Rancilio Silvia heating element failure

Loose thoughts by Bjorn Landfeldt

Background

The Rancilio Silvia is a single boiler espresso machine with a small (300 ml) boiler volume. Water from the tank is sucked by the high pressure pump and then injected in the boiler to drive hot water out to the group head or steam wand. 

I bought my Silvia (version 4) about three years ago and to be frank, didn't worry too much about the instruction manual. In retrospect perhaps I should have......

Symptoms

The Silvia has delivered good espresso since I bought it even though as of late I have noticed a deterioration due to lack of proper cleaning. About a month ago, there was a bang followed by a little smoke rising up from the left side. I turned her off and opened the top but couldn't see anything that looked burned so I plugged her back in and turned her on. She heated up alright and I continued using her for a few more weeks. One morning though, the heater only managed to get the water lukewarm and the overheating safety fuse was not the issue. 

I measured the resistance over the thermostats which was close to 0 Ohm, but the reading over the two heating element terminals was not the healthy 64 Omh, but rather 1 MOhm or so.

Verdict, the heating element had blown.

Remedy

I have purchased a new element and gasket (on its way in the mail) and in the mean time I have pulled her apart and cleaned her properly. The figure below shows the top of the boiler so it is clear which version I have.

I have seen on some forums that people take the entire machine apart to remove the boiler but this is not necessary. This is what I did. 

1. Mark all connectors and corresponding leads and take photos to make sure things get back where they belong in the end
2. Remove all leads
3. unscrew copper pipe to the steam wand and loosen it from the steam valve so it can be moved up and to the side
4. loosen the nut holding the heating element just a little so there is no problem unscrewing it when the boiler is removed
5. loosen the nut to the three way valve from the boiler. I could not unscrew the valve here but it was OK
6. unscrew the  boiler screws at the bottom using an allen key 
7. lift up the boiler head and tip it on the side so the three way valve can be unscrewed

The bottom of the boiler was covered in the debris from the ceramic insulation inside the heating element and the element itself was deformed and not centred in the boiler anymore.

 This is what it looked like when I pulled it out.

Lesson learned.

I have come downstairs every morning and turned on the Silvia until it heats up and then opened the steam valve until there is only steam coming out. Then I have foamed my milk before turning off the steam heating and started making the espresso. What I have not done is to make sure that the boiler is full of water before the element gets hot. After some research I now realise that water can run back into the tank and the boiler becomes less than full which will expose the heater element to air inside. This will sooner or later result in the composition of a blog post.......

So, important rule: Always run the pump when you turn on the Silvia to make sure the boiler is full. The best thing would be to run water through the steam wand as the outlet here is on the top the boiler so it is sure to be full.

Update.
Having put her back together and tested her, I am a happy man again. Need to go out and get some fresh beans just, the machine was out of commission for a month or so and the beans I had in the grinder were, well... Not that good anymore.

Loose thoughts by Bjorn Landfeldt

Hughes & Kettner Tubemeister 36 repair

A couple of weeks ago I got a new 2x12 inch Celestial Vintage 30 cabinet which I was eager to plug in and test with my H&K Tubemeister 36. After some 10 minutes of playing on the clean channel, the amp started to distort notably and then there was a flash and sizzling sound before the amp went silent. At the back, all four TSC lights were on indicating no output current.

The manual states that this is most likely due to a blown anode fuse which can happen when the amp is turned on with a faulty tube and the TSC does not have time to shut things down.

After searching far and wide on the web I found little information that could help me with this problem, as it happened after ten minutes of playing it didn't sound like the TSC would not have had the time to shut tubes off.

Anyway, the problem was indeed a blown anode fuse and perhaps also a faulty tube causing this, which as far as I can tell would be very unusual as I have played the amp perhaps 100 hours and have the anniversary edition with military grade tubes which should last a LONG time. The amp has not been carted around but stayed on top of my speaker at home so there should be very little risk of mechanical damage done to the tubes. In any case I would imagine that the TSC should have shut the tubes off before the anode fuse fried, but perhaps this circuitry is faulty (amp one month out of warranty of course).

I thought, I'd just post a couple of photos showing where the fuse is located for others who might experience a similar problem, it is really easy to get access to but the amp has to be opened up from the bottom. Just turn it upside down and unscrew all the screws at the bottom and remove the plate. The fuses are located on the circuit board lower down near the power supply connector. You have to remove the red and green wires to get to them and make sure to remember which color sits on which pin when you install them back.

