I completed my third model of our new house this evening. Each one has been a refinement of the previous one both in terms of design and fidelity. At this point, the basic shape feels right (plus or minus some roof pitch adjustments) and the next phase will be tuning of window size and placement. Although it will probably be a year or more before our new home will be a reality, it must be said, that I really enjoy the design process and the phase we are in now.
After many days of sub-zero temperatures, we finally got a small break from the frigid cold. Our collection of icicles were in melting overdrive. I was lazy and shot this image from indoors through a window. A more determined photographer would have gone outside and set up an off-camera flash to really freeze the motion of these streaming droplets.
On a walk through our neighborhood, I encountered no less than three snow people. This one was my favorite. I am a fan of the carrot for nose school of design and also felt the hair treatment was upstanding (outstanding).
Kyle with his girlfriend, Sabriya, on the Cape visiting his buddy’s airplane hanger earlier in the week. Jeanine is attempting to lure the kids home for Valentine’s Day with the promise of homemade lasagna. I spent a few hours building a foam core model of the new house. Doing so led me to make a few dimensional adjustments to the roof heights and I will make one more model when all of the window elevations have been finalized.
Jeanine is taking advantage of our recent snowfall to get some outdoor exercise. This morning she set out on her snowshoes for an early hike around the neighborhood. This is what happy looks like.
The fun continues at work as we continue to experiment with new shapes. Now that we have cracked the code on our metal deposition, we are printing a new part every day. This one is interesting because it would be very hard to machine using conventional methods given the hardness of the material and the thinness of the wall. It is just a tad smaller than a tennis ball. By next week, I predict we will have printed a part that is impossible to make using machine tools.
The Holy Grail for metal 3D printing. An unsupported 45-degree thin wall part. This morning, my team achieved what is arguably the ultimate milestone in our development journey thus far. Today, the uphill battle may have transitioned into a downhill sprint. While there is still much refinement to be done, we have without a doubt reached an inflection point in the life of the company. We celebrated at the office with Champagne and ice cream.
Using last week’s discovery, my team printed this cylindrical tube demonstrating our ability to print arbitrary shapes. Tomorrow we will go for broke and try to print a part with a cantilevered structure. It is the last hurdle we need to clear to demonstrate the ultimate value of our technology. Fingers crossed.
The icicle pictured here was hanging from our carport this morning. When I first noticed it, there was little to distinguish it from all the other icicles dangling from the roofline. Then I realized that what I assumed was a forming water droplet at the tip was actually frozen solid. As I scanned the other icicles, it became clear that this was a very unique occurrence, especially when one considers how necked down the pinch point is. The whole experience was a poignant reminder to me about how much beauty can be found around us if one simply pauses to look for it.
This morning we woke to more snow and further evidence of our resident coyote’s penchant for strolling up and down the frozen Sudbury River. While the ice is thick enough to support a coyote, I opted not to test it with my weight despite a great desire to make a closer inspection of the tracks. Jeanine suggested we set up her trail cam near the shoreline and perhaps we will see a future post featuring the results of that effort.
This morning, I spotted a coyote crossing the frozen river behind our house. By the time I got my camera, he was gone. Fortunately, one of our neighbors also spotted him and got a photograph which I am sharing here. Later in the day, Jeanine located some fresh tracks in the snow directly behind our house which were almost certainly made by the same fellow.
Yesterday was a super exciting one at work. Members of my team printed a single voxel wide perimeter wall using a new and very novel method. This breakthrough will allow us to print with a minimum feature size three times smaller than we thought possible, produces the best wall finish we have ever seen and should enable us to print cantilevered structures. I can’t overstate what a major breakthrough this is for the company.
Having embraced the DeWALT cordless tool family, I own more than twenty tools and half as many batteries. The relatively new one pictured above is a 60V 6AH FlexVolt which no longer takes a charge. Given it costs north of $120, I decided it was worth trying to repair rather than sending it to the dump. After opening it up, I identified a single defective cell of the 15 in this pack. I then carefully carved away the plastic holding it in place and removed the spot-welded tab from both sides. It slid out easily and I ordered a replacement cell on Amazon for $4. It should be here in a week and I will report out if the patient survives the surgery.
Normally, I would never fly my drone over Walden Pond because of all the people that are present. Even during the off-season, many enjoy walking around the trail that borders the lake. After yesterday’s massive snowfall, however, I felt that I would not encounter a single sole while conducting a flyover.
Although it affords us a great measure of privacy, our 250 foot long driveway is much less of a desirable feature when it comes to digging out after a Noreaster that left us buried in 15 inches of snow. Having sold my snowblower prior to moving, we had to have the driveway plowed to the tune of $330 (everything here gets the Concord markup). Suffice it to say, I see myself acquiring a new snowblower, perhaps not this season, but definitely next. I can’t stand paying for work that I can do myself, especially when it offers the added benefit of outdoor exercise.
As the temperature fluctuates above and below the freezing point, the ice formations on the river change daily. Today, it took the form of an ice dam with water on one side and a thin sheet of ice on the other. With up to 18″ of snow forecast for later in the day, I decided to work from home and made sure those who did choose to drive in left early enough to avoid the worst of it.
This morning, Kyle hosted the family for breakfast and a soccer game-watching party (he is an avid Liverpool fan). Jeanine prepared a lovely Dutch Baby which disappeared very quickly. While these pancakes are derived from the German pancake dish, it is said that the name Dutch Baby was coined as the result of a child’s mispronunciation of the German autonym Deutsch.
