New toy update

Took a couple hours on the new tractor yesterday. As a reminder the PO suggested that the PTO clutch was blowing the fuse, he said he measured it at 0 ohms.

The hood was adjusted too far forward anyway so I pulled it off finding only 2 of the 4 bolts that should be there. The PTO clutch showed 3.5 ohms which is exactly in the middle of the 3-4 ohm range. I took a 12v drill battery and applied power and could hear the clutch engage. The little jumper wires I had didn't get hot or show any sign of a short. There was a little pigtail on the wire coming from the switch, I disconnected that and hooked the wire to the clutch, flip the switch and the clutch engaged as it should.

Fire up the tractor and the clutch engaged but no hydraulics. Turns out theres ANOTHER clutch on the poorly mounted hydraulic pump. It looks like what happened was the pigtail used to go to that clutch also, got torn off and grounded to the frame which caused the fuse to pop.

I ended up reworking the pigtail, it was assembled upside down. I'm not happy with the routing but I just wanted to see if I could get the hydraulics to function.

Success! Lift goes up and down, bucket rolls. Everything I suspected about the hydraulic cylinders being too long is true, the lift arms are so long the bucket won't rest flat on the ground. 2" shorter cylinders would fix the problem.

I took a ride to Tractor Supply to buy some bolts since my local hardware store was closed. While there I looked at the hydraulic assortment and realized that everything on the tractor is from Tractor Supply. So the builder just bought stuff that was "close". So I'll be measuring and buying stuff thats right instead. Fortunately the rams all work so I should be able to sell them off to mitigate the cost.

Used the loader to haul firewood, I'm not sure its any faster than just using my garden cart but I wanted it to warm up and see if there were any engine troubles, there aren't other than the choke occasionally sets itself, the tower where the steering wheel is needs to come apart anyway, the bolster for the steering shaft is boogered, shouldn't be hard to fix.

Anyway the positive news for the day is I took a $1200 not-working loader and turned it into an $1800 mostly-working loader. Not bad for $1.00 worth of connectors.

A new toy

I've been looking at garden tractor loaders off and on for a couple years now. I even bought plans to build my own which of course was relegated to the "round tuit" pile.

Today I picked up a 1977 Cub Cadet 1650 (16hp, hydrostatic drive) with a loader on it. I think the loader was homemade with some modifications after initial construction.

I paid $1200 which is about half what I would normally expect to pay for such a thing. The electric PTO clutch doesn't work so I can't engage the hydraulics to run the loader but it starts easily even in the teens and is able to slide the loader bucket along pretty well.

I've been researching the PTO clutch and as with most things I won't really know whats up until I dig into it, the clutch itself is pretty simple and only about $150 if I find it needs replacement. The previous owner said it worked and then started blowing fuses, the wiring is a little hacked but not too bad so I'll pull it apart and see whats going on.

The hydraulics look like they were rigged by a halfwit, I plan to replace some of the hoses with hard lines since they're too short to route better than they already are. I'd like to replace the single cylinder currently hooked up for the bucket with two cylinders on the lift arms. Getting that stupid looking big cylinder out of the way would allow the hood to open correctly.

Anyway its a fun new toy and as I told the neighbor it'll keep my out of the bars.

A couple easy fixes

"I love it when a plan comes together." - Hannibal Smith

The other day plowing snow after sundown I noticed that the ammeter on the Cub Cadet was reading negative. A check with the multi-meter proved that the ammeter was correct and we were discharging.

A bit of google-fu found some troubleshooting instructions that mostly revolved around the voltage regulator, being the "brains" of the system that seemed a reasonable place to start.

The VR on these is real old school technology, basically unchanged from the '40s. First find the bat terminal and ensure it gets 12v even with the key off. Mine didn't... This set off a line of thinking that maybe the problem was actually just dirty contacts so I proceeded to remove each contact and scrub with a wire brush. Turned out to be the correct choice, 12v was restored to the bat terminal and charging commenced:

Not bad for a no-money job.

A few years ago I made a short video about the Jetta in the snow. Since we had a larger snowstorm this time I thought I'd make a follow-up. Then I made 2 mistakes.

#1. Behind where I had parked is a hole, the hole was bottomed with ice. I didn't use enough power to get across the ice and go the car stuck. Queue hilarity getting the car out.

#2. Some months ago the muffler fell off this car, that in itself is no big deal, the resonator is still there and does an adequate job, the car isn't too loud. However theres an aluminum heat shield above where the muffler goes which got bent down under the car by the force of the snow. A couple big sheet metal screws and large washers fixed that. I also managed to put one washer on a existing stud with a new nut:

Moving right along the snow flap on the back of the '98 Jag got bent so it drags up under the sled. It makes noise while you ride and catches when the suspension compresses. The flap is held on with 4 torx screws, I removed it and used the heat gun to get it bent the right way again. Then I secured a couple tears with zip ties and reinstalled:

Need to be careful in the summer with how I attach the tarp on this machine so I don't bend the flap again.

