Piles be gone

Just have the top corner by the street to cover now. Another 10 yds ought'a do it. Then I'll see about jury rigging up that old power pole for a log drag.



Slow and imprecise w/ that narrow box but just keep chipping away at it. Having trouble getting a good level in the gravel at top of that back slope. When pulling uphill the box lifts up above grade as the tractor rolls onto the top level. When pulling down hill the box tends to cut in as the tractor rolls onto the incline. Got to where I'd cut across the transition on an angle and that worked reasonably well.

I s'pose it'd either be amusing or frustrating for a skilled operator to watch me working during amateur hour. /heh

That'd be OK with me. It's cheaper than therapy.

Tractor therapy

Been picking away at the rock piles in the lower drive. It's dark after work now so have to wait for weekends or sneak in a few passes before work. Got the back uphill slope pretty well done. Now to working on the level top straightaway(front stretch).

I s'pect it's going to take another 20 yds to finish out to the road and the front uphill slope.

It slows the process down when the box/blade is narrower than the tractor's track. Don't want to go shopping for a wider box (time -- much less the cash out), but have been thinking about ways to mod the box on the cheap. Not clear what the most direct solution is to that.

Fab/bolt on some outriggers/wings?
Bolt a tough beam/board across the bottom back of the box? Maybe with some angle on it to protect the cutting edge?
Hit the local scrap yard in search of a 6' chunk of steel?

Probably will just finish the job before I get any mod done. I've got an old power pole laying in the lot that's 6-7" thick and at least 15' long. Maybe I'll just cut that in 2 or 3 and make a log drag out of it. Now I'm wishing I'd kept that length of scrap chain link that recently went to the dump. It'd have been perfect for a log drag...

Mo' piles

Another 20 tons of aggregate landed today.



Managed to knock the piles mostly down before it got totally dark. Too dark for a shot of that. It'll be interesting to see by dawn's early light what sort of mess I made.

/heh

16 tons and whattya get?

Actually that's a little over 20 tons in piles.



The "Eyesore" warming up. Greased, gassed, and ready to give the Zane Thang a proper test grading the drive.

Wearing down the piles. Got a little exciting a couple times working close to the edge with 2 uphill wheels cutting into the piles. Cutting brake saved me from rolling off the edge at least once at the far bottom corner.



Oh yeah, say hallo to my leetle friend.


Looks like it'll take another 30 or 40 tons or rock to cover the rest of the racetrack drive. That took a bit over an hour for this amateur operator. Pretty good workout w/out power steering. I actually broke a bit of a sweat.

Actually it's salvaged (reground) concrete. Smells like it too when you stir it up. If it works as planned it'll pack really tight when it gets damp and driven on. The road up to my local shooting range has this material. It's also like a dusty paved road it packs in so tight. The residual cement must do some bonding.

Got my Zane Thang On

Fired up the engine. Raised the lift. Got a slightly better angle to work the c-clamp press. It was tight all the way out but after I exposed the pin's shaft, it came the last bit with a 28 oz persuader and visegrips.



Ah, the sweet sweet smell of success (and penetrating oil).






Voila! Seems to work fine sitting in the drive. Now to head down to the field and see how it does holding position moving some gravel around. Not just now though, sitting here in my Sunday best (such as it is)...

Git yer Zane Thang On!

How to turn a 5 minute job into an all day off and on project...

Seemed simple enough to push a pin out of the lift arm on my tractor and replace it with a longer bolt. I need the bolt to install a Zane Thang which will allow control of the lift position.

Woulda' been simple job if that pin hadn't apparently been in the same hole since 1941. It's happy there. Doesn't want to leave it's comfy, cozy home.

So far it has resisted my increasing insistent ministrations. First tapping, then penetrating oil, prying, vise grips, an puller improvised from a socket and nasty old c-clamp.

Rassin' Crassin'...

One more try with the puller tomorrow, then the torch is coming out.

Baby gets a new bumper

That right thar is a gen-you-ine copy of a Ford 9N bumper.
Now I just have to bolt it up to "the eyesore." Well, actually I have to touch up the paint before I do anything. Of course that's not just any old color of red paint. It's Ford Vermillion Red. Try and find that in yer Home Depot paint dept.

O' course you can buy it online from the antique tractor geek store. The internet changes everything and you buy EVERYTHING online for these old 9N/2N/8N Fords.
O' course you have to buy a 6-pack. (sigh)
Well maybe some other Ford guys locally can use some/deal for what I don't need. Looks like the fellow down the hill from us is trying to get his 8N running -- it could use some paint. Ran into an old guy getting coffee today; one of the regulars. He told me he's trying to deal right now for a basket case Ford to restore.

While we're on the subject...

...of tractors:


Moral of the story: never tick off a redneck who own's a backhoe.

