tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-237402112024-02-21T07:56:19.420-08:00Go BoxThe toyota land cruiser is to all cars as X is to set of x. And things about PanamaEdhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10195137182893721649noreply@blogger.comBlogger38125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23740211.post-80700972384862184412008-04-21T07:49:00.000-07:002008-04-21T08:30:14.173-07:00Dani Rodrik on developementEvery Sunday the national paper here in Panama , La Prensa, publishes a pull out digest of the New York times from the previous week. A couple of months ago I saw an article with a quotation the really struck a cord:<br /><a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/30/business/worldbusiness/30trade.html?_r=1&oref=slogin"><br />“Like most Turks of my generation I thought I would end up doing engineering,” he said. But at Harvard, “a new world opened for me and I started to understand that the problems of underdevelopment were not technical problems in the sense of a lack of engineers or a lack of doctors. It was a problem of social organization.”<br /></a><br /><br />NYT, January 30th, 2007 LOUIS UCHITELLE<br /><br />My experience in the Campo is similar, it is not lack of knowledge always that keeps people down, but problems in organization, lack of leadership, and fighting between families that keeps them from working together that results in ´underdevelopment.´ <br /><br />Useally, seminars on technical stuff are more important because they let farmers get together from different areas and get to know each other. This becomes much more valuable than the actual technical knowledge they gain from the seminar, getting to know each other and gaining trust between each other allows them to organise better, and gives them confidence to trade information and share experience.<br /><br />For example, last January I helped to put on a seminar on drying. About thirteen farmers came to the seminar to learn how to better dry their coffee. Two of those farmers went and taught farmers from Neighboring towns the techniques that they had learned, which helped to strengthen connections between the farmers. It is hard to quantify the output or results from this work, but it is probably the most important and sustainable work we do in Peace Corps, basically being an excuse for people to get together and get to know each other better so they can have better organisations.Edhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10195137182893721649noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23740211.post-92023348581072531152008-03-15T19:26:00.000-07:002008-03-15T19:28:58.217-07:00asus computerSaw a girl at a hostel typing away on a tiny little computer, perhaps the gobox of computer, at $400 no less. <br /><br />here is the <a href="http://event.asus.com/eeepc/microsites/en/index.htm">link</a>.Edhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10195137182893721649noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23740211.post-26555987930721776262008-03-06T08:31:00.000-08:002008-03-06T08:38:20.639-08:00DryingI´ve realized that for me the big work is to see if I can make a significant difference in the dryness of the coffee with the communities I work with, or a significant difference in the knowledge of the farmers on how to dry thier coffee. <br /><br />This is the biggest problem with the coffee from farmers I work with, it's not dry enough, and therefore it gets damaged, and then it can't be exported, so it gets a lower price.<br /><br />My goal for the next year is to have a campaign in the area where I live to get the coffee dry enough, one big push to try to see if farmers can get their coffee to a high enough quality to sell internationally, and if the price is worth it for them to do the extra work to get the coffee down to that dryness.<br /><br />more to come...Edhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10195137182893721649noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23740211.post-16917580208337938772007-10-14T11:15:00.000-07:002007-10-14T14:00:57.832-07:00MIG fighters and Coffee FarmersThe most exciting thing to happen to me in a this week occurred when I climbed up to my neighbor's house and found this :<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiP8ZMHqQl69o1J5n1vxx0BOt-KI0vBTwJb2RbW5vINeeqIF-a3exQOuO8xNEGDveZrE-41OnHSIEU5HmcvSVAq6OxoYs301do2OQpQKccxJsB0I441gwmajp94gosE2POWMAkc0Q/s1600-h/Imagen+045.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiP8ZMHqQl69o1J5n1vxx0BOt-KI0vBTwJb2RbW5vINeeqIF-a3exQOuO8xNEGDveZrE-41OnHSIEU5HmcvSVAq6OxoYs301do2OQpQKccxJsB0I441gwmajp94gosE2POWMAkc0Q/s400/Imagen+045.