End of the old year and in with the new

 Hello everyone,

This year has been amazing for my wife and I as far as concerts and traveling goes. Logged over 21,000 miles on Diego. Saw a ton of cool places and things, and met a ton of new people.

Finished up some projects, got all the wood cut, finished the car port, getting ready to start on my wife’s she shed. Got my son’s car back together but have run into an issue that I haven’t quite figured out yet. I believe I have an idea of what’s wrong but been pretty busy with the holidays and my youngest son was visiting. Managed to put a trailer hitch and wiring on his new truck before he left for home.

We’re going to celebrate New Years out at our new found place for music, Austin’s. Should be fun. Then back to the grind next week.

Hope all who read this a Happy and Healthy New Year!

Think that’s all for now.

Talk to you soon, 

TVI

Amazing show and a little more accomplished

 Hello everyone,

Yep, the show was was amazing, Kofi Baker is every bit as good as his dad was! I wish I could post some of the video I took of him and the musicians that were playing with him, but I’m not good enough of an editor to make that happen.

Got home this morning and got a little more done on the car port. We had two 2x12’s 24 feet long that had to go along the sides of the thing at the very top. I had tried to enlist a friend with a work truck and crane to come and help but his truck was in the shop and he wouldn’t be able to help until next weekend. So, I did my best “ well, let’s think about this and came up with this solution:

I had several of these500 lb. Come alongs that I used as a field mechanic and I used the to do a lot of things, some questionable, but they worked very well. We had both sides up and installed in about three hours. They’ll eventually be bolted on to the 6x6’s with long carriage bolts, but for now there up in place and screwed in.

Even the boss/ safety coordinator showed up on the job!

She chewed my ass out for being up on a ladder!! LOL

Well, I think that’s all for now.

Talk to you soon,

TVI

Assembling the car port

 Hell everyone,

Been working on the carport for the last few days.

Making some progress.

There’s still two more posts to go up where the 2x4 is standing. It’s a lot bigger than we thought it was going to be, but it will still work perfectly.

Went to a friend’s house yesterday and borrowed some scaffolding to get the project finished up. Should make it a little easier.

All set up and ready to keep going!

The wife and I are going to see Ginger Baker’s son perform tonight. If you aren’t aware Baker played for a lot of old rock bands, including Cream ( with Eric Clapton!) and a few more. I’m interested to see if his son is as good a drummer as Baker was, pretty much top five on any list you see. 

Well, I think that’s all for now.

Talk to you soon,

TVI

Hopefully done cutting wood

 Hello everyone,

Yes, I believe we’re done cutting wood for the year! We’ve cut and stacked more wood than any other year and it’s almost half way through December. Plus I have quite a bit of dry wood for the shop and the fireplace.

Picked up the head for the Kia and it’s sitting ready for assembly. Also laid out out all the parts for the carport but it’s been to windy to start trying to stand up the frame.

So, a couple of weeks ago my oldest son asked me to go on a camping trip with him and the grandson, and I said yes. We’re are currently in the Smoky Mountains having a blast! They rented a cabin and we drove down in Diego, they have the cabin and I’m in the van! 

We’ll be heading home tomorrow and back to the grind. I’m helping the middle son with the car port and working on the Kia. I need it running before Christmas because the youngest son wants me to help him install a trailer hitch and wiring on his new truck when he comes home. It’s like I’ve been saying, it never ends!

Well, the steaks are cooking and I think that’s all.

Talk to you soon ,

TVI

Still going

 Hello everyone,

Managed to sneak in an overnighter and saw a very cool Doors tribute band called “ An American Prayer “. They were very very good.

After that back to business. They delivered the stuff for the roof thing for the van, but shorted us one piece, which should be here tomorrow.

Plus cutting wood, while waiting on the piece and the cylinder head for the Kia project. I’ve been trying to put a video here but I’m not having any luck. I hope we’ve cut the last tree down for this year. It’s on the ground and mostly cut up, now just splitting, picking up and stacking. The weather has finally turned into winter here, so progress outside is a little slower.

I talked withe the guy who has my cylinder head yesterday and he said it looks like just the two valves are bent, no other damage. No damaged guides or seats or more valves. Pretty lucky with that one! So hoping to get it back next week and start putting it back together.