On the SCOTUS ruling yesterday: it seems like everyone in the blogosphere is talking about the Heller 2nd Amendment decision. I have nothing intelligent to add to it. Better minds and more eloquent voices have said much already.

I will say this to 2nd Amendment supportors; this wasn't Yorktown in the struggle to preserve the 2nd Amendment. This was more like Saratoga. It proved we can win a strategic battle but we have not yet won the war or vanquished the enemies of freedom.

This is no time for "We the People" to pack up camp and go home. The appeal of just going back home to live a peaceful and godly life is strong, but, there is still a long slog, difficult odds and some tough winters ahead.

The price of freedom is indeed eternal vigilance. The 2nd is worth fighting for.

Chief Justice Story wrote that the 2nd Amendment is the Palladium (armed guardian) of the Second Amendment.

Demolition Man -- Day 3

That'll do pig. That'll do.


In the end I'm not sure if I saved anything vs having the more expensive contractor with bigger equipment do it later. At worst it's a wash. I'll settle for that. Nice to see some progress.

Now to wait for the heavy equipment and the serious cutting & packing to get going in a couple weeks.

Day 2: Demo Man

Morning of day 2. Cinderblock wall and last bit of old cistern are no more.

Both sections of wall are gone, along with the concrete apron transition from the road (what was left of the old drive).


The last of it before the serious cutting and packing starts in a couple weeks (D.V.) is to clear all the organic matter from the lot. I made a good pile last night with the 1941 9N. Too much slope for the old tractor to get up in places -- just don't have adequate traction with the 2WD. Maybe if I had water in the tires I could have done some more, but, not much. In any case, the Bobcat skidsteer and excavator is making pretty short work of the remainder of grass/weeds/brush.

The contractor hauled off two loads in his 20yd truck today. First load was 11 tons -- get a lot of soil in with the scraped grass and such. It should be wrapped up by lunch tomorrow.


Rebar, rebar and more rebar. Everywhere. Overbuilt. The old boy who built this was a man after my own heart.

Demolition Man

A real "Home Improvement, Binford type moment" going on at our place today. There's about 80' of concrete filled cinderblock and footing to demo along the old drive/shop retaining wall.

Brought in a hired gun with Bobcat and Bobcat Excavator. He gets that breaker attachment working and it's a thing of beauty. Arrr, arrr, arrrrrrrr


Check out the 1 1/2" steel in that one length of wall!!! Holy rebar Batman! The old boy who built the place for himself back in the day was a mason and was owner/operator of a granity quarry in his later years. By the looks of things there must have been some Caltrans steel "falling off" trucks at the quarry.

Last year when this same operator tore out the old 16K gallon cistern and drive/shop slab we took out an insane amount of steel. Completely filled up his 20yd dump truck -- most of if with 1" or 1 1/2" rebar. The concrete cistern bottom was nominally 18" thick"! It was built like a Nazi Normandy bunker.



We're taking about 30' of that granite quarry stone wall along the road. It grieves my soul to demo any of this old granite wall but it's a necessary evil to get the turning radius I need to access the lot with a trailer.

No worries. Still have ~400' of these walls on the property. As much as 10' tall at it's highest and still solid/crack free after nearly 50 years. The old boy really knew how to build 'em.

Mystery solved

The age of the eyesore has been determined thanks to this very helpful website. LINK
I tell ya, these antique tractor guys are even crazier than the aircooled VW crowd. I know. Hard to imagine! ...and yes I gotta say -- How COOL is that?

Looks like the guy I bought from was a bit off in his estimate.
What we've got is a 1941 Ford 9N.

Previous related post LINK

Now, to get that little 4ft brush hog into service. That unit could be the end of me. (ahem) It might result in an obituary posting here at some later date.

I can only dream of working a flat patch this 9N is...

Right off I need to get an overrunning clutch (ORC) to put on the PTO drive shaft. This old tractor doesn't have a "live PTO". That's NOT a good thing if you're in a hurry to stop. With a transmission driven PTO like the 9N has, the mower will keep the tractor moving even when you want to stop. YIKES!

So it's off to Northern Tool online and order an ORC.
Without an overrunning clutch the rotating mass of the Brushhog will continue to turn the PTO drive and keep turning the tractor axles when the clutch is disengaged.
The toughest part may be getting the u-joints and drive on that brushhog to take lube/grease. It's been sitting a while and also was in the middle of a patch that burned in last fall's wildfires. So there's a few odds and ends to tend to: I picked up a couple clevis pins on the way in to work today.
Also I wish this mower had safety chain shield hanging over the front edge. It would be nice to slow down the inevitable rock launches out the front toward (me) the driver. Maybe I should fabricate that safety chain shield too. I'd need to pick up some flat stock, scrounge for odd lengths of unused chain and bum some welding time from a buddy.