Weekend Steam: Homebuilt Steam Speeder

Not much of a description, but you can look at the info HERE.

A Rather Boring Fireline...

...is generally better than an extremly exciting fireline, but this was just a bit too slow.  We got 'r done, though.

We Like Freebies! Samsung Dryer Dropped On Us!

Our brother-in-law was given a dryer with a problem, but he didn't need it.  Our dryer was still working, but it needs a new timer and sensors, so we upgraded to the Samsung and did the necessary repairs to get it going.  For fifty bucks we have a new-to-us dryer!

Ruger's Auction To Benefit The Massachusetts Shooters Foundation

This week Ruger is offering another 25th Anniversary .44 Magnum Carbine.  It sells mid-day, March 29, 2017. Click Here to read all about it and to place your bid.  $1525

Tuesday Torque: Allen Diesel Engine

We usually see big 2-stroke Diesels, but this Allen Diesel is a four-stroke, three cylinder engine.  It doesn't sound like the big Fairbanks engines.  The writeup on YouTube says it is 200 HP and 285 RPM.

Ahhh....Monday Mornin' Comin'!

The Great Divide

I passed this milestone a bit more than thirty years ago, but today it comes to mind once more

At Thirty-Five

Three score and ten, the psalmist saith,

And half my course is well-nigh run;

I've had my flout at dusty death,

I've had my whack of feast and fun.

I've mocked at those who prate and preach;

I've laughed with any man alive;

But now with sobered heart I reach

The Great Divide of Thirty-five.

And looking back I must confess

I've little cause to feel elate.

I've played the mummer more or less;

I fumbled fortune, flouted fate.

I've vastly dreamed and little done;

I've idly watched my brothers strive:

Oh, I have loitered in the sun

By primrose paths to Thirty-five!

And those who matched me in the race,

Well, some are out and trampled down;

The others jog with sober pace;

Yet one wins delicate renown.

O midnight feast and famished dawn!

O gay, hard life, with hope alive!

O golden youth, forever gone,

How sweet you seem at Thirty-five!

Each of our lives is just a book

As absolute as Holy Writ;

We humbly read, and may not look

Ahead, nor change one word of it.

And here are joys and here are pains;

And here we fail and here we thrive;

O wondrous volume! what remains

When we reach chapter Thirty-five?

The very best, I dare to hope,

Ere Fate writes Finis to the tome;

A wiser head, a wider scope,

And for the gipsy heart, a home;

A songful home, with loved ones near,

With joy, with sunshine all alive:

Watch me grow younger every year --

Old Age! thy name is Thirty-five!

Robert Service

Collateral Damage In Prescribed Burning

Weekend Steam: Steam Shows Comin'!

Here are some shots from Old Threshers of engines I have watched for years.  There are three different Averys; an undermounted, a straight flu overmounted, and a return flu.  A forty horse Avery used to be at Mt. Pleasant, but I saw in a steam magazine that it went out of commission with a bad boiler, and it is scattered to the four winds.



Video by 1957Shep

Hank's Daddy, Ervin Simpson, Rest In Peace

I delivered a tree planting machine to Ervin Simpson well after dark, many years ago during the Spring tree planting season.  When I was ready to leave, Mr. Simpson asked me if I wanted a cat.  That's an odd question from a landowner, but Hank had been fighting with the other cat, and they had Hank declawed.  That made him worse.  A declawed cat will become a biter instead of a claw fighter, and Hank wasn't fitting in.  I put Hank in the truck with me and he rode home cuddled up against me.  We already had cats, so we put Hank in the utility room by himself and that became his home.  He was happy there, and he didn't have any problems with our other cats that way.  Every time I saw Ervin after that he would ask how old Hank was doing.  He missed his cat.  Well, Hank got bladder cancer in his old age, and we had to have him put down.  We hated that, and I did tell Mr. Simpson what happened to his old friend.  This week I saw Ervin Simpson's obituary on the WFIW Radio website.  He was a good old country boy, and I liked him from the first time I met him.  When you keep a loved pet for someone, it creates a bit of a bond.