The Best Factory I have Ever Seen

That’s not to be taken as an insignificant statement. I’ve spent a lot of time in factories. It’s my job, and my family used to tour factories on vacations. I’ve never tried to count the number of factories I have spent time in, it’s probably under 100, but above 50. Now, to be fair to my evaluation of factories I have never been in an automotive final assembly plant, or a semiconductor factory. I have seen clean rooms where semiconductors can be manufactured, but not the main production factory. 

This factory, the best I have ever seen, why was it so good? I’ll give a few examples. For starters they use a pick-to-light system where the assembler grabs the part from a bin that has a green light on it. The light will go red if he or she tries to pick from the wrong bin. It can be both motion activated or a push button on the light. After picking a part, the computer system will then move onto the next part that needs to be picked. It’s great, I’ve never seen that in another factory. 

Next, there is one particular station on one of their assembly lines where two steel pieces are assembled with a rubber seal in between, and if the rubber seal rolls or is cut, there is no way to tell visually. It may even pass the end of line pressure test. So they use a device to measure the force as the two steel parts come together, and if there is an anomaly they can disassemble the parts and inspect the rubber seal. It’s pretty sophisticated. 

The factory is clean too. Factories have been getting cleaner and cleaner the last decade, but this one just took the cake. I didn’t see any oil or dust around the hard to clean places. On the six inch by twelve inch bins used to store the small assembly parts they used lids over many of the parts to avoid any dust getting on the parts. Plus, it was the best lit factory I can remember, and the air quality inside was fantastic. Now, in the defense of many other factories, there is no welding or heat treating in this factory, so it is easier to keep the air clean. Along those lines, they use DC drivers exclusively for final torques on bolts. That’s not unique, many factories in Germany do the same, forgoing air drivers which are less precise, and create a noisy work environment. Watch videos of the Porsche factory in Germany to get an idea of what I am talking about. 

Finally, near and dear to my heart, they use shims on many of their products. Shims are used to take up a gap between two parts so that they don’t slide back and forth destroying the whole assembly. It is important to have the correct total thickness of shims in a joint. This factory measures the gaps before using any shims so that the number and thickness of shims will be correct. Often factories just guess, or use a standard number of shims. 

Where was this amazing factory? Torreon, Mexico. I must be honest, I have some nationalistic bias to the United States. I feel (or felt) our manufacturing is better than Mexico’s, probably because of all the negative propaganda against Mexico in the United States, yet I have no evidence. After following the UAW negotiations last fall with the big three automakers, assembly for several vehicles getting outsourced to Mexico was a big factor in the discussions. That’s work that the USA is losing to Mexico. I thought moving those factories to Mexico was entirely about the cost of labor. After seeing this factory… I am surprised we don’t move more manufacturing from the USA to Mexico. Certainly this one factory is not representative of the entire country, one new contract employee at the factory told us it was the best factory in Torreon, a big city, and she was very excited to work there. Point being, it reminds me of the question I often ask, “what is possible?” Sure, anything is possible, but seeing what is possible in an industrial setting, in Mexico, not Germany or the United States or South Korea is taking me some time to comprehend. 

100% Inspection

Mercedes test drives their cars, every one. Perhaps you would expect that from every car company, however it is actually unusual. When people buy new cars it is common for them to have less than 10 miles on the odometer. You see, testing takes time, it costs money, and it reduces the profit margin. It takes people, which can be a big expense. However, from a quality point of view doing 100% inspection, that means inspecting every part or every finished product, is the best way to find every problem. 100% inspection is part of the reason aerospace products cost so much money, because the testing is more rigorous than for automotive or consumer products.

The point of this is to say, if you want to stand out from a quality point of view, 100% inspection is the way to go, but it comes with a financial cost which is why it is rather unusual.

Gloves, Mittens, and Frostbite

I have a lot of gloves. Ten full pairs and three pairs of mittens. Welcome to the struggle against finger frostbite. Each pair fulfills a slightly different purpose, usually based on activity and temperature range.

Four of pairs of my gloves have some sort of leather on the palm and fingers for dexterous yet durable winter activities like mountaineering, or even shoveling snow. Each one has a different thickness for a different temperature range. It's hard to find a glove with more than a 20-30 degree Fahrenheit range. 

In order from thinnest on bottom to warmest on top is mountaineering/skiing on the left and running/camping/miscellaneous on the right.

My Gloves and Mittens

Naming them off first the mountaineering gloves. Black Diamond Scree, a great glove at warmer temperatures, breathable and tough. This has become my go to work glove for skiing or mountaineering when the temperature is above 20°F. REI One, maybe One Element glove, they don't make it anymore but another great glove. I wore this pair to 23,000 feet on Broad Peak in Pakistan and my mom even shortened the index fingers so they fit great. A nice durable soft shell with a thin leather palm and fingers. Outdoor Research Nuance, a woman's glove I bought used, that is also no longer made. It's a nice mildly beefy glove but below zero it usually lets my fingers freeze because the finger insulation is not great. I wore this glove to 21,000 feet on top of Mera Peak last spring after Everest. Valandre Oural down mittens I bought on sale way back in college maybe 2006. Warm, but tight around the wrist, they saw a lot of use in New Hampshire in the winter. Marmot Ultimate Ski glove I think? I bought it used at the Wilderness Exchange last winter specifically for Everest. Wow it's a warm glove. I have not had a chance to wear it and get cold fingers, not that I really want to. Two layers of thick leather and lots of insulation. Had Everest gone really well I could have seen myself wearing these on the summit, who knows I still could. Finally Outdoor Research Alti Mitt, the warmest mass produced mitten money can buy. I rarely wear these, even in subzero temperatures because they make my hands sweat, and I tend to have cold hands. This is a -20°F and below mitten. This is the 8000 meter summit mitten, most people use it. I assume I'll take them to the poles with me too someday. 

On the running side, thin Asics I rarely wear, thin Mizunos I wear all the time between like 30-45°F. Above 40°F running I usually don't wear a glove, but this Mizunos would be it. A pair of Black Diamonds with nice Polartec, but a terrible leather Palm that has distorted the whole glove and made it too tight, so I don't wear it often. Next up are the Saucony Nomads I wear all the time, it's a double layer thin fleece on the inside and a polyester spandex blend on the outside. I wear these things five months a year maybe five days a week when the temperatures are between 0°F and 35°F. Next is a pair of Manzellas, all fleece but a little too tight around the fingers so my fingers often get cold in these. Finally a pair of Peak Technology Gravity Mitt that my mom probably bought at Wal-Mart when I was in high school. Despite its lowly stature in a bin of name brand finger wear, it's a great mitten. I wear these things running when it's below 10°F, I also wear them shoveling and skiing. They have a fleece inner removable mitt then the outer mitt is a nylon/pvc vinyl canvas like material with Thermolite Plus fleece inside. It's a humble workhorse. I've had it for over a decade and it doesn't have a rip, and probably cost $15 when my mom bought it.