There are two fuses, 400 mA and 800 mA. In my case it was the 400 mA fuse that blew. I would recommend to use a wooden or plastic tool to help loosen the fuse as there are some fairly sizable capacitors in there which may hold residual charge. As there is no circuit diagram available as far as I can tell, it is difficult to know where there may be voltage left on the circuit board.

It is easy to check if the fuses are OK. Test with a multimeter if the resistance is close to zero or infinite. If infinite, the fuse is blown (if you are holding the probes with your fingers you may get some MOhm reading since  a little current goes through the body at this point but the fuse should be close to zero if it is OK).

Closeup of fuses and were they are located.

Loose thoughts by Bjorn Landfeldt

MAC OS X kernel out of memory problem

Over the past few months i have experienced that my MACBook pro running out of memory and suspending all applications for me to fix the issue. The problem has increased in frequency and recently i had enough and actually started looking into the issue. As of now, I have not isolated the exact problem in the code and let's face it I most probably won't have the time to do so given my work load, but I have managed to get around the problem so the system is now not running out of memory. i am running a 2015 model machine with 16 Gbyte of RAM so it is not an issue of actually having too little memory for the tasks I carry out (email, web, powerpoint, programming, MATLAB, LaTex etc.)

In my case, the symptoms were:

From Activity Monitor

• kernel_task 11-12 Gbyte RAM 200 % CPU
• nsurlstoraged Lots of RAM 100-200% CPU

This was the case even without any applications running in some cases, in other cases closing Mail or Safari could solve the problem.

Digging around the web a bit to try to figure out if others have had the same problem, I can see I am not alone but so far I have not found any solid advice on what is going on and how to solve the issue. My own experiments are pointing towards nsurlstoraged as being the culprit, running amok and for some reason causing the kernel to grow in size very rapidly.

I found some advice about deleting the SAFARI cache directory and tried that, but the problem remained. I then started looking more closely at nsurlstoraged and noticed that this process seems to trawl through a whole series of files from various applications. Especially I noticed that it started writing copious amounts of data to disk and even though it accesses a large set of files in the file system it spends a lot of time writing data to:

/Library/Containers/com.apple.mail/Data/Library/Caches/com.apple.mail/fsCachedData

and spending much time in other caches as well.

I reacted by doing two things, first I used Onyx (free tool) http://www.titanium.free.fr to clean out caches. Second, I cleaned the Mail idea database by opening the Terminal and typing in the following command:  sqlite3 ~/Library/Mail/V2/MailData/Envelope\ Index vacuum;

The problem has disappeared since then and I don't know if it will reappear but for now I have no issues with exploding kernel memory.

Also, nsurlstoraged is back to 0.0% CPU usage where it should be. I suspect that there is a bug in the code so that this process starts misbehaving when there is too much data to index and keep track of.

Is DIDO a Dido?

Loose thoughts by Bjorn Landfeldt

Over the weekend, there was much noise in media about a new revolutionary technology dubbed distributed input distributed output or DIDO for short. In Australian media the technology was dubbed an NBN killer.

Of course I was intrigued since the article in the SMH I read claimed that DIDO would prove the Shannon capacity wrong --no little claim even if it came from a tech reporter who had never heard of information theory in their lives.

So, what is this all about? Well, there was a white paper released that was supposed to detail the new revolutionary thinking and of course I read it on my iPhone while waiting to get my new tyres fitted on the car. The paper is very poorly written. In fact, the writing style as well as the inaccurate reference to the Shannon capacity and other subtleties makes the piece very unconvincing (unless you have a pocket full of money and are looking to invest). There is no explanation of the system that any researcher can make use of to understand exactly what DIDO is supposed to do, but media has bought it outright.

However, it is complete unfeasible what is being proposed? I would say no. The paper alludes to some sort of network coding using superposition of radio transmissions that given a specific coding could very well yield a constructive result at given spatial points. However, I seriously doubt that a small group of people would build such a system on their own in a short time. If they have succeeded, the best thing ever in communications.

However, given the white paper that was released and complete lack of information, I would say it is a hoax or hot air at best. Perhaps the definition of DIDO in the dictionary gives a hint. Miriam Webster lists:

Definition of DIDO: A Mischievous or Capricious act. Synonyms: Prank, frolic.

