Craiglist Score

I just scored me a pair of Vintage Radios on CL TO.

One is a 1940's GE AM/SW Tube Radio that works and the other is a 1930's Spartan Farm Radio.

And I got this for the most amazing price of ..................

Not Telling!!!!! Would rock the world economy!!!!

Not sure what I'm going to do with these..

1940 AM/SW Tube Radio Model G-71

1930 Spartan AM/SW Farm Radio Model 637-6

Second Harvest

No. No.

No fruit trees were involved this time.

My cuz Avi dropped off a carton of hard drives that were culled from servers at his place of work.

Now you may or may not know this - but all hard drives contain either one or a pair of rare-earth magnets which comprise part of the actuator arm that propels the read/write heads across the platter. The magnets can be either neodymium or samarium-cobalt magnets. What's the point of this info overload - you ask!!!

Rare earth magnets exhibit a magnetic field in excess of 1.5 Tesla v/s 0.5 to 1 for ferrite or ceramic magnets. What this means is that these magnets are strong - frickkin strong. Each one of these magnets can lift in excess of 25 lbs. And for the best part, they're free!!! Compare that to Lee Valley at CAD 8.00 - 12.00 for comparable magnets and you've got a great thing going.

And since these magnets are so strong, they make great holders for tools in my shed. They will hold the heaviest of my hand tools without a problem.

So after an afternoon with my trusty B&D AS600 and my torx bits from my Bosch set, I harvested 18 pairs of magnets and 36 platters along with assorted screws, mini bearings (from the actuator arms) and a few motors (that drive the platters)

If you're planning on going this route, watch your fingers. If those magnets snap together on your fingers - OUCH!!!!!!

Here, in pictures is the fruit of my labour (pun intended)

Box of Hard Drives to spice up my weekend - Pathetic

Gratuitous OCD shot

Garbage!!!

Pretty magnets all in a row!!

Platters!! Unsure what I'm going to do with these!!!!

Harvest

Last Saturday, Lynda, the girls and I undertook the task of harvesting all the apples from the tree and then pruning it down. It took the entire afternoon and the better part of our effort went towards keeping the girls focused on the task at hand.

I'll let the pictures speak WRT the quantity of apples that we harvested. We got some really good ones and the ones that were touched get pickled or chutnied courtesy Mum & A. Ayn.

Apples!!

We ran out of places to hold them!!!

The tree, pruned!

Removed the grass from around the tree trunk

My lawn! Probably the only thing I'm doing a good job of!!!!

Final Shedonism

Well, the garden shed is more or less complete. I could go on and on tweaking it but I had to call it a day somewhere. I'm not personally happy with the way the doors turned out. They looked too featureless and slab-like. I will address that next year.

As far as functionality goes, I could not have asked for anything more. It holds everything garden and lawn related and that is exactly what I had wanted.

Dad and I had even levelled the ground in front of the shed, deposited topsoil, some grass seed and it has taken root well.

Shed done

Too Slab Like for my liking..

The doors hold all my gardening implements

More gardening implements

Trailer Trash - Part Three

I did not do this post in the right sequence as I just could not locate the photos that I knew that I had taken..

Anyhooo... I found them!!!

This was one of the last things that Dad and I did prior to his departure to Bombay.

We isolated what would become the chassis of the trailer and discarded the remainder of the frame. We used some of the rubber caps from other parts of the frame to seal off any openings that would allow the ingress of water.

I have to start building the box one of theses days.

Trailer Trash - Part Two

I sat down today and prepared some conceptual drawing of what I would like the trailer to look like. The drawings are more or less for me to decide construction details as well as proportions of the trailer. In my earlier post I mentioned that I wanted to base the unit on the iconic Radio Flyer Wagons. I think that I more or less got the unit to look like the Radio Flyers, and I even christened the as yet unborn trailer, "Brampton Flyer"

Have a look!!

I tried to match the look as closely as possible

The Ventilated floor is an attempt to keep the weight down

The "Brampton Flyer"

Oh! Oh! Canada

Just heard this on the radio and had to give props to Luke Boyd AKA Classified from Nova Scotia. This is a damn good song and says it all.

