Intersection of Beer Geek and Computer Geek

Part of my process to get ready for migration has been clearing out old junk. I have a couple of old computers lying around, both were supposed to be transformed into Linux servers or something else that I never did. I don't want to just throw them out, the electronics can contain all sorts of things you want to keep out of the landfills.

There is an option though, Best Buy has a recycling program that will accept all sorts of things. The only problem is that they don't want to take computer hard drives. Once upon a time I actually built my own computers from parts, I don't anymore and could not even if I wanted to. But I do know enough to take out a hard drive. So then I had 5 hard drives that were stacked in a box. Now I had an external drive that had died that I built a stir plate using the neodymium magnets. I decided to get rid of it before I moved to save space. I want to build a new one once I get to Seattle, but I will need magnets to do that.

So today I sat down and harvested the magnets out of all five hard drives. Once I get to Seattle and have some working space, I will build a new, stronger stir plate. The problem with the old one is that the cell phone power supply I scrounged was only 7 volts and that did not provide enough power to stir a full liter of starter in a one liter flask, it seemed to work fine for one liter of stater in a two liter flask though (I think it was the higher water column in the smaller flask created too much resistance in the under-powered fan). I also have a box of 12 volt computer cooling fans harvested from a few machines as well. The newer machine actually had three fans it in so now I have plenty to work with.

I think if I have fans left over I am going to build a herb/hop dryer using the fans to draw air through the material spread out on screens.