Category Archives: Building Design

My latest field trip, remote places in Alaska.

17 years of intensive study of Alternative Power Production has made me a skeptic in so many ways. It’s not that there isn’t good equipment and decent investments, it’s that there are so many people who would sell you the wrong thing … Continue reading

Posted in Building Design, Critical Thinking, Inspirational People, Off Grid Power, Things I like | Tagged , , | 5 Comments

Jerry Bartlett (Crazy Jerry) top honors in Mileage contest.

If you are a friend of Utterpower, you’ve heard the name Jerry Bartlett more than once. Jerry recently shared with me that he was making good progress in getting a car ready for a high mileage contest and the results … Continue reading

Posted in Building Design, Critical Thinking, DIYer Skills, Earth & Energy, In The News, Inspirational People, Small Diesels, Things I like, Vehicle Design | Tagged | 1 Comment

Today’s Musings, 12/28/12 an important note?

As we attempt to plan our futures, we need stick our finger in the air! “In order to be in control of your life, you have to have a purpose—a productive purpose… A central purpose serves to integrate all the … Continue reading

Posted in Building Design, Buyer Beware, DIYer Skills, Earth & Energy, Uncategorized | Tagged | Leave a comment

PID Control with the Arduino

There are times when a feedback loop is helpful to prevent overshoot or wild oscillations of a process, whether temperature, motion, or other type of system. A common solution is a proportional–integral–derivative controller (PID controller). With this Arduino solution, you tell … Continue reading

Posted in HVAC/Air Conditioning, Uncategorized | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

Building a Arduino Based Weather Station

One of our interests is weather monitoring. It seems like a natural thing for a ham radio operator to be interested in, so we applied our micro-controller expertise and came up with the following project. In it’s current version, it … Continue reading

Posted in Building Design, Uncategorized, Utterpower's Friends | Tagged , , | 5 Comments

Honolulu Hell, what can we learn from Professor Panos?

Of course this post is for the DIYer community, if you are a typical Low Information Voter ‘LIV’, this is not for you, move along to that free energy page, maybe order a Hojo Generator, invest in that big air … Continue reading

Posted in Building Design, Buyer Beware, Critical Thinking, DIYer Skills, Earth & Energy, Fighting Propaganda, In The News, Inspirational People, Trusted Vendors | Tagged , | Leave a comment

In Search Of The Best Fuel/KWH ratio

FOOD FOR CRITICAL THOUGHT IS ALL AROUND US.  A look at a newer engine from China now on the assembly line.  I have been getting calls from a certain off girder who has become obsessed with the idea of fitting a … Continue reading

Posted in Alternative Energy Sources, Building Design, Critical Thinking, DIYer Generator, DIYer Skills, Engines, Generator Realities, Off Grid Power, Slow Speed Engines, Small Diesels, Survival Skills, Trusted Vendors | Tagged , | 62 Comments

The Worst Cabin Design I’ve seen

July 15th 2012, another trip to the Cowiche Mountains I’m back from a wonderful four day stay in the Mountains some 30 miles due west of Yakima. Four wonderful and peaceful days used to reflect on lessons learned, and mistakes … Continue reading

Posted in Building Design, Cowiche Cabin, Critical Thinking, Survival Skills | Tagged , , , | 4 Comments