Filled up the Miata today. 28.5 MPG for the previous tank.

BR549

OK, after figuring out my plan, I measured both my frames and then looked at some photos of Guy's frame. At this point I realized that I was wasting my time. The difference between my two frames was due to the fact that one was a SWB and the other was a LWB, not that one had been cut off. So now the plan is to just leave it alone.

Monday I went to the dentist to have my teeth filed. No charge.

Today I pretended like I was starting the rebuild of the differential for the '72 GMC. I was limited to pretending because I did not have a bearing separator to remove the old bearings from the pinion. Quick trip to the china store to discover they are out of lower dollar goodness. What to do, what to do?

I have been trying to get caught up on my school work but I don't yet see the end in sight. I think four of the ten weeks for the summer semester are complete. Note to self: work on time management skills, if you can find the time.

The '25 auction is rapidly progressing towards various stages of completion. It is currently 45% sold.

Saturday afternoon, I called up Brian (no not that Brian, the other Brian) to borrow his plasma cutter. As I told him then, "I have some plasma that needs to be cut". Some things seems funnier before you say them out loud.

My eventual plan is to replace part of the GMC's frame with part of another frame I have. Essentially my appears to have been attacked by a torch at some point in it past and I will be replace the foot or so with a section from the other frame that is in pristine condition.

The plan is:
1. Learn how to cut a straight line.
2. Determine where to make the cuts.
3. Mark the frames.
4. Make the cuts.
5. Weld in the piece from the other frame onto my frame.
6. Grind grind grind.
7. Amaze friends and family with my mad skillz.

Step 1 is complete.

Everyone needs to play with a plasma cutter at some point.

Ebay Motors is once again having a $1 listing special. Look for the 1925 Chevrolet truck to appear later today.

Drip Drip Drip

While rolling around under the Miata Friday morning doing a visual inspection, I decided that the oil leak from the CAS O-ring was not the only leak. There was a drop of oil on the front of the oil pan. (I cleaned up the oil pan while I was working on the clutch last week.) So it appears either the pan seal or the front main seal.

I thought I had replaced the front seal last year when I did the timing belt, but after reviewing last years write up, it appears I skipped it. I guess I didn't want to loosen the oil pan at the time for fear of creating an oil leak. Doh! Here's to hoping this is the only leak. I am currently debating whether I want to fix this one any time soon. The parts cost will be negligible but time wise it could kill a day.

I also had a drop of anti-freeze on the radiator drain valve. I had noticed this before also. I think the drain plug just needs to be replaced. This can wait until I replace the front seal, assuming I do, as the radiator needs to be removed during that procedure.

I keep asking myself why I am so obsessed with the car leaking. Why can't I be satisfied just sliding a pan under the car? Myself never answers.

About the time I was finishing up the inspection of my car, David arrived and we replaced the o-ring on his '91 Miata also. Having done the replacement on both a 1.6 and 1.8 liter engine, I believe the 1.6 is a slightly easier task. (It is actually possible to get the CAS out from between the engine and firewall.)

Sixth Grade

Today I finished my eighth day of field experience in sixth grade at a local elementary school's summer school program.

The math teacher offered to let me teach a lesson. It seemed like a good idea to me so I agreed. This week I taught a total of 8 blocks. And since you only have to teach your very first lesson once ever, I have that out of the way. And that is one less thing.

Don't tell anyone, but I had a really good time being back in 6th grade.

MMM

(Common Miata Oil Leak)

While replacing the pilot bearing, clutch, etc. on the Lil' Zoom-Zoom I determined my oil leak was located somewhere high on the block, probably near the rear. Googling for common Miata oil leak clued me in to the CAS O-Ring. And the location was exactly in the general neighborhood of where the oil appeared to be originating.

This evening I replaced the Cam Angle Sensor O-Ring on the Miata. After removing the CAS a quick inspection of the underside revealed black gold. The sensor was definitely dripping oil. Jackpot! Hopefully this was my only leak. I will let you know.

The entire procedure took about 2 hours including a trip to the parts store and dinner. Actual under the hood time was probably between 20 - 45 minutes. The instructions over yonder say 10 minutes. It didn't happen like that here.

Total cost including two o-rings and one of this little mirror on a stick thingies was less than $5.

Why two o-rings? Because tomorrow David M. will be bringing his car over for a little More Miata Maintenance. I bet we don't get his done in 10 minutes either.

Odometer: 107K and some change.

