Monthly Archives: September 2012

September 18, 2012 · 9:16 pm

Man Makes Homemade Hand-Held Tesla Gun!

WARNING – Construction of this gun can accidentally kill the maker if you do not know what you are doing.

BIGGER WARNING – The gun is functional and will actually KILL another person.  The voltage is lethal.  Do NOT use this for cosplay or horsing around.

After reading a Steampunk novel, not mine, though I have a similar hand-held Tesla Cannon in my upcoming novel The Travelers’ Club – Flame and Ash, written before I saw this… A man was able to make his own hand held usable Tesla cannon for around $800.

 

 

The Tesla Gun

Posted on 2012/05/09

 

The year was 1889. The War of the Currents was well underway. At stake: the future of electrical power distribution on planet Earth. With the financial backing of George Westinghouse, Tesla’s AC polyphase system competed for market dominance with Edison’s established (but less efficient) DC system, in one of the ugliest and most epic tales of technological competition of the modern age.

More than a hundred years after the dust settled, Matt Fraction and Steven Sanders published The Five Fists of Science: a rollicking graphical retelling of what really happened at the turn of the last century. (Get yourself a copy and read it immediately, unless you’re allergic to AWESOME). On the right is the cover to this fantastic tale of electrical fury.

See that dapper fellow in front? That’s a young Mr. Tesla. See what he’s packin’?

Yep. Tesla Guns. Akimbo.

As I read this fantastic story, gentle reader, certain irrevocable processes were set in motion. The result is my answer to The Problem of Increasing Human Energy: The Tesla Gun. For reals.

 

The Tesla Gun is a hand-held, battery powered lightning machine. It is a spark gap Tesla coil powered by an 18V drill battery. You pull the trigger, and lightning comes out the front.

The business end

Aim away from face.

It is functionally inferior to that of Tesla’s design in the Five Fists in a few important respects. Notably, it is a bit longer and heavier than Tesla’s own. It also cannot (yet) create an ion wind strong enough to cushion the user when leaping from a four story building.

On the other hand, my design is an improvement in two important respects: 1) It is battery powered, and 2) It actually exists.

Real sparks!

I’ve given a few talks about how this project came to be, and it’s a bit of a long story. I could not possibly have built it without the help and expertise of Seattle’s many hackerspaces. Take a look at the basic components, and you’ll see what I mean.

The Housing

Attempt #1: success!

Save your soda cans.

The housing is made from a nerf gun cast in aluminum. I had never made a metal casting before, so I went to the expert: Rusty from Hazard Factory. With his expert metal working skills and my limited ability to gather scrap aluminum, follow directions, and stay the hell out of the way, we had a pretty good aluminum housing in a couple of evenings.

Hot hot hot!

Sand casts inevitably have a few rough edges. Since I needed both halves of the housing to fit together perfectly, the next stop was Hackerbot Labs to put in some time on the Fadal 3-axis mill.

The Fadal

Big robot is big and wants to kill you.

The milling process took a couple of days, but in the end I was able to remove a lot of the bulk of the interior aluminum, and the two halves lined up perfectly. With the housing finished, I set off on the next engineering challenge.

The HV switch

The heart of any spark gap Tesla coil is the high voltage switch. It needs to be able to withstand repeated switching events of many thousands of volts at an instantaneous current of a couple of thousand ampere, generating more than a little bit of heat along the way. This meant finding a material that was a good electrical insulator that was tough enough to withstand high temperatures. With the help of the fine folks at Metrix Create:Space, I decided to make my switch housing out of porcelain.

The first step required the use of a 3d powder printer. This kind of printer is perfect for printing molds for slip casting.

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Switch mold fresh off the printer.

Once the mold was printed, I made a couple of castings using porcelain slip. After air drying for a couple of days, I fired them in the kiln at Metrix, let them cool for another day, and… Ta da! A custom sized HV switch housing, complete with little lightning bolts.

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Radio Shack does not carry this switch.

