Shop Time w/T.W. Friends

Technical Phrases with Rusty:

Module engineered - when the designer of a part doesn't work on the entire project.

Witness this handy 3/8" drive square on a belt tensioner, I'm sure many readers are familiar with these - simply use a breaker bar to pull back the spring and set the belt in place.



However when installed on the machine -- the pulley blocks the square...



I spent some quality time under the ZT, swearing with tremendous sincerity.

To be fair this is probably "parts bin building" this arm is probably common to many models with a smaller pulley or access to the other side.

Just not on my ZT.

 

It was a great day...

The ZT has been apart since the "wood in the pulley" incident. The parts haven't arrived -- the one spare I don't have in stock is the hydro drive belt - which has a chunk out of it.

I put it back together (using colorful not family friendly language), it works but makes a ting, ting noise. Thought I would try it out at the garage - promptly ate the cutter deck belt . I had one of those. Finally 3 hours late I set out to do the in town lawns.

Headed for the most important one first (fussy neighbors) and was 10 minutes on a 14 minute job (ZT is quick) and...



The heavens opened - it didn't start to rain, it went from dry to dumping so much it was hard to see in 3 seconds flat. More

I was already and wet so I finished the yard.

 

Just stellar, part 2



Well, I sat (soaking wet & ) in the truck for about 30 minutes listening to a Jennifer Hanson album, isn't she pretty.



Rain stopped so I started, lawn #2 isn't that critical so I mowed it wet - front looks ok.

Made it through all 5 more - ting, ting noise all the way.

Came home and promptly made a disaster of a pizza for dinner...
Tasted ok but fell apart like a casserole.

Thanks men, that is the most enjoyable thing I have done all day...

 

I’ll second the SPC UCAs. They have butt loads of adjustments.

 

Good morning everyone

 

Morning all

 

We have 12 acres and back onto another 100ish acres of woods. We've been blessed to be here 15 years. It isolates me from the insanity that's all around.

Yesterday we drove a couple of hours to meet our youngest, his girlfriend, and her parents at a cottage they rent every year. He popped the question Tuesday, so we had a nice day celebrating. We'll be empty nesters once he's gone, so we'll see if we keep this place or strike out in search of freedom.

 

That’s it! All my life I’ve been trying to figure out how to characterize my father’s response to his snafus…. Thanks @RustyGreen

Good THURSDAY morning everyone

Days of summer are ticking down…

 

Good morning guys

At least you had rain, down here the moisture is just super saturating the air and driving the heat index up. No rain for a few weeks now, upside of that is I haven’t needed to mow since the grass is brown and crunchy…

 

We had a brief brown & crunchy period early in the season, since then it has been wet enough the lawns won't go 7 days between mowing.

 

Same here, I need to mow again today.

 

It was 94 degrees here by 9AM… I honestly don’t believe we’ve been below mid 80s anytime in the last month…

 

My co-worker is fixing up this beautiful gal.

 

Rained/sprinkled here yesterday and today.

 

I’m on my third shirt for the day here , one of the shirts was sweated thru at 0200 on a fire but still counts

 

Same here. What’s your heat index been over there in west LA?

 

Needs a TW sticker

 

I don’t even want to know… we’ve been 100+ for several days before that calculation. I know humidity is killing us. Typically our index (feels like) adds 9-10 degrees. Humidity says 56% and forecast says highs of 98-101 for next 10 days. It’s gonna be a GEM!