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Here's one of my original essay-writing lessons. If you're like me, you are rarely satisfied with how a writing lesson runs, even when it goes really well. My favorite lessons are constantly in a state of revision, and my eighth graders regularly point out to me that I'm doing last year's lessons differently than I did for them when they were my seventh graders. I say to them, "I don't think I've ever taught the same lesson the same way twice," and that's kind of true.
For the past few years, I have been really trying to improve upon my expository writing assignments. You know, the dreaded essays. My final exam for both seventh and eighth grade is a critical analysis essay of a novel we've recently read, and few kids ever enjoy writing those. I often precede the serious writing assignments with a silly one. The lesson on this page is a silly essay assignment that sets my writers up to be more successful on their final essay for me, but we have a fun time doing it; essay organization and vocabulary are both reviewed, and the kids have a fun time writing these.
My nutty philosophy that drives this assignment: If you are required to write a genre you ultimately know most of your students won't enjoy writing, take a few days ahead of that assignment to let them write, using the same skills, but write using their silly senses of humor.
My favorite teacher ever was Mr. Borilla; he was the first teacher to make me feel confident about writing, so he has a special place in my heart. He allowed me channel my "inner silly" during his classroom's reading and writing time, and he appreciated my sense of humor when I applied it to his writing assignments--except the expository reports. Oh my, no, we had to take those report assignments very seriously. In fourth grade--after deeply researching by half-heartedly reading from the encyclopedia--we each wrote and published a 'President Report'; we each drew a different president's name from Mr. Borilla's coffee can of choices, and I drew Thomas Jefferson, and my brain was no where developed enough to appreciate Jeffersonian philosophies. In fifth grade we wrote 'State Research Reports'; no coffee cans this time, as we were allowed to choose based on states that interested us. I chose Colorado because I'd recently visited my grandmother there. I wanted to be Dr. Seuss silly when writing those two reports, but Mr. Borilla wouldn't allow it. Essay or report writing is a very serious matter when you're in fourth grade. Am I right?.
I was a great creative writer and a lousy report writer back then. I earned B's on both big reports in Borilla's class because I tried to "joke them up." Essays, I learned, weren't allowed to be fun. Later on in my own schooling, I always cringed whenever a teacher said "essay" or "report" based on my memories of those burdensome, un-fun reports back in fourth and fifth grade.
Even before Common Core State Standards, I knew it was important to teach my sixth, seventh, and eighth grade students to write analytic essays, and we wrote those long before CCSS, and we continue to write them now that we have so successfully implemented them in my district (tee-hee!), but my students can easily identify my least favorite writing genre--expository--based on the amount of energy (or lack thereof) I have given to my past essay lessons. Even so, by the time my students leave me in 8th grade, they have had plenty of experience with analyzing literary elements and writing essays on them. And my expository energy over the years has vastly improved, thanks in part to lessons like this one.
Inspired by Borilla, we take our reports and essays very seriously in Mr. Harrison's classroom. A lot of my kids expect to be Honors English-bound when they head to high school, and we talk very seriously about how students must be able to write a great-sounding, non-formulaic, unique essay. In middle school, we practice writing intelligently about our novels' themes, their authors' style of writing, and the contrasts between dynamic and static characters, because essays about literature in high school Honors English need to convey smart ideas in interesting ways; they can't rely on the lower-level-of-Blooms-taxonomy book report writing skills they mastered in fifth grade before they came to my class in sixth grade. My eighth graders leave me with the ability to write well about the books we read--the ones they liked and the ones they didn't like.
Mentor texts I have used teaching this lesson:
Become better with teaching expository! I set realistic teaching goals for myself every school year no matter what. At the time of posting revisions to this lesson write-up at my website (Spring 2014), I am finishing up my 24th year of teaching, and I am really good at what I do, which is teaching writing both authentically and in a way that is engaging to 95+% of my pupils, but I still want to be better. I take this profession of ours seriously, which is why I set goals for myself without fail every year; sadly, I know there are teachers in my own building who no longer set professional goals for themselves because they've been doing their jobs long enough to be able to run their classrooms on auto-pilot. I can't be that teacher. To enjoy my work, I need to have new goals for myself every year, and I have learned to love holding myself accountable by telling my students what my goals are every fall, explaining that I want them to give me feedback when we finish lessons I've created or revised to help me achieve my own goals. In the fall of 2012, I told my kiddos that we would be doing more expository and essay writing than we had in previous years, and that I wanted them to help me become at helping them to like and value writing the expository genre. They grumbled but agreed to give me honest feedback. In 2013, this lesson--by far--became my eighth graders' favorite for the year, and when I revised it for the spring of 2014, my current set of eighth graders agreed; additionally, in 2014, my seventh graders became involved with this assignment, which improved the lesson even further, as I will explain farther down on this page.
If you follow my work online at all, you know I believe in using mentor texts pretty much no matter what the teaching task. All of my great writing lessons have mentor texts attached to them; in addition to using them to design writing lessons, I use them when I am working on my own professional goals--like my goal to become better with teaching expository! For the two years I devoted to improving my ability to teach expository writing skills, I had the best mentor text. The Story of My Thinking: Expository Writing Activities for 13 Teaching Situations (by Gretchen Bernabei and Dottie Hall) is so worth having on your teaching bookshelf. It is so smartly written and teacher-friendly (like all of Gretchen's previous books have been), plus it comes with page after page of these fantastic organizing maps that student writers can use no matter what type of essay you've assigned them. Those thirty pages of maps make the entire book worth the $24.00 expense.
Establishing/Reviewing Academic Vocabulary: Another professional goal I have been working on lately is improving how I engage students in learning and using vocabulary words. The Common Core Standards documents are rife with academic vocabulary, and it's important to make sure your students have a handle on the "fancy" words that would help them in writing a critical analysis essay. By the way, if you've not yet used Fancy Nancy as a mentor text, add it to your list next year. The titular character in that series is very much into explaining her vocabulary words, and in her books she often says, "That's fancy way of saying [insert synonym here]." In class, we often (and you really have to use air quotes around the word fancy when having kids do this out loud in class) channel our inner Fancy Nancies and say, "Oh, that's a fancy way of saying [insert synonym here]" when the big words start coming out in our conversations about literature and writing.
One purpose of assigning the "ridiculous essay" is to review literary vocabulary words so that students can accurately use them in an essay that is fun for them to write. Below are fifteen words that I teach my kids over time and that might be helpful to learn/review right before teaching this lesson; these are literary terms my students become very familiar with during their two or three years in my classroom. I personally use this "ridiculous essay" lesson near the end of our school year; it's actually my big review activity before we began preparing to write our final exam essays, though I have been thinking that it could certainly be used as more of an introduction to critical analysis essays. When I teach this lesson, the words listed below are a review list for them, not a list of brand new words. If you are using the assignment as more of an introduction to critical analysis essays, you could probably use fewer words than the list I have included below.
As I've said, my 8th graders already were pretty familiar with the fifteen literary terms above when I assigned the ridiculous essay in the spring, but it had been six weeks since our last Reader's Workshop Project, so they hadn't used many of these words much in classroom conversations with each other for over a month; therefore, we did take twenty or so minutes to review the words by playing a game with them. We played a variation of charades in small groups of four or five students. Students took turns drawing one of the words, written on index card, from an envelope I had prepared for each small group, and they had to pantomime the words' meaning in a literary context; stress the "literary context," especially for the unfortunate-but-warped child who might draw the word 'climax.' After playing for twelve to fifteen minutes in small groups, each group had to nominate the person from their group who had the best idea for pantomiming one these literary terms for the whole class. Fun was had by all! The charade game/review prepared them to use these words again when we started writing our ridiculous essays.