Then it was just a matter of inserting a couple of tungsten welding electrodes, and I had a fully functional high power switch. The shape was chosen to fit inside the aluminum housing while still providing room for a cooling turbine fan: a CPU cooler reclaimed from a discarded 1U server. This draws hot ions out of the switch, making for bigger and more rapid lightning.

The power supply

Power is provided by an 18V lithium ion drill battery. That powers a  ZVS driver circuit which drives a flyback transformer, stepping up that 18V to around 20,000V. This stage is affectionately known as the HOCKEY PUCK OF DOOM.

Hockey puck of DOOM

Looks harmless enough, right?

The circuit is small enough that it fits neatly in a 2.5″ PVC plumbing end cap. It is potted with household-grade silicone (yes, Home Depot was an important supplier for this component). The output goes to a center tapped coil wrapped around the ferrite core of a flyback transformer salvaged from a TV.

Flyback

Little transformer. Big spark.

That leads us to…

The capacitor bank

No, I didn’t roll my own capacitors for this project. But I did make a nifty laser cut housing for them. Also, bleeder resistors are important for preventing unexpected surprises. Like waking up dead after touching this crazy toy.

capacitor bank

Stand well clear.

The caps are 942C20P15K-F by Cornell Dubilier (the cap of choice when your current absolutely, positively needs to get there ON TIME). Since the housing is made of highly conductive aluminum, electrical connections are made with 40kV high voltage wire.

The coils

All of that circuitry strobes the primary coil, protected by a couple of chunks of blackHDPE (also milled on the Fadal).

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HV wire. Red means DANGER.

The HDPE sandwich makes a great electrical insulator, helping to prevent arcs between the primary and secondary coils. The bottom of the secondary is also wound with PTFE tape (another great insulator, commonly found at Home Depot). The coil form is a piece of 2.5″ ABS pipe (Home Depot again FTW!) wrapped in 30 gauge enameled wire, then sprayed with polyurethane finish (can you tell that the Home Depot is just a few minutes drive from my lair?)

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~1100 turns of #30.

The top load is an aluminum toroid purchased from Information Unlimited (sadly I don’t have access to a lathe big enough to turn one myself.) Put it all together and there you have it: instant lightning at your trigger-happy fingertips.

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Really, officer, it’s just a movie prop! It couldn’t possibly be as dangerous as it looks.

Of course, the devil is in the details. How do you tune this beast? What about eddy currents in the housing? What do you use for an earth ground? Why is it so LOUD? How do you not die while operating it?

I’m afraid that this post has already gone on far too long. I’ll explain a bit about those topics in future posts. Until then, stay safe and make AWESOME.

Nerd alert

corona

 

 

 

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September 17, 2012 · 10:45 pm

US Military Training For Zombie Apocalypse

There are several Zombie Apocalypse Training Groups that have sprung up across the United States.  At first seen by many as cosplayers, survivalists or even kooks, they are now being employed by disaster preparedness agencies, cities, the Center for Disease Control and now the US Military.  Although these organizations embarrassingly admit they do not believe in zombies, they do believe that the same preparations will help those who face pandemics, break down of civil services, nuclear explosions, wars, terrorist strikes, earthquakes and other incidents in which public services break down and chaos ensues.  Here is one of the latest articles, reposted from The Huffington Post.  Please click on it as well to help Andy Campbell receive full credit and for more pictures.

Zombie Apocalypse Training: HALO Corp. To Train Military, Law Enforcement On Virus Outbreak

The Huffington Post  |  By  Posted: 09/17/2012 8:55 am Updated: 09/17/2012 5:55 pm

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is ready for a zombie apocalypse. Gun owners got prepared for a zombie apocalypse. Now, the military and law enforcement are getting ready.

And next month, they’ll begin training.

Security firm HALO Corp. announced yesterday that about 1,000 military personnel, police officials, medical experts and federal workers will learn the ins and outs of a zombie apocalypse, as part of an annual counter-terrorism summit , according to the Military Times.

Sure, the lesson is tongue-in-cheek — and only a small part of the summit’s more serious course load — but a zombie-like virus outbreak is a good training scenario. Visitors will learn to deal with a worldwide pandemic, where people become crazy, violent and fearful. Zombies will roam the summit grounds in San Diego, Calif. harassing troops and first-aid teams that will be participating.