Sunday Afternoon Maintenance

This afternoon, in the extreme heat of the afternoon sun, I washed the Miata. (I had two helpers so it took a little longer than normal.)

While washing the car, I found a bunch of tar along the lower half of the car, especially on the drivers side. I happened to have some tar and bug remover so I made a pass at the tar. Unfortunately it leaves a residue so the car is ready for another bath. It will have to wait.

In additional to the wash, I cleaned the windows and applied rain-x.

Next was a quick 8 mile drive to drive to fill up the tank. Technically it should only be about a mile, but I often get side tracked by curvy roads when driving the Miata on a Sunday afternoon.

The fill up proffered a mileage rating of 29.5 per gallon. Sweet. Not as good as my hypermiling experiment but not bad for my lead foot.

Odometer: Just over 106,900, which is what was on the clock when I finished the clutch job.

Zoom Zoom Zoom

Woo Hoo! The clutch is done, tires are rotated, and the oil and filter has been changed. No more funny pilot bearing sounds. Yes, after disassembling every thing, I determined that the problem was indeed the pilot bearing. And it is all good now.

Props to guys (David M, Brian B.) that helped me out. I couldn't have done it without their help.

Miata Clutch: A New Hope

This afternoon following a short two hour nap, I resumed work on the car. A gentle breeze and the afternoon shade made the garage cooler than it had been in several days.

I finished bolting up the transmission and hydraulic clutch lines. Next in was the drive shaft, followed by the complete exhaust system from the exhaust manifold all the way back to the tail pipe. Finally a couple of support bars.

At this point I need to replace the fluid and reinstall the shifter, however I don't have a small hand pump needed to pump the oil back into the transmission. One more part store trip is in order.

Since the car was already on jacks, I decided to rotate the tires and change the oil. Draining the oil and removing the tires was uneventful. Removing the oil filter however was another story.

The filter is difficult to get access to. The easiest way for me had been removing the right front tire and reaching in. Even with the tire off, I could not get the thing to budge. In the past I have just hand tightened it, unfortunately, I was not the last person to change the oil. I decided this would wait until tomorrow. It was 8:30 PM and I had not fed the kids yet. They had been so busy playing, they hadn't noticed.

Tomorrow after finding a hand pump, I will fill the tranny, install a new oil filter(assuming I can get the old one off), and fill it with oil. After putting the tires back on and doing a final bolt check, I will hopefully have the car out for a victory lap.

Sixth Grade

This week I have been attending sixth grade summer school.

As usual, the education classes I am taking require some amount of field experience. This semester I am required to spend 8 days in a classroom. I requested placement in a middle school to get an idea what it is like to work with the younger folks.

So far so good. Today I got the opportunity to teach a mini-session on factoring and prime numbers.

The most striking difference I have noticed? Sixth graders get recess. Woo Hoo!

I am amazed at some of the material we have been reviewing. Some of this stuff, I did not see until 7, 8, 9 or 10th grade. Times are certainly changing.

Today the local blog critic awarded my blog the most boring blog in the neighborhood award. I guess he missed the geometric proofs from a couple of years back. And the lyrics for 'Oh, Yes Wyoming'. (If your interested, I recently proved the triangle inequality theorem for vectors.)

Then I remembered my blog wasn't really meant to be entertaining, it was intended to document my current obsession, whatever that might be, for example a Miata, a 1925 Chevrolet,rebuilding a 1972 GMC pickup, hoping to acquire an unspecified year Corvette or Volkswagen Beetle, building Furniture, hot tubing, auto body repair, camping, hiking, biking, welding, metal-meet, camping, Dodge Chargers, low carb dieting, school, procrastination, hypermiling, building a foundry, melting aluminium, state quarters, container gardening, MDF, STL, model railroading (n gauge), tenth scale RC cars, RC airplanes, Vertigo, slot car racing, Formula One, the US Grand Prix, attending car shows, Mini Coopers, ping pong, foos ball, chocolate chip cookies, fembots with a penchant for evil, cast iron skillets or even fried okra. Whatever. I feel so validated now.

Mmmm, fried okra.

iMike and Terry did not even get an honorable mention because their blogs are too interesting. Sorry guys.

Hello, Hello, Hola!

The clutch saga continues. Slowly. My total wait time for the rear seal for the transmission was 8 days.

