now. Worked great before the power surges killed it.

So, I went to transfer my burgers from the tray to a frying pan. Cat ran up and took a chunk out of one of them while I was setting up the pan. Then another one broke in half and half fell on the floor.

I'm generally feeling run down and blech. Told Mom I felt dizzy and was gong to lie down. Her response was to completely ignore my words and say "What are you going to cook for me?"

Upside is that I can raise my arm a couple more inches now. It's not much but better than nothing. Still doing shoulder exercises and taking the meds- but I only take the muscle relaxing one at night instead of 3x a day bc it makes me too groggy.

 

[Supervisor42]

I actually ordered something from Wal-Mart tonight!
I despise them and refuse to set foot in any of their stores.
I know, I know, let the beatings begin

.
The 2 pairs of jeans I ordered are $10 less apiece than elsewhere.
The good news: free shipping and they will be delivered tomorrow, obviously by a local, underpaid, angry, WM employee.
Who wants to bet that they find some way to screw up the order?
Anyone... anyone?

 

[Peanut]

Lately disgruntled employees seem to be in short supply at the 2 I go to. I always wait to check out, never enough cashiers. Shop for my folks, checkout gets complicated or I'd never use them.

Just in the last two weeks though... at the bigger store. Had to wait for two people 25-30 items. 10min for the 1st one. Then the lady in front me waits until her cart is reloaded to pay... and then realizes "she forgot her card, it's in the car", moron!!!

This idiot cashier says okay as the lady leaves to retrieve her bank card!!! She may or may not have been coming back but the idiot just stands there and waits!!!! My items were on the belt!!! or I''d went to another register and started over.

Well, a full 5 minuets later the moron returns... with her card. She didn't even offer and "I'm sorry" to the idiot or me!!!

I dread going to one... have for a long time. They've managed to choke most of the competition.

 

[Pearl]

I actually ordered something from Wal-Mart tonight!
I despise them and refuse to set foot in any of their stores.
I know, I know, let the beatings begin

.
The 2 pairs of jeans I ordered are $10 less apiece than elsewhere.
The good news: free shipping and they will be delivered tomorrow, obviously by a local, underpaid, angry, WM employee.
Who wants to bet that they find some way to screw up the order?
Anyone... anyone?

You miss seeing all the Karen's in their PJs and yoga pants!! I'm going in person this morning ahead of the ice storm!! Hopefully most people are in bed or church!!

 

[Hardcalibres]

Yep - the average Walmart customer spends $3400 there each year. Most of the products they buy are from China.

Walmart makes a big contribution to the imbalance of trade between the US and China which is now nearly a trillion dollars a year (in China's favor).

The depth of the US economic problems are staggering - that most people don't see the imminently looming disaster, must be the the biggest example of normalcy bias in human history.

 

[zannej]

The Walmart here does not deliver to people and they charge $6.99 for curbside pickup if you spend less than $35. So, I had my cart for pickup with $35 worth of items. They then substituted a product I wanted with something slightly cheaper which brought it to $34 so they added $6.99 plus 10.45% tax. Needless to say, I was a bit miffed.

My gripe is that my deodorant keeps disappearing. I put it in my bathroom on the counter and went to use it earlier and it was gone. That is the 3rd stick of deodorant that has disappeared. I suspect my brother might be taking them bc we both use the same brand. He tried to take it before when I told him it was mine and that I specifically get the sensitive skin version. We also use the same body wash.

Also, apparently the white paint Honda used on my vehicle is garbage and has problems. And oak pollen makes it worse. It developed some crud on it and the paint started peeling after I took it through a carwash (that did not take the crud off). I'm looking at having to touch up the paint and do a clearcoat or to get some vinyl wrap. The hood and roof are the worst. My main goal is to prevent rust.

Mom has been sick all day and throwing up. She's had her flu vaccine and we were only in Walmart very briefly the other day. I don't know if she picked up a virus at the store or if it was something she ate. All of us had sour stomachs after getting food from a local place.

 

[Weedygarden]

I went to cook burgers in the air fryer but it wouldn't turn on. I checked the plug, moved it to other outlets, confirmed the outlets worked & realized it was dead. Must have been all those power surges. It lasted a few years though. Probably would have lasted longer if not for the power surges. Power blinked on and off rapidly multiple times. It's this air fryer if anyone is interested: Amazon.com

Someone told me recently that they unplug everything they are not using, including her microwave. Daughter has a friend like that, unplugs everything. One time at work, we had a power surge. As a teacher, who supplied many of my own things at work because teachers either do that or do without, lost my printer, electric stapler, and a few other things went out one afternoon.

 

[Supervisor42]

You miss seeing all the Karen's in their PJs and yoga pants!! I'm going in person this morning ahead of the ice storm!! Hopefully most people are in bed or church!!

Oh, I forgot to mention, my jeans were delivered at 6:30pm tonight .
I didn't even get to see the angry guy, no knock, no doorbell, just left it in one of the front porch chairs.
Here is the astounding part, both pair were the correct ones!
Maybe it is because I am a 'new customer' online, I dunnow.
My rant - they robbed me of a perfectly good rant I had planned for tonight!

