u/DanKegel

So... I have two 4kw systems, each with a xantrex gt-3. One panel got smashed by a baseball (?) in a storm, and it took me ages to realize nobody was willing to replace old panels. Eventually I did it myself, after learning how to do it safely. The new panel is a used one of same make and model, and tested well with my cheap chinese panel tester. Full voltage being delivered to the inverter. But... inverter says "insufficient solar". :-(

I could theoretically narrow down the problem by swapping the inputs on the inverters temporarily to see if the problem moves with the inputs, but I'm not sure that's a great idea. (It'd mean making a hack extension for the DC lines.)

Each has two strings in parallel, and the bad unit gradually failed over months after the baseball incident, fwiw.

Thoughts?

I've been watching old French movies on Youtube.

Le Majordome (a comedy from 1964) popped up again tonight. I just love it. OK, I've only watched the first half-hour, twice, but I like everything about it: the comic-book plot, the settings, the actors, the costumes, and even the way the main character tells his clients to speak proper french :-)

It's slow paced, like many movies from the before times, so you have a chance to hear and understand the dialog.

Anyone else have a favorite movie for learning french at about B1 or B2 level?

The little kids next door are running around playing hide-and-seek and tag, not video games. Maybe all's right with the world after all...

With 80 windows and tons of leaks, a very limited budget, and a historic designation, there's no way our 4500 sq ft Craftsman built in 1912 could meet passivhaus standards.

But the current heat wave has convinced me that it's time to find a way to (mostly) passively keep the place habitable when it's 95F and humid outside in Los Angeles.

The first things that came to mind were limited air sealing and insulating of the attic floor, getting more screens so we can open more of those 80 windows without letting cats out and raccoons or mosquitoes in, and replacing the attic furnace with a heat pump (as our solar array was sized for it).

But then I popped the attic hatch after sundown when it was cool outside, our few screened windows were open, and it was 85+ inside. The rush of air from the windows and up into the attic (and out the gables) reminded me that there was a strange closed off vent from a closet into the attic. Evidently this is an original passive cooling feature, forgotten after someone closed it off in winter.

Now I'm thinking of embracing that idea and adding another closable exhaust-to-attic vent or two in the other upstairs rooms, for use only when it's hot inside, cool outside, and you have a window open in the room.

Is this something other folks have done? Does it work?

1912 Craftsman home in Los Angeles. No insulation. No A/C. Gabled, vented attic.

Near USC, so inland just a bit. CEC climate zone 9 / IEC climate zone 3, I guess.

It's 94 degrees outside. Just before noon, underside of the roof is 120 degrees on the east side, 100 degrees on west side. Floor of attic is 90 degrees. Ceiling of the interior is 85 degrees. (Per my extech ir250 IR thermometer.)

That 120 degree underside of the roof made me think... that's probably radiating a lot of heat onto the attic floor.

Of course I want to air seal and insulate the attic floor, but that's kind of far off budget-wise.

So... radiant barrier? I see it's been discussed many times on this subreddit, e.g. https://www.reddit.com/r/buildingscience/comments/1jll2xc/radiant_barriers_are_they_worth_it/, and elsewhere, e.g. https://buildingscience.com/documents/building-science-insights/bsi-136-piltdown-man-does-thermal-resistance#P5

I am tempted to DIY it just on the east slope (so about 1/4 of the roof) to see if it reduces attic temps while I still have an uninsulated attic. The current heat wave is going to last several more days, and will likely recur several times this summer, so I have a chance to collect some data before and after.

The local big box sells a 500 sq ft roll for $60. That would let me do a couple rafters' worth, starting a foot above the floor and ending a foot from the ridge. It's unperforated, though.

Thoughts?

I was shopping on Lowe's.com and discovered that, after searching, I could only scroll through the results until the ad displayed on the page. After that, the page still works, but refuses to scroll.

This is an up to date Android pixel 7a.

Gave up shopping at Lowe's for the day.

I have been charging with an L1 charger at home for the last ten years. It's fine, though the first socket I plugged it into wore out, and had to move to the other socket in the outlet. Which makes me kinda want a hardwired EVSE. And maybe something slightly faster.

I'm considering having a bunch of electrical work done (installing A/C), and the panel seems like it's near its current limit... so I'm interested in limiting the current draw.

A 12A L2 EVSE (which would deliver 220*12 = 2.6 KW) seems like the smallest step up from L1, and wouldn't overload my panel.

So... what's a good 12A L2 EVSE?

Et Monsieur Porquoi est un idiot:-)

Gotta say, Telefrancais is pretty amusing.

