Small Kitchen Wall Cabinet

I had a column by the kitchen patio door. I decided to take advantage of this space and build a small wall cabinet to store flashlights, pocket knives, chewing gum, rolls of mints, etc. I ordered a solid cherry slab door and face frame and extra trim piece that matched the bar and laundry cabinets I installed previously. I built the cabinet and shelving.

 Outside:


Inside:
 

 Inside detail view:

Kitchen Touchscreen Computer Mount

I bought a portable touchscreen all-in-one computer for the kitchen but it is also battery operated for portability for use on the patio. It didn't have mounting holes and I also wanted to maintain portability. I bought some aluminum square channel and flat pieces to make a bracket to mount the computer on a small adjustable arm. The square channel allows me to slide the computer in and out for portability and teh arm holds it up off the bar counter out of the way and it can be used at the bar or rotated to see from the kitchen side.

 

 

Upstairs mini split - a lifesaver

I have two large heat pumps but both controls are downstairs and my upstairs office, TV, photography area is always hot and unbearable in the hot Tucson summers because all the heat from downstairs rises and in order to keep the upstairs cold, the downstairs has to be a refrigerator. ($$$)

On 3Apr2015 I installed a Fujitsu Halcyon DC Inverter mini split AC (also will heat but I never need that). This is so energy efficient and keeps the upstairs nicely cooled so unless it gets really hot I don't even need to use my downstairs heat pumps to cool much and when I do they can be set to a higher temperature.

The indoor unit is mounted on the wall at ceiling level:

The outdoor unit is on the roof next to one of my larger heat pumps:

This unit was one of the best house purchases I have made and wish I had done so sooner as I had many miserable summers working in a hot office.

Had to install a new water heater

Well the time came and I had to install a new water heater on 11Dec2014:

 

Nothing too exciting othe rthan nice hot water.

Window Bird Tape

My wrap around porch windows are a killing ground for birds, mostly doves. The windows reflect the sky and trees and the birds think they have an open flight path.
Ideally if this was new construction I would use the specialty Ornilux glass that is opaque to birds but transparent to humans.
 I purchased a few rolls of bird collision deterrent marker tape from Feather Friendly a Canadian Company. The tape is non distracting and has cut down on the casual window bird collisions where birds mistake the windows for sky. However, the gray hawks have learned to chase doves into the windows and then swoop in and take the stunned bird. I see this on many occassions and recently saw parents teaching a chick this hunting technique.

Here is an inside looking out section of windows prior to installing the tape:

 

 Here is the inside looking out view after the bird tape has been installed:

The small squares are barely noticable and after you get used to them you don't even notice.

Here is the outside window view:

 

The squares are applied to the outside of the window and are therfore more noticable.   These have been on since 1Nov2014 (~2.5 yrs at the time of this post) and even with window washing they have remained intact.

It has been awhile...

So it has been awhile since I have posted but projects were still going on. I will try to update with some of the past projects I never posted. They will likely be out of chronological order.