Frigid Friday

Tracking Link Courtesy of GPS, APRS, and Ham Radio
Jacque went to Albuquerque today to attend a  friend undergoing a surgical procedure, so I stayed busy without her anyway.
As noted yesterday, her Subaru has been howling louder and louder, especially since she returned from her recent trip to California.  I undertook to prioritize replacing the alternator in her absence.  Yesterday I had localized the source of the noise to the alternator.  I used the old "stick to the ear" method of poking around the various belt driven pumps, pulleys, and such, and though the noise seemed to be present all over the front of anything connected to the engine, it seemed loudest at the alternator housing.
I'm quite impressed with Subarus thus far.  This turned out to be the ultimate fabled almost nonexistent "15-minute Job".  The bolts holding the alternator were all exposed on the top and upper part of the engine, the serpentine belt was short and easily replaced, and only required 2 wrenches:  12 mm and 10 mm.  And, when the old alternator was removed, spinning it by hand resulted in a growly snarl from the bearings, proving I had indeed picked the correct suspect.  When the car was started after all was bolted back together, it purred nicely, without the growl and howl we'd almost gotten used to.
Then - Since my hands were already grimy - I decided to shorten the problematic chain on my 2-wheel recumbent.  That also didn't take too long, maybe 20 minutes..... and I now was itching to take it for a "spin" to try it out.  Since I now had a defunct alternator to return for a $45 core charge, I decided I'd try biking it over to Edgewood to the Autozone store there.  The alternator inside the back bike basket left just enough room for Jazzie, our wiggly little new Papillon puppy, so we were all good.
Of course, just as I saddled up, it began to rain.  Er, that is, sprinkle.  Which wouldn't have mattered had it been 70 degrees or more, but at 40-something degrees and upcoming high winds, I backed out and went back in the house, my doggie and I.
Within 5 minutes it had dried up and the skies opened up to a bit of blue sky, so I took off again. 
THIS time, just as we rolled maybe 20 feet, the battery went dead again... killing the GPS and the tracker.  The Li-Ion battery had been on charge all night on a different charger and had checked at 14 volts with a meter but had immediately died and now exhibited ZERO volts.  This battery has an automatic low-voltage shutoff so it must have triggered.  I pulled the backup battery off the charger and it made the rest of the trip without incident.  I am now carefully monitoring the Li-Ion battery while gently charging in hopes it will come to life and take a charge again..... but I fear I have nuked this expensive battery.  We'll see.
I had almost gotten to the bottom of our 1-mile of unpaved goat-path road and the pavement when Jacque called saying she was on her way home.  So I decided to forgo the trip to Edgewood and just ride a mile or two to go through the gears and see how many now worked with the shortened chain.  It worked, and didn't seem to jump out of gear like it had prior to removing 3 links from the chain, but it still will not go into the lowest "Grandma Gear" nor did it ever shift into the smallest cassette gear on the rear for high-speed cruising.  It's always been a bit of  'throwing the dice' getting it into that highest gear.... but we just took it a couple miles and took it back home, with the idea of triking with Jacque after she got home. 
Howsomever, when she finally got home, the wind was howling and she was exhausted from arising at 5:30-ish and was no longer in the mood to try riding.  So I think instead, as the sun fades beyond the mountain, we will pop up some popcorn and watch Monk on TV for the evening.

Beginning Battery Voltage:  12.5        Ending Voltage: 11.7 (Nicad backup)
Lowest Temp  55 F      Highest Temp:  63 F
Stats from the GPS: Total Miles:  3.33
Overall average speed            Moving Avg               Max Speed
  2.3 MPH                                6.2 MPH                    18.2 MPH
Total Trip time                       Moving Time             Stopped Time
1 hour 26 minutes                  32 mins  16 secs         54 mins 3 secs