Monday, October 22, 2012

Progress or lack of there of

Not sure how I'll pull off explaining this without pictures, but I'll try. On the front and both sides of the cabin I had to splice the OSB siding because I used the tall studs to build it with. For some reason after I broke my arm I didn't do that to the back. Instead I just added the Fascia board (I guess thinking that would seal off the inch and 3/4 gap at the top.)  Once I started putting up the insulation I discovered the error of my thinking. Turns out that there is a gap between the Fascia board and the 1 3/4 inch gap at the top of the studs below the top plate. This would allow for cold and heat to flood the wall on the back.

BTW the reason I used the tall studs to start with was because I'd read online that its best to have a high sealing in a small space because it gives the illusion of having more space and cuts gown on a claustrophobic feeling.

Since its all painted up and I didn't want to take a chance on falling off a ladder again I decided not to take the Fascia board off and do it right. That meant me having to take care of the gaps inside which is really slowing down the progress. I'm doing that by cutting small strips of blue board to fill in the gap, screwing them in place and then caulking the edges. Now I need to either shift stuff around inside the cabin or put it out front so I can get to the rest of the back. Don't know how this happens, but now I need a 12x16 storage building to get all the junk out of the cabin.

I did get the extension ladder out last week and drilled a couple of small holes on the back of the corrugated roofing at the back. The reason I did that was so I could setup the extension ladder up and wire it to the roof to keep the wind from blowing it down while I was on it or on the roof. I took the bucket of roof sealer, a paint brush, the drill and some screws up there and I THINK? I got the two roof leaks patched by using the sealer and more screws to pull the metal down where there were gaps. Only way I'll know if that took care of the leaks is to get another decent rain. I thought I might get that last night when I heard the pitter patter of rain drops hitting the roof last night and having left the windows down in the jeep that put me to sprinting out there about 3:00 AM wearing nothing but my skivvies and shoes to roll up the windows. Turns out that it stopped about the time I headed out the door and that was it so I still don't know if the leaks are sealed or not.

On another note the Jeep is leaking oil so bad now that I'm going to have to deal with that problem real soon! I had a chance to buy a good used engine for it for $125 and thought about that, but when I asked Gill (The local mechanic)  how much he'd charge to swap engines he said $700 because he had done that to the same type Jeep and didn't want to have to do it again because it was a real pain in the posterior. I asked him about putting in a rear seal in the existing engine and he quoted $250 so at that I decided I'd have to do it myself.

The Dude of the Dead that I posted the flier to some posts back turned out to be a total flop from what I hear. They advertised that it would be a three day event held at the race track and hoards of people showed up to camp out. Turns out that it was going to be held in the community center instead which really screwed things up. I'm not sure it even went on because of that.

And just so there's something here besides my babbling here you go. A song by Foreigner that I like real well.

 
And lastly there seems to be more and more spam coming in through email for anyone that has chosen to be notified of new posts to the blog. I really don't want to bring back the damn word verification so when I get a spam email that was posted on the blog I just go to that thread and unsubscribe. I'd recommend that any of you with the same problem do the same. Blogged is good about keeping them from being posted on the blogs, but they don't stop the ones going out as email. If everyone unsubscribes when they get a spam mail then the spammers are loosing because no one will ever see them.



22 comments:

  1. Hope you get both the cabin and the Jeep fixed up to your liking.

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  2. That's what I been saying TnT. Haven't even been blogging lately. (On mine or anyone else's.)

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  3. Wordpress is the answer to all of your problems. I don't recommend the hosted version because of its lack of features but when you host it and install it yourself, your problems just fade away. That's how I run Our180.com and a few dozen other sites I run.

    I wouldn't be afraid of putting the captcha back into place. That's about the only way you can slow them down. I know from experience though that even that is not perfect. There are services (lookup deathbycaptcha) that spammers use to post on sites with captcha. For a small fee, they have live people standing by and "solving" every captcha request that comes thru. Most online marketing (spamming) tools interact with these services so it's pretty easy to get a comment up on a few thousand blogs, with your link, for very little out of pocket.

    Chris Miller
    Our180.com - One Family's Journey To Finding True Happiness

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  4. Have you tried anything like an engine oil treatment like this one. I had a similar problem, I thought that the rear seal was leaking oil on my engine but it turned out to be the valve cover gasket at the very back of the motor. I bought a $40.00 FEL-PRO valve cover gasket and some gasket sealant, installed the gasket and sealant and I no longer have an oil leak.

