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I'm attempting to get started with fundraising a little earlier this year for the annual Kelly Brush Ride that I will once again be participating in this year. It's the same group of friends this year, likely minus one who unfortunately can't make it due to work reasons, but we're trying something a little different as a group this year. My friend Tom, who goes us all drawn into this madness, knows Kelly very well and the organization is trying to encourage folks to participate in the ride remotely. They've kind of reached critical mass in Middlebury, VT, with more than 800 riders participating so they can't really grow unless they change something. So our group sort of volunteered to be the pilot and we're headed to the coast of Maine to ride by a bunch of lighthouses and hopefully have some fun while suffering. Why am I explaining all this? Well, we want to show that remote folks can still effectively fundraise and participate. So we're going all-in and getting custom jerseys made to commemorate the ride. So all that said, I'm once again asking this group to be like no other forum. I'd very much appreciate any support that you can offer. The foundation is aiming to raise $1.2M to support individuals with spinal chord injuries to regain an active lifestyle. My personal goal is to raise $2,500. This organization and cause remains something near and dear to me as someone who takes the simple ability to get outdoors and do whatever I like, when I like, somewhat for granted. Every year I participate I find it helps refocus and recenter my appreciation for those that chose to not be limited by life-altering injuries, illness, etc. The foundation helps people discover adaptive sports and recreation, hosts camps to immerse people in sports and community, and most importantly, provides hundreds of grants per year to people that just want to return to the activities they love. Anyway, if you're able here's the link to donate to support me: Nate's KBF Fundraising Page And just for fun here's us with Kelly at the starting line last year. I'm hoping for much better weather this year so we can pound social media with pics and vids of our remote ride.

How you all doin' San Rafael. Neon Velvet Has them dancing under the lights

Both the power supply and amplifier chassis are approximately 290 mm × 400 mm × 90 mm, so it's actually fairly compact considering it's a full-size T2. The power supply uses five GRHV regulators and features plug-in bias daughter boards, making it easy to switch between different bias voltages. Right now it supports both Normal Bias and Pro Bias outputs. The PSU also includes about a 50sec high volt soft start. In addition, there's an AC inrush limiter on the mains input. After roughly one second, a relay bypasses the current-limiting resistor, reducing the inrush current seen by both the filter capacitors and the tube heaters during startup. On the amplifier side, most of the passive components are SMD, which helped reduce the overall PCB and chassis size. The amplifier topology stays very close to Kevin's original T2 schematic, but I added support for several different implementation options to make the design more flexible. It supports three different CCS configurations:10M90, 10M90S + DN2540, and the original T2 complex CCS. The active battery section is also configurable. It supports: LED string reference, LT1021 reference. For the 2SK216 and 2SJ79 positions, I added an extra pin so they can be replaced directly with TTC and TTA devices without modifying the PCB. The overall goal wasn't to redesign the T2, but rather to preserve the original circuit while making it easier to build, maintain, and adapt as some of the original parts become increasingly difficult to source. The chassis is CNC machined by a local machine shop. One detail I paid particular attention to was the top cover of the amplifier chassis. I designed it so that the EL34 tube sockets sit perfectly flush with the top panel, which I think gives the amplifier a much cleaner appearance. Additional ventilation slots were added in the center section for airflow. The side heatsinks are sandwiched between the top and bottom panels. This not only gives the chassis a cleaner look and prevents the sharp heatsink fins from being exposed, but also makes it much less likely that you'll scratch your hands when moving the amplifier. To make sure the heatsinks can still dissipate heat efficiently, I also added ventilation openings in the top and bottom panels wherever they cover the heatsinks. I've also been thinking about turning this project into a group buy, although I'm not sure how much interest in the T2 still exists today. The main motivation would be to reduce the chassis cost, since having a single custom CNC chassis made is quite expensive. If enough people were interested, the machining cost could come down significantly.

I know I've posted this before, but I was just forced to revisit it, and it's just as much an earworm as it ever was

Quiet birthday dinner for Melissa before larger plans, including a comedy show, this weekend. Speaking of comedy we strangely found birthday Covid cards in 2026.

Oof. RIP William Orbit. He had a long and colorful career, including producing and remixing a bunch of pop music. I'm quite partial to his early 90s work.