1) We camp with all of our friends.
2) We set up our car for Halloween trunk or treating. Stand back, fishes.
Tuesday, October 20, 2009
And I Dwelt in a Tent
Not much to say here. Just picked up a Mombasa roof top tent on craigslist. Put it on top of the Cruiser. Now I will win when:
1) We camp with all of our friends.
2) We set up our car for Halloween trunk or treating. Stand back, fishes.
1) We camp with all of our friends.
2) We set up our car for Halloween trunk or treating. Stand back, fishes.
Tuesday, June 09, 2009
Cruisin
Last year we (well, actually our good friend Jonah) bought a Suburban for our big family trip to the western US. It was cheaper than renting a car for the three weeks we were there. At the end of the trip, we left the 'Burban with my brother to sell it.
This year we are doing the same thing, and my intention this time is to buy a vehicle we will actually want to keep. We have lots of friends who could make use of a family vehicle for trips out West, too. So a few days ago, I found a 1991 Toyota Land Cruiser (know to Cruiser aficionados as the FJ80) online for a good price. The seller sounded like a good guy in my phone conversation with him, and he gave me his mechanic's number to follow up on questions I had. The bottom line is that I bought a vehicle sight unseen with only some photos and conversations to go on. Many generous relatives offered to go and pick it up for me. My sister and niece made the two-hour round trip to pick it up. My sister even floated the money for the purchase (I should probably send her a check, huh?). Awesome! The truck will be waiting for us when we get there.
The Cruiser has 235,000 miles. In my research, I have been surprised to learn that the old Land Cruiser motors have pushrods and are derived from a 1950s Chevrolet design. They are durable motors, if a little underpowered for the task. The FJ80 was a bit of a hybrid, with the "new" style body but with the old engine. My old Porsche 912 was the same thing--motor from the old 356 and body from the new 911.
The body has a little rust, but I will touch it up and frankly am not too worried about it. I will remove the brush guard on the front and try to take off the rubber strips on the sides. The biggest problem was the missing third-row jump seats. Fortunately, I found a guy online parting out a 1991 Land Cruiser nearly identical to mine. It had grey cloth seats and a set of jump seats. A few bucks later, and they are on their way via UPS. They need to be cleaned:
The most important task will be to do something to honor the white Land Cruisers that keep the civilized world in business. What do I mean by that? Turn on the TV and watch. Peacekeeping in Kosovo? White Land Cruisers. UNICEF in Mongolia? White Land Cruisers. UN Food Programme in Africa? White Land Cruisers. CIA and Special Ops in Afghanistan? White Land Cruisers. To really do this truck justice, I am going to find just the right decal to put on both doors. So here I need your help. Below are some photos I have found around the web of white Toyotas with cool door decals. What are your thoughts? What door decals does this truck need?
The plain jane UN Cruiser / 4-Runner / Nissan with black UN letters :
A British Cruiser in Gaza with the Union Jack and Emergency Aid:
A UNICEF Cruiser:
A UNDP Cruiser:
A UN Food Programme Cruiser:
Well, and here are a few that I could make into decals. They are really insider jokes, but they might get a few guffaws from impressed people. See if you can name these references. If you get the Ace Tomato Company one, you will be my best friend:
What are your thoughts?
A British Cruiser in Gaza with the Union Jack and Emergency Aid:
A UNICEF Cruiser:
A UNDP Cruiser:
A UN Food Programme Cruiser:
Well, and here are a few that I could make into decals. They are really insider jokes, but they might get a few guffaws from impressed people. See if you can name these references. If you get the Ace Tomato Company one, you will be my best friend:
Wednesday, March 18, 2009
Dynolicious
And for the record, the reported stats on the car are:
Horsepower: 160
0-60: 7.6
The difference between these figures and the actual observed ones on the chart is due to driveline drag (for the HP number) and driver (lack of) skill.
(My dad's first reaction on seeing the above graph is that the blue line is just the first derivative of the red line. Cool, huh?)
Friday, February 20, 2009
Putin Whips it Out
Alright, up to now I have only used this blog to describe a narrow little slice of my reality. Just handy projects and stuff. I don't know if what follows is a harbinger of posts to come, but I like my little idea so much that I have to put it out there.
