Musings of a Middle Aged Engineer

When Good Things Happen to Beef

2011-04-24T22:54:00.000-07:00

Mr. Prime Rib, meet Mr. Red Onion Port Marmalade!

I decided for this Easter I'd make Prime Rib. I hadn't made it in many years, and for some reason the carnivore in me came alive this week. My inner chef took over trying to think of a way to serve Prime Rib in a different way, something added to it to make it sing with a nice glass of red wine. Don't get me wrong, a good cut of beef is fine on its own, but there is a "je ne sais quoi" about adding something complementary to meat that makes it come alive and turns ordinary into extraordinary.

I love reduced port wine sauces. They turn out elegant and can make a good steak just heavenly with a glass of wine. So I thought, what I can I do with a port reduction but add some heft to it? I usually have used just shallots, but that just ends up being mostly sauce and no heft. I wanted substance.

My next thought was red onions... I love caramelizing red onions as the base for French Onion soup, so why not caramelize red onions and reduce a port wine in it. This would be good, but will definitely end up on the sweet side. Caramelized red onions become very sweet as the natural sugars get intensified. The port wine doubly so. To balance that then, my thoughts turned to balsamic vinegar. If you've never reduced balsamic vinegar down to a thick syrup, you really owe it to yourself to try it. It is good on roasted asparagus, roasted peppers, grilled meats, hell, you could spread it on your lover and just lick it off. It is really that good!

So here's what I did to make a sumptuous Prime Rib with Red Onion Port Wine Marmalade.

You can make the marmalade a couple of hours before dinner. Just give it a quick reheat in the microwave before plating the meal. This would work awesome on just about any cut of beef.

Red Onion Port Wine Marmalade

Enough for 4-ish servings.

Good quality olive oil
1 red onion, sliced very thinly
1 clove of garlic, pounded then minced
~cup of Ruby Port
~cup of dry red wine
couple of tablespoons of balsamic vinegar
couple of grinds of fresh ground pepper
orange zest (around 1/2-1 tsp)

In a nonstick pan heat olive oil, then add the onion and garlic. Stir frequently and get the onion to start carmelizing, it will begin turning brown. Don't burn it, it will just taste nasty. This requires attention and constant stirring and turning for about 5-8 minutes.

Add the remaining ingredients. My measurements are approximate. Zest the orange peel straight into the sauce.

Cook this down under low-medium heat to reduce the wine and turn the entire mixture into the consistency of marmalade. You will have to spoon it not pour it.

Remove from the pan and let cool.

Prime Rib

This is how I make prime rib, I learned it from a chef at Lawry's Restaurant.

Pull your prime rib out of the fridge around 90 minutes before putting into the oven. Let the meat come up to room temperature. You won't die, really. You want to get the meat up to room temperature to reduce the temperature gradient from the inside to the outside when this bad boy goes in the oven. It will cook faster and more evenly.

Insert an oven safe meat (leave in) thermometer into the middle of the roast. If you don't have an oven safe thermometer, invest it one. It is the only way to get perfectly finished meat.

Heat oven to 450 degrees.

Pour 1-2 pounds of kosher or ice cream rock salt into a deep roasting pan. This will lock up all the fat that renders out of the beef making clean-up a snap.
Put a piece of foil down on the rock salt -- cut smaller than the pan. You want the fat to run off into the rock salt.
Rub the entire roast with Lawry's Seasoned Salt.
Place ribs side down

Put the roast into the 450 degree oven, let it roast for approximately 10 minutes under this intense heat. The object here is to super heat the outside of the meat.

After 10 minutes, turn the oven down to 300 degrees.

Roast the prime rib until the thermometer reads 125 degrees. The middle will be rare, the ends will be medium. If you have a 4-5 pound roast, everyone will be happy. How long will this be? I don't know, a couple of hours probably. I started my around 4:15 and it finished at 6:30. It was 5 pounds.

When the thermometer reads 125 degrees, remove from the oven and cover with foil then a towel. Let the prime rib rest for 10-15 minutes like this before slicing. It will continue to cook on its own, but more importantly the juices will redistribute through the meat.

Now, right before plating, reheat the marmalade then scoop a nice dollop on every piece of prime rib.

Bon appetit!