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5121296040660285858" /></a><br /><br />A week earlier I dropped off plans from my boss. My neighbor said he would get the materials ready and we would build it together. When I arrived on the day we had planned to build the depulper, it was almost done. <br /><br />One of my goals is to figure out what the minimum amount of capital or resources a farmer would need to produce high quality coffee and thereby increase his or her income. This depulper usually costs a couple hundred dollars, but Hermonigo , pictured above, is figuring out how to do it for about $40. Depulpers are necessary as the only way to process coffee without damaging the it is to depulp by hand, which is very time consuming. <br /><br />In addition to making me happy, the wooden depulper made me think of an article I read before coming to the Peace Corps. <br /><br />A couple of years ago wired magi zine wrote an article about a rich guy who had started buying MiG fighter jets from the former soviet union. He then outsourced planes flown by hired pilots to the Navy for their pilots to practice and train against. One quotation has helped me think about my work here:<br /><br /><em>"Kirlin owes his operation to the collapse of the Soviet Union and the <strong>elegant crudeness</strong> of its technology. "When the Soviets built an airplane, they intended it to serve for 50 years, maintained in the middle of nowhere by a kid who could barely read, using a tool kit not much bigger than a box of fishing tackle." By comparison, he explains, a US warplane is designed around one parameter - performance. Price and complexity are barely considered. "All Americans want is a thoroughbred, but the Russians, they want quarter horses. And lots of 'em. <strong>Their whole design philosophy is based on simplicity and reliability</strong>." </em><br /><br /><a href="http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/13.10/kirlin.html">Builing your own airforce, one mig at a time</a><br /><br />I´ve found that this idea of elegant crudeness has helped me to design projects and think through problems, along with the idea of simplicity and reliability. <br /><br />Likewise, many of the commercial farmers that we learn from are not under the same financial constraints as the farmers i work with who are in extreme poverty. The speciality coffee industry is more like the United States during the cold war, with the pursuit of quality at nearly any costs, as those costs in the market are almost always recouped. I live in a place that is much closer to soviet Russia, better yet Siberian Soviet Russia, in terms of available resources. In order to produce quality coffee we have to get more resourceful and creative under more constraints.Edhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10195137182893721649noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23740211.post-3195822682229873402007-09-03T13:34:00.000-07:002007-09-03T14:26:25.771-07:00ResponseSomeone commented on my post, and here I thought I was writing to myself. So here goes my response. Thanks for commenting, Daniel.<br /><br /><em>Ed, I am wondering about the nature of this poverty trap and some comments that you made about the erosion of the soil. Is the race for education capital being run against the land? </em><br /><br />I don´t think "The race for education" runs against the land. Traditional farming where I live essentially means clear cutting rain forest, burning it, and then planting rice, beans,corn, or root crops on it. Planting coffee involves cutting down some of the underbrush, but the canopy remains intact, and much of the habitat for animals. <br /><br />For soil errosion, coffee trees are permenant, and are much better at holding back soil than beans, or rice or clearing it for anything else, and if you mix in some soil errosion barriers to stop the errosion, even better.<br /> <br /><br /><em>Clearly diminishing returns off of the farm because of erosion would be a terrible burden. what is the general effect of growing coffee on the land? i ask this question for all those liberal folks loving their 'sustainable' coffee in the morning. </em><br /><br />Coffee trees, and coffee harvesting, are better for the people economically, and in the long run better for the land. They can make enough money to buy as much corn, rice or beans as they would had they planted those crops on the same space , and still have some money left over. Also the soil errosion is much less and the large shade trees are left so the land is still worth more and more productive.<br /><br /><em>also could you comment on the possibilities of education? as you indicate that is the way out of poverty. is it sending children off to boarding school and then hoping that they stay in the city to work?</em><br /><br />Yeah, they either have to board at a highschool, or they have to go to a city and live with a family as a house keeper, or live with older brothers or sisters that already live in the cities if they want to go to highschool. The only highschool that goes to 12th grade is a 6 hour walk away and it only offers agricultural. There are more courses of study offered off the reservation. If a student finishes highschool and maybe some college he or she can hope to get a job in the city and send money back, or get a job with the state working for one of the agencies or for the school system on the reservation.