This is a short article, but hey, I need something to do and you need something to read! I hope everyone in CC’s community is safe and well. One of the upsides to all this is I have my two college kids home. It’s been a long time since we all five spent this much time together. Maybe we never have been able to, really, since even in high school they had this sport and that project to do, etc.
Downsides of course include that we don’t feel comfortable around my mother-in-law who is 80, or my parents in their early 70’s. We visit, but don’t go in and don’t hug. It’s weird. I haven’t been shaking hands with clients for weeks now, either, but everyone expects that now.
I also feel like a bank robber going to the few places I go, wearing a balaclava (which I fortunately had a bunch already from running in cool weather). I don’t put it up all the way over my head for the grocery store, of course.
Underside of Suburban, showing the pretty convenient filter and oil drain about even with the front axle
In addition to some family bonding, we have been doing some things around the house and with the cars. I fixed the pull down attic stairs which have been broken for years. Washing and waxing the cars, mainly, but I am going to change the oil and filter in the Suburban soon myself. I’ve had it done three times at the Valvoline pit stop place I like, but I’m looking for projects. It looks super easy, you could do it without ramps if you wanted to wiggle under there. I think there is not enough room to use my creeper, without the ramps though.
I keep getting constant coupon emails from the selling dealer, for the last couple of weeks. They are here in my town, about 10 minutes from the house. But between making the appointment, and then waiting or having someone follow me over for a ride back to the house, I’d rather do it myself. We don’t have any quick oil change places in this small town, I pass the Valvoline an hour from my house, a couple of times a week. I do wonder how the dealers are holding up right now, sales and service wise, with so many sheltering directives. Anyone out there work for one?
I had a few projects on the 2016 Winnebago View I wrote up previously, so I have tended to those. I added the chrome trim to the black plastic grille. These are polished stainless steel, and nicely made, but are not OEM pieces. The upscale passenger Sprinter vans come with this look from the factory, though I don’t know if the factory executes it the same way. Will they stay stuck on? I hope so, they certainly were sticky enough out of the package. With the “adhesion promoter” you wipe on the black plastic first, they were so eager to stick it was tricky to get them positioned right.
I also added the smoked bug deflector. Our windshield on the 5,600 mile trip out West last summer was a bug-filled mess for days! Cleaning at a fuel stop only gave temporary relief. I hope this helps keep the windshield a little more clear. It’s a nice, German made piece. You can see six raised buttons across the shield; there are six felt lined clips that aggressively grip the ledge of the hood. The deflector then attaches to those clips with six black threaded knobs. The deflector does not come out of the box curved to fit the hood, so it was pretty difficult to get it all to line up right. You have to gently bend the deflector into place. But once you do, voila, the “spring loaded” effect of deflector means those clips aren’t going anywhere. I can’t imagine it ever coming loose or flying off.
Mercedes Sprinter oil drain is super easy, just reach under the front bumper. You can see the dropped down, extended portion of the pan in front of the axle
I changed the oil and filter in the View too. The 3.0 liter Mercedes turbodiesel V6 has an enlarged pan, so it holds 13.5 quarts. This apparently was a change made right about the time this chassis was made (it’s an early 2015 Mercedes Sprinter 3500 in the Mercedes dealer’s system, but titled as a 2016 Winnebago). I don’t know if all Sprinters have that pan, or just the cutaway chassis versions.
Sprinter cartridge filter is up top on the front of the engine. Unclipping the air snorkel helps with access
It’s a super easy job; the cartridge filter is up top, and the pan drain is just under the front bumper, at the front of the pan. I needed a fluted wrench for the filter housing, none of the ones I had from older Mercedes fit. The diesel exhaust particulate filter is sensitive to the type of oil, so I ordered Mobil 1 0w30 ESP (Emission System Protection) from Amazon, which is what the dealer used at the first change under my parents’ ownership.
Mobil Delvac Synthetic, Shell Rotella Synthetic, and the like are at WalMart and probably would be just fine, but they don’t have the Mercedes approval code for this engine, so why chance it to save maybe $40 every year or so. The manual calls for a change every 20,000 miles which seems nuts, given that in an RV it works at full load about every time it runs. Between my parents and I, we have changed the oil and filter about every 10,000 miles, give or take.
I had a mouse issue with the RV, despite keeping mouse poison all around it and inside. They crawl up the air snorkel, which terminates near the bottom of the radiator. From there, they go all the way into the air cleaner housing, and build a nest. This happened twice. The first time, I had removed the dozen Torx screws to check the air filter (is that really necessary, Mercedes?) and found the housing quite full.
I cleaned it out, but the next time I drove the RV it seemed to have no “get up and go”. Checking the filter again, this time I found it completely packed full with straw and other materials. I placed a shower drain grate where there is a joint in the snorkel. This stops the mice from getting in, and it hasn’t happened again. There is a horse barn near the storage facility I use, so I guess the mice are commuting. They also chewed on the hood pad, but I replaced it with some foil faced insulation, which apparently they don’t like.
I read online about SumoSprings helping RV’s ride and handle better. Though the View rode and handled OK for a fully loaded box truck, that’s of course faint praise. It frequently hit the rear bump stops, given that it rolls out of the factory taxing the Sprinter rear axle pretty much to the rated limit. There is also the expected “top heavy” feeling, and side to side rocking such as pulling into a parking lot.
The front SumoSpring as installed
I ordered the SumoSprings online, about $500.00 for all four. They make various versions, but these are the most common and easiest to install. Front and rear, they simply replace the factory bump stops with a dense, foam rubber block. The front Sprinter model also fits all recent Ford E-Series vans, which was an interesting tidbit. The front model has a stud on the top, and you use the factory nut to install it to the frame.
