It has been a while since I have written because I have been studying for the U.S. Green Building Council LEED AP exam. I have been studying for this exam all last weekend and all this weekend. Last Monday, Friday, and Saturday I spent Most of the day studying for this exam (and the weekend before). I spent nearly 40 hours reading the 600+ page LEED 2009 Green Building Design And Construction Reference Guide, memorizing as much of the information as I could. I would read a credit/prerequisite (say SSc5.1), then read through the summary page of all related credits/prerequisites (SSc5.2, SSc6.1, SSc5.2, SSc7, WWc1), then go the next credit/prerequisite (SSc5.2) and repeat the process. This way I read through the book several times over when I finished.
Last Friday I started the practice exams and boy they are hard! I got 66% on the first and second exam. I read through all the parts of the book I missed and think I will be getting a much higher score on this third exam. The stuff the test you on is crazy. Like one of the questions was: "What is the population density for LZ2 Exterior Lighting levels?" Answer: "200-3,000 people/mi^2." This information is not even in the book! It is in a reference document. Luckily, most of the test questions are not this hard.
Showing posts with label work. Show all posts
Showing posts with label work. Show all posts
Sunday, September 11, 2011
Tuesday, August 23, 2011
Brendan and the Metric System
I had a 6 month construction rotation during which time I worked at the Beale Air Force Base and the Sacramento Resident Office (SRO). When I worked at SRO there was one Mechanical Engineer I worked with as much as possible; Brendan. Brendan and I had an ongoing lighthearted debate about the Metric vs. English unit system over the course of several months. For those who don't know my stance, then see a previous post of mine about the English unit system. During our conversations Brendan did help me understand the English unit system much better. I had always been confused with units like lb/BTU. In this case lb is not referring to the force of an object divided by its energy content. Instead, it is referring to an amount of a substance (measured in weight) per its energy content. This is because, as Brendan says, the fundamental unit for an amount of substance is not mass but weight. I would very much disagree with this, but I can understand where this idea comes from; one cannot measure mass, mass must be derived from taking its weight and dividing by gravity. Although we could understand each other we still enjoyed teasing one another; Brendan and I would tease each other almost every week. One of my favorite instances is when we were looking at a pump and calculating the load the pump puts on the equipment pad. Brendan said, "That's right , the load, not the mass but the force." He then broke out into a big smile and we both shared a laugh.
Mechanical Insulation Design Guide - Design Objectives | Whole Building Design Guide
Just finished a Webinar on this subject:
Mechanical Insulation Design Guide - Design Objectives | Whole Building Design Guide
Mechanical Insulation Design Guide - Design Objectives | Whole Building Design Guide
The most useful part of this guide I found was the condensate control calculator: http://www.wbdg.org/design/midg_design_ccchp.php
and the financial investment calculator: http://www.wbdg.org/design/midg_design_mifc.php.
The financial investment calculator can be used to calculate the rate of return on any investment!
Sunday, August 21, 2011
Aaron’s Experience with Public Transportation
Posted this to Facebook on on Tuesday, October 6, 2009 at 12:34pm
Date this event occurred: 6-24-09.
This is an entertaining story about my trip from Palo Alto to Sacramento. My first stop was the Caltrain San Antonio station. When I arrived at the San Antonio station I found myself on the wrong side of the tracks and, unlike the trains in Sacramento, there were huge fences blocking all access for pedestrians to cross the rails to get on the train going in the opposite direction. After asking around for a while I finally found someone who could tell me how to get on the other side. I needed to go to the very end of the platform (about 200 feet away) and go under a pedestrian tunnel to get to the other side. By the time I finally got to the other side my train was coming. I quickly pulled my ATM card out to pay for my tickets at the machine but my card was denied. I tried over and over again until finally my card was accepted; at this time the train was almost ready to take off. I jumped on my bike and sailed toward the train. The train attendant looked at me and signaled the train to take off leaving me stranded for an hour until the next train would show up. I learned later that in the bay area most Caltrain workers hate seeing bicycles being ridden anywhere near the train and will leave most riders if they see them on their bikes (a very weird policy, but now I know).
An hour later I get on the train. I found a place that my bike fit nicely and have just sat down when I was addressed. A Caltrain worker yelled at me “Your bike doesn’t go here!” and quick rushed down toward the rear of the train. I responded “Where should I put my bike?” The Caltrain worker ignores my response and continued walking. When the Caltrain worker got back, 15 minutes later, he said that he will be “escorting” me off the train at the next exit (I really love Caltrain at this moment). After being removed from the train at the next stop I notice that there were a lot of bicyclists getting on the train, but they were getting on at the very front of the train (this is where my bike belonged, but no one told me). I had a fairly uneventful train ride up to San Francisco after that.