As a disclaimer, many of the gloves mentioned and linked to have changed since I bought them, so I do not guarantee that the glove you may buy actually matches the glove I have, and more importantly the performance of the glove I have. You could lose your fingers to frostbite.

Your experience may vary, gloves are a tricky part of the equipment for winter sports. I was asked recently to recommend a glove for a particular situation (0°F and below, in the mountaineering context), and I couldn't recommend one because I would probably bring 3-4 pairs of gloves/mittens for anything expecting 0°F and below.

If you want one pair of gloves/mittens for general purpose 15 to -15°F, which is a very common temperature range, go for a pair of insulated glove, with leather on the palm and fingers. If the temperature dips a little farther, your jacket probably has pockets to warm your fingers up between tasks. If it gets warmer, well, just carry a pair of thin gloves, they don't weight much but thin gloves when it's 25°F are much better than no gloves. You can't have it all with gloves and mittens.

New Product Issues

A new product will never be perfect. It is so complex, that we have teams of people who's jobs it is to support production full time and deal with the long tail of issues and optimization. In other words, look at the picture below.

New Product Issues

I made this chart up based on my experience of a rough number of issues one might encounter in a large new product design and launch, and assuming that for every 10 issues solved, four new ones are created and the cycle time to solve an issue is 6 months. That is much longer than it takes to solve a typical issue, however, not all issues show up immediately, some require months of testing first. However this chart give a very good view of the challenges faced in designing and producing something. The point is, where do you draw the line and go to production?

When some companies meet their durability goals, that's it, they produce it as it is for the next decade without changing. However, as you look at the end of the long tail, those few remaining issues, you might not even know about yet. If companies knew what they were going to have to issue recalls for, they would change it before they launch the product, obviously. However, many other little issues often remain unsolved as cost compromises, things that fail just after the durability goals are met, or things that were not even tested before they were implemented in the final design. These issues are minor the vast majority of the time. They are the compromises that companies make to lower the cost of their product. I mean, if you want an invincible design, it will take a decade of testing, and cost far more than 99% of customers would be willing to pay. That being said, investing in quality is always a good investment because it increases customer loyalty when the product works well for a long time.

The challenge, for the leaders in such a program, is discerning as the program moves along with testing, how it is really doing. What problems are need to fix problems and what problems are nice to fix problems? For example, a car that receives a three star crash test rating out of five stars, is that good enough? If the battery life on an Apple Watch is only 18 hours, is that enough? Is it acceptable to use a new design without physical testing or virtual testing, just to go off of half a sheet of hand calculations done three months before going to production, because it is not feasible to make a prototype and test before production? These are all real discussions that have happened. Although you may never see it, and car companies often struggle to extol the benefits of the new model year car that looks exactly the same as the old model year, inside of those new model years are certainly little updates that improve the quality and reduce the cost. Every problem costs money to solve, which you could say creates the problem of too high of a cost.

The point being, the world could use more engineers. There is a lot of work to do, and as we solve progressively more complex problems, the future problems become even harder to solve, and thus we need more brain power.

I Live in Iowa: Week 186

This week flew by, and the next few are only going to accelerate. I worked my first official week of overtime in the last maybe year and a half or two years. And considering we are progressing as planned, I won't be putting in any seven hour days in the near future. I always try to stay on the side of saying less than saying more, and I'll try to stay on that line by simply saying we have been working on this project for four years and we are finally getting to the point of shipping! That is to say we are transitioning from testing/designing/developing to full on production. It's a ground up design, which is something marketers use to excite people, but engineers use it to talk about making mistakes and learning why we did things a certain way the last 20 years. In short, ground up design! Run away!

I'm kind of joking. Typically ground up designs start off trying to eliminate problems that plagues previous models. For example, cars used to burn out their brakes in the mountains, now it's only the odd semi truck. The model T was not safe, slow, inefficient, and very basic. Cars have come so far due to ground up designs. Personally I have learned that for me I doubt I will ever order something on the first day or week it is available because I know for a fact that they will learn things producing those first models that you definitely want incorporated on your product. The flip side is the first products will also have more quality checks than any of the following products ever will, so there is that benefit. 

As my role in this transition I am fully invested in being in the factory, on the floor where our products are being manufactured. I'm making decisions that we did not clearly communicate in the drawings and instructions. Overall, I am really learning a lot, and I know for a fact the quality is quite a bit higher because I am there.

Despite a terribly cold week with an average temperature of maybe 5F degrees I managed to run 22 miles over the four days I ran and cross country skied twice for a total of about four hours. Cross country skiing is my new hobby. It is aerobic, low impact, possible to do in bad weather and after buying the equipment, basically free. While my friends downhill skied Saturday at Chestnut near Galena, IL I cross country skied on the sides of the resort, working myself into a sweat in breezy 10F weather wearing only moderate clothing. 

It was a good week. Work is going to occupy a huge amount of my time the next few weeks, so if you read this to hear about running, don't expect much. Although, perhaps Wednesday I will have an announcement...

I Bought a Car on eBay: Day 1

Well, I did it, I bought a car on eBay. A used car with 144,400 miles on it from 2002.

New 2002 Honda Insight at Swiss Valley near Dubuque

It's crazy right? Buying a car sight unseen, no test drive, totally depending on the seller to give an accurate description and not sell a lemon. Well, first of all, eBay has buyer purchase protection, which is a simple thing that basically says, while it may not be what you thought it was, it's not going to be a disaster. 

Well, first of all some background. When it comes to cars, or really anything, I go all the way, or I usually don't bother. I run… I run so much and well enough that I will probably be going to the world championships in April in Italy. It's a blessing, a gift, that I have, yet I also work at it hours per day in serious training. I climb mountains… 8000 meter peaks, at least I try. I engineer… and I'm pretty good at it. Similarly, cars to me are these engineered things, one of the most engineered things out there with lots of moving parts, lots of functionality, a curiosity. The more unusual and specialized the better. Now that I work on heavy off-road vehicles I have even more appreciation for vehicles of all sorts. Why? I realized that any vehicle, any, is so complicated that any one person cannot possibly understand everything that goes into it. There are companies that specialize in transmissions, with tens of thousands of people, I'm thinking of ZF. That complexity is part of the interest. It is all within human understanding, just not all one person. In other words, I have a basic interest in cars.

