Did something dumb today.

[Ljohnsaw]

Ok, not me. My fishing buddy is the original owner of a 1975 Chevy Van. He take meticulous care of it, mechanically. Over the last year or so, he's been working on the engine, carb and distributor. Lack of power, stalling out when temps are up. Lots of odd things. He went through a few distributors, rebuilt the carb. I think he finally figured out it was a combo of vapor lock and crappy distributor.

In the mean time, he cleaned and painted everything. Valve covers, block, alternator, engine bay, etc. Very nice looking now. Assembled everything up. Take for a test drive and it starts missing as you go to accelerate. Adjust timing, no help. He has a very steep driveway and barely made it up.

Talked with a few friends and coworkers that are into Chevys. "Did you cross some plug wires?" Dooh! I forget which two it was but the clip that holds the wires flipped over during their long time of being off. When he traced everything back for the 10th time he found it. When he reported back to the friends, yep, just what they did, too.

[SawyerTed]

A Farmall tractor sounds just like a popping John tractor when the plug wires get crossed.   I know, dumb...it is just 4 wires. 

[SwampDonkey]

Yep, on them heat pumps. Sq footage at this new place is pretty close, maybe 200 sq ft difference. I would imagine with rates now, it would cost about $650/mo on heat pump. So I'm saving $500/month in electric. I only burn 10 gallon of gas in the buggy and maybe a gallon of chainsaw gas and a chain to get my wood. Everything is paid for but still ain't free because running anything has a cost. I also cut wood at times that don't interfere with any wage I might loose doing something else. Plus you have to figure, it's your wood and your savings nulls any wage loss in the end.  Furnace and duct and 43' of flu altogther was $10,000 installed. The heat pumps we had cost that. So titt for tat, except a furnace and flu last decades.

[rusticretreater]

Chevy embossed the firing order of their engines on the manifold for many years.  18436572

[Ben Cut-wright]

GM V8's with HEI distributor ignition were also prone to cross-fire number 5 and number 7 cylinders if the wires ran *parallel with each other.  Fix was to run those two wires in such a manner that they were not parallel and did cross over each other at some point. 

[aigheadish]

I learned a good lesson, again (and I think it's been mentioned here elsewhere already), that a 60 grit belt sander will let you know your knuckle is too close to it pretty quickly. 

[Machinebuilder]

RE: Heat pump

In East TN overnite temps in winter rarely fall below 20 degrees. the newer heat pumps manage at that temp

In January when we had a week of colder weather mine struggled. I do have the auxiliary heat in my air handler.
My January electric bill was $226, possibly the highest I have seen in 20 years of living here.

I know that heat pumps do not work well in the temps you get in the glaciated areas, But here they are a good option.

[doc henderson]

yes, but when they do, I am told it is 5 cents to the dollar compared to NG.

[Rhodemont]

It was dumb but maybe worked out for the better.  I have a few more logs to skid out for the season.  Chained up two logs this morning before trails softened up and headed out.  Well, I did not flick the lock onto the Norse winch and did not look back to see the load was dragging along.  165 feet later...bang,  The cable had run out and pulled out of the winch.  Dang.  I disconnected the cable from the logs and dragged it up to the barn.  Not that big a deal to hook the cable up again but while the covers were off it was a good time to do the maintenance that would not get done if at the end of the season I just unhooked and got onto sawing.  1 1/2 hours later back in business better than before.

[Stephen1]

I saw urban salvage, I buy the logs from my local arborists. I bought a nice whack of logs the week before the big snow hit here in the north,December, and so they have sat until yesterday. I put a really nice maple log on the mill, didn't bother scanning, hit a nail, urban salvage, really nice maple log, turn it into a cant, hit another nail, oh yeah I have a new metal detector, maybe should have Brought that out 1st,  and scan the log, nothing. Turn the log ,don't scan and hit another nail... 3 blades , but really nice 8/4 maple all really white 

[Magicman]

I buy the logs from my local arborists.

