An utter waste of time

[porsche tech]

Originally Posted by shadowjack1

I too struggle with things like this. I see a broken whatever and decide it can be fixed. I may have no need for the item but it needs fixing. I will try to fix anything before I buy a new one.

I don’t necessarily struggle with it, but also like to make sure it’s at least good and broke before I buy a new one or call somebody to fix it. My wife called our washing machine “Lazarus” because I raised it from the dead so many times.

[oldE]

In the fall of '23 a South east storm ripped our 8 x 16 run in shelter for the horses off of its anchors, so I dismantled it.
Since then, some of the materials have been used to make a cold frame for my wife's gardening endeavors and a shed attached to the garage for the ride on mower, gas and diesel as well as other gas powered implements. The glass for the cold frame came from windows I had replaced a few years ago..
I still have some pressure treated pieces piled on a rack I made from, you guessed it, materials from the run in.
The fun never ends.

Best
Les

[herr_oberst]

[wdfifteen]

Our long arm quilting machine has a tiny little 2 1/2 inch wheel that is used to move the sewing mechanism manually when you are making timing and other adjustments. You have to pinch down on the OD of the knob, push it in to engage the clutch, and then rotate it to get the machine to turn. There is a lot of machinery in there, and it's a painful effin' bear for a guy with arthritis in his hands to turn it all. (this is an "after" picture)



So I made this little do-dad to screw onto the knob to make life easier. Yes, I nicked the edge of one of the holes with the end mill. I never claimed to be a machinist.







A perquisit was the fact that I needed a decent drill press to do work of this accuracy. The POS floor model in the barn was too old, too rusty, and the chuck was too inaccurate for this job, so I got to buy a new tool - a bench mounted drill press with a decent chuck!!

[onewhippedpuppy]

A thread after my own heart. I am great at committing to fix something then about halfway into the project I realize what a PITA I signed up for and I b!tch for the remaining half. Every, single, time.

[ErVikingo]

Originally Posted by wdfifteen

I don't know why I do this stuff.

Because we come from a generation where stuff is not disposable. We fix stuff, heck look at our garages. We do most work ourselves and God knows (at least) i own more tools than some professional mechanics.

[Scott Douglas]

Originally Posted by wdfifteen

Our long arm quilting machine has a tiny little 2 1/2 inch wheel that is used to move the sewing mechanism manually when you are making timing and other adjustments. You have to pinch down on the OD of the knob, push it in to engage the clutch, and then rotate it to get the machine to turn. There is a lot of machinery in there, and it's a painful effin' bear for a guy with arthritis in his hands to turn it all. (this is an "after" picture)



So I made this little do-dad to screw onto the knob to make life easier. Yes, I nicked the edge of one of the holes with the end mill. I never claimed to be a machinist.







A perquisit was the fact that I needed a decent drill press to do work of this accuracy. The POS floor model in the barn was too old, too rusty, and the chuck was too inaccurate for this job, so I got to buy a new tool - a bench mounted drill press with a decent chuck!!

Take the piece you made off and just put a nice chamfer on the counter sunk holes. You can use a larger diameter drill bit if you don't have a chamfer tool. You really don't want those sharp edges of the countersinks around your fingers anyways.
Nice work.

[wdfifteen]

Winter is still hanging on, so I might be being optimistic that we will have any vegetation to mow this year, but I'm getting prepared anyway.

The motorcycle battery on my brush mower was shot when I bought the mower a couple of years ago. Being a cheapskate, I've been rip starting in lieu of getting a new battery. I figured I could save myself some money and a lot of effort if I rigged up a mount to use the battery out of my irrigation system, which only gets used a few hours a year. While I was at it, I installed a hookup for a battery maintainer, because I know it's going to sit a lot. Works great!

[wdfifteen]

Originally Posted by ErVikingo

Because we come from a generation where stuff is not disposable. We fix stuff, heck look at our garages. We do most work ourselves and God knows (at least) i own more tools than some professional mechanics.

I've got a whopper of a time-suck project on the bench now. I'll report back in a week or so.

[matthewb0051]

A month ago my wife informed me that the vacuum cleaner was broken and she bought a new one, ouch for a couple of hundred dollars. I asked what was broken, "the plug". Before the new one arrived via Basos express, I got myself down to the Home of Depot and got a replacement plug. Wired it up and hey ho presto, saved a couple hundo.

[matthewb0051]

Back in the Fall, I accidentally knocked a clock off the wall in our laundry room. Of course the wife was going to throw it all away. I salvaged the internal bits and made this from a license plate I had while living on Oahu:

[rwest]

Originally Posted by matthewb0051

A month ago my wife informed me that the vacuum cleaner was broken and she bought a new one, ouch for a couple of hundred dollars. I asked what was broken, "the plug". Before the new one arrived via Basos express, I got myself down to the Home of Depot and got a replacement plug. Wired it up and hey ho presto, saved a couple hundo.

Many years ago I worked doing cleaning and maintenance at a police department and a co worker did the city hall building and was always having ground pins breaking from the cord plug so I would replace them for him.

I always asked him if he was yanking the cord to unplug it “No” was always the answer... until one night I walked over looking for him and just as I was opening the door to the offices, there he was giving the cord a hard tug from the other side of the room- yup, not surprised at all.

[astrochex]

For me, its weeding the landscape beds. I've gotten behind and even with much lower than normal rainfall, weeds are perma grow.

[matthewb0051]

Originally Posted by astrochex

For me, its weeding the landscape beds. I've gotten behind and even with much lower than normal rainfall, weeds are perma grow.

I'm still trying to wrap my head around leaves falling in the spring vice FALL here in San Antonio. And they don't seem to relent. Three weekends in a row I've blown and bagged those EFFEN things. Red or Live Oak, I'm not sure.

[GWN7]

I bill my time for me and my truck @ $135 a hour, $60 for the car hauler. So $195 for me, truck and car hauler. I get $90 for my wheeled loader and my excavator I charge $100. For larger jobs such as waterproofing a basement (2-3 day job) I work out a deal.

[wdfifteen]

Vicki is an incredibly creative person - always having ideas about stuff. Often, though, when she says, "Yanno, it would be cool if we did 'this'." It means, "It would be cool if you did this for me." And so it was when she suggested we turn one of the dozen old sewing machines we have lying around into a lamp. As luck would have it, some guy had given up on the same kind of project and was selling the half finished pile of parts on FB Marketing. It was a sewing machine that was way cooler than anything we had, so $25 later, yaayyy?



The box of parts contained a White shuttle bobbin machine. White stopped making this type of machine in about 1900 so this dates from sometime in the late 19th Century.



This is how it looks after cleaning, polishing, painting, and applying decals that I had to order from Australia.





It's ready for Vicki to do the hard part - buying a lampshade.

[herr_oberst]

Originally Posted by wdfifteen

This is how it looks after cleaning, polishing, painting, and applying decals that I had to order from Australia.


It's ready for Vicki to do the hard part - buying a lampshade.

That's S... King cool. (But does she realize that this project is stealing time from the Speedster?)

Maybe some antique spools and bobbins and the appropriate thread color for that finishing touch? Even a little sample of stitched fabric under the needle...

[wdfifteen]

Yeah, Vic says she has some wooden thread spools that she's going to put on it.

I'm working on the Speedster on the triple A plan. As Arthritis Allows. I can only endure bending, twisting, grasping - making the kind of motions your body has to make to work on a car - a little at a time.

[herr_oberst]

If you want to see AUWofT wait till I post a pic of what this widget does!

[herr_oberst]

Done!

My latest UWofT is shop vac tool storage!