Scott's Magnifique Beef Stew

2010-10-30T09:09:00.000-07:00

This is a recipe that I've gleaned from several sources, combined them, and refined them over years to the point I can do it in my sleep. It requires some forethought and willingness to start dinner at breakfast time, but you will be rewarded with a house that smells delicious for about 3 hours before dinner. Everyone in the house will be asking when will dinner be ready?

I don't measure anything more. My cooking is NOT scientific it is exploration and artistry like making music. I'M SO sorry if you are expecting a teaspoon of this and a cup of that. Learn to cook with your senses, it is liberating!

You don't need an exquisite cut of beef for this because it is going to braise in wine for 6-8 hours. It will be tender and melt in your mouth, trust me.

Don't waste an expensive bottle of wine on this recipe, and DO NOT USE "2-buck Chuck". Look for a Zinfandel (not White Zin) or Syrah in the $7-$9 range from Ravenswood or Fetzer. Something you'd drink if someone else bought it.

There are a few important points when handling the beef in this dish. First when you cube up the beef, it is very important to use paper towels to dry the beef to remove excess moisture. Second, the beef in this dish is coated with flour at the start. The floured beef will be browned which adds a significant complexity to the dish's flavor and makes for a silky smooth thick liquid. Don't skip or fudge this step in a hurry. Don't crowd the beef when browning in the olive oil, do it in batches.

You'll also need a good quality braising pot or "french oven". It needs to have a very heavy lid so that the braising liquid doesn't fully escape. I'm a huge proponent of Le Creuset. It is an investment that will last many lifetimes! See this

Le Creuset Cast Iron French Oven

What you need.

3-4# chuck roast, sirloin roast, or some type of roast.
Flour, coarse sea salt, fresh ground black pepper
Good quality Olive oil
750ml bottle of red wine (see above)
3 rashers of bacon, cut in thin strips
1 large onion rough chopped
3 large carrots, peeled rough chopped
3 cloves garlic, pounded and chopped
1 16 oz can of diced tomatoes
1 can of tomato paste
Minor's Concentrated Chicken and Beef Stock (paste, available at Costco or good market) Do NOT use the cubes, they're awful (Better Than Bouillon is a good alternative too)
1 cinnamon stick
Rind from half orange (remove the white pithey part, you want the orange part of the rind)
Fresh basil that has been rolled then cut in thin strips.

Start this 6-8 hours from your planned meal time. I usually start at 10AM, and eat around 6PM. The prep stage takes 1 hour, so it is usually in the oven by 11AM.

Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees

Cube the roast into pieces roughly 1" on a side. Use paper towels to pat dry the beef cubes, again this is very important. If there is too much moisture, the beef will not brown properly.

In a bowl mix flour, sea salt and ground pepper. I'm guessing 3/4 cup of flour is sufficient.

Heat a very large heavy pot or french oven, pour enough olive oil to coat the bottom of the pan. When the oil is hot, but not smoking, dredge the cubes of beef in the flour/salt/pepper to coat, then add them to the pot. Add enough to cover the bottom, you'll probably have to work two batches. Don't overcrowd the pot or you'll never get the beef to brown.

You need to brown all sides of the beef. The object here is to get sides brown (not burned and definitely not grey.) You'll know brown when you see it, it won't be grey! When the sides are brown, the natural sugars from the meat and flour are carmelized adding significant flavor to the stew. Skip this step and your stew will just not be good. Sorry. Learn to brown!

As the beef is browned on all sides, remove and put in a bowl. Repeat with any remaining beef, adding more olive oil if necessary.

Remove the last of the beef. The bottom of the pan should have a healthy coating of browned bits of flour stuck to it. Good! The French call this fond. We are now going to de glaze the fond which is going to make for a rich thick liquid for the stew. Add enough wine to the pot to just cover the bottom. Using a wooden spatula, work to remove all the bits of flour adding a little more wine at a time as it vaporizes. Once the pot has been liberated of the fond, pour this thick liquid off into the bowl with the beef.

Add the bacon and a bit more olive oil to the pot. Fry the bacon until it starts to brown then add the onions and carrots to saute until the onion begins to look translucent. Now add the garlic and saute for another couple of minutes. Don't let the garlic brown or burn.

Now pour the beef and de glazed fond back into the pot with the vegetables.

