Hope you are well

Trying to finish a stainless Channel folder today. Basic one.

Few things on the bench. You recall I told you this was my big vacation this week. Making a few things to sell. No reason .... just hate to enjoy things. Rather work and all. Been fairly quiet, huh? One less response and Simon and Garfunkel would have won another Grammy!

Been a very pain filled day. Week really. I’m torn between wishing the day was twice as long for the work hours, and wishing it was over so I could collapse at the dinner plate. Guess I’ll go with the double hours wish. (Not sure either one would actually come true, so I’m safe).

Also made some additional tooling this week that I’ve needed. It works and everything! Also I did another round of adjustments on a grinder. Dudes! I made those grinders out of junk over forty years ago, and they need repair already. I KNOW!!!

Well, better not waste part of a wish hour. (BTW ... you can talk to me in this reduced font size. Then most people won’t catch it and accuse you of giving comfort to the enemy before he finishes the ledger. Wink. What? Huh? Nothing....... wink

Ok. Back to eating stainless steel grit ....

Gary



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/29/2018 09:06PM by barnespneumatic.

Gary, I pray you get some time to rest, and that you can continue working with less pain, after you get that rest.

Scott

Gary,

I too wish for longer work days, at least Saturdays. Got lots done yesterday but been so sore and tired today.

Would enjoy seeing that forty year old grinder. Love seeing what people have created themselves rather than buying a commercial unit.

Somewhere I have a picture of a foot operated shear my grandpa made. He used many pieces of steel welded together, why? Because there was no money to buy new material or source large enough stock. Grandpa was very poor, don’t think he ever owned a car. (This is in Mexico, Mennonite background)

My dad recalls gathering aluminum scrap to pour an 11” piston that they then turned on a simple lathe. The kind that was feed by a belt from outside to a main shaft inside. There was no such thing as ordering a new piston and expedit it next day air. I saw grandpa’s workshop in the early 80’s. I would have been 8 or 9 when we visited.

Hope the meds are helping.

Pedro

Good stories Pedro,

In the mid 60’s, my Grandfather Barnes passed. Bone Cancer. I try not to think about that. Guess I don’t do a very good job on days that really hurt.

Well, after the service the family gathered. The men migrated out to my Grandpap’s Workshop. He’d been a farmer. Put together a bunch of farms. Had a large family. Did Custom Harvesting for people. Had a bunch of School busses. Tracts of timber and sawmills. And, I’ve heard many times how the lawyers got it all and made my Grandmother ask for an allowance. I heard that during his working life, men would come by the house in the evenings, to pay their bills. And if my Grandpa knew they were having trouble or illness in the family, my Grandpa would keep them busy socializing/talking ... and just never get to accepting that payment from them. I believe he was a good man.

Well, the men at his small final workshop. Where he piddled even when terminal. He was a clever man. Made all sorts of stuff. I here he was happy in the farm’s blacksmith shop. Well ... outside his final shop was a largish steel tank. And, in a circular pattern, wrapping around the tank, was a series of 1/4” holes, touching. You see he’d needed to made a rotary belly mower deck for his Farmall Cub tractor. His last. (I hear he made tractors and even School busses). Back in the 30s, I think it was ... things were different. He’d taken the frame from a huge Passenger car ... and built a School Bus Body on it to fill a small rural route down thru Salem Bottom.

The series of holes drilled oft a disk ... which he flattened with the weight of the tractor ... and created his plate steel for the 5 foot mower deck. Was a lot of holes.

When I was a very young child, I was with him in a workshop. He (as did many working farmers then) wore a hard pith hat in the field. He swatted a a bee with it, and the bee stung me. I heard many times how that really worried my Grandpa.

Now my Great Grandfather owned a big Mill powered by a water wheel. Would have been some interesting sights to see. Those were the family’s generations which would have appreciated my work. Huh.

Night
Gary

Gary
I hope you enjoyed your stay cation . We don't go much anymore but hang out and eat well and watch movies . It's fun and relaxing.
I always say I was born too late when I hear stories about the old days . I don't have any good ones to share . I never knew my grandfathers . I really always wanted to be a farmer of some kind and always admired the Amish lifestyle . There is a large population in Michigan. I know it's a hard life for most very fulfilling. I once was camping in a campground and there was a small bus load of people dropped off two sites away of 10 Amish folks camping. It was nice to talk with them and their children seeing them actually playing with home made wooden toys .

Thanks
Kurt

Couple of additional stories:

My father was a farmer. Also had busses for county school routes. Had a small farm machinery business.

If he had a chance ... he’d drive up to Lancaster, Pa. Just to sit in his old Lincoln, and watch the Amish work. It reminded him of life on the farm, as part of a huge farm family, back in the 40’s. It was the last time he was at peace with the world. In his later years, he’d drive up there in the morning darkness. It was about 90 min up there. Then he’d sit and wait until .... the sun came up, and the diner opened... at 6 am. He’d ride the back roads and look at the fields ... watch the families working. He didn’t know those people from Adam, but they were pure and worthy in his eyes. Then he’d beat it home to drive a school bus at 2:30.

Next story:

My Great Grandfather’s Mill. There was a great long heavy iron shaft, that ran from the Water Wheel, into the mill, and to the reduction gearing that ran the Mill. That shaft once sheared off. I suspect it hat to be at least a five inch shaft. And was fixed thru the wheel Hub, bearings, and gears. And, Heaven knew how long it had been in place. It had to be welded. You didn’t just go get another one. Suffice it to say that taking it out, would not be easy. So; thinking outside the box ... why not just build a Forge under and around the break. Chimney, bellows, Fire pot, etc. the heat required to forge weld a shaft that size would be simply enormous. Actually, enormous wouldn’t begin to do it.

They got those shaft ends up to approx 2,300 degrees F, fluxed the ends. And then drove the shaft end ways with sledge hammers. It welded. It remained straight. It was in the mill until it went out of service.

Gary