a photoblog of what i did today.....

[plthijinx]

here is a week ago last sunday. i'm only just now posting them.

As y'all know i worked the go kart track for a better part of two years while looking for a job back in engineering and from previous posts in this thread you know how much work Bobby (and I when i worked for him) has put in there making improvements. well Bobby put in a third track and just opened it up to the public about a month ago.

we finally got up there to take some pictures for his website and to hang on the wall at the track. now taking pictures of the track from the air is to say the least, challenging. why? Houston Intercontinental Airport is right there. i mean right there as in jets were diverted around us!

(oh the pics were cloudy because of the windows)

it was all safe mind you, i had called Tracon (houston approach control) prior to getting up in the air and got permission to get within what's called the "Houston Class B" airspace and within spitting distance of the big airport.

when we got to the track and started our orbit i started snapping pictures as fast as i could with my nikon while talking to Houston tower and fighting with Bobby over the rudder because he kept putting the wing strut right in my frame of view. this is almost what it was like:

Bob: "HEY! get your foot off the rudder!"
Me: "NO! you either fly the plane with the ailerons & rudder..."
Houston: "N9568L traffic, twelve o'clock, boeing 747 climbing through 1,000"
Me: "and keep that strut out of (roger Houston, have the traffic in sight) my way or i'm..."
Houston: "use caution 68L, wake turbulence"
Me: "gonna operate the rudder! (roger, we're ready for it) now what's it gonna be?"

i know, hard to follow but that's something you get used to up there. listening to the radio and talking at the same time. needless to say, it was a blast. here's a few pics. one of the airport as we were passing, another of an RJ jet nearby and then a pic of the track from the north and one from the south

[infinite monkey]

:

Awesome, plt!

[orthodoc]

Wow, great pics! Having 747s thundering by close enough to make wake turbulence warnings necessary, though ... yikes.

[zippyt]

Verry Cool , witch track is new ??

[plthijinx]

thanks y'all, it was a blast. wake turbulence isn't so bad as long as you know what to do if you encounter it. i've been flipped upside down from mountain eddy currents before. kinda similar.

Originally Posted by zippyt

Verry Cool , witch track is new ??

that one right there! no! next to that one! no not that one, the other one!

[zippyt]

Oh i see that one right there ,
over behind that other one ,

[ZenGum]

That lighter-coloured track looks NUTSO FUN!

[glatt]

I totally guessed the wrong track was the new one. I thought it was the roughly triangular shaped track.

That sounds way too stressful for me. It looks like you were right in the flight path of the airport. Gah!

[glatt]

I've been away for a few days.

I went with my son's Webelos den to scout camp in the mountains of Virginia. It was a crazy experience. Lots of mahem and boys being boys running around and yelling and having fun. It was a blast.

This is Goshen Virginia. It's owned by the National Capitol Area Council of the Boy Scouts. The land was purchased decades ago by the heiress of the Post cereal company and donated to the Boy Scouts.

So here's where I slept for 3 nights. It was freaking cold at night, and there was little to keep the bugs out. But they weren't bad at all. My tent mate had to leave after the first night, so I got a tent to myself for the last two nights.


This was the swim area. Very scenic. In the time I was there, there was only swimming on the first day, and that was just to pass the swim test. The other days, we were busy with other activities. My son is still there, and it's supposed to hit 100, so they better let the kids go swimming today.


Here's the dining hall. What a freaking zoo! The food wasn't bad, but it was so loud and crowded. Almost 300 people there this week. All eating at once. Since we went to the dining hall 3 times a day, it was a big part of the experience.


Tuesday, we went for a hike in the morning. It was supposed to be a mile long, but was actually 5 miles long. We got some bad information from the leaders, and I felt bad because I brought water, but no snacks for the kids I was responsible for. Oh well. Very nice hike though.

[glatt]

That afternoon, the kids did archery and BB guns. Our den went last, and there were extra slots, so I got to shoot a BB gun for about 5 minutes. I hadn't shot one in 30 years, and had never shot from a prone position. it was really uncomfortable and felt all wrong. But looking at the pictures my son took of me, I can see that I should have been lying at a slight angle to the target instead of facing it directly. That would have fixed everything. Next time. (I still got several bulls eyes.)