For now, I will still be using Shannon when I work.

Why you should avoid to use the US cloud

Loose thoughts by Bjorn Landfeldt

I just read this interesting blog entry from ZDNet.

Microsoft has now openly admitted that US authorities has the power to force any US company to hand over private and public data stored on ANY server in the world AND to force the company in question not to disclose this to the owner of the data. Now, call me overly cautious, but I really don't like the idea of this for my future cloud services. Already, this blog, my Gmail data, flickr images, youtube videos, Google calendar, documents, facebook account, twitter and linkedIn data is readily at hand for these authorities. Couple this with Google keeping a history of all my web searches, Apple keeping my movement history from my iPhone and you guessed it, US authorities know more about me than my wife does already.

In my line of work, I am dealing with filtering of child pornography, web pages with threats to national security Internet vulnerabilities etc. I have publicly commented that the Obama kill-switch is ridiculous etc. Am I an interesting object to investigate? Not unlikely.

Let's play with the thought that some homeland security desk clerk gets an alarm from the data mining stream filter tool that there is an individual who has searched for some irregular things and also publicly commented that the US administration is giving itself powers they should not have. Hmmm, that's interesting perhaps this Australian professor is hiding something... With a mindset of finding incriminating evidence and irregular behaviour it is not far fetched that I would be subject to an investigation and if I had all mu data and all my information stored on servers that are owned by US based companies, I bet there would be lots of very personal information about me in circulation among US authorities. Would I mind? Probably not if I was kept unaware of this situation, but what if someone saw some incriminating pattern by chance and they actually acted on it?

I guess there is a real business case for non US owned cloud services. Greece?

Loose thoughts by Bjorn Landfeldt

We had the pleasure of hosting Kevin Brown, the CHRO and Manager corporate services for the Australian NBN Co in School of IT at SYdney Uni last week. He was going through the reason behind the NBN roll out, the state of affairs and projections for the future. In all, the talk didn't contain any news apart from what has been covered in the media already but one thing he did state that I thought surprising was that the reason for their existence was that Telstra has failed the market and something needs to be done to break up their near monopoly. I have suspected this for some time now, that the motive behind the NBN is not to provide broadband services as such, but to correct the horrible mistakes done when Telstra was privatised. In fact, I remember telling Quentin McDermott from 4-corners about my suspicions a couple of years back when his team came to interview me about the mandatory Internet filtering.

I was reflecting on this statement for sometime after the talk and it dawned on me that this can in fact be one of the most expensive stuff ups by any Australian government in terms of cost to rectify the situation. If the point of the NBN is to create a functioning telecom market, isn't $42bn a pretty hefty bill compared to the cost of breaking up Telstra in a retail and a wholesale company from the beginning and then float one or both? True that tax payers bill is only estimated to be $27bn, the rest coming from private investments.

Since I am generally speaking a bit interested in what is happening in the telecom market around the world, and I still have pretty strong ties with Sweden I couldn't help myself but to investigate the state of affairs in that country just to compare. Sweden is an interesting country to compare with because it is just like Australia a country with high concentration of the population in few cities with much rural regions in-between. It is true that Australia is vastly larger, but the majority of Australia will be covered by satellite which in effect renders the vastness pretty unimportant. In Sweden, rural areas will be covered by LTE just as the case in Australia (Ericsson just got a large order from the NBN Co). Also, Swedes and Australians are fairly much at the same level of computer usage, literacy etc. and the envisaged applications for the NBN is the same as the applications envisaged for the broadband network in Sweden in general.

So, how do things stack up? Well, in Australia the vision for the NBN is to provide 100 mbps broadband to just over 90 % of the population with the remaining part receiving 12 Mbps. Currently, it is far from certain that one can get more than a couple of Mbps even in Sydney because the distance to exchanges can be quite long and mobile broadband deployment is pretty patchy. Of course, there is no doubt that the NBN will deliver a completely new infrastructure and service to Australians but how much ahead of the rest will AUstralia be after paying all this money?

The Swedish equivalence of ACMA, the PTS, released a report on the state of broadband in May, detailing how it sees the compliance in the country with the Swedish government's broadband policy. The policy is in many ways similar to that of the current Labour Government, including target broadband penetration, minimum rates, competition in the market etc. The difference is that in Sweden, the Government has not had to roll out anything, the market is taking care of this on its own with the aid of spectrum release and other policies.

