The refrigerator in the cabin died in the middle of last week, so I spent a couple days dealing with that. It started making a noise as though the compressor was trying to start running, but never did. It made that noise ever 30 seconds. I actually unplugged the refrigerator for almost two days before I got a new one, but didn't lose any food, as the average temperature inside the cabin was in the mid 50s.
I did some price checking and found out delivery to Silver Plume would cost nearly $200, and renting a flatbed from the nearest Home Depot would cost at least $60, plus a tank of gas in the ruck, and a few hours of driving. I ended up finding a reasonably priced refrigerator at a Sears appliance store in Silverthorne (30 miles west of Silver Plume) and bought the floor model. I decided to put the refrigerator in my Jeep (it barely fit, and wouldn't have, had it been in a box) to take it home. With the rear seat folded down, the fridge still hung out the back of the Jeep and the rear hatch wouldn't close. I keep a bunch of ratchet straps in my Jeep and used those to fasten the fridge down and keep it from sliding out. The edge of the fridge lined up with my rear windshield when I lowered the hatch, so I connected a strap from the rear hatch to my roof rack to keep the window from slamming into the fridge and breaking. Needless to say, it was a ghetto setup. But it worked. I never went faster than 30 mph and stopped every 15 minutes to check all the straps and make sure I wasn't about to dump a refrigerator onto the highway. It took about an hour to get home. The worst part about the drive was all the big rigs flying past me going up the mountain.
When I got home, the fridge installation process was a typical Fletcher experience. I borrowed a dolly from Sears, which made moving the fridge on the rocky driveway and through the house easier (I definitely couldn't have done it by myself without a dolly). However, I had to remove the doors from the fridge, the pneumatic piston from the screen door, and an interior bedroom door in order to move the fridge into the kitchen.
I found out just how hard it is to get rid of an old refrigerator, too. I found a dump that would take it for about $10, but I had to get the fridge certified freon free first. After calling around to several appliance stores in Silverthorne, the cheapest place I found that would remove the freon cost at least $75. I widened my search and through a series of phone calls found a place in downtown Denver that would take the fridge, remove the freon, and dispose of it for $20. I spent most of the day last Thursday driving; to return the dolly to get my $50 deposit back (30 miles west) and to drop off the old fridge (50 miles east). Note that most places (HD, Lowes, etc) will take and dispose of the old fridge if they deliver the new one. So, if you find a deal with free delivery, take it.
After all that hassle, we have a nice, new fridge that is large enough to hold all our food when the whole family comes to visit. I'll post pictures when I get a chance.
Thursday, October 28, 2010
More Updates
An update on my mountain life. I also added pictures to my last post, if you haven't seen those.
Since my last post, I've completely finished painting the cabin, cut down a few more trees to chop up for firewood, cleaned up around the cabin to prepare for winter, and reorganized the shed. All that I had left for painting the cabin was the very bottom board on each side, which I saved for last to avoid getting dirt in the brush and paint can. The cabin looks brand new from the outside, and hopefully won't have to be repainted for a long time. Also, just as an FYI, I used the same four inch brush to apply the green paint to the entire cabin. I kept the brush usable for nearly four months without cleaning it by placing it in a plastic bag in the refrigerator (I also did this to keep the primer and trim brushes usable, but not for as long).
There was a bunch of trash/construction debris in the driveway that I had to get rid of before it got buried in snow and couldn't be found before next spring. I also cleaned out the shed, which was so full of ladders, saws, mowers, paint, and other random junk, that you couldn't even step into it. That was an annoying process that required taking everything out of the shed, then figuring how to put it all back in so that it didn't take up as much space. The outside of the shed is in pretty bad shape, now (peeling, fading paint), so I'm planning on repainting it in the spring.
I cut down two more dead trees at the beginning of the week, then drug about 30 four-foot long logs down the side of the mountain to the cabin (I had several logs already cut up that I hadn't yet moved down the mountain). I still have to cut the logs into one foot sections and split and stack them, but I should have enough wood now to last through most of the winter.
I had to turn on the propane heater in the living room yesterday to keep the cabin warm enough to keep the pipes in the bathroom from freezing overnight or when I'm gone during the day (and can't keep a fire going). With the recent cold front (overnight low last night was 7° F) came our first real snow storm, too. Sunday through Wednesday we had near blizzard conditions in parts of the mountains. Silver Plume only got a few inches of snow, along with heavy winds (40-60 mph gusts), but a few miles west, at the continental divide and Loveland Ski Area, as much as 30 inches of snow accumulated. Portions of I-70 (the main, four lane highway that runs east-west through Colorado) had to be closed for periods of time to clear snow.