<br /><br />Thanks a bunch for the comment, I hope this helps to answer some of the questions!Edhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10195137182893721649noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23740211.post-14075692614689443712007-08-28T10:11:00.000-07:002007-08-28T10:27:29.534-07:00Go Box Coffee and "The end of Povety"Can a poor farmer grow coffee and increase his income to such a degree that he can escape extreme poverty? That is the question that I am trying to answer for myself during my Peace Corps service. What would a farmer have to do and how many hectarias of coffee would he or she have to have based on a family size to generate enough income to escape extreme poverty?<br /><br />First off, what does it mean to escape extreme poverty? WHen you have enough to eat, to build a shelter, and to take care of your health. <br /><br />The next step is to get out of the "poverty trap," which Jeffery Sachs defines as an economic state where your capital depriciates faster than it is accumulated. For example, with the people I work with, as they grow beans and corn on their hillsides, the rain errodes the top soil and the fertility of the land is decreased. The income from the land is not enough to invest in the farm so each year the farmer and his family are poorer than they were the year before.<br /><br />The hope is that with a product like coffee, they could make enough money to invest in thier family and farm to escape the poverty trap. For example, by selling coffee, the family could have enough to buy enough food for the year, necessary medicine, and have a nice house, and on top of that send one of thier kids to school plus extra education so they might get a job. Once the son or daughter graduates, they can send back money, either to invest in the farm, or so that his or her brothers or sisters can also go to school. This way, the capital of the family, in this case the educational capital, is growing and is growing at a rate faster than other forms of capital. The family is now out of the poverty trap and is on "ladder" of economic developement, as Sachs puts it. At least that is the idea anyway. I´m working to see if it can become a reality.Edhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10195137182893721649noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23740211.post-33084206980918130272007-08-23T17:32:00.001-07:002007-08-23T17:32:31.874-07:00CoffeeEdhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10195137182893721649noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23740211.post-53925714817171397622007-08-08T13:36:00.000-07:002007-08-08T13:42:28.828-07:00Diesel Go Box<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi16HgcfM5A7gUrQvzHgc3NooHgaC16Bou8a3xBc_n97xcskUMKqaAPGXpggRH-UkwofelYhcxASr8n3n5tfVosQ9zFfyTvvdt86eaKQPrgZF-wCX-dc1a9RAWmUos5-tlQV5KK5w/s1600-h/IMG_0758.JPG"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi16HgcfM5A7gUrQvzHgc3NooHgaC16Bou8a3xBc_n97xcskUMKqaAPGXpggRH-UkwofelYhcxASr8n3n5tfVosQ9zFfyTvvdt86eaKQPrgZF-wCX-dc1a9RAWmUos5-tlQV5KK5w/s320/IMG_0758.JPG" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5096432196029585202" /></a>Edhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10195137182893721649noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23740211.post-28612294540538743432007-07-18T11:13:00.000-07:002007-07-18T11:18:19.952-07:00TolietA friend let me borrow this book, and it has plans on how to build a $25 composting toilet. I´m going to build one in my site to see how it goes.Edhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10195137182893721649noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23740211.post-53760347605720865362007-07-17T17:34:00.001-07:002007-08-23T18:44:49.876-07:00Gross Domestic ToughnessThere should be a new "econometric" : Gross Domestic Toughness. GDT.<br /><br />Where I live, people do not contribute much to GDP. Most of the food they produce they consume themselves, and a lot of the work they do could be done in 1/1ooth of the time with modern machinery. However nearly everything they do contributes to what I would like to call the Gross Domestic Toughness. Not sure how the formula would work for this one. One example I can give is this : a John Deer tractor produces exponentially more than 1 guy swinging a machete, but the machete swinger is maintaining the toughness production of the country, and could probably be the crap out of the guy working the tractor. <br /><br />Helping out a nieghbor build his grass roof hut got me thinking about this. I was walking up this hill carrying about 80 lbs of wet straw to this guys house. My neighbor , aparisio, is going to use the straw for the roof of his hut. It will take him and his family about 50 more trips of hiking this straw up over this mountain about a mile and a half to get the roof