Solar Power Photovoltaic DIY Project
I am proud to say my very first solar power project is a success. A few domestic items in my home such as my bedside lamp and my electric fan are now running from a battery that is charged from solar power collected during the day.
The bulk of the work was building the actual unit to sit in the garden and this is wear I saved the money. It has to be weather proof and transparent. The unit is essentially a glass-roofed wooden box, varnished and mounted at a 45 degree angle to the sky, facing south. Contructed from scrap material the photovoltaic plates (purchased earlier this year at Sunrise Celebration) are glued to the underside of the glass and wired in parallel. I make it sound easy here but trust me, I made a fair few mistakes.
Now I know I can do this, my next step will be to scale-up the project. The unit pictured above generates just over 12 watts of power in full sunshine but as you can see I could easily have used a bigger piece of glass and fitted more plates into the space. This was afterall, just an exercise in self teaching.
The total cost of the project was about £40.
Stub Footed Pigeon Clothes Sale
Stub Footed Pigeon are a collective of artists who formed in Taunton but have now EXPLODED, scattering themselves across the country which I guess makes us a National group. This month we turned our artistic talents to producing garments of clothing and last weekend we held a sale of our stuff. We cleared about a quarter of our stock which is pretty good going. The rest is going to Brick Lane market or eBay dependant on style.
Here are a few pictures of what I produced for the sale....
Charlotte modelling "FIGHT" design on baby blue knitwear - £22 (still available)
Charlotte modelling "FIGHT" on sexy pink knitwear - £22 (SOLD)
Charlotte modelling "Cheeky Face-rise" on white oversized tee - £10 (still available)
If you were in town on Saturday you may have seen us pushing our trolley round town, hotly pursued by 2 police man and a handful of obese shop security guards with nothing better to do than follow us.
Felix with the trolley on the high street.
Trolley in the kitchen ready to roll. Baby pigeon tee (on right of image) still available - £14
If you are interested in buying any of the garments give me a shout at martin [at] martinjoiner.co.uk All clothes are top quality, carbon neutral garments printed with acrylic ink.
Original T-Shirts by Local Artists for sale this weekend
This Saturday and Sunday (that's 17th and 18th July) between 11am and 6pm you will be able to go to Felix's house on Alma Street in Taunton (a short walk from town centre) and look through a wide range of clothing for sale at incredible prices.
On offer will be original t-shirts and jumpers produced by local artists at prices from about £5 up to £15. I have produced a few t-shirts myself including the "Fight" design above and there's also stuff from FRA (Fresh Rotten Apples), Felix himself and many more people who I will add to this blog when I've got confirmation later tonight.
As well as the new clothing there will also be a large selection of second hand and vintage clothing from Charlotte and friend's personal wardrobes. They all need clearing out before they move back to London permanently never to be seen in Taunton again.
THIS SALE WILL ONLY EVER HAPPEN ONCE. Grab this opportunity to get unique art style threads at very affordable high street prices! It's got to be worth popping by!
My DJ set of 2010
Yesterday afternoon, at a friend's annual garden party, I played my 1 and only DJ set of the year. Mostly consisting of new music from the last year it's 1 hour and 5 minutes of chilled-out sunny garden afternoon tunes. Starting with down tempo world music, then into minimal dubstep wrapping up with a section of acoustic loveliness and then cherry-topped with the very soul healing New Days Dawn by Slacker. Here's the set list, I've provided links to YouTube videos where available. Hopefully every track will be new to you and you will love every one as much as I do. If not, I will try harder next year.
Down tempo world music
- Ibrahim Maalouf - Hashish
- Fever Ray – Concrete Walls
- Aphex Twin – Ageispolis
- Pantha Du Prince - Bohemian Forest
- Faithless – I hope
Minimal dupsteppy slash electronica type stuff
- Kid Cudi – Day n Nite (Not the crookers remix)
- Various Productions - Hater (Music video by Kandle)
- JJ N° 2 - Ecstacy
- Burial - Near Dark
- Delphic - Doubt (Ramadanman Refix)
Acoustic loveliness
- The xx - Crystalised
- Tunng – Hustle
- The Moldy Peaches – Anyone Else But You
- Sigur Ross – Staralfur
- Slacker – New Days Dawn
If you only have time to click on one of these videos I thoroughly recommend looking at Various Productions - Hater.
Taking the Mic – Exeter Phoenix
This week I performed my poetry to a crowd of poets. Having previously only performed to general open mic audiences this event was my first poetry specific open mic. I am pleased to say I really enjoyed the other performers and they really enjoyed me. I read The Adventure a poem about having a night out and avoiding the crap to create an enjoyable evening, and my first and only love poem, Junk Food Date. I will definitely be heading back to the Pheonix on September 15th for the next "Taking the Mic" where I'm gonna crack out my controversial crowd pleaser, Pinnochiophile.