You may have seen this in the news this week:
I got to thinking about this, and I can't get away from my own little harebrained conspiracy theory to explain it. Actually, it's just conjecture to explain some data points, not a real conspiracy theory. So here goes with the background facts:
January 2007
China shoots down a satellite to demonstrate that they have the capability and that they are real players in the new world. (Another little conspiracy theory of mine about this one is that China did a messy job of it on purpose in order to deny that orbit altitude to others in the future. But I have no basis for that conjecture.)
February 2008
The US shoots down an ailing satellite, ostensibly to save the Pacific Ocean from a tank full of hydrazine. But the consensus view is that at least part of the motivation was for the US to let people -- especially China -- know that we have a big one, too, and that they should think twice before pointing their satellite interceptor at one of ours.
February 2009
A dead Russian satellite and a living Iridium satellite collide. The Iridium satellites are really only used by the US Military and a few oil platform workers and CNN reporters.
The grand explanation: Russia's satellite was not dead, and it was guided into the Iridium on purpose to show that Putin has a big one, too. The satellite-satellite intercept is a more elegant solution in some ways than what the US and the Chinese did because you can just park the killer satellite up there and wait until you need it. My suspicions about this have been aroused at least in part because no one has said anything about these intersecting flight paths being either predicted or, alternatively, a complete surprise. Surely if the dead Russian satellite was on a stable trajectory and the Iridium was, too, then the computers in Colorado Springs would have seen this one coming months ago and warned Iridium to burn some fuel to move their satellite. I bet somewhere in the bowels of the government there are analysts looking for evidence that the Russian satellite was communicating or that it made some propellant shots in the period leading up to the impact.
Two other nice data points: First, the Kremlin has been acting old-school nuts lately (traitor spies being knocked off in London, the invasion of Georgia, etc.) trying to demonstrate that it is still a key player in the world. Second, Biden and others warned rather ominously before the inauguration that Obama would be tested by a crisis. This probably is not The Big Crisis, but it seems at least plausible that North Korea's decision to roll out a rocket test, Iran's decision to do the same, and Russia's involvement in a satellite accident are examples of each country feeling out the new president. In Tom Clancy books at least, this sort of thing is kind of a rite of passage for new presidents. I suppose that Obama ignoring the Russia thing is the right calculated move, because a strong response would just draw us into a stupid slap fight with Putin. A spat with the US is good for his internal support in Russian politics, with the bonus of making glorious mother Russia proud of having the technological wherewithal to humilate the Americans. So a non response is probably the right thing.
Or it might have been a space accident. Maybe I should check myself into the loony bin.
You may have seen this in the news this week:
I got to thinking about this, and I can't get away from my own little harebrained conspiracy theory to explain it. Actually, it's just conjecture to explain some data points, not a real conspiracy theory. So here goes with the background facts:
January 2007
China shoots down a satellite to demonstrate that they have the capability and that they are real players in the new world. (Another little conspiracy theory of mine about this one is that China did a messy job of it on purpose in order to deny that orbit altitude to others in the future. But I have no basis for that conjecture.)
February 2008
The US shoots down an ailing satellite, ostensibly to save the Pacific Ocean from a tank full of hydrazine. But the consensus view is that at least part of the motivation was for the US to let people -- especially China -- know that we have a big one, too, and that they should think twice before pointing their satellite interceptor at one of ours.
February 2009
A dead Russian satellite and a living Iridium satellite collide. The Iridium satellites are really only used by the US Military and a few oil platform workers and CNN reporters.
The grand explanation: Russia's satellite was not dead, and it was guided into the Iridium on purpose to show that Putin has a big one, too. The satellite-satellite intercept is a more elegant solution in some ways than what the US and the Chinese did because you can just park the killer satellite up there and wait until you need it. My suspicions about this have been aroused at least in part because no one has said anything about these intersecting flight paths being either predicted or, alternatively, a complete surprise. Surely if the dead Russian satellite was on a stable trajectory and the Iridium was, too, then the computers in Colorado Springs would have seen this one coming months ago and warned Iridium to burn some fuel to move their satellite. I bet somewhere in the bowels of the government there are analysts looking for evidence that the Russian satellite was communicating or that it made some propellant shots in the period leading up to the impact.