Not a bad day's work...

Power went out

Happy 2017!

Power went out just before lunch yesterday, no problem, the wood stove was already hot for warming up lunch:

After lunch I read for an hour thinking the power would come back on, when it didn't I went out to the garage and got my backup battery, hooked it to my Coleman brand inverter, plugged in the cable modem and wifi router and got back to work:

This was a proof of concept run, I haven't tried this since we got our cable modem. In practice the inverter is kind of loud, I'd put it on our enclosed porch and run a cable. I should also make better battery connections but it worked well for an hour until the power came back on.I posted the pics on Facebook and friends said "Oh its good you're prepared" well heck I didn't even light a lantern or pull out a stove...

Prepping for winter

Had a little spare time the other day so I pulled my 51 year old Snapper rear engine riding mower out of the garage and chewed up the leaves. They had been down for awhile so they were already pretty far gone. I worked from one side of the yard to the other pushing the leaves along so when I got to the other side it was easy to scoop the leaves and grass clippings directly into the compost bin. This makes excellent compost and it was heating up the next day.

With the yard clear I let the engine in the mower cool down a little and drained the oil. I refilled with Mobil 1 15w50 which is heavier than the 5w40 I usually use but won't cause any issues. I'll let it warm up a little longer next year before really putting load on the engine.

I use blue painters tape to remind me when the oil was changed, I like to change it before putting the mower into storage but I don't always get the opportunity. The painters tape removes easily when I do the next change. I do the same thing with the snowblower. Now I just need to find time to pull out the snowblower and push the Snapper back into that spot.

Another week at camp

Deer camp was last week. For context deer camp is the week we hunt deer, as opposed to moose camp which was the week we hunted moose or just any regular trip to camp.

We didn't shoot any deer although Dad saw two which is always nice. Deer are pretty scarce in northern Maine. Back around 1980 there was a spruce bud worm infestation which killed a lot of the spruce trees. Its not unlike the asian bark beetle thing people are all worried about now. In the wake of the worm big sections of the forest were clear cut which removed much of the habitat for the deer. In the winter the little buds on the spruce trees are just about all the deer have to eat and theres no place to hide in the clear cuts. So the deer moved out and the moose moved in. The moose don't mind behind out in the clear cut and they browse on all sorts of things that come up in the first regrowth so they had lots of food.

Now its almost 40 years later and the spruce trees planted in the wake of the worm are nearing full maturity, they've grown in thick in the way that the forests used to be and in ways that the moose don't like. If you're an 800# moose you don't want to be pushing through thick spruce forests so you head out to more open spaces. Today the moose population is in decline and the deer population is on the rise. When I shot a moose in 1999 our butcher skinned and quartered 14 moose in one day. This year when Dad shot his moose the same butcher figured he might do 14 moose in 2 weeks. In '99 he thought he might process a couple deer, this year he figured on 50 or 60.

Anyway I do bring a couple projects for deer camp, this year I installed a couple 12v reading lights:

This is above my bunk, to the right of the light is the mount for Angie's battery powered light. Dad's bunk is on the other side of the wall, theres a hole behind my light with another wire that goes to another light at Dad's bunk. The lights are 2.5w when on full and have a low power blue light setting as well. They throw lots of light and are great for reading. Now that we have solar it seemed silly to have batteries for flashlights as a continuing expense, these lights were a test and since they worked so well I'll be ordering some more.
Last summer Dad installed a 20w LED fixture over the kitchen table, the gas light was producing too much heat to be comfortable. If it'd been me I'd have looked for about 10w, the one he got is really bright but its nice when you first get to camp to be able to turn on the inverter and hit the switch without having to turn on the gas. I'm going to get another 12v light to go over the sink, the inverter draws .25A all by itself, the reading lights are about .20A.

A few years ago I spent a bunch of time learning to make the best french fries possible. One thing I learned is you can't beat frying in lard, nothing works as well or tastes as good. This year we tried something new and made fried shrimp:

The batter is just ploy mix, the trick is getting the right consistency and letting the shrimp dry a little before battering them. Dad tried to recreate my shrimp a few nights later but couldn't get the batter to stick as well as I could. He didn't let his shrimp drip so his batter got too wet. Maybe I should make a video on this...

We didn't see much game but one day I spotted this little critter:

In this picture I'm about 3 feet away from him and he's finally starting to get upset. When I spotted him we were in the truck, I rolled down the window and called out but he didn't move. I got out of the truck and he didn't move. It wasn't until I got this close that he finally got upset with me. A second or two later he ran down a hole under the stick and wouldn't come back out. Weird squirrel...

