Catalytic converters are also in short supply. The rare earth metals mines in South Africa are being halted due to covid
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Anyone with fleet vehicles should make sure those things are locked up. We have had Wells Fargo trucks getting their cats stolen and guess who has to replace them? Us!
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I guess us old dinosaurs that still know how to tune a carb and use a timing light aren’t looking so dumb now.
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And my company sold off all the oldschooliefoolie mechanic injection diesels…no backup trucks. Have a peterbilt down needing ecm replacement… manufactures said " no idea if I can get one this year"… truck is 5 years old… DOH! Not good when a 1/4 million dollar truck is stuck holding down the asphalt in the yard and can’t make money!
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I see a class action lawsuit in the making there. The US government requires spare parts availability for 20 years. Can’t see big trucking fleets taking a year without spare parts without legal action.
Tom funny I was just thinking how lucky I am to have three tractors from the late 50s early 60s that I rebuilt from scrap to farm with. Not a single micro chip to be found back then…
Ok one has an electric ignition module I added but in a matter of minutes I can swap it back to points if needed
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It has been bad for business this year, I had a crane down for near six months waiting on parts from italy because we couldn’t get it from anywhere in north america
Thank you Dan. I have two engines with distributors and swapped out for ignition modules. No Idea where the old points set up went. I’m going to have to remedy that. I’m not totally against all the ECM stuff. I have an Chevy truck with an LS engine that is just shy of 300,000 miles Never got nothing like that out of my old trucks, but I can keep them running with a hammer and screwdriver. Hammer just to beat the piss out of them if they don’t act right.
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Tom I have mixed feeling on the conversion distributor kit. One of my two allis Chalmers tractors has run for a decade now on the electronic ignition the other one went through 3 or 4 of them in a year before I simply gave up and went back to points. They are almost identical motors. I even asked some other AC mechanics and they all where dumb struck as to why it didn’t work. So I change points about once a year swap out about 3 sets of modern junk points to find one that works and call it got for a year or more.
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I can’t give that a like but I can say I fully understand. We had the same problem with an Same tractor in the early 90s. I also had some parts issue with restoring my Pasquali but the pasquali is a case where it used standard parts with enough cross reference work you could find things most of the time.
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The bottom line from what I have seen is since cash for clunkers hit, it wiped the market clean for most junk yard parts. In turn the aftermarket blew up with china goods with some horrible qc. Iv experienced so stinking many junk out of the box parts it would make a customers head explode! Iv made it my common practice with all electronics (alternators, starters, and battery’s) to have them tested BEFORE I LEAVE THE PARTS STORE! Even the counter guys can’t figure out why 3 brand new and 2 reman alternators for my silverado test junk before my hand ever touched it. Puts a hurting on anyone to have to buy from manufactures to get quality parts. That being said I have had decent luck with most aftermarket points removing setups…of the premium price variety. I’m not saying run out and dump you wallet for a msd box and hei distributor, but it has worked for me in some instances where points and condenser have been obsolete
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Finally got my saw mill put back together. Still need a few things from the box store to get everything locked down but it’s the first time it’s been on rails in four years so that’s a big win for me. Hopping the blade will derust with use. I hate to have to sand them.
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I had some rusted blades when I got my mill. My advise is spray them with diesel fuel in a squirt bottle before the first cut and after each cut until they clean up. Just a squirt or two on the running blade will do. I was cutting pine boards and the pine pitch stuck like crazy to the rust if I forgot. But it didn’t seem to be an issue.
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that’s funny the Toyota factory that makes the forklifts is hiring a lot of people right now
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My oldest brother works for toyota lift northwest as there hd mechanic and they are super busy. I called him yesterday looking to order 3 new trucks for one of my yards and he said at best 3 months is the fastest they could get them built out and shipped
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Okay I wanted to work on my gasifer project today but the wind had other ideas. So I fired up the roto tiller. I put it away dry by running it out of gasoline, changed the oil the Steve U. way. I drained out the fill opening this worked great. Put oil in and put gear oil in the gear box. Fueled it up. Cleaned the air clean filter out with compressed air. One shot of engine starter fluid, after priming the engine. Pulled on the cord. Flooded it. Dried the spark plug out put back in. It started right up.
Now for the fun part. 3 hours later I am beat up after the fight the roto tiller won. But half the back garden is tilled. Time to take a break and check out DOW.
Bob
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I added water to battery bank and moved split firewood , then I dropped bucket off front end loader on tractor . Scheduled covid 19 vaccine , took some four calls , someone called back and said yes we have appointments .
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Henry I’m having my 2nd booster dose tomorrow.
Chin up, man.
The suns coming up more and more now. My grasses are growing.
Regards
Steve Unruh
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Rototillers and rocks are a bad combination, and I noticed lots of rocks where you live Bob.
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I have been pretty sick these past three days. Yesterday I was finally able to go back to work. We were about a month late on most of the spring garden mostly due to being busy and the rain hasn’t been very cooperating. So yesterday morning I got the garden tilled and the others planted it right behind me. The tractor has earned its keep. The only two things we are lacking is the peppers and tomatoes. We will probably wait another two weeks before putting them out just in case we have a late frost.
My uncle showed up from Kansas yesterday and he brought me a gift. It is not gasifier related but it does help when doing any wood working. Although I will probably use them to work the lumber for my truck bed.
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