Further details are unclear, but the Military Times made sure to note that zombies are not real.

The training comes at a time when the term “zombie apocalypse” is so viral that several branches of government have released statements on the matter. Earlier this month, the Department of Homeland Security reported that “the zombies are coming” as part of a hilarious bid to get citizens to prepare for a real disaster.

The CDC has released similar statements using zombies as a playful guise to get the public prepared for actual disasters. To assure that no one’s confused by these announcements, CDC told The Huffington Post that zombies are not real.

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September 16, 2012 · 9:56 pm

Dogs and Water – Your Every Monday Cure For the Blues!

Some dogs love water, others hate it.  Here is a combination of sprinklers, pools, and bathing with dogs.

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September 16, 2012 · 6:49 pm

You Don’t Have to Be Rich to Be a Fan!

Just a reminder to all you great blog readers that I am in fact a full time author.  The great news for you is that if you bought EVERYTHING I produce each year, it will cost you less than a movie.  For a movie, you get around 90 minutes of possible fun.  Each of my novels is about ten hours of solid fun, what a value.  Right now, Twisted History is just 99 cents on Kindle!  Twisted History includes stories from several local authors who got into it through an anonymous submission process.  I was lucky enough to have five stories selected.  Or, you can buy the full length novel The Travelers’ Club and The Ghost Ship for just $3.99 on Kindle today!  That is right, as an author, I can only produce three or four books per year.  You can be my best friend for only around $20 a year.  I promise I will give my heart and soul to making each book enjoyable for you.  What a bargain?  My next book is due out soon, delayed by my recent surgeries.  It will be The Travelers’ Club – Fire and Ash, Book 2 of the series.  Please remember to check out the store once in awhile, or look for me on Kindle.  I promise you will enjoy yourself and I will never cost you much in return.  🙂

Please remember that if you like what you read, taking the time to post a review on Kindle, Amazon, Goodreads, or even your own Facebook page is most appreciated.  If you hate what you read, feel free to keep that to yourself.  🙂

 

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September 15, 2012 · 2:28 pm

Lost Girl Renewed for Season Three!

 

I am a big fan of Lost Girl and I was really excited it got picked up for a third season, starting in January.  As a Browncoat, and a Trekker, I know how great sci-fi programs can disappear quickly because they cost more to produce and take longer to build an audience.  This season they focused a bit too much on the monster of the week cliche, but the ending episodes rocked.  Congratulations to the Lost Girl team, and here is hoping for many more great seasons.  Remember, it is the awesome characters we love, not the special effects.  If you are looking for a cool show, join me in watching this series.  It is soft R rated, so they moved to late on Fridays at 10pm.

 

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September 15, 2012 · 11:56 am

The Embassy Storming You Have NOT seen.

While we focus on the entire Middle East breaking out in Anti-American violence with 21 countries now protesting in anti-American hatred, there is a very serious Embassy storming you are probably unaware of.  Chinese protesters around the country are having violent anti-Japanese protests.  While we sit doing little about the Middle East, the Asian situation surrounding China and Japan and China and Taiwan may be escalating.  The Chinese controlled media has stirred up these protests just as the Middle Eastern media did.  Without strong support by the United States for Israel, Japan and Taiwan, others will use our silence to take action.  Meanwhile, the decision to not build a defensive missile screen in Eastern Europe has emboldened Russia to once again exert influence over countries that are former Iron Curtain members who had depended on our support.  In my opinion, we are at much more of a crisis than most realize in foreign policy.

reposted from FoxNews and Associated Press

BEIJING –  Protests against Japan for its control of disputed islands swelled across more than a dozen cities in China and at times turned violent Saturday, with protesters hurling rocks at the Japanese Embassy and clashing with Chinese paramilitary police before order was restored.

Thousands of protesters gathered in front of the embassy in Beijing. Hundreds tried to storm a metal police barricade but were pushed back by riot police armed with shields, helmets and batons. A few made it through but were quickly taken away by plainclothes police. Protesters also threw rocks and burned Japanese flags.

