Taps drip. It’s inevitable, like death and taxes. They seal using a rubber ring screwed down over the end of a metal pipe. Sooner or later the rubber is going to go hard, split or just wear away and it will no longer seal. Then water seeps through, and the tap starts dripping. Left alone the problem gets worse as the water wears away the valve seat. Then you’ll have to either re-grind the valve seat(Do you own a valve seat re-grinder? Who would?) or replace the tap. Tedious in either case. But, it need not happen. Many taps now use ceramic discs.
How They Work
Instead of blocking the pipe by squeezing a piece of rubber onto the end of it, there are two slotted ceramic discs held down over the water supply pipe. The bottom disc doesn’t move, while the upper disc is rotated over it by the tap mechanism. When the slots align the the tap is on, and when the slots don’t align, the tap is off.
Why Are They Better?
There are advantages to this approach. The main one is that the discs are very hard and withstand the erosion of water very well. Hence they last much longer before needing replacement. Also, because the water flow is between the two discs, it’s the discs that wear not the tap body itself. Because of the arrangement of the discs, it only requires a quarter turn to go from fully off to fully on and the operation of the tap is very light. This has the advantage that they are easy to turn on with the back of the wrist if you have dirty hands or for people with restricted movement.
Where they are Used
The ease of operation and the long life mean that most good quality sink mixer taps have been made using ceramic discs for a while, but basin taps with ceramic discs are surprisingly less common. The more use a tap gets, the more attractive the use of ceramic disc technology becomes. This is doubly true in hard water areas, which can be murder on traditional taps.
Disadvantages
There are a few disadvantages. The discs do eventually wear out, but manufacturers seem to have standardised, so it is reasonably easy to get replacements. Basin taps are sometimes handed and sometimes not, and it can be annoying to have to work out which way to turn the tap in order to get water. They are also more expensive and not suitable for very low water pressure. The only other disadvantage is that if you are used to the old style taps, which need a number of turns to turn fully on, you may inadvertently turn the tap on more than you intended, you can get a unexpected full-on jet of water. Embarrassing!
Photo: W. Wayt GibbsPhoto:W. Wayt GibbsHome-brew House Guard: A microphone connected to a Wi-Fienabled Arduino Uno listens for the Scouts alarms. A wireless switch turns on the siren.
The last straw was a midday break-in right next door. For months, my wife and I had worried that our neighborhood in the Seattle suburbs was suffering from a nasty rash of home burglaries. We had toyed with getting a security system for our house but balked at the monthly fees and installation hassle of conventional systems. Then our neighbors alerted us that intruders had just busted into their homeonly a few meters from oursin broad daylight.
I started researching DIY security systems the next day. Thanks to advances in mesh networking and Internet-of-Things standards like Zigbee and Z-Wave, the market has exploded with wireless security systems that are easy to install and expand, connected to smartphone apps, and much more affordable than their hardwired counterparts. Most of them include built-in batteries and 3G cellular radios, so they still work if the power or Internet router goes down.
As I waded through the support forums of several promising-looking systems, however, I noticed a common complaint: Their sirens are pathetic. The siren is not loud enough thread on Scout Alarms website, for example, had 156 posts from unhappy customers, along with (as yet unfulfilled) promises from the company to fix the issue by redesigning the case. Its surprising that none of the DIY systems make enough noise to scare off would-be thieves (or include terminals for connecting an external siren). Apparently their designers didnt have deterrence in mind.
I decided to order a Scout system nevertheless. It offered the sensors I needed at an attractive price. I liked that it works with IFTTT (If This Then That), an IoT-unifying Web-based service that I wanted to use to flash a Lifx lightbulb on my nightstand when the alarm goes off. And I had an idea for amplifying the siren to be as loud as I wantedan idea that should work with any security system, IFTTT-enabled or not (IFTTT can be sluggish responding to a trigger, not the kind of thing you want when trying to stop burglars in their tracks). All I had to do was to build a follower siren.
