USS Halsey DDG-97 Post is "In The Works"

Just didn't feel like finishing it tonight.

 I'm organizing a huge stack of "stuff" that will go on eBay, and that means photographing it, and writing the listings, and that's taking me longer to do than I expected.

And I've also got a few pictures from a crew-only, 2nd Deck tour I was on Sunday. I've seen and posted 75% of it before, but this time we went as far forward as is allowed, and saw the anchor windlass mechanisms.

BIG stuff, and probably things you'll never see.....

70 Years Ago Today......

The Empire of Japan announced their surrender.

Due to the time differences, it was heard in the U.S. on August 14th, which was yesterday.

In commemoration, we had a memorial on the Iowa Friday at 1400 local time.

An old Army vet played the most perfect rendition of "Taps" I've ever heard live, and there wasn't a dry eye to be found.

Let us all remember that day so long ago, and the courage and sacrifice that led us to it.

The USS Iowa Veteran's Association has been aboard all week, and meeting these guys was quite an honor.

I met some who served on her during WWII, and some of the guys who were the very last on her; literally the guys that sailed her into the mothball fleet.

We greeted them all with "Welcome home", and they loved it.

We also learned a tremendous amount from them about how the ship has changed over the years, and the younger guys were an absolute wealth of information about the ship's current configuration.

And we thanked them all for their service.

Just Told the RNC WHY I Won't Give Them Any Money......

I rarely do any "Political Commentary" here as I'm not very eloquent at it, but today is different.

Just had an interesting phone call.

It was the RNC calling, and rather than just hit the "disconnect" button, I thought I'd talk to the guy, and see if I could get my viewpoint across.....

The call started out by asking me who I thought was "the best" candidate in the current crop of people vying for the official RNC head nod.

I told him that, at this point in time, I favored Scott Walker, but also liked Ted Cruz and Carly Fiorina.

I'll get to Governor Walker, and my brief "chat" with the caller, in a bit....

I've got some gripes about Carly's time at HP, but for now, that's neither here nor there. She's extremely intelligent, very personable (I saw her speak at a Tech Convention once, years ago), and I generally agree with her political positions on things.

I like Senator Cruz because I also agree with his political positions, and especially like his stance in strong support of our 2nd Amendment rights. I think he's a bit of a dark horse candidate, and his "Pull No Punches" approach to things turns some people off, but I think you can say with confidence that he knows where he stands on issues, and he's got the gumption to tell you.

I like Governor Walker because again, I like his stand on the issues, and the fact that he has a proven history of getting a budget under control, and ending up with a surplus.

The fact that he survived a very nasty recall election shows to me that he can "get out the vote", at least in his home state.

Now, about that phone call.......

After chatting with the guy for a while (he claimed to be from Wisconsin, and claimed he was calling from Oshkosh), I was wondering when he'd get around to holding the cup out.

Sure enough, after niceties were over he asked for a pledge of "$100, $50, or even just $25", and I flat out told him "No".

I told him that unless and until the RNC ran a candidate that was a true fiscal and Constitutional Conservative, I wouldn't give them 10 cents.

I told him their record of running such candidates in the past had absolutely SUCKED, and that the party was well and truly on it's way to being irrelevant to their "core" or "base" or whatever they call it these days.

I told him that I would much rather give my money directly to a candidate than the RNC, as the RNC had quite a history of promising one thing, and then either "forgetting" it, or turning around and doing something almost 180* from what they said they'd do.

Once I told him no, he seemed to want to cut me loose, but I was able to hang on to him for a while, and he let me finish. I asked him to try and get my positions bumped up the line to somebody who would listen, and he said he'd flag the recording for review.

Considering the past history of RNC "promises", I doubt anybody else will listen to the recording, if indeed it was being recorded at all.......

Battleship USS Iowa Fly Over Flight

Something to amuse my readers while I ponder what to post next....

OH, I know....my "Mini Tour" of the USS Halsey, DDG-97!

I'll try and get that up later.

In the meantime, enjoy!

These guys are from the Chino, CA "Planes of Fame" air museum, a place I've visited many times.

