06.12
Last night was our Thursday general meeting — the space is open every Thursday evening for anyone to come down and see what happens. We had a few new-ish faces in the space last night, including TensorFlux from Pumping Station: One, a hackerspace in Chicago. He was in the middle of a motorcycle touring/camping journey through a good chunk of the US and parts of Canada, and decided to stop by to visit CCCKC. Here, he’s catching up online while Ulysses works on a clever electronic art project.
As part of the general meeting, we usually offer talks and demonstrations on Thursdays. Last night, dj goku continued the Cyber Security series by setting up a group lab demonstration and hosting an open discussion on using SSH to tunnel and encrypt your insecure traffic on hostile networks. I actually learned that OpenSSH has its own SOCKS listener! All this time, I’ve been using a significantly more complicated setup with OpenSSH and Squid Proxy. In most cases, the -D [port] option to ssh will work just as well and is much easier to set up. I’ll see if dj goku has some slides and links that I can point you to, as I really enjoyed learning something new about a tool I’ve used for years!
After the Cyber Security discussion, Jim Emery used one of the ballasts in the workshop and bent up some metal strapping to build an impromptu Jacob’s Ladder. These are simple to make if you have the right power supply. They’re always a big hit, though!
ax0n (that’s me) worked on getting a 2-cycle engine working properly and attempted to get the drive mechanism fitted to it. The engine starts on the first pull now and runs great, but we don’t have the proper tools at the space to get my drive sprocket attached to the clutch output.
I ended up taking the engine partially apart and discussing with a smaller group how two-stroke gasoline engines work including magneto ignition, centrifugal clutches and flywheel vane air-cooling. Two-stroke engines aren’t terribly efficient, but there is something sublime about their mechanical simplicity. I will post more on this project as it progresses.
This reminds me. My dad is letting me take his lawn mower that is still fully functional.
Plan is to make a moped for the space use. To run to the qt down the street.
And, I love the smell of Ozone in the morning.