Protests were more orderly in most other cities, though in the southern city of Changsha protesters smashed a police car made by Mitsubishi, according to reports online.

Anti-Japanese sentiment, never far from the surface in China, has been building for weeks, touched off by moves by Tokyo and fanned by a feverish campaign in Chinese state media. Passions grew more heated this past week after the Japanese government purchased the contested East China Sea islands from their private owners. Though Japan has controlled the uninhabited islands — called Diaoyu in Chinese and Senkaku in Japanese — for decades, China saw the purchase as an affront to its claims and as further proof of Tokyo’s refusal to negotiate over them.

In response, Beijing has lodged angry protests and tried to bolster its claims by briefly sending lightly armed marine surveillance ships into what Japan says are its territorial waters around the islands and by ratcheting up state media coverage. Some news programs featured explanations of historic documents and bellicose commentary.

Smaller demonstrations had been staged throughout the week. But they boiled over Saturday, especially in Beijing. Outside the Japanese Embassy, the protesters — most of whom appeared to be students — shouted slogans demanding Japan relinquish the islands and claiming China’s ownership of them. The crowd grew larger than expected, prompting police to close off a main thoroughfare to traffic.

In Shanghai, about 200 police officers kept order, cordoning off the street leading to the Japanese Consulate and allowing protesters in groups of 100 to approach the consular building. Protesters had to register with police before they could cross the cordon and had to take their banners with them when they left.

The demonstrations came before an anniversary Tuesday that often sees anti-Japanese sentiment: the 1931 Mukden incident, which marked a step in Japan’s conquest of Manchuria and onward to much of China in the 1930s and World War II. Activists have called for demonstrations Tuesday.

The uptick in Chinese anger over the disputed islands comes even though the Japanese government hoped its purchase would calm, rather than inflame the situation. Tokyo’s nationalistic governor, Shintaro Ishihara, proposed buying the islands in April and planned to develop them — something that Beijing would have seen as an attempt to solidify Japan’s claim. By purchasing them instead, the Japanese government has promised to keep them undeveloped.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/world/2012/09/15/anti-japan-protests-in-china-grow-turn-violent/?test=latestnews#ixzz26Z8O7vm5

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September 14, 2012 · 12:51 am

Pink Slime Gets Feelings Hurt – Sues ABC News!

This is an update on my earlier story about pink slime.  Apparently, pink slime has feelings, and when it feels insulted, it fights back.

Pink Slime

 

reposted from foxnews.com from Associate Press

Published September 13, 2012

Associated Press

NORTH SIOUX CITY, S.D. –  Beef Products Inc. sued ABC News, Inc. for defamation Thursday over its coverage of a meat product that critics dub “pink slime,” claiming the network damaged the company by misleading consumers into believing it is unhealthy and unsafe.

The Dakota Dunes, S.D.-based meat processor is seeking $1.2 billion in damages for roughly 200 “false and misleading and defamatory” statements about the product officially known as lean, finely textured beef, said Dan Webb, BPI’s Chicago-based attorney.

The lawsuit filed in a South Dakota state court also names several individuals as defendants, including ABC news anchor Diane Sawyer and the Department of Agriculture microbiologist who coined the term “pink slime.”

The company’s reporting “caused consumers to believe that our lean beef is not beef at all — that it’s an unhealthy pink slime, unsafe for public consumption, and that somehow it got hidden in the meat,” Webb said before the company’s official announcement.

ABC News, owned by The Walt Disney Co., denied BPI’s claims.

“The lawsuit is without merit,” Jeffrey W. Schneider, the news station’s senior vice president, said in a brief statement Thursday. “We will contest it vigorously.”

The 257-page lawsuit names American Broadcasting Companies, Inc., ABC News, Inc., Sawyer and ABC correspondents Jim Avila and David Kerley as defendants. It also names Gerald Zirnstein, the USDA microbiologist who named the product “pink slime,” Carl Custer, a former federal food scientist, and Kit Foshee, a former BPI quality assurance manager who was interviewed by ABC.