The rear SumoSpring as installed (the yellow part). You can see the factory leaf spring is about fully loaded, even though the RV has little cargo on board at this time. Full diesel and LP, but empty water tanks
The rear versions simply twist into a “foot” on the frame rail. Once installed, instead of crashing onto the bump stops, you have a progressive damping action. It is the equivalent of 1,400 pounds increased capacity on the rear, and 1,000 pounds increased capacity on the front, though you should not exceed the factory axle ratings (wink, wink).
The installation instructions looked easy, but you need to raise the vehicle to take the load off the axles, so I had no safe means to do that. It also suggested to remove the wheels to make the job easier and safer. My local mom and pop tire shop charged me $150.00 labor to install all four SumoSprings, which I thought was great. They rotated the tires side to side and checked the brake pads too while the wheels were off.
The results? Stunning. I haven’t driven far yet, but the tire place is 35 miles up a narrow, twisty road from my house, through the Pisgah National Forest. So I drove back down that twisty road to go home, and I could not believe the difference. The best way to describe it is instead of riding, bouncing and leaning like a UHaul box truck, it rode like the Suburban with all five of us, pulling the 6,000 boat. It’s no sports car, but it rode smoother and with much less lean. Bumps no longer make a “crashing” noise, it’s a distant “thump” like an SUV.
Next up: the front cab seats swivel around 180 degrees when you are parked, to face the “house” part of the RV. The driver seat is my favorite seat when parked, as it faces the small dining table so I can eat there, set my laptop there and work, etc. However, it’s a dark place to sit, there’s no good light source overhead for reading.
So, I added these nifty 12 volt LED reading lights over each cab door, that go on and off, and dim, with a touch of the metal housing. They swivel 360 degrees, so you can use them as a super bright reading light behind the wheel too. Or, you can aim them up and dim them for “mood lighting” when parked.
I split the constant hot fuse for the radio memory, and labelled the new wire for the next owner
I used a fuse splitter in the fuse box to get a 3 amp fused hot lead, and used a nearby screw for a ground. I drilled a hole in the fiberboard, mouse fur headliner to mount them, and pulled the windlace trim down to stuff the wires behind the headliner and A pillar trims. They are taking power off a nonswitched chassis fuse slot, so you can use them when parked.
For bottled water and drinks, we found this 12 volt cooler for under $80 at WalMart, which works great. It cools up to 30 degrees below the RV’s interior temperature, so you don’t want to use it for perishables like milk or eggs. But for drinks, it has exceeded our expectations, and creates needed space in the refrigerator. One problem though, is that it needs 12 volt power, even when parked. It came with an adapter so you can use it at home and plug it into a 120 volt outlet. But when we are parked and on “shore power”, the only 120 volt outlets in the RV are nowhere near the cooler, which we leave between the cab seats at all times.
The first time we camped with the cooler, I left it plugged into the constant-on 12 volt socket on the dash. I assumed the chassis battery under the cab floor was charged off of shore power and/or the diesel generator, like the “house” deep cycle batteries. Well, I was wrong! A week later, the chassis battery was too weak to start the engine when we went to leave. Fortunately, you can push a rocker switch on the dash and “jump start” the engine using the deep cycle house batteries, so we weren’t stranded.
I needed a 12 volt outlet off the house deep cycle batteries when camping, so I installed this switched triple outlet in the entry stairwell (that’s the Igloo cooler plugged into it). It gave us a handy place to plug in 12 volt USB chargers when camping, as well. The house deep cycle batteries are under the top stair, which is also the hinged cover for the battery compartment, so the wiring is only 18 inches long or so. It came with a 15 amp in-line fuse and I labeled it so the next owner knows what it is for. The switch is lighted red when on, which is a handy reminder because you need to switch it off when the RV is not in use. Since it is direct wired to the batteries, it is not switched off by the house power master switch (also adjacent to the stairs), which kills everything between trips.
So, that’s my quarantine work so far. Nothing near what Paul has done to build his own RV from scratch! That’s an impressive feat. There’s more to be done around my garage, and some of it may merit a write up!
Nice work on that awesome RV! You want it to be a place where you feel comfortable, so dialing it in is a must. And if you have the time and tools to do any or even all your wrenching, you are better off for it! When I run synthetic, I’m comfortable with about an 8-10k lifespan.
In between working at home and the foul weather we’ve had lately, I found some time to keep working on my Westy’s bumper. I straightened it a little more, ground off the surface rust, and Plasti-dipped it. Also dipped the Bundts, which look a lot fresher now!
I’m not surprised about how those helper springs improved the handling. I find it a bit scary just how overloaded these van chassis commonly are. Many or most are already very close to their legal limits before folks load them up for a trip. This was common with the Toyota based motorhomes in the 80s and such, but it’s happening again due to the popularity of these van-based chassis for motorhomes, as well as even vans themselves when fitted with all sorts of heavy accessories. I saw a video form one upscale van outfitter: the first thing they do is major chassis upgrades since their conversion pushes them way over the chassis limits.
Meanwhile, my conversion takes me up to less than one half of the max capacity (4,000 lbs) of the Promaster. Which is a pretty remarkable capacity to start with. But lots of them with professional conversions are having overload issues too, and using various overload springs and such.
Yes, the Mercedes diesel is very finicky about what oil it likes, from what I’ve read. And that is an impressive oil capacity.
Make sure the mice don’t get inside your RV, in the passenger area. I had mice living in my old Chinook when I first got it, in the furnace and all over the inside. Big mess. Note that a mouse only requires a 1/4″ gap to get through, as they can flatten their bodies that much due to a very flexible rib cage.
My Tacoma seems to use its rear bumpstops frequently even though I’m never close to its small payload capacity. I’ve been thinking about Sumo’s or Timbrens so it’s good to hear they worked for you. On the Tacoma forums, the usual recommendation is a few thousand dollars worth of new springs, remote reservoir adjustable shocks etc … but I don’t need or even want that.
