Turkeys

On the neighbor's lawn.

counted 18 of the young ones and 4 adults.

When lobsters are $3.99 a LB . . .

You best make hay while the sun shines .

Five chunky pound-and-a-halfers are way cheaper than going out for diner .

Rig up the stove and keep the stink outside .

In with the lobsters and a couple of ears of the sweetest corn I have ever tasted .

Let them rip for 25 minutes or so and prepped them for the table .

Rig up the lobster eating tablecloth, set out the spread and enjoy.

Greenland New Hampshire Yankee ultralight fly-in

Saturday was a hot steamy day but we went down to the ultralight gathering in Greenland New Hampshire. Despite the muggy conditions there were a few interesting participants.

A mono-float Phantom UL

Always a curiosity for the aquatically inclined

Some of the general scene

The runway has a considerable hill on one end and most of it slopes a fair bit

A two seat Challenger on short final for a landing

And just about to touch down

Tied down and safe from the gusty winds

An ever popular 2 seat Flightstar

And single seat version of the Flightstar.
Every time I see on of these I am reminded of the Argentinian Marcelo Matocq who back in 1999 flew his single seat Flightstar all the way from Buenos Aires to Oshkosh Wisconsin, crossing the broad expanse of the Brazilian Amazon and hopscotching along the Caribbean islands. Inflated condoms in the wings, sitting on an inflatable mattress plugged in to a fire extinguisher in the event of a ditching at sea. A rubber tube from the carburetor in his mouth that by the means of some properly applied suction allowed him to adjust the mixture as he gained altitude.

A bit more of the general scene

The flightline

The pond behind the flightline

A Moyes Dragonfly tow plane designed in Australia to tow hang gliders aloft porvides for an exposed ride

A weight shift trike comes in for a landing

A bit of squirly work in the gusty winds to get down safely

Norm Langlois was there with his self designed home built legal Ultralight seaplane. Unfortunately Norm does not know how to fly and has been unable to find anyone to instruct him in a true UL. A year ago he was making noise about teaching himself in this creation. I gave it my best to talk him out of doing so. I take it as it is still in one piece he has not followed up on his threats.

A whirly-gig gyro-copter made a couple of very gentle and nicely controlled spot landings

And a very interesting Russian built twin engine Aeroprakt made an appearance

a side view of the Aeroprakt

and my favorite, a beautifully restored Piper J-5

Marty departs on the long slow slug back home in his Kitfox

Moving day for a Wisconsin engine and a South bend lathe.

Its good to have a bunch of muscle when it comes to moving day. And so it is with my friend Terry who unfortunately after a short stint of "funemployment" is moving up to Presque Isle where he has found a new job as a CAD teacher at the local high school. So we agreed to help him load all his garage toys and dreams on a U-haul for the 5 hour trip north. Now most of us might have a few odd garage toys but not on the scale of Terry's toys. Each one of his runs about 1700 lbs. The first of which is a Lombard log Hauler 110 horse 1915 Wisconsin engine that he is rebuilding.

I arrived at 9 am on Saturday with planks, cribbing blocks and rollers for the task and found about 12 of his church brethren anxiously waiting. Sorry guys, would have been here sooner but had to attend to a little mater of selling a car to an ex-con.

In no time flat we had the thing moving on the steel pipe rollers, Terry levering it forward with the pry bar

Up the ramp and on in to the U-Haul trailer

Then after a short run to Home Depot for a couple of 4x4 runners we tackled the lathe.

Unfortunately we got a bit busy and spaced out taking any photos of that process. We did load the trailer to the gills, axles about one inch away from the rubber stops likely just past it gross limit and sent him on his way by half past noon. Arrival was expected in Presque Isle by 6 pm where the brethren from his new church would be awaiting to reverse the process.

For those that do not know what a 1911 Lombard log hauler looks like here is a photo of one restored to near original condition. They came in two flavors. The early ones had steam engines and the later sported the Wisconsin 110 hp engines.

Terry first saw the same exact engine when he was about 12 while hunting with his dad up in the woods in the Alagash. 

No mater how much he begged his dad there was no way the thing was coming home with them. 30 odd yrs later he found the fellow that had hauled the very same engine out of the woods and traded an old buffalo rifle for it. This time it made it home with him.

He set about tearing it apart  . . .

 Cleaning a 100 years of muck from it. . . and rebuilding it

Many of the bronze and aluminum fittings were missing scavenged over the years by scrap metal junkies, so parts had to be drawn up on the computer  . . .

patterns and......

molds made

A year ago we made a trip up to Odd Duck foundry in Orington where sand molds of some parts were made.

Aluminum . . .

 . . . and bronze smelted

and poured

and voila, one set of new aluminum valve push-rod shrouds

The end results after cleanup on the lathe

The raw cast bronze intake manifold fittings before machining

. . . cleaned up and . . .

 . . . fitted on the jugs

I am sad that my friend Terry is moving away but it is almost like the engine is finally headed back home.