New World Datsuns...

Now I want me some tacos!

I spent about 10 hours yesterday doing landscaping work at the old homesite and I guess the sun really taxed me harder than I thought. I was basically useless today. Spent a couple hours in the office prepping for an upcoming assignment then waited for some deliveries.

I've been prepping the Chief for a ride with Jerod next month and a passenger backrest and luggage rack are the last missing items. The factory Indian stuff is rare, expensive, and thanks to my aftermarket bags and mounts, wouldn't even fit anyway. I spent a bunch of time researching and came up with this unit for a Suzuki C90 that was NIB for $99 delivered.

I trimmed the ends off the mount plates and drilled a new hole in each one.

It mounted to the middle two eyebrow bolts and it's rock solid. Done deal.

I also put my windshield back on so I'm officially in old man touring mode.

Final touch is a cheapo temp gauge to satisfy my curiosity.

What temp are you measuring, fluids, block?

Oil temp in the tank. It's basically just a meat thermometer built in to the fill cap. There's really not much you can do about it on an air cooled engine anyway. I'm just curious how much it fluctuates.

Over this past week I chipped away at some landscaping work at the bottom of the hill. This was working toward the goal of setting it up for occasional RV usage. The weeds were completely out of control and some were taller than me. Also, you might make out the railroad ties that were used to terrace some flower beds in front of the old house. Those got yarded out with the ol' 8N and the help of my dad, the choke setter.




Around the perimeter of the old "foundation" was a pretty pronounced edge where we dragged the railroad ties. By foundation, I mean a crude footing with about 20 of these tornado straps buried in the concrete.

My dad used a cutoff wheel to weaken the rebar and I broke them off with a sledge. Then we placed the ties around the perimeter.

Then it was weedeater time. I had to dig out and haul off the pavers from the old steps up to the porch.

After that, more mower work then dragged the blade around with the tractor to try to re-contour and smooth everything. And that's pretty much where I left off.




I ran 3 short on the railroad ties as some were really rotten. I probably had about 20 hours in this week. Seems like a lot for what I got done but there was a lot of digging and picking and hauling and dumping. There was a lot of junk under the porch. Plus it was pretty warm this week and I wasn't smart enough to start early and quit before it got into the 90s.

Next phase is to round up 3 more railroad ties, bring in some gravel for the RV pad, slightly relocate the water, power, and septic dump. Then dig up about 70' of old paver walkway, fill that void with dirt, and plant a bunch of grass. Never ends.


And while I was typing all this, brown dog picked a fly off the window and ate it. Weirdo.

I spend a lot of time around here pulling weeds or spraying Roundup on them, I have paths on my east and north fence lines that grow weeds 3' tall, also weeds grow under the grape vines in the photo below.





It's never ending during the growing season, I water a different way now but this year it has not been near as hot and has been raining every week, so they are getting watered even though I went thru a lot of effort to keep them areas dry.

You have way more land to deal with, and you have grander plans than I have.
You like that yellow tractor type sprinkler, I have one you can have if you are going to be in this area, it is too big for my yard.

I love that tractor sprinkler but almost never use it any more. Thanks anyway. Yard at the new house has a sprinkler system and the old yard is just starting to yellow this week. I'll let it go dormant to save work this year. Look at how green it was in my before photos from Tuesday vs how yellow it was yesterday. It turned quick.

I haven't had great luck with Roundup over here. Plus, its expensive. Simplot sells 2.5 gallon jugs of a weed killer called Buccaneer Plus that works waaaay better and only costs about $50. I've made that jug last all year and still have about 1/2 gallon left. I'll probably grab another soon.

Did a 120 mile test and recreation ride today. I wanted to double check the pushrod tube leak and see how it travels with all the touring gear on it. Good news is the tube leak appears to be fixed. Bad news is that the windshield lets me hear a lot more noises. There's a rattle up front I need to sort out. Also, I think I'm going to back the timing off just a bit. I can hear it rattle momentarily when I roll on.
I tip-topped the tanks at the beginning and end of the ride. 60mpg averaging about 60mph. That's outstanding! My old Goldwing never did better than 50 and was down to 35 after I did the spoke conversion and regeared it.

