A Fast Paced Week

A weekend ago, we took a trip north to see a few fun things.  Sunday, we focused on trains.  Our first stop was lunch at the Whistle Stop restaurant in Monon.  It had quite a few good exhibits around the yard, and it took a good long while to get through. 

 

Then up to the Hesston Steam Museum for their "Family Fun Day".  We were able to ride on 3 different sizes of steam engines for the day.  It was a blast.

Real steam

The smallest steam engine was really small - it was a 7 inch track and we were asked not to lean from side to side.

Then we finished the day with a quick trip to the light house at St. Joseph.

The next day was a beach day at Warren Dunes.  We brought 3 big buckets of sand toys, and that is all the boys cared to do all day.

By the end of the day, they worked out a pretty good hole!

Thereafter during the normal course of the week, I got this big monster for a super bargain.  I just finished installing the electrical, and need to work a bit on the air plumbing.

This most recent weekend, we went to the Indy zoo.
I need to teach those boys how to smile.

 Yesterday, I dug up my yellow jacket nest in the ground.  This is the top layer skimmed off, and there were 3 more layers below.  Thus, it was a rather small nest.

 

I used a new method of killing the hive - water plus soap - an earth friendly means bee death.

And just tonight, I discovered another underground hive near the driveway.  With these cooler temperatures, they are pretty sluggish, so that nest should be less intense to deal with.

Things I've Killed

Just in the past week:
1.  Yellow jacket nest in the siding of the house
2.  Ground hog
3.  Mole
4.  Underground yellow jacket nest in the flower bed

I think once the underground nest is fully dead, I'll dig it up and check it out.  Eccch!

July as told through pictures

Wow, where does the time go?!?  It's near the end of July already, and I haven't made a post in quite a long time.  Here is a quick rundown of our July as told through pictures:

Smores and campfires

Camping out in the backyard

Boating and tubing at the family reunion

Admiring heavy equipment

Cleaning up junk on the old railroad track

Number 2 was happy to find coal on the railroad

Wife ran her first 5K.  

(Happy to be 473rd place)

We took a day-trip to Kokomo to see our old neighbors

...And go to the park

Number 2 Kiddo lost his second tooth

Fred joined us, and happily lives near our compost bowl

Celebrated a 6.5 year birthday for Number 2 Kiddo

We chopped down an overgrown shrub in the front of the house.  

(Don't fear - that real chain saw is not running)

Nothing like fresh corn on the cob

Worn Shaft Repair - Machining JB Weld

Well, my new (vintage) table saw has a few problems.  That's always expected, but how extensive are those problems is the real concern.  Can they be repaired for cheap?

I wired up my 220V circuit, complete with new plug and new outlet, and new switch, and the 1HP motor roared to life.  And boy did it roar.  It was much louder than I expected it should be, so I started troubleshooting.  Let's split the dictionary in half (you know that thought process, eh?).

I took off the belt from the pulley of the motor to the arbor shaft of the saw blade, and turned on the electric motor.  Either the problem will stay, or go away, and I can continue troubleshooting from there.  Well, the motor roared to life again, but this time it shuttered itself to a quick stop. 

I unplugged the motor and looked closely at the motor shaft.  I was a bit taken than I could move that shaft side to side quite a bit.  Much more slop than there should be.  It was obvious a bearing has gone bad.

Tearing things apart, the bearing was quite fine.  The shaft, on the other hand, was not.  The hard bearing whittled quite a bit of material off the shaft.  The bearing bore is 0.670, and the shaft measured at 0.630.  That is 0.040 of wobble, and that is a whole bunch.

My simple and cheap thought was to build up the worn area with JB Weld, and grind it back down to its proper diameter.  Well, I can be a little more precise than "grinding down" surely.  Let's see some pictures already!

Here's the motor armature with shaft.  

The bearing and area of interest is on the right.

This is where the bearing sits.

 This is the wear in the shaft.

 

This center silvery area is where the bearing sits:  0.040 undersized.

 

I chucked it up in the lathe, and I could see with my indicator that the wear was not even concentric.  There was a definite high and low spot.

I turned it down back to concentric.  While I don't think this was necessary, I wanted to leave a rough surface.  Better for my JB Weld to adhere to.

Applying the JB Weld to the worn area of the shaft was a piece of cake.  I noticed that the epoxy would droop over time, so I let the lathe spin as it set up.  A slow speed of 30 rpm kept the epoxy very concentric and smooth:

 

A day later, after the epoxy fully cured, I turned it down to the proper size.  JB Weld machines beautifully with a sharp insert.

The bearing fit on perfectly snug.  I thought I would see how well I did and find the high a low spots with my dial indicator.  Here's the low spot:

And the high spot...  The difference is 0.0002 or so.  That's 2 tenths of a thou.  Much improved over what it had been.

Installed it all back together tonight during a thunderstorm, and the motor sure spins smooth.  I think I'll let it sit without a belt on the pulley so as to not produce any significant loading on the bearing and new epoxy.  Perhaps a few more days will allow it to fully cure and harden.  But initial results look very promising.  Time will tell....

Wednesday Night Adventure Trip

My el-cheapo table saw just bit the dust. 

 
It's only 5 years old or so, but it is truly falling apart.  I don't use it much, and I certainly haven't abused this table saw, but you can see how it is failing.  First off, the cheap aluminum table is so thin, the bolts holding the mechanism underneath are breaking out.

Where this el-cheapo aluminum table top mounts to the base, the plastic is falling off in chunks.  Two of the 4 corners are having this problem.  

What a hunk of junk - look at that big crack:

Thank God for Craigslist.  Last night, I loaded up the family and we headed off to Monticello for the Craigslist deal of the century.  I bought an old Craftsman table saw from a guy looking to reclaim some room in his garage.  This thing is a real tank.  No plastic parts here.

I got a rolling stand, complete with caster wheels that don't roll,
and multiple slides and fences, 

and the saw itself.  It is a Model 100 from Craftsman.  It must weigh 100 pounds.

With a little research, I believe it to be mid 1950s vintage.

That electric motor is huge.  It is a 220V beast, so I will need to add a breaker and outlet to my barn, but that is a quick and easy job.  

I bought all this stuff for less than half of what I bought my junky $99 plastic table saw.  This one should last for my lifetime, I'm sure.  I'm also curious to see if I can clean in up a bit and restore it to it's former glory.  It is a good candidate for a wintertime restoration.

A New Handle Crank

With the purchase of some new steel recently,

I finally made a crank arm for the old Post Drill.

The old Post Drill had been missing this piece for as long as I can remember.  That's probably because it was never hand powered in my lifetime, but driven by an electric motor.  I designed a new crank to work as follows:

The slot is to fit around the 2 "nubbins" on the gear mechanism.

(Ignore the baked enchiladas in the background - it just shows relative size)

I made a little bend in the crank handle to avoid hitting the "advance" mechanism at the top of the post drill.

It fit just right!

Now it's just missing a wooden handle on the long carriage bolt.

 It works pretty smoothly!

Next to do is to make a proper wooden handle for this crank.

Friday Night Adventure Walk

Tonight was such a nice night, we had to 

don our capes and walk around the property: