I originally built a bench with a damaged ESD bench top that was getting thrown away. I built a torsion box to try to support it and straighten it out a bit. At the same time, I had to setup a job-site table saw every time I wanted to use it. My chop saw was on a saw-stand, but was still far from convenient.

I’ve seen several benches that do exactly what I’ve done here with the table saw, and I find this really optimal. But a lot of folks make their chop saw into a flip top, which I find really flimsy. I decided to wing it instead and build out a hing with a removable plug to put away my saw.

Outside of the hunt itself, world class backpacking and a great time. Water would freeze at night, so sleep with your filter or water bottle. Ice would only be about an inch or two and could bash it out with rocks.

First time using a hot tent and first time making strong use of hiking poles, both of which are going to be core to my arsenal going forward. The tipi of choice was a Seek Outside Cimarron. Hiking poles take a hell of a load off the joints up and down hills. Looking forward to coming back next year for some backpacking!

Some highlights from the trip besides Oktoberfest itself include Neuschwanstein Castle, Linderhof Palace, and Ettal Abbey. We also made a trip to the Dachau concentration camp; while very grim the visit was very worthwhile and educational. I highly recommend a visit to the town of Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Jackie and I had a great stay.

It’s a bit rough right now, but I will continue to separate out functions from test code and provide worked example problems on representative datasets. I’m excited to add to this repository, and I will be adding a collection dedicated to walk-through tutorials here.

The README of the project is more up to date than what I can provide here in a post, but I’d like to give a little discussion here as to the future of the project. Currently I have just a wad of code that I’ve accumulated over about 4 years crammed together into three files. The files have functions and test code strewn throughout and is not in a final product form. To move this to something more usable I think my current course of action is this:

• Separate core functions from experimental, moving experimental functions into a folder on their own.
• Separate test functions from core, moving these to a folder on their own.
• Adding an examples folder, distinct from testing to provide code used in examples on this site. For a TLDR 1000 foot view of what the code accomplishes, I encourage you to checkout the background presented in this video:

• Defining and manipulating the frames of antennas, explaining how they are sampled and a convenient coordinate system for doing so
• Expanding on a lightweight software model of an antenna
• Creating algorithms for rotation, resampling, and combination of collections of antenna elements
• Utilizing optimizers to inform decisions made about the design of an array
• Flesh-out a collection of engineering tools for the convenient use of these tools
• Providing a Pyvista and PyQtGraph set of plotting functions

Controls for PyVista Plots throughout this site

Some basic controls for the interative plots on this site:

• Rotate using left click and drag
• Pan using left click while holding shift
• Zoom using the mouse wheel
• Reset pan/zoom by pressing R key
• Show the wire edges of a mesh with the W key
• Show the vertices of a mesh using the V key
• Return to the full mesh using the S key

Had an outstanding trip to Craig in January with my father in law to hunt on a Ranching for Wildlife tag at Deakin’s Ranch. Snow was shallow enough to drive through on a lot of the ranch roads, and the scenery was beautiful. Tons of wildlife: grouse, turkey, mule deer, pronghorns, and on the last day, of course, elk. I harvested a sturdy cow elk that fell behind the herd. I’d hiked to a good terrain cover and was ready when she passed with a small group. It was a very clean, cold, early-morning kill; around -7 degrees F when I bagged her. There was an arctic cold front coming in that day, so it was nearly -15 degrees when we left Craig for home.

Processing was a family affair and we filled the freezer. Since January we’ve made sausage and countless roasts, steaks, scrambles, etc. I’m very thankful for the opportunity to be involved in an ancient human endeavor, to feed my family and myself for the entirety of 2025, and to the animal, whose suffering was minimal.