After arriving in San Francisco I got out my map to the Greyhound bus station and started to bike toward my destination. The map I was using had me going down Haight Street which unfortunately has some of the steepest hills in all of San Francisco. I ended up on Haight and Ashbury which I quickly found out is nowhere near the Greyhound bus station (apparently they sound similar in mapquest). In fact, from the Caltrain station, Haight and Ashbury is in the opposite direction of Greyhound. I then had to bike the 8 miles (literally, to the opposite side of San Francisco) to the Greyhound station. Once at Greyhound I found out that they don’t store bicycles at the station (even though I called ahead and was specifically told that they did). They were able to sell me a $16 cardboard box that I could store my bike in (Greyhound can only store things in sealed containers). Unfortunately, this box was on the small side so I had to disassemble my bike to get it to fit in the box. When I say disassemble I don’t just mean take the wheels off, I mean take every single piece of the bike apart down to the handle bars and the peddles! After shoving my bike into the incredibly small box I was then told that that Greyhound only accepts cash (my day is just getting better and better). I tried the ATM at the station but the machine kept reporting an error. The Greyhound attendants said that they had some problems with the machine before but that it was maintained by a third party so they had no idea what might be wrong with it. The attendants were able to direct me to an ATM that was several blocks away, so away I went (I was surprised that the fee to use this ATM was $4!). After getting back with the $20 to pay for my bike I was informed that when I was out my bus had left without me and that I would have to take the next one which would be arriving at 1:30AM and would get to Sacramento at 3:45AM. They then informed me that this would involve a transfer charge of $15, cash! I love public transportation.
Date this event occurred: 6-24-09.
This is an entertaining story about my trip from Palo Alto to Sacramento. My first stop was the Caltrain San Antonio station. When I arrived at the San Antonio station I found myself on the wrong side of the tracks and, unlike the trains in Sacramento, there were huge fences blocking all access for pedestrians to cross the rails to get on the train going in the opposite direction. After asking around for a while I finally found someone who could tell me how to get on the other side. I needed to go to the very end of the platform (about 200 feet away) and go under a pedestrian tunnel to get to the other side. By the time I finally got to the other side my train was coming. I quickly pulled my ATM card out to pay for my tickets at the machine but my card was denied. I tried over and over again until finally my card was accepted; at this time the train was almost ready to take off. I jumped on my bike and sailed toward the train. The train attendant looked at me and signaled the train to take off leaving me stranded for an hour until the next train would show up. I learned later that in the bay area most Caltrain workers hate seeing bicycles being ridden anywhere near the train and will leave most riders if they see them on their bikes (a very weird policy, but now I know).
An hour later I get on the train. I found a place that my bike fit nicely and have just sat down when I was addressed. A Caltrain worker yelled at me “Your bike doesn’t go here!” and quick rushed down toward the rear of the train. I responded “Where should I put my bike?” The Caltrain worker ignores my response and continued walking. When the Caltrain worker got back, 15 minutes later, he said that he will be “escorting” me off the train at the next exit (I really love Caltrain at this moment). After being removed from the train at the next stop I notice that there were a lot of bicyclists getting on the train, but they were getting on at the very front of the train (this is where my bike belonged, but no one told me). I had a fairly uneventful train ride up to San Francisco after that.
After arriving in San Francisco I got out my map to the Greyhound bus station and started to bike toward my destination. The map I was using had me going down Haight Street which unfortunately has some of the steepest hills in all of San Francisco. I ended up on Haight and Ashbury which I quickly found out is nowhere near the Greyhound bus station (apparently they sound similar in mapquest). In fact, from the Caltrain station, Haight and Ashbury is in the opposite direction of Greyhound. I then had to bike the 8 miles (literally, to the opposite side of San Francisco) to the Greyhound station. Once at Greyhound I found out that they don’t store bicycles at the station (even though I called ahead and was specifically told that they did). They were able to sell me a $16 cardboard box that I could store my bike in (Greyhound can only store things in sealed containers). Unfortunately, this box was on the small side so I had to disassemble my bike to get it to fit in the box. When I say disassemble I don’t just mean take the wheels off, I mean take every single piece of the bike apart down to the handle bars and the peddles! After shoving my bike into the incredibly small box I was then told that that Greyhound only accepts cash (my day is just getting better and better). I tried the ATM at the station but the machine kept reporting an error. The Greyhound attendants said that they had some problems with the machine before but that it was maintained by a third party so they had no idea what might be wrong with it. The attendants were able to direct me to an ATM that was several blocks away, so away I went (I was surprised that the fee to use this ATM was $4!). After getting back with the $20 to pay for my bike I was informed that when I was out my bus had left without me and that I would have to take the next one which would be arriving at 1:30AM and would get to Sacramento at 3:45AM. They then informed me that this would involve a transfer charge of $15, cash! I love public transportation.
