2024: What are you doing today?

[kb426]

Interesting stories.

[58 Yeoman]

Yeah, car buyers can be fun. Tuesday night while watching tv, I got a text from another 'Rick' asking is this still available?  I answered yes.  If they give me the generic question, I always give the generic answer.  Being that this guys name was Rick and it was a new account, I figured he was checking up on me?  I deleted it when he never answered.

So this big guy is sitting on the bench in front of my shop when I tell him the latch may be broken, and that he could find a USED one, since no new ones would be available.  He tells me "yeah, there's a shop in St. Louis that restores Corvairs, and he could probably find one."  I'm thinking you drove three hours when you could've gone to this shop to see if you fit into a Corvair?  Will wonders never cease?

[enjenjo]

I did a road trip to Galesburg Michigan today to look at some Studebaker bell housings to see what is needed for a T5 adaptation. More thinking needed. I though about stopping to see George, but I just ran out of time.

[Crosley.In.AZ]

Interesting stories.

Ah heck another story on the same Crosley wagon I had for sale..

Guy calls: asking questions that if he had seen the photos, read the ad.. He would know the answers.  Turns out he does not have a computer. His friend told him about the Crosley for sale and he is Not a car guy.  Just looking for an old car to restore.

I explain the condition of the Crosley wagon to him to the "N-th degree". I also tell him he needs to see the photos of the Crosley first. He comes out and nearly immediately starts complaining that I was not truthful to him. Crosley was too small for him. He claimed I told him the dash was complete minus gauges and he says there is no dash , no dash pad (Crosley never had a dash pad), No glass in the car: I told him there was no glass ? Crosley dash is sheet metal with holes for gauges to fit in.. LOL

We parted ways on unfriendly terms..

    

[58 Yeoman]

I've been busy.  I moved the 8' windmill in the front yard that was above a below ground level stump, surrounded by hosta flowers.  My wife removed the flowers, and I dug down and removed the rotted stump with a pick for the rotten stuff, and splitting wedges for the less rotten stuff.  Nursery will place a red maple tree there in the next couple weeks. We lost a lot of trees in August, so they will put one there, and another about 30/40 feet away, and one more near the front of the house.

My wife had a huge flower garden in the front yard that got devastated by the storm with huge trees falling into it. We dug up the one surviving hydrangea tree from there and a sunflower bush, and moved them elsewhere.  I removed everything else and tilled it yesterday.  A different nursery will place a large maple tree in the middle of that flower bed, and I will plant grass in the rest.  I'm going to rent a fun toy, and excavator to dig up some yucca plants in that area so they don't keep coming up.

Then today, I rented an electric jack hammer to take out the rear sidewalk behind the garage where the new backup generator will be installed.  It will be placed where the sidewalk was, and we will make a new curvec sidewalk next year. Yesterday, I broke up the first two sections with a sledge, but the rest of the sidewalk went to 6" for some reason, so I rented the jack hammer. Wow, wonder why they went so thick?  I used my tractor's front bucket for hauling the broken pieces to the ravine out back.  Then had to go buy 2400 pounds of dirt to fill the space.  Geez.

[Crosley.In.AZ]

Busy for us here on the house.  The windows leak air and rattle in the wind.  Seals are rotted away on the frames. The glass to frame seals shrunk , hard, bad. Full of dirt in the channels. Our bedroom was real bad. We plan on new windows in 2025. The window screens were bad, rotted, holes in them. Front main window I had to bend up the screen frames to get them out of the dirt packed channels. Then dig out the dirt with my trusty Craftsman scroodriver. Then my trusty 35 yr old Craftsman shop vac.

I used white silicone caulk on our bedroom and living room windows after digging out dirt of the channels for ever it seemed..  In the bedroom I used a common RV window treatment:  The silver bubble insulation to cover the inside about 80%. Just enough to let some light in to the room.  I used 4 layers of the bubble stuff and then a chunk of rigid foam behind.

Fixed a few electrical items in the attic. Banged my head only 3 times. I set 2 metal boxes to splice back together correctly a wire the previous owner had hacked into to run power to outside. Electrical connections here in AZ must be in a box and have access to that box, not hidden in a wall. Not wire nutted together then a shat load of tape added.

I have half fixed bad wiring that previous owner took a 240 volt line, split that into 2 120 volt lines.  He used those bolt together cable clamps on the larger wire to connect #8 wire to awg 12 wire.  Real swift I say ! 

He thought nothing of running romex wire  exposed , on a wall.  A little paint and it all blends in like Red Green's stuff  in Canada?

 

[idrivejunk]

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[kb426]

Looks good, Matt. Another cowl vent has bit the dust.

[58 Yeoman]

No more "factory air" on that truck.

[idrivejunk]

Yep it had to go.

[enjenjo]

It's unbelievable how many junk bodies end up in that shop. Of course there is money to be made fixing them. I have fixed bodies just as bad, but it's always been "my first car" or something really rare like a Airflow coupe. No reflection on you Matt or the work you do.

[idrivejunk]

Alter your belief then? Many of them get turned away. Imagine those.

[kb426]

That has to be a "wow" moment. However, if all there is are rusty bodies where you are, what do you do?

[idrivejunk]

Ha. We all thought it was a fine specimen. The wow moment for me is once theres plenty of money, amounts blur. Want can then trump frugality. Or sensibility. Thats the demographic zone where we thrive, I guess.

You just can't hardly take somebody's restored or un vehicle in then spend a chunk to reveal truths then say no to it. Throw it in the trash and buy another better one pitch works for phones and more stuff every day. But what are you gonna say to somebody who can actually pay? Nope, we can't handle that one, it's too much? That'd leak out.

Sigh. Defending a shop that I have no reason to. I'm not but kinda feels like it. All that is boss stuff.

The sunvisor area patch is going well and to my surprise this morning, there is no encapsulator dripping through holes in my roof skin or rearview mirror area fixes. Thats a bodyman moment.

[WZ JUNK]

It's starting to look like my new project may actually happen.  I am waiting for my lawyer to finish the work on getting my title, and then I will start purchasing the rest of the materials.  I am calling this one Harley Ford.  It is something to keep my hands and my mind busy.

More details to come when I start to work.