What did you do today?

[Handy Don 12,232]

9 hours ago, Mickwhitt said:

bent as a nine bob note

Hadn't heard that one in a long time. Thanks for the smile!

[Pullstart 62,883]

20 hours ago, ebinmaine said:

It's one thing to take when one is not around.. but if I'm here...

I have a few items that throw small amounts of metal quickly. 

A few other assorted interesting items. 

Me. 

BBT. 

Pupster. 

Acreage. 

A sense of actual old school justice. 

 

Bring it..

 

shovel?

[Ed Kennell 38,177]

Lucky Larry was one of my neighbors at my fish camp on the Delaware Bay.   Larry was missing his right arm and shoulder and had some prehistoric looking bumps half way down his backbone.

Larry was a free lance lineman that removed the lines from "abandon" power poles.     The amazing thing is, Lucky one armed Larry was one of the best fisherman I knew.

[ebinmaine 67,502]

23 minutes ago, pullstart said:

shovel?

Several..........

[Jeff-C175 7,202]

 

FOUND IT!

 

The continuing saga of the automobile I shouldn't be dumping so much money into:

 

I figure that little 'injector worm' was stuck under the solenoid pintle causing WAY too much gas into that cylinder causing the dead miss.  It worked it's way through and became a 'pending code' after about 15 minutes of being pushed at 55 PSI.  No idea what it is...  a 'shaving' of something!  Whatever it is, it's SMALL!  you can see the other end poking out of the hole to the left, it's sorta 'looped' through.  Needed my super magnifier macro lens to see it!

 

 

 

I should add that the spark plugs which I did NOT pull the last time being that they had less than 30K miles on them, and were double platinum, were in fact completely trashed.  Makes me wonder if the previous mechanics did even change them as they said they did.  Further evidenced by the fact that the plugs were not torqued to 150 lb-ft and the threads were not stripped!  The gap is supposed to be .060" and on all of them it was worn open to greater than .070".  Several of them the platinum 'button' on the ground electrode was completely eroded away and there was a 'crater' in the electrode where the button should have been.  Other than that, the color of the plugs was fine.  There's NO WAY these plugs could be this worn in under 30K.  Double Platinum should be FINE even after 60K miles!  So there's a new set of plugs in also.

 

Edited February 5, 2021 by Jeff-C175

[Mickwhitt 4,624]

Stropped and cleaned the starter motor today. It was filthy with carbon dust from the brushes and the bushes were dry.

A good blow out, oiled the bushes and cleaned the pinion mechanism. Its as smooth as silk now.

 

[ohiofarmer 3,276]

Maybe this does not seem like much, but if it was not successful , then he!! is comin' for breakfast!  I heat with a pellet boiler that is outside the house  This morning  the fire was out. Not only that, but the boiler has a function that activates and shuts it down in case the fire starts to burn backwards into the feed auger to keep the hopper from catching on fire.  It's a good unit in that the LED display shows exactly that with a flashing b b [back burn] on the controller.

  So all this was happening with the furnace cold as a stone and no back burn condition.. We had 40 MPH winds last night and the wind chill is tremendous this morning.   I really hate to have it down because if it gets really cold, the boiler could freeze and on and on.  I did notice that the fan that makes the pellets burn was running too slow, and changing it out would have been horrible in this weather. then I started looking at all the other wires and found that one looked a bit green and when i futzed with the connection, the back burn alarm went away. Then I cleaned it up and made a new connection and the fan went faster. All those things have to be right to keep the little firestar controller happy.and make the pellet feed operate. All this just in time before single digits and below zero stuff coming for the next 10 days.

 

 A real thank you Jesus moment it is.  It also reminds me of almost every wheel horse i bought this year.  Just poor or dirty connections in the key or charging circuits, so going with the wiring schematics on this website takes all that misery away.

[Stormin 9,981]

3 hours ago, Mickwhitt said:

Stropped and cleaned the starter motor today. It was filthy with carbon dust from the brushes and the bushes were dry.

A good blow out, oiled the bushes and cleaned the pinion mechanism. Its as smooth as silk now.