Loveland was the first ski area to open in Colorado, and did so last Sunday, after making man-made snow for a few weeks. I haven't gone snowboarding, yet, but will hopefully get to soon, as my instructor training starts the first weekend of November.
I'll upload some pictures as soon as I get a chance to at the library.
Since my last post, I've completely finished painting the cabin, cut down a few more trees to chop up for firewood, cleaned up around the cabin to prepare for winter, and reorganized the shed. All that I had left for painting the cabin was the very bottom board on each side, which I saved for last to avoid getting dirt in the brush and paint can. The cabin looks brand new from the outside, and hopefully won't have to be repainted for a long time. Also, just as an FYI, I used the same four inch brush to apply the green paint to the entire cabin. I kept the brush usable for nearly four months without cleaning it by placing it in a plastic bag in the refrigerator (I also did this to keep the primer and trim brushes usable, but not for as long).
There was a bunch of trash/construction debris in the driveway that I had to get rid of before it got buried in snow and couldn't be found before next spring. I also cleaned out the shed, which was so full of ladders, saws, mowers, paint, and other random junk, that you couldn't even step into it. That was an annoying process that required taking everything out of the shed, then figuring how to put it all back in so that it didn't take up as much space. The outside of the shed is in pretty bad shape, now (peeling, fading paint), so I'm planning on repainting it in the spring.
I cut down two more dead trees at the beginning of the week, then drug about 30 four-foot long logs down the side of the mountain to the cabin (I had several logs already cut up that I hadn't yet moved down the mountain). I still have to cut the logs into one foot sections and split and stack them, but I should have enough wood now to last through most of the winter.
I had to turn on the propane heater in the living room yesterday to keep the cabin warm enough to keep the pipes in the bathroom from freezing overnight or when I'm gone during the day (and can't keep a fire going). With the recent cold front (overnight low last night was 7° F) came our first real snow storm, too. Sunday through Wednesday we had near blizzard conditions in parts of the mountains. Silver Plume only got a few inches of snow, along with heavy winds (40-60 mph gusts), but a few miles west, at the continental divide and Loveland Ski Area, as much as 30 inches of snow accumulated. Portions of I-70 (the main, four lane highway that runs east-west through Colorado) had to be closed for periods of time to clear snow.
Loveland was the first ski area to open in Colorado, and did so last Sunday, after making man-made snow for a few weeks. I haven't gone snowboarding, yet, but will hopefully get to soon, as my instructor training starts the first weekend of November.
I'll upload some pictures as soon as I get a chance to at the library.
Tuesday, October 26, 2010
Slip Yoke Eliminator Install
Finally getting around to writing up my SYE install. Iron Rock Off Road (IRO) has great instructions on their website. I did call them a couple of times with questions, and their customer service was great each time. I got to talk to their actual technicians that do installs there.
One question I asked was about cutting oil for the drilling and tapping portion. One of the techs told me they now use an expensive Mobil 1 cutting oil for all their work, but that they used to use regular motor oil. So, I used some old Mobil 1 oil left over from an oil change.
On to the work. I did all of this in my rocky, un-level driveway, with a minimum amount of tools. For all the work, all I used was the bottle jack that comes standard with the Jeep to do all the lifting (stacked on several blocks of wood).
First, the before picture of the DS:
The IRO kit came with the bolts necessary to remove my transfer case drop, which was super convenient. For anyone wondering, they are M10 x 40 hex bolts.
All the old bolts came out pretty well, except one, which I used PB Blaster and a little heat from a torch to remove. I followed IRO's suggestion and used anti-sieze on the new bolts I put in.
Next, I removed the old drive shaft. The bolts on the rear pinion yoke came out pretty easily, after I used a little PB blaster. The hardest part was rotating the shaft to get acces to all the bolts (had to roll the Jeep forward a bit). I measured the distanced specified by IRO, then put blue tape around the output shaft and started to cut using a 4 1/2" angle grinder with a 1/8" thick cutoff wheel.
I rotated the shaft by hand every few seconds to help make the cut more uniform. I also went very slowly (removed the cutting wheel every few seconds) and took a break half way through to keep the shaft from heating up too much. I was worried about overheating the seals (though I don't know if that is a legitimate concern).
