Cypermethrin + 4 hours = no more bird eating spiders in basement. Today we were trying to complete all the drainage for the first floor bathroom however I ran out of 2″ elbows (and no hardware store is open past 3pm) so I moved on to some electrical. The basement lighting is sort of unhandy. The 3-way lights I have installed are not really in the right place. On top of that, the first floor bathroom needs two outlets installed so it was going to be an exciting afternoon of wiring.

Then along came a spider. And then another, bigger one (about the size of a quarter). My hammer made short work of them but the old familiar skin crawling and irrational sense of fear (aka arachnophobia) came rushing forth. Chemical warfare was truly the only solution. So I went to Wal-Mart and grabbed 8 cans of Raid Deep Reach Fogger. So right now, those little bastards are learning the hard way that what happens when you piss off something much higher in the food chain then you. So in 4 hours, there should be nothing left living in the basement.

Update 10:04 PM I just went down to the basement to examine the carnage - it was simply beautiful. Evidently, there was a little pill bug home in the sauna. No more. Some of those little bastards were still alive, but they were making their way towards the garbage can to die. As for the catalysts of this whole endevour - I didn’t see any dead spiders, but I was only down there long enough to re-light the water heater. All told though, I don’t think anything survived that. So Raid Deep Reach Fogger has the tenative deanmassey.net seal of approval.

I bit the $307 bullet yesterday and bought two rings of scaffolding. It has revolutionized work on the third floor. Today, Jason, Jeb and I put up a the other wall that is needed up there. Although it still took 4 hours, no one died which would have happened for sure if we attempted to do it with only ladders. Here?s today?s pic:

I decided to relax on my no more thruster pictures policy (that lasted about as long as me being on the wagon). Anyway, since once you’ve seen a picture of a hall thruster running correctly, most other pictures of similar thrusters running correctly look the same.

So today’s bit was from Tuesday’s marathon session. You see, our main high vacuum pump is the so called “cryopump”. In a nut shell, it has this surface that get’s ass cold (like 13 degrees above absolute zero) and when stuff zipping around the tank hits it, it freezes and gets stuck. No gas actually leaves the tank, it just turns into a big block of ice. Strange I know but it works. The thing also requires a steady diet of liquid nitrogen. Rough estimate is that we burned through about 500 liters of the stuff on Tuesday. Well, we get the nitrogen in 265 liter tanks so obviously at some point, the tanks have to be changed. Usually due dilligence to the temperature monitors prevents any sort of problems. However, since I was running the test by my self (shameless guilt for those absent), it is hard to pay attention to 7 power supplies, 7 temperature monitors, some computerized readings and a clock and still have the presence of mind to check every couple of minutes to see how the pump is feeling. Long story short, the pump warmed up to 20 Kelvin which created really lowsy tank pressure. The first sign of trouble was when the thruster blinked out and then seemed to have a dead short when really there was just so much background gas all bets were off. Here’s the pic.

All the pink you see is xenon neutral gas, which is not a good performance enhancing characteristic in a thruster that operates by ionizing gas. This one had a happy ending though, once I connected the new tank, the thruster was happy as hell again in a matter of minutes.

4:50pm - I guess all the bugs have been worked out because I’ve been underway here for about 8 hours and the thruster has been operating for about 3 hours at high power and nothing has blown up yet. Man is it nice when stuff works.

7:40pm The goddamn thing won’t die! We’re running up on 6 hours of continuous operation - a new record. I may actually get to push the “off” button (rather then it pushing itself). I’m in the home stretch though - just a couple more action items. After that, time for the celebratory beer or twelve.

8:56pm This is one of those days I will remember forever. The thruster test ended a bit early. I was performing the last thing I wanted to do before calling her quits and shutting it down . . . the plasma discharge was finally detaching from one of the anodes, all was well. Really strange, but well. Then there was the faint wiff of burning electronics. I look over at the power supply rack only to see smoke spewing forth from one of the power supplies. Yes, that’s right folks - I scored the ultimate victory - I tried my best to destroy the thruster but instead burnt up at least one power supply. Hell yeah!!!!

2:02am Yes now, I think I’ve got that out of my system. In retrospect, I guess it sucks that a supply went nova but on the other hand, the proof of concept still stands . . .