We Might Be Leaving Kalifornaistan Earlier Than I Thought......

Sorry I didn't get going on this earlier. Much to my surprise (and delight!) my lovely wife has all of a sudden become rather "antsy" about moving to Colorado, and relegating the wonderful People's Democratik Republik of Kaliforniastan to the dustbin of history.

I guess it started a few days ago when I was looking at real estate prices in the Fort Collins/Bellvue/Laporte/Wellington area, and saw some rather nice properties for about $75~100k less than what we'd walk away with if we sold this place.

She ran the numbers again, and confirmed my SWAG about the valuation vs what we owe, and realized she could retire early.

ANYWAY.....we could get a nice 3br 2ba on at least one acre of land, and if we moved a bit further out, we could get the same thing on 2~3 acres, and be well within our comfort zone regarding PITI, and other matters that she understands very well.


Here's one on 2.6 acres for $290,000:

Here's one on a 13,000 sqft lot for $250,000:

I noticed there's a trend towards Manufactured Housing in some areas, like the 2.6 acre property shown above.

I have no real opinion on Manufactured Housing (different link than above), other than I know it's improved tremendously over the last 25 years. My step son's future Father-In-Law (great guy) owns a construction company and builds "custom" homes, and has an excellent reputation in the area, so I'll talk to him about manufactured housing as used in that area before I make any final decision on it.

As an Engineer, I believe that if it was properly designed, properly assembled with quality components, and properly transported and installed, it should be OK.

As a potential buyer, I have a lot to learn!


And of course you can get real "fixer-uppers" in the $150,000~$200k range, but I'm just too damn old to take on another "fixer-upper" house!



Some more Good Things:

Colorado sales tax is 4.5~6.5%, compared to 9+% here.

Gasoline is 75 cents to a buck a gallon cheaper.

Food is cheaper.

Colorado state income tax is a flat-rate 4.63%, compared to 13.3% here.

Colorado property tax is generally under 1% (varies GREATLY by county), but on a less expensive home, it would be less than we're paying now, and it could very well be half of what we're paying now.

And I found several references to a "Senior Exemption" on the property tax, but as of this time, I have no idea what that means.

Our current house payment is in the $1800 range right now, and after she ran the numbers (again), she realized our payment would be in the $800~$1000 range.

The last thing she wants me to research are utility rates, and I want to look into "High Speed" Internet access.

We might possibly be out of here in two years, or less, compared to the 3~5 years she was looking at before.

I just hope things hold together that long........

Navy Days Was Great!

Got to tour the USS Halsey, and I'll post pix on Sunday.

Maybe about 25 contacts from NI6BB, and band conditions were poor.

I usually operate during the week, and I was surprised how quiet things are on the weekends, with few operations taking place across the channel on Terminal Island.

All the electrical equipment on the big cranes and the other gear over there tends to make quite a racket, but today the local noise level was only S2~3!

Too bad propagation stunk.......


In the meantime.....enjoy the video of the USS Cape St. George arriving, and our simulated "salute firing" of 5" gun, Mount 56!

Almost Forgot.....Navy Days L.A. 2015!

I'll be on the Iowa all day Saturday, and I have a ticket for a brief tour a1300~1330 of one of the three ships here for Navy Days.

The ships arrived Tuesday morning around 0900, and were graced with:



The USS Halsey, DDG-97

The USS Bunker Hill, CG-52

and

The USS Cape St. George, CG-71

Here's some video courtesy of WABC, Channel 7:



   

And here's the story on the ABC website.


Between tinkering away on the Supra, fixing my wife's granddaughter's laptop (it "self upgraded" to Windows 10 on her!), AND doing research on proximity fuzes for a planned exhibit on the Iowa (hey, they're "radio related"!), I totally forgot this was coming up this weekend!

The Iowa was closed on Tuesday for filming, and when I woke up Wednesday morning, I was rather ill, so I didn't go in for my usual Radio Room shift.

Had a 48-hour stomach bug that knocked me for a loop, but I'm back to normal now.