Richard McIntire, a spokesman for the USDA’s Food Safety and Inspection Service, declined to comment and attempts to reach Foshee were unsuccessful. A spokesman for the Food Integrity Campaign, a whistleblower advocacy group that has worked with Foshee, said Thursday that he would attempt to contact Foshee. Spokesman Dylan Blaylock also said the Washington-based group may release a statement.

Although several news organizations used the term “pink slime,” Webb said ABC was being sued for attacking the company “night after night.” The “defendants engaged in a monthlong vicious, concerted disinformation campaign against BPI,” the lawsuit claims, citing 11 TV 14 online reports from March 7 to April 3.

Craig Letch, BPI’s director of food-quality assurance, said the company lost 80 percent of its business in 28 days. BPI has declined to discuss how much it lost in sales, but acknowledged it took a “substantial” hit. Some of the customers have returned, Letch said, but not enough to allow BPI to rehire former employees.

Webb said the reports had a “catastrophic” impact on the company, forcing it to close three of its four U.S. plants and lay off 700 workers.

ABC published a list of major grocery stores that stopped selling the product, pressuring others to follow suit by placing then on a “black list,” he said.

BPI will have to prove the network intended to cause harm for the defamation lawsuit to succeed, said Patrick Garry, a media law expert at the University of South Dakota School of Law.

“The media — regardless of your opinion of them — don’t usually print something that they know to be false,” Garry said. “It may be negligent, but usually there’s a malice requirement as well.”

Critics worry about how the meat is processed. Bits of beef are heated and treated with a small amount of ammonia to kill bacteria, a practice that has been used for decades and meets federal food safety standards. Webb said that ABC ignored that information, instead giving the impression “that it’s some type of chemical product … some kind of repulsive, horrible, vile substance that got put into ground beef and hidden from consumers.”

The name “pink slime” gained traction after The New York Times used it in a 2009 article on the safety of meat processing methods. Soon after, celebrity chef Jamie Oliver began railing against it. McDonald’s and other fast food companies stopped using the product, and major supermarket chains including Kroger and Stop & Shop vowed to stop selling beef containing the low-cost product. An online petition calling for it to be banned from school menus, attracting hundreds of thousands of supporters.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture has said the vast majority of states participating in its National School Lunch Program have opted to order ground beef that doesn’t contain the product. Only three — Iowa, Nebraska and South Dakota — chose to order beef that may contain it.

The uproar prompted Beef Products to suspend operations at plants in Amarillo, Texas; Garden City, Kan.; and Waterloo, Iowa. Beef Products’ plants in Iowa and Kansas each produced about 350,000 pounds of lean, finely textured beef per day, while the one in Texas produced about 200,000 pounds a day.

The company has won support from the governors of Iowa, Nebraska, Kansas, Texas and South Dakota. U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack has also defended the product, saying the federal government wouldn’t allow the product if it was unsafe.

The company has launched its own public relations offensive, including a website — http://www.beefisbeef.com — to advocate for the product.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/us/2012/09/13/bpi-sues-abc-news-for-pink-slime-defamation/%20?test=latestnews#ixzz26Qamm1hU

 

Yummy.

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September 13, 2012 · 8:12 pm

$15 Million Construction Shut Down Over a Single Spider

$15 Million Construction Shut Down Over a Single Spider

The spider is only the second of its kind ever seen.  During construction, one was seen, and since it is considered an endangered species, the entire project was shut down.  What do you think?  Protect the spider or let the project continue?

 

reposted from Foxnews.com

A rare spider discovered at a construction site in San Antonio has shut down a $15 million project as federal and state officials consider ways to continue without disrupting the arachnid’s natural habitat.

The spider, identified as a Braken Bat Cave Meshweaver, is an endangered, non-venomous species that lives in caves, has no eyes and is virtually translucent. Josh Donat, a spokesman for the Texas Department of Transportation, said the recent discovery is only the second time the species has been spotted in more than 30 years.

“This is the second individual spider that’s ever been found,” Donat told FOX 29. “It’s not like we found 1 of 5,000 individuals in a species. This is the second time this species has ever been seen by human eyes.  The last time it was seen was 32 years ago in 1980 in a little piece of property not far from here.”