Quick recap. Order parts at O'Reilly Autoparts, Some parts show up, but not all. Make another trip to pick up the missing stuff. Get home with it. Not the right stuff. Call back. "We can't get that stuff, go to the Dealer."

Go to dealer. Order parts. Go to pick up parts two days later. Some parts show up, but not all parts. This was especially painful this time because it was a Friday and I had hoped to reassemble the car over the weekend. (Mazda Parts guy called O'Reilly to see if they had the part. Ha! They sent me to the Mazda dealership.) Back to the parts store on Monday and get the missing seal.

At this point I am fairly busy with my mundane life and don't get a chance to really work on the Miata again until this evening. That is not entirely true. Late in the afternoon, I spent about an hour with the car hoping that I would somehow be able to lift the transmission back up myself. Even with a pair of jacks, this was more than one person could really do.

At this point I got on the bat horn and called in the calvary. With the assistance of David M. under the car and non-boring Brian controlling the jack, we managed to get the transmission lifted and bolted to the engine block.

I will not call the entire operation a success (prematurely). I still have to hook up the hydraulic clutch cable, re-install the entire exhaust system, fill the transmission, and re-install the drive-shaft(Famous Australian rock band) and a few other miscellaneous details before I am really done. Regardless, all the work requiring more than two hands has been completed.

While the car is on the jack stands and one of the tires is off anyway, I will go head with an oil change and rotating the tires.

The car should be rolling before the weekend is over. A mere 15 or 16 days later.

What did I learn? Order all the parts and have them in hand before getting started.

Regrets: None really. At least not so far.

...Clutch Replacement...

Several busy days have passed and very little has been done.

Saturday we hit a British/Euro car show in the AM and spent the afternoon at the lake.

Since dropping the transmission, I have been trying to acquire the front and rear seal. Sunday I went to a local auto parts shop. They ordered them, available for pickup 9:30 AM Sunday. Long story short, they were available when they were supposed to be and when they finally showed up, they were wrong.

(Monday and Tuesday I stayed busy with school.)

Tuesday evening I removed the seals from the transmission. I also did some general cleaning and degreasing.

This morning I removed the flex plate and replaced the pilot bearing.

This afternoon, I stopped at the Miata dealer ship to order the seals. They will be in friday afternoon. I also replaced the rear main seal and re-installed the flex plate. And finally I did some more degreasing and general cleaning.

Total time involved, probably about 4 hours. Hopefully I will be ready to raise the transmission this weekend, Assuming the correct seals arrive on Friday.

Miata Clutch Replacement - Day Three

At the end of day two, I called David M. and asked (begged) him to come give me a hand for a few hours. His free time was from 7:30 - 9:30 AM today and I was already under the car when he arrived. Together we managed to remove the 3 remaining exhaust bolts (all him), drop the complete exhaust system, and removing the remaining bell housing bolts.

It was at this point we attempted to drop the transmission on our heads. We missed, but we did get the transmission out of the car.

By this time, two hours had passed and David had to exit. We got a lot done in two hours. I could probably have spent the entire day working on it and not gotten as much done. It really helped having another pair of arms to loosen the bolts when my arms had turned to jello. Also, not having to crawl out from under the car every time another tool was needed saved a whole bucket of time.

At this point I would say my original estimate of 30% was an over estimate. My current estimate is 40%. I will be half way once the pressure plate and clutch are removed.

No new tools required today.

Time today: 2 hours x 2 guys = 4 man hours.

Total Time so far is roughly 10 hours.

I should probably comment on my emotional state also. At the end of day one when there were several bolts I could not see or reach, the whole project seemed like a bad idea. The state of day two was basically neutral - basically I was cutting up 2x10s and spraying WD-40. Nothing frustrating or gratifying about that. This morning when I rolled under the car on the creeper and could actually reach the still unseeable bolts, things started to look up. After two good hours with an extra pair of hands I am beginning to feel like I can see the light at the end of the tunnel.

I don't think I could have finished the project without additional clearance under the car. The 2x10's turned out to be a very economical solution.


Miata Clutch Replacement - Day Two

Day involved only about an hour of work, two if you count the time I spent making a trip to Home Depot for supplies.

Home Depot for supplies when replacing a clutch? Yeah. I bought 2 eight foot 2"x10"s. I cut them into sixteen 1' sections and stacked them underneath the jack stands. The extra height made it easier to access the bolts on the bell housing. It also made it possible to get under the car while on a creeper.