Well, I think that’s all for now.

Talk to you soon,

TVI

Slowly but surely

 Hello everyone, 

Making progress on both fronts this week. Managed to get some more wood cut split and stacked and finished getting the cylinder head off the Kia.

You can see in the middle pic where the valves hit the piston, the damage is minimal, the valves on the other hand, are bent pretty badly. The two valves pictured are the intake valves for #3 cylinder which was why I had zero compression.

I took all the pieces and sensors out of the head this morning and dropped it off at the machine shop. Should hear from them next week hopefully.

This week is looking like mostly cutting wood although, all the wood for the roof setup to park the van under this winter should be delivered this next week, another project to do before I can get back to the car or the bike. Well, at least once we get the frame up my middle son can take over the roof project.

Well,I think that’s all for now.

Talk to you soon,

TVI 

Started the car project

 Hello everyone,

Got the shop all cleaned up and things moved around enough to make working on the car a little easier. With some help from everyone here we got the car pushed up into the shop.

I spent some time on YouTube, and did some reconoitering on my own and got the car jacked up and the front cover and stuff out of the way and found what was left of the broken timing belt.

After that I went to town and picked up a new timing belt and a compression tester. Put everything back in time and installed the new belt. Ran a compression test and CRAP! Number three cylinder has zero compression. Thought maybe I’d get lucky. So the cylinder head has to come off. After I get it off and hopefully no major damage just some bent valves, I’ll find an automotive machine shop and get the bent ones replaced and the others ground and hopefully be back in business.

Well, I think that’s all for now.

Talk to you soon,

TVI 

Been a little too busy to post

 Hello everyone,

I’ve managed to get the wood stove completely cleaned and resealed( with the proper rivets!). So it’s ready to go. Got more wood cut, probably about 3 more trees should finish me off. 

Unfortunately, I have acquired a new project that needs my particular skill set. My youngest son was out in Denver for work/ vacation and his car broke down! Turns out he lost the timing belt. If you’re familiar with “new” engines, they have interference engines and non-interference. What that means is if you lose a timing belt or chain on an interference engine, you probably bend your valves, and a non-interference engine, you probably don’t. Guess what kind he has?

So, the wife and I had tickets to a show over in Illinois by St. Louis to see Heartsfield and decided to go to the show and then leave the next day to go “rescue “ the car. Actually, it was a very nice trip.

The show was great, as always with those guys. The theatre had wonderful sound and was sold out!  

The place was called the Wildey Theatre and it was in Edwardsville, Illinois. We had packed enough stuff for the trip and left there on Sunday to head west.

As I said it really was a pretty nice trip. We had to pick up the car tote on Wednesday morning in Wellington, Colorado, which is just east of the Rockies. We had kind of curved around and up into the mountains, just to add a little adventure to the trip. We took a nice scenic route up to Estes Park on Tuesday and then came down the mountain and picked up everything on Wednesday.

The pictures of the elk were taken in Estes Park, they were walking around the town! I didn’t realize that that area is considered high desert, thus the pictures of the wild cactus.

So, we loaded everything up and drove home without a single issue. Kind of surprising but none the less it happened.

Got back yesterday, and today is cleaning out the shop and making room for the car so I can pull the head off and see how much damage is done. Hoping just for bent valves and no big broken bits. We’ll see if our luck holds out!

Well, I think that’s all for now.

Talk to you soon, 

TVI 

Back and at it again

 Hello everyone,

Well, we finished off the vacation with a couple of days at the Covered Bridge Festival, in Rockville. Pretty nice, actually. We traveled around the countryside and stayed away from the main festival haunts, with one exception. That one provided all the things we needed to complete the experience! Cinnamon rolls, and Amish breads!

We got back and started cutting wood again, the middle son got quite a bit split and stacked while we were gone. All I did was help finish what he didn’t finish splitting.

We should have this finished up this week and we’ve found about 5 or 6 more trees that need to come down. I fixed the the old gator, had to put in a new electric fuel pump, and I started putting new seals on the fire doors on the outdoor boiler. I didn’t realize how bad those seals were! I’ve got to drain the water in the boiler and replace the anode Rod, I also bought a new thermometer because the glass is cracked on mine and water gets in it. That should be this weekend and we should be ready for winter.