 

[dademoss]

(REDACTED) raccoons eating the community cat food! Yeah, it's 2 am. I had dinner, got my book, put me feet up, and BAM, here I am. At least Lori didn't have to listen to me snore . Finish off midwatch, then have a nap till reville.

 

[zannej]

Weedy, I generally keep things plugged in to keep stuff from getting in to the outlets. Although, perhaps I should start unplugging things. My rice cookers are on a waterproof power strip with an off switch. I turn it off when they are not in use. Power strips aren't recommended for microwaves. I got a 4 year protection plan on it so if it gets fried, they will replace it. But, unplugging is a good idea. I need to find some way to hold the cords where I can easily find/reach them. One problem I have is my brother's unneutered male cats spraying everything. They will spray the outlets if they can get to them. Which is why I've blocked the new outlet that was put in to the cats can't get near it.

New air fryer is not as tall as the old one but is wider. Required moving some stuff around. My brother wouldn't help me (even though I asked) so if he can't find his stuff, too bad. I had to put some things in the pantry. I turned to ask him to help me put something up higher and he had gone back to his room. He griped about the coffee machine being hard to access before and now I moved it over. If he doesn't like the new setup I don't care. LOL.

The jerk that my female friend broke up with still has my baker's rack and I was supposed to get it today but he refused. Said he might drop it at a friend's house and doesn't want me coming over because he doesn't want to see me. Accused me of deliberately hurting his feelings and not trying to talk to him for years. This dude never once checked up on me and didn't try to talk to me for years. When I went over to visit he'd play on his computer and ignore me. I don't feel the least bit guilty (he was trying to guilt-trip me, but I know the games narcissists play & I will have none of it). Once I get my baker's rack back I will go back to no contact. It's his loss bc I was going to give him pex & help fix his plumbing and do some painting for him.

I ended up having to take Mom to the ER. Food poisoning from the local place. Didn't get home til after 1am. I couldn't get to sleep until around 5am. She woke me up around 9am to go get her prescriptions. They said ready in 30min after I dropped off the slip. Had to wait over an hour instead. And my stomach still feels cruddy. At least I'm not feeling as bad as Mom was.

Raccoons are such a pain! Buggers ransacked the house awhile back. They dig in the trash and upset the dogs.

Oh, and my truck is making even worse noises now. Weird pops when I turn left. Lots of thudding from the front wheel (the one the dealership worked on). They claimed verbally that they warranty their work. But the paperwork says otherwise.

 

[backlash]

A company was trimming trees and dropped a huge limb across the power lines.
That caused everything at a neighbors house that was plugged in to short out.
Everything, all the lights, all the appliances large and small, TVs, water heater, computer. You could actually see the burn marks on the walls where the wires were.
I'm still amazed the house didn't catch fire.
The company denied they were at fault and the neighbor received nothing for the destroyed stuff.
They were illegals so they were afraid to complain.

 

[Peanut]

(REDACTED) raccoons eating the community cat food! Yeah, it's 2 am. I had dinner, got my book, put me feet up, and BAM, here I am. At least Lori didn't have to listen to me snore . Finish off midwatch, then have a nap till reville.

You have chickens don't you? I'd check my coop and shore things up. I've had coon's reach through 1" chicken wire and kill a hen inside the coop on a roosting pole. It's amazing how good they are at killing chickens. I've lost about 20 hens to raccoons in the last decade. I will not tolerate them. Period! I chain up the dogs and set steel traps. But I've also caught them in live traps with peanut butter, tuna, even a can of potted meat.

I wouldn't trust them anywhere near chickens... it's war!

 

[zannej]

Backlash, that sounds like something that would happen here.

Raccoons love oatmeal. At least the thieving buggers that ransacked my house did. Tore open all the packets and ate them dry. Stole some of the kitchen utensils too. I found some spatulas and such outside.

My mother paged me on the phone intercom thing just before 3:30am. She was slurring her words and babbling gibberish. Saying something about something taking the silver off the buns. She was struggling to get words out and I was concerned. From what I could get from her gibberish, she thought that I had called her on the phone and said something about silver being taken off buns. Her brain didn't even compute that silver on buns makes no sense. She didn't seem to grasp that and I got really worried. I rushed to her room to check on her. My brother was in there too (he had to use her bathroom). We were both concerned about it. I tried explaining to her that she either had a very strange dream or was hallucinating. She kept insisting that I called and she picked up the phone and when she asked me what took the silver off the buns I didn't answer. So she said she called me back. I got my brother to get out one of his test kits. She had trouble getting blood to come out and had to go to the bathroom. When she got out she finally got it to work and found her blood sugar was 380. She hadn't taken her nightly insulin so she took some. But now I can't sleep and I'm waiting for her to page me if her sugar drops too much. I think she took 40 of whatever unit measurement the insulin is in. She was slightly more lucid and not slurring as much, but still a bit out of it. I don't know if it was the sugar, or being sick, or the meds, or a combination of all of those. She was complaining of a headache so I got her some naproxyn. I have a headache too. Chest pain all the way through to my back-- which is probably gas now. But arrhythmia is acting up so I won't be able to get back to sleep.