Add the remainder of the bottle of wine. Yes, the whole bottle!

Add the can of diced tomatoes and a couple of healthy spoons of the tomato paste.

In a microwave, heat in a pyrex measuring vessel, 1 cup water with a heaping tablespoon each of the concentrated chicken stock paste and beef stock paste. Again don't use bouillon cubes, they are just cubes of salt that have very little flavor.

Pour this into the stew.

Add the cinnamon stick and orange peel.

Stir well to mix, then bring to a boil on the stove. Remove from the stove.

Cover the braising pot with a heavy lid. It must be very heavy. Again, I can't say enough good things about a Le Creuset "French Oven".

Put into the 350 degree oven, but reduce the temperature to 275 degrees if it will braise for 6 hours, or 250 if it will braise for 8 hours.

Your heavy work is done! Enjoy the day, the house will smell incredible in a few hours.

Remove from the oven and stir in the fresh basil, cover and let everything rest for 15 minutes before serving.

Serving suggestions and variations.

On occasion I like to add porcini mushrooms to this. I like using the dried ones and rehydrating them in boiling wine or water about 1 hour from finish, and adding them to the stew about 30 minutes before finished. The porcini is a wonderful mushroom in this dish. Any other mushroom gets overpowered.

One of my favorite things to serve with this is polenta. I make mine with a bit of chopped shallot, chicken stock, basil and fresh grated parmesan cheese (don't use the saw dust in a can, it is shite). Put a large plop of polenta in the bowl, then ladle the stew over the polenta. Makes for a wonderful surprise for guests to dig into.

Another variation is to add a nice spoon full of gremolata on the top of the stew when plated. Makes for a great presentation and tastes incredible. Gremolata is easy to make, it is a mixture of grated lemon peel, minced garlic, chopped fresh parsley and olive oil. Your goal is to make a paste that has a pesto consistency.

Serve this up with a thick crusty Italian bread like a chiabatta or go soft with a Focaccia.

My recommendation for wines would be a Syrah, Petite Syrah, a hearty Zinfandel (not White Zin!), Barolo, or even a Chianti. A cabernet would be wasted on this dish, there is too much going on with the cinnamon, orange, tomato flavors.

Bon Appetit!

Let me know if you have any questions or how it turned out for you!

Review of Eltjo Haselhoff's Fingerstyle Guitar Solos

2010-06-23T22:29:00.000-07:00

It has been quite a while since I've posted to my blog, life keeps getting in the way. However I felt compelled to write a review, actually recycle a review, that I wrote on iTunes for Dutch fingerstylist Eltjo Haselhoff's Fingerstyle Guitar Solos. The reason I felt the urge to do this is that in visiting his website, I stumbled on a snippet of my review on his site. How cool is that?

So here's what I wrote on iTunes about 2 years ago...

"As a student of guitar, I'm always looking for guitar solo CD's that speak to me in terms of style and technique. Eltjo's album does this and much more through strong melodies. My first listen through I was at work and had to stop working as I was reduced to tears listening to Snow in London. What a beautiful tune.

I highly recommend this album if you are into solo fingerstyle acoustic guitar."

I stand by my original assessment of this CD. It has become one of the albums in my rotation of guitar music to listen to. Snow In London is such a beautiful moving tune that I recently purchased a copy of the music from Eltjo so that I can learn the tune. It is written in Orkney turning (CDGGCD), one of my main tunings to play in. Hopefully I can tackle this piece and add it to my repertoire.

Musical Luv...

Right Hand Therapy -- (Sueño) Spanish Dream

2009-05-10T20:36:00.000-07:00

I spent the better part of today mixing up batch after batch of thin-set mortar for an outdoor firepit. My right hand was a cement mixer. By dinner time it hurt like hell and I needed to do something. Ah-ha, play guitar. For some reason I've found that playing guitar is therapeutic for hurting hands. Don't know why, but it works for me.

I sat down and recorded 8:00 minutes of a piece that I've been working on for a couple of months now. It is an original piece inspired by one chord from a song called Dred by French guitarist Jean Charles Guichen.

I've played this for friends out at Sea Ranch, then at my house for our St. Paddy's Day party. When I played it out at Sea Ranch, the song had no name, it was more of a practice piece for me, but it has grown and evolved. A dinner guest at a party out at the Sea Ranch commented it reminded him of Rodrigo's Concierto de Arunjuez. So, the piece is now called Sueño, dream in Spanish. It has a common thread throughout the song (A-A#-C-D scale) and has 4 movements. The piece is meditative. Not something you can rock down the highway listening to, but more like something to close your eyes and day dream to.

Click on Spanish Dream to listen!

Musical luv,

-Scott

Going Solar

2009-04-19T12:17:00.000-07:00

Our Decision to Go Solar

I currently serve on an Advisory Task Force for a Homeowner's Association in coastal California (The Sea Ranch) that is looking at the viability of implementing photovoltaic (PV) solar electricity generation systems. We’ve narrowed down two possibilities for our community; a large solar system that will provide solar generation to offset the Association’s usage across recreational facilities and water company needs, and discounted residential systems for member’s homes. After reviewing the possibilities and hearing a presentation from Solar City, I personally have made the decision to lease a system for our residence in Sonoma County (Santa Rosa).

I’ve considered a PV system for our residence in a very pragmatic and cost conscious manner. If you are a “green” advocate and have the financial wherewithal then your option is fairly clear. Build a solar system that will completely offset your entire electricity usage over an entire year and enjoy the fruits. By law you will pay the minimum Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E) bill of $4 per month and you will be reducing your home’s carbon footprint to a minimum.

I wouldn’t consider myself an outspoken “green” individual. I’m conservative with my money and sought to simultaneously minimize capital outlay and maximize return on investment (ROI).

Where are the savings?

PG&E’s E-1 residential rates for electricity are built on a tiered structure with increasing cost per kilo Watt hour (kWh). The rate structure as it exists provides incentives for large consumers of electricity to either conserve or to look at PV systems to augment their electricity costs.

Here is the current tiered rate structure as of April 2009

Total Energy Rates ($ per kWh) (from PG&E)

Baseline Usage $0.11531 (R)
101% - 130% of Baseline $0.13109 (R)
131% - 200% of Baseline $0.25974 (I)
201% - 300% of Baseline $0.37866 (I)
Over 300% of Baseline $0.44098 (I)

The “cost” of generating a kWh of solar electricity is roughly $0.165. So you can see that if your average use falls below 130% of the baseline, your electricity costs with a PV system will be higher initially. However, if you consume more that 130% of the baseline, the cost of a PV system starts to become attractive. When your usage approaches or exceeds 300% of baseline, then it is pretty clear that a PV system will save you money over time.

Another benefit of going solar is that you will move to "Net Metering" through PG&E which means that your "net" consumption and production are compared and you receive only one electricity bill per year. If your house is empty during the day on weekdays you could gain further savings by moving to time-of-use (TOU) metering.

Our house in the Santa Rosa area is 2,700 square feet with completely open southern and western facing roof angles. We have a 5 ton central air conditioner, electric radiant heat in one room, and a four person outdoor spa. Our electricity usage during summer and winter months routinely exceeds 300% of baseline. The decision to implement a PV system was pretty easy for me to make. TOU wasn't an option for us because the house is occupied during the day most week days.

Vendor Selection

I selected Solar City based on the San Francisco peninsula as our vendor to design and install the solar system for our home. Our proposal from them is for a 2.4 kW DC system that will eliminate all of our usage over 100% of baseline. I chose this route as I believe that the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) and PG&E will continue to keep baseline electricity affordable and penalize large consumers like myself. This fact seems to be supported over time with PG&E rate increases. By doing this, I am in effect locking in the purchase of electricity above the baseline at $0.165 per kWh and shielding myself from rate increases in those higher tiers over the next 15 years.

Lease versus Buy

Our next decision was whether to lease or buy the system. This is a decision that each individual must make for themselves based on whether you want to own the system and put your capital to work, or whether you’d like the benefits of solar electricity but would like to retain your capital and pay over time.

I selected Solar City because they offered a lease vs. buy option where most solar installers can’t offer this. The lease option is spread over 15 years providing complete warranty on all parts during the lease, plus constant monitoring via the internet. Furthermore, in the 15 year lease you are purchasing the equivalent of a service level agreement (SLA), a guaranteed level of electricity output over the term of the lease. If the system falls short of the schedule in the lease agreement you get a rebate, if it exceeds the SLA you get the benefit.

