Thursday, November 14, 2024

George Behind the Workshop

It is with great sadness that I let George's followers know that he suddenly, unexpectedly, and peacefully passed away at his home in September. 

George was my father. He was a brilliant problem solver and was passionate about conservation and the outdoors. He was the type of person that could fix almost anything and saw the value in reusing, re-purposing, and re-engineering. He enjoyed cooking and had a gift for breads and an endless enthusiasm for learning, on an eclectic range topics. The last books on his kitchen table were "Engineering in Plain Sight" and "Open Circuits: the Inner Beauty of Electronic Components".

I'll miss a lot of things about him, right down to the incredibly packaged parcels he would send a few times a year for special occasions. If any of you have ever received a physical package from George, you'd know that the packaging itself was almost always as impressive as whatever was contained within.

I'm sorry George didn't have more time. I'm sure there were more interesting projects in the works and a lot of events that his family would have liked to share with him.

It was his wish that his websites remained open. So please, continue to read, share, and enjoy the interesting and handy guy dad was. 

Best, Jessica

Monday, June 10, 2024

reader project 7

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
 

 

 

 

Nicolas Cretton is a teacher in Lugano Switzerland, near Milan.

He sent the following links to work done by his students. (Italian Swiss):

http://www.nicolascretton.ch/LM/LAM_Grueninger_Kunnakatt_Marcotullio.pdf

http://www.nicolascretton.ch/LM/LAM_FINALE_12_2_2014_finale.pdf

http://www.nicolascretton.ch/LM/LAM_Bizzozero_Casiraghi_Keller_2015.pdf
 

June 3 2024 Hello George,
yes, I did send this at the time. You are welcome to use these links, they are publicly available on my website.

You are absolutely right about the challenges outdoors: indeed I had to replace the mylar already once, because after a few years, it oxidized and became white, not reflecting the light as before.... I'll have to do it again after only 2 years after the last change... 

A few months ago the motor I have been using died and I have to replace it.

Although I painted the wood structure with a water resistant paint + a coat of waterproof vernice [varnish?], it is now full of little black dots (mould I guess)

So all in all, if I think of all the work, it would have been much easier to install photovoltaic panels, which require zero maintenance and we could have used them also for heating the house, since we have an electric heat pump and we could have sold the excess electricity in the summer. I already have 15m2 of vacuum tubes for hot water (shower) and a bit of heating. I could send you pictures of the installation, after 10 years, to see how the degradation took its toll... thanks Nicolas 









 
I remember that when I started this work, solar PV cost $8-10 per watt.
What a different situation now!

Thank you for your interest

George Plhak
Lions Head, Ontario, Canada 

 

reader projects
reader project 0
reader project 1
reader project 2
reader project 3
reader project 4
reader project 5
reader project 6 
reader project 7 - This article