Sounds like you are paying the arborist too much.  Maybe pay for the 2nd & 3rd cuts, but nothing for the butt logs.

But then of course, I have no idea what your deal is anyway. 

[firefighter ontheside]

Here I am with head down in shame.  We had a call today with a person who had fallen while at the bottom of a very large hill.  This person was probably 350 lbs.  we weren't carrying them up.  We had to cut a path up a creek bottom to be able to get a sxs close and then carry the rest of the way.  The chainsaw I was using was idling way too high.  See where I'm going.  On one of my cuts I turned and swung the saw a bit too close to my leg.  It caught my pants and scratched my leg.  And I do mean scratch.  It wasn't even bleeding.  I did rip the hole bigger to make sure the damage wasn't bad.  It was not.  I asked the captain of the truck it came off of to either fix the idle or have our small enigine guy do it tomorrow.  I got very, very lucky.  First time I've ever done that.

[Old Greenhorn]

I really don't want to sound like an "I told you so" type of thing, but really Chief? No chaps? You had your bunkers on? Bunker pants cost what, about 4-5 times what chaps cost? I know you know better so I feel bad even saying it, I really do. Our department always had a rock solid "no chaps, no saw" policy. The only exception was chainsaws in a structure fire.
I am really glad you are OK, that could've been really bad..

[firefighter ontheside]

No bunkers on.  It was a backwoods rescue.  I was wearing my lightweight coat, which is basically our brush fire gear, but only the coat.  I had my helmet and gloves and glasses on, but no chaps.  I'm the reason we have one set of chaps at the FD.  They just weren't on the scene.  I'm ashamed.

[Old Greenhorn]

Well maybe it's a regional thing. We had chaps on every rig with a chainsaw, which was about all of the rigs. Also our department has always had a plethora of loggers, tree guys, and arborists and those guys always grabbed the saws and chaps. In my entire time with the department I only used a saw once and that was to cut shuttle holes through the floor in a working structure fire in a 100 year old hotel. That fire was a bit of a nightmare. Short story was when you have 6 inches of water on the third floor and try to punch a saw through to drain it, that carpet can really clog up the saw quick (like 2 seconds). Ever try to cut through a hardwood floor with an axe? Let's just say it's not a fast process.
 Again, Bill, I am really glad you are OK. I do a lot of that 'saw swinging' on my mushroom trees to dice up all the small twig branches and reduce them into the duff. I have to constantly be very careful to mind that bar because I can loose sight of either the bar or my legs when I am hip deep in brush.

[Resonator]

Also not a bad idea to bump the chain brake on if a saw is "freewheeling" between cuts.
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Ran out of milk the other day, so I drove to the new convenience store 10 miles away to pick some up. Got there and figured I get gas while I was there too. Close to dinner time, so grabbed a hot sandwich when I was inside. Little pies were on sale as well, so grabbed a couple of them too.
Drove back home, sat down to have dinner. Thought to myself, some milk would sure go good with the pie...

[aigheadish]

My son this time...

His (my) car has been running rough for a bit and he says he's burning oil, so he's been added some occasionally. He works next to a car parts store, so he got the check engine light checked to find a likely camshaft position sensor issue. 

We pulled it up into the garage yesterday afternoon and removed the wheel to change the sensor to find that not only had I looked up how to change the crankshaft instead of the camshaft sensor, so I bought what I thought was the wrong sensor, but I also found a ton of oil dripping from everywhere near the front of the engine onto the garage floor. I said "You are losing a ton of oil bud!" and got pretty nervous about what we'd find. 

We attempted to replace the crankshaft sensor (I had the wrong sensor in my hand) and I slid under the middle of the car to see if I could figure out where all this oil was coming from, again pretty nervous, because I didn't see any immediate culprits and I didn't want to send the car to the shop where they'd have to rip everything apart to find a leak. Well, at that point I told him to pop the hood so we could look for a leak from the top. As soon as he did I noticed a missing oil cap. I guess the last time he added oil he didn't screw it in very well and poof it's gone. 

