Ms. Swan's Front End Rebuild....

OK, here's what I've been doing.....

Here's the car up on jacks with the left front strut removed. She should be in the garage, BUT, my wife has started "staging" things to get rid of before we move to Colorado, and the garage has become loaded with "junque" again.

 And here's the rest of the left front, with a bunch of worn out parts in evidence.

 And to remove the BIG nuts on the struts, I bought a BIG wrench at Harbor Freight. My wife calls this my "Clown Wrench" because it's so big (to her) that it "doesn't look real".

When I removed the nut, I clamped the strut in the vise, got ready to give a mighty grunt, and the nut came loose with hardy any pull at all!

The wrench came in handy to tighten the new nut, though....

 The top strut mount was toast, as seen by this "bottom view" of the bearing...

br />  Don't know if you can see the cracks in the rubber on the top, but when the car was sitting with the weight on the suspension, they were scary big....

 Here's the junky old Monroe "Sensatrac" insert. When the spring was off, I grabbed the rod and gave it a pull. It had about a HALF INCH of free play both ways before you could feel anything, and it gurgled when you cycled it.

TOTALLY shot.....

 Here's the OEM front spring on the right, along with the new Dobinsons #C59-070 that I bought from George at Raptor Racing. The wire diameter on the OEM spring is .550" / 14mm, and the free overall length is about 13.8" / 350mm.

 Here's another view of the springs. The wire diameter on the new Dobinsons C59-070 spring is .603" / 15.3mm, and the free overall length is about 11" / 280mm.

 And for those that might care (the American Iron guys go nuts for this type of information!), there was a violet paint stripe / color code on the OEM spring.

And here's the end result. A nice new shiny spring, new protective boot for the shock rod, and a new top strut mount.

Don't freak out about it being clamped in the vise jaws. It's barely tightened down to hold it for the photo, and when I did have it clamped down tight so I could torque the nut at the top of the new strut to 40 ft-lbs, I had two pieces of hardwood in there to cushion it so the jaws wouldn't bite into the new spring, possibly inducing stress fractures and weakening it.

As they used to say in the old Heathkit manuals..."This completes the assembly of this unit"!

I'll get this one back in the car after I R&R the lower control arm and strut rod bushings and replace the rubber boot/bellows on the power steering rack. It's completely dry on this side, so that means the seals are OK, but a torn boot like that just bugs me, and since I have a new one, REPLACE IT, JIM!!!


Then all I have to do is wash, rinse, and repeat this on the passenger side, and the front end is finished for now.


I blew off going down to the Iowa today as I'm on a roll here, and if I keep going I can have both sides of the front finished by Monday or Tuesday.


I learned a couple of tips and tricks from the guys on the Celica Supra forum, and I now have a couple of tools that make the job  much easier, along with a huge assortment of Cotter Pins that Ill need to bolt everything back together.


I have a pair of brand new lower control arms with OEM bushings and new ball joints, so I might just swap out the new bushings for the Energy Suspension PolyGraphite ones I have, rather than spend the extra time to change out the ball joints in the lower control arms that are on the car.


At the pace I work at, that would probably save a whole day.......


So stay tuned for another exciting episode of "The Continuing Adventures of Dr. Jim and Ms. Swan"!


Not quite as much fun as Doctor Who and his companions, but a whole lot more real.....

"Driving Ms. Swan", the Continuing Story....

Well, I've been banging away on my 1985 Supra in preparation for the "Supras in Vegas" show in September.

Got the gearbox oil changed, and my "Short Throw Shifter" installed.

No, it's not the "snick-snick" you'd get from a Hurst Competition PLUS shifter, but it's light years ahead of the one that was in the car. Part of the installation was the removal of a totally worn out metal/rubber/metal bushing in the shift rod inside the transmission, and replacing it with a bronze "Oilite" bushing kit made by one of the Celica Supra forum members. This change, along with replacing the plastic bushing on the bottom of the ball that engages it with a superior grade Delrin plastic, and the new shifter, made a tremendous improvement.

Today I pulled the driver's side strut/spring assembly out so I can replace the top strut mount plate, shock absorber insert, and install the new front spring that drops the car about 3/4".

I was planning on replacing a lot of other parts, and now after evaluating the general state of the suspension, it looks like I'll be replacing a few other things. I already have the parts, so rather than pulling it all apart later, I'll just do it now, as I have all the PROPER tools to do the job.

The top strut mount plate was full of cracks and splits, and looked pretty scary from the top. After removing it, I spent some time checking it, and some of the cracks go all the way through the rubber. The bearing was also very gritty and rough feeling, and all the grease was dried up. It's lasted 30 years and 167,000 miles, so I think it's due for retirement!

The lower control arm bushings have some nasty cracks in them, and the rubber boot over the ball joint is split allowing all the grease to come oozing out. Since I have these parts on hand, they'll be changed.

The flexible hose to the brake caliper was in worse condition than I expected. The outer jacket was peeled away in several places, revealing the fabric reinforcement inside the hose, so that definitely has to go! I have a full set, front and rear, of stainless steel braided lines that I'll be using as replacements. I've used these before on other cars, and besides being very sturdy, they also give a better pedal feel due to the fact that they don't expand when you hit the brakes.

The pads in the caliper looked almost new, as well as the rotor, but they're being replaced as well. The rotors are StopTech "Sport Rotors", drilled for cooling, and the pads are high-performance ceramic "street" pads. And the brake system will get a flush and fluid replacement with DOT4 fluid.

And one surprise was the rubber boot for the tie rod arm that comes out of the steering rack. It's split, also, like the one I already knew about on the passenger side!

Again, I ordered two boots, so those will be swapped out.

And I'll be scrubbing off all the accumulated grease/gunk/road grime, and hitting any bare metal with a shot of paint.

Godspeed, Mike.......

I'd write something poignant, but I'm not, and never will be, good enough to eulogize Mike....

 

Godspeed, Mike, and God Bless your family. Thanks for all you did.

HAARP to Reactivate in 2017

Oh, boy. The conspiracy nuts will have a field day (no pun intended) over this one.

