Netgear Nighthawk M1

I needed a new 4G router for Elysium. I was using a MikroTik Chateau Router Access Point Class 12 LTE but it was horribly unreliable, more than you’d expect from poor 3G/4G coverage.

I purchased the Nighthawk router from Amazon’s ‘Used-Like new’ offer. This was a mistake that I wont be repeating. the router did not recognise the SIM when inserted, nor any other SIM I tried. I really should have just sent it back to Amazon, but I am terrible at doing returns.

A year later I found the modem again and decided to investigate the problem. Dismantling the modem was interesting. There are a number of very small torx screws under the battery compartment to be removed. Here are some photos :

The underside of the display :

The PCB has screened boxes on both sides. The interesting bit for me was the SIM socket. I was hoping for a poorly soldered socket, but the soldering looked fine. Further investigation showed 3 of the 6 pins missing. The below photo shows the SIM socket with the upper metal body removed

The internal antenna was interesting, being strips of metallised coating on the inside of the plastic box

The next steps are to find a replacement SIM socket, or to solder the SIM directly in.

The Nighthawk M1 supports 4 antennas for MIMO and CAT 12 Multiband operation. Only two of these connectors are available to the user, however the PCB contains connectors for the other two and can be used given the correct leads.

Winter on Elysium

I do not live about Elysium full time. My visits are quite health dependant but I try for Tuesday and Thursday afternoons. My plan on arrival is quite minimal, just to drink tea, feed the ducks, watch the river go past. There are so many jobs to do on board, so often one or two things get done whilst I am there.

While this is great during the spring, summer and autumn, its much more difficult in the winter.

Elysium currently has two heating options. I chose not to have gas onboard.

1) a camping heater attachment to put on the meths cooker. Its supposed to put out around 2kW of heat but it does use lots of methylated spirits and vents its fumes inside

2) an Aladdin paraffin lamp with mantle. This should put out around 1kW of heat as well as a lovely light. I’ve not been able to trim the wick so that it only has blue flame and it has set the carbon monoxide alarm as a result.

Elysium also has a binar diesel water heater. This has been out of commission since I purchased Elysium, and I has hoped that I would have it connected to radiators before this winter set in. There are still a number of things to do in order to get this connected up.

  • Install the header tank
  • Install radiator in the bathroom
  • install radiator in the main cabin

The winter is not time t0 do this.

The long cold spell in December dipping to -10 degrees C overnight and not rising above zero during the day took me by surprise.

Previously this year I had replaced some engine pipework and did not top up the antifreeze. This was a major worry. The cold water system had not been drained either. I was prepared for the worst as I visited her after the long freeze.

The cold water system was still pressurised and running, the engine ran perfectly after quite a lot of preheating. Phew.

Cable trunking – digging trenches in the Garden

I have a lot of cables going from the shack to the antennas 100m down the garden. There are two sections. One from the shack and under a hardcore and gravel drive/parking for the cars, and then a longer section under grass to the antennas. The section under the drive has caved in and needs replacing, this time with paving slabs and bricks forming a tunnel. Below is a photo of the start of the tunnel.

The next photo shows the extent of the trench network. We hired a pedestrian trench digger and cut trenches to the most useful places.

  • Polytunnel – temperature monitoring, time-lapse camera
  • Bunker – test area
  • Apiary – bee monitoring
  • Antennas – coax and control

The cabled were buried in drainage pipe and buried in the trench. A yea later and the marks in the lawn have gone.

Bees and Infrared Cameras

During the winter when outside temperatures drop below zero, an Infrared Camera can be very useful to see which colonies are still alive

The photos were taken using a borrowed FLIR E4 Camera

Below is an IR image of 3 beehives. The two to the left are two Paynes polystyrene hives, and the one on the right is a wooden hive. You can see the difference in surface temperature and hence heat loss.

These are the same beehives but from the front. Note that there is a relatively high temperature in the entrance of each polystyrene hive

A closer look at a polystyrene hive showing heat leakage from the gap between the brood box and the super, then a larger gap to the roof.

Paynes Polystyrene Hives

https://paynesbeefarm.co.uk/collections/poly-hives-nucs/products/complete-poly-14×12-jumbo-national-hive-empty-no-frames

Of course there are some downsides with Polystyrene Hives

  • cleaning – you cannot scorch with a blowtorch, use a large bleach bath instead
  • woodpeckers make deep, ineffective holes
  • the super will not fit onto the base in the same way that the brood box does. I cannot work how to invert brood/super in the spring

Here is a picture of the apiary in the daytime for reference

Woodpecker holes

We’ve purchased a narrowboat

Monday, 1st March 2021. Lockdown. I paid for Elysium last Friday and have been told that she is ours.

Elysium is her current name, but neither of us really like it, so we are trying to decide on a new name. This may take us a while.

We organised a full survey and a river trial. Essentially she is sound with a good 10mm base plate, 6mm hull and 3mm cabin. The engine is a Lombardini LDW903 20hp 3 cylinder diesel, and it not considered a great engine.