The Swedish state of affairs is as follows; currently, 44% of the population (residential and businesses) had access to at least 100 Mbps in 2010. The Government's goal is that 90% of the population will have access to at least 100 Mbps in 2020 and PTS sees this goal as being likely to be met (nothing of concern at present). Currently, there are 1100 households that do not have access to at least 1 Mbps broadband in the country and the average broadband downstream speed is ~18Mbps.

So, it is clear that Sweden is miles ahead of Australia in this regard and it is also clear that in 2020, the two countries will have similar levels of service. It must be noted that the Australian NBN will have a larger fibre base, the Swedish rollout will incorporate a larger portion of wireless broadband through LTE2 technologies so it is most likely easier to upgrade the NBN beyond 100 Mbps when there is a need for that. However, the investment level in Sweden in broadband technologies is in the order of $1 bn per year by the market, a far cry from the NBN figures. Tax payers do not pay for the roll out and monthly broadband subscription costs are lower than they are in Australia currently.

Where there is a significant difference between Government policies is also on the focus of what to do with the beast! THe Swedish government has concerns about inclusion in the digital ecosystem, how many people feel integrated in the broadband world and do not feel excluded, alienated and disadvantaged. There is a similar goal of 90$ of the population feeling part of the digital ecosystem by 2020. Also, the Swedes are clever in that they actually discuss how to make good use of the infrastructure, how to grow industry and maximise benefits since this is the driver for the development. Sadly, in Australia we are breaking up a monopoly.

SO

Suits in Sweden

Loose thoughts by Bjorn Landfeldt

Since I am visiting the country of the Polar Bear, I thought I'd have a look at cold water diving equipment and pricing compared with Sydney. So far, it is looking good.

I am considering buying a new wet suit or dry suit since 1) My old crap Mares trilastic completely fell apart the last dive I did before leaving to go to Europe and 2) My Pinnacle Dry suit Cordura is just far too stiff and captures a lot of air so I need far too much led to break the surface. There are quite a few dive shops in Stockholm but similar to Sydney, the vast majority do not disclose any prices on their web sites. There are some different options available of course, but where I can see some interesting alternatives are basically in two different shops.

First, we have Alpin & Dyksport in Stockholm. The sell the Northern Diver Vortex dry suit for kr 7500, about AUD 1136 and the Waterproof W1 wet suit for kr 2600 (AUD 400). Then we have Dykmagasinet in Karlstad that stocks a wider range of options:

• Waterproof W1 kr 3000 (AUD 455)
• Waterproof Taurus Semidry kr 4500 (AUD 682)
• Waterproof Sedna Drysuit kr 8900 (AUD 1350)
• Waterproof Drako Drysuit kr 9500 (AUD 1439) and
• Ursuk Heavy Light Drysuit kr 7800 (AUD 1180)

All prizes include 25% sales tax.

The Waterproof suits are really top of the line quality with lots of features and an aura of quality. There is a funky looking Australian Waterproof web site that lists some retailers, but the websites have all but no information / little visibility and no pricing. I found one company in Victoria that retails the Taurus for AUD 1000.

The Diveoz forum has had some threads on these suits but there is little information available apart from everyone complaining about the pricing.

I am going to Karlstad next weekend to have a look at the suits and hopefully to try them on. Right now, I am leaning towards the W1 and Ursuk suits, but a Taurus would be a very good alternative in Sydney too.

The W1 has some nice features, extra strength around shoulders, elbows, knees and bottom. Ankle and wrist seals and zips, the shape of the suit looks much better thought through than the competition, neck comfort seal, front zipper (not dry) with flap inside, warm lining etc. (7 mm). The Ursuk seems in description very similar to the DUI TLS350 with an added hood with latex front. I would be very interested in a drysuit made of soft Nylon material with unrestricted movement and little trapped air. Sydney does not get cold enough to warrant really heavy undergarments and this suit can give similar buoyancy characteristics as a thicker wet suit.

I'll also have a look at the neoprene drysuits, it seems they are a much snugger fit on the body than trilam and a thin undergarment would be enough in Sydney. I might enjoy diving with this all year round, who knows.