Courtesy of the ARRL:

Let the conspiracy theories resume! Alaska’s High-Frequency Active Auroral Research Program (HAARP) facility will reopen in 2017. The sprawling facility now is under the ownership of the University of Alaska Fairbanks (UAF), and the UAF Geophysical Institute is preparing HAARP for a new sponsored research campaign that’s set to begin early next year, UAF Researcher Chris Fallen, KL3WX, told ARRL.
“This involves, for example, reinstalling the vacuum tubes in each of the 10 kW amplifiers — eventually 360 in total — that were removed by the US Air Force [the facility’s former owner] for warm storage in the main facility,” Fallen said. He noted that the transmitter shelters have been unheated since the previous campaign in the summer of 2014. “The five generators — approximately 3 MW each — have recently been tested individually and are verified operational.”
Fallen said the HAARP ionosonde (DPS4D “Digisonde”) will be brought back online. “Some instruments on site need to be repaired or replaced,” he said. Those would include riometers and a UHF radar. “Optical instruments will be brought back. The flux-gate magnetometer is operational again.”
Fallen said other researchers are planning to install instruments at the science pads. “We are still investigating models for increasing Amateur Radio involvement with HAARP, which, in addition to announcing operating schedules, can potentially include hosting one or more ham stations on or near the science pads,” he said.
UAF describes HAARP as “the world’s most capable high-power, high-frequency transmitter for study of the ionosphere.” Constructed in 1990 at a cost of some $300 million, HAARP over the years has inspired a wide range of conspiracy theories that became grist for late-night radio talk shows. Some have claimed that HAARP’s 3 GW transmitter and 30-acre antenna farm have been used to control the weather, while others have argued that HAARP has caused earthquakes.
The FCC recently granted two Part 5 Experimental Service licenses for HAARP ionospheric research “across multiple bands.” WI2XFX will cover experiments in discrete parts of the HF spectrum, including 2650-2850; 3155-3400; 4438-4650; 4750-4995; 5005-5450; 5730-5950, and 7300-8100 kHz. A second Experimental license, WI2XDV, covers ionospheric research between 1 and 40 MHz.
UAF is hosting an open house at HAARP, located near Gakona, Alaska, on August 27. The event will feature facility tours, a mobile planetarium, a permafrost exhibit, science demonstrations and talks, and barbecue.
Fallen will deliver a free science lecture on Friday, August 26, at the Wrangell-St Elias National Park Visitor Center Auditorium, “Radio Modification of the Ionosphere, and Who Uses This HAARP Thing Anyway?” in partnership with the Wrangell Institute for Science and the Environment (WISE)
HAARP is aimed at studying the properties and behavior of the ionosphere. Operation of the research facility was transferred from the US Air Force to the University of Alaska Fairbanks last August, allowing HAARP to continue exploring ionospheric phenomena via a land-use cooperative research and development agreement.

Democrats vs Republicans

Found this over at Common Sense Evaluation.

Sad but true.....

"Phase 1" Painting Finished

Living room and dining room areas are done, and put back together.

Kinda shot the "Working on my Supra all weekend" plans, but, sigh......

Not sure what the wife has planned next, but I'm sure it will be another "Big Deal".

Going to a meeting tonight of the Los Angeles Area Council of Amateur Radio Clubs, which is an organization composed of all the Ham Radio clubs in the area. I'm the rep for the Battleship Iowa Amateur Radio Association, so I get to go to attempt to keep BIARA informed of future plans.

LAACARC is the group that puts on HAMCON in SoCal every few years. Since one of the clubs has backed out this year, we'll be hosting it again at the end of 2017. I'm planning on being out of here by then, but I'll help right up until we move.

Prepping the House For Sale, Part 1

Of no doubt MANY additional posts.....

Even though my wife is vacillating a bit on moving, we've started doing the first of our preparations to sell the house we're in.

Yesterday we cleared out the living room and she started patching all the cracks and dings in the walls so she can paint.

The house has settled noticeably since I moved in here 7 years ago (been that long?), due I'm sure to the extreme drought Southern California has been having.

Parts of the back yard have slumped, the dirt is pulling away from the foundations, and the front porch has settled enough that there's a definite gap where it meets the house.

Her oldest son filled the gap with expanding foam when he hung the new new interior and exterior doors, but we have to come up with some kind of trim strip to hide the foam.

That'll be "on me", as he works even slower than I do! I have to cut him some slack, though, as doing doors is what he does for a living, and while he does superb work on the doors, door frames, and other trim, he's used to having the rest of his crew finish up all the little details for him

SO.....yesterday my wife scratched out and "vee'd" all the cracks, filled them with some new high-tech glop she bought, and this morning she sanded the filled spots. She just finished masking off all the trim, and she'll do the painting tomorrow. Then I can help her move all the stuff back, and the dining area and living room will be finished.

We did the bathroom late last year and it still looks good. She did the front bedroom early last year, and since it's closed up all the time, it still looks fine. That leaves our bedroom, and this room, the "Radio Room" to do.

Not sure when we'll do our bedroom, but I suspect THIS room will be the last one we do......

Time to head out to the garage so I can unearth all the stuff to rebuild the front suspension on the Supra, which is this week's project.

Can't Think of a Title, So TGIF!

Except for those of us who are retired, when everyday is Friday!

Enjoy the cartoon from our friends over at Hope n' Change Cartoons.

A Moment of Silence Please......

Back in the LBC.....

Uneventful flight from Denver, long ride in a SuperShuttle from John Wayne Airport in Orange County, and one extraordinarily happy dog greeting us when we got here.

We had a great breakfast at The Silver Grill Cafe on Walnut Street in Fort Collins, and I *highly* recommend the place.

If you're ever in Fort Collins and need a good breakfast or lunch, go there, you'll love it. Great food, great service by a friendly staff, and reasonable prices.

Trust me, you could do far worse than this place, and spend more to boot.

And it's actually 10* COOLER in SoCal than in the Denver area!

Last night there was a severe weather alert on the radio with "golf ball sized hail, torrential rains, and wind exceeding 75 MPH" for the Fort Morgan area and Weld County, I could see the clouds that had been building up in the East all day, and they looked pretty nasty, but all we got in Fort Collins was a bit of drizzle.

SO...now I have to start the process of dumping a lot of unneeded radio stuff on eBay. Mostly radios I either bought to restore, but they were too far gone for my skill level, and several that I got started on before I moved here, and LOST various bits and pieces of.

Well, I most likely have all the parts, but they've been separated from the radio far enough that they might as well be lost!

I've got two Knight-Kit Star Roamer short-wave receivers, a Collins 75S-1 HF receiver, a Drake R4-B receiver with a matching T4X-B transmitter, and a Heathkit GC-1 Mohican short-wave.

And I also have an ICom IC-970 2M/70cm all-mode rig that I have apart, but all the parts were carefully packed, and that one will most likely get put back together. It was from a heavy smokers shack, and was crusted with crud, so I *had* to take it apart to scrub it.

And I'm sure I'll find more "treasures" to get rid of once I start going through all the boxed up radio stuff that I never unpacked after I moved in here almost 7 years ago!

Had a great trip, but it's good to be back home, even if home is in Kommiefornia.....

A Few Pix from The Kid's House

Had a very relaxing day out boating on the Horsetooth Reservoir. Our daughter-in-law's father has a small boat that we've been out on once before, two years ago when we first came out here. It's a very pleasant day, and we usually motor out to one of the many coves, and pull in close to the shore, tie up to a tree, and have a nice picnic lunch.