For only the second time this year, we woke up to snow, a good three inches and still falling. The photo above was taken from inside our living room through window glass (talk about laziness or rather, a desire to remain cozy). In a further demonstration of slothfulness, I launched my drone from our tiny deck and then went back indoors to fly it. After taking a few aerial photographs, I nearly lost the drone because I could not find our house on return. Our house and property look very different when snow-covered and I found it impossible to locate. Fortunately, the drone defaults to an automated return to home function when the battery level drops. I held my breath until I could hear the drone come in for a landing.
When we purchased our new house, it was primarily for the river views. Little did we know that there would be treats for our ears as well as our eyes. When the river freezes and thaws, it makes the most unusual and wonderful sounds. Impossible to describe with words, I hope to make a future blog entry with an audio recording.
You know you are a nerd when you spend 2 hours driving around town looking at rooflines. Jeanine and I have decided that our new house design will include low slope (1:12 or less) standing seam metal roofs. These will likely be mono slope (shed) style or possibly a mix of mono slope and offset gable (for the garage). Before heading out, Jeanine agreed to a quick portrait which is the first I have taken in some time. Most of my good lighting equipment is in storage and I had to make do with a camera mounted flash. Expect to see many future photos with the river as a backdrop.
An office holiday party in the midst of the Covid pandemic presented some unique challenges. At Digital Alloys we held ours virtually over Zoom. The party featured a cocktail mixing class taught by our CEO and on-line games including a DA version of Jeopardy, Pictionary, and a true or false quiz. A sheet cake featuring a team photo I had taken a few weeks ago was the food highlight of the party. Employees participated from their offices, desks or from home.
It will come as no surprise to anyone who knows Jeanine that she is genetically programmed to nourish those she cares for. It is one of the things I love about her. When it comes to mouse eradication, however, this predisposition is not helpful. In response to the night time sounds of a mouse scurrying across the floor of a room above our shared office, Jeanine deployed several mouse traps. When I checked them to see if the culprit had been dispatched, I discovered what I can only describe as a cheese buffet for wayward mice (first image). Nice mouse-sized pieces of cheese spread in an area of the trap far from the trigger. To further ensure an undisturbed mouse dining experience, the trigger was set to the safe position, from which it cannot be actuated. Pictured below is my buffet for cats who like to eat dead mice.
This photo, taken by Kyle, features a rare albino squirrel. From a camouflage and heat absorption perspective, it seems that this guy is going to be in for a tough winter.
Maya shared this photo, taken with her friends, during a north country winter hike. Between work, the new house, and Covid concerns, Jeanine and I have had little time or interest in traveling far from home. We are both suffering from cabin fever and it may be time to take inspiration from our intrepid daughter to venture out.
Even though the kids now acknowledge that I was an early trendsetter for the bomber style hat fashion trend, they refuse to believe that my new high ear variation will go anywhere. It is most dramatic with both ears up. The one ear presentation is edgier. Only time will tell if I am once again at the leading edge of hat fashion.
Mild temperatures and a break from the rain made it the perfect day to do some yard clean up. I spent most of my time cutting a large stump closer to the ground. This is the stump on which we stranded the truck we used to move the tiny house to our new address. The task was unusually difficult because another tree was growing out from under the stump creating an obstacle for my chainsaw. Jeanine gathered fallen limbs that were littering the property and we used our makeshift fire pit to reduce everything to ash while enjoying a nice fire.
On a day that featured almost continuous rain, it started with a brief period of calm and a lovely mist moving down the river. Jeanine and I spent a good bit of time starting to build a “scrap book” of design ideas for the new house. Our architect has taken the as-built measurements of the house and will be ready for our first kick-off meeting in a week or two. One big decision that we will sit with for a while before committing to is a change from our current roof structure to mono-slope low pitch roof. We both realized that everytime we identified a house that we liked, it had this type of roof.
More often than not, when I see a swan, I see a pair and they are usually sticking their heads underwater in search of food. This guy was cruising solo up the river towards Fairhaven Bay and seemed interested in little else than reaching his destination. Kind of like me on my commute to work.
Jeanine found this vole wandering around in our basement and summoned me to relocate it outdoors. It was very easy to catch and was kind enough to stick around for a photo after I released him. A relative of the hampster, these creatures only live for 6 to 12 months but produce 100 offspring during that time. Something tells me, these guys are going to be frequent visitors. When time permits, I will have to figure out how he gained entry to the basement. The floor is poured concrete and the walls are cement blocks. There is, however, one area, under the base of the stairs, that goes down to the dirt. It is currently under a raised platform that constitutes the last step and I will have to remove it to validate my suspicion.
This evening, Jeanine offered me chocolate from this assortment explaining that we would each enjoy one per evening until they run out. Who am I to argue with this plan. Constant work on the new house has left me 15 pounds lighter and in a position to enjoy these treats guilt-free.
Work at Digital Alloys remains the source of great personal enjoyment for me. Our team continues to make excellent progress as we begin our series “C” fundraising in earnest. When I joined the company, I laid out a straight forward plan to get us to market. First, demonstrate that our printed parts were of the same quality as ones machined from the same metal. We accomplished this late last summer. Second, demonstrate that we could print parts at speeds that would result in an economically attractive business model. We achieved this milestone last month with a 30x improvement from our baseline. The final objective is to demonstrate that we can print parts of arbitrary geometry and I am feeling fairly confident that we can do this over the course of a few more months. Pictured above is a new fixture we have designed to hold the cylindrical block on which we print parts. It will be completed later this week when the final component (a pneumatic cylinder) arrives in house.