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What did YOU do today?


glad to hear the docs report was good, now to just convince em that since it was good they don't have to do it every year like ya said.
 
The tractor died today, in front of the garage as I was finishing clearing snow. Internal engine problem. Was at a fast Idle & had just raised the blade after backing up, there was a metal to metal noise like the fan hitting the radiator shroud then it coasted to a stop like it had no compression. Hit the starter and spins but its not turning over like normal, very uneven compression, take the distributor cap off & roll the motor again-no rotor movement. damn. broken camshaft? timing gears? IDK but only one way to tell- gotta tear it down. Next problem, its sideways in front of the garage. With the awd/V6 escape in that bay, which is what I would need to pull it with. So I drop the back blade right where it sits, hook up my escape to the front & pull it forward enough to get the other escape out, chain that escape to the front of the tractor & pull it through the yard & around to the side of the garage where the tractor shelter is (tarped up dog kennel with a open end) squared the tractor up then pushed it backwards into its shelter with the escape. The escape was quite impressive moving the 3000# tractor given the 3” of snow. Mine wouldn’t have done it being just a fwd with all-season tires. The awd escape has fairly new snow tires. I probably won’t tear into it until april/may when its nicer out. Got the oil changed on the equinox & started looking on fleabay for replacement 172 parts, I could change it back to a 134 if the damage is too much. no change in the oil level so I think the block is still good. The noise before it came to a complete stop might of been piston vs valves.

IMG_9512.jpeg
IMG_9513.jpeg
 
I did some cleanup in the garage. I got in a habit of placing oddball things in empty Amazon Rockauto boxes, then ditching the boxes in the garage. I went through all the boxes and tossed them in the recycle bin, then went through other stuff in the garage. I'm about 2/3s done, but there is now enough room in the garage to walk around. Before I quite for the evening I fired up the leaf blower and blew all the dust out of the garage. I have a cat that likes to hangout in the garage, but he ran out into the garage, froze halfway, and looked around because he didn't recognize the place, then ran back in. The garage is so different that he is afraid to go into it. Yes, it was that bad. I plan on doing more tomorrow. I really should get rid of the stockpile of vacuum tubes and electronic components stored in there. Collecting that stuff is a result of the ham radio hobby.
 
I had a pretty busy day... started out meeting a guy to pick up a Jeep frame for a friend (wants the 6 lug D44) that was closer to me, home by 10AM then switched to working on the shop and my brother came over hand helped for a while which resulted in a trip to Lowes to get him some lumber then we went to the Habitat for Humanity Re-Store and I happened to find two new pre hung doors for a combined $115 instead of $140 a piece... so now that the size is solidified the door holes are roughed in and I've sheeted the outside of the rooms... Next step is install the doors and wire that end of the shop finally... oh and order lights, it's dark as heck now that it's closed in...
 
I watched a guy change his oil 50 times in 2 days for the fun of it....
 
I watched a guy change his oil 50 times in 2 days for the fun of it....

Well, I don't have 50 oil filters. But, I have two Purolator TL20195 filters, then I was in Carquest and they had Fram FF3600 for $2.00, so I bought four of them. Then I made another trip into Carquest and they had a table of weird stuff for cheap. On that table was a case of 12 Mazda YF09-14-302A oil filters that looked identical to the Motorcraft FL-400s, so I looked it up and the Mazda filters were indeed the same product as the FL-400s, so I thought it wouldn't hurt to stock up on a few more to fight the impact of inflation. When I asked how much the filters were I was told they were only selling the whole case for $10. So, I figured a Motorcraft filter cost almost $9.00 now, so I bought the case of Mazda filters. Several years ago I bought 6 of those Motorcraft filters and couldn't find them when I got home. I though I did something stupid like leave them in the shopping cart at Walmart, or maybe I just thought I bought them. Anway, I found them this morning when cleaning the garage. And there is one Motorcraft filter on the shelf. So, that is 25 filters that I know of, of that size. I'm sure there are more unaccounted filters somewhere around here.

I think I've done really well at fighting the inflation in the oil filter category for some time. By the time I have to buy oil filters again for the Ranger they will probably be $40 a piece.

If you think all that is nuts, when I was bored at work I checked the Mazda dealer price for the YF09-14-302A filters. They are $4.61. Ford here wants $12.99 for the FL-400s. Walmart wants $8.97. A year ago those filters were $3.97 at Walmart. What is going on with the pricing at Ford/Motorcraft? It almost as if they are trying to price themselves out of reach.

 
I’m back to doing the same thing I’ve been doing… putting together and uploading more videos to my YouTube channel, lol. I’m almost a month ahead on video uploads now, gonna just keep pounding them out until I’m caught up or the weather improves enough to start being outside a lot.
 
Fight! Fight! Fight!

IMG_3672.jpeg


IMG_3673.jpeg


Fight!

physical therapy. Rear bumper was almost over the sidewalk….
 
Fight! Fight! Fight!

View attachment 122355

View attachment 122356

Fight!

physical therapy. Rear bumper was almost over the sidewalk….
I’ve parked my Rangers and my Choptop in the “compact” parking spaces. I’ve been waiting for the opportunity to tell someone it’s a “compact pickup” or “just because it’s tall doesn’t mean it’s not compact” but nobody has taken the bait yet, lol.

