Wood Stove

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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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California, Berkshire NY, Baltimore Maryland and Washington DC

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I am back from a speaking engagement at a familiar conference (CIDM) in San Jose California. Afterwards, I met Angie at the ATL airport and headed to the farm and to see my cousins, Aunt and Sister (and my newest relative) in Baltimore and Washington DC. It was a densely scheduled trip, but nothing compared to our typical overseas vacation trips.

I have been having educational fun with my recent birthday gift. It is a Radiacode 103. It is a very sensitive scintillation radiation detector. Loads of fun. The 1k µS/hr spike shown is what the carry on baggage x-ray machine doses out. I am glad I wasn't inside the x-ray equipment. Stopping at some antique stores along the way, I found a number of uranium glass pieces. Yes, they are radioactive. Yes, the dose is comparable to that you get from riding in a commercial airplane.

I took a couple of pics of property in Upstate NY. Unbelievable. It will beat out images of the best trailer trash anywhere. And yes, the vehicles are systemically destroyed by the highly corrosive salt used on the roads.

In Baltimore we went to Fort McHenry. Besides being the place (just off shore) where the lyrics of The US National Anthem were written, it was a great view of where the Francis Scott Key bridge once stood. It (of course) was taken out by a ship in 2024.

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