Next, I consider myself a tree hugger. Technically, I am a conservationist leaning toward the preservation side with enough knowledge to know that toilet paper comes from trees and cell phones come from big mines. Energy and efficiency are big interests for me. For several reasons, energy costs money, and using less energy costs less money on a recurring basis. My parents, grandparents, my travels to Asia and Africa, and then my unemployment all reinforced the idea that just about everything is finite, some may be finite beyond our comprehension, like the Internet or water in the oceans, but other things like income and expenses and food are all very finite, and we are very fortunate in the USA to have them, and so much more, in spades. In other words, I really try hard not to be a wasteful person. 

In other words, the most fuel efficient mass production car ever made is the 1st generation Honda Insight made from 1999-2006. The covered rear wheels and tapered design scream, "No compromises! This thing is out to get the best mileage we possibly can (without using carbon fiber)!" Every time I have seen one of the old Honda Insights out on the road I think, that's a cool car. It's something that has lingered in the back of my mind for some time that I would like to have one. 

Well, my van, which I fully intend to keep driving, is having trouble starting, has a number of problems, and the rust is accelerating. I just don't feel it is as reliable now as it was the last seven years I have been driving it. For example, it has an electrical problem on the engine, exposed to the road underneath the front seats, so that if I drive through more than two inches of water, it usually dies, and has to dry out for 10-15 minutes on the side of the road before it will run again. That could be a problem with snow this coming the winter. As I thought of how it might finally fail I considered that it would probably be an expensive repair, maybe something with the alternator or transmission, not to mention my exhaust needs work, and I would likely be faced with $1000+ in repair bills, maybe the value of the vehicle. At which point the financial part of me would determine I need to just send it to the junk yard, or sell as is and buy something more reliable that is newer, and during that time I would probably rent a car for a week or two or three. Not a terrible expense, if I have to rent a car for a month once every eight years when my old one falls apart that's not a huge problem. However, being at the mercy of the seller when I don't have a functioning car is not a bargaining position I desire to have. The proactive approach is to buy a car ahead of the old one falling apart.

So as I'm on eBay and Cargurus looking at various cars for sale across the country, I stumbled upon a 2002 Honda Insight about two hours west of Dubuque for sale at a price that I thought was very fair. The big catch was that the seller warned of the IMA (Integrated Motor Assist) battery needing some care. I thought that meant it would have to be replaced, and likely today. So I figured I would have to spend $2000 on a new 76 pound 1.1-4 kWhr battery to be able to use the thing regularly. So I bid, and asked the seller if it would make it back to Dubuque. He said no problem. Now I start to get a little excited, this car might be in better shape then I thought. 

I bid on the first auction, pretty low to see how badly he wanted to sell, he came back with a higher counter offer, and I made a second offer close to his counter offer. Unfortunately the auction ended without him selecting my bid, or any other bid. So he reposted it 20 minutes later between his counter offer and my second offer, and I bought it. In that time I looked at other Insights and decided that to me, the price he had offered was fair and I wanted it. Who knows when I might have another chance like this? Only about 17,000 of these things ever existed, and they have not been made since 2006, so they are getting rarer by the month, and this one is only two hours away. If I want one, that I can pick up in person, this was my chance, this was my unicorn.

Saturday my dad was gracious enough to drive all the way down from Sheboygan, pick me up in my parents new Prius C and then drive two hours to a small town in central Iowa. It was nice to spend a couple hours talking. The older I get the more I appreciate my parents. We pull into town and call the seller, R. He was getting rid of this car because he had just bought a Nissan Leaf. Talk about out of place, small towns in Iowa don't have Nissan Leafs sitting on main street, they have every variety of US made pickup. In other words, he's a tech guy, as an engineer, that's a good sign. It means to me he probably understands the system better than most. We did a quick walk around then took a short test drive. At the first stop after driving 200 feet the brakes squeaked, and I thought, 'great… I have to replace the brakes, he didn't mention anything about that.' So I'm starting to get a little nervous. However, as we drive around the country block (one mile by one mile) I notice that the IMA light is not on, signaling the battery is not in terrible shape, and it charges and discharges, that's a really good sign. He didn't have any pictures of the seats on eBay, so when I see no major stains and no rips or tears, I'm pretty excited, this thing is in better condition than I thought. Then he shows me the home made stereo system he put in with a subwoofer, and I realize, while I am not a big sound system guy, that he's put some money into this thing, in a good way. He goes through the list of everything he's replaced from brakes a year and a half ago (which sound fine now that I've had a few more stops), to headlights, tires, and a number of other things. During the short ten minute test drive I'm starting to get more excited, R undersold. 

You see, in Iowa, and the midwest in general, and small towns especially, honesty is a big deal. We trade on our reputation. You won't make it far in a small town by cheating people and dealing dishonest, people talk. I realized that everything he discussed in a modest way about the car, that scared other buyers away, were not as bad as we feared. He was simply being honest, and comparing his 12 year old car with 144,000 miles to his new Nissan Leaf. A difficult comparison to be sure, clearly the new car is better, but also worth 10 times as much. 

I count this as a huge eBay buying success! Having driven about 175 miles on it so far it is in great condition, compared to my 1993 Toyota Previa of course. I plan to write another post after one week, one month, one season, and one year, and maybe after unusual incidents like the first repair or letting someone else drive it. Two things about this, yes it only has two seats, and it does not have cruise control. I will probably have cruise control installed so that it is easier to take on longer drives. I plan to take better care of this car than I took of my Previa, like wash it, have some maintenance done at the dealer, garage park it as much as I can. I see this as an iconic historic car. I want it to last a long time. Even longer than my Toyota Previa. Also, yes, I want YOU to drive it! So when the weather is half decent, I'll be offering free test drives. If I don't offer, just ask. This is inspired by Doug DeMuro who let all his friends drive his Ferrari, because let's face it, it you have something cool, it's way better to share that with your friends than hoard it to yourself. I blog because I want to share my life with my family and friends, and even strangers. I'm far too blessed and wealthy to be more selfish than I already am. Thanks for reading this super long article! Merry Christmas!

