The Useful Duck!

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Wednesday, April 7, 2010

I shot two starlings, broke my truck, and found a new hammer mill

Yes Ralph, they are small targets and I'm a terrible shot. I gave up on the .22 and got the double barrel 12 gauge. Got em! Well two of them. Freaked the new dog out and she ran away. She seems to have come back again. Perhaps the 12 gauge is a little too much for her.
I needed to change the temperature gauge on my 1971 International 1800 Loadstar. Turns out it is a rare and valuable sending unit. There is only one in existence and it is in Wisconsin and will cost $74 plus shipping.
We tried out a new gauge and sending unit but when we wired it in the oil pressure and fuel level gauges quit. Well, my sometimes a great employee wired it in. I took it apart and I think it uses lower voltage for the gauges. Somehow it depends on the temperature gauge to get the other ones to work. I don't understand it. Then I hooked it up wrong and smoke started coming out of somewhere under the dash. Now the temp gauge is completely dead and so are all the other gauges.
Tomorrow it may get Stewart Warner gauges. I did find a NOS gauge and sending unit on eBay. I see my parts truck is all SW.
Then this fellow called me with a hammer-mill for sale. It is not a Minneapolis-Moline so I don't know about it. He says it has a good flat belt. He seemed relieved to hear that I wanted a flat belt. Seems to be old technology. He said the one fellow who looked at it kept asking where the PTO attached. Tomorrow I'm going to look at it. He said he was growing oats to feed his cows and then lost his rented ground. My cunning plan is to buy the hammer mill for $100 cash and then as I'm leaving sell him ground feed made with his own hammer mill. Heh, heh, heh, I can think of more ways to loose money and make myself extra work than many other folks. It is a talent.

3 comments:

  1. One reason that I retired my beloved old '79 GMC pickup was the growing unavailibilty of parts. It's probably part of a plan to force us to buy new vehicles. Old hammermills, like old vehicles are probably better built than the new ones, so I hope you get it.

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  2. Interesting to hear the rarity of heat guage sending units for the IH trucks. I have a 1600 Loadstar that thankfully hardly ever needs parts. Oil filters while still available have to be ordered, not just sitting on the shelf like years ago.
    Good find on the hammermill. Wish I could find a decent one close to home as the bearings are just about done for on mine. Its only 56 years old so I don't know why.
    Gorges, some of those old GM pickups usually rusted out before the parts became hard to get. My 81 is an exception. I've had it for 24 years and plan to keep it a while yet.

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  3. I bought the '79 new, had the body done twice, replaced the engine twice, replaced the back half of the frame and replaced the clutch once, but there were SOME parts of the truck that had over 400,000 miles on them. I enjoyed driving it for 28 years. If my Toyota lasts that long, I'll figure that I've got my money's worth!

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