Its an idea borrowed from photography, where studios sometimes deploy extra stand-alone flashes that go off when an attached photodetector picks up the light of a flash directly attached to the camera. My gadget would similarly use a microphone to listen for the distinctive chirp of the Scouts alarm and then send a wireless signal on my local network to turn on and off a much louder siren in sync with the Scout.
Setting up the Scout was easy. It took less than an hour to configure the hub (US $129) by using the free iOS app and to link it to a couple of entry-door panels ($69 each), several door/window sensors ($29 each), and a few motion detectors ($49 each). I connected the system to IFTTT and configured an app called DO Button to let my wife and me arm or disarm the system with our phones.
For the listener part of the project, I bought an Arduino Uno ($20), an ESP8266 Wi-Fi shield for the Uno ($15), and a sound detector sensor board ($11) from SparkFun. Compared with more advanced microcontrollers, the Uno is smaller, cheaper, and can run on batteries. But its limited memory later proved problematic.
I made things easy on myself on the siren side by buying Belkins WeMo switch ($39), which connects to Wi-Fi and can toggle power to any appliancein this case, a 9-volt power supply for a 110-decibel Honeywell Ademco 702 siren ($23). The WeMo also comes with a free smartphone app, which serves as a handy backup in case I need to sound or silence the siren manually. Belkin hasnt documented the TCP commands that control the switch, but helpful hackers have deduced them and posted Arduino sketches that can turn the device on or off via Ethernet.
All I needed to do was adapt that code to work with the Wi-Fi shield, and then use it as a function inside a larger program that monitored the frequency, intensity, and duration of the sounds picked up by the microphone board. Within a couple of hours, I had the chirp-detection algorithm built.
To calibrate it, I put the microphone right next to the Scout hub and triggered the alarm. The critics were right: Its cry for help is truly feeblequieter than a phone ringing or the alarm on my clock radio. So quiet, in fact, that I wasnt convinced the sensor could distinguish it from background noise. Removing the hub cover revealed the problem: The piezo speaker is mounted so that sound is aimed directly into the thick plastic side of the device. I drilled a hole a little over a centimeter wide to expose the speaker to the air, and immediately the volume doubledstillnot loud enough to deter an intruder, but sufficient to activate my chirp detector.
Then I hit the 2-kilobyte problem: My program demanded more RAM than the Uno offers, mainly due to the lengthy data packet it had to assemble and send to activate the WeMo. Savvy developers pointed me to a function that forces the compiler to store data in the much more expansive flash memory (intended for storing programs) rather than in the Unos RAM. But that came at a heavy cost in speed: The Arduino took about 30 seconds to toggle the switch, when it worked at all.
Through trial and many errors, I finally worked out a way to keep the crucial data packets in RAM while stuffing most everything else into the flash. The final program loaded with memory to spare. Connecting all the pieces, I loaded up the Scout app and hit the siren button. Chirp, chirp, chirpWHOOP, WHOOP, WHOOP. The big siren came on so loud and suddenly, I almost wet myself. Im sure the neighbors heard it. And thats the point.
This article originally appeared in print as DIY Home Security.
The obvious tips that you’ve heard at least a thousand times before are to lock your doors and windows, trim your bushes around the home, and to not let newspapers pile up when you’re on vacation; but you’d be surprised as to how many people forget about the little things…
People tend to be too open and personable online, even with strangers. They tell everyone in Facebook and Twitter where they’re going, for how long, blah, blah, blah. The most important thing is to tell as few people as possible (online and offline) that you’re going on vacation, a business trip, or away for a long weekend; this will prevent potential thieves from interpreting your announcement as a free invitation. It’s better to blast all of your social networking friends with trip pictures after the fact when you’re already back home.
An empty home is an inviting one to a burglar. If you make sure that your doorbell works properly it will help protect you when you’re home, as many thieves test doorbells. A working doorbell will also trigger your dog to bark if you’re a dog owner. Dogs can be heard by owners and neighbors if a burglar is checking out your home the day before they attempt to break in. Little yappy dogs tend to be even more of a turn-off because they just don’t stop barking.
