u/madsci

We've got an AC300 with three B300 batteries, charged by a 2.4 kW solar array. Every night people are plugging electric trike batteries in to charge so they're ready in the morning, but that puts a serious drain on the B300s and can leave them dead before dawn.

What I'd really like is to set up at least one 15-amp outlet for opportunistic charging - all of the optional charger loads would go on that outlet, and once the Bluetti batteries dropped below a set threshold, say 30% SoC, it'd be shut off to leave the remaining juice for lights and stuff.

There doesn't seem to be any way to do that with the AC300 alone. I'm an embedded systems engineer and don't mind building some custom hardware to do it, but I need telemetry from the system to tell me how much juice it has left.

In looking over the manual the only interface I see is Bluetooth. I think the protocol has been reverse engineered but I haven't dug up the details yet. I don't have access to the system right now so testing a solution isn't possible. I don't mind doing a little troubleshooting and tweaking on site, and if it was something like Modbus RTU I'd be 99% sure I could pull it off with minimal adjustments, but Bluetooth can be a pain in the butt.

Is that my only option, or is there another solution? If it has to be Bluetooth, are there any existing projects out there that are known to work reliably that I could use as a starting point?

Thanks!

My mutant vehicle is almost all furry seating surface except for one 1' by 1' control panel. I've decided the control panel isn't really necessary and I'm replacing it with something more practical - a coffee dispenser.

So that leaves me with the requirement to brew a bunch of coffee in camp. Instant would be the easiest option but some people are more discerning about their coffee than I am and might appreciate a little more effort put into it.

I do have a propane stove, and I have the ability to run AC appliances for short periods without a generator, so I could just drag a drip coffee maker along. Is that the most straightforward approach to get "real" coffee easily in multi-quart quantities, or is there a better method I should be considering?

I've got an intermittently-used 2006 F-350 diesel flatbed and the batteries are always getting drained. I've installed a small solar panel on the roof but I'm struggling to find a place to connect it without having to go all the way to the engine compartment.

Based on the Body Builders Layout Book I thought maybe circuit 50, the 12-gauge red wire running back to the trailer hitch, might do it since circuit 49 is explicitly marked "relay feed ignition run", but I'm only getting 12v on circuit 50 when the key is on.

Is there a circuit I can use? Or should I be tapping into one of the pass-through circuits and patching it in under the dash? Or going all the way up to the engine compartment?

Thanks in advance!

This isn't specifically for a disability but I figure this is the most likely place I'm going to find what I'm looking for.

I've got a big (7' x 7', 600 pounds) 6-wheeled rideable robot/vehicle that I drive with an RC airplane controller. I have to have a secure two-handed grip and I have to brace my right hand tight while pinching the right stick so that the jostling of the vehicle doesn't send it into wild oscillations.

I want to move to a one-handed controller, partly because it's fun to be sneaky about who's controlling the bot. I figure what I'm after would probably also be suitable for someone with hand tremor. The key seems to be the ability to have thumb and forefinger both braced securely and opposing each other in isometric tension.

I tried an Android VR controller that can sort of be gripped like that, but it turns out that all of those controllers, even the ones with analog thumbsticks, only report D-pad directions to Android. I gutted that controller and have reworked it into a functioning prototype that works on Android but will need a lot of work to produce a comfortable housing for.

I'm starting to think that the answer might be a miniature ball-type joystick right on the end of a handgrip. I can't recall ever having seen such a thing, though.

Has anyone encountered a controller like this? And if not, are you aware of any broader need for such a controller? If I'm going to go the DIY route, if other people would be interested, I'll put more effort into documenting the build and making it more reproducible.

Thanks!

I'm installing Pergo DuraCraft LVP flooring and the instructions call for a 3/8" gap between the planks and wall, and 3/8" backer rod in the gap. Only the diagram shows the backer rod having the same height as the planks, when in reality 3/8" rod is about twice as high. You're supposed to fill in the rest with silicone sealant and then put quarter round molding over it. Do I just squeeze the sealant in there and then squish it all down with the molding? It's going to take some force and will definitely squish silicone everywhere.

The recommended 3/8\" backer rod. Do I just squish it down?

I'm reworking the teleoperation setup for my rideable robot. Right now I can control it with a common RC aircraft controller (it only uses one stick) but that's a little bulky to carry around. I can also control it with an Android app but the ergonomics aren't great.