While we were there, a group of people came in towing a large SeaDoo with some kind of large pipe coming out of the side. Turns out it's to power one of those watet-jet "FlyBoard" things, and once they got it assembled, the guy and his girlfriend took turns putting on a show for everybody moored in the cove.

I didn't get any pix because I was floating on a REALLY BIG inner tube, but everybody else did, and as soon as they email me the pix, I'll post them here.

Here's a pic of the garage/shop at the kid's place:

And here's the view to the North:

To the East:

And a bad, blurry pic of some barbed wire for wirecutter:

My wife has (finally!) received all her documents from the people handling her retirement pension, and she's mulling over her options for staying to the end of the school year next June, or possibly leaving earlier, about the beginning of 2017. This would give us plenty of time to get everything in order, get the house all squared away and on the market, and get a good chunk of our stuff "podded" and shipped ahead of us. Our in laws have offered us storage space to keep things, and have even offered to let us stay with them until a house out here closes, and we take possession.

So, we're laying the foundation for our move, and really looking forward to it.

House Hunting in Fort Collins

Well, we took the afternoon "off", hooked up with the realtor, and looked at five houses.

The first one was really nice. 3br, 2ba, nice family room, wood-burning fireplace in the living room, and a little gas "fireplace" (more like a stove) in the family room. 12,000 sqft lot, BIG garage with a workshop AND a third added-on garage bay at the very rear of the main garage.

Asking price was $289,900, and it had one offer.

Next place my wife fell in love with.

FIVE br, 3ba, fully finished basement ( with two of the fully-conforming bedrooms and 1ba in it), 14,250 sqft lot, but only a one-car attached garage, BUT it has another driveway alongside leading to a nice fenced-off "RV Storage Area", which would have plenty of room for an additional two-car garage/workshop.

$275,000 with three offers, but the owners were more than happy to allow us the run of the place while we looked.

Third place was a "Brady Bunch" tri-level ranch house, but my wife, who'd never been inside a tri-level before, decided she did'nt like AT ALL, so "tri-level" will get added to the "NOT" part of my searches.

It was around $280k.

Next place was kind of a modern style, with vaulted ceilings and lots of wood work, but was fairly small, on a small lot, with no room to really do anything with.

Very nice house, beautifully maintained, wonderful wooded lot with HUGE trees (the whole neighborhood was like this), but just not anything like what we're looking for.

Last place was a "Oh NOOOOOO!" kind of place. 3br, 1ba, dinky one-car garage that appeared to have been a living space at one time, and LINOLEUM FLOORS in two of the bedrooms!

One of the bedrooms had some, uh...."unusual" light fixtures hung from the ceiling, and my step-son busted up and said "GROW ROOM!" as soon as he saw them.

Even the realtor said the place was over priced, and we all had a good chuckle about it.

I had a fairly good idea of what areas I think we'd both be happy in, but my wife is still "learning" these things. She can't read a map to save here life, so when I show her things on Google Earth and Google Maps, she just can't make the connection to the real world.

The first three places were up in the North part of Fort Collins, and the LaPorte area, the area I'd really like, and she pretty much agrees with me now that she's had her "boots on the ground" in those areas. It's close to important services, like a good hospital (we're not getting younger!), a 20~30 minute drive into Fort Collins proper for "Major Shopping Excursions", and yet far enough out that it feels like rural living.

After living in the L.A. area for the last 34 years, I'm sure ready to get back to something like the area I grew up in, and she's pretty tired of the traffic, congestion, and crime, too.

Took a few pix of the area outside Bellvue where the kids are living now, and I'll get those posted tomorrow. I wouldn't mind living there, but my sweet little wife wouldn't like the isolation.

Arrived in Fort Collins

Got here about 1630 local time, and by the time we got the car and got to the hotel it was 1900.

My wife made all the reservations through Travelocity, and picked an "economy" car at Hertz.

Sorry, but I'm NOT driving a Chevy Spark!

I prefer something just a bit bigger than a motorized roller skate that loses big time in a collision with a large dog.....

SO....we went with a Nissan "Rogue", a mini SUV. It has a ton of room for a small car, drives pretty nicely, and was a good deal.

It's a bit low on power, but does 75 on the highway just fine, and moves out smartly around town.

As expected, Diamond and Coco (the two dogs the kids took with them when they moved) went absolutely bonkers when they heard our voices.

The wife and DIL are out "shopping" for a bit, and I'm catching up on all the email that came in while we were traveling.

More to come......

Light Posting Ahead

We're headed out to Fort Collins Wednesday morning.

Planning on having a "mini private wedding reception" for my step-son and his (fairly) new wife. They had invited us out for a "real" reception, but things went sideways due to some, uh...."family issues", so it will just be the four of us.

They got moved into one of the houses her family owns because her brother and his wife closed on a home of their own, so we'll get to see their new place.

It's about half the distance to where they both work from their old place, so that's better for them in winter. We drove by it last time we were out there, and it looks pretty nice.

And it has a ton of unused storage room in some nice, dry, heated outbuildings, so it's a possible site to stage some of our stuff before we move next year.

And I've got 5 or 6 places I want to drive by and look at with the wife so she can look at the neighborhoods. As we found out last time, real estate pix posted on the websites can be quite "creative" in cropping out the neighbor's house with seven cars up on blocks, or the pig farm next door, or the trailer park across the street, or.....well, just about anything they don't feel would enhance their chance of selling the place.

Let's just hope things hold together for the next 12 months or so, so we can escape from The People's Demokratik Republik of Kommieforniastan!

Test and Review of Airspy vs SDRplay vs HackRF SDR Receivers

I had a HackRF, and sold it after a few weeks of playing with it. My biggest gripe was that it has an 8-bit Analog-to-Digital Converter in it, the same number of bits as a $15 "dongle" receiver. It was also as easily overloaded as all the dongles I've played with.

Earlier in the week, I used the $100 gift certificate I won to buy an SDRplay receiver from my local Ham Radio Outlet.

So far, it's been a royal PITA to get running on my Linux PC. I made the mistake of RTFM, and installed the MiricsAPI on this PC before I tried to run any of the Linux software I already have on this PC, like Gqrx and Linrad. The MiricsAPI installs some things that stop Gqrx and Linrad from working properly, and there's NO uninstaller to remove the API!

The Linrad developer was kind enough to contact me, and has given me excellent advice on how to get the SDRplay running on Linux, but until I can figure out how to get their damned API removed, I'm dead in the water.


I'd heard of the Airspy receiver before, but never really looked in to it, but it looks like one will be my next SDR purchase, at least until the piggy bank is full enough to get a Flex 6500 that will be the replacement for my Flex 5000A.

ANYWAY......while searching for ways out of this current dilemma, I stumbled back across the RTL-SDR website. I'd first found this website when I started messing around with the "$15 Dongle" receivers, and it was a wealth of information to get my feet wet.

A few minutes ago I found their comparison on the three receivers listed in the title of this post, and from my experience with 2 out the 3 receivers, I'd say they're bang-on!

