That opinion extends far beyond my wife about me...:laugh:

Taking out a heavy but unknown capacity hitch in the 86 Dually. Putting in a B&W 30,000 lb turn over ball. Taking out the auxiliary tank also long enough to Line-X the bed.

Leaving soon for Sabetha, KS to fetch the first of my 2 prize C10's...:grin:

Have a gantry crane that is really handy. 10 x better than a cherry picker for pulling and installing engines.

But... it wasn't quite wide enough to fit either my car hauler trailer or my 49 Studebaker dump truck under it. Couldn't find a small I beam to replace the 9 footer. So, I bought some 1/4 inch thick 3 inch angle iron. Already had some 1/4 inch thick steel plate in 20 foot lengths. Cut pieces to 130 inches long. Welded the plate between two pieces of the angle iron. Then I welded on two end plates cut from the end or some C channel I had left over from a previous project. That means the new "web" is 3/4 inch thick. A bit of overkill, but it is what I had available.

Got it done last Sunday. The pics will probably post sideways, as they were taken on my cell phone. Even though I load them on my computer and rotate before downsizing and saving, they still come out sideways most of the time.

I haven't seen pics of your shop in a year. It looks good and all those LED lights ready brighten it up.
The crane should be more usable now.

Almost like daylight, and very well spaced, so no shadows or dark spots.
70 lumins per sq. ft. of floor space. Draws the same amperage as two traditional 300 watt bulbs.

Yeah, I need to update pics on my shop thread. Getting pretty close. Have a working toilet and deep sink. Just cut a piece of granite to put in my kitchenette with the beer fridge and microwave.

I spent the last few weekends cleaning out a garage. By cleaning out, I mean completely emptying it. It's part of a property I am renting out to someone and they wanted that space too so I figured it would be a good reason to get rid of a few things. It was a lot more work than I thought it would be and I hope I don't accumulate that much "stuff" again. When I got through and looked at the now empty shop I thought, hey a guy could build a car in there...


Tommy

I feel for ya. When we moved I spent 3 WEEKS 10-14 hrs/day 7 days a week emptying out my 2,000 sq ft building.
I got rid of a lot of "junk", but didn't really downsize. Everything is now in the 2 buildings at our new place and I just bought 2 '67 C-10 project trucks...:tongue:

What I did yesterday, was remove the 292 and TH350 from my '54 210 2 dr sedan. The car will be going to a local swap meet on May 1st and the engine/trans are now destined for a couple C-10's.


https://hosting.photobucket.com/imag...080&fit=bounds

Went over the mechanicals on possibly the best unrestored
original 55 nomad known to exist, original everything, paint, interior , drivetrain

That nomads a beauty.

Nice one SpeedyB!!

Finished up my new trailer hitch project. Irritating detail is that the pre-drilled holes for the safety chains hit on the edge of the ribs. I called B&W about drilling new holes and they said that will void the warranty. So I scalloped the ribs around the anchors then finished it all off with a Line-X installation.

Looks like a cool truck! What year is it?

86. 47k miles. Original paint.

Working On
 

Couldn't get back to China due to Covid so I'm now in Singapore. Will soon tow to Israel. The flare tower is telescopic to get under the Suez Canal bridge.

Pulled the old 1992 Pace trailer out to get it ready to pick up my Hellcat next week. Tried out the brake controller and it is bad (only 10 months old) Luckily I kept the receipts and Drawtite is sending me a replacement under the 1 year warranty.

I then went to clean out the trailer and sweep it out. Of course the mice have been at play. I actually chased one up the side railing and it ran down the rafters to the other end and disappeared between the wall panels. Most of the interior has been removed after years of dealing with mice so there's not a lot of places to hide anymore.

Then I found out why it had stuck around. After moving around the old rags, I found two tiny baby mice on the floor. Ugh! It wouldn't be right to just toss them out in the cold. So I got a little box and put them in it with the stuffing they had collected. I cut a little door in the side and placed a Ritz cracker with some peanut butter on it just inside the little door of the box. I put it back in the same spot I found them and closed up the trailer.

