Off road minivan: Your roof is being bent

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Automotive Insanity > Off road minivan: Your roof is being bent

Safety Dance: Sep 10, 2007; Five degrees to starboard!

ryanrs posted:

Help, I'm not dying, but can't get home.
I carry a 50W 2m+70cm ham radio and a decent antenna. I've only needed to use it once, to report some other guy I thought might be in trouble. It works great if you know how to use your radio and have a handy list of local repeaters. I did, and I was able to summon the Kern County Sheriff from the middle of the Kiavah Wilderness. Basically you tune around the local repeaters until you find someone, then ask them to call the sheriff for you.

Or if you don't know how your radio works, you tune to an active repeater but nobody can hear you because you didn't set the right frequency shift and PL tone. If you just buy a radio and throw it in your emergency kit without using it, you're pretty much guaranteed to be hosed in a real emergency.

Do you have a ham radio operator's license?

# ¿ Mar 7, 2021 14:50

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# ¿ May 10, 2024 01:48

Safety Dance: Sep 10, 2007; Five degrees to starboard!

Elmnt80 posted:

You might consider a literal anchor as a thing to attach your winch to in sandy conditions.

ryanrs posted:

I've heard of people burying their spare tire in the sand as an anchor.

I don't think I've seen you mention it, but do you carry Maxtrax or similar recovery boards? I was just watching a video where a guy buried some as a winch anchor.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_w6xM7npW0o

# ¿ Mar 7, 2021 21:56

Safety Dance: Sep 10, 2007; Five degrees to starboard!

I have doubts about a boat anchor's ability to dig in and hold, versus becoming a projectile if there's any elasticity in the winch cable.

# ¿ Mar 7, 2021 22:14

Safety Dance: Sep 10, 2007; Five degrees to starboard!

ryanrs posted:

Wow, that looks way better than burying your spare! Thank you for the great idea.

I carry a pair of these $95 maxtrax ripoffs. For those unfamiliar with the name brand maxtrax in that video, those 4 plastic boards he had retail for $600. Noooope.

My off-brand traction boards aren't as strong as the maxtrax, but they seem to work ok. I've heard they can get brittle in freezing weather. I can also throw some of my long-handled tools in the hole to reinforce the boards (pickaxe, sledgehammer, pipe, etc).

The same guy did a video comparing his maxtrax to ~$100 knockoffs, and came to the conclusion that the maxtrax were a little better, but the knockoffs weren't bad at all. They cracked a little when he used them as a jacking point and that's about it.

# ¿ Mar 7, 2021 22:23

Safety Dance: Sep 10, 2007; Five degrees to starboard!

Automotive Insanity > Offroad Minivan: Burnt Sienna

# ¿ Mar 9, 2021 00:55

Safety Dance: Sep 10, 2007; Five degrees to starboard!

I swear your Sienna looks identical to the one I drove in high school, with the exception of a big dent where I tried to push a shopping cart without getting out of the car once.

e. I even got mine stuck up to the axles in mud once.

# ¿ Mar 9, 2021 02:43

Safety Dance: Sep 10, 2007; Five degrees to starboard!

ryanrs posted:

Zoom out, enhance:

Hah! No, the dent was on the rear passenger quarter panel, about elbow high. I was not kind to that Sienna.

# ¿ Mar 9, 2021 15:23

Safety Dance: Sep 10, 2007; Five degrees to starboard!

I found a guy selling a Monprice 3D printer on Craigslist for $50 because he couldn't figure it out. I got it running quickly and replaced the bed. It's not as nice as the latest Prusa or whatnot, but it's a working 3D printer for under $100 with a decent build volume. Check and see if someone near you spent too much on a fancy toy and wants to unload it.

e: Some resin 3D printers are selling for under $300 nowadays. When I have the room, that's going to be an upgrade I get.

Safety Dance fucked around with this message at 22:35 on Jun 8, 2021

# ¿ Jun 8, 2021 22:33

Safety Dance: Sep 10, 2007; Five degrees to starboard!

The Sienna is front-wheel drive, so I don't think the parking brake would help in that situation.

# ¿ Jun 17, 2021 16:02

Safety Dance: Sep 10, 2007; Five degrees to starboard!

