Weekly Update for 13-APR-2015

So, the softball team is playing as well as can be expected. They’re 0-2-1, and they’re very proud of their tie, to them it shows that they’re improving. I can’t fault them for their enthusiasm. 🙂

The twins are doing great in Volleyball. I’ve had a chance to see part of one of Sofia’s games and toomorrow I’ll try to see part of one of Isabel’s games. Problem is her team beats the opponent so quickly I can’t get to the games in time. Wish me luck.

I think I’ve fixed the leaky transmission in the ’91 240! What a bear of a problem that I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy!

Haven’t had a chance to do any reloading or machining for a while, we’ve been very busy with the girls. Hopefully towards the end of the school year!

Who’d a thunk it?

Did you know that J-B Weld Kwik can be used to fix a bicycle pedal? It’s true!

My youngest has a inexpensive bike from Walmart with a solid crank. Not a knock against it – it works well for her. The problem is that she somehow managed to literally wear the threads out of the pedal hole, along with most of the threads off the actual pedal. 8-O. My dilema – hunting down a replacement crank or drilling out the pedal socket and threading it or pinning the pedal. I decided on a third option – I pulled out the secret weapon of enlightened men everywhere – J-B Weld, more specifically, the Kwik. I mixed up a batch and set it up. Wow! It filled the voids of the missing threads and when it was done setting up it was on there good. My girl got on the bike and took off. Another job done!

Oh, another thing I fixed this weekend – the dishwasher. The upper tray has these axles that clip on to the tray and has rollers that fit into the stainless slides. We’d gone for years with one broken, then another broke last week and when it dropped down we lost a few glass cups. Something had to be done. In just a few days we had a pack of four. In a few minutes (after I figured out how to take off the ends of the slides) the job was done. Kind of embarrassing it took me so long to take care of it. Oh well.

Slow weekend

The wife and kids were up in Phoenix for the annual Fiesta de la Virgen de Guadalupe, so I was on my own. Fortune Cookie ( Twin Peaks and Silverbell, (520) 579-7813) pork fried rice and some crab puffs for dinner . Yummy!

Didn’t make it to Industrial Metals, got out of the house too late. I stopped by my buddy Roy’s house, picked up a couple of bad cylinder heads that he didn’t want anymore. I’ve been trying to find a source of small letters to put on the placard for my cast pieces so I stopped at Hobby Lobby. We’ll see if what I found works, I’ll look on-line as well. Some other miscellaneous errands, but nothing major.

I had dinner and veg’d out for a while then about 7pm I went out to the garage and started taking the head apart. What a pain in the ass! Those studs didn’t want to come out for anything – broke a few. Oh, and what do you do if you don’t have a valve spring compressor? Short answer, you make one, of course! I’ll post a picture of it when I get a chance to do the second head. I put it together in about an hour – you just can’t put a price on having metal, a welder, and hand tools. I don’t know what these metrosexual men do when they run into something they don’t have the tools/skills to overcome. Seriously, do they go shower and put on their skin conditioner and pout? Anyway, got the valve springs out and then the fun began – cutting it in half. Why? Because it needs to fit in my foundry. I think for the second head I’m going to try something I’ve heard mentioned – heat. Apparently, high heat will weak the aluminum enough that hit can be broken up into smaller pieces to fit. I’m not cutting up another one! It was 11:30pm by the time I finished! Jack was barking up a storm – the moon was bright so he went nuts. Silly dog.

I had dinner and then settled down to watch Ender’s Game. Wow! I know they had to edit the story for length, but they did an excellent job getting the story on the screen. The school and training was really well done. The kid they picked to play the part of Bonzo – perfect – I hated that little kid. In other words, he knocked it out the park, he played it perfectly. I didn’t know how they’d pull off the dreams and the adventure game but with the exception of there being no giant at the end, it was great. I’ll definitely watch it again. One of my favorites.

Sunday was an absolute nothing. I felt like crap, this crud that’s going around just won’t leave me. I want to get better so I can get back to my walks. Think I fixed the headlight problem on the car – loose connection. Topped up the fluids and called it a day. Watched the end of the first half of the ‘Cat’s basketball game against Oregon State (I despise Robinson) and the second half. Nothing like winning by 20 points. Resident Evil flicks, Walking Dead on television now. What’s not to like? 🙂