IF you're considering something better than a $15~$20 toy, by all means check out the review.

There's a lot you can do with the dongles as long as you're aware of their limitations, but if you want something more, then check this out.


RTL-SDR.COM SDR RECEIVER REVIEW

SDRplay Receiver

Since I won a $100 gift certificate for HRO, I decided to use it on a little gadget I've had my eye on for quite some time now.

It's called an "SDRplay", and is a little software defined radio receiver,

I've experimented a bunch with the USB "dongle" receivers, and had a HackRF1 for a while. The problem with the dongles and the HackRF receivers is that they only use 8-bit analog to digital converters, resulting in a pretty severely limited amount of dynamic range, especially if you live in an "RF Alley" like the metro L.A. area.

Strong signals on far removed frequencies "break through", and I had to turn down the RF gain and the IF gain in the software to get decent performance out of them.

Running them with my 144 MHz "eggbeater" antenna and an SSB Electronic preamp, which includes a helical filter, made them perform much better for 2 Meter Ham Radio work, and 137 MHz APT weather satellites.

The SDRplay uses 12-bit ADC's, so it should be quite a bit better.

I haven't tried the SDR play on my Windows PC yet, but it looks like it's going to take some fiddling around to get it to work on my Linux PC.

It gets properly detected when I plug it in to the USB port, but Gqrx and Linrad both barf when I try and make it receive.

And yes, I followed the instructions to the letter from the SDRplay website about installing the drivers and API.

Just have to do some more digging around, I guess....

Fracking Computers.........

No, this isn't about oil extraction.....

The other night, OpenSUSE installed some updates on this PC that broke the audio. This is rather unusual with OpenSUSE, because they usually run their "A Game", and I haven't suffered a "bad" update in years.

Of course it just might have something to do with the fact that I have various audio things things installed in a rather "unstock" configuration because the OEM setup doesn't include all the various codecs and other stuff I use for messing around with SDR things.

SO....since it's been a couple of years since I built this PC, I decided to upgrade to the newest version of OpenSUSE.

Off I went to Best Buy to grab a couple of new hard disks, as anytime I upgrade, I install new drives. That way I have my previous OS and all my applications available so I can extract bits and pieces of things, and all my documents, pix, and other stuff is untouched by the upgrade to the new OS.

Tore the PC apart, dragged it outside and blew all the dust bunnies out of it, installed the new drives, dragged it back in here, nd proceeded to install OpenSUSE "Leap" 42.1 on it.

I also took this time to install new video cables between the PC, KVM switch, and monitor. Sometime last year my KVM switch took a dump, and I replaced it with a new one of the identical type from Monoprice.

It caused nothing but grief with the video switching, so I just ran the video cable from the monitor directly to the PC, dragged another monitor in here to use with the Windoze PC, and used the KVM switch for just the keyboard and mouse.

Last night I installed new, very high quality "Dual Link" DVI cables in place of the DVI cables that came with the KVM switch. All seemed good until after the installation of the new OS, when I started to have numerous problems with the keyboard not responding, the mouse not responding, and the video doing strange things.

The KVM switch uses a USB connection between the PC and the switch to handle the keyboard and mouse, so I moved that cable to a USB 3.0 port on the back of the PC, and all seemed well.

This morning the weirdness started again, so I decided to just reinstall the OS, carefully picking only software that I needed, and leaving out some of the other stuff for now. Not quite a "Bare Bones" install, but not the "Kitchen Sink" install I usually do, either.

It seems more stable now, but has hung twice when I open the Dolphin File Manager (Windows Explorer for you non-linux folks).

The next thing to do is to TURN OFF all the fancy schmancy eye candy bullshit that everybody includes these days, like window transparency, window fades when switching tasks, the bouncing mouse cursor that shows you when it's busy, and all the other useless, annoying shit that's turned on by default to show you just how clever and creative the programmers are.

And I'll go to NVIDIA and grab the latest driver "blob" for this fairly high-end video card rather than use the Open Source video driver that's included. A lot of people in the Open Source community bad mouth NVIDIA for not releasing their source code so the community can do a "proper" Open Source driver, but that doesnt bother me.

I just want my system TO WORK, and if that means using a closed-source driver module, tough shit. At least I'm assured that the driver works, works properly, and won't get all weird on me during an upgrade.

And if this doesn't clear up the lingering issues I'm having, then I'll try running the video directly from the card output to the monitor again, and see if that makes it fully stable.

Oh, well....off to my Doctor's appointment, which is why I'm not on the Iowa today.....

Email From a Buddy

A gun is like a parachute.
If you need one, and don't have one,
you'll probably never need one again."

The definition of the word Conundrum is:
Something that is puzzling or confusing.

Here are six Conundrums of socialism in the United States of America:

1. America is capitalist and greedy -
yet half of the population is subsidized.

2. Half of the population is subsidized - yet they think they are victims.

3. They think they are victims - yet their representatives run the
government.

4. Their representatives run the government - yet the poor keep getting
poorer.

5. The poor keep getting poorer -
yet they have things that people in other countries only dream about.

6. They have things that people in other countries only dream about - yet
they want America to be more like those other countries.

Think about it!
And that, my friends, pretty much sums
up the USA in the 21st Century.
Makes you wonder who is doing the math.

These three, short sentences tell you a lot about the direction of our
current government and cultural environment:

1. We are advised to NOT judge ALL Muslims by the actions of a few lunatics,
but we are encouraged to judge ALL gun owners by the actions of a few
lunatics.

Funny how that works. And here's another one worth considering.

2. Seems we constantly hear about how Social Security is going to run out of
money. But we never hear about welfare or food stamps running out of money!
What's interesting is the first group "worked for" their money, but the
second didn't.

Think about it.....and Last but not least :

3. Why are we cutting benefits for our veterans, no pay raises for our
military and cutting our army to a level lower than before WWII, but we are
not stopping the payments or benefits to illegal aliens.

Am I the only one missing something?

"If you do not take an interest in the affairs of your government, then you
are doomed to live under the rule of fools." - Plato

First Flight Scheduled for B-29 "Doc"

I'm one of "Doc's Friends" in that I've given them what support I can comfortably afford.

WELL.....Doc is scheduled to take to the air next Sunday, July 17th!

Here's the press release I just received:

First Flight Scheduled for B-29 Doc

WICHITA, Kan., July 8, 2016 – Doc’s Friends, the group managing the restoration of the B-29 known as Doc, announced today the historic B-29 will make its return to flight Sunday, July 17. The restored Boeing B-29 Superfortress will take off from the non-joint-use runway at McConnell Air Force Base, adjacent to where the restoration team has spent the last 16 years restoring the warbird.

“Hundreds of volunteers have spent thousands of hours working to restore this national treasure,” said Jim Murphy, Doc’s Friends Restoration Program Manager. “After 16 years of hard work, sweat, tears and tireless attention to detail, we are ready fly.”

Doc’s flight crew expects first flight to be an early morning event on July 17 due to anticipated hot weather. First flight is also dependent upon weather conditions in Wichita and plans could change with little or no advanced notice.

Due to security restrictions at the active air force base, as well as security access at Doc’s home at Air Capital Flight Line, runway and ramp access will be limited.

The public, however, will have multiple locations from which they can view Doc’s first flight and landing. Specific details of those public watch areas and first flight timelines will be released soon.

The public is encouraged to subscribe online at http://www.b-29doc.com/signup/ to receive information regarding the public viewing locations as soon as the information is released. The information will be provided to the media for public disclosure via news releases.

On the web: www.b-29doc.com
Twitter: www.twitter.com/DocsFriends
Facebook: www.facebook.com/DocsFriends

About Doc’s Friends
Doc’s Friends is a 501c3 non-profit board managing the restoration of the Boeing B-29 Superfortress known as Doc. The group was formed in 2013 and is led by retired Spirit AeroSystems CEO Jeff Turner along with other Wichita business leaders; Charlie Chandler, Jack Pelton, Steve Clark, Lynn Nichols, Brad Gorsuch, Ron Ryan, Tim Buchanan, Jeff Peier, Esq., and Tom Bertels. Doc’s Friends is committed to returning this World War II warbird to the air to honor previous generations, educate current and future generations and connect the world to the rich heritage of aviation.

I'll be keeping my fingers crossed that all goes well. Be nice if Doc and Fifi can get together sometime soon....

AES Closing After 59 Years

Well, this has all the Ham Radio tongues wagging.

Amateur Electronic Supply, headquarted in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, is going out of business at the end of July.

I bought tons of stuff from them over the years, and they were Good People to deal with.

Sad to see a brick and mortar Ham Radio store close, but profit margins on Ham gear are very low, and Hams are notoriously cheap, so running a major chain of Ham Radio stores is a headache I wouldn't want to have.

I'll miss them, they were truly a fixture in the Ham radio world.....

Here's the story, courtesy of the ARRL website:

Amateur Electronic Supply (AES) will close its doors at the end of July after 59 years in business. No reason has been given for the decision to close the business. AES has been a premier player among Amateur Radio equipment retailers for decades, as well as a major presence at Dayton Hamvention® and other events. Various media outlets were informed of the closing in a brief e-mail message on July 6, but word of the closing has not yet appeared on the retailer’s website or Facebook page.
“It’s with great sadness that I have to tell you that Amateur Electronic Supply (AES) will cease operations at the end of this month,” AES National Sales Manager Tom Pachner, W9TJP, said in an e-mail. An employee at the Milwaukee headquarters store, who did not wish to be identified, confirmed that the message was legitimate. It’s believed that the AES staff was notified before the July 4th holiday weekend. In addition to the Milwaukee store, AES operates outlets in Cleveland (Wickliffe), Las Vegas, and Orlando.
Fond-du-Lac, Wisconsin, native Terry Sterman, W9DIA (SK), founded AES in 1957 when he was just 18, after getting into the radio-TV business by working in his father’s TV and electronics parts store. On January 1, 1998, ownership of AES shifted to Amateur Electronic Supply LLC, headed by Phil Majerus, a prominent Wisconsin businessman. Sterman died the following year at the age of 60, after a period of ill health.
For many years, the public face of AES was its Executive Vice President Ray Grenier, K9KHW, who oversaw marketing and advertising for the retailer from 1964 until his retirement in 2013. Grenier nearly singlehandedly produced the famous AES catalog, as well as magazine ads. For about 20 years, he also organized the well-received AES Superfest, a promotional effort begun in 1995 that grew into a hamfest. In April, the AES Superfest hosted the 2016 ARRL Wisconsin Section Convention.
Many radio amateurs reacted to the news on various online forums, expressing surprise, sadness, and dismay, and saying they would miss AES. A few reminisced about having bought their first radios from AES.

A Song For the FUSA

I'm not really a betting person, but I'd be willing to bet there's going to be massiver voter fraud in November.

And I mean breathtaking.

It'll be so bad, and so blatant, that Richard J. Daley would blush.....

Hillary Gets a Pass.....

I'm shocked, I tell you...just shocked.

OK, folks...it's official now. The Rule of Law is now DEAD and BURIED in the Former United States of America.

The FBI said they couldn't find "intent" to violate the laws regarding the handling of classified information.

Well, Bubba...if you or I did the same thing, just the act of setting up our own private server, which is itself a CLEAR violation of the law, would have been plenty of "intent" to violate the law and gotten our sorry asses sent to a Federal-Pound-You-In-The-Ass prison.

Stick a fork in the USA, man.....it's DONE.....

Happy Independanve Day!

I'll be headed out to the Iowa in a few minutes to finish installing the LP-PAN panadaptor I got for NI6BB.

The audio cables that transport the "I" and "Q" signals from the box to the M-Audio sound card were a bit too short, and too stiff, and the BNC cable that transports the IF signal from the TS-850 to the box had BNC connectors on both ends, while the radio uses an RCA connector for the IF out.

SO, after I got home from the ship yesterday, I made some new cables that should work much better.

Don't eat too much today, and remember what the holiday is all about.

Like I have to remind my readers about what it means.....

Poor Puppy!

Poor Little Miss Pebbles decided she does NOT like fireworks this year.

She was fine last year, but now every time something goes BOOM, she runs to the door or a window to see what it was.

She's not scared, more annoyed and protective.

Be a "TWO Benadryl" day tomorrow.....

Battleship Iowa Interior Panoramic Views

In case you haven't been to the site that hosts these, or haven't been lately, there are a LOT of areas that have now been photographed, and added to the site.

One of the recent improvements to the museum area on the second deck has been the installation of some 60" (I think) monitors that have interactive views of all these.

There's a mouse, or track ball, or other pointing device, and the public can select the area of the ship that they want to see, and "explore" it in a Virtual Reality kind of way.

These are almost all areas that are Off Limits to the public, and I haven't even been to most of them.

The fact is, at my age I don't think climbing up to the "O-12 Level" is much fun, and going all the way down into the bowels of the ship isn't much fun, either, so I'm grateful that the photographer has been allowed access to the ares, and done such a knock-out job in documenting them.

I haven't been down to the museum area in a while, so not having seen the new exhibits, I'm fuzzy on the details, but knowing the quality of work that our crew does, I'm sure it's quite impressive.

Enjoy!

Panoramic Views of the Interior of the Battleship Iowa

WTF...No More Silver Plated BNC Male Connectors for RG-8X???

DUH....

Just looked at all my usual suppliers, and these seem to be NLA.

There are plenty available for RG-58/58 foam, but none for "Cable Group X", which also includes LMR-240.

