Yes, you’ve noticed I haven’t posted much this week. Here’s what’s been going on.
The weather has been good, so we’ve been getting a lot of work done around the properties. Hubby arrived from San Antonio with another car trailer load. He’s been moving his antique vehicles from the house down there to up here. So far, he’s moved the ’46 Mercury 4-door (a complete car), the Spitfire (a complete car), and the ’46 woodie station wagon body and frame. The wood kit for the restoration on that car has also been moved up here.
The latest was the body and frame. Unloading was an interesting process. Hubby has built a rolling frame which holds the body off the ground. We reassembled the frame. He has a portable crane, which he also assembled and slid between the wheels of the trailer. Then he attached six points of the body and hooked them to the crane. He lifted the body over the trailer rails, pulled the crane back from the trailer, and the trailer out from under the body. Then we rolled the rolling frame out of the garage and positioned it under the hanging body. Once positioned, he lowered the body onto the rolling frame. Once it was where he wanted it, he disconnected the straps and crane from the body. We disassembled the crane and moved it aside.
Before rolling the rolling frame into the garage, we removed the car frame from the trailer and moved it into the garage and laid it on the floor. Then we rolled the body on top of it. The woodie is now ready to be worked on. I believe his first step is to sandblast the frame and get it protectively coated (primer and paint?). After that, he plans to install brakes and wheels. Once the woodie frame can roll, he’ll be able to do other things with it. I’m not too up on this whole process, but this car is a complete body off restoration — if for no other reason than it’s in pieces to begin with.
As an aside, the results of hubby’s engineering skills are a wonder to see. He has had to do most things by himself for most of his life, so he engineers safe and mechanical ways to accomplish what needs to be done. His father and grandfather were degreed engineers, but hubby’s formal training has been in English and music. Obviously, he inherited a superb engineering ability, because the things he creates are a marvel to see.
Yesterday, we went over to the store property. We may open a business there someday, but for now, we store stuff there. The gutters have been clogging up, so we got some gutter covers. They needed installing, so while hubby started that project, I hauled out the electric lawn mower. I weedate the tallest stuff a couple of months ago, but I wanted a nice finish to start the growing season. The land around the store building is .4 acres, so I didn’t expect the electric mower would survive to do the full job in one day — it’s only rated at .33 acres per charge. I got about half done before having to put it away for recharging. While hubby was finishing the gutter cover job (8 three foot pieces were assembled incorrectly, so we’ll have to take them back to Lowe’s and exchange them), I raked and bagged leaves behind the building. I ran out of contractor bags at eight and still have about three bags of leaves to bag. I’ll get them another time. Overall, it was a productive day.
Oh, and I got the first run of Scene 18 written the other night. I need to do a review and clean up before moving on the Scene 19 — which I have to ask myself why it’s in the book. I like it, but what does it really accomplish by being there? I’m not sure yet.