After all tax credits and rebates an outright system purchase would be $12,000 but factoring in an inverter purchase at year 10 brings the purchase price to $13,000. The lease cost over 15 years is $14,500.

For me the decision was pretty clear to go the lease route. For a initial payment of $1,000, I will get a turn key system with a 15 year warranty and an SLA. When the $1,000 DC/AC inverter burns up in 10 years (it will), it gets replaced for free. Doing the numerical analysis, the lease costs me $1,500 more in today’s dollars which lowers my return on investment (ROI). However, I don’t have to tie up $21,000 of capital (of which I would get a $6,000 federal tax credit next year and ~$3,000 PG&E rebate).

The Details for our System

Initial Payment (at installation): $1,000
System size: 2.4 kW DC

First Year:

Current Average Electricity Bill: $170
Average Electricity Bill with PV: $90
Lease Payment: $63
Monthly Savings: $17

Financial Benefits Over 15 years

Assuming 6.0% historic average increase in electricity and 3.9% escalator in lease payment

Breakeven: 50th month
After-tax ROI: 30.4%
Savings over 15 years (2009 dollars): $9,600

Environmental Benefits Over 15 Years

54,000 pound offset of CO2 production (green house gas)
37 pound offset of NOx (smog)
11 pound offset of particulate matter
9 pound offset of SO2 (acid rain)

So the deal is done, we’ve signed the paperwork and have gotten in queue for our system which we expect will be installed by late summer. Yes there is a waiting list. The PG&E incentives are being phased out as more PV systems come on line. At this point waiting to move on a PV system in California will increase the cost of the sytem because of lower rebates.

This is a turn key proposal in that Solar City will take care of everything; from design, permitting, installation, inspection, to turn-on. As this unfolds I will post more blog entries.

Pole Dancing

2009-03-09T19:25:00.000-07:00

A friend sent me this video from the USGS.

Yes it is safe to view at work or with the kids present. Very safe.

PoleDancing.wmv

Free Music - Michael Gulezian - Mood Rub a Dub

2009-02-18T17:16:00.000-08:00

I stumbled upon Michael Gulezian's website by accident one day looking for guitar sheet music. His guitar playing is extraordinary and reminds me a lot of the late Michael Hedges. No coincidence, they were friends.

Michael sounds like a neat guy and I'd love to have him come to Sonoma County for a house concert in MY HOUSE.

He offer's free music on his website and encourages people to share it. So I will, with you!

Here's a link to the MP3 you can put on your iPod, MP3 player, or computer.

Mood Rub a Dub.mp3

If you like it, go to Michael Gulezian's website store and buy a CD to two and support a true artist without the pre-packaged glitz.

Musical Love,

-S

Beginning Fingerstyle Lessons

2009-02-08T12:53:00.000-08:00

A friend of mine wanted to start learning to play fingerstyle guitar and since I've gone down this path recently, I thought I'd share what I've done. I created a set of lessons that start off with a simple arpeggio pattern a la "Julie Andrews", a waltz pattern, then a set of exercises that begin to work the thumb and fingers and prepare you to separate the thumb and fingers. This is not hard, but tedious because in essence you undo a life of neural connections that make the thumb and fingers work in unison. The goal of the lessons is to get them to do their own thing.

Here's a link to the lesson as a pdf. Scott's Beginning Fingerstyle

The Taylor Guitar Factory Tour

2008-07-12T07:10:00.000-07:00

Note: All pictures can be clicked on for larger images.

On a recent family trip to Southern California, I had the opportunity to make a side trip to El Cajon to visit the Taylor Guitar factory. Anyone who knows me well also knows that I am a Taylor Guitar poster-child. I fell in love with Taylor's about 2+ years ago when buying my first guitar. I now own and (try to) play four of them.

Before I get to the tour, let me tell you about my little Taylor collection and thus the reason why I wanted to see where they were born.

I committed that I was going to do something I wanted to do since I was 12, that is become a competent guitar player. In elementary school I started taking lessons from a Vietnam-vet neighbor of ours who taught me cowboy chords and strumming. In the seventh grade armed with about 4 chords and a horrible guitar, I played on stage for the Christmas presentation. Shortly thereafter, that (cheap) guitar self-destructed and my parents couldn't afford another. That ended my guitar playing for 30 years.