Renting in Sydney

So we sold our house in Western Sydney and moved to the Sutherland Shire to be in an area where the schools are bette and we are closer to the water. BIG mistake. The Shire is full of people who were born without morals. I mean completely without morals. Not just shifty, I MEAN COMPLETELY WITHOUT MORALS.

First we moved to Grays Point. We rented a house from Raine & Horne Miranda. The owners were traveling the world and even though the property was a bit expensive ($600 / week) we were in an area with a good school and it looked peaceful so we went for it.

After 4 months, the owners declared that they were moving back home and we had to find another house to rent. We had plans to go to Sweden for a sabbatical at this stage so we asked if we could stay a couple more months before we were going. The owners suggested that they would move in with us, we would pay full rent and they would use our stuff. Naturally, we were a bit hesitant and while we were discussing this, I got a phone call from the real estate agent siply stating " the owners are moving in with you tomorrow, is this OK?" I was a bit bewildered at this and told the real estate agent that we had made no such agreement. The agent was fairly abusive asking me what the owners were supposed to do now that they had already rented a truck. The next day we had the owners coming to our house to "have a chat with us".To cut a long story short, the real estate agent tried to rip us of by stealing our bond money but when we filed a counter claim with the tenancy board, there was a very quick shift in atitute and we got our bond back. We then moved to Gymea Bay and rented a house from Ray White Gymea. It became evident quite quickly that the house was in a very bad condition and needed some urgent repairs. The bottom floor had a rising dampness problem which caused mould to grow everywhere, on all our clothes, furniture, books, you name it. My wife even got respiratory problems and has started using asthma medicine as a consequence. The real estate agent never did anything about the problem as it unfolded. It was not until after we had called mould experts ourselves they reacted and offered to 'clean the carpet'. At this stage, we had all out belongings off shelves and out of drawers on the floor to stop the mould destroying everything.

The landlord came past and cut three holes 20x 10 cm in the walls in the bedroom plus installed a fan to circulate air and get rid of some of the moisture. If you have lived in Sydney during winter, you know that you don't want three such holes in the bedroom wall since the indoor temperature quickly falls to 5-8 degrees. We had no option but to request to move again, 3 months after we moved in. At this stage, Ray White Gymea started to become really abusive. The correspondence we have had with them is unbelievable. They have had my wife in tears, done everything they can to make our lives Hell even though we have started to get ill from living in the premises and we have two young children who may be affected for life. Very interesting people those Ray White people. Now, we have the outgoing inspection tomorrow and we notified the Ray White Ofifce so we could do the inspection together. We were tole that they were going to do the inspection alone and we were not allowed to be there, go figure.

I was told by the residential tenancy board to notify the agent that we would do an inspection so they can be present if they choose to. We should have witnesses and take many photos. When I wrote an email to RayWhite Gymea about this, the owner, Bill Anastasiadis wrote me an email saying that the tenancy board was ill informed and going on about him being the principal of Ray White Gymea.

I can't wait for the final inspection. Obviously these people are following their own moral standards, not what the tenancy board thinks is the norm for Australian renting agreements.

The question is, is this a Sutherland Shire decease or is this just Raine & Horne Miranda and Ray White Gymea business operations and moral standards?

One thing is for sure, renting properties in Sydney in this climate sucks. It is not enough paying rent on time and looking after the property. You also have to be prepared to take abuse from real estate agents and bow down to the people who own property, after all, they must be better than you since they own a house to let and you don't have that much money.

Loose thoughts by Bjorn Landfeldt

UPDATE!!

The principal left the following comment on this post

"Bjorn,

It is amazing how you have posted only parts of the true facts.

When we where alerted to the mould issue it was my office that paid for a steam cleaner and mould expert to attend the property not you.

It was my office that also had someone attend to rectify the problem.

You also fail to mention that my office also negotiated and had the Landlord release you from the Lease and also had the Landlord pay for your removalist costs and compensate you.

I advise that you have the true facts mentioned on this blog of yours otherwise it will be construed as defamation."

Anyone who may have thought I was exaggerating.......

It is true that Ray White wanted to steam clean the carpet, but it was not until we ourselves had an expert inspecting the property they got some cleaners in to clean the mould off the walls and outside the furniture. All clothes, books, inside book cases etc. were left covered in mould and also left for us to clean.

It is true that the landlords agreed to end the lease and pay for our move, after all we were starting to develop serious respiratory problems and with a pregnant woman.......

