What did YOU do today?

[CamTheHedgehog]

Running the Kentucky Adventure Trail for a couple days first.

Near Stanton Kentucky tonight

Sweet! Have fun out there!

 

[pjtoledo]

In Jersey, after a few moments, the snow was gray and piled up on the sides of the road, mountains of slush

My brother set me up to visit when he was plant manager for Colgate Palmolive in Ndola in Zambia. I’m not saying anything prejudice, but it was an agricultural community with no knowledge of machinery. From my work in the hardware store and fiddling with cars and following my father with real estate, after the three day Christmas party, I went into the plant, and I got several machines working that hadn’t been working in a while.

Colgate made me an offer on the spot, and I stayed for nine months, and then I went to Tehran, Iran for three months before I came home and finished my last semester of college.

To your question, I worked in Ndola, But I saw Victoria Falls in Livingston, I travel to Nairobi and Mombasa in Kenya, and Cairo, Egypt on my way to Iran. Of course that was 3000 years ago when the shah was in charge.

Absolutely changed my life and my perspective. One of the big challenges with Americans is they think everything is like we have it here. It is actually America that is very different, very exceptional.

My career has always been international, but I say this from the heart and I say this very sternly. I would not go back to those places now. It is a different world.

I went when if you dreamed of touching the hair on American head, you would pay the consequences. Not that way anymore.

I'm bald, would I be any safer???

 

[scotts90ranger]

I took the plug out- it was carbon fouled. Cleaned that with a brush, sprayed a bit of wd40 down the hole and checked for spark, which there was. Checked for compression with my thumb. . Checked for fuel getting to carb, which there wasn’t. Fuel lines are badly rotted but removing air/fuel mix screw got some fuel into the bowl, at which point it fired right up. Carburetor is badly gummed up, I’ll have to rebuild it tomorrow. The whole machine will need a once over, belts, tires, paint, oil change, but at least I know it’s worth saving now.

From my experience with Tecumseh's I'd say you're lucky, I've had no luck with them, almost all briggs I've been able to get running though...

 

[sgtsandman]

From my experience with Tecumseh's I'd say you're lucky, I've had no luck with them, almost all briggs I've been able to get running though...

It seems the Tecumseh engines are like Stihl carburetors. They are fantastic and reliable until they aren't and then you are better off just replacing the whole thing. My Toro single stage snow blower has a Tecumseh engine and it's about 20 years old. I'll be sad when that engine fails since Tecumseh is now owned by a Chinese company and made in China.

 

[sgtsandman]

Today's plan is to build the other firewood rack and, if I get that far, the other shelf for the shed. Hopefully, the grass will be dry enough to get it cut tomorrow. Then starts the prep for the meet in Kentucky. I have to figure out if I can get everything shoe horned into the 5 foot bed. Stuff I need to know for truck camping trips in the future anyway. Having the bed cap will help, though I would prefer being able to pack everything so I can still see out the back window. We shall see.

 

[racsan]

Put a fleabay bullbar on my escape, not sure how I feel about it, guess its better than nothing. 30 min install my ass!

 

[sgtsandman]

Today's plan is to build the other firewood rack and, if I get that far, the other shelf for the shed. Hopefully, the grass will be dry enough to get it cut tomorrow. Then starts the prep for the meet in Kentucky. I have to figure out if I can get everything shoe horned into the 5 foot bed. Stuff I need to know for truck camping trips in the future anyway. Having the bed cap will help, though I would prefer being able to pack everything so I can still see out the back window. We shall see.

Well, I got 90% of the firewood rack done. I need another 2X4 for the sides of the roof so I can cut and trim the remaining side boards that need installed. Then I can put on the roof. Depending on time remaining, the tarp front cover may or may not get done. It's not like there is going to be any firewood in it for the immediate future anyway.

I need the shelf for the shed to be done and the grass needs cut before we leave.

 

[pentode]

From my experience with Tecumseh's I'd say you're lucky, I've had no luck with them, almost all briggs I've been able to get running though...

It seems the Tecumseh engines are like Stihl carburetors. They are fantastic and reliable until they aren't and then you are better off just replacing the whole thing. My Toro single stage snow blower has a Tecumseh engine and it's about 20 years old. I'll be sad when that engine fails since Tecumseh is now owned by a Chinese company and made in China.

I rebuilt the carb today and now the machine runs very well, however the needle doesn’t always seal well so the bowl tends to overflow. Thing is, I don’t deal with these carbs very often so I can’t tell right off by looking but I don’t think there’s a seat in it at all. I’ll investigate more tomorrow, parts stores were closed today anyway. Man that thing was dirty with gross old sludge and every kind of corrosion you can imagine.
Kind of ironic Tecumseh is Chinese now seeing as how he started off as a Native American. . Nothing against the Chinese at all, but it does irritate me when these American companies dissolve into nothing more than brand names.