What it's like to drive a 300,000+ mile car...

Sometime in the next week I will go over 322,000 miles on my 1993 Toyota Previa minivan. Every thousand miles is another little astonishment for me, because cars don't last to 322,000 miles! The engine should have siezed up years ago. The transmission should have broken. I should have at least rusted something apart in the last 21 winters.

If I had to categorize the experience of driving a 20+ year old vehicle in the rust belt every day with 300,000+ miles I could use two words thankful and fearful. I am thankful that it has come this far and fearful that tomorrow something is going to break and I will be stuck by the side of the road. Really neither should be surprising. This whole experience, driving this the last seven years, has shown me that people often buy new cars to really drive down that fear. We don't think of it that way, but certainly people buy new cars rather than used because the repair costs both in time and money will hopefully be less. It's true, as an engineer I know how things fail, and the newer you get it from the factory, statistically the less likely you are to have a major problem. 

The flip side of it is, we aren't as thankful for the new car in the way we are thankful for the old. When I see my van in the parking lot I smile sometimes because it just keeps on running! Oh sure, you can be thankful your new car smells new, has no problems, that you can afford it, etc. but you aren't thankful it still drives, because for the amount of money you paid for it, it had better work. 

Another highlight for me is that it gives me perspective on appearances. You can dent my van and I won't care. Also, I know that my value both intrinsic and economic has nothing to do with the car I drive. 

I have realized only recently how much this van has shaped my views on quality. Now that I have taken one vehicle over 300,000 miles I fully expect other vehicles to go the same distance with only minimal repairs. That, and I have no problem using zip ties and duct tape to keep it running. Some may view that as a low quality strategy, but they are economical and widely available. There are multiple levels of quality, but for most vehicles, getting safely from A to B at the desired speed trumps every other aspect

Faucet Design

ERRR! They did it again, yet another faucet that I hit my hands against the sink while washing.

A Faucet, and I Don't Have Large Hands

I realized a couple months ago that one of the reasons I like my kitchen sink and bathroom sink, and kitchen and bathroom as a whole in my apartment, is that the sinks have faucets that extend well over the edge. Seriouly, three inches is not enough, I want at least 100 mm between that water coming out, and the back of the faucet. For some reason soaping up my hands and then rubbing them on the sink bowl just never struck me as the best way to clean my hands.

It's funny, once I started thinking about this, sink design that is, it has become more interesting. My preference is a hot and cold knob, with clearance between the spout and bowl. Simple, effective. How many times on the single knob designs do you play with it to make sure hot is still on the left and cold on the right? Half the time hot and cold sides aren't even labeled? What about those shower designs were you just rotate the knob? You don't get to choose between temperature and flow rate! Why hotels put those in is beyond me.

A hot knob and a cold knob, it's old, but it works. Sometimes we don't have to reinvent the wheel.

Sponsorship

With the recent news of Clif Bar dropping a couple climbers it has sponsored for years because what they do, what has made them famous and brought Clif Bar publicity (free soloing), is too dangerous for Clif Bar now. I have not seen the movie “Valley Uprising” but my friends and I have planned a party to watch it when one of us ultimately buys it. Basically, Clif Bar didn’t make the right move, at least not at the right time. 

The issue of sponsorship has come up a number of times in my life. Most recently after I became a 24 hour runner. Before that it was going to Mt. Everest. Before that, I have been wearing my Isaiah Janzen jersey for nearly two years. I realized at the time when I switched to sponsoring myself that while I had been “sponsored” it was for a total of about $100 in free gear only, which I received at the beginning of the sponsorship, and had for 18 months. The benefit to the company and the cost to my chest in races was a little too lopsided. So I became my own brand. I already had the website under my name, why not a racing vest? (Oh I’ve thought about mugs, t-shirts, polos, luggage and bumper stickers too.)

Building a reputation, which is all a brand really is, takes a long time. It can be wasted in a short amount of time, just ask any of the fallen stars, or jailed people who made one mistake. Or thinking bigger, just ask Kodak and US Steel why their companies are not as impressive as they once were. So I decided, if I am going to build a brand, my brand, which is to say my public reputation, I’m going to do it. When I do things, I tend to do them all the way. 

I read a lot. I read articles, books, magazines, tweets, blogs, and all sorts of random stuff. Much of what I have read is about mountaineering, particularly in Nepal, China and Pakistan. One of the big things people write about, or did 10-15 years ago was climbing all 14 8000 meter peaks. Ed Viesturs did it. I have two of his books, he is famous for doing them all without oxygen bottles and being an American. (Being half decent at anything and being a US citizen usually means higher earnings than only one or the other.) Climbing 14 8000 meter peaks is dangerous. For the record I emailed back and forth with Ed before my Everest attempt asking advice. His advice: don't go for the summit in the first weather window, too many people usually do. If we say there is a 2% chance of dying on each 8000 meter expedition, and you only summit one out of three expeditions, that means to get 14 summits you have roughly a 43% chance of surviving. The list of people with 10 or more 8000 meter peaks who have died on an expedition is long. The list of people with less than ten, but more than one, and thus at least some experience, is much much longer. So this is my background. I know these numbers. It is a dangerous game. You can read in Ed’s book the conflict in him returning to Annapurna to get his 14th, after multiple failures on that mountain. Did he go back for himself? Or did he really go back because the publicity was high and he was sponsored by 20+ companies including Rolex who wanted to be part of the first American and sixth person without bottled oxygen? I don’t want to have to make that kind of choice. Lists get people killed. There is a list of 14 mountains that has killed many people, probably dozens by now, who were captivated by that list. People who had sponsors who expected something in return, summits. 

While sponsorship interests me, I don’t think I can separate the sponsorship from the external expectations, which may nudge me into making a poor decision that is a little too risky. I didn’t tell anyone but my parents what my goal was in the 24 hour race (160 miles) until I was about 12 hours (and 83 miles) into the race and I had lots of evidence it was possible. Few people here in Iowa knew I even climbed mountains until I announced I was headed for Mt. Everest. Listen, I have big plans, big, ridiculous, outrageous, stupid, dangerous, unrealistic, “impossible” dreams that I desire to chase. For me to keep a clear head I need to shun external expectations. 