Actually, saw a few snowflakes dying around yesterday, seems pretty early, hope that isn’t a sign of things to come!

Anyway, I think that’s all for now.

Talk to you soon,

TVI

Woodstock and whales

 Hello everyone,

We visited the Woodstock museum and it was very cool. Lots of facts I didn’t know and some great footage from the event I’ve never seen.

I didn’t realize it was moved to a different spot just one month before the show, man those people worked their asses off to have that thing go off on time!

After that we drove east and landed in Plymouth Rhode Island, home of our beautiful country! We finally went whale watching and it was just the coolest thing. I didn’t get any really nice pictures but we must have seen 40-50 whales. We were standing at the back of the boat looking to our left watching some and three came up about 4’ from the back of the boat and actually blew water on us! It felt like I could have reached out and touched them, unbelievable!

Well, I think we’re heading home now, there’s still a lot of work to do at home.

I think that’s all for now.

Talk to you soon, 

TVI

Wow, far out man

 Hello everyone,

So far the vacation has had its ups and downs, I will say mostly ups. We’ve been trying to skirt around the remnants of Ian because the damn roof vent on the van has been leaking again. 

We stopped at a very cool brewery in Honesdale, PA. The owner was a fun guy with a ton of stories to tell about the town and surrounding area. 

Well it turns out that we were only about 30 minutes from the original site of Woodstock! Well, shit man, if you’re a boomer of any kind you need to go there! So, after the best damn brisket sandwich I’ve ever had, 

and a little more conversation, the owner offered me a ladder and the next morning I tried patching the roof vent for, I think, the fourth damn time now. After that, off to Woodstock!

Down at the bottom of the hill was where the stage was setup. After the patching and the drive up there we didn’t have time that day for the museum, so we went back the next day. Found a nice little campground about 5 minutes from the place with nice showers and finished off the day.

We’re still planning on heading East to the coast and try to get in some whale watching, fingers crossed.

Well, I think that’s all for now.

Talk to you soon,

TVI

Just an update

 Hello everyone,

As I said in the previous post, my wife and I went on probably our last extended vacation this year.

We’ve had a nice first few days, except for the rain leftover from Hurricane Ian! First two days were nice sunny and crisp, the last two days rainy, cloudy and bummers. 

First and only real planned stop on this vacation:

I didn’t realize until after I put the picture up that my thumb made an appearance!! If you’re into music at all, this is an absolute bucket list place to visit. From the very beginnings of rocks formation of blues and country to the newest techno stuff, this place has it all!

I don’t know where we’re headed from here, we kind of decided to fly by the seat of our pants and let the wind blow us in the right direction.

Well, I think that’s all for now.

Talk to you soon,

TVI 

And so it begins

 Hello everyone,

The title says it’s time for wood cutting! It’s a lot of work for me, being almost 70, but it’s still my favorite time of year. Cool and crisp, not cold and snowy. The leaves are falling and changing colors. Plus, the work heats my house all winter, without paying the price for LP gas.

Here is the start,

Three large trees down, two were dead, one was dangerous for walking by. I’ve tried over the years to take the damaged ones if I could. 

The wife and I are leaving on vacation for a week or two, so my middle son is in charge of processing the wood that’s down. It’s mostly cut into chunks already but needs to be split, collected and stacked. We added a new spot to store wood awhile back, which hopefully makes it easier to keep the home fires burning. When we get back we’ll have more wood to cut, I’m guessing about 5 more or so good size trees

Well, I think that’s all for now.

Talk to you soon,

TVI

It’s been awhile

 Hello everyone,

Yep, it’s been awhile, but I have been busy. Still getting the yard cleaned up and ready for fall. Ordered new chains and bars for the saws, that’s about the next project on the list, cutting wood.

Since I sold my pickup, I haven’t had a way of hauling too much around so I had an old homemade trailer sitting out in back of the barn and the wife and I decided it was time to resurrect it. The whole bottom was rotted out of it from sitting outside all of this time and the mice had eaten most of the wiring up. The hitch on it was very worn out, I have been using it on the back of the 4 wheeler to move wood and wood chips around so it moved but not road worthy.

