The single most important thing that I wish someone had told me when I first learned to drive stick was how to read a tachometer. A tachometer if you have one is the gauge next to your speedometer. It’ll probably read from 0 to 8 in units of 1000 x RPM. It is the MOST useful tool in learning to drive stick. Please read this whole article before attempting to drive a manual stick shift car, most steps are interconnected, and you’ll want a basic understanding of the whole picture first.

How to Change Gears in a Manual Car That is Off?

The stick on a manual car is really basically just a stick mounted either on the floor or by the dashboard.
It’s probably going to have numbers from 1 to 4 or 6 and “R” for reverse. With the car OFF and parking brake on, try moving the gear shifter from 1 to 2, to 3, etc. Thats basically how you change gears, just by moving the gear shifter into different positions. Notice that when you’re in a numbered or lettered position, the stick cannot move left and right much, this is good and is how you know that you’re in gear. The position in the middle where the gear shifter can easily move left and right is called the neutral position. It this position, no gear is selected and the car is said to be in neutral.

How to Start a Manual Car?

In a manual car, there are three foot pedals, the gas pedal and brake pedal like you see in an automatic car, but also an added clutch pedal on the far left side. This is for operating the clutch and will allow you to change gears while the car is running. To start a manual car, first make sure the parking brake is on, then move the gear shifter to the neutral position, and then fully depress and hold the clutch pedal down. Now, turn the key in the ignition just like you would in an automatic car while the clutch pedal is still fully depressed. Once the car is started, let the clutch pedal back out. Your manual car should stay running if all is well.

What is Stalling in a Manual Car?

Stalling is when the engine speed gets too low and then cuts out and stops running requiring you to start the engine again. This can be quite abrupt and jerky when you first start learning to drive a manual stick shift car. Stalling is really the only part aside from hill starts that’s more difficult than driving an automatic.

How do I Avoid Stalling a Manual Car?

Use and read the tachometer, it’s not just there to look pretty, it’ll give you useful information! It tells you how fast your engine is spinning in 1000 x RPM (rotations per minute), the higher the RPM, the faster your engine spins. Most driving teachers will tell you to use the force and feel the clutch. Which is complete B.S. and pretty hard to do when you aren’t familiar with what you’re feeling for. The tachometer will take the guess work out of selecting a gear and when a car is about to stall. When your manual car is started, running and is stationary, you’ll notice that the tachometer is reading something around 1k RPM. If you press the gas pedal, this reading will go UP. The more you gas, the faster your engine spins. The speed that your engine spins at while nothing is happening is called your idle speed. Your car will happily sit there at idle speed no problem. Make a note of what this idle speed is and remember that if you stay above idle speed, you WILL NOT stall! If you don’t want to remember that, then just assume never go below 1k RPM.

How to Get a Manual Car Moving?

Once your engine is running, you can start to get your manual car to move by putting the hand brake down, depressing the clutch pedal, putting the gear shifter into gear 1 and then slowly letting the clutch pedal back up while gassing it a little and staying above the engine idle speed. When you let the clutch out while in gear 1, the engine speed will want to drop as the engine will be spinning faster than your wheels are. Pressing more on the gas pedal will help keep the engine speed from dropping below its idle speed. While you’re letting the clutch out, the car will be moving forward! Make sure there’s space in front of you. Once your foot is fully off the clutch pedal, your car will be moving and will continue to move unless it stalls. Eventually this whole starting process will be smooth and takes less than 1 second.

What is the Clutch for in a Manual Car?

The clutch connects a spinning engine to a transmission that drives the wheels on a car making it move. When the clutch pedal is in its resting state (not depressed), it is directly connecting the engine to the transmission which is connecting to the wheels of the car essentially. In this state, if engine spins, the wheels spin. This is the reason you need to fully depress your clutch pedal while starting the car. If your engine is spinning, but you wheels aren’t, that just pain doesn’t work and your engine will stall. The clutch will allow you to change gears while your engine is spinning. Although you can technically change gears without depressing the clutch, it is definitely NOT RECOMMENDED and will put a lot of wear on your engine and transmission. When the clutch pedal is fully depressed, the engine is disengaged from the transmission and the two can freely spin at different rates.