When a child first rides a two wheel bicycle on his or her own, the child wants to ride that bike. If the child did not want to ride the bike, he or she would stop the pedals. When one starts to ride there is also the question of how to stop, put your feet down or fall over? Similarly, how do you turn the bicycle without training wheels? This is complicated stuff for a five year old. The child is not going to do his or her best if there are distractions like yelling siblings, or even yelling parents, cars, or other local hazards. I am like that five year old child. God is like the parent, it feels like he is still there pushing me along, but I can’t see him and I don’t hear him yelling. External expectations might be like the sibling, that is yelling while I first try it on my own, who I glance at just before I hit a curb and crash. Maybe that sibling is not yelling, but wants to help push while I learn, or give me his old bicycle. Maybe that sibling wants me to learn to ride my bicycle so that we can both race the neighborhood kids down the block, and hopefully not get hit by a car. Sponsorship can be the car driving down the road not looking for five year olds on bicycles. Get on board and ride, or get out of the way.

I am in the business of risk management. I am rather good at it. The risks scare me, and they may kill me, so I can not ignore them. Anything that may contribute risk to the program is a candidate for elimination. Cotton clothing when the temperature is below freezing? No, that’s too big of a risk. Continue to push my body when workouts are already going poorly? No, that’s a sure way to setback months instead of just days. Drive faster? Usually not a great choice. Sponsorship comes down to much of the same. I want to do what I want to do, and I don’t want people that fund my fun to expect success because success is not the goal. Oh success is the goal, but it pails in comparison to doing the right thing. When success becomes the sole focus, you see Rita Jeptoo taking EPO, and beating me at Chicago last year. She probably would have beat me without taking EPO, but the fact that she probably was taking it makes it worse for me. I want 148th place in Chicago last year!

In mountaineering, the discussion is not about taking drugs, it’s about climbing the day after a snow storm, when avalanche conditions are terrible, but the sun is out and it’s a beautiful day. If your sponsors expect you to climb the mountain you may be more inclined to climb when avalanche danger is higher.

To expect success, at the really hard, really dangerous stuff, is ignorance of the previous failures. Yes, we went to the moon, but we had the Apollo One disaster, and numerous pilots died in airplane crashes, not to mention the probable fatal industrial accidents that occurred during production of the vehicles. You don't just go to Mt. Everest and climb it, sometimes unexpected things happen, and no one summits.

My reluctance to take on sponsors has to do with other factors as well. I have worn shoes by seven different companies in the last six days because of different applications, even within running alone are four of those seven brands. Going with one company may limit me from using the best possible tool, which may be made by a competitor. No, the shoes that I wear in a marathon aren’t going to make a 10 minute difference on my performance, maybe one minute tops, probably more like 10-20 seconds. Mountaineering, maybe one sleeping bag or tent, or ice tool is the best, and another may break the second day in a five day storm and leave you exposed. The point being, in the pursuit of best, it’s a risk to lock yourself into one product line up. I will say, knowing both mountaineering companies and running companies, you can have success with any particular company, the vast majority are of quite a high quality. The risks I am talking about are almost insignificant compared to not even bringing an ice axe on a trek over a 19,000 foot pass and a 21,000 foot mountain.

So that’s where I am. I spend a lot of money on shoes and other outdoor clothing, race fees, and equipment every year, not to mention my $70 weekly grocery bills. Perhaps I could find sponsorship for all or some of the products and services I use. I just do not want to do something half way and open myself up to a risk, however small, of not having the best tool for the job, or pushing myself into a situation that is far beyond my comfort zone.

I Live in Iowa: Week 165

Where to start? That is always a challenge when discussing big things isn't it? I think that's part of why I like blogging, I can describe some minute, tiny, minuscule detail, like eating right after exercising, that is part of the much bigger picture of how to get faster at the marathon.

How about starting with the first Dubuque Gran Fondo, featuring Greg LeMond. What a day?! I was second overall in a bicycle race and first in my age group??!?? I'm not a bike racer. I've maybe ridden like 400 miles, all of 2014. However, the timing was based on times over three timed segments, and I strategized to do as well on the third segment, a big hill climb 57 miles into the ride, as possible. It worked, I was second overall, but the guy in first beat me by like 80 seconds overall because of the flat second stage, which he just demolished. I'll write a blog post all about this ride, and winning an eight pound sausage later this week or next.

Work has been good. We are solving problems and making the product better. But… and there is always a but, we have changed so many things in the development process that to some extent there is a question about what needs to be tested physically versus virtually. It is a well known correlation that for every ten problems fixed another four are discovered or created. Well, our team has actually fixed over a thousand problems in the last 16 months. Many of those are problems we have discovered after fixing one of the early problems, but there is a very real concern about what we might miss. Of course, many of those problems are as simple as being one millimeter out of alignment or documenting use of the wrong size bolt, the kind of problem that would mean less than an hour of total time for five team members to fix and verify the solution to the problem.

An analogy is how to you save a forest from bark pine beetle kill? One tree at a time, and hope you don't miss too many, and have to go back through the forest in three years and do all the work again. It is the same with building a new product. Quality is a function of time. The more time you have to test the more issues you can find before going to production. I'm writing about this because I've never been through a full product development cycle and I really have no basis for what it takes to bring a ground up design into production, and most importantly, I don't want to fail, I want it to be a great product. Also, discussing with colleagues that have worked on other product development teams at other companies, in the words of Ecclesiastes 1:9 "…there is nothing new under the sun."Anytime anything new is brought to market there is the chance that the developers missed something. Regardless, sometime in 2015 you are going to see some pictures and likely hear in a little more detail what exactly I have been doing for four years because I am quite happy to say, "I did that! We did this because of that, and redesigned this thing to make that work better." However, we've still got a couple bugs to work out of the system. Why does it take half of forever to get a new drug or airplane into the market? Testing, drugs and airplanes you really want to get right.

Running was a really quiet week, only about 24 leagues, rounding up. However I took Saturday off, because of the 23 league Gran Fondo. So really averaging four leagues per day is not so bad. Also, I did bicycle a total of 37 leagues for the week, my highest this year. That's also how much I drove this week. Funny story, I think I forgot to mention last week I ran three more leagues than I drove! That doesn't happen too often. Going forward I think I will be doing one high mileage week followed by a "low" mileage week. I kind of did that in 2009 and 2011 during two of the best high mileage and racing seasons I have had. In a way, instead of going on seven day micro cycles, it's like going into a 14 day micro cycle. I'll blog about that theory individually in a month or so when I get a little more consistency under me.