We are out of the house and there were no surprises towards the end apart from the removalists not moving everything so we had to do much of it ourselves, but still...

Loose thoughts by Bjorn Landfeldt

While most media were focusing their attention on the Copenhagen climate change conference in December, the government quietly announced it would this year mandate filtering of the Internet by Internet Service Providers. This would require ISPs to block all access to web pages on a list, compiled by the government.

The announcement came in mid-December, at a time of year when most people were too tired or busy to care. One group however realized changing the law to require filtering by ISPs is highly ineffective, makes us vulnerable to future misuse and ignores possible negative effects on another, more trumpeted, government initiative the National Broadband Network.

The Computer Research and Education Association (CORE) felt strongly enough about the redundancy of the government’s approach that it banded together in its opposition to the government’s proposed amendments to the Broadasting Services Act. At its annual meeting in Brisbane, CORE, representing all Computer Science lecturers and professors in Australia and New Zealand, decided to officially oppose the government’s proposed filtering. I was asked to take the lead and draft a press release on behalf of CORE.

Never before has our group reacted so rapidly and decisively. The urgency was motivated by a sense of shock that the government would actually consider such a move, based on the painfully redundant trials of last year. Our objections are purely technical; it is over to others to consider the societal and moral aspects of filtering.

First, a list-based filter – whereby the government provides ISPs with a list of sites containing banned web pages - will only capture a small fraction of the content the Government wants to block and none of the material circulating around nasty pedophile rings. Claiming that it will be reliable and effective method in capturing unwanted content and especially stopping child pornography is absolute nonsense. Second, content generation is changing and information is becoming increasingly ephemeral or “short lived”, especially considering the shift in information sharing through social networking media, Facebook, Myspace, Twitter etc. We don’t know exactly where we are heading, but we know the static web page will rapidly decrease in importance as the means to spread information and these web pages are the only items on a black list. Third, it is trivial to work around ISP filtering, in fact, much easier than it is to work around filters installed on individual PCs in homes. Since children are generally more computer savvy than adults, the question is whether the filtering scheme will effectively stop children or adults from accessing information. Perhaps in the near future, if wanting to find out what the Sex Party’s election platform is, one has to ask the kids. A simple poll among school kids and adults of who knows how to work around filters could make for interesting bedside reading, before pulling up the Internet blanket covers and going to sleep.

ISP filtering trials conducted prior to the government’s December announcement demonstrate the Government chose to only look into the past when carrying out the tests, not at all considering the National Broadband Network being rolled out. It is well known among the research community that list-based filtering can be done in existing systems without significant performance penalties. What remains unknown is how it will affect the NBN. Conversely, it is not known how the NBN will change the playing field for different kinds of media. There is a real risk it will require the filtering mechanisms to be significantly extended and developed to have any impact, which would put us on a very dangerous slippery slope. Making such changes and extensions would be much easier once the basic legislation is in place, setting the scene for further restrictions and censorship.

CORE has asked the Government for a working party to be put together to properly attend to the many issues surrounding the proposed legislation – a very sound suggestion. Australia is blessed with many smart people who are capable of properly investigating the matters surrounding this form of censorship and we can make informed decisions after the groundwork has been done. If we can implement filtering so that the effectiveness is maximized, and the risks and side effects minimised, it will be found out. Then, and only then, should nationwide filtering be implemented. If the case for filtering is convincing, I am sure Australians would embrace the scheme. An alternative is to stop talking and again make available the PC-based home filters the tax payers paid for during the previous administration, saving on the $125.8 million earmarked to improve cyber safety in the 2008 budget.

Maldives, my kind of government

Loose thoughts by Bjorn Landfeldt

So it has happened. The world's first cabinet meeting under water. When the Maldives' cabinet held a plenary session under water they definitely raised my interest in the country. I don't think we will see Joe Hockey and Kevin Rudd getting into their wet suits to discuss climate change in the near future.

Whoever votes to move part of the cabinet work under water gets my vote in the next election.

Hmmmm, practicing for long deco perhaps

Loose thoughts by Bjorn Landfeldt

Apparently, there is a Guinness world record to break for spending the longest time under water. Yesterday, the Irishman Sean McGahern spent 27 hours under water to smash the previous 24 hours to pieces. The record breaking took place in Malta. One may wonder what the point of that is, but then again, people seem to do just about anything to break a record.