 

 

 I've two starter motors with knackered Bendix end bushes. If I could lay my hands on some phosphor bronze I have a go at making new ones.

 

Had my first covic vaccination  jab today.

[Mickwhitt 4,624]

Norm,  PB bushes are readily available from beaing suppliers. I have a range of sizes i keep just in case. Easy to turn to size ive put bronze bushes in every pivot point on my wheelhorse. 

Shouldn't be a big job to press new ones in to your motors.

Mick 

[Jeff-C175 7,202]

On 2/4/2021 at 6:27 PM, Jeff-C175 said:

 

FOUND IT!

 

The continuing saga of the automobile I shouldn't be dumping so much money into:

 

I figure that little 'injector worm' was stuck under the solenoid pintle causing WAY too much gas into that cylinder causing the dead miss.  It worked it's way through and became a 'pending code' after about 15 minutes of being pushed at 55 PSI.  No idea what it is...  a 'shaving' of something!  Whatever it is, it's SMALL!  you can see the other end poking out of the hole to the left, it's sorta 'looped' through.  Needed my super magnifier macro lens to see it!

 

 

 

I should add that the spark plugs which I did NOT pull the last time being that they had less than 30K miles on them, and were double platinum, were in fact completely trashed.  Makes me wonder if the previous mechanics did even change them as they said they did.  Further evidenced by the fact that the plugs were not torqued to 150 lb-ft and the threads were not stripped!  The gap is supposed to be .060" and on all of them it was worn open to greater than .070".  Several of them the platinum 'button' on the ground electrode was completely eroded away and there was a 'crater' in the electrode where the button should have been.  Other than that, the color of the plugs was fine.  There's NO WAY these plugs could be this worn in under 30K.  Double Platinum should be FINE even after 60K miles!  So there's a new set of plugs in also.

 

 

All finished again!  Not wanting to do it again again, I replaced all six injectors, three coil packs, plugs, fuel pressure regulator in a "shotgun" approach even though I might have gotten by with just replacing the one injector that was plugged.

 

When we took it out for a test drive yesterday I could not believe the difference in power!  Even from the first repair test drive.  This car now ROCKS!  Of course my wife never pushes the pedal down more than a quarter inch...  I offered to trade my much newer Honda and I would drive the Monte.  "No, I love MY car!". She should write a song...

 

So hopefully that's the end of my " dumping too much money into an old car" story, unless all y'all wanna hear about rebuilding the front suspension!

 

NEXT PROJECT: Foundation repair and support piers under the main carrying beam of my 100 year old home... Should be fun mixing concrete in a 4' crawlspace!

Edited February 7, 2021 by Jeff-C175

[ebinmaine 67,502]

1 hour ago, Jeff-C175 said:

FUN mixing concrete in a 4' crawlspace!

Some would choose a different word but whatever....

 

[Jeff-C175 7,202]

On 2/7/2021 at 10:51 AM, ebinmaine said:

Some would choose a different word but whatever....

 

 

I erred on the side of Prudence!  She don't like trash talk.

 

Mixing not so bad actually, getting the 80 lb bags down there is the hard part!  Need at least 8 bags.

 

 

Edited February 9, 2021 by Jeff-C175

[cschannuth 3,816]

Got the new (to me) Charger 12 out today with the little 42 inch blade on it. We only got a couple of inches of powdery stuff but I was amazed at how fast this thing is. I  used to have that plow on my 606 with the upsized pulley and it will do 8 miles an hour in high gear but I guess I always used it in second gear. I was amazed how much faster I got everything done with the charger.  No action pictures because it was 0 degrees this morning and nobody really wanted to come out and take pictures of me playing on my tractor, ha ha.

Edited February 7, 2021 by cschannuth

[Horse Newbie 7,069]

2 hours ago, Jeff-C175 said:

hopefully that's the end of my " dumping too much money into an old car" story, unless all y'all wanna hear about rebuilding the front suspension

Makes for some interesting reading...

[Horse Newbie 7,069]

2 hours ago, Jeff-C175 said:

Should be fun mixing concrete in a 4' crawlspace!

Edited 2 hours ago by Jeff-C175

You must be a young man !