Two hours: Trip to HD, sawing the boards into pieces and then lowering and re-raising the Miata. Also spraying the exhaust bolts with WD-40.

Miata Clutch Replacement - Day One

My original estiate of 3 or 4 days to complete this task still feels about right. I read online it could be done in 9 or 10 hours with help. So far I have been working alone so 10 hours seems out of the question.

Today I drained the transmission, dropped the drive shaft and loosened 7 of the 14(?) bell housing bolts. The remaining seven at this point seem like they are unaccessible. I am sure this is not true. Three of the bolts have nuts behind them. I haven't figured out to reach the bolt and the nut at the same time. I think my arms would require multiple elbows.

I think I am about 30% done and I have put about 5.5 hours into it so far.

New tools acquired: 3/8" and 1/2" drive universal joints. 18 mm six-point socket.

I already had two sets of metric sockets. One set is 12-point and the other is an impact set. Neither had a 18 mm socket. Why?

Weekend Update

We had a busy weekend. For starters we had a most special guest. OK, it was just Terry. The kids were thrilled to see her.

Friday we saw the Narnia movie.

Saturday morning I hit a car show in Decatur at the annual balloon festival. Many nice cars, too hot for me though. After the show, I went to my mothers house were we had a birthday party. The part was to celebrate her, Terry's, and Jordan's birthdays. Speaking of which, today is Jordan's birthday. Terry bought him an MP3 player for his birthday. He has been plugged in ever since.

Sunday. Hmm. Can't recall a clue about Sunday.

Monday we saw the Indiana Jones movie. And I ordered a clutch kit for the Miata. Little Beth and David came over for dinner. And Brian is working on rebuilding the carburetor on his 1966 Mustang. Once it is complete, he is going to finally give in and sell it to G.

This morning I put another coat of paint on the trailing arms of the GMC truck. I haven't touched them in months. Once the Miata clutch is complete, I will probably finally get around to rebuilding the GMC's differential.

Time for school.

Hypermiling

I recently read two articles on hypermiling. One of the articles described how some guys were able to get more than 100 MPG out of a stock Prius. Hypermilers use driving techniques to exceed the estimated fuel efficiency of their vehicles. It sounded interested so I thought I would give it a try.

I decided to adopt a single technique for one tank of gas. One the next fill up I checked my mileage and started the experiment. Crunching the numbers 305.0 miles / 10.9 gallons resulted in approximately 28.0 MPG during normal driving. Not bad when you consider I tend to have a lot of fun while driving the Miata. Maybe, maybe too much fun.

The driving technique I applied is called pulse and glide. Essentially you accelerate up to some speed and then shift into neutral and coast for a while. Some folks kill the engine while coasting. I did not. After using this technique for a while, you begin to realize how often being in gear is actually holding the car back. You seem to get a little bit of free speed every time you shift out of gear. You can also use the hills for a little free energy whenever possible.

After two weeks and 324 .4 miles I filled the car up with 9.86 gallons of gas. This time the tank averaged 32.9 MPG, an increase of 4.9 MPG or 17.5%. Not bad.

Pulse and glide is easy on the open road with a manual gear box. I don't think I would try this with an automatic transmission though. Will I drive this way all the time? No. Occasionally? Certainly.

Press Button, Get Bacon

I went camping again this weekend. Also to the Sipsey Wilderness. We started at a different trail head and camped at a different site. I don't know where we were relative to the last trip but I plan to check the map later.

We had a small group this time: myself, Brian B., Chad E., David M., and Billy T.

There were a lot of folks (including two Boy Scout Troops) out camping this week. More than I have seen on any other trip. I am not sure if it was the weather or just a more popular area.

The hike in and out included 15 yards through a cave called fat man's squeeze. The packs had to come off to make it through the cave.

We had a nice flat campsite between two ridges with easy access to water. We setup in the fork where a major and minor creek met. It was fairly obviously from looking at the ground that the area was frequented by wild pigs though we did not see any. We did think we heard one the second night.

The evening meals this trip consisted of Jambalaya the first evening and red beans with rice the second evening. Dish duty was easy with the water access only 50 feet away.

Overall it was a great trip.

The Summer of Rick

A friend of mine who we shall call David has termed this The Summer of Rick.

While some would say this event started on Friday, I believe it more accurate to say that it started on Monday. Friday was mostly a normal day - I went to work. And Saturday and Sunday were as usual a weekend.

