Midwinter calling, day 18

Serving information

While I have been building radios, accessories and stuff I have gotten several ideas and it feels a little embarrassing that it took me 2 months to figure it out a way to maybe transfer pictures and files to and from Jane's iPhone. Thankfully, I'm in the habit of never throwing away files or programs that might be useful, and I am too lazy to carefully select what I'm copying if it doesn't take up too much space. I have copied over a lot of program installation files to the tablet and copied the most important ones to my USB stick in the wallet as well, so once I came up with the idea it was easy to find what I needed to basically set up a FTP file server on my tablet. I was easier than setting up a web or email server, and it works on both Android mobiles, but then again, so do bluetooth, so who knows if Apple's closed system cooperates. The tablet works as a local WiFi hotspot that Jane should be able to connect to via IP address and download or upload files. I have Caecilia asks Jane to come in with her iPhone to my workshop.

"What's up? Why do you need my iPhone?"

"Connect to WiFi, password is 'jane'."

"What?"

Surprised and perplexed, Jane discovers that there is a WiFi network called 'Abacus', as that has always been my default name for home WiFi. Abacus is both early in alphabetical order and an ancient counting tool, and computers are basically modern calculators. Everything will just take too long to explain so I nab her phone and with Jane peeking over my shoulder, enter the IP address and deactivate web security for the site, but she is still perplexed as I set it as her homepage. I have a big smile as I show her the files, pictures and music she can save or upload and I download a picture I've taken of her with the others, and I start to download all my MP3s. I'm happy and satisfied that it works, because it will make Jane happy, but Jane is ecstatic when she gets it, and I reassure that I'm not shitting her. Jane kisses and hugs me so many times it's uncomfortable, but this time she doesn't seem to be affected and Jane just loudly shouts:

"Nerds are so bloody underrated!"

Jane is giggling as file after file is downloaded, lost in the possibility of being able to use her iPhone for so much more. Her giggling turns to ecstatic joy as she plays the first song and she try to explain to Caecilia, and I point out that as long as my tablet is on, she can connect from her bedroom because it's just a dry logwall in between. Jane can now use her own mobile for so much more and beside playing all the music I have and transfer pictures, also watch documentaries or the movies. So worth it. Jane gives me another kiss and hug and say she's going to watch 'Atomic Blonde' again, just because she can, and as she leaves say she is going to save the unwatched movies for movie nights - which feels good.

From the glances and smiles, Caecilia - and everyone else lured by Jane's shouts - have of course noticed my pants problem, but my smiling bouncing sexbunny becomes disappointed when Kari pulls rank to deal with my issue and starts shooing everyone out with a smile. After two months in this house with a dozen women, and several who specifically pay attention to me or guard me, I can only guess how much talk, gossip and rumours there are.

My ferry to Orusingen isn't finished, but rumours about it has spread and Jolfr Lum, the biggest Storman on Tosra and a bit of southern Orusingen, makes a visit to get more information. It's the first time he's been to my islands, and I should have invited him and the other Storman in the area, or visited them, but I've been too busy with everything. Terrible excuse, but true. At least I have not visited some, and ignored some. I recognize Jolfr Lum both from the Tosra meeting and from the Auction, but there were so many people I talked too at both times. I invite Jolfr to the wedding, and inform him that it will be an unusual event and small with mostly friends and almost no relatives, but he is looking forward to participating. Especially when he finds out who the other guests are. So Jolfr gets a tour of the mansion and some of its amenities, and I introduce my sambos, Jane and guards etc. We go for ride where I give him a tour of the harbor bridge to the village and introduce him to Fjölkunniga Unn. Unn has only been here for a few weeks, but have started getting visits from nearby people as word quickly spread about a new Fjölkunnig that was easy to reach by boat, and as the Academy's sejdwoman Unn has instantly gained respect.

Jolfr has been inspired by my ferry, as well as what Storman Maurr said about the ferry in Laxlanda, and of course Jolfr wants to show that he too can spend silver and prove his status as a Storman, and he wants to connect Tosra with Orusingen via a rope ferry between Mosra and Orusingen. There is already a bridge between Tosra and Mosra, but between Orusingen and Mosra it is too deep and far. A ferry is not a huge expense like a permanent bridge is, and easier to build even if it partially block the boat traffic between the islands, but there are no large deep-drafting ships here, so if they let the rope sink into the water behind the ferry, maybe with the help of stone or lead weights, then most boats or ships can just sail over, although I advise him to spread the word to avoid sailing there until it is tested how deep the rope sinks, and still put up big wooden signs with symbols showing to not sail in front of the rope ferry, and keep in the middle of the strait. A ferry there makes it so much easier and more efficient to move between the islands as not everyone has a boat, especially not big enough for a horse and cart, and the boat can be somewhere else along the coast. The islands here are large at 150-350 km², so not short distances. A ferry also gives an opportunity to collect a small toll even if Jolfr won't do it. At least to start with. It is after all a prestige thing as much as useful, and Jolfr wants people to uses his ferry and be grateful. With just a bit of design change, the ferry doesn't have to be manned, and there can be windlasses in each end, but that is not as impressive as having a slave do the work while taking care of the ferry, jetties and fishing or something.

As we ride I also talk with Jolfr if it would be possible to try hunting larger animals somewhere on Orusingen or Tosra. It's just a couple of animals and I'm not sure anything will be killed, it's more if it turns out that hunting on the islands is unfruitful. Jolfr owns land some forest covered hills fairly near and gives me permission to hunt and gives me suggestions for best locations and how the terrain is, and he will inform the farms there on the way back to his own mansion.

Kari have already suggested that we hunt on the land she owns on Orusingen, and of course she is happy to come along, but she doesn't want to shoot. She will stay at the farm and prepare for my return. Hunting can be fun, but most future shooting will probably take place on the range to try to get better and target shooting might be a hobby. Right now, projects are keeping me busy, but in the future that will decease, and without the internet and annoying transportation issues and severely limited entertainment etc, I'll need to find something to fill my spare time, which I as a rich person will have more of, and I can't have sex all the time. I can almost hear Caecilia as Barney Stinson in the background shouting 'Challenge accepted!'.

I could say 'fuck it' and just try to enjoy myself for the rest of my life, but that will just disappoint a lot of people, and if I've contributed to making this world nicer and more technical, I'll ultimately enjoy it more. Both because I did something good, and because the world is more technical, which will be more interesting for me too.

My two radios are finally finished. Complete with transmitter and receiver in the same housing, and they are basically identical on the outside, except for the small engraved brass plate with the text that says which radio in the order it is and the plate with the frequency scale, although I tried to tune the radios very similarly they're not exactly the same. The only major difference internally is that I have used the good IF filter in the mansion's receiver, because it is an advantage if it is the most sensitive and selective of all radios.

A radio is powered from either the house's 12V system, a large or small 12V lead batteries or via two series connected 5V USB battery banks. One radio will always be here at the mansion and powered by the house's 12V mains. But the other one, which is intended for the ship, has basically been given two permanent power banks and it has a bolt-on pocket for the power banks, but the power banks will be charged in the mansion. Both radios will have excellent operating time as their power consumption in reception is very low, especially with the squelch activated so the speaker is not powered.

There is a simple multi function moving coil instrument in the front behind a glass plate, and via a switch can be selected to show the voltage input, show the output to test that the radio really is transmitting, or work as a bad S meter that measures received signal strength. Unfortunately the coil is insensitive, and I didn't want to sacrificing semiconductors just to make that unimportant function better. As I have quite a lot of small colored surface-mounted LEDs, I have used a blue LED as an 'On' indicator that sits inside the glass plate of the moving coil meter so that the LED is protected. If I need the LEDs in the future, I can just remove them. The On/Off switch is pretty clear, but an indication that everything is right is nice, and the LED is angled downwards to also provide some light in front of the radio for taking notes on a dark night.

These two radios are CW+AM. CW which stands for Continuous Wave and is for Morse/Norse code, while AM which stands for Amplitude Modulation is the voice mode. It was simply easiest to make a modulator for AM, and making an AM detector in the receiver was far easier then demodulating FM, DSB or SSB. AM is less efficient and more sensitive to interference than other voice modulation systems, but easy to understand and build. And I just felt more comfortable doing it, having only done CW, AM, FM and data before. Currently, there is a simpler stand-alone boom microphone with a preamplifier on a plate, and a separate Norse key that I am quite proud of, as they are small works of art in brass and wood, both with connectors made of wood and brass. In the future I hope to make good carbon microphones, or dynamic microphones with a simpler internal preamplifier in the radio, because it saves components, but I was impatient.

There is plenty of room in the radio case and some on the front for a couple of future upgrades that may prove necessary, such as a switch for future frequency bands or something else. Since it is mostly surface-mounted components, the electronics are small, and it is controls, coils and rotary capacitors that are large. The low frequency and manufacturing limitations simply makes them big.

For sound, Bodil has finished two headphones, with padded edges and everything, and I've also built a pair of headphones with the speaker elements from Tom's scrapped bluetooth headphones, and it will be here at the mansion for as an extra headset. It has absolutely the best sound and frequency range. Regardless of the headset, there are screw terminals on the outside with strain relief, and they plug into a separate socket on the front of the radio, but there are double sockets so two can listen with separate headphones even if it affects the volume in both. If the small connectors turn out well, they will be installed.

