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The Star Trek Corridor

8/12/2016

TW is a huge Star Trek fan so the lower levels of the house will have a definite Star Trek / Sci-Fi vibe.

In keeping with the Star Trek motif we are calling the levels "decks" like a ship. In a ship the Main Deck is designated as deck 1 and lower decks are consecutively numbered 2, 3, 4 etc.

So, the main level of the house is Deck 1, the mid-level of the basement (East) is Deck 2 and the lowest level (West) is "Deck 3". :-)

The main project we've been working on over the past few months has been building out Deck 2.

A central feature for this half of the basement is a 20 foot hallway that runs directly beneath the hallway on the main level.

This hallway acts as the "spine" of the house. The plumbing, electric, Ethernet and coax run through the steel trusses in the ceiling and fan out to the rooms on either side on both levels.

In keeping with our passive solar design, the north side of the corridor is windowless and has two "Cargo Bays" for storage. The south side has Crew Quarters for visiting guests.

The house is built into a ridge so the north side is entirely underground while the south side has windows and a walkout. Visiting Starfleet dignitaries will have their own private patio!

The picture on the right shows the framing for the two Cargo Bay pocket doors.

Fun With LEDs

I decided to put a suspended ceiling in the corridor so we will have access to the utilities that run down the 'spine'. But to stay with the Star Trek theme it had to be something interesting.

We started by installing about 100 feet of LED strip lights around the perimeter. The LED strips come in 16 foot rolls with a self-adhesive backing so they are very easy to install. This is our third project with LED strip lights and we plan to use them much more in the future.

The strips are powered with inexpensive 12V 'bricks'.

We wanted the ceiling to have a futuristic look and investigated a lot of different suspended ceiling products. We finally decided on translucent plastic panels from Ceilume. They come in a variety of different patterns and we selected the simple Polyline for it's classic industrial look.

Main Engineering Blast Door

We wanted something really cool as a focal point at the end of the hallway. TW designed a fantastic graphic for the door and we commissioned RMwraps in Idaho to produce the graphic. Click on the pictures below to order your own Star Trek door !

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Cutting Cable - Part 1

7/25/2015

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Intro

We don't have any cable TV service on the mountain so we have to look at alternatives. Two of our primary candidates are Over The Air (OTA) and streaming services such as KODI.

In this post I'll discuss OTA which can deliver the major broadcast networks and some PBS stations.

To find out what Over The Air (OTA) stations might be within range I used the transmitter locator tool on antennapoint.com (click on the image to go to their site).

They identified 15 transmitters within a 60 mile radius. Most of the stations are directly south in the Atlanta metro area and should be within range with a suitable antenna.

Three stations (Chatsworth, Athens and Toccoa) are far off axis.

Note that each transmitter broadcasts multiple stations so we should be able to get quite a few channels OTA.

Experiment I - Leaf Indoor Antenna

For the first experiment we tried the Mohu Leaf 50 amplified indoor antenna.

I selected this antenna based on small size, good reviews and the fact that the amplifier is separate so I could try it with and without the amplifier.

The antenna itself is about the size of a sheet of paper and only 1/4" thick. This allows us to hang it on the wall with a couple of tacks and try different locations.

Most of the major stations are in Atlanta which is almost directly south. For the initial experiments I just tacked the antenna to a south facing wall near the TV.

Results

The results are both better and worse than I expected.

On the positive side, the indoor Leaf 50 picked up 19 transmitters with a total of 68 channels. This is 5 more transmitters than predicted by the locator tool. As expected, we are not able to pick up 8 (Athens) which is off-axis and very low power. I'm surprised that we are able to pick up 18 (Chatsworth) and 32 (Toccoa).

In addition, we are picking up 5 transmitters that were not identified by the tool. These include 4 (very poor signal), 26, 45, 47 and 50. None of these transmitters are significant for us.

Virtual channel 26 is a low power station in Atlanta transmitting shopping, Spanish and French channels.
Virtual channel 45 is W45DX-D which is a low power station in Atlanta licensed to Home Shopping Network.
Virtual channel 47 is also a low power station in Atlanta. It is owned by Korean American TV Broadcasting.
Virtual channel 50 is also a low power station located in Atlanta

On the negative side, reception is inconsistent. Sometimes we get 60 (or more) channels and at others we have almost no reception at all. It does not seem weather related so I must consider the possibility that there's interference from our WiFi or other wireless devices in the house.

