Christmas Not My Victrola

Click over to YouTube to check out Ben Chan's other videos. He and his brother will go far.

Tree or Pole?

Here is solid evidence that Festivus is catching on! Now I have to decide whether to put up a Christmas tree this year, or an electric Festivus pole. This would be beautiful at night, kind of like Roman candles. Oops.....this is a fireworks stand, not a Festivus pole store. I am so disappointed.

Watchmaker Special

One of my friends from way back is a retired watchmaker who happens to like old cars. What kind of car is best suited to a watchmaker? The American Austin, of course! Forty years ago he restored his first Austin, and I thought it was a beauty. That's my friend in the top photo in his first big restoration job. That car was nice, but it was very rough to start with, and it was a car you would drive to shows. He sold it long ago.

A couple years ago he found a good 'Barn Fresh" Austin and went all out to make it into a showpiece.

The tires were made for motorcycle sidecars.

The motor is rebuilt to tighter specs than when it was new. You could drive across the country in this little beauty, but if it has to move more than a few blocks, it is loaded into a closed trailer.

Christmas Not My Victrola

Monday Again!

Back To The Old Grind!

Remember

Weekend Steam

This video, by smgussey, is one I picked up on YouTube, and is interesting because the Case steamer takes off from a dead stop with a multi-bottom plow in the ground. The clutch had begun slipping and adjustments had to be made, and that is where this video begins. There is some great stack talk.

The next video is the view from the operator's platform on a smaller Case steamer. This video is by ddog7831, a young steam operator. Thank You, ddog!

Crankin' It Up

We pulled another one out of the cabinet that we had not listened to before. This one is a Billy Murray-Ada Jones duet of an Irving Berlin song,"I'll Take You Back to Italy." This was one of the songs in the Broadway play, "Jack O' Lantern" which ran from Ocober 16, 1917, to June 1, 1918. There were 265 performances, and there were 65 in the cast. Wouldn't you love to be able to go back and see some of these stage plays? We played this as usual, on the old Brunswick.

Eye of the Beholder

Ernie Pyle's books are always a good choice when you have a few minutes and want to read something that will entertain, teach, or touch you with a bit of poignancy. I flipped open one of my copies of 'Home Country' last night and found this gem about Ernie's father.

"We were disappointed in my father and my cousin as tourists on their western trip. We persuaded them to come back by way of Canada so they could see Lake Louise, which I considered the most beautiful sight I had ever seen. I noticed that he never said much about it in his letters, so when we reached home next time I asked him about Lake Louise. Had they seen it? Yes, they even walked clear to the other end and back. And weren't they impressed by it, by that first breath-taking sight of the blue water and the great towering mountain and the white glacier at the far end? No, not especially. Well, what was the reason? No reason, just weren't impressed. The best thing they saw in the Canadian Rockies was when they got to Banff and went to a movie."

I Don't Miss It

Oil well service rigs stayed busy this year with the big spike in oil prices. Lots of wells that had been shut in were pulled and worked over in hopes of rejuvenating production. The well in this video is in southern White County, Illionis. The rig is a double drum; one drum has a short line for pulling rods and tubing; the other drum has a long line for swabbing. In this video the crew is running in a string of pipe to do a workover. This could mean cleaning out a well or deepening it. The pump sitting on the right is for circulating fluid to bring out the crud or cuttings. A power swivel would be used to rotate the pipe. A pit has to be dug next to the well for the fluid.

As you watch you will see the crew snap the elevators on a joint of pipe, the rig picks it up, and then the pipe is lowered onto the last joint that was run in. The power tongs are then raised to the new joint to screw it in. The pipe is picked up out of the slips and lowered into the well. The sound of the pipe sliding off the stack makes me just a little nostalgic. Notice how easily the elevator man can flip around a joint of pipe.

Most of my work in the oil field was servicing and fixing the rigs and trucks for a well service company. I spent a lot of time under these rigs fixing things like air brakes and drive shafts. I prefer working with trees.

E-Postal Results! and More!

Curtis Lowe has the November E-Postal results up on his blog. Click over there to look at the scores on a very interesting match. Rugers got a good workout this month, including my mother's new 1973 vintage Single-Six.

Before she took it out to shoot we put in a 17 lb. Wolf hammer spring and a 30 oz. trigger return spring. These made the Ruger much easier to shoot. We shot a few targets to dial in the sights, moving the rear sight down several clicks, and left one click. Mom shot a couple of bullseye targets to get a feel for her gun, then shot the postal match target. This match required shooting at the first nine balls in order at 7 yards, with any kind of rest allowed. Mom sat in a chair and rested her forearms across the back of a second chair. Her first shot missed all the balls, but for the next five shots she was in the zone. She reloaded, missed the 7, hit the 8, and missed the 9. She is very pleased with her revolver and is anxious to practice more. One of EJ's cousins was watching, and since he had never shot before, we had to do some range orientation with him, then let him try his hand at shooting .22 pistols. He was able to keep most of his shots in a 3 1/2 inch circle at 7 yards after a bit of practice, and then he shot the postal targets a couple of times. He hit 4 out of the 9 both times, but not in the right order. Oh Well, he had a good time, and the next time he comes out to the country we will make sure he gets to burn more ammo with us.

Shopping Again

We spent a good bit of time car shopping on Friday and Saturday of last week. We saw this Model T truck along the road as we came home on Saturday afternoon. It is a bit better than 'barn fresh'; it will start and run. The guy told us that it needs bands in the transmission.

The ignition system has been cobbled up. The timer has been replaced by a distributor, and the coils and coil box are gone; replaced by a modern ignition coil. Model T trucks have a low speed rear end for rough service, and this one has a two speed rear end, so it will probably run as fast as a car.

I am wanting to spend a bit less time under cars, so I am passing on this beauty. Feel free to jump in and buy a project. It is located on IL Highway 15 between Keenes and Bluford. Below are more pages from Dyke's Encyclopedia. Click on each photo to enlarge, then right click and save as to keep these references in your hard drive.

Click on the T's label at the end of the post or in the label list to save all of these pages on the Model T.