So I went with a buddy of mine to Zone Music in Cotati to see if a guitar would find me. After listening to my friend (I couldn't really play anymore) play about 20 acoustic guitars, he played the first chord on the Taylor and I shouted "that's the one". Even my friend's eyes got big when he hit a big fat E chord. Then in Dropped-D he started jamming. All he could say was "Wow!, Wow!, Wow!" I tried to coax a few chords out of it, but comparing the fret board feel to the others, I knew it was a match. So that is how I got my first Taylor 110. Yes, it wasn't a $99 special, but I wanted a guitar I would enjoy playing every day and I mean every day.

After taking lessons for about a year or so with my beloved guitar teacher, Tony Gagarin, I started venturing into alternate tunings and started writing a piece of music in Open-Gm. Tony for what ever reason let me try it on his 12-string which happened to be in that tuning. That spoiled me right there. There is just something about a 12-string, I guess it is the chorus effect of all those harmonics running around. After doing a lot of reading online and chatting with others I took the plunge and ordered up a Taylor 355-ce online and hoped for the best. When it arrived at my office, I rushed home and spent the next 2 hours in musical bliss. That guitar can ring forever. It is like lush sweet honey in my hands.

Just recently I purchased a Taylor 314-ce from Charlie down at Tall Toad Music. At this point in my playing I wanted a guitar with a cut-away and built in electronics so I could start digitally capturing direct from my 6-string. My grand plan is to start doing open mic in a couple of months as well so having a 6-string with electronics was desired. The 314-ce is a similar construction to the 355-ce in terms of wood composition, neck radius/width. The bodies differ slightly. The 355 is a Jumbo body, huge in fact, where the 314 has a smaller girth and pinched waist. Both deliver stunning bass response and crystalline high notes. They just sound and play incredible.

Oh yeah, The tour...

Taylor offers tours Monday-Friday leaving from the main lobby at 1PM sharp. The give you a no-holds-barred look at how they make guitars. You get to see every facet of how they turn out some incredible musical instruments. The one thing you get from talking to the people there is that they are passionate about making the best quality instrument possible and they really, really care about the environment and conserving natural resources.

Taylor Guitars for the most part aren't "hand-made", there is a lot of automated machining that goes into them. Some comment on this as a negative, but Taylor does it for 2 reasons. First and foremost is that it reduces waste, second it gives them a high level of consistency between each guitar and thus a higher quality product.

Guitars are made of wood. Duh! This is a renewable resource, however, as I found out, the prized sound board wood, Sitka Spruce is about to run out and it takes 500 years for a Sitka Spruce tree to become the right size to make a guitar sound board. Sitka spruce is just the choice wood for steel-string acoustic guitar sound boards. It has great strength & weight and has exquisite sound characteristics. That is why it is used in guitars and pianos. Some of those qualities also makes it a great wood for sailboats. At the current rate of consumption, there is 9 years of Sitka Spruce left. Then we all have to wait another 500 years. Here's a picture of a 600 year old cross section of the beloved wood.

The tour starts by a walk through the lumber yard. Taylor uses a wide variety of woods in the construction of their line up; Sitka Spruce, Sapele, Mahogany, Ovangkol, Red Cedar, Indian Rosewood, Ebony, Maple, Walnut... Some of the wood is so rare and expensive it is kept in a locked cage. Walking through the lumber yard was a sensory experience. The smells of the woods was quite something.

Here's picture of raw walnut that was just dragged in. That day the guys in the shop were getting ready to cut-up this walnut for a run of solid bodies.

The beginning looks like wood-shop from 8th grade except for guys punching each other in the arms and making grunting noises.

After the wood is chopped up into manageable pieces like neck blocks, bodies, etc. It needs to start being acclimatized so that the moisture level is just right for working with the wood. Taylor is very fussy about keeping the temperature inside at 75 F and a relative humidity (RH) of 47%. Here's a stack of sticked walnut that is being fanned to wait until the water level wood reaches the ambient RH.

The next step in the process for non-solid bodies is to have the sheets of wood go to the laser cutting facility. They use a white-light laser (some CO2 + some other gas, forgot to ask) to precisely cut the tops and sides. It takes about 2 minutes for the laser to zip out the top with incredible precision. This helps them avoid "oops" with the tops using a saw to reduced their waste from bad cuts.