Next year, and I'm saying this in case you choose to do this lesson as an introduction to critical analysis essays (instead of as a review, as I did), I am planning to have students create "Word Art" drawings and explanations for all of these academic vocabulary words listed above, and I will save the students' work from that assignment in a folder, and bring that folder out for students to critique right before writing our essays; that would serve as just a good review as our charade game did this year. What's "Word art"? I am glad you asked. This spring, when I challenged my eighth graders to design and create new vocabulary activities they could teach my seventh graders to begin using, they came up with some good ones, and "Word Art" is one that I think would work well with academic vocabulary. Basically, the students have to illustrate/decorate the letters of a vocabulary word(s) so that each letter relates somehow to the meaning of the word, and then they have to create a three- to four-sentence explanation of the choices they have made when illustrating. Below are some of their excellent examples, which--true enough--are not for the academic words I listed above, but which show how the word art activity looks when it's done thoroughly and properly by my three different grade levels. I can totally see the students being able to illustrate/explain the word setting or tone using the same activity. Anyway, that's how I'll review the vocabulary next spring for this assignment when I attempt to make this good assignment even better: by having the students create "word art" examples for our literary terms that we can bring out and look at.
Establishing a RAFT after sharing some student samples of past 'ridiculous essays.' When I first did this assignment back in the spring of 2013 with my eighth graders, the children's book we over-analyzed to write our ridiculous essays about was "Green Eggs and Ham" by--of course--Dr. Seuss. My students were tickled with my incredibly over-dramatic read-aloud, and they talked about it for weeks afterwards. I was a good actor back in high school and college, and I feigned so much anger when I was reading the narrator's lines--the character who does not like green eggs & ham or Sam-I-Am--that I accidentally tore one of the pages when I flipped it. My 2014 eighth graders (who had "One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish" as their Dr. Seuss book to over-analyze) confessed to me after I had read the book that they were disappointed I hadn't ripped a page when I read it to them; they had all heard from the previous year's eighth graders, like Natalie, who actually entered the Mr. Stick cartoon at right as a contender in my Mr. Stick of the Week extra credit contest I host every Friday. Students--in their notebooks--have to write about something that happened that week (or about an idea that occurred to them) and make a Mr. Stick cartoon to illustrate the writing. The Mr. Stick of the Week contest is just one more way I try to get my students to take care of and put pride into their writer's notebooks. Most entries in this weekly contest are hand-drawn and hand-written, but Natalie wanted to do hers on the computer, which was an impressive feat, if you ask me. Learn more about Mr. Stick here, or click here to see some of the Mr. Stick entries I have photographed and posted at Pinterest when students win. Having a Pinterest board, I find, is a great motivator for my students, and it allows me to keep an amazing online gallery of student samples.
Once you have shared the children's book you want your students to over-analyze, explain to them the task at hand: they are going to work with a partner and--together--create a fairly short essay that does at least three things: 1) introduce the book using excellent literary vocabulary words; 2) analyze the picture book's theme; 3) analyze the author's writing style. We call these "Ridiculous Essays" because no one would really over-analyze Dr. Seuss to write an essay like the one I'm about to ask them to pen. It's their job to make the essay sound like it's the type of critical essay of literature one would expect to write in college or high school Honors classes; that means they have to use their "smart kid" words, and I refer them back to my list of vocabulary. I call this type of assignment a RAFTS prompt, and here is what I show the kids so that they understand their purpose and their audience:
My students thrive when they can read and discuss another students' writing sample for an assignment, and the beauty of doing a lesson a second time (and using a different Seuss book when doing it) is that they can read a sample about a totally different book, understand their task at hand a bit better by seeing someone else's previous attempt, but have no solid ideas to directly copy from. "Green Eggs and Ham," which I saved two fun samples from last year, is a radically different story than "One Fish, Two Fish..." In its second year, the discussions my kids had about the previous year's student essays set them up for so much more success when they prepared to write about "One Fish, Two Fish...".
So here are the two samples of the writing task I am assigning my students; these samples were inspired by "Green Eggs and Ham." The first discussion question for my writers was "Who sounded smarter with their essay, and what did they do specifically to sound smarter than the other essay?"
Abby and Wonje's Ridiculous Essay
a partner-write from two of my eighth graders in 2013
The timeless story, "Green Eggs and Ham," written by Dr. Seuss, shares the story of an unnamed character and his confrontation with Sam-I-Am. The plot unfolds as Sam-I-Am offers the un-named main character a platter of green eggs and ham. The main character rejects the offer and becomes increasingly upset with Sam-I-Am, who seems adamant in refusing to allow the main character to pass up such an opportunity and a delicacy.
As the story progresses, the protagonist develops, and it becomes clear that this un-named narrator is—in fact—a very dynamic character. The narrator becomes a much more animated character, and in his rage is prone to repeating the same statements over and over again. This is a great change from his original polite refusal to accept the green eggs and ham. In contrast, Sam-I-Am changes little, other than revealing new situations in which green eggs and ham eating would be ideal. He does not seem to register the anger or irritation of the un-named narrator.
A major theme throughout the novel is that judgment should be withheld until a situation is fully understood. The un-named narrator shows a wonderful demonstration of the consequences of not following the precept of this theme. Judging the green eggs and ham without tasting them, our narrator only allows himself to be goaded into situations that are more and more out of hand.
Seuss' writing style is very unique in that his tale is told only using dialogue. The choice of repetition in this dialogue is crucial to developing the rage of the main character, and it results in well-planned idea development. As a whole, the sentence fluency suffers, as all the sentences share nearly identical sentence patterns, which keeps the writing almost too simplistic.
The story "Green Eggs and Ham" by Dr. Seuss shares a simple plot, in which two characters debate whether or not the closed-minded, un-named narrator will enjoy green eggs and ham if he simply tries them. Sam-I-Am, the presenter of the green eggs and ham and this story's antagonist, attempts--through multiple scenarios in which green eggs and ham may be enjoyed--to make the un-named narrator eat green eggs and ham.
Our un-named narrator is decidedly dynamic inasmuch as he is stubbornly prejudiced against green eggs, ham, and Sam-I-Am, but ultimately he discovers that all objects of prejudice are, in fact, not as bad as he previously viewed them. Sam-I-Am, on the complete opposite side of the character scale, is very static in his persistence that our un-named narrator should try green eggs and ham. Despite the un-named narrator's repeated refusals to try green eggs and ham anywhere Sam suggests eating them, such as in a box or with a fox, Sam-I-Am maintains unflinching optimism and persistence, achieving his goal in the end as the narrator agrees to try that which he has shown prejudice.
As the short narrative progresses and the un-named narrator's stubbornness begin to dissipate, a theme emerges. It is clear that perseverance is the key to Sam-I-Am's success; we can, therefore, declare one of the themes of Dr. Seuss's masterpiece, "Green Eggs and Ham," is that if you persevere and refuse to give up, you can accomplish your goals in the end.
Rubric discussion prompt. "Which essay sounds smarter?" is a pretty subjective discussion prompt, which I start with on purpose. Whenever there's time, I actually want my students to read other students' samples twice--once for comprehension, a second time for the purpose of analysis--, so I give them a more objective prompt for their second read of the two essays. "Here is a rubric," I say. "Read it over carefully, then re-read the two essays knowing what the rubric is specifically looking for. Which of the essays would score better using this rubric? Be prepared to defend your ideas by citing words, phrases, and sentences from the essay or the rubric."
How "partner writing" tasks work. I have become a real believer in what I call "partner writes." That means--when it's appropriate--that two kids write a short piece of writing together, passing the pencil back and forth so that every other sentence is in their own handwriting. Before a sentence is written, they are required to talk about it, shaping its exact wording while they practice their negotiating skills with each other. It's a great technique, especially if you're doing a fun piece of writing that relatively short.