Two other nice data points: First, the Kremlin has been acting old-school nuts lately (traitor spies being knocked off in London, the invasion of Georgia, etc.) trying to demonstrate that it is still a key player in the world. Second, Biden and others warned rather ominously before the inauguration that Obama would be tested by a crisis. This probably is not The Big Crisis, but it seems at least plausible that North Korea's decision to roll out a rocket test, Iran's decision to do the same, and Russia's involvement in a satellite accident are examples of each country feeling out the new president. In Tom Clancy books at least, this sort of thing is kind of a rite of passage for new presidents. I suppose that Obama ignoring the Russia thing is the right calculated move, because a strong response would just draw us into a stupid slap fight with Putin. A spat with the US is good for his internal support in Russian politics, with the bonus of making glorious mother Russia proud of having the technological wherewithal to humilate the Americans. So a non response is probably the right thing.
Or it might have been a space accident. Maybe I should check myself into the loony bin.
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
Imelda Marcos mit den 3 Streifen
What does a man do when he is forced to watch the premiere of "Lost"* because it is his wife's birthday? Why, I get the iPhone out and take photos of all of my Adidas shoes. And then post the catalog online for all the world to admire.
A little prologue about this. It all started out innocuously enough. I have always known that Adidas fit my feet well. A few years ago, a friend gave me a pair of Adidas running shoes. The shoes were just slightly too big for me, but economic circumstanced dictated that I wear them anyway. This led to the discovery of something amazing: I had been wearing shoes 1/2 size too small all my adult life! These larger Adidas fit my feet better than any other shoe ever had. So the die was cast. Apart from the odd pair of Keens for the beach, Crocs for looking like a hippie, and dress shoes for not looking like a hippie, I am pretty much exclusively an Adidas guy now. If I find a pair of Adidas in my size that I like, I buy them without even trying them on. That's how confident I am that they will fit. This has only let me down in one situation--when I found that hiking boots should actually fit sort of snugly in order to prevent blisters (60 miles in Yosemite with REALLY bad blisters, more on that sometime). I also went down 1/2 size for my cycling shoes, and that was the right choice.
*"Lost" is an improbably popular US television show. I recognized fairly early on that this was a show that was willing to be dishonest with its viewers. Call me cranky, but there you have it. It jumps the shark on every episode, has innumerable soap - opera - style - "everything - you - just - watched - was - part - of - a - dream" devices**, is loaded with inconsistencies, and in general is contrived to keep you coming back to see more schlock next week. For the record, I think the whole thing is some sort of big time/space bending magnet that allows time travel. Also for the record, I don't give a fat flying crap about it. It is the show I hear in the background while I am waiting to get the remote back so that I can watch "The Ultimate Fighter." For those of you who are asked to describe Lost to someone who hasn't watched it, here is my answer: Take equal parts "Bill and Ted," "The Sixth Sense," "Cast Away," "Twister," and "Lord of the Flies." Cut in a bunch of filler, and there you have it. "Twister," by the way, gets in there because of Helen Hunt's magical self-washing white shirt in that movie. Apparently there is a magical salon and laundromat the Survivors visit a few time per day.
**I know these flash-forwards and flashbacks and blah blah and have to do with time travel.*** So technically they aren't using this soap opera device. Even if the writers had this whole thing storyboarded as one big monolith before starting Season 1, I still feel they are being dishonest in the way they roll it out. But that's down to taste, and there's no accounting that.
***I have email evidence that I called this at the start of the second season. I am happy to acknowledge that some sad corner of the Lost community out there knew this before I did. I grudgingly admit that bringing Bill, Ted, and Marty McFly to primetime is kind of cool.
A little prologue about this. It all started out innocuously enough. I have always known that Adidas fit my feet well. A few years ago, a friend gave me a pair of Adidas running shoes. The shoes were just slightly too big for me, but economic circumstanced dictated that I wear them anyway. This led to the discovery of something amazing: I had been wearing shoes 1/2 size too small all my adult life! These larger Adidas fit my feet better than any other shoe ever had. So the die was cast. Apart from the odd pair of Keens for the beach, Crocs for looking like a hippie, and dress shoes for not looking like a hippie, I am pretty much exclusively an Adidas guy now. If I find a pair of Adidas in my size that I like, I buy them without even trying them on. That's how confident I am that they will fit. This has only let me down in one situation--when I found that hiking boots should actually fit sort of snugly in order to prevent blisters (60 miles in Yosemite with REALLY bad blisters, more on that sometime). I also went down 1/2 size for my cycling shoes, and that was the right choice.
