Stan and I went down again this week to photograph some of the interiors for the Virtual Congress project. We were lead through a number of different areas of the Capitol including some things that the public doesn’t normally pass through. I was able to get a lot of decent reference and texture shots for the modeling we’ll be doing down the road but right now I’m still focusing on the exterior of the Rayburn building and the Capitol Complex.

Here’s a shot of the Capitol Building dome from inside the rotunda:

And here’s a screenshot of the exterior model of the Rayburn building:

Over the past two weekends I’ve planted three new trees around our yard: a red maple, a plum, and a kwanza cherry. All three were about 11 - 12 feet in height. You don’t realize how heavy those root balls can be until you’ve had to deal with one. To move the two into our backyard ot took me and my neighbor’s son, literally running the wheel barrel up the backyard to get enough momentum to get them up on our hill. My father helped me with the cherry - that one wasn’t too bad because it had a short trip from the back of my truck to our front yard. We replaced a dying blue spruce that we had transplanted to this particular spot three years ago when we moved here. After cutting it down we had to use a 2×4 to give us enough leverage to pry it out of the ground. Even then it was a bear to roll out of the hole and onto the grass.

A while ago I received an email from the folks at Keystome Homebrew saying that they were taking orders for fresh Chilean grapes and juice. Chile has a different growing season over there so around this time of year is when their fresh stuff comes in. I placed an order for a six gallon bucket of Merlot and got a message yesterday saying the shipment arrived. This afternoon I picked up my order along with a few other things and brought this home:

This evening I didn’t waste any time and got things cleaned up and started right away. I have another container that I’ve used as a primary fermenter but the bucket the juice came in will do just fine. My initial hydrometer reading is apx. 1.090 and the temperature in that back room of my basement is about 68 degrees.

Everything sealed back up after adding the yeast:

This evening I spent some time trying to figure out one of the issues I have with my flash. I seem to have fixed the firing problem where the two contacts weren’t touching - I cut a short piece of a paper clip and more or less just wedged it into the hynge opening of the flash housing, making sure it stuck out just enough to catch the end of the long contact. Wedging it in there like I did was enough to hold it in place, even while the flash was up, but I thought perhaps a little something extra might be helpful… so I mixed up some two part epoxy and added it in around the paperclip and inside the hinge area, making sure not to get it on any moving parts. It seems to have done the trick.

Flash down. Arrows pointing to the longer of the two contacts, the end of the paper clip, and the point at which the two contacts meet.

Flash up. Arrow pointing to the two contacts now touching, due to the paperclip pulling on the longer of the two contacts.

As for the issue I’m having with the flash not able to close anymore, I’ll probably just end up using some tape to hold it down until I can figure out a better way to engage the latching mechanism on the other side of the housing.

Last week I got into my truck and attempted to lower my window. As I did, I heard a loud noise and the window subsequently stopped moving. I took off the inside door panel later that night to take a look around and it turned out the wire that’s part of the window regulator just tore in two. I ordered a replacement regulator from car-stuff.com and it came this week. Removal and installation this evening went without a hitch. Once of my colleagues needs to do the same thing on his car so I thought I would help by documenting the process…

Driver side window regulator replacement on a 2002 Chevy Avalanche.

1. Remove the door panel. There’s a 7mm bolt that’s exposed just under the door handle and another one that’s behind the control switches. You’ll want to remove the triangle shaped trim to the right of the window as well as the trim cover behind the door lever. Disconnect the wires from the control switches and slowly lift the door panel. There’s another connection to the speaker you have to remove, and then also the door light bulb and wire located towards the bottom of the door.

2. Next you’ll need to remove the water deflector. I’ve done this a couple times so mine came off pretty easy, but make sure you don’t rip it because you’ll need to replace it. I removed the bolt that holds the door lever. It slides off and I just let it hang there. I did end up having to cut a slit through the plastic in order to get the deflector over the door lever.

3. At this point you’ll need to raise the window all the way up. If your wire has broken like mine it should be pretty easy to do. I secured the window with blue painter’s tape. Use a lot of it and you’ll get the same strength as duct tape, but without the residue.

4. Remove the wire harness that’s connected to the window motor.

5. Loosen the two bolts on the clamps that hold the window.

6. On the Avalanche, there are a total of six bolts that hold the window regulator in place. Remove all six.

6. Once the bolts are removed you should be able to jiggle the clamps loose, collapse the window regulator in on itself, and rotate it 90 degrees in order to be able get it out from inside the door.

The failed regulator:

The new regulator:

7. Now to install the new regulator simply do everything in reverse. Before I placed it inside the door I loosened the two bolts on the window clamps. After getting it in the door, I added all six bolts back in place, and once was happy with the way everything was situated, tightened them down. At this point I also reconnected the motor’s wire harness. The window clamps were just a few inches lower than I needed them to be so I temporarily reconnected the wire harnesses back to the control switches and raised the regulator up. This was also a quick way of testing to make sure the new motor and regulator were working properly.

8. Once raised, tighten the two bolts on the window clamps.

9. Remove the tape, and test the window.

10. Replace the water deflector. I used a weather-proof plastic tape to help the membrane stick back onto the door. You should double check exactly where your door panel will go back on to make sure no tape is revealed behind it.

11. Replace the door panel.

12. Celebrate the fact that you’ve got yourself a working window again.