This was our fishing spot. We spent two evenings here after dinner. It was spectacular and so quiet and peaceful, and the setting sun lit up the distant mountain range beautifully.

The morning before I had to leave, we did a hike up to the top of the mountains you can see from the fishing spot. There's a nice viewing rock up there. What you can't see in this picture is the 300 other people who had hiked up there that same morning.

I enjoyed this scout camp a lot, and was sorry to go, but it's clear that it's a lot more fun to do things as just our den of 12 boys than to be thrown in with a group of 300. But the benefit of the large group is all the activities that they have for you.

[plthijinx]

Originally Posted by glatt

I totally guessed the wrong track was the new one. I thought it was the roughly triangular shaped track.

That sounds way too stressful for me. It looks like you were right in the flight path of the airport. Gah!

that's the original track. reason it looks so dark is it gets 2 coats of tar seal every year. the new one is just plain asphalt without sealant.

@zen: yeah that's the half mile track (the other two are a quarter mile). it's loads of fun unless you work there! people can't seem to stay on the track so you have to go out there and get them going again. the one's that do it on purpose get booted back over to the "kiddie track" as we called it


Glatt? that looked like a blast! i bet y'all had a large time! great pics dude!

[infinite monkey]

That place, that lake, looks so peaceful...I just want to go there and relax for like a thousand days.

Sheesh I need a vacation.

[chrisinhouston]

Well this is a combination of a few days of work in my garage workshop. I had this older style Ryobi plunge router that I seldom use because I have a nice new Hitachi model and I also had an old metal framed table sitting around so I decided to make a router table that could come in handy should I ever get around to redoing my kitchen and making my own cabinets and doors.

Image 1. The table which I had to cut down in size since it was bigger than the 24 x 32 inch top. I also added some supports for some shelves which will help firm it up.

Image 2. The table with shelves and top in trial positions. I then took it outside and painted it with fresh black spray paint. The top will be 1 sheet of 3/4" birch plywood laminated to 1 3/4" sheet of laminate covered particle board. The laminate makes it easy to slide the stock across it.

Image 3. The insert which is 3/8 aluminum plate and is about 9 x 11 inches. I traced it to a scrap of birch ply and cut that out and then sanded it until the insert plate slid in smoothly. This is my pattern for routing the laminate top.

Image 4. I used construction adhesive spread with a notched trowel and then used just about every clamp in my shop to squeeze them together and left overnight.

[chrisinhouston]

Ok so the next morning I removed all of the clamps. The insert plate came with some pre-drilled holes for non plunge type routers like Porter Cable which are more common but like I said, I had this nice one not being used and it is a more powerful one then my Hitachi. I removed the small cover plate from the bottom of my router and discovered I had room to drill out the holes and tap new ones to allow for a bigger machine screw. I then matched the adapted router base up with the insert plate and drilled holes on my drill press. I went with a nice countersunk machine bold that is tightened with a allen wrench.

1. and 2. Attaching the router base to the insert
3. I added a locking nut so the machine screw can't accidentally vibrate loose.
4. Here is a closeup of the pattern cutting bit on my Hitachi router. I used my sabre saw to cut the area that would not be needed and would leave a lip to be cut with a rabbet. I then clamped my plywood pattern and used the pattern bit to cut the rabbet. The ball bearing above the cutting tips runs along the pattern. It took 2 passes to get the correct depth.

[chrisinhouston]

I purposefully left the lower piece of plywood on the table top slightly larger, about 1/8" and used a longer pattern bit to trim it to get a perfectly smooth edge. Then I attached some 1/2 pine to give a nice solid edge and hide the ugly view of the particle board and plywood. I used glue and my brad nailer to attach it and then used a small rounding bit on my trim router to round off the edge and the corners.

1. Edges attached and smoothed out.
2. Insert plate installed with router attached and bit just protruding.
3. View from underneath showing the router hanging upside down.