Pompiere

One of four Bald Eagles we saw on our ride around the township today. All of them were less than 50 yards from the road.

Sedgemop 

Recently took a nice long ride through rural Missouri on the Katy Trail. Made a couple stops at the local vineyards/wineries along the way and can report that Missouri wine ain't half bad.

RCMoeur 

The ride along Sonoran Desert Parkway two weeks ago (yeah, the bike's in the way of the scenery):



And the view from last week's ride up to TV Towers at South Mountain at twilight:



Tomorrow, I head up Yarnell Hill. I'll see if I can find anything scenic.

gugie 

Riding with @Andy_K last Sunday, stopped at Barrel 47 in Carlton, OR for rehydration. I sat down, Andy pointed behind me, I turned, and saw this.

stardognine

Ha, I just grabbed this pic yesterday, from the craigslist freebies. Not sure if he's related to your first pic, but he sure looks like he might be. 🤔😁

djkashuba 

Cantharellus californicus by djk762, on Flickr


Cantharellus californicus by djk762, on Flickr


Cantharellus californicus by djk762, on Flickr


Wool by djk762, on Flickr

curbtender

And some forget-me-nots'


Wool by djk762, on Flickr[/QUOTE]

stardognine

A small percentage of the deer I see regularly, along the American River. Most of the time, I don't even have my phone out, much less turned on & ready to take pics. 🙄😉 Sometimes, they just aren't afraid of ya, and get into staring contests. 😁

steelbikeguy

Yep, some days it seems like the food chain has inverted and the deer are wondering what humans taste like.



Steve in Peoria

stardognine

Yep, the biggest of these guys that I've seen, was about a 10 or 12-point buck, from around 20 yards away. Probably about twice the body mass of these does. His whole bearing just said, " Don't try it!", lol. 😁

northbend 

Bob's BD ride by Matthew Pendergast, on Flickr

M1T

Cisco, Utah. One of those abandoned places near I-70. Cisco is appx. 12 miles off I-70 kind of on the way to Moab. But even then, there is a slight backtrack to get to Cisco. A woman runs a small store, the Buzzard's Belly, and camp ground which is really nothing more than some gravel pads. Certainly not something you'd want to pitch a tent on (I was on a bike solo bike tour across Utah). But she sells beer, and there are all kinds of cool things there like these life size Gorillas. SE Utah is a desert, so in the summer, these things could induce burns. I think they are for sale to if you're looking for yard art!

Straightblock

Along the MUT, a dirt sofa for the dirt jump spectators.

steelbikeguy

Winter is not trying very hard to reach central Illinois so far!
We had about a half inch of snow fall last week, but it wasn't much below freezing, so it seemed like a decent day to get on the trail for a ride. It certainly looked nice enough, with the snow sticking to the trees...



... but being barely below freezing, the snow would compact into ice. I was going very slow around any corner! I stayed upright, so I can't complain.
The warm snow was really packing up in the fenders and around the brakes, though. Another good reason to keep the speed down.
Once it warmed enough to start the snow melting on the trail, the moisture would get flung forward off of the front tire and freeze there. It eventually projected an inch forward of the fender, looking kinda weird and cool.



Despite the risks and the need to clean the bike up afterwards, it was good to get out on the bike and get some exercise and fun!
Plus, there was the stop at the bakery....



Steve in Peoria

rumrunn6

oh neat! what is that silver box? at the bottom of the photo?

steelbikeguy

that's a home-built LED headlight. I think it is my 3rd generation of LED light... or maybe 4th?
It's pretty basic, and optically similar to a flashlight. i.e. no optimization to put the light out below the horizon.
The most unique feature might be the standlight, if only because it uses a 100 Farad supercapacitor for the standlight. It'll run for about 10 minutes at a much higher brightness than commercially built lights.
Having a standlight run for a long time can be inconvenient, so I included a switch to disable it. I mounted a magnet on a rotating plate on the right side of the light, and it controls a reed switch on the inside of the housing (the reed switch used to be a sensor for a bike computer). This is just a way to avoid exposing a mechanical switch to the weather.

a shot of the front of the light...



and a shot of the inside. You'll note the big green thing that takes up about half of the space... that's the 100F supercap, and explains why commercial lights normally use a little 1F supercap.