Useful Product Life (Product Quality)

My van has 305,000 miles. In a couple weeks it turns 21 years old. The engine, transmission, axles, sheet metal, and all the major components are original. The dash isn't even cracked! I did not realize until the last year or two how much this van has driven my view of quality and durability and expected useful product life.

So often in the United States we view many things as disposable. Cars, televisions, furniture, appliances, clothing, and I suppose I could even say relationships, but that is beyond the scope of this post and I don't even really agree with that opinion. That is really all I have to say about product quality, that I have a van that is nearly 21 years old with 305,000 miles on it and when I think of quality, that's what I think about. A high price does not necessarily mean high quality and an inexpensive product with a good value does not necessarily mean high quality either. Quality is something that lasts a long time, through thick and thin, in good times and bad. In my case, hopefully one more winter of salted roads.

My Problem and a Trip to Canada

It is my fault. I can not blame anyone else. The fact that there is a crack in the prototype structure after far too few hours of operation, when I did the FEA on it, is my fault. Now, I am the design engineer responsible to fix that structure. Not only is it my fault, now it is my responsibility. This is why people move to new jobs far from the old ones, to leave old projects behind for the next poor sap. On the other hand, commitment and a deeper experience are what I am after and having responsibility  for the failure and now the fix is exactly the kind of end to end experience I am after, even if it means I feel afraid of being a failure.

I will be in Canada next week! Tuesday it was a rumor from one person. Wednesday morning it was official and Thursday I booked tickets. Initially the trip was to investigate one moderate issue that is my responsibility, now with the revelation of a major issue that is also my responsibility, the trip will be even more valuable. I'm flying into Spokane and driving north to Cranbrook, BC area. 

Companies exist in large part to absorb the problems of any one person. In other words, failures happen but they do not have to ruin a career. Companies also exist to pool resources so that one person can not do too much damage. In this particular case we have a good team, we will solve this problem, before Thanksgiving. 

The Secrets to the Asian Equipment Markets

I listen to people talk about themselves or others not understanding the China market or the India market or Indonesian market in terms of selling a product that is desirable. In fact, this is a multibillion dollar issue. Well, no one ever asks my advice, and given the people that typically proffer these questions have more years of experience in the office and get paid more than I, I don't feel it is my place to offer a suggestion. Plus, billions of people live in Asia, they must have a better perspective on what Asia wants than I. However, this is my blog, and you are at the mercy of my writing, so I'm going to tell you about Asia. I think my perspective will actually be very accurate, but to be honest I could be totally completely wrong. So how does one win in Asia?

1. Price matters, more than you imagined. 
1. Try buying a car in the United States. The salesman will talk to you about Bluetooth, radio, speakers, traction control, acceleration, heating, air conditioning, colors, comfortable seats, lighting options, and then he will get to the optional features where you can spend more money. All of that is ridiculous. Air conditioning? I hope you aren't serious. Charles Lindberg flew across the Atlantic in an uncomfortable wicker seat instead of nice and heavy leather. In other words, an excavator digs holes and lifts stuff, a loader carries stuff, neither is a machine designed for comfort.
2. Secondly, the way that we build things is expensive. Our labor is expensive. Roughly 8-10 times as expensive. Our designs are expensive. Our materials are expensive, because of their quality. How many engineers does it take to design a new machine? Somewhere between 20 and 100, and they aren't cheap.
3. Everyone in the US supply chain has to make an American sized profit of what 5-70%? In Asia, a 0.5% profit margin is making a profit. With three billion people economies of scale work really well.
2. Reliability is about the stuff that takes more than three people, basic welding, or simple lifting to fix. Dented fenders or sheet metal, cracked windows, rusted bolts, a terrible pain job, leaky fluids, squeaky joints, no exhaust filtering, moderate cracks like a cracked bucket, and other problematic issues in the US are not problems in most of these places. In fact these other countries are similar to what a typical farmer might have access to on his farm. The ability to weld a crack or ignoring a cracked window or taking safety gear off the machine are all standard procedure. However, an engine problem, a cracked frame, or other issue that requires serious skills to replace, that is unacceptable. In short, make sure the critical stuff will last, ignore the other stuff.
3. Relationships matter more than the transactions. This is probably changing in the US with the Facebook generation, but it is especially true in Asia. For example, in Pakistan I had tea with a Pakistani at his climbing shop for 30-40 minute and afterward I bought an ice axe for 1/3 of what it would cost in the US. No employee at REI would sit with me and talk for over half an hour while we sipped tea just for me to buy a $38 item. I don't expect them too, but in Asia, the relationship happens before the transaction, not because of the transaction. Three Cups of Tea is the perfect example of this idea. If it took 30 minutes and tea to get me to spend nearly $40, how much more is required to sell a $200k piece of equipment? The other aspect of the relationship is the unspoken question, 'will you be here in ten years when I have a difficulty?' That is the problem the US withdraw from Afghanistan is up against now. Do we really care about making it better? It will take a generation or more. There is plenty of blame to go around, not just big US companies or countries but the indigenous people as well. In short, relationships matter more in Asia than in the Americas and relationships take time to develop.

That in a nutshell is the key to the Asian markets. Can you compete on price to the point of selling at a loss for years so that over decades you can make your profits? Can you make sure that the right stuff breaks and the right stuff does not break? Will you take the time to develop the relationships?

Janzen Gear is in Business!

It took two years for the hangboard idea to become a reality, but now it exists! I have something to sell!

Janzen Gear Hangboard 0.1, 0.5 and Two 0.8s

I could say more, and I hopefully will over the next couple days, but for starters head over to Janzen Gear and check out the development blog. After you get a taste of the little bit of the first business that I tried to start, and failed, and I suppose am having some success now, head over to Etsy and buy a Janzen Gear Hangboard 0.8!

Thank you guys for reading! This is probably the first time that I have taken something from concept to product and actually have something to sell. It's exciting. This is releasing the entrepreneur in me! I'll probably shoot for the moon once I actually sell one.

Anyway, take a look, tell your friends, tell me you saw this, and go read some Janzen Gear.

If I Was to Start a Blog Again

I have been thinking about this a little recently. The reason being that once you start something, changing direction can be difficult. For example, I started my blog under the premise of starting a company. Then when I started the company I started a new blog directly for that. For some reason, probably because people were still reading it, I kept this blog moving. In other words, this is it. I will have this blog indefinitely. The graphics and layout will change and the content that I add will change. One day in the future I could quite possibly be talking about what to do about a daughter’s boyfriends. That however, is not in the foreseeable future. 