I could use RG-58 for this little project, but in my humble experience, RG-8X stands up better to rough handling.

It's just to make some 3~5 foot jumpers for 3~30MHz, so the loss of the cable is irrelevant, but as I noted, 8X stands up to rough handling better than 58 does.

sigh.....looks like I'll have to use 58, which means a trip out to the garage to see if I can dig up the roll of RG-58 I bought years ago.

I knew I should have stocked up on these the last time I ordered them.

Good quality connectors and adapters to an "RF Guy" are like ammo to a gunney....it's hard to have "too much/too many"!

108 Years Ago Today

The Tunguska Event occurred.

And scientists' still aren't sure what caused it.

I tend to think it was a comet or air-burst meteor rather than a spaceship from elsewhere, but, since nobody knows for sure, who's to say.....

"Independence Day: Resurgence"

Took the wife out to dinner and a movie tonight.

We hit Panera Bread for dinner, and then went to see the new "Independence Day" movie.

They got most of the original cast back, except for Wil Smith, who wanted a cool $25 million, so they wrote him out of the script.

It's a fun summer action movie, a bit corny in places, but fun enough if you don't mind the price.

I got the Senior ticket for $9, but it cost $12 for my wife. Dinner was $26, and two boxes of Junior Mints and an ICEE for her brought the evening's total to a bit over $60.

Makes me feel like a Real Old Fart when I say I remember taking a girl to dinner and a movie for $11!

Field Day AAR

Well, it turns out I didn't set up my satellite station at the Field Day site after all.

My son's knee was really bothering him, so I told him to stay home, and I went down Friday afternoon to help the others get set up.

Hung around for a while, and since they had everything going well, I said hello to some of the guys I only see once a year, and then came back home.

Worked on the Supra for a while, took a 'mini-nap', and then jumped in the shower.

Saturday evening was the "Crew Appreciation Dinner" down on the Iowa, so I went down there, had a bite to eat and hung around a while talking to my friends, and watched the awards ceremony.

Hot and muggy here today so I'll get to work on the Supra a bit later after it cools a bit and the breeze kicks up....

Field Day

WELL.....

I emptied out the Jeep last night and loaded all my stuff into it.

As soon as my son shows up we'll load the tower, antennas and cross-boom, and the generator, and head down to the site.

I'm NOT going to push hard this year. I'll have the "100 point" satellite contact on Saturday as soon as an analog/linear transponder bird goes over, and then just goof off and hand out contacts to other stations.

We have three new analog satellites in orbit this year, but I didn't manually add them to my tracking program, and since I also didn't set up and do a dry run this year, I'm not sure if they were automagically added when I updated the Keplerian Elements for the program.

I usually have lots of "dead time" between passes, so I can always add them manually if I have to.

And I see our friends in the UK have decided to withdraw from the EU.

Good for them! One of the guys I volunteer with on the battleship is from France, and they don't like how Brussels runs things, either. As I was watching the news about 0100 this morning, I saw items rolling by in the banner that several other countries are stirring with demands for a referendum. Maybe the EU will crumble, and maybe it won't, but all the "Doom and Gllomers" were spouting the standard party line, and wagging their tongues about how the breakup of the EU would be a bad thing.

Yeah, right.....

Nice Cool Down

Down into the low 80's today with a nice breeze.

SO....rather than go pummel away on Field Day stuff, I'm going to work on the car.

I really think I'm going to blow off operating the satellite station this year. I just don't feel like lugging everything down there, and then lugging it all back home, and spending a day putting things back in storage.

The "Supras in Vegas" meet is coming up in mid September, and there are some things I simply have to get done on the car before I feel comfortable driving it to Las Vegas and back.

I've been doing Field Day with the club since 1996, and except for the times when I was at-sea to support a lunch, I never missed one.

Plus my son injured his knee a couple of weeks ago at work, and he won't be able to do as much stuff to help me this year as he always does.

We'll still go down to the Field Day site and support the other guys, but I'm going to sit this one out......

Happy Father's Day!

To all the other Dads out there.

Enjoy the day.

I've got most of my Field Day stuff rounded up, and ran the generator for about 30 minutes this morning.

Put a heavy load on it, got it all warmed up, and changed the oil.

Just kicking back for the rest of the day. It's 96* and climbing here. Supposed to hit 105* on Monday.

Too hot (for me, anyway) to do much outside.

A Question for the Mainstream Media.....

This is all I have to say about the Orlando massacre......

And some advice from the Brevard County Sheriff:

Field Day is NEXT Weekend

OOOPS....got too busy on the Iowa and messing with the Supra this year, and now Field Day is one week off.

SO....that means tomorrow I'm going to have to drag out the generator and fire it up, go through my "Field Day" tool bag and round up the usual suspects that always turn up missing, drag the antennas, preamps, feedlines, and control cables out, and set everything up.

We have three new satellites this year, so I'll have to make sure that they show up properly in SatPC32 (my tracking program), and make three new uplink/downlink frequency "cheat sheets" that I use to keep track of the frequencies used for each satellite.

Here's an example of the one I made for FO-29:

My tracking program is set to tune the radio to the middle of the downlink passband, in this case, 435.850MHz. The corresponding uplink frequency is 145.950MHz, +/- any Doppler shift. If the middle of the transponder is busy, and it usually is, I'll tune up to 435.870, or until I find a clear spot. The transmit VFO in the radio should tune to 145.930, but if it doesn't, I'll hit the "unlock" button on the radio which separates the two VFO's, and tune to what the corresponding uplink frequency should be, and do a "1,2,3" transmission to find myself, and center my signal through the satellite to my downlink frequency. Then I "lock" the two VFO's back togther, and the tracking program will send frequency corrections to both the transmit VFO and the receive VFO, keeping my signal properly tuned.

The chart just helps me keep things straight, as FO-29 uses an inverting transponder, which means the signals come back through the satellite on a different sideband (LSB up, USB down), and with the tuning direction reversed.

I'll be back at Angel's Gate Park this year, working with my other club, URAC. We ran Field Day on the Iowa last year, and although we did rather well, lugging all the satellite gear aboard, and getting placed in the location we were allowed to set up in, made satellite contacts difficult.

More to come as the week progresses......

400k Hits!

Wow....if I had 10x that amount I'd have something to cheer about.....

Well, So Much for "Be Back Later"!

DUH...posted that on Tuesday, and here it is Sunday.

Museum Ships Weekend went well on the Iowa. We made about 350 contacts, and the guys running the "Legacy Equipment" (the 1980's Navy-installed gear) made about 50 contacts.

If you worked NI6BB and want a QSL card, follow the directions on the NI6BB QRZ.com webpage. I can't link to it, as QRZ does not allow direct links; you must be logged-in on the QRZ page to do lookups.

I spent my "shift" for the legacy guys down in the transmitter room. I don't care to operate the Navy-installed equipment even though I have, as it's all tied through a telephone-type handset. Not my style of operating, but I'll support the guys when they need it.