Unfortunatly, I must repost that today’s thrust test did indeed fail after 35 minutes at an operating point that cannot be stated. You see, we use this crazy kapton tape to electrically isolate stuff on the thruster but I guess I really didn’t do a good enough job because when we stepped up to nominal operating parameters, the back of the thruster basically exploded. Just an FYI: several kilowatts into a propellant line yields not so favorable results. Fortunatly, it only vaporized the insulator (don’t get me wrong - witnessing a stray 4kW plasma discharge is basically watching fundamental physics unwravel) so the fix only took 15 minutes. As I speak, the chamber is at (hopefully) 1/1000 of atmospheric pressure awaiting my arrival at the lab in 7 hours (yes I try to get to work at 8am) to bring it down the rest of the way to 1/1,000,000 or 1×10^-6 torr (regular pressure is 760 torr).

Get this though, due to the massive amount of wiring, Brad refused to check out the wiring on the thruster. Not that I blame him, but it was sort of strange hearing “Nope, you’re on your own” from my PhD advisor (with a brief thought that I’m still only in basically my first year of graduate school). At this rate (about 50-60 hours a week), I should have no problem finishing my PhD in a total of 3 years . . . politics withstanding. You’ll have to catch me at a bar or wedding reception for the full explanation of that.

That withstanding, I’m no longer so sure I should post pictures of the thruster setup and operation. We’re starting to operate on the absolute bleeding edge of technology and there are many not so honorable institutions (both corperate and not-so-national) that would love to devine even an approximate understanding of what is happening here. So in short, any more thruster pictures will basically be sensored (god I hate to do that, but I hate being in jail worse) possibly blurred pictures. However, if you ever land yourself in the Houghton/Hancock area and are a US citizen, feel free to stop by and check it out.

Yes! They?re finally here. I?ve assembled the latest installment of the house pictures from stuff I ran around taking this evening as well as some previously taken pictures. For all those wondering what really took so long, think how you would want your room/house to look before posting pictures of it on the internet. Since you?ve already clicked on the link and aren?t reading this I bring you:

5-23-04 House Pictures

I?ve also added some more injuries. You should check them out too. Enjoy.

Due to some last minute wiring changes Brad and I made before we started the thruster test, the test was aborted. Damn cathode heater gets me every time. Anyway, test has been rescheduled until next Monday and I leaving to go camping at an undisclosed location in 3 minutes. Hopefully this serves as a much needed respite from the stuffy lab I’ve been living in.

Good night thruster, sleep well . . . because tomorrow I’m going to punish you with electricity until you break.

I may as well make it official, my new address is

Dean Massey (aka Whipping Boy)
C/O Dr. Brad King
Vacuum Chamber #1, B007C
RL Smith ME-EM
1400 Townsend Drive
Houghton MI 49931

What a week though. (Begin whining) I?m quite certain that I?ve spent more time in the lab then at home. Thus far I?ve been batting about 50% in the research department ? I didn?t blow anything up, but it didn?t quite work perfect either. Today at about 1:30 I stopped in Brad?s office to see what the testing plan was, we decided to attempt a run tomorrow. This means that I have to have the thruster installed, wired and checked out by 8am when we hit the go button on the pumps. So tomorrow will be spent listening to the cryopump while blazing new paths in Hall thruster development. Where are the other 5 PhD students you ask? Gone from Houghton. So mark my word Alex, Jason S, Jason M, Emily and Jerry after the Joint Propulsion Conference early July, you will not see me until August unless you drive by my house. That said, Friday, I?m going to work on the house. I?ve been trying to balance work vs. other work and to be honest I haven?t been too balanced. Perhaps next week.

Anyway, sorry for the lack of pictures ? I?m a lying sonofabitch. Don?t quote me here, but if I don?t have to put out any fires during tomorrow?s pump down (yeah, like that has happened) maybe I can finish my neat little semi-interactive photo gallery.

The last few weeks have brought a momentous amount of change to the house. In the last week, I?ve hauled over 4,000 pounds of junk to the dump. Where did all this come from? Mostly from removing two more nasty bathrooms on the second floor. Like the others before, it is always gratifying to see an entire pain in the ass cross the threshold out of the house. Besides the bathroom, construction has begun on the third floor. The final plan is to divide it up into 4 bedrooms, one of which was already there. The crown jewel of the operation will be my room. I?m basically taking the front (turret side) third of the floor as my room. Can?t wait.
So where?s the pictures you ask? On the way. Unfortunately, many of the construction pictures turned out blurry so I have to take them again tomorrow when the light is better. However, I will give a you a little taste of what is to come.
This is a shot of the third floor (click for larger).

And I also honored a request issued about a million years ago to post some pictures of what the outside looks like, so here?s a shot looking east at the house.