How to Change Gears in a Running Manual Car?

Almost like how you would while it’s off except now you need to do it while the clutch pedal is depressed. When the car is running, if you want to change gears, fully depress and hold the clutch pedal while moving the gear shifter into position. Then let the clutch pedal back out. Moving to a higher gear will cause your engine speed to drop. A good general rule of thumb is it’ll drop 500 RPM for every gear you go up, and 2k RPM will the lowest you’ll want to coast smoothly. So, you won’t be ready for gear 2 until you reach 2.5k RPM while in gear 1 and so on for the rest of the gears. The tachometer will tell you if the gear is too high, too low or just right. Stay above 2k RPM for a smooth ride, stay above 1k RPM to avoid stalling. Stay below 4k RPM to avoid excessive noise. If you want to go FAST, most engine’s powerband for maximum HP output is somewhere around 5.5k RPM through to the redline

How to Stop a Manual Car?

If you want to come to a stop, the quickest easiest way is to disengage the clutch by fully depressing the clutch pedal so that the engine is no longer making the wheel spin, then moving the gear shifter to neutral. Now let the clutch pedal back up and apply the brakes like you would in an automatic car. A more fancy way is to shift to lower gears until you reach the lowest gear and eventually neutral.

That’s it, if you master those basics you should be able to drive any modern manual car. Pay attention to that tachometer! There are more advanced topics like double clutch heel toe downshift, launching the car by dropping the clutch, etc. Those may be covered in a future post, but just the bare basics for this one.

Is a previously unavailable domain name that you’ve been eyeing coming up on its expiration date? You might just be lucky enough to snag it soon! A domain name that I’ve been wanting for a few years was registered by someone else and had been parked for all those years. Every Spring I try to contact them via email to see if I can buy the domain name from them, but no luck, never a response. But as luck would have it, this year the domain went past its expiration date and the hunt was on. I back ordered the domain through Godaddy’s domain back ordering services for $18.95 and thought that I was good to go. A few days go by and not much happened, so I did some research and found this quite eye-opening Original How to Snatch An Expiring Domain Article on what happens when a registered domain expires.

Little has changed since that article was a written in 2005 and most of it still applies, but eNom for all intents and purposes is now NameJet for domain catching. So, the big 3 for catching dropping .COM domains are SnapNames, NameJet, and Pool.

Domain Expiration Date

The domain that I was interested in was:
Created Jan 19, 2007
Expired Jan 19, 2012

You can check the WHOIS information for registration dates at www.verisigninc.com

Despite what the expiration date says, you won’t be able to register this domain right on the expiration date, not by a long shot. For 40 days after the domain expiration date, the original registrant can still renew that domain without penalty from their registrar. No status change will appear on the WHOIS information.

Domain Redemption Period

Updated Feb 29, 2012
Redemption Period Feb 29, 2012

After 40 days, the domain status gets updated to Redemption Period. The domain will remain in Redemption Period for 30 days. During this Redemption Period, the WHOIS record will show a status of Redemption Period and registrant information starts disappearing from the WHOIS record. The most important change here is that, the current registrant will have to pay additional fees ~$100 to renew this domain now. Good sign that your domain will be available to drop.

Domain Pending Delete Status

Pending Delete March 31, 2012

After 30 days of Redemption Period, the domain is put into Pending Delete status. The WHOIS record will show a status of Pending Delete. The domain will remain in Pending Delete status for 5 days. No one will be able to register this domain until it drops in 5 days now.