From my limited experience, they would be great for that. I was so impressed I looked to see if they are available for the Suburban though I don’t load it up heavily. They are not compatible with the Magnaride setup on the Denali/Escalade/Suburban Premier trims.
I don’t install any. No need; fully loaded for a trip, I’m at only about 50-55% of my cargo capacity. But others on the PM forum have.
I keep mouse poison inside too in bait stations like I use around my rentals. I haven’t seen any sign of them inside so far, thank goodness.
Mouse poison is ill-advised. The mice consume the poison and die in some impossible to reach area. Not a good smell.
Use cotton balls soaked in peppermint oil. It repels them. Has always worked for me.
That smell is awful. Especially if they die in the wall cavity behind the fireplace, and you want a nice roaring fire the night after you move in. It supercharges the smell. Ask me how I know.
I was going to suggest that expanded mesh aluminum “gutter guard” stuff, which you can easily shape and secure over the edge of an intake pipe with a clamp. I have used it before when I did a ghetto intake for my Dakota, it kept all but the small leaves out and I don’t think it would restrict air intake any. 1/4 inch is pretty flat, but I believe it. Life, uh, finds a way.
Since I’m not too far from scottn59c I too have been housebound due to heavy rain, so I’m trying to tackle a smoke detector issue. Two of them went off I. The middle of the night and the only way to stop it was to pull the batteries from all 5 detectors in the house. My theory is that it’s some problem in the “red wire” interconnect that causes all of them to go off if one does. I then disconnected each one at a time, and narrowed the problem down to two locations. If I can’t find an obvious loose wire connection I have to decide whether to call an electrician or just disconnect the third wire everywhere. No real automotive tasks that are calling me at this time … though I could write up some CC’s I’ve been think about.
Waiting for you to write up your old Westy 😉
It’s been a mixed bag. While I have loved staying at home (yes, I’m likely in the minority) I have been working more than ever. For some things the work and need is there regardless of weather and pandemics.
In my spare time I’m building a house. It’s not a huge house, but it is three levels. Of course, it’s a doll house that should have been made years ago. My daughter got it when she was nine and she turned eighteen last month. Better late than never. I’m enjoying it but I’m still in the painting phase. Gluing is coming up soon enough.
I’ve also been cutting brush. My one acre plus lot behind the house is covered with bush-honeysuckle, which is highly invasive in these parts, and it is choking out all other vegetation. So the honeysuckle needs to go.
Try something called “FreshCab” for your RV. It’s in most hardware stores and smells quite nice although mice hate it. I’ve been using it for years with good results.
The worst part of this ordeal has been it interfering with my daughter’s high school graduation. She recently observed she was born in the shadow of 9/11 and her high school days are ending with a pandemic. It’s wearing on her and some of the other kids we know.
Yes indeed, I have a high school senior and a college senior. So two missed graduations, no senior prom, no college “admit days” or tours for his college choices, etc. There’s been a lot of tearful conversations about all this, but we just have to redirect focus on the fact that we have a house, computers, internet, our health, and a shared experience.
It was made worse for her this weekend. She’s in the midst of orthodontic treatment and her orthodontist was the first person in this county to die due to complications from the coronavirus.
This happened just three days after we had a hailstorm with 3″ hailstones that has totaled out the roof of the house. So she keeps getting subjected to really bad events, which is compounding the situation.
However, as I type she is upstairs laughing, so it isn’t completely bleak – just highly irritating for her.
Wow, we heard about the ortho in J-City last week – he was a very good friend of our neighbor! Horrible. Our middle guy just did a virtual visit with his ortho, they checked everything but couldn’t adjust anything (obviously). Kind of a holding pattern for now.
I’m sorry to hear all the turmoil your family is experiencing Jason Shafer and I’m sorry to hear that your family orthodontist has passed away. I used to think that graduating high school in 2008 and college in 2011 was a bit rough, but that is nothing compared to what is happening now.
“born in the shadow of 9/11 and her high school days are ending with a pandemic.”
That is sobering. I can remember how scary it was to graduate college and enter the working world right at the start of the Great Recession. I have no doubt that such a harsh reality check fed my lust (and others’) for #VanLife. I don’t live out of my van, but I’ll probably never stop living with the fear that one day I might need to if the ax falls.
To add to Scottn59c’s comment, I suppose it is better to be starting higher education under these conditions than graduating into it. This is going to be an ugly year for new college grads and their families.
Oh yes, that honeysuckle. I was fortunate to have two big strapping lads living at my house the summer it got tackled, with the occasional help from a third. I have had the easy job of clipping its constant attempts to re-establish itself.
I’ve had nightmares about cutting that stuff. You’ve been here and when we bought the place a goodly portion of the yard was non-traversable given the abundance of that stuff.
You well know the joys of it. What you are doing by cutting the new stuff is the best way to stay on top of it.
I don’t know, I think it’d be worse to be STARTING college in the fall, especially if you were planning on or accepted somewhere away from home. Can’t imagine paying out of state tuition and then have your kid working out of her bedroom at home if this ends up going much longer or enters a second phase/wave. We have one switching schools from elem to middle next year, the same situation will completely suck I think for that as well. The other two each have another year at their respective schools which will work out either way I suppose.
My Son just graduated.
He went direct to work for a couple of years, in his intended field, right out of high school. (of course doing the job for half as much as he could have got paid with a college degree, but still way better than he could have otherwise made) Meanwhile his HS friends who went straight to college have graduated and have jobs in the same field.
He and I discussed what his plans were for work, well before the Pandemic hit and the stay at home order took effect. That is when he told me his friends who were working at Costco, Docusign and Smartsheets were all telling them to apply at their company. One of the things that his friend who works at Costco gave as a benefit to coming there was that it was pretty recession proof. Sure they do sell things like TVs, jewelry and other things that people might cut back on in a recession. But even in a recession people still need to eat and wipe their butt. When you stand in line and look at the carts around you you’ll see much of the merchandise is actually from the grocery, paper goods and HABA side, with a good smattering of stuff from the middle aisle.