In parallel, the neck facility is using a CNC machine to router the necks that have been assembled up by a another group. This machine can do 8 necks at a time and takes about 15 minutes.

Before going on the CNC machine, the fret wires are installed by hand. This part of the job needs the precision of the human hand I guess.

Once the tops have been cut up, higher end models of Taylors have abalone rosettes installed around the sound hole. This is all done by hand. The abalone is purchased in arcs then hand applied to the laser cut recess in the top. They use "super-glue" to apply the rosette, then the top is finish sanded and polished to remove excess glue and make the rosette smooth with the top.

Finally all the pieces join up on palettes to make their way to the side-bending shop.

The side benders are custom designed equipment by Taylor. They used to waste 20% of the sides because bending takes a precise amount of pressure, heat, and moisture to coax the wood into a completely unnatural shape. By hand, a little too fast or too much pressure, and into the waste basket it goes. Now with automatic benders, waste is less than 2%.

Once it comes off the bender, it goes into a buck to be glued up with the other half and clamped so that it can cool and dry into shape.

Out of the buck, the guys in that same room apply curfing around the edges. Curfing I guess is a wood-working term. The curf is a piece of wood with slits cut in it so that it becomes highly flexible. This is glued on with wood glue. This room was just stinky and hot. The side benders throw off lots of heat and the glue smelled like hell.

Here you can see the curfing on a stack of bodies. The purpose of the curf is to provide a much larger surface area to glue the top on.

In the next room, a small team of women were gluing the bracing on the tops. There is 200+ pounds of shear stress across a steel 6-string guitar top. Without bracing and curfing, the sound board would tear apart and peel off the top of the guitar. Here's our guide, Martin (wrong name for working at Taylor), showing the template for bracing a steel-string guitar. The 12-strings have MORE bracing and the nylons have minimal bracing.

The next group is responsible for putting all the pieces together. Since the gluing process now is on all visible parts, it is crucial to make sure all glue that can ooze on to exterior parts is sanded off. The reason is that that finish will not adhere to the wood. So Taylor uses a glue that is doped with an ultraviolet marker that can be seen under a black light. Nothing on the body or necks can glow before going to finishing.

Here's a rack of guitars waiting for finishing. The finish application is done by a robot in a clean-room. Taylor takes great care in the finishes they use for low volatile organics (VOCs) and capturing the VOC's that would contribute to pollution.

Now it is on to final assembly. These guys have the great job of playing every guitar that exits the plant. They will do a QA on assembly, playability, tonal purity across the entire fret board. By the way, each department has guitars hanging on the wall. Everyone plays during breaks. Yes they are passionate about guitars!

I was a bit envious of this part. First off these guys have all the good stuff. Boxes of beautiful gold and silver tuners, and a crap load of Elixir strings of every gauge you can fathom. Next, they get paid to play guitars all day long.

Sean below is doing a final check out on a brother of my 355ce 12-string.

And finally a long rack of finished Taylor goodness. Each guitar has a name tag on it. That person was responsible for the quality assurance of the guitar.

The Taylor facility also has a complete repair shop for warranty and out of warranty repairs. These guys and gals had great stories of guitars coming in that had been dropped, kicked by angry spouses, over tuned, dried out like prunes in a desert, etc. They were confident they could take an abused guitar and make it playable again.

And here's the beautiful Chantha, doing a final tune and check on a guitar that had come in for repairs.

Hope you enjoyed reading about my Taylor-made day! It is a great tour if you are into guitars or fine woodworking.

Digital Recording becomes easy

2008-05-10T22:42:00.000-07:00

Now that I've been trying to learn how to play guitar for the last year and a half, original music is starting to percolate in my brain and exit through my fingers. A while ago after dinner one night I started improvising on my Taylor 6-string and found a cool groove. My wife liked it and I was on to something. The problem was the next day it was gone. Poof. I couldn't find it again, I searched and searched, but my fingers refused to recall whatever it was that moved me.

I finally found a cure for recording what comes out of my brain and emanates from my guitar. It is a bit more hi-tech than a simple personal recorder. This is a 4-track digital recorder that can mix from multiple inputs, add effects like reverb, amp modeling, percussion tracks, etc. Finally using the recorder you can master the whole shebang into an MP3 or WAV file. Pretty damn cool.