Lost Work Bag
On Thursday, August 18th I accidently left my work bag on light-rail. It happened during the worst day too. That morning I couldn't put my bike on the bus, because the bike racks were full. The bus driver did let me take my bike on the bus, which was nice, but that meant I had to hold it in place the entire ride. Next, I got into an argument at work with a colleague. After work, I went to the usual spot to be picked up by bus 29. However, this time bus 29's bike racks were full on the way home as well (this has only happened one other time in over two years). So that meant taking the light rail home followed by bus 23 or 25.
On light-rail there was a mean old lady who hit me with her cane when my bike bumped her. When approaching my stop, I concentrated on controlling my bike so as not to bump anyone else as I got ready to get off. After getting off of the light-rail I started to climb on my bike and pedal toward my stop, but a RT worker quickly informed me that no bike riding was allowed anywhere around light-rail. I quickly dismounted my bicycle and noticed that my bag was missing. I turned around just as the doors to the passenger cart I was riding in closed and a second later it started moving. My heart sunk as I started walking to the light-rail train and knew that it was not going to stop. I quickly called my wife and explained the situation. She told me to call 321-BUSS; after doing so, I waited at the station for my light-rail passenger cart to come back around. At the appointed time, nearly 30 minutes later, I saw the train coming back. The operator told me that at this time the light-rail train, I had taken earlier, should be on its way back downtown. My mood grew more depresses as I saw this train coming though. I knew the light-rail train I had taken had four passenger carts, the one approaching only had two though. So I took the next light-rail to Watt and I-80, the end of the line, to see if anyone had turned my bag in. After arriving, I asked an RT personnel if my bag was turned in. She got on her radio and asked if my bag had been seen on any of the passenger carts. I felt so silly, if I had known they could have done that earlier, I would have asked the RT personnel to radio my bag missing the minute I realized my bag was gone. In any case, no one had seen a bag and no bag had been turned in. I will be calling the lost and found this coming Tuesday just in case though. The RT attendant also told me that light-rail trains are shortened around 4:30pm. So the short light-rail train I didn't bother searching, was the one I had been riding in after all. After that, I had to ride my bike four miles home where I had lots of time to think about the bad day I had.
On light-rail there was a mean old lady who hit me with her cane when my bike bumped her. When approaching my stop, I concentrated on controlling my bike so as not to bump anyone else as I got ready to get off. After getting off of the light-rail I started to climb on my bike and pedal toward my stop, but a RT worker quickly informed me that no bike riding was allowed anywhere around light-rail. I quickly dismounted my bicycle and noticed that my bag was missing. I turned around just as the doors to the passenger cart I was riding in closed and a second later it started moving. My heart sunk as I started walking to the light-rail train and knew that it was not going to stop. I quickly called my wife and explained the situation. She told me to call 321-BUSS; after doing so, I waited at the station for my light-rail passenger cart to come back around. At the appointed time, nearly 30 minutes later, I saw the train coming back. The operator told me that at this time the light-rail train, I had taken earlier, should be on its way back downtown. My mood grew more depresses as I saw this train coming though. I knew the light-rail train I had taken had four passenger carts, the one approaching only had two though. So I took the next light-rail to Watt and I-80, the end of the line, to see if anyone had turned my bag in. After arriving, I asked an RT personnel if my bag was turned in. She got on her radio and asked if my bag had been seen on any of the passenger carts. I felt so silly, if I had known they could have done that earlier, I would have asked the RT personnel to radio my bag missing the minute I realized my bag was gone. In any case, no one had seen a bag and no bag had been turned in. I will be calling the lost and found this coming Tuesday just in case though. The RT attendant also told me that light-rail trains are shortened around 4:30pm. So the short light-rail train I didn't bother searching, was the one I had been riding in after all. After that, I had to ride my bike four miles home where I had lots of time to think about the bad day I had.
Friday, August 19, 2011
I hate the English unit system
Written on 10/6/2010
Here is the perfect example: MBtu and MMBtu
Btu = British Thermal Unit. A British unit which quantifies heat energy.
M = 10^6 (where “M” means million or Mega) or it could mean 10^3 (where “M” comes from Roman numeral lettering i.e. M = 1,000). The latter definition is the most commonly used. It mainly depends on what mood you are in though.
MM = thousand thousands which gets its meaning from implied multiplication (1,000*1,000 = 10^6). This implied multiplication comes from the Arabic algebra style of mathematics. Using the Roman style of mathematics “MM” would mean 2,000.
Thus we see that the English unit MMBtu uses the Roman numeral system with the implied operations of the Arabic algebraic system followed by the British energy quanta. Was the person who invented this unit doing drugs at the time? I think so.
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