Wonderful, Chance of Showers and Storms Saturday

Do you have to have the lights off to see it well? I always wondered about that.
It's actually not too bad, I have two sets of tube lighting - one near the screen and one on the other side of the room. It is a bit harder to see if the near lights are on but with the back lights on you can see just fine. I generally prefer lights off. You can get some really bright projectors these days. I can try to post a picture or two if anyone is interested, the quality is outstanding.
 
It's actually not too bad, I have two sets of tube lighting - one near the screen and one on the other side of the room. It is a bit harder to see if the near lights are on but with the back lights on you can see just fine. I generally prefer lights off. You can get some really bright projectors these days. I can try to post a picture or two if anyone is interested, the quality is outstanding.
I’ve always had a few questions about those setups, if it’s annoying you can ignore it.

What’s the cost vs say a midrange 55 ish TV? Obviously you need additional equipment for audio which a lot of people have anyway.

Standard HDMI interface from whatever media player you’re using?

What do you get for life of the bulbs? A friend of mine had a projector probably 10-15 years ago and I remember him saying that he got about 1,000 hours out of them and it was $200-300 to replace it. I’m sure the tech has come a long ways and prices have come down since then.

Do you use a screen or shoot the wall? All of my walls are textured and I wouldn’t want to mess with that.
 
I’ve always had a few questions about those setups, if it’s annoying you can ignore it.

What’s the cost vs say a midrange 55 ish TV? Obviously you need additional equipment for audio which a lot of people have anyway.

Standard HDMI interface from whatever media player you’re using?

What do you get for life of the bulbs? A friend of mine had a projector probably 10-15 years ago and I remember him saying that he got about 1,000 hours out of them and it was $200-300 to replace it. I’m sure the tech has come a long ways and prices have come down since then.

Do you use a screen or shoot the wall? All of my walls are textured and I wouldn’t want to mess with that.
The projector I bought 4 years ago was about $650, I hand cut and built a frame/screen for about $150, already had 4 good speakers that I've had forever, spent about $500 on a 6 HDMI in / 2 Out Onkyo 9.2 receiver (that came with a pair of really nice Polk Shelf speakers), bought a $250 Polk sub and center channel. I hooked up my gaming PC, Xbox One, Amazon Fire TV, Mediacom (at the time) among some other things, which is why I needed the 6 in. 1 runs out to the projector. Honestly I needed to update my sound system anyway (which is amazing now). Obviously you could probably get away with just a few speakers which would likely already sound better than most midrange TV's,

Got some good Sennheiser's to use when I'm watching things alone so I don't shake the house.

I just had to replace my 2nd bulb a few weeks ago, $54. It gets a ton of use and they are supposed to last 3000 hours. $108 over 4 years isn't bad for how much I use it.
 
Do you have to have the lights off to see it well? I always wondered about that.
Forgot to mention that if you're going to have extreme darkness, white screens are probably the best way to go. Since I knew I'd have light bleeding into the room - sometimes lights on - I elected to go with a grayer screen material like this.

Did a lot of looking for ideas on Tom's Hardware and found a great one to build the screen frame. As with any DIY project just read articles from multiples places and do your research. First thing was to figure out where in the room I would mount it, which determined what kind of throw ratio I would need and used that to decide how big it would be. After that was able to pick out the projector I wanted. Just had to map it all out!
 
The projector I bought 4 years ago was about $650, I hand cut and built a frame/screen for about $150, already had 4 good speakers that I've had forever, spent about $500 on a 6 HDMI in / 2 Out Onkyo 9.2 receiver (that came with a pair of really nice Polk Shelf speakers), bought a $250 Polk sub and center channel. I hooked up my gaming PC, Xbox One, Amazon Fire TV, Mediacom (at the time) among some other things, which is why I needed the 6 in. 1 runs out to the projector. Honestly I needed to update my sound system anyway (which is amazing now). Obviously you could probably get away with just a few speakers which would likely already sound better than most midrange TV's,

Got some good Sennheiser's to use when I'm watching things alone so I don't shake the house.