I had better rethink my thinking that 15 min deco is boring if I wan to get into that sport.

Video at:

Tech gear

Loose thoughts by Bjorn Landfeldt

It may be a late revelation, but it seems to me as if the tech dive industry is moving towards a low cost breakthrough. I was searching a bit yesterday and found some threads on fora such as scubaboard about new tech dive gear. For example, EDGE-HOG, Highly Optimised Gear. It seems there is a factory somewhere in Taiwan that makes much of the techie gear and things are re-badged under different names. For example, look at this regulator from HOG.



This looks surprisinly much like an APEKS to me.

Tech Diving Limited is selling the HOG second stage plus a first stage that also looks much like an APEKS first stage together with an SPG and hoses for $249. The Wings on the HOG web site also retails for $199 about half of what looks like a standard OMS or DiveRite wing.



Does this signal the start of a price collapse for tech dive gear? If it is possible to manufacture and retail for such low prices and the gear is very similar, interesting development. It will be interesting to follow the development and see if there will be any reviews of this stuff.

New Canon G11 - even better for Underwater photos

Loose thoughts by Bjorn Landfeldt

Canon has just released the new G11 compact and it has some interesting features for UW shooters.



Most notably, Canon has reversed the trend of hunting for increased pixel density and instead gone for image quality. The new G11 has a 10 Mpixel sensor which is significantly down from the G10's 14 Mpixels. Canon wanted to create a camera that can truly work as a replacement for a DSLR in some situations, such as journalism where photographers may want to take photos without being too intrusive. This camera is built to provide much better low light and difficult light results. For an underwater photographer that sounds heavenly.

I am waiting for dpreview to test its capabilities. It is clear that it will be much much cheaper to go G11 and housing than any dSLR and housing / ports.

Canon D5 Mark 2 Underwater video review

Loose thoughts by Bjorn Landfeldt

Backscatter has posted a review of the Canon 5D mark 2. There are lots of reviews around about its capabilities and pros and cons but what makes this one stand out is that it is a dedicated underwater review and also about the specific task of producing underwater video. Who would have thought a couple of years ago that DSLR would come this far.

The resulting video is stunning



View the 720p video for some nice shots of dolphins and sharks in the Bahamas. I know this is a bit of a promotional video urging us all to open up our wallets, but it is clear one can create very nice video photography with this gear. Unfortunately, the initial setup cost (without the scooter) is around USD 10.000, a new car.

Well, one day when housings get cheaper perhaps.

Olympus E-620 Underwater test

Loose thoughts by Bjorn Landfeldt

DPreview has released a test, well a story more than a test, of the Olympus E-620 in the PT-E06 Olympus housing. One of their reporters went on a dive holiday to the Philippines and brought this setup along, together with two sea and sea YS 100 strobes.

The general opinion is that the setup is working well, the housing is of reasonable quality and she also seemed happy with the new 9-18 mm wide angle lens. My friend Taso has the E-520 in the PT-E05 housing (almost identical setup) with the 50 mm macro lens and dedicated INON magnetic manual focus ring port and he took it diving for the first time last weekend. It was clear, looking at the first photos that the macro lens can yield some very good results, especially with the two INON strobes he uses, even spread light etc.



I am getting more and more interested in this combination as the upgrade path from my current Canon G7 in Ikelite housing. First, the Olympus body seems to be very reasonable with many features that are nice for underwater use such as fast focussing and inbuilt image stabilisation in the body. Second, the housing is cheap compared with most other housings on the market. Third, with the catering for popup flash one can use any strobe, in my case I have an INON z240.

I have been toying with the thought of buying a housing for my Canon 40D. The only reasonable housing seems to be the Ikelite but since it does not allow the flash to pop up and the TTL circuitry only supports Ikelite strobes, I would have to buy two new Ikelite strobes of many $100 a pop. The Olympus alternative sounds more reasonable.

Without having searched for the the cheapest prices, BHphoto lists the 620 housing for USD570 and the 9-18mm wide zoom is USD510. The PT-E06 housing is AUD 1200 or so locally and the PPO-E04 dome port plus the PER-E01 spacer ring is about USD1100 at BHPhoto. I bet you need some gears etc. on top of that.

Not cheap, but still cheaper than going Canon.