Steve in Peoria
(you should see the tail light!)

DQRider 

Your nickname isn't Heathkit, is it? Nice job!
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steelbikeguy

well, this is the natural result of a bike rider/commuter becoming an electronics engineer!
It's a somewhat homely little light, but a huge advance over my first attempt at a standlight design, back in the days of incandescent bulbs...




Steve in Peoria

DQRider 

Same kind of geek here... Avionics in the `Corps for ten years, followed by Quality, R&D, and finally management in aerospace. Have soldering iron (and Simpson 260, and O-scope), will travel. It's nice to see there are still some analog solutions...
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steelbikeguy

Have I mentioned my time as an avionics tech in the Marines before? 1977 to '81, working on A-4's and TA-4 Skyhawks in VMAT-102 in scenic Yuma.
Lots of experience with the Simpson 260, and the PSM4D (I think). Such a glamorous life!
I've got a shot of a buddy reviewing aircraft wiring drawings while troubleshooting. The Simpson is up on the aircraft ladder. Not sure why he has a tug out there.



After my EE degree, I spent a number of years at McDonnell Douglas doing avionics and space stuff. Fun work, but after defeating the Soviets, the work dried up and I had to change jobs to an industry where there was more than one customer! Earth-moving equipment was a distinct change, but got to do some microcontroller work for a while, then did some sensor design, and did my best to do interesting work. It was intriguing to watch electronics take over the machines, to the point where joysticks and displays dominated the cab... very much like what the F-18 was back in the 80's.

Steve in Peoria (still enjoying any excuse to get out a soldering iron or 'scope)

rumrunn6

yes! show us!

steelbikeguy

okay, but I'll keep it brief...

the concept is fairly simple... instead of running a tail light in parallel with the headlight, it is instead wired in series with the headlight. i.e. an electron leaves the dynamo, goes through the headlight, then goes through the tail light, and then goes back to the dynamo.
Piece of cake.
There is generally an advantage to doing this, as it extracts a bit more power from the dynamo (except at very low speeds).

My tail light is just 10 red LEDs wired in parallel, and only handling half of the dynamo's current. The dynamo voltage is a sine wave, and the LEDs will carry the current of one half of the sine. There is a schottky diode wired in reverse parallel with the LEDs that passes the other half of the sine wave, but with almost no power lost.
The dynamo puts out 500mA of current, and each LED carries 50mA.

When current flows through the LEDs, the voltage across them is about 1.5v. I use this voltage to charge up a AA nicad battery. When the dynamo is stopped, I use a little circuit to boost the AA nicad's voltage enough to drive 4 more red LEDs. As with the headlight, there is a switch to disable the standlight function.
Very simple.

The circuit boards and AA nicad battery look like this, all by themselves...
The battery is under the board at the top. The LEDs are on the bottom side of the board at the bottom of the photo, and the voltage boost circuit is to the right.




I have to make housings for my lights, and this might be the most labor intensive part of the projects. A nice 3D printer might be a better method for getting a decent housing.
The board with the LEDs is under the voltage boost circuit board.



the assembled light, mounted on the Tubus rear rack. Very nice and tidy, and not going to get hit by any bike rack that I park the bike in.



My bike lights evolved over the years. The tail light started with just a little board with 10 red LEDs. I didn't have a standlight circuit, so I just mounted a battery powered Vista light next to it. When I did come up with the standlight design, I added that.
It was pretty horrible looking, but it worked.
Here, you can see my original horrible tail light cluster on the left, and the new light on the right. Finally, I could let my bike be seen in public and not get taunted by all of the cool kids.
A side benefit was that the LEDs had improved over the years and were considerably brighter! Maybe too bright??



Steve in Peoria

rumrunn6

fascinating! thank you for sharing. love the ingenuity!

M1T

Angry "midget rattlesnake" (don't cancel me, thats what they're called) near Natural Bridges Monument in SE Utah during a bike packing trip. I came about an inch from running over the little guy, heard that distinct sound, and quickly stopped. This went on until I had to move on 5 minutes later... check out the shadow cast by its head. They are rarely seen in the wild.

northbend 

Yikes Tony! A pissed off rattler is not something I'd want to encounter anywhere and yet, it's kinda cool too. Glad you got a picture of it.

Matt