Of course now 6 weeks later that has become all too real as Costco is one of the few business that remains open and they are doing booming business selling TP and food.
For the first couple weeks of the shutdown, I was still pretty busy. I work for a corrugated cardboard packaging company and we supply several medical companies, plus others like soap companies and food companies. So we are considered essential. I’m in electronic prepress, so I can’t work from home. I have to be press-side when new jobs are running to approve them. Really difficult to do that remotely.
However, the slowdown has started hitting us; our plant was running full speed, in fact, the factory worked on the weekends to keep up with demand. They didn’t work this past weekend and the job queue is shrinking.
We’ll see what the upcoming weeks bring.
I hope things continue to go well for you, it’s strange times indeed and I know a lot of people of all incomes who are out of work (NC courts have closed until June 1, for example, so a lot of attorneys are effectively shut out of work, if that’s what your focus is). Let’s all hope it’s a short-lived situation.
I’ve been helping my elderly parents avoid leaving home, and that keeps us somewhat busy as they have separate households. Otherwise, my wife and I are fortunate to be working at home, my employer was a champ about getting 6,000 of us home on short notice.
We’ve set up respective offices, and since then I’m tackling a long delayed master bedroom update. Lots of fiddly trim detail with a box ceiling and crown moulding. I have to admit feeling some guilt showing up at Lowe’s to buy paint. Is it right to shop and help keep people employed while taking social distancing and wearing a mask seriously, or just stay home?
At our lunch conference, I’ll be bringing to the boss a proposal to purchase a hitch and wiring harness (through e-trailer) for our 2018 Fusion 2.0T AWD. It will be tasked with our jet ski this summer. For our sport boat, a new rear view mirror is arriving Friday, and I’m hoping to finally achieve mirror nirvana – third time’s the charm, and all that. The prior two were deficient in their own ways, a tendency to fall at inconvenient times or vibrate like delirium tremens after a week long bender. And, it will be time to do some wake-up for the season maintenance on both.
My hope that everyone is safe and well!
Uh, I waxed the 4Runner for the first time. Ever. Using Meguiar’s that I’ve had for a decade. So you’re a couple of massive tiers ahead of me.
To avoid quarantine insanity, we escaped to some very vacant dirt roads last Friday and had a nice picnic lunch up a narrow old mining track with quite a view:
The wax job, incidentally, was to assuage my guilt at putting more brush scratches down the side that day. It kind of worked. It’s very shiny between the lines in the clearcoat.
We’ll try the pic again, downsized to 2MP
I win!
Now, that’s some first-class social distancing! Thanks for sharing. 😉
My office has moved everyone to their homes, staff and all. Our courts are not trying cases, but they have partial staffing and smaller things are getting done, many via video or phone conferencing.
It will be interesting to see what happens going forward – the number of auto accidents is likely plummeting right now. OTOH, bad economic times often result in a jump in lawsuits by folks who really need money, as well as some outright fraudulent claims. Being on the insurance side of these, hopefully there will be work to do. There will probably be a lot of business claims arising from COVID-19 losses.
There are no car jobs going right now, both cars are sitting in the garage hardly being used. If I were smart I would cancel the insurance on one of them and drive the other until such time as both of us will be out at the same time.
Not really much change in my life. I started a major remodel of one of our rooms in the house, including chipping up the original 1929 linoleum (no asbestos in the felt, fortunately). Skim coating the walls, as they had a pimply sand texture that we’re not fond of. Two coats, to get that smooth plaster look. Then paint, and floor sand and finish.
Stephanie misses the Y. We get out on a substantial walk or hike every day. They’ve shut down state parks and developed recreation areas on federal land (Forest Service/BLM) but that still leaves vast numbers of trail heads and such. We might take the van out for a little loop of the remote areas of Eastern Oregon, although that kind of thing is not being encouraged. We’ll be fully self contained.
Some of my tenants couldn’t make rent this month because they were laid off from restaurant work. But they’re eagerly awaiting the first of those $600 weekly payments from the feds on top of their state unemployment; they’ll be making a lot more than they have ever made before. Some can’t believe it, given they were working part time. A bonanza!
Not surprisingly I have one tenant whose cannabis business is just fine, but is not paying rent because we have a 90 day moratorium on evictions. They’re scheduled to move out in about that time anyway, so this is an opportunity to live rent-free for a few months.
“We might take the van out for a little loop of the remote areas of Eastern Oregon, although that kind of thing is not being encouraged. We’ll be fully self contained.”
I hear you. We cancelled a self-contained family campout down in the warmer desert regions of the state for the same reason. San Juan County has more or less banned out of county visitors and others are quickly moving that way. We opted for a closer outing.
It is weird not having access to the vast public lands that I’m accustomed to.
Glad you are doing well. It’s a shame that some people will take advantage of the current rent-delay rules. I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if I was able to pay and decided to just be a d**k about it. Just like some companies seem to have a license to gouge now. As for my family and I, so far not much has changed (yet). I am still working, and my commute is quicker with less traffic. Toilet paper is back in the stores to normal levels. (Weird thing to panic-buy, isn’t it?) My younger son and I go to a local large county park which is almost always empty and hike or play frisbee; stuff like that.
We were doing social distancing before it got popular anyways, because we’re an odd group. 😊
Stay safe and sane, and thanks for my favorite website.
Being over-70 and living in Ireland, I’m not supposed to venture more than 2km from home, and that just once a day for exercise. Started my Honda last Tuesday to take a couple of black refuse sacks to the tip, but other than that and a stroll up the road each day I haven’t been beyond the garden gate for ten days.
