snow scoot

SNOWSCOOT

Back in 2003 I picked up my boots, bindings, and Burton board for $80. At the time I think the board was already pretty old and since then it has been eating rocks going down the Y mountain in Provo, Emigration canyon in SLC, and been dragged behind my brother's jeep at little Sahara and Armagosa sand dunes. I even tried wake boarding with it once in an Oakley irrigation ditch pulled behind a four wheeler. The board isn't exactly in its prime anymore but I had one more idea for it. They call them snowscoots. Usually when I say snowscoot people go "ya I've seen that", then they proceed to describe something else. Anyway, there are a lot of variations in the states and it seems like the actual snowscoot is a lot bigger in Japan and Europe and I am only aware of one place in America that even sells it. But that doesn't matter because obviously I am not buying one and this was a zero dollar project.

basically I cut the board at about two thirds down the length of it and made a special mounting bracket so I could attach it to a bicycle fork for steering.

Most of the rest of the frame had to be custom built the back portion (remaining board not yet attached in this picture.

The funny thing is that I built this in the middle of the summer. It was a little frustrating because it was 100 degrees in the garage and I knew I would have to wait quite a while before I would get to use it. I finally got my chance this winter to take it up to Mt. Charleston. The thing is a lot of fun and pretty easy to get the hang of. It did really well in powder and on smaller hills. Attempts at taking it down steeper slopes without powder were pretty scary. The edge profile was not well balanced, the end result being that when you tried to corner it, the front end was getting a lot more edge than the back. Next thing you know, your nose would be pointing uphill and the flat back end would dig in and launch you off. It is worth mentioning that falling on this is a lot better than snowboarding because your feet are free to jump off and help catch yourself. Maybe someday I will find another board to cannibalize so I can put a flared back end on it. Anyway, it still made for a good ride as long as you were on the right slopes, and I am excited to give it a try on the sand dunes sometime.

And of course   HERE is the video of the snowscoot in action.

Phineas Gage

In this year's anatomy class the teacher wanted to review some of the material from last year's head and neck portion by having us wax up the various structures and "reverse dissect" them onto plastic skulls. He gave us a list of required structures then informed us that if we do them perfectly we will get an 80% for the project. To get a higher grade we have to include "a little something extra," whether that be additional structures or some sort of pathology. I decided to do a model of Phineas Gage.

   On September 13, 1848, 25-year-old  Phineas Gage was blasting rock for the Rutland & Burlington Railroad. After a hole was bored into a body of rock, one of Gage's duties was to add blasting powder, a fuse, and sand, then compact the charge into the hole using a tamping iron. After forgeting to add the protective sand, he proceeded to tamp down the charge. The tamping rod was rapidly ejected from the hole when the powder ignited. The iron entered on the side of his face...passing back of the left eye, and out at the top of the head, then flew an additional 80 yards.

Phineus was conscious for the ride back into town and even was able to sit up in the wagon, the following is a report from the first attending physician.

Dr. Edward H. Williams “I first noticed the wound upon the head before I alighted from my carriage, the pulsations of the brain being very distinct. Mr. Gage, during the time I was examining this wound, was relating the manner in which he was injured to the bystanders. I did not believe Mr. Gage's statement at that time, but thought he was deceived. Mr. Gage persisted in saying that the bar went through his head .... Mr. G. got up and vomited; the effort of vomiting pressed out about half a teacupful of the brain, which fell upon the floor”

The common story told is how he later became erratic, violent, and unable to hold employment, common symptoms of having bits of grey matter pop out through the top of your skull, but this seems to have only been temporary. He later was able to secure work as a stage coach driver, which he did for many years, then died with family in San Francisco.

There are several other cool parts to this story. The first is that when I first learned about this guy back in a neuroanatomy course there were no known surviving pictures. Then just in 2009 an antique collector uploaded some pictures labeled as "the whaler." Turns out it was Phineas himself...thank you awesome internet.

Another awesome factoid is that he carried that tamping rod with him for the rest of his life. I imagine it was an excellent conversation starter. Here is the other daguerreotype, once again sporting his tamping rod.

The last interesting fact is that he was later exhumed and you can see his skull for yourself at the Warren Anatomical Museum.

So that is Phineas Gage, and here is my version of him

 

Rover

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZjaFEEl1p6A&feature=youtu.be

For starters, I was never sure what to call this thing. Technically it is not a go kart because it has full suspension, but calling it a sand rail seemed a bit grandiose. So we will just call it rover.

My cousin Mark had been telling me about his broken down buggy that had been sitting in his backyard. I had been wanting to do a similar project but all those parts start to add up. This one easily has over $1000 in parts so I was surprised when he said I could just have it.

I could do a full post about Mark's generosity. He is like the handy man's Santa Clause and he ends up giving me something every time I see him. This was almost a full year ago and I was bummed that I didn't have a way to get it home until July when we took it apart and threw it in the back of my parents Pilot.

 On a side note I later proved that you could indeed carry this thing around on my wife's car...

Once I finally got it home the engine wasn't running and the frame was so small that Mark's little boy Timmy was about the only one who could fit in it. The other issues it had was that the disc brakes didn't completely disengage and the front tires were going bald, upon closer inspection I found that it was because in a turn the outside tire was angling more than the inside tire (the opposite of what you want it to do).

The first thing I did was take out the old broken down Briggs and Stratton and put in a slightly bigger engine (the one off of the doodlebug actually). The rover was now running...you just couldn't get in it. So the next thing I did was chop it completely in half and lengthened it by about two feet.

I though it would it would be fun if it were a side by side so I remounted the original seat off to the side and reupholstered a new one for the other side, added some width to the front, remounted the brake and gas pedals, and completely redid the steering assembly, moving the steering knuckle from the front to the back.

I put this spring in to force the calipers to completely retract from the disc brake when at rest.

The larger engine started torquing the transmission out of alignment so I later added this brace to keep things in place

After almost losing my first passenger on a turn I added a bar to the passenger side. 

The steering assembly has actually gone through about 4 different iterations. The original I already described. My first rebuild did not maintain alignment at different  points in the suspension's travel and the second was a huge work out to steer. The current set up has fixed all those problems but sacrificed a bit of turning radius. 

With all that done the rover has been a ton of fun. Neighbor hood kids are always begging for rides and the nieces an nephew are also big fans. It didn't even have to be on, Weston loved just sitting in it.

It has a wide stance and a very low center of gravity so you feel a lot more secure in it than on an ATV. I won't say it is impossible to tip but you would really have to be trying. It is still light enough and small enough that you can lift it up and it is just the right size for the back of a Ford Explorer. You can take it anywhere and if you really get it stuck you just hop out and lift it out. It can do a little over 40mph on a flat street but doesn't really have any hill climbing power. Someday I would like to find an old motorcycle engine/ transmission to swap in for a little more power,  a better transmission with more low range. "Faster" and "more power" are not Maria's favorite words so we probably won't be spending money on that any time soon.

Here are some highlights of the finished product.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZjaFEEl1p6A&feature=youtu.be