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| Why I go camping: It takes me to places where the photos are. |
Now that I was out of 3/4 inch oak, I had a new (and better?) idea. I would use veneer oak plywood. In case you are not familiar with it, veneer is a thin slice of wood, peeled off a tree as it is turned. This veneer happens to be 1/16th of an inch thick. I cut it to the right size (6x9 inches this time) and went through the rounding and sanding process. Since my scroll saw was sans blades, I decided to go with the reciprocating saw again, only more carefully than before.
Unfortunately, the properties of the oak did not change, in spite of the thinner material, and it flew apart in two separate pieces. I glued it back together. It was time to turn in, a euphemism for throwing my hands up in the air and grieving my series of disastrous efforts.
The next day I was looking at my gluing job and an even better idea came to mind. I didn't need a frame for it, I could mount it in front of the gaping hole in my dash, which would act as a cooling and venting area. Too bad this idea hadn't come to mind earlier. It turns out the oak wood previously discarded was perfect for this new vision. I sanded the piece, drilled holes, and mounted it just below the void. The monitor fit upon it perfectly. Success was mine, nothing could stop me now.
I consider myself modestly handy with wiring. I have installed quite a few car stereos over the years; this would not be too different. Although the device has a plethora of wires emitting from its base, the only ones I needed to worry about was the red and black ones. Now, this sounds simpler than it really was because it took me a great deal of reading the manual and playing with a battery and hookups before I came to that conclusion. However, it was now very straight forward. My confidence bolstered, I saw fit to actually hook it all up.
Solderless connections in hand with wire strippers, plyers, and electrician's tape, I used the power supply from the old unit. I even had a voltmeter handy to be sure positive and negative lines were as I surmized. Correct lines joined, connectors connected, and even the old camera feeds repurposed to carry voltage to the new cameras. It was brilliant, OK, it was fine, but I felt good. Now I had to power it all on.
I turned on the chassis power supply and the unit started beeping in an uncharacteristic manner. Clearly, it was getting power, but somewhere I muffed up. I pulled it all apart, that old feeling that things were not going to go my way was regaining its grip on me, and checked all the voltages again. No, I had done it right. I determined (again after a few "breaks" and much soul searching) that the culprit lay in the kind of voltage being supplied. I don't have an oscilloscope, but there must be something odd about the nature of this source. Maybe AC, maybe square waves - who knows - but I needed a new power source.
My neighbour (thanks Clint) suggested I pull power off the cigarette lighter. An excellent idea. And so I pulled it out and redid all my connections again. A large pile of spent blue solderless connectors was growing as my various attempts were consecutively being thwarted. However, this must work. So, once again I hooked everything up, using the new power source, and did all my connections as before. Cut, strip, merge, twist, connect, repeat. Done. Finally. Finished. Complete. Success. So I powered it all on. NOTHING.
Maybe the line was switched through the ignition. No, that wasn't it. Maybe the engine had to actually be running. No. Voltmeter out and guess what. The cigarette lighter circuit was dead. I trailed the wire back, took apart the fuse panel, prayed and covered myself with ashes (an exaggeration, but you get the idea). I would have fasted for a month if that helped, but there was no making this thing fly. Now I had a problem. Where was I going to get a power source?
I decided to use an empty slot on the fuse panel. I went to Lordco and bought, for a measly $17, the necessary wire and fuse holder to make it work. I ran the wire through the rig and came up underneath the dash. I used a ground wire from earlier and the voltage checked out. Taking it apart and reconnecting it, the blue wasted connectors now threatening to bury me, I completed the job once again. Power on - wait for it - success!
I hooked up a camera to the rear feed and it worked too. Amazing! On one attempt. At this juncture, I did not even think that possible. No blood, no agonizing, no pain. At last, I was done - well, for the moment. You see, I now have to drill holes in the back of my RV, hook up the connectors through them, waterproof the access points, somehow get those wires to the power supply back there, tie them together with more blue connectors, and hope it all works. What could go wrong?
Unfortunately, the properties of the oak did not change, in spite of the thinner material, and it flew apart in two separate pieces. I glued it back together. It was time to turn in, a euphemism for throwing my hands up in the air and grieving my series of disastrous efforts.
The next day I was looking at my gluing job and an even better idea came to mind. I didn't need a frame for it, I could mount it in front of the gaping hole in my dash, which would act as a cooling and venting area. Too bad this idea hadn't come to mind earlier. It turns out the oak wood previously discarded was perfect for this new vision. I sanded the piece, drilled holes, and mounted it just below the void. The monitor fit upon it perfectly. Success was mine, nothing could stop me now.
I consider myself modestly handy with wiring. I have installed quite a few car stereos over the years; this would not be too different. Although the device has a plethora of wires emitting from its base, the only ones I needed to worry about was the red and black ones. Now, this sounds simpler than it really was because it took me a great deal of reading the manual and playing with a battery and hookups before I came to that conclusion. However, it was now very straight forward. My confidence bolstered, I saw fit to actually hook it all up.
Solderless connections in hand with wire strippers, plyers, and electrician's tape, I used the power supply from the old unit. I even had a voltmeter handy to be sure positive and negative lines were as I surmized. Correct lines joined, connectors connected, and even the old camera feeds repurposed to carry voltage to the new cameras. It was brilliant, OK, it was fine, but I felt good. Now I had to power it all on.
I turned on the chassis power supply and the unit started beeping in an uncharacteristic manner. Clearly, it was getting power, but somewhere I muffed up. I pulled it all apart, that old feeling that things were not going to go my way was regaining its grip on me, and checked all the voltages again. No, I had done it right. I determined (again after a few "breaks" and much soul searching) that the culprit lay in the kind of voltage being supplied. I don't have an oscilloscope, but there must be something odd about the nature of this source. Maybe AC, maybe square waves - who knows - but I needed a new power source.
My neighbour (thanks Clint) suggested I pull power off the cigarette lighter. An excellent idea. And so I pulled it out and redid all my connections again. A large pile of spent blue solderless connectors was growing as my various attempts were consecutively being thwarted. However, this must work. So, once again I hooked everything up, using the new power source, and did all my connections as before. Cut, strip, merge, twist, connect, repeat. Done. Finally. Finished. Complete. Success. So I powered it all on. NOTHING.
Maybe the line was switched through the ignition. No, that wasn't it. Maybe the engine had to actually be running. No. Voltmeter out and guess what. The cigarette lighter circuit was dead. I trailed the wire back, took apart the fuse panel, prayed and covered myself with ashes (an exaggeration, but you get the idea). I would have fasted for a month if that helped, but there was no making this thing fly. Now I had a problem. Where was I going to get a power source?
I decided to use an empty slot on the fuse panel. I went to Lordco and bought, for a measly $17, the necessary wire and fuse holder to make it work. I ran the wire through the rig and came up underneath the dash. I used a ground wire from earlier and the voltage checked out. Taking it apart and reconnecting it, the blue wasted connectors now threatening to bury me, I completed the job once again. Power on - wait for it - success!
I hooked up a camera to the rear feed and it worked too. Amazing! On one attempt. At this juncture, I did not even think that possible. No blood, no agonizing, no pain. At last, I was done - well, for the moment. You see, I now have to drill holes in the back of my RV, hook up the connectors through them, waterproof the access points, somehow get those wires to the power supply back there, tie them together with more blue connectors, and hope it all works. What could go wrong?
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