[Horse Newbie 7,069]

57 minutes ago, Jeff-C175 said:

 

I erred on the side of prudence!

 

Mixing not so bad actually, getting the 80 lb bags down there is the hard part!  Need at least 8 bags.

 

 

May be easier to dig down to undisturbed earth, set a solid concrete (one on top of other) block or two, then use those adjustable steel support legs...just an idea...

[Jeff-C175 7,202]

8 hours ago, Horse Newbie said:

You must be a young man !

 

I wish!  Far from it!  68 !

 

Or, 18 with 50 years experience! 😄

Edited February 8, 2021 by Jeff-C175

[Jeff-C175 7,202]

8 hours ago, Horse Newbie said:

May be easier to dig down to undisturbed earth, set a solid concrete (one on top of other) block or two, then use those adjustable steel support legs...just an idea...

 

Those aren't considered a permanent structure.  It's already a dirt floor and below frostline so a simple form and two bags of crack resistant per footing, then 5 blocks high. Jack it up an eigth of an inch, slide in a piece of 2x8, lower jacks.  Easy. Peasey. 

[Pullstart 62,883]

@Jeff-C175 couple things.  Hard hat.  Videos!

[AMC RULES 37,130]

 Look!

That's our Kevin promoting job site safety.    

[Pullstart 62,883]

55 minutes ago, AMC RULES said:

 Look!

That's our Kevin promoting job site safety.    

The diesel shop teacher next to our auto shop always used to say “If you come to me and say Mr. Armentrout, my safety glasses got ran over, I’m going to respond why didn’t your head get run over too?”  I know most the safety rules, just don’t always remember the, in the heat of battle!

[Jeff-C175 7,202]

2 hours ago, pullstart said:

Hard hat.

 

You should have seen all the PPE I donned when I was pulling out all the old fiberglas insulation!  Tyvek disposable overalls duct taped to gloves and boots, full face respirator with P100 canisters,  tyvek head covering duct taped to respirator and overalls.  Good thing it was not hot out!

 

Don't know about videos, but I could take a couple photos I guess...

 

I once used bubble wrap as a padding underneath a Halloween costume (Frankenstein's monster) and I have to say ... it purt near kilt me!  I could not believe how HOT!  and I mean HOT! it was inside that costume!  Bordering on heat stroke hot.  Nearly passed out, had to strip it off QUICK!  I did win the costume contest though, it was worth the $250 in the end.

[Mickwhitt 4,624]

When I was an apprentice mechanic we covered cars, vans and trucks as there was no difference in the course. You had to know about everything even if you worked on cars.

When we were given our first PPE gear one of the car lads decided to test his steel capped boots by lowering the vehicle lift onto the toes as he stood beneath it. He'd seen it done where he worked which was a car shop. Didn't factor in the lifts at college were heavy good vehicles ones and much heavier.  So all ten toes came off clean as a whistle,  amid much howling from him and laughter from us as we thought he was just messing about. 

Needed a new safety sign in addition to "Don't be an air gun cowboy " and "Potential Bomb" for welding tanks..  .one that said "Don't **** around with vehicle lifts "

 

[Horse Newbie 7,069]

16 minutes ago, Mickwhitt said:

When I was an apprentice mechanic we covered cars, vans and trucks as there was no difference in the course. You had to know about everything even if you worked on cars.

When we were given our first PPE gear one of the car lads decided to test his steel capped boots by lowering the vehicle lift onto the toes as he stood beneath it. He'd seen it done where he worked which was a car shop. Didn't factor in the lifts at college were heavy good vehicles ones and much heavier.  So all ten toes came off clean as a whistle,  amid much howling from him and laughter from us as we thought he was just messing about. 

Needed a new safety sign in addition to "Don't be an air gun cowboy " and "Potential Bomb" for welding tanks..  .one that said "Don't **** around with vehicle lifts "

 

Daaa-uuum !

[Mickwhitt 4,624]

He was one of those I would consider "Hard of thinking" 

All roll cages, Kent cams and Piper exhausts. Trying to turn a Ford escort into a formula 1 car. 

I took the bus to work but my daddy didn't own a garage. If his daddy didn't I doubt he would have had a job.