There are a few concrete things I would do differently if I was to start over again.

1. Set a mild to moderately focused theme. Talking about engineering, then running, then socializing, while very descriptive of my life, does not convey a clear sense of purpose. It would be better for the blog if the scope of topics was smaller and the depth great. 
2. A couple weeks of content ready to go. I would not publish it all at the same time. Simply one post the first day, another on the second and so on at a frequency that is what you plan to maintain or slightly higher than you plan to maintain for the life of the blog. For example, I typically post 4-5 times per week. The first two weeks I might do 5-6 articles to get people interested and have some content for the search engines to start combing through.
3. Generate some buzz with the first few articles. Tell your Facebook friends, Twitter friends, and even people in person about this awesome thing you started. Nearly a dozen of my friends have started blogs, but so often after a couple weeks or months it fades away. Or there is only one new article a month, which is okay, but kind of depends on the scope of the blog as to it’s impact.
4. Design it to look great and have all relevant information accessible. I really like the design of my blog now. However it went through a couple cumbersome renditions. Overall it is quite simple to navigate. I especially like the labels and blog archive features. They seem to link to relevant articles or different times in my life which give context to the other articles.

There are also a few suggestions I have for people setting out on the path to self publishing.

1. Once you start, keep going! It is not always easy to write about your topic or topics, but for the sake of the whole truth please write during the hard times as well. 
2. Develop a style. The Internet is a strange place and really there are few rules. You could start a blog about your college experience, or quest to run the Boston Marathon, and when the goal was accomplished and you wrote a couple epilogue articles, end contributing to the blog. I suppose what I am suggesting is that the blog have a plot line that builds over time with some sort of climax. Although, Seth Godin, from what I can tell, has no long running theme aside from marketing/sales/business to his blog and it’s the most popular in the world. In other words you do not need to read any of his posts to understand any of his other posts. I prefer on the other hand stories that build and continue that take a long time to tell. I know that some of my posts if read alone would not make much sense, but as a whole, the message is more complete. In other words, decide on the way you will tell the story or types of stories that you would like to tell. 
3. Include pictures, graphics and videos when possible. I realize that I publish words in far more abundance than I do pictures, charts and videos. Yet visual images convey strong messages. 

There you have it, four suggestions to do when you start a blog or website and three as you build and maintain it. 

QE3, Housing and Me

I just read the article, Behind the Fed’s New Round of Stimulus: Will It Help Housing. Plus, I have been thinking about buying a house for half a year, maybe longer. I read tweets trying to get people to buy a house. Often I read this stuff I get frustrated. People don’t get it!

For example, in the article by the Dutsche Bank analyst (being an analysis for a major bank indicates 1%er) “The level of mortgage rates isn’t the problem - it’s restrictive credit overlays. For example, we have been doing a rent vs. buy analysis for many years and the relative attractiveness of owning has been at historic highs for several years already.” Wow, where to start...

Rent vs. buy analysis, this makes me skeptical. First of all, I am sure they included the cost of maintenance of your home, which is covered in the rent, but can add up to significant sums of money. However, any 30 year prediction about the US is ridiculous if it assumes a constant growth rate or even an entirely positive varying growth rate, for anything not just housing prices. The 2008 crash showed us that prices can go down, way down. Sure that probably won’t happen in this decade, but what about 20 years from now? Second, Most people don’t have the luxury of selling their house when the market is good. They sell when they have to move for work or some other major life event. In other words, you could lose thousands on a house simply for selling it at an inconvenient time of year or during a couple bad economic quarters. Third, renting happens in cool places. Near downtowns, colleges, urban areas, restaurants, and the like. Buying happens in suburbia. A maze of the same mediocrely built developments far enough away from everything you have to drive to everything. 

Next, restrictive credit overlays, I’m not entirely sure what this means, but I think it means the only people left to buy are people with bad credit. Yours truly. I was 30-60 days late on a loan payment once two years ago, that I didn’t even know about. I have upwards of $32k in student loans, and I funded 2010‘s unemployment on credit cards which I am still paying off. With tens of thousands of dollars in debt, you want me to buy a house and put myself probably over $100k in debt? Why? So that I can pay more every month in interest? I’m not arguing with the author at all on this point, I’m totally agreeing, but I’m pointing out that those people with restrictive credit include fully employed engineers with a couple of degrees in the second quintile of household income. Really, I am a risk? In other words, I can’t get a good job without an education, but I can’t get a good education without significant debt, and you want me to buy a house on top of that? I suppose that I am more upset at the importance our culture places on credit score than on your ability to pay. For example, is it better to have a $200k mortgage and credit score of 825 or no credit score and $200k in the bank?

Another thing mentioned earlier in the article is that every half point that the mortgage rate goes down really just encourages people to refinance. Which keeps the banks busy. So they have no incentive to further lower interest rates. If I could lock in a 30 year mortgage at 2.X% or better, that would be more motivation to buy. Under 2% would be better. But before we get there most of my coworkers will refinance twice. There is also the mortgage tax deduction, but the problem is I oppose most tax loop holes, especially loop holes that reward people for additional consumption. So I would hope that in my lifetime we do away with a mortgage tax deduction.

Historic, that is such a loaded word. How long have we been measuring rent versus buy? 1950? Since the post WWII housing boom? Well, yeah then it’s a no brainer that it’s a great time to buy versus rent. But, and this is a big one, we have a very aging population that built houses for large families, and we don’t have the people to fill the rooms. In other words, the 4-5 bedroom 2-3 bathroom 2-3 car garage that typify most of what is out there is totally inappropriate for a huge portion of the population today. I don’t need four bedrooms! Sure I could rent out rooms, but I could also take that money that I would use on a downpayment and pay down my loans or invest in the stock market. What about all the single mothers with one or two kids? Do they need four bedrooms? If we go back in time we see that houses were smaller, and I feel, hope, that we are headed in that direction. I like large houses, but from an energy standpoint they take way too much. Too much to build, too much to heat and cool and light. For example, 90% of the waking activity that takes place in my parents house happens in a 15x20ft area with the kitchen, table, television, couches, and computers. Most of the activity occupies only 15% of the house. Why do we need an additional living room?