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Temperature Sensors - Part III

4/13/2015

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Intro
As mentioned in the first temperature Sensor post (way back in December of 2013) there's a lot of theoretical info on how much heat can be stored in the slab but there isn't very much practical info on how long it takes for the slab to warm up in the sun, how warm does it actually get and how fast does it cool off at night so I wanted a way to measure the temperature of the slab throughout the day.

My brother Phil is an experienced software engineer so he came up with a really cool system that allowed us to embed temperature sensors right in the slabs before they were poured. We now have the system running and we're starting to collect data.

The first step was to get all of the cables terminated. Internet, phone, sensors.... yikes - that's a lot of cable!

Making progress...

The Hardware
We use one-wire digital temperature sensors from Dallas Semiconductor. There are 5 sensors embedded in the basement slab, 11 in the main level slab and 4 in the main level ceilings above the drywall. I have several spare channels that will be used to monitor outside air temperature as well as inside air temperature on both levels.

An Arduino processor (on the left) retrieves data from the sensors and a small embedded PC (on the right) collects the data and publishes it to web every 15 minutes.

Results
The planning, modelling and engineering are finally starting to come together. Now we can monitor the temperatures of both slabs in real time. Here are the temps right now as I'm writing this post.... How Cool Is That!!

The data is stored permanently for graphing and analysis. The graph for the past eight days clearly shows the difference between cloudy days on the 6th and 7th versus sunny days on the 8th and 9th.

It's interesting to note that the slab doesn't start to warm up until late afternoon (4:00 - 6:00 PM). Following a sunny day, the slab will stay above 70 degrees for up to 12 hours.

It's already past the Spring Equinox so our heating season is almost over. I'm looking forward to seeing how the house performs next Fall and Winter.

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Temperature Sensors - Part II

2/2/2014

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As I mentioned in a previous post, we are embedding temperature sensors in the concrete floors so we can measure the heating from the sun and the effects of thermal mass. The crew installed 11 sensors in the upper slab before pouring the concrete. We now have 7 sensors in the basement slab and 11 sensors in the main floor slab.

When the framing is complete we will install additional sensors in the ceilings and roof.

The first floor sensors go through the metal deck and will get routed through the basement ceilng.

The basement sensors go through the concrete floor and will be routed up through the basement walls.

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Temperature Sensors - Science Project

12/20/2013

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Since neoTerra is a passive solar project we are incorporating thermal mass in the form of concrete slabs in the basement and on the first floor (I'll talk about the construction of the suspended first floor slab in a future post).

There's a lot of theoretical info on how much heat can be stored in the slab but there isn't very much practical info on how long it takes for the slab to warm up in the sun, how warm does it actually get and how fast does it cool off at night so I wanted a way to measure the temperature of the slab throughout the day.

My brother Phil is an experienced software engineer so he came up with a really cool system that allows us to embed temperature sensors right in the slab. It uses a very small computer called an Arduino and very precise temperature sensors from Dallas Semiconductor. I'll post details on the project in the How-To section.

The sensors are encased in stainless steel sleeves so we can bury them diretly in the concrete. We are putting seven sensors in the basement slab.

Three will get direct sun, three will be in areas that get partial sun and one will be in an area that doesn't get any sun.

We are tying them to the remesh before we pour the slab.

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Fun with Fans - Science Project

10/6/2013

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You know how the basement always stays nice and cool in the summer. In our present home there is at least a five degree difference at each level. The basement will be comfortable at 75 while the second floor is at 85.

Our open floor plan makes the problem worse. When we run the air conditioning the second floor cools off. But as soon as the AC stops, the cold air all settles back down in the basement.

neoTerra will also have an open stairwell. We thought it would be reallly nice if we could circulate that cool basement air up to the main floor, so I did a little science project to test the theory.

For this test, I selected a 340 CFM Panasonic WhisperLine fan. These are among the quietest and most energy efficient on the market.

I put the fan on the basement floor and used flexible duct to push the air up the stairwell to the second floor.

It worked better than expected, though the cleaning lady was a little baffled by the shiny metal tubing running up the hallway!

The 340 CFM fan actually moves too much air for a single room so I'm planning to buy two smaller units for neoTerra. We will locate them at opposite ends of the house to make the air travel as far as possible to get back down the central stairwell.

Here's a link to the Panasonic web site:
http://www.panasonic.com/business/building-products/ventilation-systems/products/whisper-line.asp

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The Star Trek Corridor

Cutting Cable - Part 1

Temperature Sensors - Part III

Temperature Sensors - Part II

Temperature Sensors - Science Project

Fun with Fans - Science Project

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