Catching the Expired Domain

Dropped April 6, 2012 caught by Snapnames 1:15 Pacific Time

After 5 days of Pending Delete, Verisign releases the domain back into the wild available for registration some time between 11AM – 2PM Pacific Time. Now is the moment of truth and time to put all the professional domain name catching services to work. In my case, Snapnames successfully snatched the expired domain at 1:15 Pacific and by 2:15 it was already transferred to Moniker under my name. Very happy with the services of SnapNames, especially for the reasonable sum of $69 including the price of 1 year of registration. The total process took 75 days after the domain expiration date, the most WHOIS lookups you’ll ever do!

Does an Expired Domain Retain Domain Age?

No, the new creation date on the WHOIS record will show the new creation date.

Which Domain Name Catching Service Should I Use?

Use at least all of the BIG 3: Snapnames, NameJet, and Pool. You never know really which service will be successful for you. All 3 services are currently free of charge unless they’re successful, so what have you got to lose? Godaddy domain back order on the other hand does require you to pay $18.95 upfront. They were the most vocal through emails regarding the changing statuses of my domain, but in this case they were ultimately unsuccessful despite looking the most proactive in alerting me of what’s happening. If the domain name is REALLY important to you and you suspect that there may be others interested, DO NOT try to catch it yourself manually via Godaddy or something, YOU WILL LOSE if any of the professional services are involved. They’ve got far more resources at their disposal and domains are snapped in microseconds after they drop.

I’d be happy to use Snapnames, NameJet and Pool in the future, the upfront payment for Godaddy just isn’t appealing to me, and it’s much better to operate with less risk.

If you want to register a TBR ( To Be Released ) .CA domain, you’ll need to backorder it through a CIRA registrar. These domains are not going to be available on TBR day through the regular channels of registering a .CA domain. They’ll remain unavailable with a status of pending delete. So don’t think that you can try and snap up a domain on the TBR list manually through GoDaddy or someone at 14:00 Eastern Time on Wednesday. That’s just not going to happen, you’ll find that the domain is still unavailable for registration.

The big boys for .CA domains are Sibername and Pool.com I’ve had success with Pool.com and they’re based out of Ottawa Ontario. They’re also one of the BIG 3 when is comes to catching .COM’s and other TLD. Definitely competitive with SnapNames and NameJet.

Unlike .COM domains that drop any and every day of the week after 75 days after the expiration date. .CA domains are To Be Released every Wednesday between 14:00 – 15:00 Eastern Time. CIRA’s website has a list of TBR domains for each week, and as such, anyone can easily see what interesting domain names are coming up making it fairly difficult to snap up the good ones. Here’s a link to the list: TBR List The value of .CA domains seem to be on the rise as the really good ones do go for 6 six figures and are definitely not worthless if your audience is in Canada. I’ve prepared a little script to pick out dictionary words along with other possbibly interesting .CA domain names. Dictionary Word .CA Domain It’s fairly simple, just loops through each domain and checks if it’s a dictionary word. I’ve also found http://dotcadomains.blogspot.ca/ to be particularly interesting. They’ve got this list of domains that were snapped from Sibername. Pretty neat to read.

Who Can Register .CA Domains?

.CA domains are for Canadian citizens and companies in Canada, and everything goes through the CIRA.
If you win a drop on a .CA domain, you better make sure that you can actually register it.

What Happens When Pool.com Catches a .CA Domain?

As I’ve mentioned, I’ve had success with Pool.com catching a dropping TBR .CA domain. On TBR day, your back order changes so that you can’t delete it from your back order list anymore. Nothing really is shown at TBR time between 14:00 – 15:00 Eastern. Around 19:00′ish I noticed that Successful Backorders now shows that my domain was successfully acquired and was just awaiting payment, $60USD is the current rate if you’re the only backorder. At about 20:30′ish I received an email saying that I was successful in acquiring my shiny new domain and $60USD + GST was charged. That $60USD also INCLUDES 1 year of domain registration. Not bad of a price at all. Also, under the rules of the CIRA, you will NOT be able to change registrant information for 60 days.