In hindsight, I wish I had just made the cut with the Jeep running in reverse, so that the output shaft was spinning. I ended up doing this anyway, and using a grinding wheel to smooth and straighten my cut. The shaft spun a lot slower than I thought it would, so it wouldn't have been very hard to make the cut with the shaft spinning.
On to the drilling and tapping. I used an old windex bottle to spray the motor oil into the hole while I was drilling. I marked the center of the shaft by sliding the new yoke on, then pushing a permanent marker through the center hole. It would've been better to use a large drill bit that just barely fit through the hole in the yoke to start a small hole in the center of the shaft, but I didn't have one available. My hole was slightly off, but everything bolted up just fine.
I backed the drill bits (first drilled a small hole, then the larger one) out every few seconds to clear chips and keep the drill bit from overheating. The drill bits supplied by IRO worked just fine for this process, and didn't seem to get dull. I also used the tap from the IRO kit. The kit didn't come with a tap handle, which I was disappointed with at first (since I did't have one). After getting under the Jeep, though, I realized that a tap handle probably wouldn't have fit in the drive train tunnel. I ended up using a small #10 box wrench to turn the tap and that worked perfectly.
I was too oily to take pictures after all this, so all I have are pictures of the new yoke and shaft installed.
The whole installation took me about 3.5 - 4 hours to do by myself, including a break to eat and take pictures part way through cutting the shaft. I'm very happy with the kit so far.
One question I asked was about cutting oil for the drilling and tapping portion. One of the techs told me they now use an expensive Mobil 1 cutting oil for all their work, but that they used to use regular motor oil. So, I used some old Mobil 1 oil left over from an oil change.
On to the work. I did all of this in my rocky, un-level driveway, with a minimum amount of tools. For all the work, all I used was the bottle jack that comes standard with the Jeep to do all the lifting (stacked on several blocks of wood).
First, the before picture of the DS:
The IRO kit came with the bolts necessary to remove my transfer case drop, which was super convenient. For anyone wondering, they are M10 x 40 hex bolts.
All the old bolts came out pretty well, except one, which I used PB Blaster and a little heat from a torch to remove. I followed IRO's suggestion and used anti-sieze on the new bolts I put in.
Next, I removed the old drive shaft. The bolts on the rear pinion yoke came out pretty easily, after I used a little PB blaster. The hardest part was rotating the shaft to get acces to all the bolts (had to roll the Jeep forward a bit). I measured the distanced specified by IRO, then put blue tape around the output shaft and started to cut using a 4 1/2" angle grinder with a 1/8" thick cutoff wheel.
I rotated the shaft by hand every few seconds to help make the cut more uniform. I also went very slowly (removed the cutting wheel every few seconds) and took a break half way through to keep the shaft from heating up too much. I was worried about overheating the seals (though I don't know if that is a legitimate concern).
In hindsight, I wish I had just made the cut with the Jeep running in reverse, so that the output shaft was spinning. I ended up doing this anyway, and using a grinding wheel to smooth and straighten my cut. The shaft spun a lot slower than I thought it would, so it wouldn't have been very hard to make the cut with the shaft spinning.
On to the drilling and tapping. I used an old windex bottle to spray the motor oil into the hole while I was drilling. I marked the center of the shaft by sliding the new yoke on, then pushing a permanent marker through the center hole. It would've been better to use a large drill bit that just barely fit through the hole in the yoke to start a small hole in the center of the shaft, but I didn't have one available. My hole was slightly off, but everything bolted up just fine.
I backed the drill bits (first drilled a small hole, then the larger one) out every few seconds to clear chips and keep the drill bit from overheating. The drill bits supplied by IRO worked just fine for this process, and didn't seem to get dull. I also used the tap from the IRO kit. The kit didn't come with a tap handle, which I was disappointed with at first (since I did't have one). After getting under the Jeep, though, I realized that a tap handle probably wouldn't have fit in the drive train tunnel. I ended up using a small #10 box wrench to turn the tap and that worked perfectly.
I was too oily to take pictures after all this, so all I have are pictures of the new yoke and shaft installed.
The whole installation took me about 3.5 - 4 hours to do by myself, including a break to eat and take pictures part way through cutting the shaft. I'm very happy with the kit so far.
Wednesday, October 13, 2010
Random Updates
Edit: just uploaded pictures.
I haven't updated my blog in a while, because my laptop died, so I can't get pictures up. So, I decided to update without pictures.