I bought a used motor vehicle from a private party 2 days before the DMV closed down.
I just finally heard this back from the DMV:
“The vehicle cannot be registered until the DMV re-opens. You must park the vehicle on private property until it can be registered.”
Since I have a vehicle I can’t operate until the DMV reopens (it’s currently closed “until further notice”), I’ve been slowly tearing it down and properly repairing the work that ham-fisted “professional” technicians did to it prior to my ownership.
Two hints… I’ve been doing the work in my dining room, and you can expect a SOAL post whenever the DMV reopens. 🙂
Segway Of A Lifetime?
Those don’t need registration though, do they?
Close, but not quite!
Just now scooter popped in my head.
Look forward to the post in any case.
We have a winner!
I thought I would go nuts with the kids at home, but they have been living online since they halted school and we have them doing a daily routine as though they are in school. I moved into the Sun room with the cat and we’ve been loving the sunshine and fresh air. Living in the heartland away from the viral hot spots has been great. No reports of infections in the county. So, about once every two days, we all pile into the van and go for a ride.
I am considered essential, so I am working from home. We’ve been flooded with work. I hope all the guys stay well, especially those on the coasts and New Orleans.
It hasn’t made much difference to me. I’m retired and live in a granny flat out the back of the family home. As I’m a bit wandery in my mind these days, never went out much anyway and can’t drive any more it hasn’t made much difference to my mobility. The only change is that when I do walk up to the shops there aren’t many people around, and not much traffic moving through town – it’s like it was 20 years ago before all the new housing developments. I dread to think what’s going on inside those houses though – they’ll be climbing the walls!
So, there’s plenty of time to work in the garden and orchard, care for the poultry and build models when it’s cold and raining outside – (latest one below). That’s pretty much situation normale. Daylight saving ended last weekend, so there’s that for my body to get used to. And I’m learning my way around a new laptop; that’s a challenge. Ohj, yeah, I’m behind in my homework for writing group too. I “owe” them two stories now. Haven’t done them, but I sent off a bonus one yesterday on a totally different topic and blew their minds. Fun, that!.
The main difference would be that my daughter checks up on me more frequently: How’s the laptop going? Do you need help with anything? Want to watch a movie, etc. That’s nice .
We had some home remodeling projects planned before the shutdown. Some have been delayed, like our master bedroom shower that was removed three weeks ago. They’re putting it in right now. We had to move everything out (mostly) because we were going to have new flooring put in. That meant my cars are now outside in the rain because the household stuff is in the garage in boxes.That job has been put off for another few weeks. I’ve been doing some interior painting in the meantime. So the cars can wait. I’ve been off for over three weeks, I left my part time job a week before our quarantine was announced, since I am in a high exposure occupation and I’m in the old person demographic. Chances are, I wont be working until the end of May. It’s called for a bit of belt tightening but we’re going to be fine. I go out and work in the yard and for a walk. Even though I live in Santa Clara county, our neighborhood is very spacious and low density. I really believe that we really have to try to “flatten the curve”. So I’m going to do my part. Stay healthy and safe.
Building yachts is “essential” in Maine, so off to work I go. I just try to avoid the others who are left after half the workforce was furloughed. No new boat sales, but I have a few weeks of work left on the last two.
Been indulging my car hobby more than usual. Last weekend changed the oil and did some carburetor tuning on my ’70 Corvette LT-1, followed by a 30 minute drive. Otherwise hanging around the house with wife and youngest kiddo (college freshman daughter), doing minor projects and such, watching Netflix and Amazon Prime, and trying to support some of our favorite local establishments by ordering take out. For us car guys working on and driving hobby cars serves as the ultimate in social distancing. Weather’s warming up and there’s hardly any traffic these days, so we’ve got that going for us!
Happy place…
NICE!
I’ve been working from home, since I’m employed in an industry that’s considered to be essential.
My house is currently on the market. I’ve been doing touch ups and spring cleaning in the yard, so that the house is ready for showings once people start venturing out once again.
I retired at the end of January, and we’re in the process of moving back South to be close to our divorced son and two grandkids. Son travels(ed) a good bit for work, and we’re more than happy to keep the kiddos for him. The new house is a 3BR/2BA ranch on one acre, which is a major downsize from our 5BR/2BA farmhouse on 15.5 acres. The new place backs up to a large cow pasture, so we’re still in the country and can enjoy cows without having to take care of them. One other plus is that we’re about 10 minutes from a decent-sized Amish community. We got our driver’s licenses, tags and titles prior to the new State’s ‘stay at home’ order, thankfully.
The new house really only needed paint and flooring updates, which we’ve done ourselves. The farmhouse has been undergoing a marathon of gutting three upstairs bedrooms of their old plaster, lathe and blown-in insulation. I broke down and hired a crew to hang and finish the drywall in two of them after it taking nearly a month for me to do one of them on my own. Then there’s the 30-some other items on my pick list to finish up.
We listed the farm about two weeks ago and got five showings the first week, but things have now gone quiet. Our Realtor said they are not doing any showings at all in town, even though this is considered an ‘essential’ activity.
On the car front, we took the TourX in to have a TSB done. I then took the Chev SS in for an alignment (having recently replaced tires) and transmission and diff lube changes. Did my own oil change on the RAM 2500. The truck’s been getting a workout pulling a 24′ enclosed trailer that’s our surrogate U-Haul van – loaded, it’s been returning about 6-7MPG, and maybe around 9-10 empty. Stiff headwinds on the return leg will drop that back to 6-7MPG, though.
So, other than minimizing trips to town and having to listen to church on live-stream, life’s not appreciably different for us (yet).
Our younger son and wife are working from home, and he took advantage of the extra time from not having to drive in and back to finish up the VW Beetle model kit I gave him for Christmas – thought he did a great job on it!