done. The hut is no bigger than 15 by 20 feet. <br /><br />I think the toughness idea came to me when i came to the top of the hill and found two of his brothers sucking down hot sugary coffee like it was Gatorade. they had both beaten me up the hill, carrying a much higher percentage of their malnourished body wieght than i was. After cresting the hill and I doing all i could to set down my straw bale without sprawling out and looking like a total wuss, they gave me this look like " what are you tired for, we eat little mountains like this for breakfast" but instead just handed me a gord of the piping hot coffee, which if sweetened to the point where you can feel it rotting your teeth is a great re hydrator. <br /><br />any ways, for less than 200 dollars, the fam could throw up a roof in 1/20 th of the time and about 1/10000th of the pain, but then who would make up for the lack of toughness that otherwise would not be added to the economy?Edhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10195137182893721649noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23740211.post-36253287390541253742007-05-21T11:48:00.000-07:002007-05-21T11:50:55.243-07:00InstructablesI love <a href="http://www.instructables.com">instructables</a> . <br /><br />One interesting project is a cheap electrical generator. <br /><br /><a href="http://www.instructables.com/id/ERTAINQF18DW99A/">http://www.instructables.com/id/ERTAINQF18DW99A/</a>Edhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10195137182893721649noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23740211.post-24471624172420684032007-04-08T10:46:00.000-07:002007-04-08T10:53:43.204-07:00Edhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10195137182893721649noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23740211.post-85847866281255105502007-04-07T12:29:00.000-07:002007-04-07T12:52:05.738-07:00Minimum Input ProjectsLiving amongst extreme poverty has gotten me thinking a lot about reducing the minimum cost of imputs, in both time and money, for starting projects. What are the cheapest tools you can make yourself? what is the cheapest house you can build? what is the cheapest way to get electricity? The cheapest flashlight? cheapest way to get all the nurtriants you need? <br /><br />One Minimum Input Project I'm trying to get rolling now is for a photo project with kids at the school. I came across this design for a pinhole camera using 35 mm film and a match box, some electrical tape. If you use some expired film, than the whole project is pretty cheap. <br /><br />Links:<br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/tags/matchboxpinhole/">Flickr photos with Matchbox Pinhole tags</a><br /><br /><a href="http://alspix.blog.co.uk/index.php/alspix/2005/12/31/">Here's the website that explains the basic construction by the guy who designed it.</a>Edhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10195137182893721649noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23740211.post-90762740370005475692007-03-16T20:16:00.000-07:002007-03-16T20:17:50.968-07:00Guide to Field SolderingInstructables comes through again. Im here waiting for a late bus back to site, and found this <a href="http://www.instructables.com/id/ETCSN5UKKDEWVV2NMR/">site on how to solder without electricity</a>.Edhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10195137182893721649noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23740211.post-27405285122887325742007-02-22T22:23:00.000-08:002007-02-22T22:24:57.001-08:00Go Box electricution<a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/edobrien/UpInTheCoMarca/photo#5030115565091303682"><img src="http://lh5.google.com/image/edobrien/Rc6PdKxuMQI/AAAAAAAABdY/sVAHXnO3saw/s288/Imagen%20012.jpg"></a><br /><br /><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/edobrien/NorthCarolina/photo#5034604236494924210"><img src="http://lh3.google.com/image/edobrien/Rd6B4Oz06bI/AAAAAAAABs4/owd5zrtdJ14/s288/Imagen%20016.jpg"></a>Edhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10195137182893721649noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23740211.post-12510122698896877292007-02-22T22:20:00.001-08:002007-02-22T22:22:07.280-08:00Go Box entry<a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/edobrien/NorthCarolina/photo#5034604197840218498"><img src="http://lh6.google.com/image/edobrien/Rd6B1-z06YI/AAAAAAAABsg/qC_WV-TPerA/s288/Imagen%20013.jpg"></a><br /><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/edobrien/NorthCarolina/photo#5034604206430153106"><img src="http://lh4.google.com/image/edobrien/Rd6B2ez06ZI/AAAAAAAABso/6mYSOCgtTGw/s288/Imagen%20014.jpg"></a>Edhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10195137182893721649noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23740211.post-23726472442915269182007-02-19T19:05:00.000-08:002007-02-19T19:23:21.727-08:00Go Box HouseThe <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/16/realestate/greathomes/16tiny.html?pagewanted=2&ei=5087%0A&em&en=95dbd914b32af6c7&ex=1172034000"> NYT