SO......I'm taking my camera with me, but I think they have a "No Camera" policy on the ships; I'll have to read what the ticket says.

At least I should get some good shots from the pier and from the Iowa.

Backyard Visitor

And Pebbles went completely NUTZ!

She heard some other dogs barking, ran to the back door, and started whining, something she rarely does.

Then I heard my wife say "Oh my GOD!!" in a rather frantic voice, so I grabbed my 1911 and headed for the back.

We had a visitor on the backyard block wall!

 

By this time Pebbles had bolted out the door when my wife cracked it open, and by the time I got out there she was doing her best to dislodge the intruder from the wall:

This was when she was on her way UP!

Her front paws got to within a few inches of the top of the wall, so I decided I'd better end the fracas, as I didn't want a 1930 emergency call to the Vet.

I went over there, and barked out our "safe" word, and she stopped and sat down, so all those HOURS of practicing that command paid off.

I got her back inside and praised her for being "safe" (DO NOT use the word when doing this!), and gave her one of her favorite treats.

Part of the grapevine is on the ground, and not the trellis, as she tried to climb the trellis a few nights ago in response to "something" being up on the wall.

It's usually a cat, but they take off after she makes one pass at them, and the other night she repeatedly kept trying to get up the wall in that area, so now I think I know what got her so riled up!

The possum was starting to get a bit defensive by the time I got to the fence, but I don't think it's their nature to attack, so the only thing I was worried about was if it fell off the wall.

Hopefully the little critter won't be back tonight........

DC SHOES: ROBBIE MADDISON'S "PIPE DREAM"

This is amazing!

Pressure Washing -Part 1-

Well, yesterdays attempt at pressure washing the bottom front of the Supra was a mixed success. My son brought over his "Task Force" pressure washer (the old house brand at Lowe's), and we proceeded to blast the underside of the car.

There were several problems from the get go.

One, his washer soap tanks have never worked, and two, we wound up having the seals blow out of the pump, putting us out of action.

The other "problem" was that the ZEP Industrial Strength (whatever that means these days) Purple cleaner I bought was not meant to be sprayed on and washed off (regardless of what the container says....), and it just runs off without having a chance to do much. Some of the people I talked to said it works quite well if you put it in the detergent tanks of the washer, but with our washer being non-functional in that area, that was a NOGO for us..

Then I ran out of good old Gunk Engine Brite, which does work extremely well if you spray it on, let it sit, and blast it off.

We got the loose stuff off fairly well:

But the majority of the crud is still on the frame and suspension components, as you'll see in the following pix.



Found a small dent in the oil pan:

And a bent area of the front cross member, probably caused by somebody hitting one of those concrete parking lot bumpers:

The oil pan dent is nothing to worry about, and likewise the ding in the cross member. The metal isn't split or folder back on itself, so I can just use a little "persuasion", and bend it back.



Also gently cleaned the topside:

Which resulted in large chunks of the black wrinkle finish paint blowing off the cam covers:

That's no big deal, as I have another set of cam covers that I'm going to get degreased, and finish them in the same colors. I'm not sure if I'm going to do it myself, or get them powder coated.


And I found out my power steering pump is blue, probably indicating a replacement at some time in the past:

The only rust I found on the car is under the battery tray, which I knew was there from the topside:

When I put the new battery in, I cleaned the tray with Naval Jelly, primed it and painted it, but blew off the upper area for "later".

After I finish degreasing the car and get it in the garage, I'll pull the battery, clean and rust encapsulate this area, and paint it.

 This is the area at the very bottom of the car, under the battery tray, where the battery had been dripping for who knows how long:

It's going to take some serious wire brushing and sanding to get the surface clean down there so I can encapsulate the rust and paint it.



And as usual, Pebbles was out there "Straw Bossing" us:

I'm not going for "show car" quality, and probably never will. This car has a nice "patina" to it (all the rage these days!), and since it's truly a "survivor" car, I figured it's earned every little nick, chip, and scrape.

