Diet Taco... trying to keep things light

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LOL wow now I think we all need to start a thing.

PS, that's a donkey, not an elephant.

 

Perhaps you need to look deeper to perceive how he actually chose a donkey to confront an elephant?

 

#keanumindblown

 

The astute reader will note in one fell swoop I:

• Confronted the elephant
• Converted to metric
• Went nuclear grade

 

I think by 1980, the first two were not very successful, but I did vote for JC in ‘76 because he was an engineer, though the nuclear part didn’t get many brownie points from me.

 

@DVexile finally got the Bracketeer and Amerex Purple K in today as I knocked out several simple jobs I transported down to Dad's on my chemo watch. I really hope you at least used blue thread locker on yours, since you've already put your loved once at risk with your malaise regarding other fasteners in this application.

 

I don't know:

In 1952, an accident at Canada's Chalk River Laboratories near Deep River, Ontario caused a partial meltdown in an experimental nuclear reactor. Hydrogen explosions followed and hundreds of thousands of gallons of radioactive water flooded the core, heavily damaging the reactor. When the Canadian government turned to U.S. nuclear experts for help, "Father of the Nuclear Navy" Rear Admiral Hyman Rickover sent his protégé – Lieutenant James Earl "Jimmy" Carter – to lead a team of maintainers into the reactor core to shut it down.

...

Lieutenant Carter divided himself and his 23 guys into teams of three. Each worked 90-second shifts cleaning and repairing the reactor as per what they practiced on the tennis court. A minute and a half was the maximum time the human body could handle the amount of radiation in the area.

By today's standards, it was still way too much radiation – Carter and his men were exposed to levels a thousand times higher than what is now considered safe. He and his team absorbed a year's worth of radiation in that 90 seconds. The basement where they helped replace the reactor was so contaminated, Carter's urine was radioactive for six months after the incident.

Which is part of the reason for the other sense in which I meant "nuclear grade":

USS Jimmy Carter (SSN-23)
USS Jimmy Carter (SSN-23) is the third and final Seawolf-class nuclear powered fast attack submarine in the United States Navy.
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Which despite its namesake has performed some pretty darn bad-ass missions.

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Yes, I certainly wasn’t referring to his presidency as “nuclear grade”!!! Good demonstration that being an intelligent and moral person with a compelling life story does not necessarily make for a good executive!

 

“Pepsi Syndrome?”

 

I remember seeing it “Live ... on Saturday Night”

 

Haven't watched it in many years. Everything doesn't need to be so political.

 

Jack Pad
June 2018

I am now the proud owner of a coveted @GHOST SHIP tire tread jack pad! Usually these go on the base of a hi-lift but it is such a great idea and just as useful on a bottle jack. Sergio had a little bit of tire material left and as a kind gesture in return for a book I sent he cut a piece for me. Cutting tire tread is not a fun job so I'm pretty sure I came out ahead in the exchange!

All I needed to add were some bolt holes. Since the bolts don't actually do much in this kind of application I only bothered putting in two holes. They need to be drilled a bit larger than the bolt size first because the rubber swells back into the hole a bit and second because the wires from the steel belt also protrude into the hole.

In the end I found using my bench vise as a press was the best way to get the bolts seated - for all intents and purposes permanently - in the tread. You really shouldn't use a vise as a press so I didn't go whole hog on that and the bolt heads still stick up a bit from the countersink space beneath them. The first time the pad is used in anger I expect they will seat a bit more into the pad.

This is a great alternative to my aluminum tube cross pieces especially if there isn't going to be a lot of space around the base of the jack. Of course the aluminum tube setup is much more stable to prevent tipping but the main goal of the tread pad is to prevent slipping.

Extra big thanks to Sergio!

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I've got one of those special @GHOST SHIP pads for my hilift but after seeing your jack solution I'd really like to get one of those T4R bottle jacks.

 

There's a thread in here somewhere about alternate jacks that fit in the stock location. And those @GHOST SHIP pads are pretty sweet....

 

Second Jack Stand Fabricated
June 2018

It was a cool and rainy afternoon/evening, just the kind of day to spend some time in the shop. Knocked out another set of aluminum tube arms for my second 4Runner jack. So now I have a matching pair of 4Runner jacks with their rams removed to be compatible with Safe Jack accessories each with extra stable aluminum tube bases. Plus the aforementioned tire tread base when there isn't room to use a tube base. I also picked up a few more Safe Jack plates for the second jack.

Especially if you include any reasonable cost for my time/labor this now a pretty expensive jacking solution! Anyway it felt good to make something for the truck even if it took way longer to do than it should. Aluminum is really easy to work thankfully or else it would have taken even longer.

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Now it's time to mod the mod by adding tire tread to the tube arms.

 

Mountain bike tires... Just saying.

 

Exactly what I was thinking.

 

How's that diet going?
"Final" Truck Weight

Well I think it is the end of heavy things getting added to the truck now that the sliders are on. A long list of minor mods remain but none of them should make much of a difference and all the involved materials are already in the truck in my "to-do" bag. In addition I believe I have a "final" configuration of camping and recovery gear at this point as well. So off to the scales we went!

This is what I'm calling "Dry weight with full tank" meaning:

• Full tank of gas
• All camping gear (including sleeping bags)
• All recovery gear
• Everything that "lives" in the truck and goes on every trip
  
• No driver or passengers
• No child booster seat
  
• No luggage (e.g. clothes and stuff brought on plane)
  
• No water
• No ice
• No food
• No extra fuel in jerry can

And the results:

• Front Axle - 2640 lbs
• Rear Axle - 2760 lbs
• Gross Weight - 5400 lbs

Not too bad actually. Adding in everything else for a typical family trip would be the three of us (340 lbs), 10 gallons of water (83 lbs), ice (up to 20 lbs), food (up to 20 lbs) and luggage (up to 100 lbs) or an additional 560 lbs putting the total at about 5960 lbs. My goal was to be around 6000 lbs when "fully loaded" and it seems I got there for our heaviest trips! For my solo trips well below 6000 lbs of course.