 | Seattle, suede |
 | Yukora mid ATS, mesh / leather |
 | Samba, leather and suede |
 | Samba, leather and suede |
 | Cyclone, synthetic cycling |
 | ADI TR, suede |
 | Gazelle II, suede |
 | ADI TR, suede |
 | "Mexico 70" Gazelle, suede |
 | Country 73, leather |
 | "Vacation City" Marrakesh Gazelle II, leather |
 | Gazelle, patent leather |
 | Flavours of the World, France, suede |
 | Classic Skater Vulcan, leather |
 | CAMPUS II (The Original Games), synthetic / suede |
 | Calgary Winter Olympics 1988, synthetic |
 | Anzo Aprese Low, suede |
*"Lost" is an improbably popular US television show. I recognized fairly early on that this was a show that was willing to be dishonest with its viewers. Call me cranky, but there you have it. It jumps the shark on every episode, has innumerable soap - opera - style - "everything - you - just - watched - was - part - of - a - dream" devices**, is loaded with inconsistencies, and in general is contrived to keep you coming back to see more schlock next week. For the record, I think the whole thing is some sort of big time/space bending magnet that allows time travel. Also for the record, I don't give a fat flying crap about it. It is the show I hear in the background while I am waiting to get the remote back so that I can watch "The Ultimate Fighter." For those of you who are asked to describe Lost to someone who hasn't watched it, here is my answer: Take equal parts "Bill and Ted," "The Sixth Sense," "Cast Away," "Twister," and "Lord of the Flies." Cut in a bunch of filler, and there you have it. "Twister," by the way, gets in there because of Helen Hunt's magical self-washing white shirt in that movie. Apparently there is a magical salon and laundromat the Survivors visit a few time per day.
**I know these flash-forwards and flashbacks and blah blah and have to do with time travel.*** So technically they aren't using this soap opera device. Even if the writers had this whole thing storyboarded as one big monolith before starting Season 1, I still feel they are being dishonest in the way they roll it out. But that's down to taste, and there's no accounting that.
***I have email evidence that I called this at the start of the second season. I am happy to acknowledge that some sad corner of the Lost community out there knew this before I did. I grudgingly admit that bringing Bill, Ted, and Marty McFly to primetime is kind of cool.
Monday, January 12, 2009
Totally Tubular
I like good music, and I appreciate good sound equipment. Although I don't have an ear sensitive enough or educated enough to hear the difference between types of speaker cables, I can tell the difference between bad stuff and good stuff. I was introduced to "good stuff" by my good friend, whom I will call Friend 1. He took the dive into the hi-fi world with a handmade British CD player and amplifier and $3000 speakers. He has since upgraded significantly. Since becoming attuned to the existence of good equipment and the people who like it, I have discovered that I know a few audiophiles. They are nice people, difficult to distinguish from your average Joe (they are men, so "average Jane" wouldn't fit here). A good way to ferret out an audiophile is to speak effusively about how much you like the sound generated by a Bose system. This is sort of like talking about Velveeta at the Cheese Board in Berkeley. Turns out most of them HATE Bose stuff. One told me that he was stuck at a party where a Bose system was playing loudly and he actually became nauseous after an hour of listening.
Audiophiles come in many flavors. The more ecumenical of them appreciate flavors they do not themselves embrace, but that they recognize as being good. Truly confident ones don't criticize other flavors at all. Rather, they leave it to their equipment to persuade you that their flavor is the best. A few examples of my friends' flavors:
Friend 1: Nice audiophile equipment with mostly solid-state circuitry. Speakers that sort of look like normal speakers. Sound quality for a jazz CD that will make you cry. Probably into his system for about $10k.
Friend 2: Krell Amplifier with no cooling fans, instead milled out of a solid block of aluminum (about 300 lbs). B&W speakers that are curvy works of art. Apparently they (the speakers) leaked a gallon of oil onto the floor after a particularly loud New Years Eve dance party. (Is that cool or what to have speakers that somehow need a bunch of oil in them?) Were taken away and rebuilt by the manufacturer. Don't know how much he is into this system for, but it is certainly mid 5-digits.
Friend 3: Has a massive collection of '80s New Wave vinyl records. These play on a high-end turntable through incredibly heavy 7-foot-tall Magnepan speakers that are only like one inch thick. Some people buy a BMW 335i, but this guys owns a Toyota Matrix and about a BMW 328i worth of audio equipment.
