Hi, all - thanks to those who attended the kickoff chat. We'll be meeting in the same place, same time next week (see the schedule here).
(above image via @MelissaN on Twitter)
First, I wanted to mention that we have a program blog here: http://publiclab.org/blog/oil-testing-kit
You can post to it at: http://publiclab.org/wiki/oil-testing-kit-beta#Share+your+work
This is an easy way to share your work and any difficulties you've encountered. It'd also be great if you left comments on one anothers' posts -- if you see something that could be improved or adjusted, or just for encouragement!
Some additional notes from the chat:
There was a discussion about mineral oil -- it was not included in the kit, but is available in most pharmacies and supermarkets -- it is used as a laxative. Since it was chosen specifically because it does not fluoresce, we don't feel that different mineral oils should make a difference, but please do record a baseline of pure mineral oil in a cuvette and upload it as you begin your scanning. (Which is next week's topic!)
Mineral oil is also available online for $9 on Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Vi-Jon-Inc-S0883-Mineral-Oil/dp/B001B2RG1C/
The next chat is next week, Oct 7, same time and place, and the topic will be: preparing samples, scanning and uploading. The chat, is available at:
For fun, we shared the old OTK kickstarter video, which is lighthearted but informative: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a6jKe80YO8w
Here's the complete chat. Thanks, and please leave any additional questions or input in the comments, below!
Thanks again to all our OTK Beta Program members: @eustatic, @cquijano84, @Tofu, @ronhuber, @norby, @uprmotero, @Craig, @tmccaffr, @Charles_Hamilton, @mahsa, @JayB, @MelissaN, @LKStendie, @wsg, @zhughbanks, @JeanellSullivan, @Webstertiums, @emilycheung17, @ethanbass, @Cindy_ExCiteS, @chongyukwai, @drocheleau, @gracecagle, @Bluemountainsurfer
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Hi, all! We're glad to see that folks are receiving the last part of their OTKs, and starting to assemble them! Please be careful with your lasers -- check out this laser warning notice for more advice on safe usage. (And thanks to @Craig for the lead image of his unboxing!)
We're now announcing the schedule for the beta program. Each week, on Wednesdays, we'll be hosting a Q&A and open chat session which we highly encourage you to join. If you aren't able to make this time, please leave comments in the research note we'll be posting each week, to stay in touch. Also, please try to get documentation for what you've done posted before the meeting for that week, or shortly afterwards if you have pending questions.
Our meetings will be 30 minutes, and @ygzstc, @warren, @gretchen and @stevie will be around for each one.
The first, kickoff meeting will be on Wednesday, Sept 30, at 1pm Eastern Time (ET), in the Public Lab chatroom:
The schedule for the assembly and testing will be as follows, with the date of each meeting:
Week 1 (Sept 30): construction & calibration
Week 2 (Oct 7): preparing samples, scanning and uploading
Week 3 (Oct 14): discuss, wrapup
Week 4 (Oct 21): next steps: followup challenges announced
The schedule is also now posted on the Oil Testing Kit Beta Program wiki page
That said, please begin assembling and try calibrating your instruments! You can find instructions here:
if you have questions, post them here and/or bring them to the Wednesday chat. Thanks and good luck to our beta program participants, and we look forward to hearing from you!
@eustatic, @cquijano84, @Tofu, @ronhuber, @norby, @uprmotero, @Craig, @tmccaffr, @Charles_Hamilton, @mahsa, @JayB, @MelissaN, @LKStendie, @wsg, @zhughbanks, @JeanellSullivan, @Webstertiums, @emilycheung17, @ethanbass, @Cindy_ExCiteS, @chongyukwai, @drocheleau, @gracecagle, @Bluemountainsurfer
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Hi guys, Liz Barry suggested me to contact you. I am an artist working on a "toolbox for bioremediation" This is part of my larger international project Manuals for Public Space. Earlier this year we did a balloon mapping project together with the PL and Newtown Creek Alliance. Right now this project is part of Art in Odd Places Festival at the 14th street. I would be very happy if we could do a workshop using your soil testing kit on Oct. 11th. I talked to Liz and she suggested to ask you if I could borrow a kit from you. Of course I will announce PL and our group as partners and lot of people (even internationally) will get the opportunity to see that.
Please let me know if it would be possible to borrow the kit. The opportunity to conduct the workshop with this amazing kit is very exciting! :-)
Matej Vakula - couple of minutes ago I posted this as a comment. Apologies for that.
