Carzee's shed

[Carzee]

Hi Ross,
Glad you are still happy, I've had my ffr since May last year (yes one of the first) and i still smile.........
I drove the KLR vehicle on Tuesday, wish I didn't Lol because the power steering brings it into the 21st century ( and i am 50  and still pass the 20 - 25 BFA test!)  so Strong arms......
The turbo is incredible they said it doubles the power and they could triple the power but no need, and the boost wont hurt the motor.
So I will get the power steering and save for the turbo - my Afghanistan vehicle will stay original for its military history.
Next time i am in Canberra I'll let you know and check out your vehicle.
Cheers
Scott

I agree about the engine pwr, seems fine to me (...coming from experience of 2.25 petrol engine) but pwr steer is nice as you say.
Look forward to seeing you, will be spending more time Canberra way after November. Today was the day things firmed up a lot more - got an official letter re the redundancy and a compulsory meeting about our options for 2015 (my bet is that its been moved forward to line up with the financial year end June 30).

[drifter]

Did you forget I have a 20 ton press in the garage over here?

[Carzee]

Hi John, yeah I did.
Well I am going to remove/replace the panhard rod bushes so I know they are dependable for 3 years (and so I don't get a nasty surprise).

[Carzee]

Yesterday I spent quite a while on the fuse block. It was dirty from creek water (behind the fusebox cover there were red water drop marks and red dirt). Some fuses were pretty loose and not grabbing the connectors well and at least six fuses in the block were incorrect value fuses...

I used a damp rag to wipe it all clean and then inspected each wire and its blade connector. I didn't just use a torch; I made a round profile jewelry screwdriver shaft flat and even thinner on a old flat file then I was able to poke the tab on each connector and one by one remove each wire and clean the connector, tighten the "teeth" for the fuse and re-insert the wire. Four connectors had some oxidation I cleaned up. Fitted new -correct value- blade fuses by Narva via Repco.

It may all get dirty and dusty again soon enough... but at least I'm better informed of the fuseblock condition and its one more detail down. All part of "GTK" for 257.

Here is a edited photo of the fuseblock decal:


Where the smaller, lower decal says that there are old-fashioned in line fuses ( Inspection Lamp 15A and the Dashlight Dimmer switch 5A ) in a certain location ( "Located Under Center Dash Cover" ), it is referring to the pyramid shaped housing in the middle of the dash which has the Ammeter and Hourmeter on the FFR and the Inspection lamp sockets (red female and black female aux jacks closest to the main dash/odometer housing). Its probably the same location on the GS thought its a simpler box design.

[drifter]

Lookin' good.

[DennisM]

And where is your missus gonna sit, ?? the trailer LOL cheers mate Dennis

[Carzee]

Hi Dennis. I was by myself. The gear was only in the cab overnight -mainly to avoid possum hassles. ...and if a badge or a ranger woke me (to move me on) I was ready to roll.

[boxy]

I would watch those rangers. They are usually pretty weird.

[Carzee]

Not touching that one. Some areas are very fragile and need security measures. The area I was very low on birdlife for sure, probably due to feral cats being about 15km from the CBD. The only fauna I saw were some wallabies (in the moonlight about 4am). It was a very quiet night.

Once I got down the hill I went to adjust the webbing on the box and noticed the UHF aerial was not there. Remember, this was the first time I had '257' doing some proper 4wd work. It was turning into a bit of a shakedown... so I went back up the hill looking all the way for where it had fallen off. It was about 100m from the top, lucky no one had come along and run it over. I put it on, this time with Locktite and drove back down the hill. No more aerial probs.

Plan to go back this weekend.

edit - Thought up a nick for '257' after this hill incident. Its 'Yo-yo'.

[Carzee]

Discovered by accident that you can get drinkholders/ can holders for the perentie centre console. It fits flat on the oblong tray (the wallet and biro tray forward of the rifle butt shapes, nearest the gearsticks). Cost $10 to $15 depending on the brand of tape and the shop. Who knew a 20m roll of tape fits cans and coffees? Am I the last to find out?

[Carzee]

+++++++++++++

New section -  the allotment!

I have developed a interest in learning about veg gardening and have an allotment.
I want some to build a bit of experience in living off grid.