Getting the iPhone to work with Exchange and Google

Loose thoughts by Bjorn Landfeldt

Thanks to some new features in OS 3.0 I finally managed to get my iPhone to synchronise both with my work email and Google calendars.

The problem with the iPhone is that it can only have one exchange account active at the time. Since my employer (the University of Sydney) mandates the use of Microsoft Exchange, I am forced to synchronise my emails using this server and that has left me without any means of synchronising with Google calendar. Google mail has been easy for a while using an IMAP account.

The new trick that works well is to use CalDAV to Google, and even though there are some rumours that this only allows one way synchronisation, I can create new events on the iPhone and they show up on the Google web interface so all is good.

Here is what I had to do.

1)
I created an exchange account to the University and set up mail and contacts but I deactivated the calendar option for this account since I don't use the corporate calendar. If you leave it turned on, the entries will be merged in iPhone. You will also have to set the default calendar in settings>mail, contacts, calendar down the bottom, settings for calendars.

2)
I created an IMAP account on the iPhone:

settings> mail,contacts,calendars> add account

select Gmail account type
enter username@gmail.com as address and fill in password
set outgoing server to smtp.gmail.com

3)
Create a new account for the calendar
settings> mail,contacts,calendars> add account
account type other
select CalDAV

Server name www.google.com
user name your.name@google.com (your gmail account name)
password (your password)

Now, the email client should have two accounts, one for the exchange mail and one for the Google mail. The calendar application should have your Google calendar contents and you should be able to create and read events on the iPhone as well as the web.

Pshycho babel fish

Loose thoughts by Bjorn Landfeldt

My wife bought a little craft set for my oldest daughter to do now at the start of the school holidays and here starts the story of the Chinese cutting corners on translation and using babel fish instead.

The craft set is something called "colorized scalewing of flutter" from a company called Karry. The description on the package (and I suspect this is why my wife purchased this specific product) states:

Colorized Scalewing of Flutter is a new product congregated with toy and DIY together, using your both hands to portray and assembled beautiful colorized scalewing. set free your polychrome dream in the play.

Then the packaging goes on to describing HOW to set free the polychrome dream as follows:

Playing method:

1) Unscrew the outer lid (OK I follow so far)
2) Smear different colors glittery glue on wing of Scalewing, beautiful and likable (Hmm, alright I get the gist)
3) Hang the small colorized scalewing after was finish. That will have a distinctive gout. (No, lost me there)
4) We can make it as pendant or hang it on the bag,and you will feel very complacent.I (Surely someone is taking the piss)

The packaging warns:
Not suitable for children under 3 years due to small parts.

I think what they meant was:
It is not suitable for children under 3 years to run export companies, play with lego instead.

Isn't it great to see what Australian shops import and sell to us, such quality products. It makes me feel warm and fuzzy just thinking about just how much the shops care about the products they sell.

Lesson learned, don't use babel fish to translate instructions and manuals. Hire someone who speaks the language in question.

Waterproof compacts

Loose thoughts by Bjorn Landfeldt

I wonder if waterproof compacts are the best option when getting into underwater photography on a budget. Having flooded a Canon G7 in a flimsy WPDC-11 housing a couple of years ago, I know it can easily happen and it is costly. Olympus has a range of shock/water proof compacts that have housings available on the market. The cameras don't look like they would produce professional quality shots, but for the enthusiast!!


Pentax just released the new OPTIO W80 (available in July). The camera looks very interesting and would probably produce acceptable UW shots (I don't know about RAW). The question is, will there be a housing available for it?

Craftivism

Loose thoughts by Bjorn Landfeldt

Found an article about a new global movement called craftivism. The idea is to use handcraft to change the world for example by making happier looking crocheted coats for tanks.



Isn't this the ultimate passive resistance movement in a sense? I would have loved one of those when I did compulsory military service in far northern Sweden in -30 C for a year and a half. The tank was cold from time to time.

Snorkelling trail

Loose thoughts by Bjorn Landfeldt

This is something I like. In Haninge in the south of Stockholm, the local council has put together a track for snorkelers. The track runs along a sandy bottom in shallow waters and is made of a runner to follow as well as information plaques. The plaques are educational, telling the snorkeler about the flora and fauna they have around them.

This is a great idea, I reckon the coastal councils in Sydney should consider this for the community, perhaps coupled with an artificial reef in Gordon's bay or similar. How about a section for snorkelers and a deeper section for scuba divers.