Aluminum oxidizes pretty quickly, forming a layer of aluminum oxide on its surface that protects the aluminum underneath. I bet whoever faced that billet left a greasy handprint, and the aluminum oxide formed differently so it reflects light differently.

# ¿ Jul 20, 2021 03:40

Safety Dance: Sep 10, 2007; Five degrees to starboard!

According to McMaster, the cheapest one of these has a sensitivity of 0.157" / 1ft, which, if my high school trig serves me well, is about 2/3 of a degree out from level. I'm not sure if that means getting the bubble within the circle is 2/3 of a degree out from level or what, but I bet that you'll affect "level" more by climbing around in the van.

Safety Dance fucked around with this message at 19:49 on Sep 29, 2021

# ¿ Sep 29, 2021 19:44

Safety Dance: Sep 10, 2007; Five degrees to starboard!

Krakkles posted:

Oh man, I feel guilty before I even suggest this, but since it's for off-road anyway ... maybe kill the brake pedal switch?

This would be a good excuse for one of those switches with the red covers.

# ¿ Sep 30, 2021 03:22

Safety Dance: Sep 10, 2007; Five degrees to starboard!

Aren't the speedo and the odometer typically separate things? I'd be surprised if the Sienna was designed such that an ABS fault would let the odometer be wrong.

# ¿ Sep 30, 2021 04:00

Safety Dance: Sep 10, 2007; Five degrees to starboard!

Applebees Appetizer posted:

I was just joking dude. But I've found that beer usually works best lol.

I tried that with my local bike shop and it turns out most of them don't drink!

# ¿ Oct 5, 2021 16:14

Safety Dance: Sep 10, 2007; Five degrees to starboard!

Darchangel posted:

I can't really comment on an aftermarket TPMS from experience, but they can't be terribly difficult to install. The old school ones required strapping a sensor on the the barrel of the wheel inside the tire, but modern systems, including OEM, just use a sensor that incorporated the valve stem. The tire has to have the bead broken, but it doesn't have to be dismounted entirely to install them.

There are aftermarket tire pressure systems where the sensor is just the valve stem cap, and there's a little display that plugs into the cigarette lighter. I can't speak to the quality, but I bet you could find a decently reviewed one.

# ¿ Nov 9, 2021 02:25

Safety Dance: Sep 10, 2007; Five degrees to starboard!

ryanrs posted:

So that's two votes for Anvil Canyon selfie? (And though I appreciate the watery sentiment, my 'expedition' loadout already includes 200 lbs of water and I will not be doubling that.)

Just make sure the 200lbs is in multiple containers, so that if you spring a leak you don't lose it all.

# ¿ Dec 3, 2021 18:08

Safety Dance: Sep 10, 2007; Five degrees to starboard!

Hey ryanrs, do you have a twitter/instagram/other place where you post photos of your van? I was telling a coworker (who also uses a converted Toyota Sienna as a mini camper) about your van, and she was curious to see more. I didn't want to lead with "so have you heard of the dead internet comedy forum Something Awful Dot Com? No no it's not like that"

# ¿ Jul 20, 2022 18:04

Safety Dance: Sep 10, 2007; Five degrees to starboard!

ryanrs posted:

Bear Alarm
I want a bear early warning system to alert me if a bear enters my camp at night. Then I can chase it away before it gets into my food and destroys everything. I'm guessing bears spend a few minutes quietly poking around before digging in, so that's my window.

I made a prototype networked radar / thermal smart sensor, but I still need to write a bit of firmware to verify it actually works. I want to go full sci-fi / heist movie with this tech. For example, the system should be smart enough to draw a map of the sensor deployment automatically, without me having to gently caress around in ms paint each evening.

Biggest risk is the software, because I will probably lose interest when it's only 10% complete. Really not looking forward to making an iphone app.

Would it be easier to deploy the sensors on the corners of your van? That way, you get proximity alarms around where you're sleeping and you don't have to re-jigger the map of how they're deployed. Also, obviates the need for an iPhone app if it just flashes some lights and sounds inside the van.

# ¿ Oct 11, 2022 20:09

Safety Dance: Sep 10, 2007; Five degrees to starboard!

ryanrs posted:

The device needs to be reasonably self-contained and compact, so I can show it off to interested parties such as potential employers.