What I want is a one-handed joystick controller that can connect to the Android device via Bluetooth as an alternative to the on-screen joystick. All of the one-handed controllers I can find are just D-pads, though, even when they're built with an analog thumbstick.

I want something that can be gripped securely in one hand. The RC controller always has to be used with a 2-handed grip because when you're riding on the vehicle it's easy for the vehicle motion to make you bump the stick. I need to be able to grip the body of the controller with three fingers and grip the stick with thumb and forefinger.

I may end up using a 2-handed X-Box controller for the moment but sometimes I'm sneaky about it and control the bot while standing in a crowd. Something I can use with one hand in a pocket would be ideal. Triggers and buttons are a secondary concern.

Does such a controller exist?

Since automod won't let me post without it:

1. Budget is let's say USD $200
2. Country is USA but open to buying from anywhere
3. Console/platform supported: Android (or generic BLE GATT)
4. Desired features: As described above
5. Types of games: None, it's a robot controller, but the bot does mess with people
6. Other controllers I'm comparing to: ACGAM R1 which didn't work, XBOX Adaptive Joystick which has about the right form factor but no Bluetooth

In the time between post attempts I managed to make a working prototype of my own controller, with a XIAO ESP32C6 board grafted on to the ACGAM R1's joystick and using a 3D printed housing. This is the route I'll pursue if I can't find anything off the shelf, but I'd still rather just buy something.

Every RV forum always has lots of anxious newbies worried (understandably - we all have to start somewhere) about every little thing, like a loose interior panel or a frayed breakaway cable. Let's show them how you keep an RV on the road when real problems crop up - and maybe give them some inspiration for stocking their toolkits.

I'll start with a quick and dirty one I pulled off a few years ago on my old trailer. As I was packing up to head home, one of the hinges on my trailer's rear trunk door failed and the weight of the door and twisting caused by the gas springs ripped the others off. The whole door just fell off completely, and I was going to have to get in there again before I got home.

My fix was to cut pieces off of one of my 2" ratchet straps. I melted the edges with a lighter and then used self-tapping screws to just screw the strips straight to the door and frame to make improvised hinges. It held up fine until I could get new hinges, and the holes were easily sealed up.

What have you had to do to get your RV home, or at least back to civilization?

https://preview.redd.it/isll00ym1d9h1.png?width=2381&format=png&auto=webp&s=d2780cbf50a98a041fd37eb763eb43767787d063

https://preview.redd.it/6cdonqy6xq7h1.png?width=1500&format=png&auto=webp&s=cd48d73905148daf9458154cc18b8bf920d59071

I'm fixing up a 2018 Jayco Octane SL toy hauler and it looks like the floor is likely to be the most difficult project. The painting will be tedious but I'm more confident about that. (Not so much in my ability to choose colors, but that's a separate issue.)

I'm not expecting to have a heavy vehicle in the garage area, and some of the garage has been converted over to clothing and tool storage, but it's still a possibility that I'll have something ATV-sized in there at some point and I'll definitely be dragging toolboxes and stuff in and out. The previous owners took it to Burning Man several times and I'll be doing the same.

The damage to the existing floor seems to have been caused by hauling jagged metal sculpture pieces. I'm not expecting to be quite so rough on it but heavy stuff is going to get slid around and I do want something reasonably durable.

I'm hoping to get some feedback on how complicated this is going to be - there are a lot of irregular edges to follow, and there are several tiedowns in the floor that I'll need to try to accommodate and I'm not sure how that's going to work out - I haven't seen any videos or explanations of how to deal with something set into the floor like that.

Has anyone here redone the floor of their toy hauler? Any lessons learned that you can share?

I've only ever met about three other burners out of ~140,000 people in this valley, but every couple of years I like to check to see if any others have popped up.

I'm one of those people who's gone enough times that preparation is fairly routine; I just go down my 600-item packing list, spend 20-40 hours tearing down and rebuilding the art car and fixing up other projects and equipment that broke last time, and I'm ready to go. This year will be more involved because I'm fixing up a new-to-me trailer.

I've also got plenty of shop space to spare, and maybe even extra room to transport stuff between the flatbed truck and the new toy hauler, so if you've got some art project in mind you've been wanting to build but didn't have a place to do it, didn't have the right tools, or didn't have a way to get it there, hit me up. The ticket scarcity days are over, the Instagram influencers seem to be thinning out, and it's time to make it about weird art and dangerous things to climb on again.