I rebuilt a wood stove I had in storage. The only textual items on the stove is "Made in West Germany". After puzzling about how to repair the broken leg (everything from welding with tungston rod to fabricating a splice), I found a similar replacement foot. It was similar, so I ended up buying two in order to make it look and set right. It was a fun "little" project. It cost me about $150 in materials and probably took me about 8 hours. I am looking forward to getting it fired up at some point. Since it is going back into storage I am wrapping it up with as much rust inhibitor as I can. I bought some VCI paper for the effort.
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Things have been a blur lately.
I had a flight lesson the other night. I am gaining confidence. I remeber some of the things that I struggled with before I am now comfortable and confident. I have a ways to go still for sure.
The big thing was though, I called a missed approach (go around) because I was too high and didn't feel comfortbale with the rate of decent. I gave it the gas and went through the process of a go-around and the engine skipped a few beats on the climb-out! I let my instructor have the plane and to be safe we did a 300 degree turn and landed downwind. That is the second time the plane has hiccupped on me during climb out at low altitude. We agreed this time it was a bit different than the loss of power we had last time with a scored cylinder. This seemed electrical. The plane is being looked at. My instructor says I have bad luck with the plane. We had an extended debrief and talked about options. We both agreed that the golf course was the best place to go if the power quit entirely. More experience. Turning back to teh airport with a power-out condition is a common mistake. Concentrating on landing the plane is a priority.
I went to a student music recital in Greene on Sunday. That was different and simple.
I mowed the hay-field-to-be Saturday. It took me about 6 hours to mow 17 acres. That was a speed record for me. I still managed to hand carry a bunch of rocks I found with the mower to the hedge row. I plan on mowing that field 4 times this year. Some of my other mowing plans are under review.
I am getting some expert advice on my silo of whether it is safe and/or usable.
I am working on one of my Evinrude outboard motors. I don't remember where I got it. Possibly I got it from the trash years ago. It turns out it is a 1948-1951 1.5 HP model. It looks like it is all there. It will go well on the canvas canoe since it has an internal gas tank and it will look period.
The garden is going in with a different setup this year.
I went and looked at the Solon Pond Mill. I was mistaken last time when I was up there in 2000. It was Summer and everything was overgrown. The mill is about an 1/8 mile from the building I thought might have been the mill. The mill is in rough shape. But everything is still there. I couldn't get underneath to see if the turbine was in good shape. I had heard that it was buried in muck. I suspect it is there, but probably in rough shape as well. It is a combination grist and saw mill, and could be restored to do exactly that. I am going to pass. I was thinking it would make a great homesite however. There is 3.9 acres (a lot for a mill) and you could build a nice house that looked period and work on getting an awesome water powered workshop out back. There is a planner, and it looks like a jig saw and I bet a few other pieces of woodworking equipment in there. All the shafting looks good. It is fun to think about the coolness of starting with logs and making furniture all out in th...
I am flying this morning. We are getting off the beaten trail. We are going to Mt Heine on White Island and Williams Cliff on the side of Mt. Erebus. We are trying to determine if we have a found a better radio location at these two points. We are taking GPS, maps, a 900 Meg radio and ice axes. It will make the network simpler if I can prove these spots will work. Cravasses are common near Williams Cliff so we are on high-guard about where we will set the helo down. We may not set down at all. Cravasses are really problematic down here. They are hundreds of feet deep and they are very often covered with snow. Sometimes the snow may be 6 or 10 feet thick and may support equipment for a while. Then one day the equipment breaks through. Ice radar is normally used for traverses.
Iceland was a real hoot. It is a mecca for off-road, drone-toting, adventure seekers. There is a surprise around every mountain or glacier. There is considerable variety to the landscapes and near limitless long vistas for reflections. I will go back again. Here is a multi-million dollar view of Iceland. Here are few stills from the drone. I flew both in the rain and in winds over 40 mph. This is just a small sample.
Well the big fun this weekend was that we got the CAT D6 Dozer running! After 30 years of not being run it now runs. When the diesel finally kicked it did not disappoint in the slightest. The thing belched a big black cloud of black smoke and the cooling fan emptied the radiator of 30 years worth of bugs parts and mouse nests all over us. The neighbor came over pretty much in disbelief. In thinking about it, he had only ever lived across the street, it appears, and he was maybe 40 years old. That machine had been a familiar static fixture for almost his whole life. Something simple like getting that big old engine running is truly a lot of fun and was satisfying. I don't have a video of the engine rebirth. It took more hands than two people have to work the controls required to get the thing started. Now it is a bit more work to get it to move. It appears the brakes and possibly other parts are stuck.
I get a kick out of hearing the term "Deep South" in 2026. It is a crazy incredibly outdated label. I think maybe I should start saying the "Deep Northeast". I am a Yankee. My family came over on the Mayflower and moved to Upstate NY via Connecticut. Terms used in the revolutionary and Civil war days are generally inappropriate. My family is all but totally out of NY State now. I find the term "deep south" to be of the same thinking that the movie "Heidi" is what contemporary Europe is like. Watching the fireworks in Rochester, NY from the back yard of a house in the city made it look like a real war zone. It is a long drive between Berkshire, NY and Duluth, GA. Most of the 35K miles on the truck were spent in between. I drove the truck about 3k miles in 2-1/2 weeks. It was great to spend time on the farm. It was good to make some progress on needed repairs and improvements. I also felt good about making some new friends up there. I will be...
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