Latestarter's ramblings/musings/gripes and grumbles.

[Alaskan]

they are not know for their smarts

 

[Mini Horses]

Come on guys -- mine is not like that! She doesn't yap at flies but she WILL tell me if a strange car comes into the drive, anyone walks into the yard, she's really exceptional with NOT being the yapper most of them are. She will sit, stay, wait, heel, leave it, stop it, come -- and all that. She will alert with a couple barks but stops when I acknowledge and tell her it's ok. I'm lucky. She was a 1 yr old rescue when I got her.

 

[Latestarter]

Didn't do any fencing today. Instead, I dragged out the chain saw and cut some low hanging limbs that were scratching me all to hell when I mowed. The goats were very happy and enthusiastic when I dragged them over and threw them in the pasture. When I got done, I stripped down on the back porch and hosed off. Nice to live out in the boonies But off course doing any kind of work in this weather means laundry piles up quick... Dirt and sweat means one wear then washer bound.

Speaking of laundry, I decided it was time to wash the sheets. They were very high quality when I bought them (I think I recall they were 5 or6 hundred thread count Egyptian cotton) but they've got a number of years on them... So I strip back the comforter and the top sheet only to find the fitted sheet is torn to shreds down around calf level. Just worn right the heck through. Didn't even feel it while sleeping So off to wally world for a new set of sheets... I just threw the old sheets as well as the pillow cases in the trash. This time, I did things a bit different and bought a queen fitted in dark tan, a king flat in off white, standard/queen pillow cases to match the flat sheet and then a dark brown king sized comforter. I FINALLY have a sheet and a comforter that reaches more than 4" past the edge of the bed! I'll move my old queen comforter over to the spare room full sized bed, so it too will have a "real" size vice the full sized one.

 

[greybeard]

I haven't done much of anything except back and forth to Drs, hauling in lg mouth bass every morning, and working on my neighbor's 33 year old Honda 250 FourTrax. It had quit running, then sat for 4 years, and he offered to clean the most recent flood debris off one of my fences in exchange for me (labor only) getting it running again.
I'm beginning to think I really got the short end of the stick with that trade, but I should have it ready for him Friday.
Fuel enrichment (choke) cable froze up.
Rear brake cable froze up.
Carb bowl was full of some kind of black powdery crap.
Fuel tank full of gummied gasoline and shutoff valve had dissolved.
Rear brakes shoes rusted to the drum.
Main fuse holder back behind the left rear tire had all but fell apart.
Both rear brake adjusting nuts has turned to alum oxide.
It had had 1 oil change in it's entire life and he wasn't aware there was an oil filter behind the little plastic deco thing by the kick start pedal.
Valves were way out of adjustment and the whole thing covered in tree sap and dirt, sand & leaves.
Master cylinder for the front brakes is froze in it's bore with the piston all the way in and the handle just flops in the breeze (I'm not going to attempt to fix that...he'll just have to do with rear brake.)
Starter brushes needed cleaning and the commutator was corroded.
The foam air filter was just dust.
Slow jet in the carb body was froze, would not come out and the passage under it was full of crap, but I finally got it all dissolved and the passage clean...I hope. I'll assemble the carb tomorrow and get it put on, put the new choke cable on and get it set up and give it a spin and see what happens...

 

[Baymule]

I admire people who can fix mechanical things.......

 

[greybeard]

I admire people who can fix mechanical things.......

Don't.
It's a curse.

This is the 2nd one I've gotten running in the last month. Drug my own 250 out from under my house about 3 1/2 weeks ago, where it had sat for over a year, then the Harvey flood put water over it, and I drug it out with the intention of hauling it off for scrap. Decided to try one time just to see if it would still turn over. Pulled the spark plug, kicked it and it rotated with no water shooting out the plug hole. Drained the water/oil out of the crankcase, squirted some gasoline directly into the carb opening and kicked it twice and it fired and ran for a second or 2.

Then of course, I was bound by some directive from the unknown to fix it up again and went thru the carb and electric system, freed up the same cables I'm currently working on and have been riding it ever since, which is why my neighbor decided I could fix his, tho his is in way worse shape than mine was.
Mine looks like something out of Road Warrior, but it runs fine.

 

[CntryBoy777]

Dad-gum @greybeard sounds like ya would of been better off just assembling one from the ground up....if the parts were available....that's a bunch of work for sure....

 

[greybeard]

Just one bit at a time.
I was a mechanic for most of my life, till I decided to become a machinist and then to return to my youthful roots and fancy & decided to seek fame & fortune in cattle.


(The old adage is:
You know how to make $100,000 in cattle?
answer:
Start with $200,000)

 

[Latestarter]

Not sure GB... more technical work but less physical work involved... Would you have preferred to clear fence lines? Least that would have been out in the "fresh air" huh (and hot sun, and humidity)? Maybe you could have cleared the fence lines with your equipment... don't know. Glad your 4 wheeler wasn't a write off. Looks don't move it from place to place.

Did you ever finish putting in the new culvert pipe back by the pond? So how is your health doing? Hopefully things are getting better for you. I wish I had a pond I could fish in. Not big on eating them but love catching them.

 

[greybeard]

Not sure GB... more technical work but less physical work involved... Would you have preferred to clear fence lines? Least that would have been out in the "fresh air" huh (and hot sun, and humidity)? Maybe you could have cleared the fence lines with your equipment... don't know. Glad your 4 wheeler wasn't a write off. Looks don't move it from place to place.

I could have the fence cleared in less than a day, and piled it and then burned it all the next drizzling wet day so I didn't have to worry about the fire getting out. Most of it is tractor work with the landscape rake on the back, which I've done lots of times.

Did you ever finish putting in the new culvert pipe back by the pond? So how is your health doing? Hopefully things are getting better for you. I wish I had a pond I could fish in. Not big on eating them but love catching them.

Nope, pipe is still sitting next to where it goes. Started to do it one day and blew a seal on the backhoe and it's going to be a physical rascal to get that big cylinder off, break the rod nut out so I can pull the piston and replace the seal.. so it has to wait till the doc oks me doing more physical work. Just this week got the ok to get back on my bicycle and can now do a little more, but won't get released back to 'full duty' until the 30th (next week) when they put me out again, and run that apparatus down my throat to peer inside my heart to make sure the tissue grew over the implanted device as it should. That will also be the end of me taking warfarin or any other strong blood thinner, but will still go back on anti-platelets for the rest of my life which I don't mind since they don't cause me any bleeding or bruising problems.

My next project tho, is going to be sitting on the bow of my vee hull boat with my weedeater/brush cutter blade while wife s-l-o-w-l-y pushes us along with the trolling motor from the back seat as I cut lily pad risers. (emphasis on slowly!!) Then, I can get the boat thru the open channel with a backpack sprayer on and spray some of the lilies on each side with Eraser AQ or another aquatic approved herbicide. Can only do a small section at a time otherwise the dead rotting vegetation will upset the O2 content in the pond and I'll have a fish kill.

I just do catch & release, (wife doesn't like fish and these aren't the kind of fish I'm supposed to eat anyway..they want me to eat salmon, tuna or some other omega3 oily type fish, but I do need someone to fish out a lot of the bass...way too many in there. Flood took most of the channel catfish but looks like the bass and crappie stayed ....if not increased their presence. My youngest son is supposed to bring a couple of his friends from work one weekend and do that..they're all big time bass fishermen, but I have to open some channels first.