I must learn to use Norse code well, and train someone people in it. Ciara and Kari do the best they can and we practice and will continue to practice a little every night. After I created a library of separate files for each Norse letter, number and special characters, Jane was willing to help by creating many small playlists, which means I don't know the code or order until we verify. It's a fairly efficient way, and since many people can listen to the same file, several people can practice at the same time. To practice transmitting, we sit in the same room and practice with the simple test panel, where one transmits and two practice writing down. It feels silly but it works quite well at our pace and still gives semi-realistic practice that I will improve in the future.

What is left is to make and install proper antennas, as I won't do any more real radio tests until Iselin is back. It's bad enough I did all this work without her. It's a bit tragic that building and developing radios feels more like a betrayal to Iselin than if I have sex with other women, but I think she agrees.

I can use my mobile horn speaker for my tests, and while I was waiting for the Bodil to finish parts I installed the bluetooth receiver from the headphones, which works fine. It was so easy. So the horn speaker is now a bluetooth horn speaker and can be connected to mobile phones or my tablet, with pause, forward and back buttons, and apart from being practical, it will make Jane happy as her mobile of course lacks a 3.5mm jack.

During the time I've built, I've also prepared to build a simpler CW only radio where most of the parts are the same. The radio will lack squelch and only work with Norse code, but Norse code is more important because it gives much longer range than voice. It is possible to add upgrades, such as AM voice if it turns out that it actually works well at least to close distances like Borgarsandr. However, I need to make the microphones and transistors for microphone amplifiers can simply be used for other things. If voice is basically useless with the NVIS antenna, it is very unnecessary to use components for it. The CW radio should hopefully be able to work excellently in the 'local area' such as Borgarsandr 43km away, and if it is possible to reach Skiringsalr 150km away reliably day and night, that would be excellent.

I must have the quietest radio environment for radio experiments ever. Here there are only thunderstorms and other natural phenomena. I doubt there is electricity anywhere else, and here there are no high voltage wires, spark gaps, gasoline engines or even AC voltage in the house. I've taken care to shield the USB chargers and it's basically only the wind power generator on the roof and switching in the service system that can give some interference spikes, but I'll shield them and add a couple of filter capacitors at the next service just because it is a good idea and not much work.

Radio astronomers would surely be jealous of this, because the extreme radio silence is a great advantage and makes it easier to hear my fairly weak transmitters. I'm not looking for the occasional lucky contact, but something that works practically every day. Once I've tested the radios and know how well they work, I may build more, and maybe set up relay stations for messages from others, although I don't know if there's a market for this so it'll be mostly for my own sake. There isn't a post office here, and nobody has addresses.

I will probably want more radios for more ships, and even a pure radio receiver would be useful if the mansion sends signals that tell the time so they can set clocks and to give an update or collect information which radio signals were heard and when. Hopefully by the summer I will have finished measuring and calculated a rough time equation for sundials for which I am still taking measurements. That doesn't happen every day, but when the alarm goes off 10 minutes before and I'm nearby, I do it. Since at least one more radio will be built and I still need some parts for other projects, a couple of boxes of spare parts have been accumulating, and the idea is that Iselin and I will build the next radio together.

I'm thinking of taking apart my digital SLR camera. It is in worse condition and cheaper than Tom's model, and apart from a small speaker and microphone, I'll get a few more buttons, LEDs, springs, some small electric motor that I might be able to take apart for really nice thin varnish-insulated wire etc. There may be a few electrical components or semiconductors that are useful, but I don't have a wiring diagram for the camera and have to test everything. The glass in the lenses should also be useful. I want to build a good telescope for watching stars etc, but it need a lot of light and magnification. Before I start taking anything apart, however, we are going to try casting glass in a crucible to see if it gets hot and good enough to get better large glass without air bubbles, and by hand grind and make a 'simple' telescope with two lenses and long focal length. Iselin wants to do most of that herself, so it's hardly a burden for me. But I might try to melt glass blocks as a surprise for her homecoming. Might as well to do three at once, and that is something the guards can help with.

I am doing what I can to prepare an antenna installation tomorrow, but it is time to make a proper vacuum 'pump' and continue with the steam engine improvement, line shaft system and making more machines. I want to put a generator on the steam engine so I'm not wind dependent for charging, and when it comes to machines, a router is a priority, along with a simpler roller. Before I start working with the vacuum pump and other machines, I make three prototype thermometers where I heat up the ends and form bubbles with the help of two wooden blocks I've drilled, carved and filed out and attached clamped handles, with support and stabilization of the glass tube and the template. I also make three pairs of glass bulbs I've been thinking of trying to make the simplest light bulb out of. The glass is quite thick so I think it will be durable enough, and I put them in the heated oven to anneal the glass.