June 15 or thereabouts.
A late start to june, it would seem.
Here’s what happened: Part of the reason there’s been no blogging for the last year is that my uploads started being throttled, and I was rarely able to get the photos to load. And what’s a blog without photos? I googled it and it would appear that godaddy is not such a bargain after all. So 2 weeks ago, I signed up with name.com and then took my time getting the site moved over, and only just now got it done. Domains vs hosting. web file systems. Filezilla. I learned a lot.
So that’s my excuse.
So where were we?
How about the motorcycle? I got it all put back together and tested the compression. Before, it was waaay low at 45psi, so here’s my chance to see if all my work made a difference. It sure did: all the cylinders read zero. That’s as bad as it gets. The only one with a non-zero reading is #4, and it’s got the only valve that I could get a feeler through. So apparently, grinding the valves effectively made them longer, and now they don’t close and I need to shim them.. This is a big bad deal, but the parts are in the mail.
This is almost as disassembled as it got.
How about the green house? I got the wall plates on and the beam up and I’m ready for joists. The basement is wet, and there’s a big colony of mushrooms in the dirt where I dug in december.
The beam is up!
The house has athlete’s foot.
And then there’s the spiral staircase.
I could not get this pinned down in cad and eventually oriented the tripod on-the-fly when the answer finally presented itself. (It seems so obvious now) The tripod is done and the treads are ready to weld.
9’9″ long 8 1/2″ OD 1/4″ wall steel
Used to be a pressure cooker for steam-bending wood.
Then it was a basketball hoop.
Now it’s going to be …
… a spiral staircase.
C3pr has come to a screeching halt. It’s a little worrisome, but there really is a lot less incentive when the weather is nice. I’m having a hard time finding someone to sell me a camera package, but supposedly a guy is working on it for me. Keep following up…
sat june 20
welded all the angled stair treads to the central column.
First fire of the season. Christmas tree conflagration. Jupiter and venus near the moon.
Stairway to heaven
sun june 21
tried welding some bracing on the stairway, but 7018 rod is just too hard to work with.
Re-assembled the motorcycle. Forgot the choke, so disassembled again.
Found a source for a new point contact. I need one because I stupidly broke one.
Measured and threaded the 3/4″ rounds to use as tie rods next door.
Cleaned out the birds nest on a ladder. Again.
Creemee. Nachos.
mon june 22
A whirlwind trip. Tailed by a cop all the way down stagecoach road, making me nervous at the speed limit + 2. Haun for welding rod. QCS for big-ass #9 re-bar. Fairfax for property pricing. Bond for gas line. Hannaford for groceries, where I bought way too much meat.
Home, and I welded the diagonal pieces to the staircase and then turned it on its side.
Over at the green house, I drilled holes for the 3/4″ tie rods.
Got a very upbeat report about Celia and then I burned the steaks on the grill. (I burned my leftover pizza for lunch, too)
I put in the tie rods and moved the subflooring upstairs
wed june 24
I worked on the motorcycle all morning. I cleaned and put on the pipes, put on both kickstands and the front wheel. The pipes cleaned up real nice. I spent $12 on onesy twosy metric bolts.
I sketched the steps I need for the stairway and dropped it off at CMF.
Criscolo wants to snap up my offer and buy my land. Just like that. Sweet deal for them. Problem solved for me. And a cute price.
I sent a gentle reminder to Bill and got back an encouraging response.
I installed the tie rods and secured the peripheral joists next door.
Pipes
Thu june 25
worked on the motorcycle. Fenders, air filter, brake fluid (all over the floor).
Worked on the green house, putting up joists and trimming the remaining beams. Dirty work.
Got an informative reply from Bill the vision guy. Need to review his links and get back to him.
Hamburgers and fries. I finally cooked them right!
fri june 26
I started installing subflooring, did a lumber run for the 2nd load, and then put up the joists for the west end and then moved 9 sheets of subfloor from the truck to mid-height. It’s hard work, but I managed to get thru the whole day without feeling like I’d torqued my body. We had pizza and watched half of a really slow movie.
Them boards is heavy.
sat june 27
worked on the green house subfloor. All but the edge pieces are tacked down, and they’re going to be tough. I bought nails, but I’ve been using screws, thinking to myself all along that the next guy to remodel is going to hate me. Then I cleaned up and we went to Charon’s for Marshall’s 77th. Steven, Julia, Kate, George. Watermelon feta salad.
sun june 28
First time in a long time I haven’t done any green house, c3pr, motorcycle, stairway or any other work. Instead, it was a social day. A day off, as it were.
We met bill&lisa and then marshall&charon&steven at the whip for lunch. Everybody talked at the same time. Whew.
We drove back and had an hour to kill. I googled the map to the pie place, but it was easier to grab a piece of my 35 year old atlas and clutch at a piece of paper while I drove. We got there right on time.
At the whip, we ended the meal with a cup of coffee. Overcooked coffee. And you know what overcooked coffee does to me. It makes me pee. So I peed 3 times at home and then barely made it to the pie place without peeing in my pants. And then I peed twice at the pie place and again at home. And this is from just one overcooked cup of coffee. And it didn’t bother anyone else in a family where everyone is getting old fast. Should I be concerned?
tue june 30
I emailed Bill about photonfocus and got a good reply. I like this guy.
Today I got the motorcycle running. It needed the points put in and I needed a little 600 grit paper to make the points conduct and then a new plug terminator in #3 and then there were problems with the petcock. But after a fair amount of dry cranking, it started right up. There is much more to do, but this is a really cool milestone.
Next door, I finished fitting the floor and started nailing it down.
Mary brought home the finished doors and drawers, so we’ll probably finish the LR shelves by friday. Finally.
Hamburgers for dinner and another movie that Mary didn’t like.
Window is designed to be replaced at great cost.
This cost me $8 and it’s as good as new.
It’s the end of June. The beginning of summer. There’s been a lot of progress on a lot of projects. We are generally pleased.