 

[The Lazy L]

I bought a used lever rifle. Timing is off on the rifle which I believe was caused by an out of battery discharge. Since the lever is custom I sent the Gunsmith that I'm told customized the lever an email asking if he'd check the lever to see if it was still in specifications. Gunsmith quickly replied with a "Yes".

Took an hour to:

1. Gunsmith's email didn't provide a shipping address. Found his shipping address buried in his web site.
2. Address Label printer wouldn't print. Check cables, OK. Warm reboot the computer, no print. Cold shutdown computer and restart, no print. Computer macOS is Monterey 12.6.2. Internet search for printer manufacturer for updated driver. German... research Internet for English version. No updated printer driver available. Complete an online Tech Support form asking when?
3. Print an address label on 8 1/2" x 11" paper. What a waste of paper.
4. Wife wasn't raised to put things away in their place when done. She was using the shipping tape yesterday so I asked her where would I find it? I get a blank look in reply. Usually I find it in the bottom left kitchen desk drawer should look there? I'm told her mind doesn't work like mine as she doesn't remember what she did with it yesterday. I find it in the bottom left kitchen desk drawer.
5. Reuse a USPS bubble envelope. Insert the Email reply from the Gunsmith and the lever. Shipping tape the envelope close and tape the address label on.

Update: Wife was headed to town so I asked her if she would stop at the Post Office and mail my package. She said she would. I get a call from the wife. She's at the Post Office and because the reused USPS bubble envelope had "PRIORITY" on it, it will cost $10 or the wife can take it to her girl friend, cross out "PRIORITY" and then it will only cost $5. I ask if the P.O. has a black marker she could use to black out "PRIORITY". Wife says "Yes". Then why don't you ask the P.O. to borrow their marker? Wife says she doesn't know if they have one? I'm confused, Honey it doesn't have to go out today just bring home and we'll black out "PRIORITY" here.

A simple 5 minute project is really cutting into my productive nap time.

 

[The Lazy L]

... I've had coon's reach through 1" chicken wire and kill a hen inside the coop on a roosting pole. ...

Chicken wire is only good for keeping chickens in, not for keeping predators out.

 

[ABR]

I work at a school and the district announced this afternoon that due to the weather there will be a 2 hour delay for students tomorrow. BUT staff is still expected to arrive at their regular time regardless of the weather Seriously?! It's too dangerous for students to be on the roads to school but perfectly fine for staff?!

 

[havasu]

Our city is crying that they are broke. I am personal friends with the Treasurer, so I asked him what was our malfunction. We have 88000 persons in our city, the medium income is $65k. And we have 33,000 homes, the cheapest being $390k and the highest price is $22mil. The issue is the distribution of our property taxes. Out of every dollar spent, our city general fund gets $.09 cents. Our school district, the community College, and the scholastic back up fund takes $.59 cents per dollar. That is our problem!

 

[zannej]

I ended up not getting to sleep until after 9am. Finally racked out. Mom woke me up again bc she was hungry-- sometime around 1pm- and I got her oatmeal but she couldn't finish it. She wants something with electroytes and wants eggs but we are out of eggs. I messaged my brother asking him to bring some home but found out he's already home and I had fallen asleep and not seen/heard him come in.

Havasu, 88k is a lot of people. We had around 6k here last census but I know at least 50 people (if not more) have died since then. Most of the population was elderly. More males than females too, which is unusual. I guess most of the women get the hell out of dodge. LOL.

I'm still exhausted and trying to motivate myself to get up and check on mom again and maybe go to the store if I can wake up enough.

 

[The Lazy L]

Our city is crying that they are broke. I am personal friends with the Treasurer, so I asked him what was our malfunction. We have 88000 persons in our city, the medium income is $65k. And we have 33,000 homes, the cheapest being $390k and the highest price is $22mil. The issue is the distribution of our property taxes. Out of every dollar spent, our city general fund gets $.09 cents. Our school district, the community College, and the scholastic back up fund takes $.59 cents per dollar. That is our problem!

Schools here get roughly 75% of the paid property taxes.

 

[angie_nrs]

Our city is crying that they are broke. I am personal friends with the Treasurer, so I asked him what was our malfunction. We have 88000 persons in our city, the medium income is $65k. And we have 33,000 homes, the cheapest being $390k and the highest price is $22mil. The issue is the distribution of our property taxes. Out of every dollar spent, our city general fund gets $.09 cents. Our school district, the community College, and the scholastic back up fund takes $.59 cents per dollar. That is our problem!

I think you'll find similar findings in most villages, cities, & townships. And just look at what we've gotten for all the money thrown at the schools. Yet, they continually beg for more more more, like Billy Idol. It's insane, especially considering the product they produce and the amount of time spent actually 'teaching'.

I think we ought to defund the schools!

 

[zannej]

I don't know the division of property taxes. We get homestead exemption and live outside of the town's jurisdiction. We don't get any of their services. But sales tax here is 10.45% (used to be 11%). IIRC, 3% of that goes to the school board. 1% goes to the police.

I've heard teachers in California get paid a little over $100k/yr (some of my cousins are teachers out there). They make less than $30k here.