Is there a reason you tore out all that old plaster and lathe, a very messy job? I know it’s commonly done, but on all of my old houses I just tape the cracks and skim coat the plaster. Way less demo, dust and mess. I did that to some of my houses that were moved, which cause lots of cracks. None have come back.
That is also how I handled old cracking plaster too! My neighbor tore down the walls and then completely redid them in plaster and lathe. It was a nightmare that took a year to do, and after he finished, it didn’t improve the look any more than my taping and patching up did. As a matter of fact, it was his nightmare that caused me to reevaluate how I was going to handle the walls.
The new house is new, and it doesn’t have the beauty and charm of the old house, but also none of the plaster work either.
The plaster was in pretty bad shape (multiple layers of wallpaper and cheap paneling applied over the years, so lots of cracked nail holes), and the blown-in insulation had settled in numerous places leaving 1-2′ gaps with no insulation. Our winter LP gas bill went down significantly as I got more rooms done. Since I also completely rewired (and re-plumbed) the house, it made those jobs easier, too. Finally, there were a number of places I had to repair/rebuild structural elements. I should do a HOAL on it sometime (“The Other Side of the Curb”)!
The first kitchen remodel I did on one of our houses was a 20’s era house in Oakland, CA where I tore out the lathe and plaster to be able to replace the old wiring in the walls. A huge mess but once done makes everything so much better and easier to upgrade. And really allows one to see all the in-wall moisture and/or termite damage on exterior stucco covered walls. We ended up rebuilding one exterior wall entirely for the entire span of the kitchen at that time. Mind you the rest of the house likely had the same damage, I think the original stucco mostly kept it standing.
Spending lots of time working solo on the latest remodel which is only two miles from our house. Getting test cars means getting creative with (careful) long drives to exercise/nature spots which are still allowed. One manufacturer cut back for now so you won’t be seeing any more FCA reviews for a bit (from me anyway, I’m sure other larger outlets may still be) but somehow I was given a vehicle from another manufacturer this week without even asking so there may be some more variety soon…
Was able to get a client into a bunch of vacant homes to show in Denver last week with all of us driving separate, keeping distance, suiting up and spraying everything and everybody but today the word came down that showings are not considered essential to the real estate process by our A-G. Closings are though, but can’t see anyone closing without showing a house first, we’ll see how that ruling ends up turning out…
Got one rental re-rented remotely to a new college researcher moving from Indiana to Wyoming for July, the other one the current tenants may stay on another year. Or not, then will need to try to get that re-rented virtually as well next month. Thank goodness all current tenants paid rent without being prompted. The third rental, currently vacant and in a state of disrepair is next on the remodel list for the summer.
No real need to wake up early so able to binge watch the new season of Ozark late at night (highly recommend!) and the new season of Bosch starts soon as well.
Keep it safe out there, everybody.
My wife has been binge watching Ozark, but my 12th grader is watching That 70’s Show from the beginning, so I’ve gravitated to that room. My wife and I had just started working with a realtor on an “empty nester” condo but that’s been torpedoed for now (realtors are “nonessential” here too so no in-person showings). We are still watching the MLS portal she set up for us, but there’s little to no listing activity either.
The RE rules are/were interesting in WA.
The initial order was that closings, loans ect were an essential business so closings could occur on time. However movers and stagers couldn’t empty house and you couldn’t meet to hand off the key to your client. Of course showings and open houses were banned. You also couldn’t inspect or appraise so those that could proceed with closing were very limited.
The state Realtor’s association quickly got a lot of that changed. Showings and key hand offs were the first change, inspections and appraisals shortly there after. It took another day or two for the movers and stagers to be able to empty the house.
All showings must be by appt made through the listing broker.
Only two people can be at the property at a time. So you get there first, block the driveway. Take the wife into the opened house, she goes out to the car and then the husband can come in.
Which of course makes no sense, if one of them has it they are more likely to give it to the other in the car or at their current home. If I give it to one of them and didn’t give it to the other at the showing then they’ll still get it from their partner eventually.
But hey it allowed a showing this week that resulted in the listing that I put on the market right before the news broke going under contract this week. In discussions with that broker she shared a high rise condo she had just listed has banned all non residents, so no showings there.
Up until today the weather has been cold or rainy/sleet/hail and cold with occasional sun breaks. So I haven’t done much with vehicles. I had done a careful vacuuming and dusting of my car and every vehicle had its day or two on a charger maintainer, topping them all off. I did do a quick clean out of the pickup’s interior sorted the receipts and organized the tool box.
Today however it was nice and sunny and relatively warm. So the wife’s car got a deep cleaning on the interior. The Marauder got a good vacuuming as well.
However the van got a lot of the attention today. I have had problems with mice with it in the past and I had pulled a lot of the interior panels out to clean out the mess. I worked on some more of that today and then took a crack at figuring out the wiring for the emergency and other lighting that was removed when it was decomissioned. Yes state law says emergency lighting has to be removed, but he lights in the back and the marker lights that are really needed with the extended top?. Digging into that I found some places the mice had been before so that all got vacuumed out and while I had the engine cover off for easier access I vacuumed out most of the “helicopters” and pine cones that the squirrels had stashed on the back of the engine, around the coils and injectors of course.
I have had them get in intakes before. The daughter’s car ended up with a packed air filter that choked off the car considerably on occasion, to the point that it wouldn’t idle, couldn’t make it up hills but other times it ran normally enough.
It actually is kind of embarrassing that it took me a while to figure out the problem. The check engine light did come on and the codes she found were for specific cylinder misses and adaptive fuel limit reached on the bank with the misses. Adaptive limit often shows up as a symptom of a serious miss. So I ended up replacing some coils, having the miss jump around, swapping coils around, ect until I went at it as the miss was the symptom and the fuel limit was the cause. So the air filter came open to find it packed with chaff and insulation. A new air filter and it ran like new. I did use some hardware cloth to create a screen to keep them out in the future. Most of my cars now have that since I live out in the woods with lots and lots of wildlife.