wrote about tiny houses</a>, go box in style, although at $24,000 for 120 square feet, not go box in sticker shock. The house I hope to live in soon is 126 square feet, and should cost a little under $250. Look for my wood and tin roof shack in the next New York Times special on little houses.Edhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10195137182893721649noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23740211.post-77116319704870236282007-01-27T12:53:00.003-08:002007-01-27T12:53:50.242-08:00DisclaimerDisclaimer: This website expresses the views of Ed O'Brien, whom is entirely responsible for its content. It does not reflect the policies or positions of The United States Government, United States Peace Corps, the Republic of Panama, or anyone else.alright, now the legalspeak is out of the wayEdhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10195137182893721649noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23740211.post-1166824638879560282006-12-22T13:54:00.000-08:002006-12-23T13:49:37.090-08:00Go Box Garden PanamaWhat is the Go Box Garden? <br /><br />The variables for a garden are :<br /><br />Time input<br />Space input<br /><br />Calorie output<br />nutrition output<br /><br />I would also add:<br /><br />money input<br />soil improvement/ ecological impact output<br /><br />Where I live the money input must equal zero.<br />For my go box project, I would like to set up some small gardens, some double dig plots. <br /><br />After that is done, I would like to try to find out what the minimum amount of land and time are necessary to meet a family´s nutritional and caloric needs.Edhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10195137182893721649noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23740211.post-1160080838895941762006-10-05T13:21:00.000-07:002006-10-05T13:40:38.923-07:00Go box Farm, Garden, MealWhat is the go box meal? Where does the go box meal come from? The Go box garden or farm, of course.<br /><br />But what is a go box farm or garden? Steven Shapin of the New Yorker wrote an article recently discussing how the sucess of Whole Foods is forcing some to redefine what organic agriculture is, and what its aims are. Here is a quotation from the <a href="http://www.newyorker.com/critics/content/articles/060515crat_atlarge">May 15th New Yorker</a>:<br /><br />A former Nutritionist at Columbia, who went on to grow produce upstate, recalls, "When we said organic, we meant local. We meant healthful. We meant mutually respectful growers and eaters. We meant social justice and equality."<br /><br />In the article, Shapin also sites Sir Albert Howard writings as the "orgins of the organic movement." His book, "an agricultural testament" is on line <a href="http://journeytoforever.org/farm_library/howardAT/AT1.html">here</a>, and might give an idea of what the go box farm looks like.<br /><br />Both the article and the book have a lot to offer the go box perspective. As i go through the book I´ll probably post more here.Edhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10195137182893721649noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23740211.post-1159320753304251532006-09-26T18:21:00.000-07:002006-09-26T18:32:33.316-07:00Go Box Cell phoneWhat is the best cellphone in terms of ruggedness, durability, dependability, efficiently, and effectiveness?<br /><br />The efficiency variable would have to be defined in terms of initial investment, and battery life.<br /><br />effectiveness and durability would have to be defined as ability to receive and make calls from areas of varying degrees of , in addition to the easy of use for functions.<br /><br />Durability and ruggedness would be defined as the ability to drop it in a stram, bounce pass it to your friend across a street, and still make a call. Also, to keep it in your back pocket and not have it get crushed or tweaked out by butt sweat.Edhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10195137182893721649noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23740211.post-1157835036216941242006-09-09T13:47:00.000-07:002006-09-09T13:50:36.226-07:00Yugo boxMake magizine rocks. Heres a entry on <a href="http://www.makezine.com/blog/archive/2006/09/yugo_auto_sculptures.html?CMP=OTC-0D6B48984890">Yugo sculpture art</a> on from thier blog. <br /><br />Yugo is the no go-box.Edhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10195137182893721649noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23740211.post-1147207363723958832006-05-09T12:09:00.000-07:002006-05-09T13:45:52.500-07:00Go Music BoxIm headed off to the hills of rural central America, and Im going with my I pod. I decided I needed some kind of case that would keep a low profile, so that the pod doesn't take off. <br /><br />I saw this design : <a href="http://www.retropod.com/">http://www.retropod.com/</a>. With out a doubt, pretty rad, go box, in that as long as you don't act all hipster advertise it as an ipod in a walkman, it keeps it modest, yet very useful. <br /><br />I didn't have access to one of those big old walkmans, and didn't have the time to wait to buy one on eBay. Rummaging through my mom's collection of assorted obsolete electronics that she has hoarded away in her basement ( gotta love that yankee pack rat mentality) I pulled out an FM am GE transitor radio, and used the shell to make my case. Not to hard, but here is the step by step in case you're interested:<br /><br /><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4065/153/1600/IMG_0849.