I checked back after 1 hour. No change
2 hour mark: no change
3 hours: the cracker had a couple bites taken out and was moved away from the entrance. I checked the box and it was empty. Mommy Mouse had moved her babies out.

So I left the entire trailer empty with all the doors open overnight so hopefully they will find a place to relocate to.

I also moved the peanut butter box a few feet outside the trailer in the yard, hoping that entices them to move.

You are too nice, Steve. Young mice around me don't reach breeding age, but I do feed the adults...Tom Cat pellets.

Lawn tractor ... my hips and knees start raising hell if I use the push mower ... UGH!@#$%

UPDATE: And this morning the Ritz cracker and peanut butter was gone from the carboard box in the yard. So maybe I coaxed them out of the trailer over night.

Hey you never know when God is testing you! So treat all the critters out there nicely. Did I mention I saved a bumblebee this morning that was stuck inside our patio screen door?

I finished up this 496 for my uncle's boat.

Fuel tank back in the dually after doing the Line-X.

I made some goulash and mashed potatoes from scratch tonight. Used some authentic Hungarian paprika that we picked up in Szeged when we spent a month in Budapest a few years ago... good stuff if I do say so myself... the kids weren't as thrilled though.

Nothing that exciting here - I got the horns working again on the Chevelle. When I took the brake booster off I knocked off the wire to the horn relay, easy fix for once.

Trailer Refresh...
 

I decided to do a refresh on my 25 year old utility trailer. We use it to haul the ATV to the camp, lawn tractor to the shop and junk to the dump. It is the typical 5 x 7...steel mesh unit. It had mini tires from the factory, so that was the first upgrade...bigger wheels/tires. Had to move the fenders up and reweld...lot more rubber on the road.

Next step was the cosmetics....cleaned it top and bottom....rustproofed under the fenders and painted the rest. A friend custom cut some southern yellow pine boards [they were treated]...and I painted them all a nice green. We then drilled holes and used carriage bolts to secure the boards and sides to the steel.

Last step was a nice new LED lighting setup...we are ready for the road now :wink:

Looks delicious

Apologize for the long post, but there is no short way to tell the story.

Had a busy day today.

Have to give you a bit of background. Some of you will remember my post about the Publishing Museum that Sherri and I took on as a project a few years ago.

Posted about it here: https://www.yenko.net/forum/showthre...museum+project


We are still hard at it. We have made about $70,000 worth of improvements to the building. I have an architect that has donated about $25,000 worth of his time and a structural engineer who has donated somewhere around $15,000 of his time. I have the preliminary structural report (should have a final in another month or two). Happy to report we have zero structural issues on this 120 year old building where Statehood was announced for Oklahoma on Nov. 16, 1907. What is amazing is that the 3rd floor windows have been boarded up since sometime BEFORE 1965!!! Even with all the water intrusion, and all the neglect this building has suffered in the last 60 plus years, it stands firm waiting to be restored.

We raised a net $93,000 at our first fundraiser, fighting with Covid all the way. My fundraising chair (a fairly new board member who is a bonafide heavy hitter in the non profit sector) tells me we will raise at least $250k this coming October. She is incredible. Still, we are a LONG way from our current goal of $10 million to bring this building fully into the 21st Century.

So, what does this do with what I did today. Our former Governor, Frank Keating (he was Gov here during the OKC bombing in 1995) and his wife Cathy have been incredibly supportive. Gov. Keating is speaking at our next fundraiser. His son Chip, a great fundraiser in his own right (he has a Foundation that supports families of fallen troopers) has started working on Oklahoma lawmakers trying to get the State of OK to put up some matching funds. Although our local Senator has not expressed much interest in introducing any such legislation, we haven’t given up hope. I have now shown the building to one former Gov, the current Gov, the Lt. Governor (who spoke at our first fundraiser, and is also very supportive) several lobbyists, and 46 different State legislators. They are all blown away by the amazing artifacts we have, and some of the now working machinery we have mechanically restored. After I explained the field trip experience we wanted to create for Middle School kids, he said: “every school child in Oklahoma needs to make a field trip to this historic building before they graduate.” Chip immediately started pitching the idea of State matching funds. Gov. Stitt looked me in the eye and said: “you get these guys to pass it (pointing at several legislators that were present that day) and I will sign it.”