Hope everyone stays safe and your job is still there to go back to if you’ve been put out of work.
Plans? Oh, sure, I have a big list of plans closely corresponding to my big list of tasks. I work from home anyhow, so that part’s not different. What’s different is that now writing about car lights seems extraspecially ridiculous and pointless and futile—the world’s burning down, so yeah, I’ll get right to work writing six pages about what colour the turn signal should be. My spans of attention and motivation, infuriatingly short at the best of times, are decimated.
I’m Chief Editor of the global vehicle lighting and driver assistance industry’s journal (yes, it exists; it’s headquartered in France where much of the world’s best car lighting used to come from), which is still up and running, and in 15 days I have to file a from-scratch report on the North American vehicle lighting industry. All the site visits that would’ve gone into building it got scrubbed, of course, and I’m struggling with how to build a report-lenth report beyond “Once upon a time very shortly ago, the industry was treading water waiting for U.S. regs to catch up to the rest of the world. Now it’s stopped, just like every other industry. The end”.
I feel like I’ve aged several decades in a couple of weeks’ time. Like, I’ll take my pills and then barely a moment later I can’t recall if I took them today, or if that was yesterday. The days are difficult to discern from one another; a Sunday isn’t different to a Wednesday any more. I’d say I’m acting absentminded, but I think it’s really more like preoccupied and conflicted—I’m grateful to live in a country run by thoughtful, informed, competent grownups, and horrified to see the opposite of all that in my native country.
I’ve been binge-watching shows and movies. I’ve been doing repairs round the house. I’ve been cooking up a storm—I find it meditative and therapeutic, which is copacetic, as it results in meals. I’ve been grateful just about every minute to have married exceptionally well. We’re being our usual hermitty selves, only with more handwashing. I’m about half a notch away from getting up in the middle of the night to wash my hands, instead of the usual reason.
Carwise (aside from writing about certain parts of them)? Nada. I’m driving (not a lot) and disliking my 2007 Accord. Perhaps if civilisation doesn’t end I’ll replace it eventually.
Stay strong, Daniel. I’m trying to buck my tendencies and be an optimist on this one.
And keep disliking that 2007 Accord, it seems to be a perennial vexation. Perhaps it needs a COVID-inspired nickname. The Virus? The Plague?
Could you post some further details on the added dimmable interior spotlights you installed? I like the concept and would rather not reinvent the wheel when you have done such a nice job with your setup.
NZ is at level4 lockdown but being a harvest truck drive weare classed as essential, part of the food chain so nothing has been dona at home the lawnmoa has had a run but thats about it Ive taken my Hillman to work to give it some exercise plus the occasional classic should be out and about a workmate who has a 59 Cadillac hardtop and 67 Pontiac drives his Hi lux ute to work instead, no projects underway even an oil change on my daily car cant happen everything is shut and I dont trust Supercheap or Repco to supply the correct oil filter, one good thing the roads are quiet very little traffic other than trucks, crawling up the Ashurst saddle last week in low first overloaded at 11kmh I pulled into the left lane at a slow vehicle bay and one car overtook normally there would be dozens,
Well, I’m working from home. It’s been very busy as we are scrambling to get projects complete,components ordered and completed things shipped as things get more and more shut down.
Want to set some metallurgical samplers air freighted from Finland to a mine site in Arizona? No chance, sea cans is the only option.
Unlike Jason, my daughter is very happy to not be graduating from high school this year, she is keeping busy kid-sitting some health care workers children and learning to play the tuba. My son is finishing up first year of university, he is hoping to be able to move back into residence in September, we shall see about that.
Not much happening on the vehicular front, I’ll probably put the battery back in the motorcycle this week and I’ll have to retrieve the Mustang and camper trailer at the end of the month.
Don’t know what I’ll do with them since there is no place to go, I cancelled the May trip to NY state with my father and we’re not optimistic about July Mustang trip to the east coast. However if I’m healthy and employed in July I’ll be quite happy regardless.
I’ve been at home with my family for two weeks because my employer has been deemed non essential. I’m horrified at the extent of the tragedy unfolding around us, and feel guilty that the stay at home order for another month suits me very well for now.
After 10 years of working 60 hours weeks and literally, no vacations, a long rest is most welcome. Spending time with my family without anything in particular to do is a welcome luxury. I’m catching up on all the simple pleasures that I’ve missed in recent years. Having time to cook elaborate meals and watch movies every night with family is delightful.
The Grand Fleet ( my motley car collection) is recieving an unprecedented and long overdue overhaul. Today I’m finishing ball joint and sway bar link replacement on the Continental. Last week I replaced tie rods, upper ball joints and rear brakes on the Marquis. Tomorrow I start on heater core and timing belt on the Volvo. And of course everything gets an oil change and interior cleaning.
The list goes on and on as my other cars have long deferred repairs that have all been on hold for years due to my lack of free time. For me, this is pure happiness, and distracts me from the horrors on the news. Stay well, everyone.
My industry (defense) is essential so I have to go in to office most days at least half day. We are distancing and shifting when we are In office. I feel fortunate that my family and I are healthy thus far and that My job status isn’t affected by this. Of course the weekends are wide open now so I’ve got my yard and lawn on point now! And all 6 cars are washed and waxed and oil changed. I have a couple minor odds and ends to fix on them like the passenger power window on my ‘89 mustang that has a bad ground I think. I’m almost getting desperate enough for things to do to tackle heater core replacement in my ‘88 Mark VII. Lol. Hope all stay safe and healthy
The kid is home from college; after a tumultuous first semester (Freshman year) getting use to the jacked-up expectation, this semester was settling down quite nicely for her when COVID closures smacked us up. She’s doing ok with the online stuff; her classes sound interesting and we’re blessed that her small university is a very caring environment. She does tremendously miss her small group of close-knit friends, but thank God for Facetime, etc. She and the crew from her old Girl Scout troop played Cards Against Humanity via Zoom the other night and it was hysterical hearing all the hooting going on. Of course we’re disappointed her summer term in Berlin has been canceled but it’s best to be safe these days with the unpredictability of COVID-19.
