Text of the interview is listed below. The original article can be found at http://www.hartfordadvocate.com/gbase/Lifestyle/content.html?oid=oid:127686 My Ride John Waiveris by Nathan Conz - September 29, 2005 John Waiveris, 31 Hometown: Windsor Job: Website software programmer Ride: Allis-Chalmers 808 Ride-On Mower Advocate: When did you get the mower? Waiveris: I got the mower when I moved into this house a few years ago. But I first drove it when I was 7 or 8 when it was my grandfather's mower. A: How many acres is your lawn? W: Three acres. A: When you began using it, how long would it take to mow your lawn? W: It'd take me four hours to mow the lawn, pretty much every time, and two tanks of gas. A: When did you decide to try to improve your mowing time? W: This year. Honestly, it was to start a blog. [I design website software] and I needed to blog about something, so I started timing how long it'd take me to mow. Then my mower turned into a Frankenstein machine. Every week I'd weld new parts on. I think the record now is around 35 minutes. A: How often do you need to mow? W: This time of year, once every two weeks, and regularly once a week. A: What's the newest addition to the mower? W: My latest thing is that I put a GPS system in the mower. I'm trying to get the most efficient path. Basically, I've got a GPS receiver, like a radio, and it takes my coordinates to a satellite, and it goes into a pocket PC. I record every point on the path I take, and then I put it into Excel on the computer. I can plot it out and see how far it took me to drive the lawn. I can do a graph in color of where on the path I was driving 6 miles an hour and where I was driving 4 miles an hour, and so on. A: What was the GPS system meant for originally? W: I'm a professional programmer and I was living in London at the time and I made something so race cars could time themselves on a race track and analyze where they get the maximum performance on the race course. A: So what's the best way to mow the lawn? W: I used to mow it in small sections, but now I choose as long a path as I can without ever stopping or taking a 90-degree turn. So, I'll start here [in the backyard] and I'll take a lap around the front yard and then straight back. I do that as much as I can. A: What else have you done to it? W: I've changed the drive ratio. I took about 50 to 100 pounds of extra weight off of it. I sharpened up the blades and balanced them. I also put a gas pedal on it; it revs up now and has a nice idle. A: How fast can it go now? W: It only can technically go 6 or 7 miles an hour, but it feels fast. A: Have you ever crashed it? W: Yes, my mom says I should wear a helmet. A: Instead of doing ... this, did you ever consider just getting a new mower? W: No. I only have like $30 invested in it, and it only takes a quarter to a half a tank of gas every week now. So I probably made back the money I've put into it with saved gas. A: How much for me to buy it from you right now? W: Ten bucks, one hundred, I don't know. A: I'd buy it for $10 with that GPS thing. W: Yeah, that wouldn't come with it. John Waiveris, 31 Hometown: Windsor Job: Website software programmer Ride: Allis-Chalmers 808 Ride-On Mower |