We had a busy weekend. Friday evening we attended a social. Saturday AM I was planning on taking the Turnip Truck to the a car show. It was rained out. Saturday evening, another social of sorts. Sunday included testing a propane burner I had built in the driveway. The burner sounded like a jet engine. It was really cool. And folks came from miles around to watch. OK, there were only four of us, except when Guy dropped by the strawberries.

The Summer of Rick actually started on Monday. What is this summer?

Monday morning instead of going to work, I went to school. I am now officially a full time college student again. I will be going to school full time summer and fall and then doing an internship as a student teacher in the spring. This puts me on track to graduate (again) in the May of 2009 and begin teaching in the Fall.

The summer is just one season in the Year of Rick.

I am currently 2 days into a 15 day mini-semester. It involves 3 hours in class every morning followed by me attempting to accomplished somewhere, anywhere, near the amount of studying I need to be doing to keep up with the class. The class meets the same number of hours a regular class meets, it is just all being crammed into a 3 week period.

After the first three weeks are over, the normal summer semester starts. Hopefully summer semester will be less painful. I will let you know later.

I went camping this weekend in the Sipsey wilderness. Our camp site had a 100'+ rock wall one side, and a stream on the other. The scenery was spectacular. Lots of rock formations and flowing water. The temperature was perfect all weekend and we only had a couple of minor rain showers. Everyone managed to stay dry.

I saw one rattlesnake too many. And two ticks.

And tonight I will be very happy to be sleeping in a real bed again.

The End.

Can you believe I didn't think I would be able to write a post about camping this weekend without mentioning how many times our trail guide took us down the wrong path? Even so, it was an excellent trip.

Today we had a funeral for Mr. Lizard.

Mr. Lizard left behind many friends. He was laid to rest under a flowering dogwood tree.

Rest in peace Mr. Lizard.

Stairway to Heaven

My neighbor asked me to make some stairs for his trailer, a goose-neck used to haul motor cycles. The stairs are used to ease access to the section above the hitch.



I spent a couple hours in the shop this evening making these. The assembly measures 30"x30". The treads are 10"x30" and the rise is 7".

Yep, MDF again!

Propane

Disclaimer: We are not trained professionals. Playing with fire is dangerous. If you attempt anything stupid like you have seen here, you do so at your own risk. We advise you to ignore what you have seen here and go back to playing Wii.




And now back to the regularly scheduled program.


This weekend we tested the propane pre-warmer. Success.




The ease of propane has made of question whether we should be using propane as the main heat source rather just a pre-warmer. Hmmm. To be continued.


The water tank has now been chopped in half to make the foundry. We originally intended to slice the tank up with Mr. Mustang's new plasma cutter but ended up using a jig saw with a metal cutting blade. Keep it simple, eh? Here is the tank after chopping the top.

Guess who got a sunburn this weekend?

This weekend was the first car show of the season. Mr. Mustang and I took our vehicles to a nearby car show/fund raiser for a volunteer fire department.

This was the second year for the show. The show consisted of about 80 to 100 cars, up from last years count of 18.

It was a bit chilly out so we did not set up our tent, instead opting to sit in the sun to keep warm. We both ended up sun burned. The worst part is that we had a tent and sun block with us. We just didn't use it.

Below you see a 1924 Studebaker. This was the oldest car at the show.



And this old Lincoln won best of show. As you can see, it was parked next to the Turnip truck.

TGTIF

John Hancock

Here is my sig. It is located on the edge of the hood, passenger side. I looked for Mr. Miata's but was unable to locate it. I thought it was in the center of the hood. That made me wonder if they clean the names off from time to time to make room for more.

BMW Ultimate Drive Event

This morning I drove a few Beamers in the BMW Ultimate Drive Event. First I drove an M3. This car was a rocket! While driving the M3 on the interstate I passed about a dozen Dodge Vipers. Obviously a Viper club on the go. Before exiting the car, I checked under the seat for a "Barn Door Fan Club" bumper sticker. Someone else must have gotten to it first. I took this picture right after getting out of the M3. The next driver was already in place.



Next was a convertible 650i. This car had a heads-up speed-o-meter. If you want a big convertible, this is the car for you. That is me in the car sitting still.



And this is me driving the car driving on the interstate. I am also the photographer.



And then a Z4 Coupe. Just like last year, I was disappointed with this car. The interior is crampted and it needs more power. It is not nearly as fun to drive as a Miata or a Charger. This is me in the Z4.