Today, I was able to show our US Representative, the Honorable Stephanie Bice, through the building. We spent an hour looking at the artifacts. I demonstrated one of the presses (it has been in the building since before 1911) and showed her the party favors we printed on that machine. Like everyone else, she was blown away by this significant piece of Oklahoma History and Publishing History. Really neat young lady whose father is a first generation immigrant to the US. We are lucky to have her in Washington.

As soon as she left, I went to work replacing some dilapidated letters on the third floor balcony. The phrase “ESTABLISHED 1889" was prominently displayed on the front of the balcony. Most of those letters were metal. Two had been replaced with wood. As you might expect, the wood swelled up, rotted, and was falling off. The two missing letters were the first “E” and the “L”. I had already replaced the letters on the second floor balcony (also wood) with laser cut aluminum letters anodized silver. Those we were able to get to with my scissor lift. The third floor balcony is 35+ foot high, and my scissor lift was useless. A few months ago one of my neighbors was painting windows on her downtown building. She and her partner had rented an articulating boom lift. She called me and asked if I needed it for an hour or two, as it wasn’t get picked up until the evening. Hell yes. So, I went up and removed the deterioration wooden letters, and also removed the one good “E” that was still up there. It was metal, painted black on the sides and bottom and yellow on the front. I could tell from how some of the tabs that were tucked into the mortar, that it was original to the building. I have since confirmed that, sure enough all the letters left up there were original to the building.

Looking at the back side, it sure looked like galvanized steel. So I bought some galvanized steel sheet metal and hammered out a new “L” and a new “E”. Had to get special low heat solder and flux to solder the pieces together. As soon as I finished I started sanding the front surface of the original “E” which quickly revealed ..... copper. Crap. Made them out of the wrong stuff. Oh well, it was good practice. They weren’t quite dimensionally correct, as I ended up making them about 1/16 inch too wide.

So, bought some copper sheet and made new letters out of copper. Sandblasted them to make sure the paint would stick. Painted the sides and bottom black.

How the hell am I going to get these up there? I had no idea. I was thinking that I may be dangling in a harness from the balcony. Sherri wasn’t crazy about that idea. Then I heard that OG&E had donated a bucket truck to the City of Guthrie. This is where it pays to live in a small town. Two weeks ago I go see the City Manager. I take my new copper letters into his office and tell him we need a way to get them up there. He calls one of his maintenance guys and says: “Hey, I am giving your cell phone number to Lynn. He is going to call you when he needs the bucket truck. We need this done before the 89er day parade, so when he is ready, make sure you have someone at the Museum with the bucket truck.” Doesn’t get much easier than that. Then I ask him if they have any street striping yellow paint we can paint the front of the letters with. He says sure. Also says it takes months to get that stuff because of EPA restrictions.

Bottom line: I show the Congresswoman around for an hour and spend the next hour and a half putting up letters and painting them with the paint the City donated. They look awesome. Yes, the “L” is slightly crooked. But by the time we were done, the wind was coming from my left at 30 mph with 35 mph gusts. All in all a good day.

Enjoy the pics.

OH yeah, and we were still at the office for a 1:00 pm appointment, and worked right up til 5.

Last two pics. Painting and finished product.

Went down and looked at them this evening. They really show up great with just street lights on because of the reflective quality of the striping paint.

Dang, Lynn, that is really cool that you are doing that... https://s3.amazonaws.com/emoticon.ac...2BU8D0%2FE0%3D
Hard to believe the state hasn't pursued this much harder, being the location of the original proclamation of Statehood...:flag:

Looks outstanding. My Aunt used to serve Goulash and it was always a favorite of mine. I'll have to try making it myself soon.

Tommy

Thursday, Friday my wife cracked the whip and got me to finish the trim in the overhead door cove we made in the shop. We were sitting around, watching the non-stop drizzle and wind and she brought this up, so we went out and did it. Looks much nicer now. She is really good about offering to help, even though it is limited to driving me around up at the ceiling with the fork lift. She was diagnosed with Osteoporosis last year and has to be careful with how much she lifts now.

Friday, I sold my 1954 Chev 210, so...

Today, we went tree shopping in the rain/drizzle. Frikken weather is driving us nuts. We bought a Prairie Expedition Elm and a Hakura Nishiki Willow. We want a Prairie Gold Aspen too, but the field the B&B trees are in was way too muddy for our street shoes. We will be going back next week with the truck and trailer to bring the trees home and will bring our Sorrels with to pick out the Aspen. Might get a Prairiefire Crab at that time too. We have 2 acres of mostly open yard that needs a LOT more landscaping and trees.

Mounted a new Eley hose reel and Pit Products hand soap shelf. My third Eley reel and I have some PP products in my trailer, excellent products!
I used stainless socket head cap screws to mount the shelf, with fiber washers to insulate the aluminum from the stainless wash sink.

Up next is remounting the vise on the freshly powder coated Equipto bench and morning the fire extinguisher.

I determined that a re-organization of my shop was in order before starting another Chevelle project. -Bill W

If it was me, I'd cut that 4x4 under the bench leg back most of the distance to the leg. I would be tripping on that every time I used the vise.

It extends only to the front edge of the bench, never tripped on it. Aside from raising the bench height, (I'm 6'2") I had trouble with heavy stuff, like an automatic trans in a trans cradle, trying to tip the bench forward. - Bill W

OK, it appeared to be even with the front and it sounds like it's been there for some time. You are probably not as clumsy as me either...:grin:

The office and the Museum have been hogging a lot of my time. But did get some work done on my shop today.

Just about finished with my suite of add ons to the warehouse side. I did not want to take up any shop space. Entire suite is only 17 feet long. Mob/broom closet, kitchenette (no sink... but a beer fridge), water closet (just a toilet and a mini deep sink) and a utility room to house the "water heater". Water heater is a point of use design. Just enough hot water to wash up. I had purchased a gas tankless, but didn't need it, as I nixed the plans to include a shower.

Got the granite countertop put in the kitchenette. Was going to do a backsplash, but seeing there is no sink (just the mini fridge and a countertop microwave) decided to just caulk it. Will paint the caulk wall color when it dries.

Used black pipe for the toilet paper and paper towel dispenser. My grandsons asked how I change the paper roll. Showed them that you just unscrew the flange on the end.

Did more sheetrock work today. Still need to trim everything.

Late March I bought 2 1967 C-10 trucks, 1 in NE Kansas and the other in Wheeless, OK. Look that up, it may as well have been NM. I wanted other parts the seller had and he kept putting off getting them ready for me, so a week ago I said I was coming down for the truck and he said he would have "everything ready". I left home at 8:45 am Monday April 25 and drove thru to Hutchinson KS and had a room for the night. I left there at 3:30 am and was at the location, after some terrible directions, at 10:45 am. NOTHING was ready and we spent the next 5 hours dismantling another truck for the parts I wanted and still didn't have time to get them all. His family runs cattle and he was supposed to be helping them round them up for market that day. As it was, I left at 4 PM and went to Boise City, OK. I was caked in dirt from the wind blowing like the dust bowl days, as they are extremely dry in OK. I bought a shower at the Love's truck stop in Boise, ate some pizza and hit the road at 6PM. I arrived home at 8:15 PM Wednesday. 2,022 rt miles in 60 hours. All that for this prize...:wink:


https://www.yenko.net/forum/cache.ph...2FDSC09346.JPG

Sometimes I wonder about the things we put ourselves through in this hobby.

Really getting hard to find a 67 these days. Eventually, you will probably be glad you did it.

Refinishing counter tops. We have an extra kitchen in the basement and want to update the white p-lam tops but didn’t want to spring for new stone, so let’s see how the Rustoleum kit does. Just like doing garage floors. ;)

Tonight’s episode will be sanding smooth and top coating. Wish me luck, hate to screw it up now after all the initial phases seemed to go ok.

Looks good.