I've Got Wood
Induendo aside, I have collected quite a bit of firewood to get me started this winter. So far, I've cut down three or four decent size pine trees and chopped them into firewood. It takes a while and quite a bit of work to cut down a tree, section it, drag the sections down to the cabin, cut them into one foot long pieces, then split and stack them all. Splitting the wood gets pretty monotonous (and does a number on my back), so I play a little game while I'm doing it. I try to see how many pieces I can split a log into with only one swing. A normal swing splits the log into two pieces. So, I see if I can split it into three or more pieces with just one swing. So far, I've gotten several tripple kills and two elusive quadruple kills (yep, that's a halo reference). Yes, splitting an entire tree's woth of wood is that boring.
Cabin Update
The weather is starting to cool off here (snowed this week), so I'm try to get the outside work done on the cabin before it gets too cold to paint. I've scrapped, caulked, and primed the back three sides of the cabin that needed it, and am ready to paint the whole backside (five small sides), as soon as I get a weather opening. I'll upload some pictures as soon as I figure out how, since I no longer have a laptop to take to the library.
I have gotten two coats of green on the back and am planning on painting the trim today. I accidentally got semigloss instead of flat paint for the second coat on the back, so it glows just a little more than the rest of the cabin. I'm hoping it gets dirty and tones down soon.
Mom's Visit
My mom came in town to visit last week. We spent most of the time working on the inside of the cabin. We got rid of some old furniture that was falling apart and just wasting space, hung some new curtains, and cleaned up a bit. We reorganized the living room so it should accomodate more people than it used to. As always, it was nice to have a visitor.
Snowboard Rack
One of the problems that we have in the cabin is that there isn't enough floor space or storrage space. We've got lots of stuff, but nowhere to put it. One think we have in abundance are snowboards. Right now most of them are stored under beds, but when people come and start using them, we needed a place to store them where they are accessible. I've had an idea in my head for a while to build a snowboard rack, and finally went to Home Depot to get the parts. The rest of this is kind of a how-to, so it might go into too much detail.
I used a 48" long by 3/4" wide flat piece of aluminum (1/8" thick) for the main structure.
I used #8 x 1.5" long screws with tapered heads to attach the alluminum to the wall. The hard part was figuring out what to use to hold the snowboards. I started searching through the random parts drawers at HD and found some small rubber corks (I bought eight of the smallest ones they had). They were perfect for what I had in mind.
I used #8 x 3/4" long screws with tapered heads to attach the rubber corks to the alluminum. It's important that the screws are tapered, so that the heads are flush with the aluminum.
I'll find a way to post a picture of the rack soon, so I don't have to try and explain how it works. The large gap between each of the posts is 10.5" between the center of each screw. The small gap is 1.5 inches between the center of each screw. To attach the rubber corks, I drill one hole were I wanted the cork to go that was smaller than the diameter of the screw. I then drilled a hole with a much larger drill bit to countersink the screw head (I tried using a drill bit with a countersink, but the countersink portion didn't work at cutting the aluminum). It is important that the screw threads into the aluminum partly so that it stays steady and can't move.
I drilled a small hole part way threw the rubber cork, then threaded it onto the screw that was fastened into the aluminum.
Seven more times, and the rack was ready to be mounted. The mounting screws had to be countersunk as well, to keep them from scratching the snowboards.
The final rack is very sturdy and will hold four snowboards. I plan on mounting one more rack somewhere, since we now have five snowboarders in the family.
Slip Yoke Eliminator
I also installed a slip yoke eliminator on my Jeep. It involved cutting, drilling, and tapping the rear output shaft on my transfer case. It was quite a little task for me to undertake in my sloped, rocky driveway, but all went well and the Jeep is driving better than ever. The slip yoke eliminator allowed me to get rid of my transfer case drop, so I have a little more ground clearance now, and a little more confidence that I'm not going to bang my transfer case on a rock off road.
Before:
After:
First Snow
We got our first snow of the season two nights ago. I woke up to about three inches of snow covering everything, but most of it melted by the end of the day. Loveland Ski Area, on the other hand, has been making snow since last Friday, so their opening day is getting closer and closer.
Job Update
I got invited to Loveland's instructor training in November, after which they make official job offers for the season. So, I don't officially have a job yet, but at least I know I didn't blow the interview. Unfortunately, instructor training overlaps with two of my last three OEC classes. That means I'll have to miss the last two OEC instructional classes (one of which is the practice practical exam), then take the practical exam the following weekend, which will be a challenge, to say the least. Hopefully all goes well.
I haven't updated my blog in a while, because my laptop died, so I can't get pictures up. So, I decided to update without pictures.