My final ride was a 760. I selected this car because it had a V12. This car was sweet. The old-guy in me loved this car. The young guy in me opened the sun roof even though the sky was overcast. See how this car makes me look older than the Z4 did.



Just like last year, this event was a lot of fun. I ran into four people I knew who were also there for a drive. I am also happy to report that after driving all those cars, when I drove out of the parking lot, I was pleased that I preferred my Charger to any of the cars I had just driven. When I was driving the 650i convertible I couldn't help but noticing how disconnected I felt from the rode. At times that could be a good thing, but when I am in the Miata, I enjoy feeling the road. I think the thing that bugged me about these BMWs is that the controls in the cars are all so complicated. Also, no two cars I drove seemed to have the same buttons and when they did, they were located in a different position. It took me forever to find the seat adjustment controls in the 760. (They were located to the drivers right on the left vertical side of the center console.) Even the gear shifts were awkwardly different. I suppose if you drove one all the time, you would get use to the controls and probably prefer them, but for a short trip around town, they were simply awkward.

Foundry Fuel Injector (Take I)

Here is my first attempt at a foundry fuel injector. It is designed to burn WVO. It also has a propane hookup for pre-heating, and an air hookup.



This is the hookup for air. It connects to the air compressor. I will be using an air compressor initially because I have one, therefore it was convenient. Most folks use a blower.



This second hookup is for the propane. The propane is to pre-warm the foundry. Once the WVO is burning, the propane may be turned off. The connector is not exactly straight. I had trouble getting the tap started on the pipe. Perhaps I drilled the hole crooked.



This is the oil hookup. I put a valve inline to shut off the oil. Below the cutoff value is a quick connect.



This is the bottom of a five gallon bucket. The bucket will be used as an oil tank. Initially the oil will be gravity feed. Eventually I will probably pressurize the oil tank. Here the bucket is hanging up. I was checking for leaks. None so far.



I read that the oil tube inner diameter needs to be greater than 1/4". I used 3/8" tubing. I used air fittings with an ID of 3/8" also. Perhaps tomorrow I will test out this contraption.

Differential Pictures

Here are a few pictures of the differential after sand blasting. The diff has now been painted, but as usual I haven't taken the pictures yet.

What's the Diff

This weekend I finally got around to the differential housing.

Step one: Remove anything that doesn't look like a differential housing.

Step two: Sandblast the giant hunk of metal resembling a differential housing.

Step three: Paint giant hunk of metal that resembles a differential housing.

Weekend Update

F1: The first F1 race of the season was this weekend. Hamilton finished first, no surprise there. Of the 22 cars, only 6 finished. Kimi was 9th, Masa DNF. Still pulling for Ferrari. G is dedicated to McLaren. Rubens(Honda) will probably be black-flagged for leaving the pits under a red light putting Kimi back into the points.

Diet: Lost another lb and a half this week. Having achieved my initial goal, I have not yet determined where I am heading now.

GMC: Disassembled the rear diff preparing for some sandblasting.

Melting: No progress.

Other: Attended auction.

'72 GMC Update

Today I finally disassembled the differential I brought home from the junk yard on the 4th of July. The plan is to begin blasting it next weekend. I didn't take a pre-disassembly shot but here are a few post shots including another diff chunk in a bucket. The gear ratio on this one is 3.73. The other was a 3.07 if my memory serves me correctly. Both are in good shape. I will probably use the 3.07 as it will provide better gas mileage.

Kruse Auction In Huntsville

I attended a classic car auction this weekend. I had never been to one before and it was quite enjoyable. The I only lasted about 5 hours. I suspect the entire event was 10 or more hours. During my time there, the lowest price was $2100 and the highest price was $110,000. Quite a few muscles cars sold in the 60 to 70 k price range.

This '57 convertible went for $110k.




At one point one of the bidders assistants was messing with me. I had accidentally made eye contact with him and he offered to place a $57,000 bid on a '62 convertible Corvette for me. *** Shakes head side to side and looks at this feet. *** The car eventually sold for $67k. I did not buy it.

If possible, I will try to attend this again next year.

After much pain and frustration, the images are back in weekend post. Scroll on down.

No Pictures

The photos in the following posts are not showing up. The links got messed up. I will fix this tonight tomorrow. Thanks for you patience.

Formula One season starts Thursday with the first race on Sunday.

Shall I go ahead and predict Kimi will win again this season? Certainly.