I just had to replace my 2nd bulb a few weeks ago, $54. It gets a ton of use and they are supposed to last 3000 hours. $108 over 4 years isn't bad for how much I use it.
Thanks for the info. I don't have a very suitable place in my house for one, but I've toyed with the idea of getting a projector and just making it a mobile setup that I can shoot at my garage wall for sports get togethers. My garage isn't heated in the winter, so it'd be a lot easier to move a projector than a 55 inch TV.
 
As with any DIY project just read articles from multiples places and do your research.
Best advice in the world for anyone in 2019. Seriously. I've done shit in the past ten years I would never have even thought about trying before the internet.

Just a short list I can think of off the top of my head...

- Designed and installed a lawn sprinkler system with automated timers and valves with zero experience
- Put in laminate flooring (gets the award for looking ridiculously harder than it is)
- Fabbed an adapter bracket to put a 420cc engine on a 24" snowblower
- Drum brake job on a 2000 Dakota
- Heater core on that same Dakota (that one saved me thousands of dollars)
- Built a bunch of computers
- Water heater install
- I made both my and my son's beds

And tons of other things I can't even remember. I'd be comfortable saying that YouTube and online forums have possibly saved me $50-75K in the cost of making things I can't afford, fixing things myself and not paying labor, getting items for way less than retail, and not paying people to install stuff like garage doors, irrigation, etc.
 
Forgot to mention that if you're going to have extreme darkness, white screens are probably the best way to go. Since I knew I'd have light bleeding into the room - sometimes lights on - I elected to go with a grayer screen material like this.
So is the concept that if you have light bleeding in, the white screen will wash out the image?
 
So is the concept that if you have light bleeding in, the white screen will wash out the image?
Yeah that's part of it, but I think a lot of it pertains to the black not being dark enough. I'll just copy/paste one of the reviews that somebody posted because they say it better than I ever could: Projectors do not project black, they simply limit light. "The black levels on this screen will only be as good as the darkness of the screen subject to the amount of light striking it."
So after reading that I noticed that there are black screens now (I don't remember seeing those 4 years ago) that would be even better with a preponderance of ambient light.

 
Yeah that's part of it, but I think a lot of it pertains to the black not being dark enough. I'll just copy/paste one of the reviews that somebody posted because they say it better than I ever could: Projectors do not project black, they simply limit light. "The black levels on this screen will only be as good as the darkness of the screen subject to the amount of light striking it."
So after reading that I noticed that there are black screens now (I don't remember seeing those 4 years ago) that would be even better with a preponderance of ambient light.

Perfect. Thanks.

I never thought about projectors not projecting black.
 
Perfect. Thanks.

I never thought about projectors not projecting black.
Hah I didn't either until I was skimming the reviews, then I got to thinking why don't they make black screens? Sounds like it's somewhat newish - especially around the time I got mine. Now I want to upgrade! Lol
 
Hah I didn't either until I was skimming the reviews, then I got to thinking why don't they make black screens? Sounds like it's somewhat newish - especially around the time I got mine. Now I want to upgrade! Lol
It makes sense that black screens are fairly new, needed to give projectors time to catch up and emit light bright enough to get a decent picture on a darker screen.
 
More power?
That was a fun pet project with a goal in mind.

Fair warning, the following will probably not be interesting to most people to read. Just saying you’ve been warned.

I needed a new snowblower a couple years ago because the 30 year old Craftsman I inherited from my dad gave up the ghost...

I had two requirements, 1) it be an Airens, and 2) it have the most torque possible without having to go to a different engine format/gearboxes, etc. I wanted to be able to go through any snow conditions encountered in NW Iowa with zero trouble and I wanted to be able to throw snow a looooong way if needed.