As mentioned in related subreddits in the past, DFU mode is handy for reimaging old (but not too old) macs. References:

- https://support.apple.com/en-us/108900

- https://mrmacintosh.com/restore-macos-firmware-on-an-apple-silicon-mac-boot-to-dfu-mode/

- https://www.marclittlemore.com/rescuing-my-bricked-m1-macbook-pro/

I needed it because somehow when my work laptop was decomissioned, they let me keep it, but it ended up with an encrypted disk I didn't have the password for. DFU mode to the rescue!

There were two hitches:

1. I didn't have a usb-c to usb-c cable, needed for transferring the new image from the good mac. The one I bought from Walgreens failed to transfer the new image (Apple Configurator, the app you use to do that, barfed with Error 2006). Happily, Target had a real Apple usb-c to usb-c cable, and that worked just fine.
2. Getting into DFU mode is a little mysterious; Apple's instructions are fine, but it's not quite true that you don't see the Apple logo; you see it, and the booting progress bar, for the first few seconds... but just keep holding those four keys down until they go away, and then keep holding just the power button until the big DFU logo shows up in Apple Configurator on the other mac. It's pretty quick once you get the hang of it.

As mentioned in this subreddit in the past, DFU mode is handy for reimaging old (but not too old) macs. References:

- https://support.apple.com/en-us/108900

- https://mrmacintosh.com/restore-macos-firmware-on-an-apple-silicon-mac-boot-to-dfu-mode/

- https://www.marclittlemore.com/rescuing-my-bricked-m1-macbook-pro/

I needed it because somehow when my work laptop was decomissioned, they let me keep it, but it ended up with an encrypted disk I didn't have the password for. DFU mode to the rescue!

There were two hitches:

1. I didn't have a usb-c to usb-c cable, needed for transferring the new image from the good mac. The one I bought from Walgreens failed to transfer the new image (Apple Configurator, the app you use to do that, barfed with Error 2006). Happily, Target had a real Apple usb-c to usb-c cable, and that worked just fine.

2. Getting into DFU mode is a little mysterious; Apple's instructions are fine, but it's not quite true that you don't see the Apple logo; you see it, and the booting progress bar, for the first few seconds... but just keep holding those four keys down until they go away, and then keep holding just the power button until the big DFU logo shows up in Apple Configurator on the other mac. It's pretty quick once you get the hang of it.

Attended their coffee & croissant hour with about ten other folks.  People seemed at B1 or higher level, I was the weakest speaker.  A native speaker or two attended as well.  In the short hour, we played two simple games, including a round of "20 questions".
Everybody had fun, and I learned a word or two in passing, and gained a little confidence.
Highly recommended, worth the $20.

I noticed Quviviq now also has the $135 goodrx coupon that Dayvigo has. Since I've been drowsy the next day after even just 2.5 mg of Dayvigo, I decided to give it a try.

First off, Quvivic has a shorter half-life, and indeed doesn't seem to leave me drowsy in the morning. That's a big plus.

Second, Quvivic is supposedly bad to break or cut, so maybe you can't microdose or save money by buying they higher strength dose and breaking it in two or four, as I had been doing with Dayvigo. Maybe enteric coated gelatin capsules would get around this. You'd need a pill cutter, since the pills are shaped to be hard to split up.

More details after I've been on it for a week or two.

I took a year or so of community college french long ago.

Recently I picked it up again, and started doing light self-study (just watching, listening to, and/or reading french for fun). After six months of that, I felt ready for another class.

Community college didn't seem as easy to find french classes for these days, so I signed up for a small shared class at the Alliance Francaise. I should probably have signed up for A2 level, but I went for B1, and am glad I did. I'm the worst speaker in the class, but it feels like I'm learning a lot, and I am certainly having fun. We're about to start reading "Les Oubliés du dimanche" by Valérie Perrin, and I'm really looking forward to the discussions.

And who knows, maybe I'll actually reach B1 level in a couple months :-)

I caught the sleep timer in the act of failing twice recently.

And I noticed the problem is: it starts playback, but occasionally fails to start the timer.

A workaround seems to be: set the timeout again. The second time, it works.

It's annoying to have to do that, but it's better than a night of poor sleep because the sleep timer failed to stop the player when it was supposed to.

I took a year or so of college french long ago, am trying again to pick up french.

I'm comfortable reading mystery and romance books, partly because you can follow and enjoy those stories even if you miss half the words.

But I wasn't at all able to understand those same books as audiobooks!

So recently I've been alternating listening to and reading them, and sometimes do both at once.

It really helps me follow the torrent of spoken french, and after a few months of nightly listening, I'm starting to be able to follow spoken books better.

Do others do this? What are your favorite books to do this with?

I'm trying Eragon now. (Borrowed the printed book from the local Alliance Francaise; thanks, guys!). Have also enjoyed it with Maigret, Gamache, and Hamish Macbeth stories.