There are other audiophile friends in various stages of craziness, but these ones help illustrate why it is difficult for me to find a reasonably-priced stereo system whose sound is pleasing enough to listen to. I have been spoiled.
So if it isn't obvious from the little projects you see on this blog, I'll say it here explicitly: For one reason or another, I have a real need to be using my hands to build something from time to time. Not every day or even every week. But I need to build a real object sometimes in order to feed a part of my brain that needs that sort of thing. What better thing to build than a stereo? I have relatively vivid memories of my father soldering together a Garrard stereo kit when I was three or four years old. They had to keep the project in a locked room so that I wouldn't break in and work on it myself.
In the last few years, there has been a resurgence of interest in vacuum tube audio equipment.
I won't go much detail here about this. Suffice it to say that 1) Vacuum tubes produce a rich sound--to some tastes it is better than sound from modern solid-state equipment; 2) I have a professional interest in the persistence of old technologies like vacuum tubes; 3) Tube amps can be VERY expensive; and 4) There is a rich selection of low-end DIY tube amp kits out there. Google around about all of this. You do not have enough time before you die to read all of it.
The Project
So I did a little research and bought a K12 tube amp kit from Arizona Hi-Fi. It appears that they are not selling these any more. The closest substitute seems to be the K-8LS kit. Note that this gives only 8 watts per channel. But, as you will find when you google around, people seem to think that although all watts are created equal, "tube watts" are more equal than others. And this kit has been very well reviewed by discerning audiophiles. The kit was easy to assemble. I was able to solder the whole thing together in an hour or two on a Saturday. The box is recycled from a Costco bamboo wood organizer system. I built the circuit board upside-down (I soldered in the components on the back of the board rather than on the front) so that I could make an enclosure with the tubes sticking out into the air as far as possible. I have not actually made the cover yet, but I will get around to it. This is important, as there are a few capacitor leads that carry enough voltage to kill someone. The only hiccup with soldering things on upside-down was the volume pot. The volume knob works in reverse--the 0 is on the far right, and 11 is on the far left. I think knobs work like this in the southern hemisphere, right?
To complement the amp, I got a set of what I like to describe as low-end high-end loudspeakers. They are PSB Alpha B1 bookshelf loudspeakers. Like the amp kit, audiophiles have identified these loudspeakers as having much higher sound quality than their price would suggest.
It took a few days for the tubes and speakers to burn in and for the sound to start to be really crisp. The little system makes a beautiful, warm sound. Even running on iTunes from my laptop, the sound is remarkably clean. The best validation of the system's quality came from Friend 2 above (the one with the megabuck Krell). I invited him into my office to have a listen, and he had me download a great test song, "Eclipse" by Joao Gilberto. I played it for him, and he couldn't get over the sound quality. He had been chasing down a ground hum in his system, so he was especially pleased with the dead silence during quiet parts of the song. Friend 1 suggested that I buy "The Köln Concert" recordings by jazz pianist Keith Jarrett and "The Art of the Trio, Vol. III" by Brad Mehldau. On my little system, the Jarrett recordings in particular can make you cry. I have also had good luck working with "Music for 18 Musicians" by the Steve Reich Ensemble playing in the background.
Audiophiles come in many flavors. The more ecumenical of them appreciate flavors they do not themselves embrace, but that they recognize as being good. Truly confident ones don't criticize other flavors at all. Rather, they leave it to their equipment to persuade you that their flavor is the best. A few examples of my friends' flavors:
Friend 1: Nice audiophile equipment with mostly solid-state circuitry. Speakers that sort of look like normal speakers. Sound quality for a jazz CD that will make you cry. Probably into his system for about $10k.
Friend 2: Krell Amplifier with no cooling fans, instead milled out of a solid block of aluminum (about 300 lbs). B&W speakers that are curvy works of art. Apparently they (the speakers) leaked a gallon of oil onto the floor after a particularly loud New Years Eve dance party. (Is that cool or what to have speakers that somehow need a bunch of oil in them?) Were taken away and rebuilt by the manufacturer. Don't know how much he is into this system for, but it is certainly mid 5-digits.
Friend 3: Has a massive collection of '80s New Wave vinyl records. These play on a high-end turntable through incredibly heavy 7-foot-tall Magnepan speakers that are only like one inch thick. Some people buy a BMW 335i, but this guys owns a Toyota Matrix and about a BMW 328i worth of audio equipment.