The event is hosted by Liv Torc who also happened to be plugging her new book, a professionally printed book with glossy cover and illustrations. Lately I've seen a lot of poets plugging their books at open mics which is interesting as I am currently thinking about self-publishing my poems. Most advertise prices of £2 or £3 for books and don't seem to be selling them. Does poetry simply not sell?
But looking closely, most of the self published 'books' were just basic vehicles for the words. Black and white photocopies stapled together and badly folded. Most people would rather read from a computer screen than another sheet of A4 copy paper. They had all the charm and beauty of a school newsletter. In contrast, my book is going to be a work of art. A tactile and sculptural binding of leaves printed in traditional mediums. A hard cover and spine will firmly hug a neat stack of high quality archive paper. Each book will smell of fresh plywood and ink, be numbered as a limited edition and will have been handmade by myself. All this and it will still retail for about a fiver!
Chilli seedlings move to Autopot
I re-potted this year's chilli crop into a brand new autopot twinpot system with 47 litre tank today. The clever Australian designed system keeps the pots sitting in a constant shallow pool of nutrient solution, never allowing them to flood or dry out. All gravity operated and completely reusable the tank is filled weekly with water and liquid fertiliser. Notice the bottle of Growth Technology Chilli Focus liquid nutrient in the background. This stuff is the mutts nuts and it's made right here in Taunton.
If you are wondering these are Cayenne Peppers seeded from last year's crop and these 2 plants will fruit around late July and be continually harvested through until October when it gets too cold. They will produce enough fruit to keep me and my friends in supply of culinary kick for the next year.
Sunrise Celebration 2010
Hard to choose an image that sums up Sunrise Celebration 2010. But to sum up the element that was most inspiring to me personally is slightly easier. The fantastic British inventors who are producing tomorrow's energy solutions in their sheds were fantastic. To see more visit http://www.ianmoore.org/
Steam Bending Experiment 2 – Success
I write this as I sip a beer in celebration. My second steam box was a success, but only after some mid-steam additions.
I bought some flexible ducting from a reclamation yard for £10, strapped it down to a study stretcher and blanked off the ends. I steamed a few strips of 2x1 pine and maple for an hour. They had hardly become flexible at all and were not even that hot or moist to the touch. I pondered and decided the steam was condensing back into water too quickly. The heat and water was escaping from the steam box and not being forced into the wood.
So I improved the seal at the top end, shortened the hose and insulated the whole thing with multiple layers of cotton sheeting, blankets and reflective Mylar sheets. After doing this the outside surface became only warm to the touch where it was previously untouchably hot, the trickle of water reduced to a drip and the small jet of steam escaping became more furious. This all suggested that both the temperature and the pressure inside were rising. And it seemed to work because after 3 hours in the steam box I was able to bend my test piece.
All the steam-bending books recommend green wood but absolutely insist on knot-free, straight grain with no grain run-offs. This 2x1 pine is about 2 years old so it's not particularly green. It has paint on 2 sides but I chose it for it's straight grain and knot-free construction. It was steaming for 3 hours but the first hour and a half of that was without the improved insulation. I reckon it would need less to do it again. It took a fair amount of force to bend it into place and it looked, felt and sounded on the limit of breaking.
Note: It was very hot to the touch which I think is a good guide for future bends.
This experiment was a test of the steam box not the jig but it is worth noting that I did not have enough clamp points along the curve. I spaced them every 15 cms and as a result the arc is not perfect with visible flat sections and tight bends disrupting it. For proper projects I reckon I am going to have to invest in about 20 more clamps and make the jig from MDF shaped with a jigsaw.
Conclusions:
- Insulation is one of the key factors to building a functional steam box. If you have to write "Caution: Hot surface" on it then you haven't insulated it enough.
- 2x1 kiln dried pine needs about 2.5 hours of steaming if you wish to bend it to a curve with an 80 cm radius.
- You can never have enough clamp points along the curve. Buy more G-clamps.
Steam Bending Experiment 1 – Fail
I used a length of PVC soil pipe, a plumbing fitting and an electric wallpaper steamer to make a steam box with the intention of steam bending wood. For 15 minutes it worked fine, a little trickle of water flowed out the bottom end into the bucket and a small jet of steam puffed from both ends of the pipe confirming that the entire length of wood was engulfed in the hot vapour.
Then, as I sat back to admire my handiwork, I noticed the pipe was moulding to the contours of the chairs it was resting on. The PVC pipe could not take the heat and was melting. I abandoned the experiment. The wood had started to become flexible so it's clear that to make this project successful I just need to build the steam box out of metal pipe instead of PVC. I think the cheapest metal pipe is stove pipe or ducting, so I will contact some heating suppliers and scrap metal merchants tomorrow.
Can you think of a cheaper way to get a long metal container? If so, comment now.
A good piece of art at the Brewhouse in Taunton
I popped into the Brewhouse on my way home from town today and found this wicked piece of cardboard sculpture on show in the gallery. It's free to go in so take the time to check it out next time you're passing by.