So, found a wiring harness that I had in my picking pile, I also had an almost new hitch for a 2” ball ( the old one was 1 7/8”), but it was for a three inch tube and the one on the trailer was 2 1/2” tube. So, I met up with my brother and Sho Teacher Bob for breakfast and asked him if he had any scrap 1/4” plate laying around and he did. He cut me up a couple of pieces and I stopped by and picked them up and, Bob’s your Uncle, spaced it out perfectly.

I’m no where near the welder that Shop Teacher Bob is but, I can make it stick together pretty well. Anyway, got all that taken care of, and had to install a wiring kit in Diego for the trailer lights.

My oldest son had a full sheet of 3/4” chipboard leftover from a project and said I could have it for the bottom of the trailer. Not exactly the perfect bottom but good enough for me to use for a few years at least, as long as I park it in the barn.

So I drove up to his house this morning and stuffed that sheet in the bottom and then loaded up a bunch of junk he wanted to be rid of.

I also had the job of installing a new garage door opener for him, which I didn’t mind at all ( I got a carnitas lunch out of it, so, all cool!). I was only there about 5 minutes and he dropped a trailer hitch on my big toe! Wasn’t really his fault, it just happened. I don’t think it’s broken but, it’s pretty bruised and pretty sore.

I did stay and put the door opener all together and programmed it so it’s all working.,

So, it looks like clean the shop and help the middle son fix the gas leak on his van tomorrow and then probably start cutting wood.

Well, I think that’s all for now.

Talk to you soon,

TVI 

Just mostly cleaning

 Hello everyone,

I’ve just been busy cleaning up things. We’ve been sorting through our “stuff” and pitching out a lot of crap. The wife has sold some stuff on the internet.

I have a small motorcycle camper that I decided to sell. I put it up and cleaned it all out and took a bunch of pics of. I found a Facebook site that is all about these campers and I asked if I could sell it on the site. They said yes but, I never even got it posted and a guy is coming from Kansas City tomorrow to buy the thing!! He asked me in the comments about it and in about 15 minutes he called me and set up coming and getting it. Crazy!

I’ve been pricing out getting some of the parts for the bike powder coated. Still not sure about that and now I’m going to have to find someone else to spoke up the wheels because the guy I had lined up is retiring. I’ll have to start that search again. We’ve got a couple of more trips planned and then it’ll be time to start cutting wood. After that project is done, I should be able to concentrate pretty fully on the bike.

Well, I think that’s all for now.

Talk to you soon,

TVI

Been a little busy

 Hello everyone,

Unfortunately not working on the bike too much but, lots of other mundane jobs.

They changed all the power poles out on the road I live on and the wife asked them to leave a few for us. We ended up cutting them down and put them behind the woodshed for some more storage closer to the boiler.

Also used a couple close to the shop for dry wood for the wood burner in the shop. I used a lot of wood last year in the shop and intend to use more this year when I’m working on the bike.

When I first bought this property, I built a shed kit for storing a lawn mower and four wheelers so we didn’t have to haul them down here every time we came down. It’s in fairly rough shape, but my wife has decided she wants a she shed, well sort of. Anyway, we spent a few days cleaning it out and cutting down the brush and trees around it and inspecting the damage. It’s going to need a roof and some of the siding replaced. We’ll get to that in the coming weeks.

We’ve gone to a few concerts, saw Santana a couple of weeks ago, saw a local band called the Together Band that does mostly 60’s and 70’s soul music and they were very good. This coming week is a 60’s revival, The Turtles, and a few more. We’re going to spend a few days over by where this concert is going to be. They have a huge flea market and a grocery store that sells large quantities of goods, so we’re going to hit both before we come home.

We went to see our youngest son this past weekend, actually we were gone about five days. We stopped at a place called Land Between the Lakes in Kentucky for a couple of days on our way down. It was very nice.

Got to camp right on the water!

This week is catch up for being gone five days and I have to check out a couple of things on the van. I developed a problem with the charging system for the lithium batteries. I think it’s just a loose connection, so I’ll get to that this afternoon. I also have to look at the wife’s ebike, for some reason the headlight is stuck on and won’t turn off.

Well, I think that’s all for now.

Talk to you soon,

TVI