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4065/153/200/IMG_0849.jpg" border="0" alt="" /></a><br /><br />Here's a picture of the case before cracking it open. The plastice case consists of two pieces of hard plastic, held together by two screws.<br /><br />I didn't document taking out the circuit board and speaker, but basically all that was required was cutting some wires, taking out some small screws, and using a small flat head screw driver to pry under and break off small plastic tabs. <br /><br /><br /><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4065/153/1600/IMG_0851.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4065/153/320/IMG_0851.jpg" border="0" alt="" /></a><br /><br />Here are the two halves of the case side by side.<br /><br /><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4065/153/1600/IMG_0878.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4065/153/200/IMG_0878.jpg" border="0" alt="" /></a><br /><br />Once the two halves are apart, I took a Butter Knife to a gas burner to heat it up, then used the knife to melt off the posts that held the screws together. This freed up more space for the Ipod, cardboard, and wires that would come later. The case is not is well put together as it was with the screws, but the cases snap together strong enough, and eventually Ill put some large rubber bands around the body to hold it together.<br /><br />note: stay away from those plastic fumes, get it done in a well ventilated area.<br /><br /><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4065/153/1600/IMG_0852.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4065/153/200/IMG_0852.jpg" border="0" alt="" /></a><br /><br />To protect the Pod from moving around too much and getting scratched by the hard plastic, I cut two pieces of thin pizza box cardboard to the size of the inside of the radio, and mounted them using 3m squares.<br /><br /><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4065/153/1600/IMG_0860.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4065/153/200/IMG_0860.jpg" border="0" alt="" /></a><br /><br />I used a controller that connects between the ipod and the head phones, and wrapped the extra wire in the body of the radio.<br /><br /><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4065/153/1600/IMG_0883.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4065/153/200/IMG_0883.jpg" border="0" alt="" /></a><br /><br />The controller goes where the 9 volt battery normally would go.<br /><br /><br />This is a basic design, one hack that would come in handy would be to both weather proof it, and then also have sly opening that would access the bottom of the pod so that it could be recharged without opening the radio case. That will be another post.Edhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10195137182893721649noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23740211.post-1145046510884746572006-04-14T13:24:00.000-07:002006-04-14T13:28:30.896-07:00Go Box trains<a href="http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060414/ap_on_bi_ge/japan_hybrid_train">Japan to Test Fuel Cell-Powered Train</a><br /><br />Here is an article about new Hybrid and Fuel cell trains.<br /><br />It'd be great to have them on this side of the Pacific, too. Check out this quotation from the article, JR East sounds like a go box minded company:<br /><br />"JR East, as the Tokyo-based company is also known, estimates the NE Train will consume about 20 percent less energy than traditional trains. The company has cut overall energy consumption by 13 percent since 1990, despite rising traffic volumes."Edhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10195137182893721649noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23740211.post-1144426093652789842006-04-07T09:03:00.000-07:002006-04-13T11:14:39.006-07:00Go Box Americar<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4065/153/1600/americacar.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4065/153/320/americacar.jpg" border="0" alt="" /></a><br /><br />Here is an example of the third variable, creativity or self expression, being fully realized . The Toyota corolla itself is quite efficient, but the personalized paint job gives it a patriotic character, especially here in the nation's capitol.Edhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10195137182893721649noreply@blogger.com0