A very Maine week

Went moose hunting with my dad last week. Its kind of a big deal since there were only 2140 permits this year. Dad drew wildlife management district 19 which is waaay outside of our normal range. This is "downeast" which is to say the far eastern corner of Maine.

Dad rented the Mickey Finn cottage at Shoreline Camps in Grand Lake Stream, Maine population 109. Driving to Grand Lake Stream takes half an hour less than driving to our camp in Caribou although its nearly 50 miles closer...

A few months ago dad went up to scout around since we don't know the area. Fortunately there woods roads just like up north.  My uncle Guy and dad's friend Dave also came out so the four of us piled into my pickup truck and into the woods we went.
This is good moose country and we saw tons of tracks:

The first day was mostly a bust, we saw one partridge but it was really windy so Dave couldn't get close enough. Dave said he heard a couple others in the woods at different times in the day but no luck there. We saw a porcupine on the side of the road and dad took a couple shots at him with the .410 but he didn't seem terribly bothered by it. We also saw a turkey, I had never seen a turkey on a woods road before since we don't have all that many in Arostook county. I'd also never seen a lone turkey before but we didn't see any others.

Late in the day we found this cow moose:

She was big, probably in the 500-600# range, about 80 yards from the truck. Dad's permit specified a male so she was safe. We all agreed that if she had been a male it would have been worth shooting but she was out in a big swamp and it would have been a long hard job to retrieve the body.

On the way back to camp I noticed a couple roads I hadn't seen in the morning and made a note to try them the next day and I'm glad I did, on day 2 we hadn't even reached the end of the first road when there was a moose standing right in the middle of the road. Moose are big critters and standing in the middle of the road this one looked like a giant towering over the truck even though it was a good 50 yards off.

Being that we were heading east and the moose was right in front of us the glare from the sun made it hard to tell if there were antlers or not. I was quick with the field glasses and called out "Antlers!" Dad sent an 11.5mm, nearly 1oz bullet down range and the moose dropped like a stone. The bullet took him in the right shoulder and while it was a good shot and he wasn't going to get up again he wasn't dying with any real speed. The other barrel of dad's cape gun had a 16ga round ball which being that its 16ga (ie 16 balls to the pound) weighs in right at 1oz. That ball deflated the right lung and ended any suffering real quick.

Thus began the dirty work. Being the good son this falls to me. I'd done the job once in '99 when I shot a moose and again in 2009 when dad shot his little one but on a big moose like this the field dressing is a big job. The skin is thick and theres a membrane between it and the internals that has to be cut, you don't want to cut too deep though since you don't want to puncture the guts which will stink and can spoil the meat. I was very careful and managed to not cut anything bad, in all the field dressing took me close to an hour.

Finally the big job of loading the animal started, we had brought ramps with us and tied a strap between the tie down points at the front of the pickup, we then used a come-along to winch the moose up the ramps. The come-along cable was short so we could only go about 3 feet at a time with the moose trying to slide back down the ramp every time we had to reset. If you've ever used a come-along you know how frustrating they are.

After another hour we were loaded and headed back to camp. We paused for ice, its important to get the body cooled as soon as possible to reduce the possibility of spoilage so I put 10# of ice into the body cavity right away. We quickly packed up camp and headed to Waite, Maine to get the moose weighed, tagged and logged, this is also the traditional time for picture taking:

Waite is a small place (population 101) and we were definitely the biggest thing that happened all day. The cape gun was a character in this story in its own right and something nobody in Waite had seen before.
Places like Waite and Grand Lake Stream are always full of characters and we met a bunch of people who claimed to never have seen a moose before. I find that odd since we had seen so many tracks in the woods but we decided that those people must never leave the paved roads. If you want to see animals you need to go where the animals are.

In Waite I bought another 20# of ice to pack the body with for the 2 hour ride north to Caribou to our butcher Scotty of Scotty's Meat Shop. Scotty has cut all our moose for us and does a fantastic job. Since it was early in the week anyway it got to hang and age for a day or two which really improves the flavor and texture of the meat. The last time we shot a moose the meat still came wrapped in paper, these days its vacuum sealed:

I took the picture after we'd already taken about 1/3 of the meat, in all we used all the coolers we had, plus we borrowed one from Scotty, bought another and filled an apple box:

Scotty cut the skull cap for us so we can have the antlers. When I shot the moose in 1999 I cut the skull cap myself, having done it once paying Scotty $50 to do it is a great investment...

There was so much meat my parent's upright freezer was overwhelmed, we had to tape the door shut so meat wouldn't fall out.

Thats after filling the freezer in the fridge upstairs. Angie and I brought a cooler full of meat home the next day which helped the situation. Dad will give Guy and Dave meat too so this animal will feed lots of folks.