She has a rather odd layout inside. A nice shower with a grim loo leading into a kitchen, bed and a lounge. This will change. I like the idea of a bed at the bow.

The gas hob and oven will be removed. I don’t trust myself with gas on a boat, if there is a leak the gas will make its way to the bilge. We will have a meths cooker and a microwave. Not sure what to use the gas lockers for.

The plan is to get her ready to move in April/May from near to Heathrow back to the Fens and to a marina near to Newmarket. Its going to be an interesting summer.

Elysium is being craned out of the water on the 3rd of March to be cleaned and the hull blacked, then an engine service and cam belt change. The engine bay is in a poor state and needs a good clean. Craned back into the water at the end of March.

So, the plans for this year are :

  • Disconnect Gas
  • Install Spirit cooker
  • Remove Oven
  • Move and rewire fridge
  • New toilet
  • Remove sofa
  • Remove mattress
  • Make table/seating
  • Make ottoman bed
  • remove front cover/cratch
  • Move hot water cylinder
  • Move batteries
  • 48v from Engine
  • reconfigure batteries to 48v
  • Install Inverter/charger

..oh and to install some radios

So what is rheumatoid Arthritis Like ?

I was diagnosed in early 2020 with Rheumatoid Arthritis, specifically psoriatic arthritis. At the time, I was not convinced of the diagnosis but the symptoms have been getting a lot worse now in early 2021 so I am convinced.

Symptoms :

  • ‘Bone pain’ – a deep ache seemingly from deep inside my limbs. Shoulders, arms, hands, legs and feet. Level varying from 1 – 5 out of 10. Especially bad in the mornings and evenings. Finding a comfortable position to sleep involves lots of wriggling to finally find that position with no pain. Its great for a few minutes and then it starts again. It takes me ages to sleep.
  • Specific pain – it began at the rear of my heels, I could not lay on my back because of heel pain, but now it has moved to fingers and toes. Level up to 7 / 10
  • Fatigue, exhaustion. All I could do was to lay down, too exhausted to read, watch Netflix, listen to the radio. Too tired to sleep.
  • Brain-fog – inability to think straight, to get the right words out. Clumsy. Easily upset. Depression, hiding.

So far I’ve tried hydroxychloroquine which seemed to enhance the symptoms, methotrexate tablets which made me rather sick and now methotrexate injections that wipe me out for 2 days and another 2 to recover. However, after 3 days of just starting steroids a lot of the aches have gone – steroids are not a long term solution.

How will I know that the medication is working ? I’m currently having biweekly blood tests showing two inflammatory markers and liver function indications. Hopefully the inflammatory markers will lower before the liver damage becomes significant. Its all a bit of a balance.

And the prognosis ? Well I hope to find a medication that will successfully blunt my immune system so that it stops attacking my joints and I can get back to some sort of normal life. There are a number of RA medications to try yet, all I need to do is to find one that works.

Beeswax processing

As a beekeeper, you end up with a lot of brood frames which need replacing, wax scrapings and mappings from when processing honey. Melting these down by heating up with water will not remove the impurities such as propolis, dead bees and other waste. An easy way to both remove the wax and as a first stage filter would be to heat the frames or whatever in a black box sealed under glass.

This was an unused double glazed roof light, the back sealed with a piece of wood and the inside lined with aluminium painted black. The box was tilted to point at the sun, and the bottom edge was lined with aluminium foil to collect the wax.

Further processing

The wax/tin foil mix was was then heated with water to melt it into a more convenient shape and filter it some more. One trick is to put the dirty wax into an old pair of tights and heat up, the was will liquify and escape to float on the surface and the debris will remain behind. This is great, but some debris float to contaminate the wax. Using the same principle of a cafetière, I make this press to keep the debris on the botton whilst the wax cools. The filter was cnc cut out of aluminium plate

To make this ( yes, our floor was dirty )

48v narrowboat electrics

Hopefully this week, we will finalise the purchase of Elysium. I have a medium term plan to convert her to hybrid power using a 48v motor as well as the Lombardini 20HP diesel engine.

Elysium ( her name might change ) currently has a 12v system configured as below ( circuit drawn with kicad ) :

This is all fairly standard. However, Elysium’s 12v system needs upgrading and I have plans to convert Elysium to a hybrid diesel electric drive and will need a 48v high capacity supply for this. So, the questions is – should I install a 12v system for the short term or a ( complicated ) 48v system for the long term ?

Below is the proposed solution. I like Victron kit. The engine’s existing 12v alternator charges the cranking battery and the 12v/240v inverter feed one mains input to the quatro, the other being from shore power/generator. This has the minor advantage for being able to charge the 48v battery bank to its full capacity ( 14.4 bulk charge ).

The disadvantages are the unnecessary complexity, especially creating the 12v for the fridge, bilge pumps and comms radios. The design feels unsatisfying. In order to charge the 12v battery bank, both the quatro and the 12v charger will need to be running, with the power loss that entails.