Why partner writers? So many of my kids are interpersonal learners, which means they learn better when they can talk about a task while they're doing it. Writing an essay--in most classrooms I visit--logically means quiet writing time. When it's a state test or an essay final or you're summatively assessing a writing skill we've been working on, then don't use partner writers. But if they're practicing smaller writing skills, which they totally are with this ridiculous essay assignment , I find they do a pretty great job writing together. In the partnership, they practice and negotiate those smaller writing skills to craft the best-sounding sentences they can. Later, they will write alone (in this case, these ridiculous essays were practice for our final exam essay, which was a critical analysis essay on a real piece of literature), and I find that having that experience in place helps them all do better. Heck, I even allow them to have their partner essays out as a resource they can consult when they come in to write the final, real essay, which they write completely on their own in a quiet classroom. During the discussions and the negotiations that come with partner-writes, however, learning is happening. Just make sure they pass the pencil.
A warning from an experienced teacher: you will have students who pass the pencil and the rough draft page to their partners, and they'll try to get away with not talking about the next sentence before it's written. They secretly agree that "I'll just write the next one. We don't have to talk about it." Eliminate that possibility right from the start. See my story in the box below.
A funny, true story from the memory banks of Corbett Harrison, former-actor and present-day teacher: A few years back, I knew I had numerous kids in one class who would most-likely try to get away with silently writing during "partner write" time, because--you know--some kids think they are too good to have to talk to each other and negotiate; they just want to be left alone to do the bare minimum. I wasn't sure which students would try to get away with it first, so I cheaply "hired" (for two small pieces of chocolate) a pair of my good kids from that class. They were told to pretend they were not discussing before writing, and for about six minutes they--indeed--pretended that they were trying to get away a no-talk partner-write. I let them get to their fourth or fifth sentence before I--in my best acting voice--loudly called them out for not talking before writing. I grabbed their partner-write essay and dramatically ripped it in half, telling them to "Start over! And this time follow my rules! I expect one whole minute of talking--and that's the minimum!--before you even put down the first word of your essay's next sentence." Three of us acted for the class that day, it cost me two mere pieces of chocolate, but I ended up with one class that really became good discuss-ers and negotiators during partner-writes.
If my kids only knew what a good actor and manipulator I am! Shhhh. Don't tell them. Gosh, I hope they're not reading this!
So after the class analyzed last year's eighth grade writing samples based on "Green Eggs & Ham," here's how it all went down with this year's eighth graders and this year's partner-write:
Piquing my seventh graders' interest while preparing everyone for their final essay assignment: I have taught writing to all grade levels (K-16), but I currently have sixth, seventh and eighth graders. All my kids write daily in their writer's notebooks. All collect vocabulary as their regular weekly homework task from me. By the time they're eighth graders with me, they are very good at these two routine tasks. Very, very good. If you're ever amazed by the quality of my students' samples, please understand why; I have many of those poor kids for three years, and they get good over those three years.
My end-of-year final for both my seventh and eighth graders is the same task: write an intelligent-sounding critical analysis essay of the final book(s) we've read together as a class. We prepare to write the essay in the three weeks before the final exam happens--through Socratic discussions or partner-writing tasks like the ridiculous essays, among other tricks I have up my sleeve--but they aren't allowed to even start writing their essays until the day of the final. It's a rough draft essay that I expect them to take great care with when composing it, but they know I'm less interested in their conventions and more interested in their academic voices and their unique ideas that they can back up with text evidence.
If you happen to care what challenging books Common Core has me assigning my kiddos, my 8th graders end our school year with a "World War" novel study; they have one of three books they can pick from. Their essays must intelligently analyze theme, writing style, and one other literary element that intrigued them from one of these novels:
Now my still-energetic sev-vies (that's my nickname for our seventh graders), to prepare for their final essay, they have to navigate through two Steinbeck novellas: The Pearl and The Red Pony. Their job is to write a comparison/contrast essay about the two novellas, which also must include a discussion of theme, writing style, and a third literary element of their choosing.
This year, I selfishly-but-wisely made great use of my 8th graders' best, freshly-written "ridiculous essays" to show my sev-vies what smart-sounding critical analysis essays sound like. I explain how the eighth graders are practicing their essay writing skills by composing smart-sounding analyses of silly books. I explain to them that in a year's time they will all be at a point where they--too--can write really smart-sounding essays, even if the book they're writing about doesn't feel like it should have a smart-sounding essay written about it. "Please," my seventh graders whine, "please read 'One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish' to us too, Mr. Harrison."
"Next year," I reply, though I will definitely have a different Seuss for them to analyze next year because these seventh graders had the task of over-analyzing the 8th graders' "One Fish, Two Fish..." essays. Sharing the 8th graders' essays had some positive benefits:
So...below I share the eight essays that were nominated by this year's eighth graders to be typed, read, and analyzed by this year's seventh graders. I presented them on two different days as my sev-vies prepped for their own Steinbeck essay finals. They became great discussion tools. They honored my eighth grade writers who really tried to show off their "smart essay voices." They not only intrigued my seventh graders to want to read the Seuss book, but they also to want to write their own Steinbeck essays to match the intelligent voice the 8th graders were showing off with a fun writing assignment.
All-in-all, "Ridiculous Essays" were a great way to end my school year, and they totally did what they were supposed to: prep my kids to write a genuine critical analysis essay that proves to me they can find intelligent things to say in assigned books that aren't necessarily easy reads.
Click here to print this two-page handout to share with your students.
The discussion prompt that went with this handout: "Rank these four essays--from first place to fourth place--based on who sounded the smartest in their discussion of theme. Then, rank these four essays--from first place to fourth place--based on who sounded the smartest in their discussion of writing style."
Click here to print this two-page handout to share with your students.
The discussion prompt that went with this handout: "After reading all four essays, you and your partner choose any two that you want to offer the writer advice for on how to improve the essays. Write down two pieces of detailed, intelligent advice on how the authors might make their writing come across as even smarter."
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Bando Chemical Industries Ltd. breached its 50 day moving average in a Bearish Manner : 5195-JP : September 1, 2017
Updated: September 01, 2017 06:32AM UTC
Date: Friday, September 01, 2017
Below is a quick look at 5 technical indicators for Bando Chemical Industries Ltd.. More studies are available on the Technical Chart.
Considering peers, relative underperformance over the last year and the last month suggest a lagging position.
5195-JP's share price performance of 18.04% for the last 12 months is below its peer median. The 30-day trend in its share price performance of -3.89% is also below the peer median implying that the company's stock performance is lagging its peers.
Bando Chemical Industries Ltd. has an earnings score of 81.30 and has a relative valuation of UNDERVALUED.
Stocks with High Earnings Momentum are a preferred option for momentum plays. If they are undervalued, it can be a further advantage and may indicate sustained momentum.


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Symphony Hall
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Considerations when choosing stepper motors
Number of wires (unipolar/bipolar)
The Duet boards use bipolar stepper motor drivers. This means you can use stepper motors suitable for bipolar drive, which have 4, 6 or 8 wires. You cannot use motors with 5 wires, because those are intended to be driven in unipolar mode only. (Some unipolar motors can be made into bipolar motors by cutting a trace on a circuit board.)
Simplest to connect are 4-wire motors. Inside the stepper motor are two coils, each coil having a wire connected to each end. The wire and coil pairs are called a phase. The 4 wires map to the 4 output pins of each stepper driver on the Duet (see below for identifying phases and connecting).
With 6-wire stepper motors, there are still 2 coils, but each coil has a centre tap, effectively cutting the coil in half if needed. This creates an extra wire for each coil. You can choose to run them in half-coil, by leaving two end-wires unconnected, or full coil mode by leaving the centre wires unconnected. See the motor specification to check that your Duet can supply enough current for how you want to wire them.