Oh! Canada! We stand on guard for thee!!!!

errr.... What are we guarding????

More Shedonism

The shed is almost done with most of the interior fittings in place. The doors have been readied and Dad has painted both sides with the weatherproofing paint. I've been having trouble getting a matching set of hinges to the pair that I have in possession. I'll have to work something out....

Full frontal shot. My lawnmower will be happy to spend Winter indoors. It told me so!!!!

From the side

Shingled roof

Dedicated storage for my shop vac

Dedicated shelf for my fuel canisters

I used the wall cavity on one side for my garden waste bags

Trailer Trash - Part One

I'm not sure at what point I had decided that I needed a trailer to tow behind my bike. Maybe it was when Layla finally graduated to a real cycle that enabled us to start cycling to progressively greater distances. Anyways what I need (want), I cannot normally afford, so I gravitate towards making stuff. However with the very little time that I have being divided between taking the girls cycling and swimming and the rest in construction..... the prospect of building that trailer seems further and further away.

Till yesterday.

I found this left out for garbage collection......

A fully functional child carrier made by our very own "Chariot Carriers" in Alberta. Oh Joy!!!

It's an amazing piece of tech with cast plastic wheels shod with street tyres and with fully sealed roller bearings attached to a solid axle. The frame is aluminum so it will make for easy working. The only problem is with the hitch that attaches to the cycle, but that will be rectified.

I ripped off the protective shell and it is now laid bare for hacking.

I plan to make the trailer look like the Radio Flyer Wagons.

Shedonism

This summer I decided to build a smaller auxiliary shed for my Lawn Mower and garden tools. It would be a lean-to against the shed that I had built last summer. Dad and I poured the concrete pad a couple of weeks ago and while the concrete was wet, we set a small garden plaque into the pour for a touch of whimsy.

We chose to 'Grow Giggles' as we will get a lot of Free Laughs when people see the state of my garden!!!

Yesterday, I built up the frame out of balance 2x4' that I had around the place. That's not bluwood you see, but regular and PT lumber that Dad coated with a coat of Weatherproofing stain that was sold as a mis-tint at the Re-Store.

The plan is that the vacuum cleaner will go on a shelf on the right, below which will be stored my off-season tires. On the Left will be the Lawn Mower, above which on a small shelf will stand my fuel for my gas powered equipment and above that will rest my ladder on two hooks.

I will use one of the in wall cavities to hold the lawn waste bags. I have not as yet decided what I will do with the others. All of my garden implements will hang from the two doors, that we will start building tomorrow.

Curb Appeal - Part 4

Not much progress really, but what does not seem like a lot, actually took three whole days to complete. I wanted the front porch to be free of any visible fastening system and this is what took all of the time. I used Simpson Strong-Tie Deck Board Tie (DBT1Z) to hold the boards in place. The system took a longer time that the traditional method of fastening the boards from the surface down. The results though are quite different. There will be no wear or splintering that is normally evident when screws are driven from the top.

Still a long way to go.

Lucky Luke - Eurokids

I remember first reading Lucky Luke at my neighbour Mr. Robert Dango's house. Incidentally, U. Bobby is from where I get my moniker - Bob!!!

Lucky Luke, penned by Morris (real name Maurice de Bevere) saw it's best books during the time that it was written by Rene Goscinny. Since Goscinny passed away, Morris collaborated with various other writer and kept the series alive. The series are being currently done by Achde & Gerra. It is said that Achde apprenticed with Morris and was a natural choice to take over the reins following morris' passing in 2001.

Pity that we did not see the same thing done with Herge's Tintin.

Anyhoo these comics have been out of print for the longest time, till British publishing house Cinebook started releasing them from 2006 onwards. Needless to say that I've been collecting them faithfully.

Recently, while checking Wikipedia, I found out that a publishing house in India named Eurokids has just released a 24 set of Lucky Luke. Thankfully these differ from the titles that Cinebooks has released and me wants so badly.

I've set the wheels into motion and thanks to my most wonderful cousin Christabelle, should have them soon enough. Cannot Wait!!!!!!

They are also available as 3 in 1 sets. But honestly - would you pass up on the amazing cover art????