hot sonday domestics day

did the usual, laundry, some further digging through stuff at Da’s pre-move preparations-like, and then came home to

Musical Chairs Engine Blocks,,,

Cleared both the blocks out of Buffalos bed, set the treefiddy on blocks off to the side, but set the 4.3 on a stand so that I can start taking off the ‘not same’ parts, and clean up covers and other stuff. Its used, its dirty, but it ran, ran good, and IS ON HAND .

tree0-fiddy is a goner, so it can wait until such time as I can get in to it, and is now out of the way.

Why did I shuffle engines around? I needed Buff to pull a tree out of the woods, and she is 4wheel drive,

sometimes,

when she feels like it,

but not today,,, GRRRRRR

Talkin’ to Brudda B, he mentioned some guy that put his front diff on a ‘choke cable’ type actuator, and I looked into those once. About $200 bucks for the kit, but I can make one for about $10. FIgure when I have the front end all torn apart to get at things,; then would be the best chance to do it cleanly. Lots of ‘gunk’ in the way right now.

Not that I am tearing into her, yet,, She is in place to do so, and the donor engine is as well, but that Holey Trinity of “Time, Space, Money” I’m woefully short of one, and near bankrupt in another. SPACE,,, thats there,,, just need to get the other two up to spec.

And I am no rush currently.

But she definitely needs that swap now. Apparently that ‘303’ error was a seeping head gasket, and now, when I start her, she runs rough as shit until I burn off that coolant sitting in #3. Smokes some too, but that burns out pretty quick. About 5 miles of running and she settles down. This sitting is telling about how far down she is. 340K on the odo, that block is TIRED. And its the last thing needed. New trans 3 years ago. Rebuilt Posi-Diff 2 years ago (Cripes how time flies!!),

And I will be doing upper A-arms, lower BJ’s, tierod ends, and Pitman arm while I have everything out. That Pitman arm is a REAL MOTHER on S10s and with the engine out, is almost easy. Much easier than with all the stuff in the way, and there is a metric ton of it in the way. (oh,, and she needs new shoes,,, )

That by the way is the ‘Money’ side of this equation,,, Not a lot individually, but nickles and dimes add up to substantial amounts in short order.

Bloo is doing frellin’ awesome as my Daily Driver. Slight misfire I haven’t isolated but only when real low in RPM(around 1000-1200) and hard loaded. Don’t notice it too much at start because I am in 2nd gear for seconds, not long pulls, and she runs through that window real quick like.

And once she is at speed,,, yah,,, lord she runs good!!! Went to London Satyrday, hit a long hill, didn’t need to downshift; just a llittle more pedal and she went right up it, no bogging, no lugging, no speed loss,,,, RPMs sitting right around 2100 and LOADS of torque at beck and call. Filled up on return; still seeing that 18mpg highway.

I has ZERO complaints

(and I am knockin’ on wood right now. No solid backup plan if she goes sideways.)

It’s back to the J.O.B. tomorrow. SonofBossman corrected his screwup on thursday, telling us we were off on monday. He jumped a week on the Calender and thought tomorrow was Mermorial Day. Threw me for a loop too until I really sat down and LOOKED at things. Sent him a text this AM asking, got reply back this afternoon “OOPS” ROFL.

being a bizzy Bee. Da is too. Two swarms this week. Both came to him, but that means he has more work to do, bribing the Queens with sugar water and ensuring they settle in, not decide to move on. The one was HUGE!!! Looked like a damned storm cloud moving in, and they came in, settled on an empty hive and settled down in less than 10 minutes. It still trips me up watching them move as a unit, like a little fuzzy carpet that moves. Or when they are flying in swarm: a mini tornado of BUZZZZZZ, that looks completely random unless you watch close. THEN, you can see there is order within the Storm.

Watching a swarm is a very Zen moment, believe me,,,

Anybowzersboos,,,, Its late Sonday, my day is wrappin’ up, needs a shower in a bad way (stinks) and need to put away laundry still.

more tomorrow

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