Got the differential lube changed in the Supra. The "Mark II" Supras only have 1.3 quarts in the differential, which is pretty "light", so keeping fresh lube in it helps preserve the parts inside.

Getting the fill plug out was a pain, as it's a "Low Profile" hex plug, and they're usually in there "Gorilla Tight", which means you DO NOT use a typical box-end wrench or 12-point socket to get the plug out.

The wrench WILL slip off the plug, and you'll round the corners off, making it even more difficult to remove. I know people that wound up pulling the cast aluminum differential cover off the car so they could get the plug out!

Instead, use a 1/2" drive SIX POINT socket with a 1/2" drive breaker bar. PUSH DOWN on the socket with one hand to keep it in place, and smack the breaker bar with 5 or 6 pound "Hand Sledge" (or what my son calls my "BFH"), and after a couple of good whacks, the plug will come loose.

I refilled the differential with Red Line synthetic 75W90 GL-5 gear lube, with 2 oz (half a bottle) of their synthetic limited slip additive.

I just took the car down off the jack stands, and I'm going to take her out for a nice little Sunday Drive to get the transmission lube nice and hot, and then drain and refill the trans with Red Line synthetic MT90 gear oil.

One "bonus" to using the Red Line synthetic products is that they don't stink to High Heaven the way "regular" gear lube does.

And since the easiest way to refill the trans in the car is to pour in the 2.5 quarts of MT90 in through the top, AND most of the interior is out so I can get started on installing the new carpet, I'll just pull a few bolts and remove the shifter mechanism from the top, and pour the fresh lube in through there.

And since the shifter will be out, I'll replace it with the "Short Throw" unit I bought a while back from Raptor Racing, one of the very few places that sells aftermarket parts for these cars.

Time to go for a drive!


****************************************************

Car is up on jacks, and the trans is draining. The drain plug came out fine, but the fill plug is being obstinate. It's not critical to get the fill plug out, as once I pull the OEM shifter, I can pour the 2.5 qts in through the top before I replace the shifter with my new one.

I'll just have to jack the car up a bit more and reposition the jack stands to get a better "angle" on my ratchet handle so I can PULLLLL harder on it.

I tried the breaker bar first, but there's not quite enough room to get the socket on the plug using the breaker bar as the head is thicker than my 1/2" drive ratchet/socket combo....

Busy Day....Be Back Later!

Title says it all.

Have some errands to run, and then I'll be back with a post about Museum Ships Weekend on the Iowa!

Supra Passed Smog.....BARELY....

Passed fine on NOX this time, but just barely squeaked by on HC.

Max limit is 130ppm, and the car tested at 129ppm.

That's a bit too close!

The test tech agreed that the converter should probably be replaced, based on the numbers out of the tailpipe.

SO....I now have until next April to get a converter, and install it.

Magnaflow never replied to my emails, and never called back like they said they would, so even if they make a converter that actually fits my car, I won't be buying one.

Walker makes one, and I'll probably get that one.

YAY! Supra's All Back Together Again, and the EGR System WORKS!

Whew........watta PITA, though.

To start with, I followed the recommendations of the celicasupra forum members who have been down this path, and took everything apart to clean it.

The first problem came when I took the EGR valve off the "Upper Intake Manifold". The valve is held on by nuts on studs, and taking the nuts off freed the valve up, BUT the big line bringing the exhaust gas to the valve was rigidly mounted. The 27mm (!!) nut came off OK, but the rigid mounting of the pipe, and the studs protruding through the valve mounting flange, didn't allow for much movement.

So, like a dummy, I grabbed my BIG pry bar, and pried the valve off.

Guess what? The valve is made of very thin section CAST iron, and the threaded part had two sections break loose from the rest of it.

GROAN!

I used some good old, field-proven "JB Weld", and bonded the pieces back together. After letting it sit in the hot sun for several days, I cleaned the JB Weld off the threads with some jeweler's files, and used a sanding drum in my Dremel tool to clean up the back side where the inlet tube slides into it.

In order to put it all back together when all the cleaning was finished, and not fight getting the valve over the studs while trying to get it to line up with the exhaust gas pipe, I pulled the studs out of the manifold, chased the threads on both ends of the studs, the hold-down nuts, and the threads in the manifold so they'd all go together "finger easy", as it's a cramped spot to work on.

I knocked the core plug loose from the manifold at the passage junction where the exhaust gas dumps into the manifold via a small, pressed-in brass tube, and found the brass tube was plugged solid. I cleaned that out, and then removed the threaded plug from the back of the manifold, and ran a Hoppes 45 cal Bore Snake through the passage to clean it out.

BTW.....Hoppes #9 Powder Solvent works GREAT to remove baked-on carbon on car parts!

Then I took the "EGR Vacuum Modulator" apart and cleaned it, and cleaned up my now "repaired" EGR valve.

I started putting it back together last Friday, but got sidelined a bit with all the Memorial Day activities I helped with on the Iowa.

I put the cleaned EGR valve on the manifold loosely and got it started on the inlet pipe, and then run the studs in. They threaded in easily since all the threads were chased, and once I had the valve and inlet pipe aligned and the BIG nut kinda started, I put the nuts on the studs and tightened the valve down solid to the manifold.

After a bit of fiddling with the BIG nut (and a few choice words....), I got the inlet pipe tightened down, made sure the hold-down nuts were tight, and put the rest of the air-intake piping back on.

The engine started on the first crank and came up to fast idle. I put full manifold vacuum on the EGR valve, and the idle speed dropped like a rock, and the engine ran really rough, just like it's supposed to.

After it was fully warmed up, applying full vacuum to the valve makes it stumble and stall, just like my Toyota Service Manual says it's supposed to.

SO, even though the only part that "needed" cleaning was the little brass tube that channels the exhaust gas into the manifold, the whole shebang is now cleaned about as well as it can be without pulling everything off the engine.

Tomorrow I'll take her out for a good, long drive and make sure everything is up to operating temperature, and then head to the smog test place.

If she doesn't pass this time, I'll put a new converter on her, but the Toyota guys seem to think she'll pass, given as she failed on NOX, and the EGR system was essentially NON-OP.

Glen Beck "Suspended" By Sirius/XM Radio

Interesting article located here.


The gist is that Mr. Beck is suspended for a week, and his program will be replaced with David Webb.

Memorial Day Thanks

 
To all our fallen service people, and to fallen warriors everywhere who fought for liberty, I humbly give you my thanks.

I'll be on the Iowa all weekend helping out with NI6BB operations, and (probably!) doing some tour guide and escort duties.

All the tour guides and Security folks (yep, they wear red shirts!) know when "Radio" is manned and  having an event, so we usually get several visitors who ask to see the Comm Center. We're pleased and honored to show them the area and answer questions even though we're not on the tour route.