8-wire stepper have 4 coils, so with two wires per coil, this makes 8 wires. You can run an 8-wire stepper in half-coil (with only 2 coils connected) or full-coil mode, and in full-coil mode you can choose to wire the coils in series or in parallel. There's plenty of other documentation around the internet on how to do this, just make sure that the Duet can cope with the current requirement. Ultimately, we still need only 4 wires to connect to the Duet.
Rated current
This is the maximum current you may pass through both windings at the same time. The maximum current through one winding (which is what really matters when using microstepping) is rarely quoted and will be a little higher. However, even with one winding driven at the quoted rated current, the motor will get very hot. So the usual practice is to set the motor current to no more than about 85% of the rated current. Therefore, to get maximum torque out of your motors without overheating them, you should choose motors with a current rating no more than 25% higher than the recommended maximum stepper driver current. This gives:
- Duet 0.6 and Duet 0.8.5 (recommended maximum motor current 1.5A) => Stepper motor rated current <= 1.9A
- Duet 2 WiFi and Duet 2 Ethernet (maximum motor current 2.4A) => Stepper motor rated current <= 3.0A
- Duet 2 Maestro (recommended maximum motor current 1.4A with good fan cooling) => Stepper motor rated current <= 1.7A. Hower, if you use motors with lower rated current (e.g. 1.0 to 1.2A) and 24V power, then the drivers will run cooler.
Holding torque
This is the maximum torque that the motor can provide with both windings energised at full current before it starts jumping steps. The holding torque with one winding energised at the rated current is about 1/sqrt(2) times that. The torque is proportional to current (except at very low currents), so for example if you set the drivers to 85% of the motor rated current, then the maximum torque will be 85% * 0.707 = 60% of the specified holding torque.
Torque is produced when the rotor angle is different from the ideal angle that corresponds to the current in its windings. When a stepper motor is accelerating, it has to produce torque to overcome its own rotor inertia and the mass of the load it is driving. In order to produce this torque, the rotor angle must lag the ideal angle. In turn, the load will lag the position commanded by the firmware.
You will sometimes see it written that microstepping reduces torque. What this really means is that when the lag angle is assumed to be equal to the angle corresponding to one microstep (because you want the position to be accurate to within one microstep), higher microstepping implies a smaller lag angle, hence lower torque. The torque per unit lag angle (which is what really matters) does not reduce with increased microstepping. To put it another way, sending the motor a single 1/16 microstep results in exactly the same phase currents (and therefore the same forces) as sending it two 1/32 microsteps, or four 1/64 microsteps, and so on.
There are two relevant sizes: the Nema size number and the length. The Nema size number defines the square dimension of the body and the mounting hole positions. The most popular size for 3D printers is Nema 17, which has a body no more than 42.3mm square and fixing holes in a square of side 31mm.
Nema 17 motors come in various lengths, ranging from 20mm long "pancake" motors to 60mm long motors. As a general rule, the longer a motor is, the greater its holding torque at rated current. Longer stepper motors also have greater rotor inertia.
Nema 23 motors offer higher torque than Nema 17 motors. The Duet 2 (WiFi and Ethernet) can drive them if you choose them carefully, in particular in respect of rated current. Look for a rated current of around 2.8A. You should use 24V power.
Step angle
There are two common step angles: 0.9 and 1.8 degrees per full step, corresponding to 400 and 200 steps/revolution. Most 3D printers use 1.8 deg/step motors.
Aside from the obvious difference in step angle:
- 0.9deg motors have slightly lower holding torque than similar 1.8deg motors from the same manufacturer
- However, to produce a given torque, the lag angle needed by a 0.9deg motor is slightly more than half the lag angle of a similar 1.8deg motor. Or to put it another way, at small lag angles a 0.9deg motor has nearly twice as much torque as a 1.8deg motor for the same lag angle.
- At a given rotation speed, a 0.9deg motor produces twice as much inductive back emf as a 1.8deg motor. So you generally need to use 24V power to achieve high speeds with 0.9deg motors.
- 0.9deg motors need step pulses to be delivered to the drivers at twice the rate of 1.8deg motors. If you use high microstepping then the speed could be limited by the rate at which the electronics can generate step pulses. The interpolation mode of the TMC2660 drivers on the Duet 2s can be used to overcome this issue.
The inductance of the motor affects how fast the stepper motor driver can drive the motor before the torque drops off. If we temporarily ignore the back emf due to rotation (see later) and the rated motor voltage is much less than the driver supply voltage, then the maximum revs/second before torque drops off is:
revs_per_second = (2 * supply_voltage)/(steps_per_rev * pi * inductance * current)
If the motor is driving a GT2 belt via a pulley, this gives the maximum speed in mm/sec as:
speed = (4 * pulley_teeth * supply_voltage)/(steps_per_rev * pi * inductance * current)
Example: a 1.8deg/step (i.e. 200 steps/rev) motor with 4mH inductance run at 1.5A using a 12V supply, and driving a GT2 belt with 20 tooth pulley would start losing torque at about 250mm/sec. This is the belt speed, which on a CoreXY or delta printer is not the same as the head speed.
In practice the torque will drop off sooner than this because of the back emf caused by motion, and because the above doesn't allow for the winding resistance. Low inductance motors also have low back emf due to rotation.
What this means is that if we want to achieve high speeds, we need low inductance motors and high supply voltage. The maximum recommended supply voltage for the Duet 2(Wifi or Ethernet) is 25V.
Resistance and rated voltage
These are simply the resistance per phase, and the voltage drop across each phase when the motor is stationary and the phase is passing its rated current (which is the produce of the resistance and the rated current). These are unimportant, except that the rated voltage should be well below the power supply voltage to the stepper drivers.
Back emf due to rotation
When a stepper motor rotates it produces a back emf. At the ideal zero lag angle, this is 90 degrees out of phase with the driving voltage, and in phase with the back emf due to inductance. When the motor is producing maximum torque and is on the verge of skipping a step, it is in phase with the current.
Back emf due to rotation is not normally specified on the data sheet, but we can estimate it from this formula:
approximate_peak_back_emf_due_to_rotation = sqrt(2) * pi * rated_holding_torque * revs_per_second / rated_current
The formula assumes that the holding torque is specified with both phases energised at the rated current. If it is specified with only one phase energised, replace the sqrt(2) by 2.
Example: consider a 200 step motor driving a carriage via a 20 tooth pulley and GT2 belt. That's 40mm movement per rev. To achieve a speed of 200mm/sec we need 5 revs/sec. If we use a motor with 0.55Nm holding torque when both phases are driven at 1.68A, the peak back emf due to rotation is 1.414 * 3.142 * 0.55 * 5/1.68 = 7.3V.
How accurate is this formula? dc42 measured and then calculated the back emf for two types of motor:
- 17HS19-1684S: measured 24V, calculated 24.24V assuming holding torque is specified with both phases energised at rated current.
- JK42HS34-1334A: measured 22V, calculated 15.93V assuming 0.22Nm holding torque with both phases energised at rated current. Perhaps the holding torque for this motor is specified with only one phase energised, in which case the calculated value becomes 22.53V. I have also seen the holding torque for this motor given in a different datasheet as 0.26Nm , which increases the calculated value to 18.05V.
How to work out the power supply voltage you need
If you have a target travel speed for your printer, you can work out at least approximately what supply voltage you will need to the motor drivers. Here's how, with an example calculation:
- Decide on your target travel speed. For this example I will use 200mm/sec.