Ariens makes basically 4 widths of snowblowers (24, 28, 30, and 32") and offers 7 different engines on various models ranging from 208cc cheapy "homeowner" versions all the way up to the 420cc which is the biggest engine you'll find on any walk-behind production blower. Engine manufacturers don't offer HP ratings anymore, only CCs and torque, btw. Then, Ariens offers their different models in standard or "SHO" configurations. The SHO has a 14" impeller and it also turns about 20% faster which throws snow a hell of a lot farther.

So...what I wanted was the smallest width (30 and 32 are way too big and the difference between a 24 and 28 is one pass on my driveway if you do the math), and the engine with the most torque which = fastest and farthest snow removal. As you might imagine they don't offer it that way. So what I did was ordered a 24" SHO that came with a 369cc engine, took that off without ever starting it and sold it to a guy on Craigslist. Bought a brand new 420cc online for about $200 difference and fabbed the adapter stuff. Then, because I had it all apart anyway, I had a friend machine me a new impeller pulley...

The pulley on the standard machine is X inches in diameter, and to get the faster impeller for the SHO machines they simply decrease the pulley diameter and tighten the tolerance between the impeller and the housing. So I just took it a step further and made another pulley a little bit smaller yet. The stock pulley netted about 1,100 impeller RPMs at 3,600 engine RPM, and when I put the new one on I was at about 1,190-1,200. Doesn't sound like a lot but it's a huge difference.

Last thing I did was dick with the governor arm to speed it up slightly. Almost all Briggs and Chinesium small engines are spec'd to run at a range between 3,500 and 3,700 RPMs. Obviously they come from the factory on the way low end of that, so drilled an intermediate hole in the governor arm and the spring holds the motor right around 3,700-3,750 now. Totally within the duty limits.

So, for about $150 extra (I sold the heated hand grips it came with), I can now easily throw snow over my garage and into the back yard where it doesn't get in my way and it won't melt next to my basement windows. This thing fucking SCREAMS. Goes through even the 30" end of driveway stuff at full walking speed, zero problems. Even though it's a narrower bucket I still get done way faster than before with a wider one. Small width, huge motor, and fast impeller for the win. If your're out there listening Mr. Ariens market research guy, people will buy that shit.
 
That was a fun pet project with a goal in mind.

Fair warning, the following will probably not be interesting to most people to read. Just saying you’ve been warned.

I needed a new snowblower a couple years ago because the 30 year old Craftsman I inherited from my dad gave up the ghost...

I had two requirements, 1) it be an Airens, and 2) it have the most torque possible without having to go to a different engine format/gearboxes, etc. I wanted to be able to go through any snow conditions encountered in NW Iowa with zero trouble and I wanted to be able to throw snow a looooong way if needed.

Ariens makes basically 4 widths of snowblowers (24, 28, 30, and 32") and offers 7 different engines on various models ranging from 208cc cheapy "homeowner" versions all the way up to the 420cc which is the biggest engine you'll find on any walk-behind production blower. Engine manufacturers don't offer HP ratings anymore, only CCs and torque, btw. Then, Ariens offers their different models in standard or "SHO" configurations. The SHO has a 14" impeller and it also turns about 20% faster which throws snow a hell of a lot farther.

So...what I wanted was the smallest width (30 and 32 are way too big and the difference between a 24 and 28 is one pass on my driveway if you do the math), and the engine with the most torque which = fastest and farthest snow removal. As you might imagine they don't offer it that way. So what I did was ordered a 24" SHO that came with a 369cc engine, took that off without ever starting it and sold it to a guy on Craigslist. Bought a brand new 420cc online for about $200 difference and fabbed the adapter stuff. Then, because I had it all apart anyway, I had a friend machine me a new impeller pulley...

The pulley on the standard machine is X inches in diameter, and to get the faster impeller for the SHO machines they simply decrease the pulley diameter and tighten the tolerance between the impeller and the housing. So I just took it a step further and made another pulley a little bit smaller yet. The stock pulley netted about 1,100 impeller RPMs at 3,600 engine RPM, and when I put the new one on I was at about 1,190-1,200. Doesn't sound like a lot but it's a huge difference.