Fast forward to the next morning, I see emails saying a new account was created at DomainsAtCost.ca, and that they were attempting to transfer ownership of the domain to me. The whole process dealing with Pool.com is quite painless and easy. The handling of domain registration with DomainsAtCost was pretty simple as well. The emails were quite detailed and there’s email address AND phone numbers for support to walk you through the process if you need. How strange these days, support phone numbers are just out there in the open like that, quite a nice refreshing change to see unlike other companies who hide phone numbers like it’s some sort of valuable secret.

Will My Expired .CA Domain Keep Its Domain Age?

No, the creation date on WHOIS will show the new date of registration if you catch a TBR .CA domain.

Put the following in a .htaccess file in the folder that your old domain is pointed to:

RewriteEngine On
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ http://www.newdomain.com/$1 [R=301,L]

Of course, you do need to replace www.newdomain.com with the REAL domain name.

What do you do if a domain that you had your eye on wasn’t available at first, but was just registered by someone who never did anything with it and was just sitting on it? Sometimes you get lucky and it goes past the domain registration expiration date and is not renewed by the owner or the owner just decides they don’t want it anymore. Depending on the domain registrar (e.g., Godaddy), that domain may or may not continue to the redemption period and then ultimately deletion period. This post deals with domains that remain in the registrar’s possession. Read this other article on registering expired .COM domains.

When a somewhat interesting domain expires or is deleted by owner, there’s a good chance that it’ll remain registered with the domain registrar for some time. This might happen if the original owner registers it for 5 years, but then decides 2 years in that they don’t want it anymore and delete it from the current registrar, but it’s still registered by the registrar.

In my specific situation, a .COM that I had my eye on two years back suddenly became available while doing my occasional WHOIS checks (it pays to keep checking). It looked like it was still registered, BUT Godaddy was showing that the .COM that I was interested in is expired. So, I logged onto Godaddy, searched for that domain and sure enough, it said that the .COM was expired AND there was a button to place an order instead of a Back Order button. I quickly added it to my cart and tried to checkout. You’ll notice that there’s an additional charge on top of the registration fee of ~$10 for registering an expired domain. Not bad considering I had waited 2 years for this opportunity. Everything looked good, and got the order confirmation in my email.

When I checked back in my Godaddy Domain Manager, the new .COM was no where to be found!! What is going on? I search for that .COM again and it looked just like it did before. Did my order not go through?? Quite alarmed, I did some searching online and sure enough, in the Godaddy fineprint, it mentions that expired domains may take up to 2 weeks before they are transferred over. Phew! At least now I know that this is normal.

Fast forward 6 days, I get an email from Godaddy saying that my transaction is complete. I look at my Godaddy Domain Manager, and there it is! I check WHOIS and an unexpected surprise, the creation date was from the original owner’s registration date! So, registering an expired domain from Godaddy DOES indeed preserve the domain creation date which suggests domain age is maintained. Quite a bonus for me considering it only cost ~$10 extra on top of regular domain registration fees.

If you’ve got a domain name that you’ve been eyeing, keep checking and you just never know if you get lucky!

SELECT
p.*
FROM
wp_posts AS p
INNER JOIN wp_term_relationships AS tr ON tr.object_id=p.ID
INNER JOIN wp_term_taxonomy AS tt ON tt.term_taxonomy_id=tr.term_taxonomy_id
INNER JOIN wp_terms AS t ON t.term_id=tt.term_id
WHERE
p.post_status="publish"
AND t.name="News"
ORDER BY
p.post_date DESC

This theme changes WordPress so that it only displays the featured images on the main page and displays just the featured image with title and description below when clicked.

Download the Simplest Photo Gallery Theme for WordPress

See it in action at BanffPhotos.com

On my Olympus E-3 I can comfortably get 400~500 shots from one battery pack. Shooting like crazy, I struggle to reach 600 shots in a day. Even for all day events like weddings, I’m finding that there’s often a break in between with plenty of time to switch batteries. I always carry an extra in my slingbag.

