I plan to use the truck primarily as a mobile computer networking center with the additional use of functioning as emergency relief. The idea for the networking setup is to be able to drive just about anywhere and instantly have a computer network setup to play video games with a bunch of people. Using some Linux scripting, a custom router, a portable server, and my cell phone it is even capable of having an internet connection. Eventually John and I plan to have all of the internet acquisition function automatically and add the ability to be a mean War Driving machine.
During the testing of the UPS system I drained the batteries rather low. To recharge the batteries I can either run the Diesel engine of the truck and use the alternator or I can use a smart charger that uses mains power. The battery bank is rated at 345 Amp hours at 24 Volts which takes several hours to charge. The alternator on the truck seems to output an average in the neighborhood of 50 amps at 28 volts while the car charger can only output 15 Amps at 14 volts.
Sorry for the shaky camera work, I didn’t have any of my usual weights or stands with me.
We got somewhere in the neighborhood of 22 inches this past weekend (the “Snowpocalypse” according to the media) which effectively immobilized all of the vehicles on my street… except for my Deuce. The snow plows don’t usually come down my road until well after the storms so I decided to take maters into my own hands. Using the 18,000lbs of the truck I compacted the snow to a much more manageable 2 inches so that other cars and trucks could drive again.
Throughout the course of the day John and I also helped pull/push/winch a car to safety and helped a lady in another part of the neighborhood get to work. We also had a lot of fun in the process.
This weekend John and I installed the raceway on the driver’s side of the box. The network cables are now neatly tucked behind the metal raceway. Unfortunately, either the windows or the power strip that came with the truck was installed crooked, so it looks a little off. We also took a look at the driver’s side door henge which is bent and preventing the door from closing completely. John ran a new power cable from the network box to the main breaker box, but since we didn’t have enough raceway we had to just let the cable hang in place. Hopefully next weekend we will have more materials and be able to tidy it up.
Not the most interesting video, but some people requested that I post what video I had of the most recent LAN party. The game of choice was Warcraft III with DoTA, Castle Fight, Line Tower Wars, and Battle Tanks. There were about 12 people (depending on what specific time). We had 5 people in the Deuce and a Half and another 5 people in my computer room.
This weekend John and I worked wiring the 120v electrical system for the M185a3. Over the span of two days we were able to wire and test the electrical umbilical connections, about half of the Ethernet cables, and install the network box. More videos will be posted as progress is made.
I’ve decided to start posting some videos of the progress John and I are making on the deuce and a half. This video glosses over the progress we have made so far. Over the coming weeks I’ll be posting more videos showing specific sub-projects, such as setting up the network box, installing a seccondary breaker pannel, charging the battery bank, and other various things.
John and I spent most of this past weekend working on the truck. The primary goal that we accomplished was connecting the alternator to the rear battery pack (henceforth referred to as the “Atomic Pile,” a reference to Batman). In order to tap into the 60 Amp output of the alternator we had to run some wire from the Atomic Pile and into either the stock battery box or the engine compartment. John thought it would be nice to be able to disconnect and monitor the power flow from the cabin, so we decided on routing the cable under the cab, through the engine bay, and into the cab. Once inside the cab the circuit runs through a 60 Amp fuse, an ammeter, and (hopefully soon) a heavy duty switch. We weren’t able to get our hands on a switch this weekend, but we’re going to keep looking for one.
I ran a test today to make sure that all of my servers could be run off of my truck’s electrical system without any downtime. I simply ran a long extension cord from an outlet in the truck to my server closet. I then unplugged the server closet UPS from the wall outlet and plugged it into the extension cord. The UPS in the closet beeped a few times, but kept on running. I then unplugged the shore power umbilical from the truck, the closet UPS beeped a few times, and then was running off of the truck’s UPS. Everything went off without a hitch. The trucks 6.6KWhr of usable battery life should give me about 16 hours of run-time, plus whatever the closet UPSs provide on their own. The closet draws around 415W of power. This includes all of my servers, switches, and routers, except for my surveillance system.
The only downside to this setup is that I have to manually unplug the closet UPS from the wall and then plug it into the truck. In order to get around this I may just run it from the truck system all the time (with the truck’s umbilical connected to shore power) and then switch the closet over to the local outlet whenever I drive the truck.
I know it’s been a while since my last update, but we’ve been doing a lot with the Deuce. When we first started working on the truck I thought that all of the electrical wiring in the box was going to have to be redone. John did some testing with the existing cables and figured out that everything should actually work ok. The stock umbilical cable did not seem to join with the breaker box properly, so we decided not to use it. Instead, we disconnected the generator start/stop control buttons and ran a standard household electrical cable from the inverter to where the buttons used to be and then into the breaker box. We are using an APC 900W UPS connected to six Everstart marine batteries from Walmart. Each battery is 115Ahr at 12 Volts, which gives a total of around 8.2KWhrs if I drain the batteries down to the shutoff voltage. Granted, I have no intentions of taking the batteries down to the 10.5V cutoff, so an 80% depth of discharge leaves me with around 6.6KWhrs, which is still a good chunk of change. Running the inverter at the full 900W would give me about 7 Hours of run time.