- From the target travel speed, work out the worst-case maximum belt speed. For a Cartesian printer, the worst case is a pure X or Y motion, so the worst case belt speed is the same as the travel speed. For a CoreXY printer, the worst case is a diagonal motion and the corresponding belt speed is sqrt(2) times the travel speed. For a delta printer the worst case is a radial move near the edge of the bed and the worst case belt speed is the travel speed divided by tan(theta) where theta is the smallest angle of a diagonal rod to the horizontal. In practice we can't use the target travel speed for radial moves right up to the edge of the bed because of the distance needed to accelerate or decelerate, so take theta as the angle when the nozzle is about 10mm from the edge of the bed opposite a tower. For my delta this is 30 degrees, so the maximum belt speed is 200/tan(30deg) = 346mm/sec.
- Work out the motor revs per second at the maximum belt speed, by dividing the belt speed by the belt tooth pitch (2mm for GT2 belts) and the number of teeth on the pulley. My delta uses 20-tooth pulleys so the maximum revs per second is 346/(2 * 20) = 8.7.
- Work out the peak back emf due to inductance. This is revs_per_second * pi * motor_current * motor_inductance * N/2 where N is the number of full steps per revolution (so 200 for 1.8deg motors, or 400 for 0.9deg motors). My motors are 0.9deg with 4.1mH inductance and I generally run them at 1A. So the back emf due to inductance is 8.7 * 3.142 * 1.0 * 4.1e-3 * 400/2 = 22.4V.
- Work out the approximate back emf due to rotation. From the formula given earlier, this is sqrt(2) * pi * rated_holding_torque * revs_per_second / rated_current. My motors have rated current of 1.68A and holding torque of 0.44Nm, so the result is 1.414 * 3.142 * 0.44 * 8.7/1.68 = 10.1V
- Preferably, the driver supply voltage should be at least the sum of these two back emfs, plus a few more volts. If you have two motors in series then the required voltage is doubled.
In my example, this gives 32.5V, which is above the 25V recommended input voltage for the Duet 2. But at least we know that for a worst-case delta move with 200mm/sec travel speed, if I use a 24V supply then that is more than 2/3 of the theoretical value, so the torque available for that move should not drop off by more than about 1/3 of the usual torque available. On the other hand, a 12V supply would clearly be inadequate - which explains why I was only able to achieve 150mm/sec before I upgraded the printer to 24V.
I have put a spreadsheet to do the calculation the other way (i.e. work out the speed at which torque starts to drop off) at https://www.dropbox.com/s/5z66rgjc8gptn5....
General recommendations
- Unless you will be using external stepper motor drivers, choose motors with rated current of at least 1.2A, and at most 2.0A for the Duet 0.6 and Duet 0.8.5, or 3A for the Duet 2.
- Plan to run each stepper motor at between 50% and 85% of its rated current.
- Size: Nema 17 is the most popular size used in 3D printers. Nema 14 is an alternative in a highly-geared extruder. Use Nema 23 motors if you cannot get sufficient torque from long Nema 17 motors.
- Avoid motors with rated voltage (or product of rated current and phase resistance) > 4V or inductance > 4mH.
- Choose 0.9deg/step motors where you want extra positioning accuracy, e.g. for the tower motors of a delta printer. Otherwise choose 1.8deg/step motors.
- If you use any 0.9deg/step motors, or high torque motors, use 24V power so that you will be able to maintain torque at higher speeds.
- If using a highly-geared extruder (for example, an extruder that uses a flexible drive cable to transmit the torque from the motor to a worm reduction gear), use a short low-inductance 1.8deg/step motor to drive it.
Stepper Driver Numbering
Drive numbers used in G-code correspond to the following driver labels on the board(s):
|Drive number
|Board Label
|Two headers wired in series
|On Duex 5
|On Duex 5
|On Duex 5
|On Duex 5
|On Duex 5
|On LCD_CONN header
|On LCD_CONN header
To see the exact location of the pins check the Duet wiring diagrams
Connecting stepper motors
Using the internal drivers
The Duet 2 WiFi, Ethernet and Maestro all have 5 on board stepper drivers.
To connect stepper motors to the internal drivers, refer to the wiring diagram at Duet 2 Wiring Diagrams or Duet 2 Maestro Wiring Diagram. The pinout of each stepper motor connector is the same as for other popular 3D printer electronics.
Note: it is highly recommended that the stepper motor casings be grounded, especially in belt-driven printers. Otherwise, motion of the belts causes static charge to build up, which eventually arcs over to the windings. If the motors are screwed to a metal frame, grounding the frame is sufficient.
Each stepper motor connector has four pins. You must connect the two wires for one phase of the stepper motor between the two pins at one end of the connector, and the wires for the other phase to the two pins at the other end.
Identifying the stepper motor phases
Here are two ways you can pair the stepper motor wires into phases:
- Use a multimeter. There should be a few ohms resistance between two wires that belong to the same phase, and no continuity between wires that belong to different phases.
- With the motor wires not connected, spin the spindle between your fingers. Short two of the wires together, then spin the spindle again. If it is much harder to spin than before, those two wires belong to the same phase. Otherwise, try again with a different pair of wires shorted together.
Duet 2 (WiFi, Ethernet and Maestro)
If you have two Z stepper motors, connect them to the ZA and ZB connectors. These connectors are wired in series, which is better than wiring them in parallel for most types of stepper motor used in 3D printers.
If you have only one Z stepper motor, plug it in to the ZA connector, and plug two jumpers into the ZB connector. Duet 2 boards are normally supplied with these jumpers already fitted.
Duet 3, Duet 0.6 and 0.8.5
If you have two Z stepper motors, then for the types of motors commonly used in RepRaps (i.e. with rated current in the 1.2 to 2.0A range), it is better to connect them in series than in parallel. Google "wiring stepper motors in series" for instructions on how to do this for example:
Some recent Chinese 3D printer kits have low-current Z stepper motors that are designed to be connected in parallel instead. If the motors have a rated current of 1.0A or below, connect them in parallel.
Using more than one motor on an axis with a separate driver for each motor
Use the M584 command (see http://reprap.org/wiki/G-code#M584:_Set_...) to specify which drivers are used for the axis concerned. You must be using RepRapFirmware 1.14 or later.
Using external drivers
See the using external drivers page for more details
If your motors are rated above about 2.8A and you are using the Duet 2 (Wifi or Ethernet), or above about 2A and you are using the Duet 2 Maestro, or obsolete Duet 0.6 or 0.8.5, or if they need higher voltage than the Duet can provide, then you need external stepper motor drivers. These generally have optically isolated step/dir/enable inputs. For example, stepper motor drivers rated at up to 5A using the TB6600 stepper driver chip are widely available on eBay.
If the drivers require no more than about 2mA @ 3V on the step, dir and enable inputs, then you can drive them directly from the expansion connector of the Duet. See the Duet 2 Wiring Diagrams for the expansion connector pinouts. Otherwise, you should use 3.3V to 5V level shifting ICs such as 74HCT04 to boost the signal level to 5V and drive them. You can use the Duet Expansion Breakout Board for this purpose.
To remap the X, Y or Z motors to external drivers in RepRapFirmware 1,14 or later, use the M584 command (see M584 Gcode). The Enable signals on the expansion connector are active low by default but you can change this using the M569 command (see M569 Gcode). You can also set a minimum step pulse width in the M569 command (try 1us or 2us when using external drivers), and configure the direction.
Checking connected stepper motors
Before conducting this step, temporarily allow axis movement without homing by navigating to the G Code console and entering: M564 S0 H0
Navigate back to the Machine Control page. At this time, we will check the operation of our stepper motors.
Move each stepper motor, individually, 1 mm in each direction.
Note that a stepper can't be moved before homing, unless the M564 command is used to override this safety default.