When you leave boxes for expensive equipment or appliances out on the curb for the trash man to pick up, thieves already know what’s in your house without looking inside. Some potential intruders may even pick through your trash; always shred important documents, receipts, bills and statements before disposing of them so they are more difficult to read. Throwing out important papers intact could easily lead to identity theft, or they could tell burglars about the kinds of electronics that you have in your home, services you pay for, etc.
One of the worst stupid people tricks is leaving a house key in an obvious place. Leaving your key in the mailbox, under the doormat, on top of the door sill or a fake rock, etc, is too clich; that’s where most intruders would look first. You can have the best door and window locks in the world and even the most advanced security system, but if a criminal has access to a key, 99% of their work is done for them already. So, wrap your house key in foil and place it in a secret spot that only your family knows about. Now that we’ve covered the basics, let’s get into the details of home security.
For many, a well designed and planned out kitchen is the center of a great household. It is where families spend the bulk of their time both before and after work. If youre looking to change the atmosphere of your home and looking to make an impact, then remodeling your kitchen should be your primary objective. Living in San Francisco, you can just imagine the different types of design flavor and eclectics when it comes to remodeling and kitchen projects. With a remodeling project comes certain responsibility, many folks are truly unsure what it REALLY takes when taking on such a task. Just the blueprints and plans themselves can be daunting. With that being said, here are some San Francisco kitchen remodeling ideas to create the kitchen of your dreams. The first thing you need to keep in mind is that Bay Area Kitchens offer a lot of options when it comes to usability and style and yes size does matter here. From Victorian or Tudor style home, to modern contemporary trackstyle housing – the kitchen needs to be large enough to blend numerous task areas together. However, if after you designed and built the kitchen and it turned out too small, it could be your worst nightmare if you have a family of four or more. The best thing about Bay Area kitchens, particularly San Francisco kitchens is that they incorporate the various size and styles of just about any preference. In addition, using the right cabinets and stylish hardware will give your San Francisco kitchen a fashionable elegance, giving your family moments to spend time together and bond.
San Francisco kitchen design is really a unique concept and allows you to reflect your personal style with what youre really passionate about. When it comes to surfaces. Many San Francisco Kitchens are so versatile that they provide a different look for every kitchen. For instance, just changing the lighting of a room instance will give your kitchen just the momentum it needs to make it POP. An innovative San Francisco kitchen remodeling project is filled with lighting ideas to make your kitchen beautiful, but also help you to work in useful attributes to provide for better overall functionality. I personally am a fan of track lighting and dimmer switches to create that perfect mood. San Francisco kitchens are also notorious with the flooring, particularly hard wood. Still, there are lots of choices here anything from vinyl to ceramic tiles, to wood floors and laminates. Possibilities are endless.
When designing your San Francisco Kitchen, its important to pick the right color choices. The right Bay Area Kitchen color scheme puts all the components of the particular project together. You can go with any colors that you wish depending on lavish you want to be. Different shades of blues and off brown shades are good, though red and orange colors are better. Whether it is paint or wallpaper, spice up your kitchen walls to add ambience, again your contractor can provide you with good options. The last element to your San Francisco kitchen remodeling project is buying new appliances. I cant begin to tell you how important it is to pick the right appliances. Dependable appliances prepare the food for the family and good brands such as Whirlpool and Maytag offer a matching suite of various designs and innovations to fit your style. This is truly where contractors come in; they can give you kitchen remodeling ideas to suit any type of budget, helping you to meet your remodeling goals. Also when your remodeling your kitchen, you might want to think about doing the bathroom at the same time, what the hell. Knocking out two birds with one stone will ultimately leave you with a sense of accomplishment after everything is accomplished. A Happy and Stylish kitchen is a useful kitchen
Photo: W. Wayt Gibbs
Photo:W. Wayt GibbsHome-brew House Guard: A microphone connected to a Wi-Fienabled Arduino Uno listens for the Scouts alarms. A wireless switch turns on the siren.
The Editorial Arrangement 