dudevato
1 mW
I found I needed to resize my pics in order to post them. Soon I'll get some of the Solar Only boats I've messed with. For now here are 2 speedo's I've put together.
I've read on line (either here or elsewhere) that GPS units are not accurate enough to differentiate very small changes in MPH, say the 1/10's we might be interested in knowing about. These do and for $10 and a couple of hours of fabbing.
This first one is made from a kid's bicycle wheel (10" I believe) with 10 or so fender washers tack welded on. The High Tech part of it
is a digital bicycle speedo from Walmart. They go for like $10 as I remember, and can be calibrated to the different diameters of tires you'd find on different bicycles.
I never got around to calibrating this correctly as I was only interested in seeing differences between motors, directions on the lake (into or against the wind) etc. I'd guess it would be somewhat actuate if you used the 8 or 10" dia these paddle wheels are.
If you make something like this you will find it is Very Noisy and very Splashy You'd want to swing it into the water, take a reading, then swing it out of the water. Again, very distracting in contrast to the quite of an electric boat
But I wanted something to keep track of my day's adventure so I started over. I wanted it quite and calm and I wanted it to look a bit nicer.
#2 is based on a plastic/rubber lawn mower wheel. I cut shallow slots in it with a jig saw and Shoe Goo'd in some more fender washers. With it being enclosed the noise and splash ought to be diminished as much as possible.
I've read on line (either here or elsewhere) that GPS units are not accurate enough to differentiate very small changes in MPH, say the 1/10's we might be interested in knowing about. These do and for $10 and a couple of hours of fabbing.
This first one is made from a kid's bicycle wheel (10" I believe) with 10 or so fender washers tack welded on. The High Tech part of it
is a digital bicycle speedo from Walmart. They go for like $10 as I remember, and can be calibrated to the different diameters of tires you'd find on different bicycles.I never got around to calibrating this correctly as I was only interested in seeing differences between motors, directions on the lake (into or against the wind) etc. I'd guess it would be somewhat actuate if you used the 8 or 10" dia these paddle wheels are.
If you make something like this you will find it is Very Noisy
and very Splashy You'd want to swing it into the water, take a reading, then swing it out of the water. Again, very distracting in contrast to the quite of an electric boatBut I wanted something to keep track of my day's adventure so I started over. I wanted it quite and calm and I wanted it to look a bit nicer.
#2 is based on a plastic/rubber lawn mower wheel. I cut shallow slots in it with a jig saw and Shoe Goo'd in some more fender washers. With it being enclosed the noise and splash ought to be diminished as much as possible.