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  5. I am so sorry to hear about the problem with your jeep. Those mechanics love to charge a pretty penny but at least you have the knowledge to be able to do it yourself.

    Thanks for the song, it is one of my favorites as well. That is the only positive thing about this new ISP...I can click on videos and actual be able to see and hear them!

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  6. Chris, I've run a site for 14 years, duked it out with the big boys like AOL and others for the right to run the site without them blocking my email to my members and other BS. to boot. Now I have 6,000 members in at least 25 countries (I lost count of the countries a long time ago) Now its a constant battle to keep spam bots and spammers out and I have all sorts of tools to help do that. Blogger isn't perfect and I've been known to gripe about it a lot, but I'll stick with it.

    Anon, I've run in to that problem in years past and had forgotten about it, but that could be at least part of the problem. I keep Lucas engine stop leak in it, but with all the oil leaking it only helps a little. I may go ahead and get a valve cover gasket to go with the seal and do both at the same time. Thanks for reminding me of that.

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  7. MsB, I've done a lot of mechanic work in years past, but had the tools to do it with. I'm real limited on that now days, but can do it. Main thing I hate is crawling through the sharp rocks to do it. I'll have to come up with something to take care of that problem.

    Until I get another camera I'll probably post different videos when I post new threads.

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  8. I hope you get your vehicle fixed, there is nothing worse than having a vehicle eventually break down when driving. Also, I hope you get that rain you want to determine if your patch work, worked on the ceiling.

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  9. Sandy, there's a 50% chance of rain Friday (unless they change that) and then a 40 and 50% chance next week. Maybe one of those days will work. I could spray water on the roof to see, but don't want to waste the water. I don't want to put insulation in the sealing before I know if the leaks are fixed or not though.

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  10. Tffnguy,

    (captaincrunch)

    I wanted a "Dudes of the Dead" poster. I tell you what, you score me a poster and I will ship you a midget auto mechanic....hahaha ahhah

    that was funny.

    sorry 5hit happens with the oil leaks, etc. It would not be Terlingua without some kind of snafu.

    One more thing. Day of the Dead stuff is coming up for you guys. No one down here in my area of South Texas knows anything about the Mexican "Day of the Dead" stuff. I think out west in Mexican culture its more common.

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  11. CC, I gave that poster away as soon as I posted the picture of it here.

    Yes they celebrate Day of the Dead at the Terlingua cemetery I think.

    BTW the midget crap is getting OLD.

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  12. We should chat sometime. Been running sites for about the same amount of time. My thing has always been online forums. I've launched and sold several and still run a few with 10,000+ members. Not to mention the 40+ wordpress sites I run and several ecommerce sites where I make my living.

    I never rely on hosted solutions like blogger though. It just never works out. So I run dedicated servers and if there is an issue with my emails being delivered, I work to either get the IP off of the blacklists, or I change the IP.

    Spam is literally a non issue when using a real time spam database, combined with a question / answer utility.

    Chris Miller
    Our180.com - One Family's Journey To Finding True Happiness

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  13. Wished we were closer, I would switch it out for you.

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  14. MDR, wish I still had a cherry picker and all the tools I had in Plano and I could do it. Oh well... Things change.

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    1. I still got all that stuff and use it when I have to, I didn't say I enjoy it as much as I used to mainly because I am getting too old to keep crawling under them but never the less I still have to rebuild one on occasion.

      Hey how close are you to the chili cook off in two weekends. I might need a place to camp when I come down there next year????

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  15. I'm about 28 miles from where they hold the cook off so camping here probably wouldn't do you any good. However, you're welcome here if you ever just come down.

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  16. I figured out how to fast track the sealing off of the back of the cabin and got that done yesterday. I only have one more insulation panel, but will have to wait until I get the cabin wired before I put that one up. Now it looks like I'll be able to finish up insulating with only buying two more bags rather than three.

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  17. Dave if the seal is that bad the only fix is to replace it. If you have the 4.0 engine it has a two piece rear main seal, It's not that hard after you loosen up the whole front end so you can get the oil pan off to get the seal out and then put the new one in. If I was there I'd do it for you.

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  18. Bkid, it is the 4 liter and I'd read on a jeep site where it is a 2 piece seal. According to that jeep forum one person said they dropped the center link and was able to drop the pan. Several other people said the pan will come off without doing anything. I guess I'll find out when I try tackling it.

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