9 Comments
Hello a pleasure to greet you. I was reviewing the numbers on configuration of external drivers, but it is very brief and I am something new but my input project is to make a 3D printer of high precision and speed with low vibration etc. then for this I will use stepper motors NEMA17 Stepper Motor 1.5A 0.52Nm 2Phase 48.3mm (1.9in.), model MS17HA6P4150) 0.9 Deg Moon's brand the same brand has a driver with emulation but I have no idea what it would be like to do wired to configure in the Duet Wifi, although I understand clearly that I must use the pin com LCD, you with more experience my question would be the following, how much performance can I get to the SR3-Mini controllers from Moon's with the Duet Wifi, can give me that high precision with reduced inertia and precise control? and how would the connection between this and the Duet Wifi?
Please use the Duet3D forum for support :https://forum.duet3d.com/
Tony -
Would be great if you could point out that the mH must be /1000 for H in the calculation provided for INDUCTANCE. Thanks for this great practical summery!
I noticed that the spread sheet was a bit different than the provided calculations…seemed odd. Also, where did you get all the calculations from? Is there a reference textbook you used?
So I'm playing with Duet RepRapFirmware configuration tool. I'm driving my nema23 with external drivers on expansion board. I got a little confused that It only allows up to 2A. Does it matter on this settings if I'm driving it on external drives? Also Duet said their drives are capable of 2.8A, this is throwing it off.
Could it be because the board is using 24V and motors usually runs 3-4V?


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Hello! I don't know if anyone is still reading this blog, considering I haven't posted anything on here for more than a year. Where have I been? That's a great question. I don't really have any reason for not posting, I guess I've just been caught up in the important job of raising a family. :) Anyway, hopefully I'll be able to start posting a little more regularly. I plan on posting a few of the projects I've done over this last year. Also, I'm hoping to share some pictures and projects from the old schoolhouse my husband and I recently purchased and we're remodeling for our home. In the meantime, here's some felt food for you.
This felt food was a lot of fun to make for our niece's birthday.
This felt food was a lot of fun to make for our niece's birthday.
Would anyone be interested in a tutorial for the pizza or the tacos?
TACOS: With meat, cheese, salsa, and sour cream
Juice Pouch, Bag of Chips, and Banana:
Pancakes with syrup and butter and Eggs:
Sugar cookie baking set:


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In a first for the magazine, the June issue of Woman's Day, now on newsstands nationwide, features two real women who walked their way to weight loss success. Both Vanessa Herron and Tallena Johnson lost a combined 200+ pounds with simple, inspiring changes in their daily lifestyles.
Says Thousand Oaks, CA resident Vanessa Herron (left): "A doctor's visit in February 2014 was my wakeup call. I was 242 pounds, prediabetic, and my blood pressure was sky-high. I knew it was serious, and I had to focus on getting healthy. The problem: I'm a working mom of four kids ranging in age from 14 to 22, so I have limited time. I thought about ways to fit activity into my day. I realized my daughter's middle school was one mile away. So, I started walking her there instead of driving. At the beginning, I wasn't able to keep up. I'd wave Brenda on and go back home. Each day, I went a little farther and was eventually able to make the whole trip. After four months, I was down 40 pounds and could walk without huffing and puffing. Today, my health measures are in normal ranges and I've shaken the 'victim' mentality. In other words, I felt like life was running me instead of me running my life. I now believe that if I can work hard enough to change my health, then I can apply that discipline to other areas. It's been going well—I devote time each day to my novel and other writing aspirations!"
Says Fremont, NE resident Tallena Johnson (right): "When I was really heavy, I felt like people were staring at me, so I didn't go into stores or restaurants by myself. I'd walk with my head down and avoid eye contact. My mom had a heart attack at age 41, when I was 19, and that was never far from my mind. On my 39th birthday in 2012, I hit 250 pounds and thought, I'm going to die if I don't do something. So I set a goal to get under 200 pounds by age 40. I joined the Anytime Fitness gym near my house, but at first I could barely walk on the treadmill for 10 minutes. I didn't want to overdo it and get frustrated, so I decided to add just 1 minute of walking each day. After 20 days, I was up to 30 minutes of walking and the pounds were consistently coming off. If I couldn't make it to the gym, I'd stroll around town with my then teenage daughters, Kayla and Kendra. Now, I feel like I am turning heads—in a good way. I hold my head up high with my shoulders back, I smile and make eye contact. I try to radiate positivity."


text: Meadowlark calls to mind summers spent in the country, running back through wildflower pastures in the evening. The book mixes beautiful garden motifs with classic design elements, pretty trellis prints with trailing vines, time honored textures with soft scrolls and damasks. You will also find botanical flowers, friendly birds and coordinating plaids and stripes, all rendered in a romantic palette of graceful colors. The collection is host to exquisite printing techniques, including metallic effects, pearl finishes and raised inks.


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Thursday, April 16, 2015
Corey Taylor talks about Slipknot's current live shows
Slipknot frontman Corey Taylor and percussionist Shawn 'Clown' Crahan interviewed by Maniacs TV at this year's Soundwave Festival. You can read an excerpt below:
About Slipknot's current live shows, Corey Taylor said: "We put together a pretty good show that we've been touring all over the world right now. And the cool thing is that we've got three different rotating sets that we've been playing. Other than that, we've been blowing stuff up, we've got a giant goathead, and then there's just us, which is crazy enough as it is."
Below the video:
Posted by Metal Rock News on April 16, 2015
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Make your conference successful
Hotel Vianen is the perfect location for holding business meetings such as meetings, multi-day conferences, seminars, giving trainings, product presentations or organizing trade fairs.
In addition to business meetings, Hotel Vianen also offers dinner, a company party, a 25-year anniversary, wedding or condolence. Hotel Vianen offers you 27 tasteful and inspiring rooms with different capacities and layout options.
All rooms are characterized by plenty of daylight, spacious layout, comfortable seats, air conditioning and modern technical facilities. All these features ensure that you get the most out of your meeting. The rooms below can be combined. Maximum capacity parties: 2000 persons Capacity exhibition: on request.


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There are many different reasons that a student or parent might want to write a letter to their school principal. These include to address an issue, make a suggestion, ask a question or just to get to know the principal. No matter the reasoning behind it, a letter to the principal should be written in a formal business format.
Decide if you are going to send the letter to the principal via mail or deliver it personally. If you want to send it via mail, including your address as well as the school's address before the greeting on your letter in proper business format. If you are going to turn the letter in at the office, addresses aren't necessary. However, make sure that the principal knows how to get a response letter back to you, such as putting your home room number and teacher on the letter.
Enter down two lines and then write your greeting using "Dear Principal' and then the principal's full name. If you don't know his first name, you can just use his last name. Follow your greeting with a semicolon.
Enter down two lines before you start the body of your letter. Address the reason why you are writing the letter in your first sentence so that there is no confusion about the topic of your letter. Be very cordial and professional when writing the body of your letter while still expressing your point.
Remind the principal how you can be contacted by reiterating your contact information. It is proper to give two different ways to contact you, such as a phone number and an email address.
Enter down two lines and write your salutation. "Sincerely yours" is a professional closing typically used in business letters.
Enter down two lines and sign your letter. If you are typing your letter, enter down four lines and type your name. You should sign your name above your typed name.
Proofread your letter for any spelling, grammatical or structural errors. Catching errors before the final draft of your letter is sent to the principal is important in order to come across as professionally as possible.


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Saturday, August 29, 2009
Beater How-To: Beater to Derby in 10 Easy Steps
At some point, all beaters will be beyond their usable life and difficult choices must be made. Sell the car to an unsuspecting craigslister? Let it shamefully return to the earth in a junkyard? Or shall it go out in a blaze of Americana glory? Once the sensible decision is made, this is a guide to help you make the transition: Beater to Derby car.