My little job of monitoring 32 students in online learning and co-hosting Zoom lessons is fascinating (lol). I’ve never been a desk jockey, so thankfully I’m still able to bike around a lake near us at 6 am and take a walk around the hood at noon as well as another after dinner. Strange days indeed.
I’m also powerwashing the living hell out of everything.
Stay safe all.
My wife and I are retired so work is not an issue. I have never been big on touching/hugging/etc so keeping a safe distance is no hardship for me. So far the virus has only been an inconvenience for me; we used to eat out quite a bit so now we are cooking more often. We try to plan trips for shopping so that we only need to go every two weeks or so. The weather is starting to warm up enough for top down driving so we have gotten the Mustang out for some around town cruising. Probably the worst thing for me personally is that non-emergency surgeries have been postponed indefinitely. I was scheduled for hip replacement surgery at the end of April and who knows when this will take place. Stay safe.
Skim coating old plaster walls is an art. I wish I were better at it. For cracks I use that mesh tape which seems to hold up longer than paper.
Contractor is taking 150′ of asbestos-covered steam pipe out of a rental for $2.5K. It’s a steal at that price, I think. Pulling permits and everything.
Waxed the Sienna. Took me all day. Some weird stuff on the hood—mag chloride from a recent trip to Chicago?—that took me a couple of hours to rub out.
Did some more “decorating” in my Wells Cargo trailer & also gauged up its tires on March 28th. I found a bunch of old–some not TERRIBLY old but expired nonetheless–license plates in the shed where my dad keeps most of his tools & mounted 5 of the best-looking ones (each from a different year but all from SC) on the side where the spare tire was formerly mounted. Removed from the trailer to get the best view of the tags, the tire will just sit in the corner the jack footplate (removed for adequate coupler clearance) is propped up against. No matter how many times I tightened the screws holding the tire mounting bracket to the wall, they always loosened themselves & sometimes to the point of the whole thing coming off and the tire slamming onto the trailer floor–guess what happened when I last used the trailer to put up my church’s manger scene props? >:( Good riddance, I say.
Anyway, the tags in the middle except the very top one each came from a car dealership from which we’ve dealt business with before (also all in SC): Cromley’s Ford in Saluda & Newberry (STILL do business with as of now), Twin City Motors in Batesburg-Leesville (where my grandparents’ ’88 Cutlass Ciera came from; now currently You’re Approved Auto Sales), Les Hite in the same town as well as Barnwell (now currently Bi-Rite; original owner passed away some time ago), and B&L Auto Sales in West Columbia (where I found my ’05 Astro). The top tag says “THE GREAT STATE” in an outline of SC’s shape and is the only one of the whole bunch that’s magnetic–on the left side of it is a small but useful fridge-magnet-style note holder, and in it are the instructions for the cargo net I had originally gotten for my ’96 Aerostar but successfully installed in the trailer (again partly removed for better picture view).
On the left side is a SC Road sign I got from our annual Poultry Festival in May of last year–NO festival this year b/c of you-know-what–just happening to have the number 50 on it. The special thing about this is that there just happened to be quite a few things that turned 50 years old in 2019, and I turned the sign into a collage of as many of those things as I could fit onto it without completely covering up the sign itself. Directly underneath is a tag from my church which I must have had on the Aerostar before its 2nd & final deer hit (I have 2 MUCH better ones on my 2011 Ranger & the Astro).
The thing inside the cargo net is an extra center cap from the Astro, and that white “box” at the bottom is an early ’90s Emerson turntable microwave oven I got at a yard sale of sorts from the SC State Museum of all places–fully functioning for only $10! Best bargain I’ve seen in quite some time, but currently nowhere else to put it as the similar-vintage Magic Chef microwave in our kitchen is still in perfect working order.
Les Hite was where my dad’s ’89 Town Car and my mom’s ’97 Mercury Tracer (& maybe also the ’83 Plymouth Horizon) came from. “I Don’t Do Mondays” is the message on the note holder & pretty much holds true for almost anybody in school, college or work–as well as Garfield the orange housecat. Close-up of the “50” sign with all the things read left to right: The Brady Bunch, Apollo 11, Pontiac Firebird Trans Am, Scooby-Doo!, Ford Mustang Boss 302 & 429, LGBT Rights Movement, Tic-Tacs, GAP, Wendy’s, Shealy’s BBQ (PARTICULARLY special to SC in that it’s locally owned in Batesburg-Leesville!), Funyuns, Cracker Barrel, The Very Hungry Caterpillar, Sesame Street, The Internet (NOT World Wide Web), Smoke Detector, PBS, Woodstock, ATM, and Capri-Sun. I would’ve included Captain D’s as well, but I ran out of room & they didn’t officially use that name until 1974.
As for other things I’ve done since then up to now (when not on my job that is–KMS Metal Fabrication is considered an essential operation), I’ve been catching up on some reading from all the books & magazines on the desk shelves in my room in addition to popping in DVDs of all my favorite shows & movies I could find from Wal-Mart & eBay. I’ve watched a great deal from YouTube also–plenty of churches now have their worship services live-streamed there, mine included–plenty to keep me occupied until the virus pandemic subsides. Oh, and of course some work around the house too.
The trailer hitched up to the Astro in front of the aforementioned shed when I finished the job. I got a caster wheel for the trailer jack to help in putting the trailer up when unhitched. I was about to put it up anyway so I went ahead & put it on to save all the trouble later.