Donat said the construction project near Highway 151 and Wiseman Road, which began in April, will be put on hold indefinitely as U.S. Fish and Wildlife officials and the Federal Highway Administration consider ways to proceed. The project became subject to the Endangered Species Act once the rare spider was discovered, he said.

The find could halt the project altogether, officials said, as residents who live in the North San Antonio Hills section say they’re frustrated with the situation.

“This will stop all the traffic and I don’t have to stand out in the front of my house every morning with my kids and make sure they don’t get run over before they catch the bus,” resident John Mellow told the website.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/us/2012/09/13/rare-spider-found-in-texas-shuts-down-15m-construction-project/#ixzz26PTEPGE1

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September 12, 2012 · 1:55 pm

American Killed In Libya Was Fellow EVE Online Player – Messaged In Game He Feared He Would Die

American Killed In Libya Was Fellow EVE Online Player – Messaged In Game He Feared He Would Die

As a long time gamer and a long time EVE Online member, it is chilling to know that the American Intelligence agent in Libya posted just hours before his death that he thought he would be killed.  He noticed his “so-called” Libyan Police Protection taking pictures of their quarters while he was playing online.  This is not the first time I have had a fellow gamer die, many are disabled and succumb to their disease or injuries, many are men and women overseas in combat areas, some have heart attacks.  But this is especially chilling to me, coming so soon on the heals of hearing of the event.  It shows what a small world we live in.  My prayers to his wife and two children and the many friends he had online and in person.

 

Excerpt reposted from FoxNews who reposted from Wired.com

 

One of the American diplomats killed Tuesday in a bloody attack on a Libyan Consulate told pals in an online gaming forum hours earlier that he’d seen suspicious people taking pictures outside his compound and wondered if he and his team might “die tonight.”

Sean Smith, a foreign service information management officer assigned to the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, was well known in the online gaming forum EVE Online, where he went by the name “vilerat,” and was seen as a leader by his fellow gamers. Smith was killed along with three others, including U.S. Ambassador to Libya J. Christopher Stevens, when the consulate was attacked by an angry mob.

But hours before the bloody assault, Smith sent a message to Alex Gianturco, the director of “Goonswarm,” Smith’s online gaming team or “guild.”

“Assuming we don’t die tonight,” the message, which was first reported by Wired, read. “We saw one of our ‘police’ that guard the compound taking pictures.”

Within hours of posting that message, Smith, a husband and father of two, was dead. Gianturco, who could not be reached for further comment, got the word out to fellow gamers, according to Wired.

“My people, I have greivous [sic] news,” wrote Gianturco. “Vile Rat has been confirmed to be KIA in Benghazi; his family has been informed and the news is likely to break out on the wire services soon.

“Needless to say, we are in shock, have no words, and have nothing but sympathy for his family and children. I have known Vile Rat since 2006, he was one of the oldest of old-guard goons and one of the best and most effective diplomats this game has ever seen.”

On Wednesday, as word spread throughout the guild, tributes poured in for the foreign service information management officer who also was a moderator at the Internet community Something Awful, which is known for posting disturbing photos and videos. Nearly 500 posts to themittani.com, a site run by a the director.

“To your wife and children, know that the love of thousands of video game nerds, the world over, fall to your shoulders,” wrote one poster.

“Vile Rat was a shining example of life lived to its fullest,” wrote another. “A great man in all respects and will be missed by many. Not even 12 hours ago we were talking in jabber, he had made a joke about the lack of security in such places and crappy Internet. The whole thing seems surreal.”

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2012/09/12/diplomat-killed-in-libya-to-fellow-gamers-assuming-dont-die-tonight/#ixzz26I5gn53p

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September 12, 2012 · 7:28 am

Ancient Human Species Found Underwater :-)

Petrified remains of extinct species Homo Televiticus are round under the ocean. Scientists believe that they actually suffered petrification while still alive due to immobility. It is still unclear why so many died simply by not moving and staring forward, extincting the species.

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