There are other audiophile friends in various stages of craziness, but these ones help illustrate why it is difficult for me to find a reasonably-priced stereo system whose sound is pleasing enough to listen to. I have been spoiled.
So if it isn't obvious from the little projects you see on this blog, I'll say it here explicitly: For one reason or another, I have a real need to be using my hands to build something from time to time. Not every day or even every week. But I need to build a real object sometimes in order to feed a part of my brain that needs that sort of thing. What better thing to build than a stereo? I have relatively vivid memories of my father soldering together a Garrard stereo kit when I was three or four years old. They had to keep the project in a locked room so that I wouldn't break in and work on it myself.
In the last few years, there has been a resurgence of interest in vacuum tube audio equipment.
I won't go much detail here about this. Suffice it to say that 1) Vacuum tubes produce a rich sound--to some tastes it is better than sound from modern solid-state equipment; 2) I have a professional interest in the persistence of old technologies like vacuum tubes; 3) Tube amps can be VERY expensive; and 4) There is a rich selection of low-end DIY tube amp kits out there. Google around about all of this. You do not have enough time before you die to read all of it.
The Project
So I did a little research and bought a K12 tube amp kit from Arizona Hi-Fi. It appears that they are not selling these any more. The closest substitute seems to be the K-8LS kit. Note that this gives only 8 watts per channel. But, as you will find when you google around, people seem to think that although all watts are created equal, "tube watts" are more equal than others. And this kit has been very well reviewed by discerning audiophiles. The kit was easy to assemble. I was able to solder the whole thing together in an hour or two on a Saturday. The box is recycled from a Costco bamboo wood organizer system. I built the circuit board upside-down (I soldered in the components on the back of the board rather than on the front) so that I could make an enclosure with the tubes sticking out into the air as far as possible. I have not actually made the cover yet, but I will get around to it. This is important, as there are a few capacitor leads that carry enough voltage to kill someone. The only hiccup with soldering things on upside-down was the volume pot. The volume knob works in reverse--the 0 is on the far right, and 11 is on the far left. I think knobs work like this in the southern hemisphere, right?
To complement the amp, I got a set of what I like to describe as low-end high-end loudspeakers. They are PSB Alpha B1 bookshelf loudspeakers. Like the amp kit, audiophiles have identified these loudspeakers as having much higher sound quality than their price would suggest.
It took a few days for the tubes and speakers to burn in and for the sound to start to be really crisp. The little system makes a beautiful, warm sound. Even running on iTunes from my laptop, the sound is remarkably clean. The best validation of the system's quality came from Friend 2 above (the one with the megabuck Krell). I invited him into my office to have a listen, and he had me download a great test song, "Eclipse" by Joao Gilberto. I played it for him, and he couldn't get over the sound quality. He had been chasing down a ground hum in his system, so he was especially pleased with the dead silence during quiet parts of the song. Friend 1 suggested that I buy "The Köln Concert" recordings by jazz pianist Keith Jarrett and "The Art of the Trio, Vol. III" by Brad Mehldau. On my little system, the Jarrett recordings in particular can make you cry. I have also had good luck working with "Music for 18 Musicians" by the Steve Reich Ensemble playing in the background.
The amp (note the volume--it is at about 3 or 4, not 7 or 8). The tube give off a nice warm glow when the music is playing:
Closeup of circuit board. Note that all the component locations are numbered. Makes for an idiot-proof assembly job:
One of the loudspeakers:
Back of the loudspeaker (Made in Canada!):
Friday, January 09, 2009
iPhone Photography: Add-On Lenses
I bought two lenses for my iPhone in hopes of adding some capability to its camera. They were made for cell phones, but they work just fine with the iPhone with a little work. The lenses attach to the back of the phone with a strong magnet in the lens. The lenses mount to a metal washer that is affixed to the phone with adhesive. The iPhone doesn't have enough flat area for the whole washer, so I clipped mine back with wire snippers. The washer now ends right where the edge of the iPhone starts to fall away. I purchased the lenses expecting to use the zoom one most. But the macroscopic one turns out to be the best and most useful. Here are some photos of the lenses, of the mount on my iPhone, and of some things I shot at with the lenses. The first is a before/after shot of an office with the plain iPhone lens and then the 2X zoom. The next two are macro shots of my keyboard and of the inside of one of my watches. I could not read with my bare eyes the writing on the metal tab holding in the battery, so I took a photo and blew it up on my iPhone.
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