In demolition derby, it's the little things that make all the difference between getting knocked out in the first five seconds or being able to compete for an entire weekend. Demolition derby is the lowest budget form of motorsport and your vehicle preparation should reflect that. There is no point in going to the Home Depot to shell out cash for steel and fasteners when the vehicle itself is practically a poorly organized yet well stocked hardware store. Think of your vehicle like Bear Grylls thinks of the forest. Sway bars? No - windshield bars. Spare tire? More like battery box. Rear seat? Not anymore - crash padding. So grab a case of PBR and a hammer and try these ten easy tricks to help save you cash, provide better derby performance, and create the illusion of safety.
1. Strip the Interior
This is the most boring step if the car belonged to you initially. If not, be prepared to amass a collection of new photos (some you'd rather not see...), empty packages of Newport Menthols, mysterious unlabeled VHS tapes, and broken pens.
Perhaps the easiest way it to take the seats out, pry the soda soaked floor covering loose from the rockers, and roll all of the trash into a carpet-tube for easy disposal. Then proceed to the nearest sink without touching your mouth or eyes.
With the seats out of the car, start taking loose the brittle interior body panels that could otherwise explode on impact. In the interest of convenience, resist the temptation of stripping the interior door handles at this point. It's also worth noting that the dash should stay with the car. It's a royal pain in the ass to take out, but more importantly its glowing red idiot beacons may be the first indicator that your car has shut off mid-derby.
2. Remove the Glass
It is of paramount importance to remove all glass in the vehicle for hopefully obvious reasons. Although it is possible to only remove the front and rear screens and roll down the windows so they look removed, this can come back to bite, or more appropriately cut you in the ass.
Start by removing all of the side windows either by taking them off of the tracks or by hurling a brick through aforementioned windows. Either way, you will most likely still have to vacuum up a lot of broken glass. Save thought by breaking the quarter windows.
Front and rear glass removal is certainly the most challenging part of a derby car build. The fancy way of removing the windshield is to remove all of the trim, soak the seals with WD-40 for 24 hours, then insert piano wire into the goo around the window frame. With gloves, grab the piano wire from both sides and pull it all the way around the glass - should pop right out afterwards. The everyman way of removing the front windshield it to throw something heavy through it and pick up the pieces. The only disadvantage to this method is that fine glass shards go everywhere. Absolutely everywhere. Broken glass also sticks into the window sealant, forming a halo of pain and sadness around on the windshield frame.
3. Hole in the Hood
At some point, the car will catch on fire. Most demo derby organizations are fully aware of this fact and require that you cut a hole in the hood so that one of their staff can walk over at a leisurely pace and put it out. There are a few questions to ask one's self before whipping out the air chisel:
-Where do the fuel lines run?
-Does that bracing do any good?
-Where is all that oil coming from?
-If the hood bends up, will I be able to see out of this hole?
After the considerations are made, start cutting to a size of about one square foot. Fridge racks make awesome hood hole guards.
4. The Mini-Spare
Somewhere underneath all of the mid-90's clothes, umbrellas, and cassette tape cases in the trunk is most likely a mini-spare and jack set. The wheel should be removed and placed on a non-driven (can't stress this enough) wheel so that the body can encroach further without contacting the tire. If you can find two-mini spares, perfect. Of course, don't forget to weld the jack set to its mounts while you are in there for some extra battering mass.
5. The Old Floor-Mat-Over-The-Alternator Trick
There's nothing like getting knocked out of a derby because the main lead on the alternator contacted the radiator or engine compartment, blowing the main charge relay. Save yourself the embarrassment by taking the smallest of the floor mats and draping it over the alternator. Then using coat hangers, 'safety wire' it to the alternator itself so the posts are covered for when the alternator it impacted by the body or is knocked off its mounts and left to dangle by the leads.
6. Spare Wheel Battery Box
Remember that wheel you replaced with the mini-spare? Find that and lay it face down on the passenger side floorboard. Drill a few holes corresponding to the lug pattern of the wheel and bolt it down to the floor. Take one of the other floor mats, fold it up and place it in the center of the wheel. Secure the battery with the vehicle's battery mounting hardware from under the hood or just use a ratchet strap, as shown below.
7. Easy Lifting
There is a bit of Darwinism present in the derby: low cars are always more prone to being driven over and killed by higher cars. It is advisable to find some way to lift your car an inch or two. Some have been known to cut off the end of the shock absorber and stuff it with shop rags. Others have covered bricks in duck tape and jammed them in between the spring coils. Whatever the method, it can't hurt.
8. Structural Modifications
When impacted from behind, some cars inherently bend up, some cars bend down, and some split at the seams. Cavalier: down, Grand Am: up, 1972-1976 Impala: up, 1977-up GM and Ford full size: down. Bending up, although not without its disadvantages, is preferable to bending down. Most drivers would prefer not being able to see out the back to having the back half of the car create an improvised road grader as it dragged it's ass around the arena, collecting mud and car parts along the way. To overcome the natural directional tendency of the rear of the car, some easy modifications can be made to ensure the car bends that way you'd want it to.
With access to heavy equipment, some drivers have notched the frames at the rear of the vehicle and jostled it with a front end loader until the recently cut gap is closed, at which point the frame is re-welded. I, not having this luxury, have had some success with beating the middle of the C-pillar with a baseball bat until they are more or less vertical, pre-stressing the rear of the car. Unfortunately, there is no scientific data to prove that this works, however, I can only say after having done this, none of the cars I've driven have bent down.
9. Cooling System
Antifreeze may taste good to dogs, but it's not so delicious to humans. To keep from getting a mouthful of hot Ethylene Glycol steam when the radiator does let go, flush it out and replace the coolant with water. To keep the radiator and hence the motor preserved a little bit longer, take the radiator loose at the top mounts so that it can lean back into the motor instead of splitting in half. Your cylinder head will thank you.
10. Securing the Bodywork
Securing the bodywork should be the last step before painting to keep you from crawling through windows and glass encrusted door frames, as well as to maintain access to the engine compartment until tech inspection. Keep the hood and trunk from obscuring your vision by drilling holes in the fenders and lids allowing for them to be coat-hangered together. To keep the doors from popping open as well as to stiffen things up a bit and not to mention reduce the element of surprise, loop a chain around the B-pillar that is slightly too short to reach all the way around. Run a long bolt through the eyelets of the chain and tighten it mercilessly until the doors and B-pillar become one entity.
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An Expedition in Condensational Poetry
by Michael Prihoda
How small can a poem get while still retaining a critical meaning, an essence of depth? This, essentially, is the question that led me to blackout, and, eventually, to a form of conceptual redaction that is the purest expression of condensational poetry I can conceive of.
I've always been fascinated by architecture, especially the inner workings of a structure. The supports, the columns, the cladding, the interior workings. And in approaching art, it is the book that becomes the structure, the individual pages rooms to tour, all of it adding to a beautiful architectural mass. I think there's a lot of cross-pollination between something like Alain de Botton's The Architecture of Happiness whose premise boils down to how we surround ourselves with spaces that blossom pleasure and the way humans surround themselves with art that produces pleasure. So it is with the projects I attempt to create. I surround, condense, and reflect back.
I'm certain most readers will be familiar with the famous six word story about baby shoes that may or may not actually be Hemingway's and examples abound of minimally constructed prose and poetry across the net and in anthologies such as Flash Fiction Forward, Hint Fiction, Twitter fiction, One Sentence Poems, Monkey Bicycle's one sentence story feature, and others. Basically, too many to bother naming here.