The Iowa is having quite a shindig, as usual, so if you're in the area, please stop on and say hi.

Battleship Iowa "Original" Transmitter/Receiver Update For Museum Ships Weekend

Haven't done a specific post on this topic in a while, and since Museum Ships Weekend is coming up, I figured it was time to let everybody know what's been happening.

As of this time, we have three of the transmitters working. One only puts out a couple of hundred Watts (it has low exciter drive to the final amplifier) and the other two put out approx 1200 Watts PEP when running in SSB mode.

Some of the pix below are courtesy of the excellent Navy Radio website run by Nick, K4NYW.

Nick has been a GREAT help to us, and has visited the Iowa.

THANKS, Nick!

Transmitters:

We have four operational R-1051 receivers, that have had the "chain belts" replaced with spares we received from the good folks on the USS Midway.


R-1051 Receiver aboard USS America:

If you ever get down to San Diego, please stop in and see the Midway. It's time well spent!

We also have three URR-74 receivers, which are the MILSPEC version of the Watkins-Johnson 8718 receiver. One of those works perfectly, one works but is low on sensitivity, and one works when it wants to.

URR-74:

For antennas on Museum Ships Weekend we'll be using the "Goal Post" or "Bull's Horns" antennas located on the starboard side by the #2 stack for transmitting, and the "Twin Whip" antennas mounted on the bridge deck for receiving.

We have two of the "Red Phones" manually patched through the "Coke Machine"; one on the bridge, and the other in FACCON, which is the correct name for what we call the Comm Center, or "Radio Room".

Red Phone:

Coke Machine:

We've trained up a crew of guys for the transmitter room that will set the transmit frequency and adjust the antenna coupler for minimum reflected power, and we'll have a guy in FACCON to tune the receiver if we have to "QSY", and another guy who will coordinate everybody, and keep the transmitter and receiver crews on the same page, and more importantly, on the same frequency!

Antenna Couplers:

"Goal Post" or "Bull's Horns" Transmit Antenna:

"Twin Whips" (to the right) Receiver Antennas:

We've tested all the gear on the air several times, and except for the fact that the 1051 receivers have a front-end "as wide as a barn door", and aren't the best to use on a crowded Amateur Radio band, everything is working well enough to hit the airwaves on Museum Ships Weekend, which is June 4th and 5th this year.

NI6BB will be on 17 Meters, at the upper end of the band around 18.164MHz, using this gear, which we refer to as the"legacy" equipment, and on the other ham bands using our commercial Ham Radio gear.



We'll be running SSB, CW, and PSK-31 this year, so hope we run into a few of you on the air!

The Trumpinator!

Stumbled across this and thought you might find it funny.....

Boeing Wins Case Against Sea Launch Partners

From a post on NASASpaceFlight.com:

Boeing wins case against Sea Launch partners

On May 12, 2016, judge Andre Birotte of the Central District of California, ordered RKK Energia to pay Boeing and its business unit, Boeing Commercial Space Company, BCSC, a total of $322.49 million in owed investments and interest.

The same ruling ordered KB Yuzhnoe and its production partner Yuzhmash, (both based in Dnepropetrovsk, Ukraine) to pay a total of $193.44 million.

The total sum owed by Russian and Ukrainian space industry in the Sea Launch debacle thus reached $515.93 million.

As the person making the post noted, it's doubtful that Boeing will get that amount, if anything, from their former partners.

Here's a nice history of the program from RussianSpaceWeb.com.

Every time I drive from Long Beach to San Pedro, I see the ships sitting there.

They haven't moved in almost three years now, and I'm sure the hulls are rather thickly encrusted with barnacles and other sea life.....

Tuesday Car Bashing

Well, not really "bashing" anything on the car, as I refuse to let it get to me.

It's an inanimate object and while working on it can be frustrating at times, I just walk away if it gets that bad.

All the bits and pieces of the EGR system have been cleaned up, and are being reassembled today.

Hopefully I'll have it running this afternoon, but had to take a break for lunch.

Patriotic Soda Display

Saw this over at a car-guy place, and since I haven't seen it before, I thought I'd share it.

Quiet Day

Thursdays are generally pretty quiet here.

Wednesdays I'm on the Iowa all day, so Thursdays are used to catch up on other things, and just kick back.

I've got the EGR passages in the Supra's intake manifold all cleaned out, along with the EGR valve and Vacuum Modulator for it.

I used a Hoppes 20 gauge "Boresnake" to get the passages all scrubbed out from fore to aft, and pipe cleaners and compressed air to get the valve and modulator cleaned out.

The red line shows the path of the EGR passage from the valve 'atthe rear, to where the throttle body bolts to the Upper Air Chamber" portion of the intake manifold. In the center is a core hole plug (aka "freeze plug") that you gently remove to gain access to the passage.

Photo credit goes to my buddy "Driftingmy85" over on the celica supra forum.

The entire HOWTO thread is located here in case you're curious about how to do it.

Tomorrow I'll put the whole shebang back together and take the car out for a run, AFTER I do the "apply full vacuum to valve to see if the engine stalls" test, which will tell me if the exhaust gas is indeed getting into the manifold.

I'll probably wait until Monday to go back to the smog test place and see if it passes.

If it doesn't pass, I'll get a replacement catalytic converter. I took back the Magnaflow converter I bought as it had an extra fitting for supplemental air injection which this car doesn't have, and it's the ONLY converter Magnaflow has in production that's supposedly for this car.

Two emails and a call to Tech Support at Magnaflow yielded exactly *nothing* other than "We'll get back to you".

Walker Products makes a California legal converter without the air fitting, so if if cleaning out the EGR doesn't produce a passing result, that's what I'll get.

Freedom.....I WON'T

Or as our friends over at the Western Rifle Shooters Association are given to say, resist.


I first read this little story by Eric Frank Russell back in high school, and thought it was quite interesting, and more than a bit quaint, but then I grew up in the Midwest, with all the accompanying values and morals that growing up middle-class in the 1960's Midwest entails, including taking your "obs" seriously.

It's a little story of a vast Terran empire reaching out to its long neglected colonies in order to bring them "into the fold", and most likely tax the living snot out of them.

The residents of one particular planet aren't about to be enslaved, and have pretty much perfected The Ultimate Weapon, and show the Terran empire what it can do.

So grab a cup of coffee, and head on over to abelard.org and read "And Then There Were None".

I'm sure you'll enjoy it, and maybe pick up an idea or three.....

TGIF!

Raining here in SoCal in May.....amazing!

So, with the rain, I'm not doing much on the Supra today.

Vacuumed the house (and fixed the vacuum!), cleaned the bathroom, and unloaded/reloaded the dishwasher.

We're going to see some female comic Saturday night, so I'll report back on that.

In the meantime, enjoy this old Leon Russel classic.

It has a great lyric in it...."The left ones think I'm right, and the right ones think I'm wrong".