Flask and First Cast

This first image is of one of the two flasks I made yesterday. The top section is called a cope, the bottom section a drag.



This image shows the cope seperated from the drag. The keying is used to re-align the two sections after removing the pattern from the flask.



The larger flask is 12" x 8". The smaller is 8" x 6" if memory serves me. They are both made from MDF. I sprayed the inside with a clear coat of paint before using. After the first cast, there was no evidence of the clear coat left. I suppose I was skip the clear coat in the future.



The saw horse along with the board leaning on it act as a wind screen. The foundry is located in the center, a metal pail to the right acts as a receptical fro dross. The pail contains a stainless steel spoon used for removing the dross from the crucible. To the far left is the coal bin, not currently in flame. The air hose feeds oxygen to the fire. It is typically set at about 20 to 25 PSI.

First Cast (Continued)

Aluminum. Ready to pour.



Removing the crucible from the foundry.



On your marks, get set, go!



One down.

First Cast (Part III)

Pouring the shell.



The leftover metal is poured into a small bread pan to form an ingot.



Cooling off.



Here the patterns have been placed back into the forms. This was probably not necessary but at the time it seemed like a good idea. The first casts have been removed and are cooling just to the top of the image. The sand is discolored around the pattern due to the heat from the hot aluminum. The sand becomes quite hard after the initial pour.

First Cast (Part IV)

Here are a set of castings cooling on the molds.

We (Danny and I, supervised by Brian) made a total of 4 sets of castings. The first Sol was melted down and re-cast due to inferior quality. The image had a void probably caused when I paused during the pour and then added additional metal.



Here is a shell. The shells were not quite as nice as the Suns, but they are still excellent examples of our first casting.

We also poured four ingots, one of which was remelted and used on a subsequent cast.

Look for my adventures creating the green sand, a.k.a casting sand, in a future post. The mold was used four times today before putting the sand back into its storage bin. I have read that the sand can be reused for a lifetime.

Today I made a couple of flasks for metal casting. A flask consists of a cope and a drag. Pictures tomorrow.

At first I thought I was making four flasks, and then five. Somewhere along the way I miscounted the parts and ended up with 2 and a half. A half a flask doesn't count, so the final count was two. Another prime example of poor planning. Seriously though, when I was cutting parts, I overlooked that the flask had an upper and lower assembly. I only counted and cut parts for the lower assembly. Duh! That is what I get for drawing up the plans on a piece of wood and then cutting up the plans.

199.6

[0 to go]

Welding Class

Tonight in my welding class I made a crucible. The picture below contains the crucible, my aluminium ingot, and a quarter (for scale). The crucible should easily handle six pounds of liquid aluminum. At least I think so.



After I finished creating this masterpiece, I set it on the bench and declared it to be a work of art. Or perhaps a tip jar. Folks really appreciate good art.


You can't hide money.

Another perfectly good weekend drawing to an end.

23 lbs down.

[1 lb to go]

I Did It All By Myself



Alternate Title: My assistant Danny.

Accident Waiting To Happen


At the top you can see the flames in the foundry. In the middle you can see that our charcoal supply caught fire.

Stop, drop, and roll.

Coffee Can Foundry In Action

Here you can see some liquid aluminum.

The First Failure



The crucible was a stainless steel camping style coffee cup. We lost containment before the second pour occurred. Where did the melted aluminum go? It wasn't in the foundry and it wasn't in the crucible.

The First Pour



The hand belongs to Danny G.

Coffee Can Furnace In Action

Coffee Can Foundry Success!

What you see here is the first successful aluminum melt from my coffee can foundry. This little ingot weights in at 1 lb 3.25 oz (545 grams).

Metal Melt

I have been obsessing about metal casting for quite a while now. The effort to date has been mostly academic, books and blogs. Most recently I have been researching iron casting.

I think the time has come to melt some metal. For the first try, I am going to go with a low cost, low effort foundry. A coffee can foundry.

I already happen to have a pair metal coffee cans in the garage. A trip to Wal-Mart will provide me with some charcoal, a stainless steel crucible (aka 'camping' coffee cup), and a stainless steel utensil for removing the dross.

I just happen to have some extruded aluminium to melt. A bucket of sand will be used for forming the first ingot. Nothing fancy.

The only issue not yet resolved is the air source. And tongs. Currently I am considering either using an air compressor or a shop vac as the air source.

Any effort toward the goal will be considered a success. Stay tuned.