The device from Boss (Roland) "Micro BR Digital Recorder" and is about the size of a palm computer. It is probably the only "recording studio" you can carry in your guitar case. (Click pictures to enlarge)

Once you've recorded your masterpiece and "mastered" it to MP3, it is simple to download to the PC via a USB connection. Then using the freeware audio editing tool Audacity, you can edit it, clean-it up, crop it, etc.

So, here's my first take at recording a little riff that I came up with. I've called it Ethereal, because it is. This is played on a luscious Taylor 355ce 12-string tuned to 1/2 step below DADGAD. This modal tuning allows me to use open strings much like a harp. If you listen really close, there is a little hint of Pink Floyd buried in there. This is really my first attempt at doing this and didn't spend any time tweaking input gains (or ironing out the rough spots).

Listen to Ethereal

Peace.

The Second Victim

2008-04-24T19:21:00.000-07:00

We’ve had a Republican administration since 2001 that has lead us down a path that is fiscally dangerous. They’ve done it with the sole purpose of creating a crisis such that we will have no option but to drastically reduce spending. Not on wars, but on societal programs, the bogeyman of conservatives. One need only look to the quote from conservative icon Grover Norquist; "I don't want to abolish government. I simply want to reduce it to the size where I can drag it into the bathroom and drown it in the bathtub."

Since 2001 the current Bush administration has added another $4.2 trillion in debt to bring the tally to $9.37 trillion, or $30,800 for each American. This debt has been run up with the sole purpose of creating a fiscal crisis to starve spending. This is akin to having credit problems then maxing out your credit cards to curtail spending.

I’ve often heard the question; how could America have been lead into a war that history now shows was based on trumped up evidence? The answers are varied; however the fiscal security of our country was the second victim right after the truth.

What is Unit Testing?

2008-02-02T10:36:00.000-08:00

Agile software development processes require a foundation built on unit testing. To successfully integrate unit testing into the development process, a framework in which test suites can be created in parallel to application code is necessary. Developers should focus on creating unit tests that exercise system functionality with pass/fail results. The granularity of tests needs to be scrutinized in that one wouldn’t create tests for trivial operations and shun creating tests that have a high degree of coupling across the system. The ideal granularity is somewhere in between; to evaluate the function and system requirement driving that unit of code. The goal in integrating unit tests into the development process is to give developers a tool that they can leverage to quickly test large sets of system functionality during development. Further, that the growing set of unit tests become the regression test suite that are run as a “smoke test” after every automated system build out of the source control management system. Having a comprehensive set of tests is the keystone that gives developers the “courage” to take on re-factoring of existing code because they can immediately know whether they’ve broken functionality and specifically what is failing as a result of their actions.

Don't Tread on My Data

2007-10-28T21:39:00.000-07:00

"const" Means const

Method call parameter lists are contracts, plain and simple. They are meant to be held inviolate by the implementation of the method. To break that contract is to commit programming malfeasance. Here's something you should never, ever, ever do lest you earn a place across the River Styx condemned to debug memory leaks into infinity.

void ABadBadThing( const void* pData )
{
unsigned* pDataIn = (unsigned*) pData;
...

// Now go trample all over the callers data
*pDataIn = someUnsignedValue;

return;
}

Is it apparent what has happened? Classic "bait and switch." The implementer of this function has made a contract with me, the client, that if I call this method my data is "const" which means I can assume that it will be unchanged by the call. "const void* pData" means that what pData points to is immutable, it won't be changed; what goes in, comes back out.

The heinous sin was committed by the cast operation “unsigned* pDataIn = (unsigned*) pData" which in effect strips off the "const" attribution in the parameter list by creating a mutable alias to my data. The implementation of the method is now free to go take a big poop all over my data.

There are two parties to blame here. The first is the implementer that at some point was thoughtful enough to put a "const" on the parameter, then at some point decided to coerce the pointer into a mutable type. The second is the C++ programming language which allows users to abuse type casting.

Sometimes C++ makes me feel dirty and in dire need of a shower to cleanse myself. This is another one of those times. I found this little gem in library code I inherited for a project and it cost me about a day of debugging because I assumed my data would be unchanged when it came back.

Fool me once, shame on me.