I had him start the car to find a semi-fine mist of oil spewing out of the fill hole and when I went to cover the hole the engine started sounding much more normal. That mist had seemingly soaked the liner on the bottom side of the hood and it was running downhill over everything on the front passenger side of the engine. We went back to the parts store to find they didn't have a new cap, so one was ordered and he'll pick it up this morning. 

He's got to go to work today so in an effort to keep new oil spillage (after we added like 3 quarts) to a minimum and get a more correct closing of the engine I put a microfiber towel over the fill hole (hoping it doesn't shed much) and then a little cup thing I had around which was about the same size as the hole, then a chunk of 2x4 on top of that, which was all held down by the hood when it was closed. Not ideal, but I think ok for a 5 mile drive to work and the car parts store. 

We changed out the camshaft position sensor (the sensor I bought that was correct but I thought wrong) while we were up there too...

Some top notch Red Green-ing that I'm not very proud of. I was hoping that the fill hole would have a lip on it so I would zip tie something over the top of the hole, but that was a no go... 

[Stephen1]

Also not a bad idea to bump the chain brake on if a saw is "freewheeling" between cuts.
----------------------------------------

I do not run my saw without using the chain brake. Basically,  if I'm not in a cut the brake is on. I caught my leg with chaps on once, tore the chaps, learned my lesson. 

[rusticretreater]

Some top notch Red Green-ing that I'm not very proud of. I was hoping that the fill hole would have a lip on it so I would zip tie something over the top of the hole, but that was a no go...

There is a time honored fix for all of this.  Its called duct tape. 

[SawyerTed]

"Ya know duct tape doesn't stick to an oily engine."  He said in his best Red Green accent!  

[Resonator]

The guys that do hydraulic repairs use something that looks like a cone, and is made of spongey rubber to plug lines and ports when they do a rebuild. It squeezes into the opening, and holds itself in place. Maybe you could improvise something like that with a sponge wrapped in thick plastic.

[doc henderson]

@aigheadish I see you gave the son an older car so you could spend time together and teach him to work on mechanical things.  I see the plan is coming to fruition.    the master plan.  what a good Dad.

[aigheadish]

For as oil covered as that engine was ain't nothing sticky sticking to it. My boy will have the joy of getting under there, probably this afternoon, to wipe any excess oil up, so we can determine if it really does have a leak somewhere, though I doubt it at this point. His penance for losing the oil cap.

Doc, that may be the most optimistic thing I've ever heard! In reality I spent quite a bit more than I wanted, buying him a camry with the hope that it's a Toyota that won't need much work... He's proven me a fool between this and some other issues he's had. He is doing relatively well with the work and learning some stuff, but he's also learning that dear ol' dad is learning right along with him.

He wants to a take a months/years long road trip before too long and I told him he should start learning how to fix a van for pretty much any problem it has on the road. I guess we are making some progress to that.

[beenthere]

Month long or year long road trip should provide a lot of learning for the boy. Just don't make the mistake of footing the bill for such a trip. 
Won't be much learning if you do that. 

[Wlmedley]

Sold my boat last year and bought a SxS . Didn't use the boat anymore and thought a SxS would be pretty handy plus I got rid of my 4 wheeler which I didn't need after getting the SxS. Overall it's worked out well. My wife and I take rides fairly often when the weather is good plus I've found it much easier than the 4wheeler and trailer for bringing firewood out of the woods. Yesterday I was feeling pretty good about how steep a hill I had backed the SxS up to load wood I would have normally had to throw down by hand and then pick up again and load. I pulled the park brake about half way like I always do and started loading the bed. Had it loaded pretty heavy when SxS started rolling down the hill. Luckily I was close when it started to take off and was able to reach in and pull brake handle on down. Big wedge from a tree I had cut laying within a few feet so I wedged the wheel which I should have done to start with. I never pull the park brake all the way because I figured it was stretching the cable. I probably should rethink this assumption and I will definitely be chocking the wheel when on a steep hillside. I'm afraid these hills are eventually going to get me.