Block & Tackle

Well, not really. It was more like tackle the block. I alluded to this job a couple of months back and was going to get to it right after the owner returned from a trip he was taking. His return coincided with the Missus falling and breaking her shoulder as well as harvest time. Finally got around to welding it up this morning.

Another one of those jobs that's easy when you know how. I removed the piece, beveled the edges and ground some metal along the break line so it would fit back together nicely. Even though cast iron is pretty brittle, it does stretch some and removing a little metal is normally required to get things to fall back into place. There were also a couple of spider cracks that needed to be "Vee'd" out. The welding rods I used normally do a bang up job but they are getting old and have picked up some moisture over the years. Between that and a little oil sucking up through the cracks, I got a few pinholes but I ground the weld beads down and two passed everything and it looked real good. Much better than is evident from the crappy photo. The photo is the first I've ever taken with a cell phone. If they all look like that, it'll probably be the last, too.

I did a little solder job for the landlord at the boxing gym yesterday. I should have taken a picture of that one. It was nice and shiny brass. No biggy on the job - took longer to drag the tools out and line the pieces up than it did to fix the thing. It was some kind of pendulum for a clock. He called to thank me while I was fixing the tractor block and said he's got some little woodworking project he wants me to take a look at.

There's no end to things that need to be fixed out there. However, there is an end to the number of people capable of doing a lot of these little jobs. Solder brass, weld cast iron, do a little woodworking - all in a days work for me. I welded the block up at the high school where I was formerly held captive. I was there for a couple of hours and only a couple of students showed any interest in what I was doing. Nice thing about it, though. There's always going to be a place for those guys. It would be nice to figure out who turned off the curiosity on the rest on them. If it takes 10,000 hours to develop your craft, why not take advantage of the opportunity afforded to you in high school and get a head start on people who will later be competing against you for a job? You would think after all these years I'd have the answers. Nope, still asking questions though.