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1921 Danger to Fisheries from Oil and Tar Pollution of Waters 1921 Danger to Fisheries frm Oil &Tar Pollution of Waters. Original typeface 1923 Pollution of Waters. US Commissioner of Fisheries pg 23
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Last Updated on September 2nd, 2015
I just wanted to share some ideas and suggestions for improving the stability of the spectrometer v3.0 and oil testing kit attachment. I'll try to keep updating/modifying this list of items time to time.
1- DVD holder attached to wooden block
If you need/want to re-place the current DVD holder, velcro is too strong and may damage the holder’s bottom section. So, you can attach the DVD holder to the wooden block instead. An idea of this attachment is in Figure 1. Also this may help to achieve inter-device compatibility.
Figure 1 - DVD holder attached to the wooden block (Dimensions are not correct – just to illustrate the idea)
2 - Separate top for spectrometer
Folding edges of top of the spec tends to be torn easily (especially the folding edge on the camera side) so using tape might be a good idea. In addition, separate top might be a simple idea to modify without disturbing the optical setup at the bottom part. (For the sketch see Figure 2.)
Figure 2 - Sketch for a separate top for spectrometer v3.0
3- Stabilizing the USB cable
You can use tape to stabilize the USB cable of the webcam to the wooden block to prevent disturbing the camera position (Figure 3)
Figure 3
4- Increasing the stability of the OTK attachment
Some folded parts of OTK can be fixed using double-sided tape (or with few drops of glue) to make it more sturdy (Figure 4)
Figure 4
5- Connection between OTK and spectrometer
Stable connection between OTK attachment and spectrometer is necessary. Tape/velcro on the bottom and some attachment like in Figure 5 on top may be useful. This also helps reducing unwanted ambient light to leak inside.
Figure 5
6- External Power Supply for Laser
An alternative way to set up the laser is to use few additional cables an external battery holder (Figure 6). Advantages of this kind of setup are: (i) you can change the batteries and operate the laser during measurements without touching/disturbing the OTK attachment; (ii) you can even use an ac/dc adapter (3V dc output) to eliminate low battery charge (i.e. low laser intensity); (iii) you can even power the laser (or any other light source you want to test) using USB port of your laptop/PC. But you have to keep in mind that USB provides 5V output NOT 3V; (iv) you can have a smaller OTK attachment.
Figure 6
7- Alignment between Spectrometer Slit and Cuvette Holder of the OTK
In my case, alignment between the slit and OTK was off. So, I used double-sided tape to adjust the height of the spectrometer (Figure 7). This also helps to have a more stable connection between the spectrometer and OTK attachment.
Figure 7
8- Modifying OTK for Absorbance Spectroscopy Applications
Having another opening on the back side of the OTK attachment (see Figure 8) allows us to use this attachment for absorbance spectroscopy applications as well. (Details like size, shape etc. needs to be carefully calculated though!)
Figure 8
NOTE-1: Also, please check Mathew's and Dave's profile pages to see their great upgrade suggestions and illustrations for spectrometer and OTK attachment.__
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Just a quick announce -- after the big revision of Spectral Workbench went live last week, I also posted a few new features, including one we'd discussed on the mailing list -- range limiting.
Now, you can tag spectra that you own with a tag in the format range:min-max
-- as in, range:400-800
-- to highlight a region you want to use in your analysis. For example, if your device has wide swaths of unusable range above and below your spectrum, as in this spectrum, you can have only a narrower band shown in sets.
I haven't yet figured out if we're going to "mute" data outside that range when viewing just one spectrum, but it seems likely -- we'll show a notice too saying "this spectrum is being displayed only between 400-800 nanometers. View entire dataset" or something.
This is also important as any "equalizing" or other processing of the set will run only on the range of spectrum data displayed, so for example in the Oil Testing Kit procedure, we'll be able to set the range to not include the laser peaks, making equalizing height or area more consistent.
Once you've added a tag, any sets displaying the spectrum with the new 2.0 sets display, to be made default soon, will only show this range. See, for example, https://spectralworkbench.org/sets/show2/2446
As compared to a screenshot of the previous, unclipped set:
In other news, I've done a very very preliminary backwards-compatible port of the Macros system to the new 2.0 graphing system, which means we can run a somewhat buggy "equalize height" script, resulting in this case in the following (screenshot, as the macro doesn't currently save the equalized height):
I'm not totally sure why the dips to zero occur, but I'll figure it out soon.
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