On a few cameras, the battery grip will allow for faster FPS when shooting bursts. For most people it’s little more than a great big battery holder.

• airbag and brake dash lights are on intermittently
• battery dash light is on
• strange sulphur smell coming from the battery
• high voltage >14V when car is on
• no voltage at car battery (dead from overcharging)

Tools for Changing the Alternator

• 10mm, 12mm, 14mm shallow and deep sockets
• 3/8″ ratchets
• 3/8″ extension
• 14mm wrench

Estimated Time to Remove and Install Alternator

3.5 hours (at least that’s how long it took me doing this casually)
Air tools are not required and quite possibly impossible to use due to clearance for this fix.

Where is the Alternator in a B15 Nissan Sentra

It is located passenger side above the A/C compressor. It is clearly visible from the top of the engine bay. It’s about the size of a coconut and there are visible electrical coils.

Remove Negative Battery Terminal

Disconnect the terminal closer to the driver side using a 10mm deep socket.

Remove Alternator Bracket and Engine Ground

Remove 14mm bolt for engine ground near alternator bracket.
Remove two 12mm bolts attaching alternator to bracket to engine block. Note that the longer bolt attaches to alternator and shorter bolt attaches to engine block. These bolts are easiest removed with a socket. Unplug the plastic electrical plug on engine block found behind the alternator bracket.
This creates space to remove and install the alternator from the top later.

Disconnect Electrical Connection to Alternator

Remove the 12mm nut underneath the rubber red dome cover and unplug the plastic plug facing front of car located directly on the alternator itself. The 12mm nut is easiest removed with a socket and extension.

Remove A/C Compressor Bolts

Although the alternator is clearly visible and close to the top of the engine bay, there are two 14mm bolts holding the bottom of the alternator in place. One facing driver side, one facing passenger side. The lower 14mm bolt facing driver side is the biggest problem due to clearance. There’s a little more than 1 inch of space between it and the exhaust header. It is visible from the top, but you’ll need a REALLY long wrench and A LOT of patience to try and reach it through this space. So we’ll unbolt the A/C compressor and make some space for underneath the car. There are four 14mm bolts holding the A/C compressor in place, 2 on the top and 2 on bottom. The 2 bolts on top are visible through spaces from the top of the engine bay and reachable using a 3/8″ shallow socket. Anything bigger will bump into the fan. Loosen these long bolts and just leave it hanging inside the A/C compressor housing.

Now it’s time to get underneath the car. The 2 remain bolts holding the A/C compressor in place is easily reachable from beneath the car with a socket. Once the A/C compressor is unbolted, shift it around and unhook the belt from the pulley. You can now move the A/C compressor towards the front of the car and reach the driver side 14mm bolt on the lower part of the alternator. I ended up double wrenching this bolt from underneath. A snipe will work as well.

Remove Alternator

There is now just one 14mm bolt on the lower portion of the alternator holding it in place. The lower 14mm bolt facing passenger side is not visible, but easily accessible with a shallow socket. So use the force and feel for it. The alternator is now freed and you should be able to lift it out from the top fairly easily.

Install Alternator

Installation is the reverse of removal haha. Do pay attention as to which bolt goes where, they’re not all that interchangeable. These instructions are for the QG18DE with air conditioning, Sentras with the SR20DE or QR25DE will have slightly different specifics. No need to remove splash guards, heat shield or fan in case.

This second image marks this year as my switch to the Olympus E-3 and HG glass for rugged all-terrain all-weather shooting no matter where I am. This combo really tested my dedication to carrying a camera and sling around. Now I pocket the E-PL1 like a phone no matter where I go.

The third and last image will always remind me of my encounter with the one I call “Minolta Man” who turned my view of strangers and photography upside down and led me to weird and wonderful events around Calgary like the Chestermere Water Festival, Langdon Days, and Tsuu Tina Rodeo Pow Wow this summer. I keep 3 photos on my memory card at all times (this is one of them) in the event that I should run into the Minolta Man again some day.