The next image is a slight modification where we add a fictitious 48v input 12v 3 stage battery charger, I’m not sure these exist.

Of course the upgraded 12v only system is easier, it will just need replacing if I move to 48v propulsion :

So, that’s it for now.

On feeling down – depression

I’m writing this during the winter early in 2021, during a pandemic. There are a lot of reasons to feel down, but that is not quite the answer.

*** If you are feeling depressed, please seek professional medical help. I’ve tried it and it works, eventually ***

I can think of a lot of reasons to be down

  • The expectation of friends, never being able to fulfil them
  • Feeling in pain for much of the time
  • Nausea and vomiting from migraines and RA medication
  • The impossibility of being in a job that I love, which happens to be killing me
  • Things I am avoiding doing
  • Worry about the future
  • Guilt about the past
  • Current political and social trends

Well I could go on, but all the above things don’t add up to depression for me, they create stress, frustration and often the energy to get on top of them but not depression.

My experience of depression is when everything, even small things seem insurmountable, there is no end in sight where things might improve, there is no point in trying and there is no hope.

I’m not feeling like that as I write this, but I have been there and I have friends who are there at the moment. I am hovering on the edge though. I can feel myself :

  • catastrophising – when you take any small irritation to the logical end, then further into fear and hate, and sometimes beyond. This is a bad place. It almost seems fun at the time, it really is not, and I am now very good at stopping myself
  • avoidance – not answering emails, phone calls. Hiding from friends and family because conversations will not go well.
  • Doom scrolling – read twitter, Facebook, BBC news. Find threads that you know will make you sad, but gleefully read all the bad stuff from trolls
  • finding things to buy on eBay or Amazon that you’ll probably never use
  • loop listening you music that takes you down

This is a great place to consider what would help to bring me back out. How can I help someone who is already down there.

  • I know this sounds a bit wishy-washy, but it works for me. I have a thought experiment. I’ve been given £100,000 and I have to spend it on other people. Which friends need it most ? What would they really like but cannot afford ?
  • Try to remember a time when you were really happy. Who you were with, what you were doing, see if these memories make you smile, or even cry.
  • If you feel brave, then think of the worse case scenario. If you job is *so* terrible, then just leave. Would that be so much worse ? Can you afford it ? Have a quick look at recruitment sites
  • Be with friends. Quiet friends who will give you space to talk. Friends who have been there and have survived
  • Avoid people who are consistently negative, they are dangerous when you are feeling down

Migraines, more migraines and then Nothing..

No photo description available.

I have had migraines on and off since my late 20s, my mother and sister both have migraines too. I wanted to blog a little about my migraine treatments over the last 30 years, the successes and the frustrations and what seems to be coming next. I am worried that once this is on the internet, a prospective employer would never hire me after reading this. So far, I have managed to do my job because have been blessed with understanding Employers and some really exceptional line managers.

Lets go back to the late 1980s. Working hard, two young children, taking turns with my partner to go clubbing in London. I noticed that my hangovers seemed to be getting worse, so that even a taste of alcohol would start off a day of debilitating headaches with sickness. It took me a while to realise these were migraines

Giving up alcohol seemed to help, but there is a huge list of possible migraine triggers.

  • Chocolate – gave up for 4 months, no effect
  • Caffeine in general – gave up for 3 months, no effect
  • dairy – vegan for a month, same migraines
  • citrus fruit – I’m pretty sure that orange juice invokes migraines

Migraine vs Headache

I get headaches as well as migraines. Sometimes a headache will morph into a migraine over time.

So what’s the difference ? For me, I classify a headache as pain without any other migraine effects, see below. The pain of a headache can be more than a migraine but somehow easier to cope with.

I used to worry that my migraines were not really bad. For instance with a low level migraine, I could still work, socialise like a real human being and laugh. I could find distraction in a low level migraine, usually involving concentration and appear ok, albeit a bit tired and grumpy. The downside was that concentration often leads to worse migraine outcomes.

I then found this paintable, and it made so much sense

Image result for pain scale

So, with a headache you get

  • pain

Whereas with a migraine I get

  • pain
  • nausea
  • vomiting
  • tinnitus
  • Intense sensitivity to smells
  • Awful taste in my mouth ( this is my biggest migraine indicator )
  • fatigue
  • light sensitivity
  • lack of concentration
  • physically clumsy
  • emotionally clumsy and sensitive

Its usually better for me to be away from people. I can still work, but am horrible to be with.

Next blog post will be about the medications I have tried to help with migraines, but for now I’ll quickly give my experience of Candesarten

I was very sceptical about yet another daily drug to try in order to help my migraine symptoms, but as I had to stop sumatriptan injections I really had no choice. I started 8 mg around Christmas 2017 with little improvement in my migraines, then went up to 12mg in January. My migraines just stopped. No migraines for over a year but then they came back. It was a very nice year..