A good day. I met Raven in town for coffee, a short stop at Salvation army looking for rugs to no avail, then home. It’s raining so not a lot got done outside. Raven brought left over lamb and veggies, I cooked rice to go with it, excellent. Raven cleaned and set up the vardo inside as a friend was to visit.
I worked on fine tuning the fenders to fit with the big hammer on the bench, BANG BANG, pretty loud. I sanded the rust off one fender outside as Raven’s friend Mark “Green Man” arrived. A very good man, we talked of Hermes, Philosophers Stone formulas, garden gypsum and gopher purge among other things, great conversations. As he went home we got ready and headed to the movies for the new “Hobbit” release in 3D, good final movie. Raven spent the night in the vardo as she will be going to Sebastopol.
12/21/2014
I worked on the trailer tongue this morning, removed the old hitch and fitted the new 2 1/2″ square tube with the drilled holes to fit the the new hitch. I scored a pen line and measured to the center of the old smaller hole, transferring the measurement to the square tube. Center punched and pilot drilled small, then brought to size, 3/8″, it fits the bolt. Fitted the square tube in place and drilled the matching holes. It was tricky getting the lower hole drilled up, once started big I transferred to a small bit and pre drilled, then finished the 1/2″ hole from the top. I had to grind out a slot in the new hitch to allow the old bolt room. This will need to be welded to be strong enough. One major grade 8 bolt is holding the wagon here. We will add a smaller 3/8″ grade 8 bolt, but the welds will help a lot. The holes are right, in place and bolted secure with the new 2″ hitch rated for 3500 lbs.
I saw Luis this evening, He’ll be out tomorrow after work to assess the necessary welding. I’ll take a wheel off for him to see the details.
8shotoflove8 