That's also why I am taking pains to design-in interesting hardware capabilities, but I'm not fully committed to actually implementing the software. If this was an actual consumer electronics product, the app-level software and network code would be done by a different team. It's too big for one person to do it all in a reasonable amount of time.

I specifically want to show I can take a hardware design from concept, through circuit design, mechanical design, firmware, and outsourced manufacturing (just board assembly and enclosure 3d printing for now). Scaling up manufacturing beyond 10-100 prototypes is also a job for other people (probably need to re-design/optimize everything at that point, e.g. injection molding).

So that's the background context for this project.

OK, yeah, fair enough. It's an interesting tech demo!

# ¿ Oct 11, 2022 21:07

Safety Dance: Sep 10, 2007; Five degrees to starboard!

kastein posted:

I know a lot of things like excavator buckets are made out of AR500, maybe that? The guys in my press brake fb group seem to find it fairly difficult to bend.

You would be in a press brake facebook group.

# ¿ Oct 12, 2022 17:34

Safety Dance: Sep 10, 2007; Five degrees to starboard!

StormDrain posted:

Is this a friend of yours?

https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZTR4k6D5e/

It's mid-engined for better off-road weight distribution

# ¿ Dec 3, 2022 02:36

Safety Dance: Sep 10, 2007; Five degrees to starboard!

ryanrs posted:

And for this trip, I think that means it stays at home.

That's a funny way of saying "I'm going to build a small electric crane for moving spare wheel+tire combos onto and off of my roof basket."

# ¿ Dec 21, 2022 23:44

Safety Dance: Sep 10, 2007; Five degrees to starboard!

Platystemon posted:

Put the spare on the hood like you’re on safari.

I did this once on my Jeep. It was a look.

# ¿ Dec 22, 2022 03:17

Safety Dance: Sep 10, 2007; Five degrees to starboard!

ryanrs posted:

Return Trip

Maybe relocate the spare tire? Or at least fix the snapped cable.

You could upgrade the gas shocks on the liftgate and mount it there (assuming there's some structure to mount it to).

# ¿ Jan 13, 2023 05:16

Safety Dance: Sep 10, 2007; Five degrees to starboard!

ryanrs posted:

It's not really about the cup holder, it's about designing and making the thing. I've wanted to do a plywood tab and slot project for a while, and there aren't many places to do carpentry on a car (morgans excepted). So the cup holder carpentry was a nice opportunity, but Putin hosed it all up.

Oh well. I will probably stick with the roll of duct tape for now.

I have more interesting van parts already in production, albeit slightly delayed:

You realize this is baltic birch plywood that's already sitting in a warehouse in they US, right? They don't pay a Wagner PMC to slice up trees on-demand.

# ¿ Feb 14, 2023 21:03

Safety Dance: Sep 10, 2007; Five degrees to starboard!

ryanrs posted:

Just 'Ryan'.

CNC A/C plate cost breakdown:
$130 base part
+65 add the 'R'
+25 anodize red
+40 expedite fee during Chinese Lunar New Year
+20 shipping
+20 tax
----------------
= $300

Goddamn, it better not leak.

I assumed it was Rear, for the rear A/C.

# ¿ Feb 21, 2023 05:44

Safety Dance: Sep 10, 2007; Five degrees to starboard!

ryanrs posted:

Antenna

The old one was bent up from using it to break into the van when I locked my keys inside. I bent it into a hook and used it with a door wedge I whittled from firewood.

Wish I'd thought of this on prom night in 2004 when I locked my keys in my Sienna.

# ¿ Feb 24, 2023 07:53

Safety Dance: Sep 10, 2007; Five degrees to starboard!

I was gonna say TinyGo, but that's my answer to everything and I've already forgotten what microcontroller you were using.

# ¿ Mar 14, 2023 04:07

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# ¿ May 10, 2024 01:48

Safety Dance: Sep 10, 2007; Five degrees to starboard!

What are you using to model the parts you're sending to Sendcutsend?

# ¿ Apr 9, 2023 21:18

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Automotive Insanity > Off road minivan: Your roof is being bent