I used to move mobile homes when I was younger, about 16 years old. The way we put those strap anchors in is with an auger with a lawnmower engine on it that had handles on each side. Two guys holding that thing would not stop you from getting slapped into the side of the trailer when you hit a rock. Those straps would not keep a tornado for taking that thing away. One time we were moving a mobile home for guy and it was his third. The first one had gotten wiped out by a tornado south of Montgomery Alabama, so the second one he had he put those straps every 2 feet apart, alternating between them going around the frame and then around the complete mobile home itself. They were anchored into an 8 inch thick concrete slab. The next tornado that took the second mobile home away from him left the floor and all the furniture where it was and just took the walls and the roof. Some people never learn.

Believe it or not that was a job I enjoyed.



Oh, and take the windshield back off and you won’t hear the noises.

Squeaks and rattles to mechanics is so, so much more irritating than you can imagine.

I have my ear so you Ed to my work truck now. I can tell what tool fell over in one of the lockers by now.


I just developed a new wind noise. Drives me bonkers. It is such a slight wind/reed noise. One of the seals on the box walls let out just a little. Co-workers can't hear it. It's sooo loud to me.


After my last trip to Boise...I want to stay there more and more with every trip. SMH. Actually thinking of planning a week long family vacation there.

Take the kids to the water park.
https://www.roaringsprings.com/

Check their calendar because they do weird hours and days as the season winds down.

DRIVEN wrote: ↑Tue Jul 16, 2019 5:28 am Take the kids to the water park.
https://www.roaringsprings.com/

Check their calendar because they do weird hours and days as the season winds down.

I was just right next to that...almost went myself.
The IMAX theater is tempting as well.

Blew off my chore list this morning for a test-em-out-N-sight-em-in trip. Spent about 3 hours at the range. The 100 yard bay was occupied but the one next to it was about 80.

The Creedmoor is awesome! Almost no recoil and immediately started stacking divots on the plate. I think with some practice, even I could place some good hits.

I took my 82 year old out and fed her some 60 year old MREs. It's been in this ridiculous configuration for about 2 1/2 years and I still haven't made time to stretch her out yet.

This thing is a stupid, ridiculous money pit, but dammit, I love to shoot it.

Remember this thing?

You know what it wants to do? It wants to knock your fucking teeth out. Another exercise in ridiculousness.

I also retested and sighted this AR. It's seen a lot of configurations over the years and most recently it got switched out to the skinny fore end and fixed stock. This is as bread N butter as it gets. Rock solid reliable and i was able to put 90 rounds in a row on a 1' gong with only 4 strays using the crappy iron sights. And I'm not a good shot. There are several ARs at my house but this one has always been a favorite. It's simple and it just plain works.


I also played with some pistols. A couple unreliable .380s that I had hoped I'd fixed (I hadn't) and this AR. First time out since I installed the Law folder. Sighted in the Sparc and rang the gong over and over like it was a rifle. Pretty impressive for aN 8" barrel pistol.




I still love it here.

Guns are fun. That folding stock is pretty cool. Too bad you cant fire it with it folded. Also, that stock on the rifle sure is pretty.

The Law folder is a quality piece but as you mentioned, can't be fired when folded. I was tempted to try a couple of the less expensive competitors but reviews indicated quality issues.

The Boyds stock is really nice in appearance and ergonomics. Once you add options they can get pretty expensive but I'd buy from them again. It's not pillar bedded but the barrel is floated. I also had to do a bit of inletting for the Timney but in the original configurationit fit like a glove. If it was a hunting rifle I'd probably go fiberglass for weather and weight. That Mosin is a porker and even with the brake and overall mass, still kicks pretty good.

I got back from 2 weeks working in Honduras at 2am. I've got a handful of assignments close to home for the next week or so then hoping to do a long weekend ride with Jerod. You know how much I'll be thinking about yard work?

DRIVEN wrote: ↑Thu Aug 08, 2019 6:29 pm

you 2 bad ass bikers need some sunscreen. lol

was the person taking the pic burned as bad as you 2 ? again lol

When I rode back in the 70s/80s I didn't like riding my road bikes on gravel, I had hit gravel on black top before on a curvy road and almost went down.
Plus dry gravel creates a cloud of dust when your riding with others, unless I was leading I didn't even want to be there.

Haha, I'm not a gravel fan either. We were only about 15' off of a pretty decent paved road. Today was day 4 and we've been trying to dodge the rain. Mostly unsuccessfully.