What I are trying to say is, if I had tens of thousands of dollars saved, and little or no debt, yeah I would buy a house and maybe rent out some rooms. However, when I have far more in debt than I do in assets simply because I paid for an education and I went through the year of unemployment, you would be mistaken to think I’m going to willfully triple down on debt with the ease that I bought a carbon fiber road bicycle. 

This all gets me fired up because I’m the guy people are looking for to spur the economy through consumption, but I’m doing what the 1% does and focusing on wealth creation and preservation and not consuming. For example, last I heard Bill Gates bought $560 million of John Deere stock when it was close to $60. Assuming he owns 9 million shares at a quarterly dividend of $0.46 per share he’s making over $16 million on the dividend alone per year. I spend close to 2300 hours there a year and make far less than 1% of what he does due to John Deere. He spends almost no time on John Deere and makes more than 100 times what I do from John Deere.  Between loans, rent, food,  insurance, taxes, and everything else I spend most of my paycheck every month. He on the other hand is taxed at 15% on dividends and since I know he has other investments does probably not need any of his John Deere income to buy groceries at Hy-Vee or pay for gas or FICA. In other words, at the end of the year he is left with roughly 85% of that $16 million but I am left with what, maybe 30-40% of the less than 1% that he made. And you want me to buy a house? Why don’t you get Bill to build a few thousand?

Website Updated!

Hello Friends!

I updated my website. I got rid of some stuff that people weren't really clicking on and simplified everything just a little to make it a little more user friend. It's also a little more mobile device friendly too!

To expand on the changes a little I shall start with the old. The old website was great, but it had a darker tone to it and the opening picture in the header took a long time to load. Since I spend a significant amount of time accessing the Internet from my phone, it was a hassle to wait for it to load. The links near the top were nearly a waste too. No one bought DVDs. The only person that paid me to coach was a person that I started coaching before I put up the coaching webpage.

The color scheme was inspired by a number of thing. Twitter Blue, as I have been calling it (4099FF) even though it isn't Twitter Blue, has a nice feel to it. It is solid enough that it feels clear, bold, clean, bright, cheery, and to be honest, educated, if that can count as something a color can make you feel. Green is the color of life and growing living things. I went with a bright green because it's more exciting than a dark green. When you scroll over any of the links they turn green signifying the life in that link to another place. There is also a little red too. After you have visited a link it will turn red. That way it is easy to keep track of what you have visited and what you have not.

I hope you enjoy it!

Improving Ring Gear Life (Gear Design 101)

We recently had a situation at John Deere where a particular gear failed during testing before it was desired. There were a number of complications with the testing and the gear is just part of the picture. In other words, we caught a number of issues during the normal testing process so that when the product is eventually released with the new modifications it will last years in the field, without a question.

Since heat treating ring gears is my specialty I took the initiative and started asking questions. On a tangent, Google: "heat treating graduate school" with or without quotes and WPI is the only college that comes up in the top ten with a result for a graduate degree. In other words, did I go to the #1 school in the world for heat treating graduate programs? Anyway, as I started asking questions I desired to give my input, even though I am clearly not responsible for the gear or the testing in any way.

Engineers do quite a bit of trying to communicate to other people via presentations, so I created a PowerPoint. It is the best presentation I have made during my working career and possibly ever. Take a look for yourself.

Improving Ring Gear Life

As you can see, there is a significant amount of simplicity. It is only one slide. There are pictures, an equation, color, bold typeface, and quantifying numbers. I just gave you months of education, in the space of about three tweets. This information is not specific to ring gears, but  ring gears are typically expensive and prone to failure.

Lest anyone has the idea that the solution is always this simple, there are often other constraints like the bolts to the ring gear, the manufacturer we outsource the gear from, and the other components in the system (like a pinion gear) that will all be affected by changes to the design or heat treating recipe. Honestly, I would be pretty happy just designing gears and transmissions. Happy engineering!

Consumerism

I spent my Tuesday lunch break on the Trek Project One website building and pricing different bicycles. I have done that in the past, but this time I might actually buy something. As I consider buying a third bicycle, albeit far better than my other two, I feel a little evil. There are so many other things in the world I could spend my money on. Furthermore, I get excited by not spending money. I still don't have cable or Internet at my apartment. My preferred vehicle is a 1993 Toyota Previa with 270,000 miles on it.

It seems to me like a really nice bicycle is a waste while people around the world starve and die. I have a friend from college and he would say, "I never want to have any money." The meaning is that there are people in need who could use his money. It took me awhile to understand that, but it has made an impact on my life.

Related to the title, I overheard a conversation recently between two people complaining about the high price of insurance and taxes on "old" luxury cars, specifically the years 2002 and 2004. In some ways it was appalling and in more personal ways it was representative of my life and specifically buying a new bicycle.

Five months ago I was passing the year mark for unemployment. It is amazing how quickly the money seems to be changing me. Because now it is just a bicycle, that once I buy it I never have to pay more for it. Next year it's a car with gas, insurance, and taxes. Then it's a house. Then it's a pool in the backyard and a huge tv, a newer car, a second property, and an endless list of material junk.

On the other hand, my bicycle will contribute to dozens of peoples paycheck and employment, I will surely ride even more, and if regular use of my bicycles allows me to delay buying a car for a year or more, then it would be worth it. Plus Trek gives their frames a lifetime warranty, so basically this is a one time, until I either do Ironmans or am in my 40s, kind of purchase.

User Friendly?

Recently I had to show someone how to use a very simple piece of electronics. As I was demonstrating the two step process I realized it should not require two steps to do what that person wanted but only one step.

Often it seems that the people capable of developing things are not the people who really understand the end users. Case in point, traffic flow patterns decided by civil engineers because civil engineers know how to build roads. I know a lot of civil engineers and they are very good at what they engineer and build, but ultimately they think differently than the average driver. I don't know who would be better at designing traffic flow patterns but I am sure that some profession would be. Another example, computer programs are all written by computer programers. Again programers are great at making things work and getting software to do what I want, but sometimes it seems like the person using the software was an afterthought to the purpose of the software. The Janzen Gear ice axe was in many ways a lesson for me about the whole just-because-you-can-doesn't-mean-you-should aspect of industry.

If you are ever in the position to create a product that will be used by people, keep user friendliness in mind. After using dozens of software programs and driving tens of thousands of miles I feel we can do better. That of course starts with me since I try not to be a hippocrite all of the time. If I ever make something and you can not figure out how to use it, let me know and I shall change it. If we all make our products just a little more user friendly just imagine where we will go.