Day 2304

 I stayed up late last night playing games, so I didn't et up until 9.  Then it was pet stuff and breakfast.  After breakfast I took some parts and tools out to the garage to work on the winch.

I modified one of the original winch mounts to fit.  Then I modified the winch enclosure to fit the mount.  That gave me the basis for mounting the winch.  I attached the winch mount with a screw at the bottom.  I didn't have a long enough screw to mount it at the top.  I attached part of a servo mount to the enclosure, then I attached the top of the servo to it.  The result is really secure.

I attached the winch enclosure to the bumper using screws.  It attached easily because there were already holes drilled in the bumper.  At that point the winch was finished, but I still needed to add lights.

There were threaded holes in the bumper for LED lights.  I used a couple of scrap pieces to fabricate LED holders to screw into the bumper.  By then it was 1:30, so I went inside for lunch.

After lunch I soldered resistors to the LEDs using the new cordless soldering iron.  It works pretty good, but the tip is too big.  I need to look for a smaller one.  Then I used wire from the connector assemblies I bought for the SCX24 to wire the LEDs to a Y wire assembly I purchased a long time ago.  The other part of the Y connector went to the servo.

The last part of the process was to go back to the garage and modify the LED holders.  When I was finished the whole assembly looked nice.  When I tested it the LEDs worked fine.  The servo didn't.  After some debugging I determined that the servo is toast.  It worked when I modified it.  I didn't have the heart to take it apart.  If worst comes to worst I have another servo.

I put everything away in disgust and went back out to the garage.  I spent an hour and a half putting the bike rack together.  I got it all unpacked (there's a lot of pieces).  I also got a load of the packing material ( a lot of cardboard, plastic bags, and foam) taken to the garbage.  I put about half of the rack together before I decided to quit for the night.

Dinner was leftover pizza.  After dinner I did some surfing while Ellen watched a chick flick.  I joined her to watch TV when it was over.