Surface rust gets fixed. Nicks/chips through the paint get fixed. The bleached out cracked paint on the mirrors and rear sunshade are getting fixed, and the same with the front bumper. I have new carpets for the interior, and the seats will get properly cleaned when they're out for the carpet replacement.

 I bought this car to drive, and I'm more concerned about getting the front and rear suspensions rebuilt, the brakes rebuilt, all the hoses and belts (including the timing belt, tensioner, and idler) replaced, the new wheels and tires on it, and a proper 4-wheel alignment.

The only thing I can't do "in house" is replacing the windshield, which has seen better days, so that will get vended out. It's not cracked, and hasn't delaminated that I can see, but the blue tinted area at the top has that "Old Jap Car" brown tint to it now, and it has a lot of little nicks and chips in it, any one of which could turn into a crack.

Plus, it just looks bad!


The pressure washer that I bought should be here Tuesday afternoon, and I bought some gel-type Gunk that hopefully will stick to the vertical surfaces and soften up the crud enough that the washer can blow it off.

And all the bending, stretching, and lugging stuff around is good for me, and gets me off my behind and moving more than the day or two per week I spend on the Iowa. I joked with my previous Doctor that I had joined the "Toyota Physical Fitness Plan", and after I explained it to him, he said that was good way to look at it.

I just hope Part 2 goes better, and I can get all the grease, crud, and other gunk off the bottom of the car!

Saturday Already?

Sheesh.......time sure flies when you:

A) Don't Know What You're Doing

B) Are Having "Fun"

C) Are "retired".

Seems like I have less free time now than when I was working!

Or maybe it's just the backlog of projects I'd been saving "For When I Retire" that are finally getting my attention.

Writing up a PowerPoint (Libre Office "Presentation", actually) presentation to give to the Iowa staff on RF safety.

The speaker last month at the "other" radio club was a former SoCal Edison guru on RF Exposure, and he's offered his services to us.

So, while we've made the required calculations, he has the proper, calibrated test equipment to actually measure the RF field strength at various distances from our antennas, and tell us how well we meet the requirements.

One thing I deliberately did when I ran the calculations was to completely ignore any feedline loss, and used 100 Watts "at the antenna" to generate the results, giving us "Worst Case" results.

I keep pushing to actually measure the power at the antenna feed point, but nobody else seems interested. It's starting to look like another "Let Jim Do It" project, but knowing the guys, as soon as I drag in the gear and announce what I'm doing, several people will tag along to observe and help.

And I'm cleaning out the garage AGAIN. Seems like "stuff" just condense out of thin air to fill up garages in SoCal, especially when there's NO CAR in there!

My son is bringing over his pressure washer today so I can finally get all the grease/dirt/oil/crud off the bottom of the Supra under the engine bay so I can swap out the power steering hoses and get it smogged. The last time I took it in the refused to smog it, saying the high-pressure line to the power steering rack was leaking, and "Spraying fluid all over the place", making it unsafe to work on while the engine was running.

I looked under the hood, and while I could find a few drops of power steering fluid, no way was it "Spraying all over the place". I understand their concern, though. A long time ago I had a second generation Celica that had a cracked exhaust manifold, a common problem. Being extremely low on $$ at the time, I just let it go. I'd only paid $500 for the car, the crack happened right after I had it smogged to transfer the title, and it wasn't that loud.

WELL......the exhaust leak was pointed right at the high-pressure power steering hose, and one day when I was coming down the street, about a block away from my little bachelor pad, the hot gas finally burned through the hose.

Ever see hot hydraulic fluid under high pressure hit a flame?

Yep, it went BOOM, fire and smoke belched out from under the car, and one of my neighbors who happened to be walking down the street at the time said it looked like something out of a movie. There wasn't enough air under the hood to keep the fire burning, and it was low on fluid, so at least the car didn't burn to the ground.

So while I was upset that they greatly exaggerated the leak the Supra has, I can see why the mechanic was hesitant to work on it.

Oh, well.....

Time to go out and get greasy. Hopefully the power washer and the stuff I vought at Home Depot will get the car clean on the bottom.

I just hate working on crummy, greasy, grime-covered cars! It slows you down, and is a PITA......