 

[CamTheHedgehog]

Did a bit of real world experimentation- discovered that running the AC in my 4.0L ranger drops your gas mileage by about 3-5 MPG. Which is nothing to sneeze at.
Numbers would have been more consistent but the trip I was taking to Walmart is downhill one way and uphill another, so there’s some wiggle room to account for the difference in effort needed to get up the hill. Now I know why I have been getting terrible mileage, it’s because I’ve been using my AC constantly.

 

[Xombi]

Replaced shocks front and rear on a 94 Ranger 4.0 v6 4x4 and sheared a front passenger side lower shock stud. Nut was locked to stud threads.
I had enough thread left for a nut.
Grabbed lower nut off drivers side and off the hardware store
Bought two 7/16 coarse locknuts, one fat the other skinny. They didn't look quite right in the store.
Went to work on sheared passenger side and it was 12mm x1.25 metric. Gosh darn dagnabit.
Back to hardware store for correct nuts. Cleaned threads up with 50 yr old metric thread file.
Worked on it for a bit and got the nut to start by hand.
Got shock mounted.
I guess the radius rod on the passenger side had been replaced at some time in the past. Assume nothing.

The engine torque damper is also shot. The part is NLA. There are several engine torque dampers for other makes, with two eyelets, and an eyelet conversion kit seems to be the way to go.
Any thoughts?

 

[sgtsandman]

I rebuilt the carb today and now the machine runs very well, however the needle doesn’t always seal well so the bowl tends to overflow. Thing is, I don’t deal with these carbs very often so I can’t tell right off by looking but I don’t think there’s a seat in it at all. I’ll investigate more tomorrow, parts stores were closed today anyway. Man that thing was dirty with gross old sludge and every kind of corrosion you can imagine.
Kind of ironic Tecumseh is Chinese now seeing as how he started off as a Native American. . Nothing against the Chinese at all, but it does irritate me when these American companies dissolve into nothing more than brand names.

That was the problem I was having. I had cleaned and rebuilt the carb, cleaned the muffler and spark arrester screen, changed the spark plug, and checked the valve lash ( Stihl engines are four stroke even though they used mixed fuel) and still couldn't get the thing to run. I gave up and took it to a Stihl dealer after I had bought a carb from amazon with still no success. They replaced the carb with a Stihl carb and cleaned the fuel system. That got it running again. Very frustrating.

 

[CamTheHedgehog]

Replaced shocks front and rear on a 94 Ranger 4.0 v6 4x4 and sheared a front passenger side lower shock stud. Nut was locked to stud threads.
I had enough thread left for a nut.
Grabbed lower nut off drivers side and off the hardware store
Bought two 7/16 coarse locknuts, one fat the other skinny. They didn't look quite right in the store.
Went to work on sheared passenger side and it was 12mm x1.25 metric. Gosh darn dagnabit.
Back to hardware store for correct nuts. Cleaned threads up with 50 yr old metric thread file.
Worked on it for a bit and got the nut to start by hand.
Got shock mounted.
I guess the radius rod on the passenger side had been replaced at some time in the past. Assume nothing.

The engine torque damper is also shot. The part is NLA. There are several engine torque dampers for other makes, with two eyelets, and an eyelet conversion kit seems to be the way to go.
Any thoughts?

I feel the pain on the fastener front. These trucks are a very odd mix of sae and metric fasteners, and it’s not consistent it seems. Except for the German-built Cologne family of engines, they are all metric.

 

[sgtsandman]

Did a bit of real world experimentation- discovered that running the AC in my 4.0L ranger drops your gas mileage by about 3-5 MPG. Which is nothing to sneeze at.
Numbers would have been more consistent but the trip I was taking to Walmart is downhill one way and uphill another, so there’s some wiggle room to account for the difference in effort needed to get up the hill. Now I know why I have been getting terrible mileage, it’s because I’ve been using my AC constantly.

Long highway trips is where running the A/C shines. Mpg is still better if you don't have to run the A/C at all but yeah, mpg takes a measurable hit with these Rangers.

 

[CamTheHedgehog]

Long highway trips is where running the A/C shines. Mpg is still better if you don't have to run the A/C at all but yeah, mpg takes a measurable hit with these Rangers.

Yep- this trip was about 25 miles each way, almost all 55mph highway.

And that is what I did on the way back- zero ac at all because it was so cool already.

 

[Xombi]

I had spoken with the management that took over Tecumseh. I complained that the seats set out in the kits were not ethanol proof.
Did you install the replacement seat correctly, there is an up side and down side.
The kits are now more expensive than the chinesium carburetors.
If you have a 20 plus year machine you can have throttle shafts leaking air and clogged areas behind welch plugs, replacements that were once included in the kits.
Chineseium for the carbs, but the fuel pumps for my Kawasaki spewed gasoline everywhere, threatening to engulf the machine in flames, and should be avoided IMHO.
If the Chinese carburetor has a solenoid, it may shortly fail.