Those are pretty generous parking spots for that land yacht to have all that room…
 
All the grannies and grandpas in physical therapy with me were excited I was such a bad boy!

If I can, I park on the dividing island, and I park right down the edge of the curb. With those big slab sides, if you chip the door, you can see it from a mile away.

A shortie 2025 F150 pick up truck is 209.1 inches. Ole Blue is 219…..
 
I struggled if I should put this in what did you do today or what did you do to your Ranger today. “Do“ implies that you got something done. That really didn’t happen. And what I did to my Ranger, was I put over 35 miles on it going to the office depot that’s 3.8 miles from my house.

I have a beautiful HP 7740 printer. 11 x 17 all in one print, scan, etc. It’s absolutely gorgeous. It doesn’t print, but it’s a real beauty. I need the 11 x 17 for my engineering work.

When I bought it several years ago, coincidentally, there was an HP rep in the store when I went looking. When asked about using remanufactured ink or refilling the ink, he said “HP doesn’t like it, but you can do it.“. So I bought it. I’ve been very happy with it for the first four or five years.

Then HP started doing updates that have nothing to do with the functionality of the printer, they are to defeat the aftermarket ink cartridges, which are 1/3 the cost of the HP cartridges, and there is no discernible difference in the quality of the printing.

Up until a week or 10 days ago, I could push a few extra buttons, and the remanufactured cartridges would still work.

Side step, I bought a new computer/laptop because my old one kept choking on “not enough storage.” I had it about a month and a half and still hadn’t changed my stuff over, so I bit the bullet and went to the computer store and they changed everything over and set it up for $150. Money well spent.

While they were doing it, they looked at the memory in my old computer which I want to keep and use for a sign cutting machine for graphics for my toys, and they said it really didn’t have a problem with the memory, but almost 40% of it was HP stuff. When they took out everything except the actual printer drivers, the old machine worked fine.😖😖😖

I hooked up the new one to the HP printer, which was working fine with remanufactured cartridges a week ago, and I got an error message.

In the last two days, I have bought about $150 in genuine HP cartridges, and I have spent almost 6 hours on tech-support on the phone. Lincoln got to ride around in the truck, but on the fifth trip, he was a little bored. And now all the cartridges appear to function properly except the red cartridge. And I did get another red cartridge and swapped it out.

IMG_3692.png

If you look at the top, you’ll probably immediately realize that this call was incredibly swift because I had already learned a lot of the system from the previous two phone calls.

I firmly believe, if I spend enough money, in the next two or three days, I will be able to print a single sheet of paper.

🤬🤬🤬

If not, I think I’m going to put my big toe and granddaddy‘s vice and crank it until it’s flat as a sheet of paper while I put a salty pretzel in my eye as deep as my ear. It will take less time, be less painful, and just as productive.

Later tonight, I’m going to see if I can rig something to reach inside and clean the printer side contacts for the red cartridge…..
 
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I struggled if I should put this in what did you do today or what did you do to your Ranger today. “Do“ implies that you got something done. That really didn’t happen. And what I did to my Ranger, was I put over 35 miles on it going to the office depot that’s 3.8 miles from my house.

I have a beautiful HP 7740 printer. 11 x 17 all in one print, scan, etc. It’s absolutely gorgeous. It doesn’t print, but it’s a real beauty. I need the 11 x 17 for my engineering work.

When I bought it several years ago, coincidentally, there was an HP rep in the store when I went looking. When asked about using remanufactured ink or refilling the ink, he said “HP doesn’t like it, but you can do it.“. So I bought it. I’ve been very happy with it for the first four or five years.

Then HP started doing updates that have nothing to do with the functionality of the printer, they are to defeat the aftermarket ink cartridges, which are 1/3 the cost of the HP cartridges, and there is no discernible difference in the quality of the printing.

Up until a week or 10 days ago, I could push a few extra buttons, and the remanufactured cartridges would still work.

Side step, I bought a new computer/laptop because my old one kept choking on “not enough storage.” I had it about a month and a half and still hadn’t changed my stuff over, so I bit the bullet and went to the computer store and they changed everything over and set it up for $150. Money well spent.

While they were doing it, they looked at the memory in my old computer which I want to keep and use for a sign cutting machine for graphics for my toys, and they said it really didn’t have a problem with the memory, but almost 40% of it was HP stuff. When they took out everything except the actual printer drivers, the old machine worked fine.😖😖😖

I hooked up the new one to the HP printer, which was working fine with remanufactured cartridges a week ago, and I got an error message.

In the last two days, I have bought about $150 in genuine HP cartridges, and I have spent almost 6 hours on tech-support on the phone. Lincoln got to ride around in the truck, but on the fifth trip, he was a little bored. And now all the cartridges appear to function properly except the red cartridge. And I did get another red cartridge and swapped it out.

View attachment 122395
If you look at the top, you’ll probably immediately realize that this call was incredibly swift because I had already learned a lot of the system from the previous two phone calls.

I firmly believe, if I spend enough money, in the next two or three days, I will be able to print a single sheet of paper.

🤬🤬🤬

If not, I think I’m going to put my big toe and granddaddy‘s vice and crank it until it’s flat as a sheet of paper while I put a salty pretzel in my eye as deep as my ear. It will take less time, be less painful, and just as productive.

Later tonight, I’m going to see if I can rig something to reach inside and clean the printer side contacts for the red cartridge…..
have you tried online searching, HP forums?
 

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