Last thing I did was dick with the governor arm to speed it up slightly. Almost all Briggs and Chinesium small engines are spec'd to run at a range between 3,500 and 3,700 RPMs. Obviously they come from the factory on the way low end of that, so drilled an intermediate hole in the governor arm and the spring holds the motor right around 3,700-3,750 now. Totally within the duty limits.

So, for about $150 extra (I sold the heated hand grips it came with), I can now easily throw snow over my garage and into the back yard where it doesn't get in my way and it won't melt next to my basement windows. This thing fucking SCREAMS. Goes through even the 30" end of driveway stuff at full walking speed, zero problems. Even though it's a narrower bucket I still get done way faster than before with a wider one. Small width, huge motor, and fast impeller for the win. If your're out there listening Mr. Ariens market research guy, people will buy that shit.

How do I hire you to make me one of these badass machines? :)
 
How do I hire you to make me one of these badass machines? :)
Honestly, for the cost and effort, I'd by the 369cc version and roll with it. It'll eat up whatever you throw at it. I built mine mainly because it'd be unique and I wanted to see how well it'd work.

I also have a unique circumstance in that I live on the south side of a dead end east/west street. So when the plows come, I get the entire street's worth of snow at the end of my driveway. The plows can't turn around, so they go all the way down the street, back up, and just keep taking passes until it's clear pushing everything to my side. If we get a foot of snow I easily have 3-4' at the entrance.

Here's the stock model that I tore apart for mine, it easily throws snow 50', and there is no other 24" blower on the market that comes close in engine size the way it is. I just "supersized it."

 
Honestly, for the cost and effort, I'd by the 369cc version and roll with it. It'll eat up whatever you throw at it. I built mine mainly because it'd be unique and I wanted to see how well it'd work.

I also have a unique circumstance in that I live on the south side of a dead end east/west street. So when the plows come, I get the entire street's worth of snow at the end of my driveway. The plows can't turn around, so they go all the way down the street, back up, and just keep taking passes until it's clear pushing everything to my side. If we get a foot of snow I easily have 3-4' at the entrance.

Here's the stock model that I tore apart for mine, it easily throws snow 50', and there is no other 24" blower on the market that comes close in engine size the way it is. I just "supersized it."


Snow plow driver has to be laughing their ass off when they drop all that there.
 
Honestly, for the cost and effort, I'd by the 369cc version and roll with it. It'll eat up whatever you throw at it. I built mine mainly because it'd be unique and I wanted to see how well it'd work.

I also have a unique circumstance in that I live on the south side of a dead end east/west street. So when the plows come, I get the entire street's worth of snow at the end of my driveway. The plows can't turn around, so they go all the way down the street, back up, and just keep taking passes until it's clear pushing everything to my side. If we get a foot of snow I easily have 3-4' at the entrance.

Here's the stock model that I tore apart for mine, it easily throws snow 50', and there is no other 24" blower on the market that comes close in engine size the way it is. I just "supersized it."


I have an older Ariens 520 right now (https://www.snowblowersdirect.com/Ariens-520-Snow-Thrower/p2450.html), and it works fine for my small driveway on normal-to-dry snow, but as soon as I get wet snow or the plow truck goes by, it doesn't do much. Only a 195cc engine. May have to upgrade to that 24" w/ the 369 that you were talking about at some point.
 
I have an older Ariens 520 right now (https://www.snowblowersdirect.com/Ariens-520-Snow-Thrower/p2450.html), and it works fine for my small driveway on normal-to-dry snow, but as soon as I get wet snow or the plow truck goes by, it doesn't do much. Only a 195cc engine. May have to upgrade to that 24" w/ the 369 that you were talking about at some point.
You’d probably be good to go with the Deluxe 28 SHO which has a little smaller 306cc engine and is $300 less than the one I bought. The 28 SHO is by far and away their most popular model and it’d be a huge upgrade for you. 9 ish HP vs the 5 you have now. Its the one I was going to get before I got this crazy idea to build Frankenblower.
 

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