In thinking of architecture and how it blends with poetic brevity, I keep mentally returning to a visit to the Art Institute of Chicago, specifically their miniatures section where I was fascinated at the detail, the care, the artisan-ship that went into each magical house on perhaps a Lego-man scale.[1] While all of those aforementioned publications and forms have a place in the world of how-small-can-writing-get-while-still-being-impactful, they all left something to be desired. They are the photographs to the expedition I always seek in my work. They were glimpses up the side of a mountain I wanted to climb every peak of. Ultimately, this led me to wanting to build out a redaction of an already full work of fiction. To make a full miniature house instead of just a gorgeous table or, say, a cornice or a gargoyle[2]
I started with the general blackout method using Camus' The Stranger, moved to Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse Five, and finished my initial blackout trilogy with The Great Gatsby, all three portions having now been published by Sein Und Werden Books. I took a Sharpie to every page in each of those books and am still quite pleased with what I produced. But it still left something on the table. Those projections didn't fully capture what I believed redaction work might achieve, not to mention the tedium in crossing out unused lines of text with a black marker.[3]
How to proceed? Well, I returned to the way I constructed my own poetry. Often using couplets, short lines, clipped phrases, lowercasing. All things redacting from a source text allowed and even encouraged. So I began to leverage a siphoning process, a lifting of words from a source text to create structured, original poems. Of course rules would still apply. Each poem comes from exactly one page, or as near as possible to that. Each poem can only use the words that exist on the page before me and I do not change the order of the words on the page. I also do not pull more than three consecutive words as I'm not interested in quoting and my projects do not apply to the same brainwaves as someone like David Shields or Kenneth Goldsmith. The poems themselves always stay small (they could hardly be otherwise), often not building beyond a few lines, probably at an average of twenty-five words. When I lift them, they still retain their architecture, as if I were pulling bricks from a wall. Another builder might come along, see my bricks, and be able to easily slot them back from where I took them. Pulling words in this way allows me to employ my own structure while also lending each poem a higher readability.[4]
Something else my new trajectories wanted to get at was the essence of the source material. Not just retaining the words of the original authors but the ethos, the scope of their writing, the themes. I wanted to write the story behind the story. The condensation on the windowsill from their rain shower. For this new method, I started with The Road by Cormac McCarthy, then proceeded to Invisible Cities by Italo Calvino. In each, the central conflict, the ideas, and the philosophy transferred into the poems I made while redacting. They are McCarthy's words. They are Calvino's sentences. But they become my poems. Something that I could not have written without their productions, but also something they could not have conceived of either. I think of these creations as companions to what those authors have written. An homage of sorts, as I would never bother to do this with work I didn't believe had incredible merit.
I went beyond feeling inspired by these authors. I explored their universes and I reported back what I found in glimpses, in pastiches, in broad strokes and achingly small units. I went to fiction to find my poetry. I went to fiction to find just how small I could get while still retaining not just beauty, but purpose, philosophy, a consistent heartbeat.
[1] Looking for a more elegant comparison than chunky plastic? Perhaps the new movie Downsizing might have characters who would be right at home, those conservationally-conscious denizens. Though at this point I can't help but point out Honey I Shrunk the Kids might have gotten there first with the shrinkage idea. Those kids would have fit perfectly in a late 18th century tudor abode or else the early 19th century duplex (here my accuracy may be waning).
[2] I can hardly claim to be original in this sort of endeavor. There's one quite well-known work of an author fully blacking out a classic work of fiction (name and title escape me) though in that project the author beautified the process and made each page into a work of art alongside finding choice words. In another instance, I stumbled across an author with a blog called Erasing Infinite whose goal is to create a poem from each page of Infinite Jest. I imagine that project isn't finished yet.
[3] Doing blackout means destroying the source text, something I quickly overcame, especially considering, while they were masterworks I took to task, millions of other copies were floating about the world and the destruction of one would hardly jeopardize Camus' status as widely read and historically necessary. However, books, when well made, do not come apart easily. That kind of deconstruction is not something I crave.
[4] Something blackout poetry struggles to achieve is a guidance for the reader. While doing away with stanzas and line breaks and all that tradition, it loses any structure to tell a reader how to proceed and in so doing, becomes stilted, sometimes awkward, however illuminating the words on their own might be.
Michael Prihoda is a poet, editor, and teacher, living in central Indiana with his wife and the dream of having a pet llama. He is the author of five poetry collections, the latest of which is The First Breath You Take After You Give Up (Weasel Press, 2016).


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Published on Nov 9th, 2017
Social media has evolved into one of the most influential and effective marketing tools for brands and media companies to reach and connect with their consumers. With a total of 54 billion consumer engagements across Facebook, Twitter and Instagram from January to September of 2017 within the U.S., it has become necessary for brands to not only be present but also effectively engaged with their communities and target markets.
However, when it comes to measuring social media success, many brands today still make the same mistake of focusing on the BIG vanity number in social: Fan count. Followers will indefinitely increase overtime, but it is not necessarily an indicator of consumer interest and satisfaction, as can be seen from the data of fans v.s. unique engaged audience.
At Shareablee, we measure more than 2 billion social users globally, identifying every impression, action and click for all social media content, and have identified unique engaged audience (UEA) as the more accurate metric to measuring success. Not only is UEA a more accurate understanding of social traffic, it has also been proven to better correlate with ROI. Our research has revealed that socially engaged consumers tend to spend about 51% more throughout their lifetime than the overall population, making UEA an important KPI for overall performance.
In order to grow and remain relevant in the social media space, UEA has to grow, which begs the question: What metrics do brands have to focus on to not only retain UEA but also bring in new engaged audiences?
With our endless ocean of data, from content and page engagement to the individual engager, we have narrowed social measurement for brands into two parts: Quantitative and qualitative data.
Quantitative data, the simple counting of actions, comments and shares, give brands a good idea of how well content is performing and how much interest it managed to generate. Qualitative data on the other hand allows brands to identify and plan bigger strategic goals of what their main consumers like, what drives them to engage and where their consumers are engaging when they are not on your page. Along with individual demographics data, brands can utilize this information to build effective content that both grows engagement as well as targets other markets with high affinity to the brand, expanding their market size and opportunity.
However, content creativity built on qualitative data isn't the sole factor to a successful campaign. It is important to always follow up with the next step of using basic qualitative data to confirm the success of the content. By analyzing both engagement and shares, one can narrow down the contents that possess qualities of interest that consumers are more likely to share and recommend on social. This, in turn, would increase the content's reach and effectiveness.
Although optimizing content is crucial to success, it is just as important to identify top performing content style and type in your competitive and industry sets. At Shareablee, we have the most well collected data sets of entire industries while also providing custom competitive data sets for more accurate analysis and comparison within an industry or a brand's competitive space. This competitive data will aid on your journey to target the right markets with the appropriate content and build fully connected customers. After all, a fully connected customer is 52% more valuable than a highly satisfied customer.
For more details into the top metrics and KPIs that brands should watch for, download our "Measuring What Matter" 2017 webinar where we discuss the three topics:
If you are currently planning your social media efforts and wish to know more about social media measurement and analytics, feel free to contact us at email@example.com or request a demo and we'll reach out to you, guiding you on your brand's social media journey.


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We've currently been deciding where to go next and after a cup of coffee and a long debate we've decided it's going to have to be VIETNAM! I for one am very excited about this decision.
As we've mentioned before in one of our other blogs trip advisor has very much helped us along the way with planning a lot of our adventures and it's been no different with this one. So decision made we started scanning through recommendations of where to go and what to see. A few hours later and with our planning board sorted we now have a rough idea. I am somewhat of a planning freak; I know some people like to turn up and see what happens but I like to know I'm going with a rough guide so I don't miss anything I might want to do or see! Obviously once we get there our plans are guaranteed to change and I realise that but I still love the fun of getting a board, printing pictures and seeing what's out there. It gives me such a warm fuzzy feeling inside and something to focus on once we've decided where our next destination is going to be. So with our flights now booked, we just need to sort out our visa's and then it's time to start packing! And I will be sure to travel light this time. From what I've read Vietnam is meant to be amazing and I am so excited to be going to this beautiful country and seeing all it has to offer. Be sure to check back to see how our travels go!
If anyone has any recommendations of things we can see or do whilst travelling around this beautiful country then be sure to leave us a comment.