Anyhoo, from the start, shovel work its hard work if you are not used to it. That phase has gone by and I can say the aches and pains have diminished a fair bit after only a fortnight of getting around with creaks and groans. And I did not resort to dencorub as I don't own any. LOL. You may have picked up that this time last year I had to have scans for tumors - I had a real health scare and this year I have gradually changed some things around. We're talking chloestrol. We talking high iron causing bad neck and muscle pains etc.

Here is the 5m x 8m plot I am sharing. Other people have yet to get going on their bits but we have made a start on ours. The first thing was to dig out a minor stump. Turned out it was alive underground and have way too many roots. Horrible thing.

We have water available. There is town water on tap but I don't want to use sprinklers. The procedure and product have got to be organic and sustainable, so compost and materials have to be checked to be untreated. The first thing planted should be snow peas. Maybe in a week from now. We have got the stakes already. Yes a frost will be a constant worry but we will have to work out something to minimise that.
By the time it warms up in a few months we will have corn, cherry tomato, and the other usual vegs.

So far we have a used wheelbarrow and some tools. And 50m of used shade cloth. And some seats.

[Carzee]

Here is a pic from yesterday where we uncovered some road base/blue metal.
The green "vege bed" is aligned north and south. BTW, the POV of the camera is looking toward South.
The purple "vege bed" is aligned to the plot border only.

For any members who are green thumbs, which alignment would you choose. I read that north-south alignment is better for the plant productivity as during the day the suns gets on both sides of the plant in a bed or on a trellis.

edit- add map

[Carzee]

Update,

1. Pickets are in. Last Saturday and Sunday we hired an old-fashioned picket tool.
Why did we take a decision to use star pickets and wire:
for trellis
for shadecloth and bird netting
and for general perimeter to keep out grey roos.

...and used 2.4m pickets happened to be available close by.

2. Today we picked up a load of approved (top of the line) compost for $39 . Once at the plot we cleared the stump excavation and enlarged it and then used a coal shovel to unload the trailer and fill the excavation. Didn't take as long as I thought, and since the breeze was positively antartic today it was cool. The compost will be mixed with dirt in the barrow as needed when we start the beds for the trellis corner (south western corner). When the compost dump is empty it will become the Corn Corner (south-eastern corner).

[Carzee]

BTW, the compost/landscape supplier has a weighbridge and you are weighed empty and then, once you're loaded, they weigh you again on the way out to figure out the invoice amount. Well, the weighbridge said the trailer was loaded with 680kg of compost. I have seen members on the forum load their Number 5s up with firewood and that must be heavy so I thought the compost was ok.

[Carzee]

Was cold today, even for Canberra. A convoy of huge icebergs drifted down the river past Duntroon into Lake Burley Griffin and crashed into the pylons of Commonwealth Ave Bridge sending truck size chunks of ice from up the top down onto the traffic below. No, that didn't happen, but I did hear something about local ice problems and some snow is now dusting the local ranges: here's the numbers:
http://www.bom.gov.au/products/IDN60903/IDN60903.94926.shtml

It was also cool last Saturday. See the update photos below. One photo I took 3 days later shows a south-west view from Black Mountain towards Mt Stromlo Observatory and the snow dusted ranges on the horizon.

Certainly a memorable day - it was like working in the opposite of a sauna -no sweat despite lots of huff n puff. It was like the paddocks were air conditioned. This must be how it is to work outside in Scotland. I got a blister as you'd expect from a lot of digging but thats the only gripe -it certainly got to better than doing the digging in the warmer months. I excavated the corner bed for Snow Peas (will be cherry tomatoes in warmer months). The heavy work, digging out, backfill with compost and soil mix, and a layer of lucerne for the worms about 8 inches down. The inaugural planting of seeds was all done before going home that day. They should grow 6ft tall.

I watered the seeds only, and used a soft drink bottle. It was about 5 litres in total. And that night it rained and again today. (This trial and error so I am noting the trivia here to help figure out what went wrong if it all goes wrong).

Sunday was a bit of R&R at Majura watching a Black Powder shoot at the range. The wind was from behind the shooters but some of the slugs are so big it would hardly matter I think.