I've Got Wood
Induendo aside, I have collected quite a bit of firewood to get me started this winter. So far, I've cut down three or four decent size pine trees and chopped them into firewood. It takes a while and quite a bit of work to cut down a tree, section it, drag the sections down to the cabin, cut them into one foot long pieces, then split and stack them all. Splitting the wood gets pretty monotonous (and does a number on my back), so I play a little game while I'm doing it. I try to see how many pieces I can split a log into with only one swing. A normal swing splits the log into two pieces. So, I see if I can split it into three or more pieces with just one swing. So far, I've gotten several tripple kills and two elusive quadruple kills (yep, that's a halo reference). Yes, splitting an entire tree's woth of wood is that boring.
Cabin Update
The weather is starting to cool off here (snowed this week), so I'm try to get the outside work done on the cabin before it gets too cold to paint. I've scrapped, caulked, and primed the back three sides of the cabin that needed it, and am ready to paint the whole backside (five small sides), as soon as I get a weather opening. I'll upload some pictures as soon as I figure out how, since I no longer have a laptop to take to the library.
I have gotten two coats of green on the back and am planning on painting the trim today. I accidentally got semigloss instead of flat paint for the second coat on the back, so it glows just a little more than the rest of the cabin. I'm hoping it gets dirty and tones down soon.
Mom's Visit
My mom came in town to visit last week. We spent most of the time working on the inside of the cabin. We got rid of some old furniture that was falling apart and just wasting space, hung some new curtains, and cleaned up a bit. We reorganized the living room so it should accomodate more people than it used to. As always, it was nice to have a visitor.
Snowboard Rack
One of the problems that we have in the cabin is that there isn't enough floor space or storrage space. We've got lots of stuff, but nowhere to put it. One think we have in abundance are snowboards. Right now most of them are stored under beds, but when people come and start using them, we needed a place to store them where they are accessible. I've had an idea in my head for a while to build a snowboard rack, and finally went to Home Depot to get the parts. The rest of this is kind of a how-to, so it might go into too much detail.
I used a 48" long by 3/4" wide flat piece of aluminum (1/8" thick) for the main structure.
I used #8 x 1.5" long screws with tapered heads to attach the alluminum to the wall. The hard part was figuring out what to use to hold the snowboards. I started searching through the random parts drawers at HD and found some small rubber corks (I bought eight of the smallest ones they had). They were perfect for what I had in mind.
I used #8 x 3/4" long screws with tapered heads to attach the rubber corks to the alluminum. It's important that the screws are tapered, so that the heads are flush with the aluminum.
I'll find a way to post a picture of the rack soon, so I don't have to try and explain how it works. The large gap between each of the posts is 10.5" between the center of each screw. The small gap is 1.5 inches between the center of each screw. To attach the rubber corks, I drill one hole were I wanted the cork to go that was smaller than the diameter of the screw. I then drilled a hole with a much larger drill bit to countersink the screw head (I tried using a drill bit with a countersink, but the countersink portion didn't work at cutting the aluminum). It is important that the screw threads into the aluminum partly so that it stays steady and can't move.
I drilled a small hole part way threw the rubber cork, then threaded it onto the screw that was fastened into the aluminum.
Seven more times, and the rack was ready to be mounted. The mounting screws had to be countersunk as well, to keep them from scratching the snowboards.
The final rack is very sturdy and will hold four snowboards. I plan on mounting one more rack somewhere, since we now have five snowboarders in the family.
Slip Yoke Eliminator
I also installed a slip yoke eliminator on my Jeep. It involved cutting, drilling, and tapping the rear output shaft on my transfer case. It was quite a little task for me to undertake in my sloped, rocky driveway, but all went well and the Jeep is driving better than ever. The slip yoke eliminator allowed me to get rid of my transfer case drop, so I have a little more ground clearance now, and a little more confidence that I'm not going to bang my transfer case on a rock off road.
Before:
After:
First Snow
We got our first snow of the season two nights ago. I woke up to about three inches of snow covering everything, but most of it melted by the end of the day. Loveland Ski Area, on the other hand, has been making snow since last Friday, so their opening day is getting closer and closer.
Job Update
I got invited to Loveland's instructor training in November, after which they make official job offers for the season. So, I don't officially have a job yet, but at least I know I didn't blow the interview. Unfortunately, instructor training overlaps with two of my last three OEC classes. That means I'll have to miss the last two OEC instructional classes (one of which is the practice practical exam), then take the practical exam the following weekend, which will be a challenge, to say the least. Hopefully all goes well.
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