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I just talked with Richard's wife, and she says he's fine and should be home later today. I'm not going to elaborate any more than that. That will be up to Richard. He's doing well and we'll hear from him soon I'm sure of that!

As a Senior Citizen it is my obligation to keep the medical employed. After four days in the hospital I am now home and well, God is good. Details to follow.

This little saga began in November. I have had hand tremors for several years and started a new prescription to deal with them. In early January I developed shingles and my doctor prescribed two medications; they stopped the shingles in their tracks. A few days later I began having tremors throughout my body, two of the medications were having a battle and neither one could be stopped clod turkey. My doctor developed an accelerated plan to get me off both. They weren’t shown as being incompatible. This resulted in me being sedentary for about three weeks. In all likelihood this resulted in the blood clots forming Monday, January 26. I was feeling good and spent some time exercising. The next morning was normal, then after lunch I experienced a severe pain behind my right ribcage. Paramedics took me to our local hospital and after some imaging I was transferred to the hospital in Asheville, NC, The following morning doctors removed several blood clots from my right lung. One of the clots was six inches long. Further imaging showed no further clots. They also discovered that I had Atrial Fibrillation and stopped then restarted my heart putting it back in normal rhythm. Under normal circumstances I would not have been released the same day but with the impending snow storm they sent me home. Thank God for all of the wonderful medical professionals who cared for me.

I've been getting back into scale model building a bit. I started when I was 8 and did quite a lot for 5 or 6 years. After that I've been poking at them every few years since. For several decades I've been collecting and storing the future projects. I'll be keeping this thread as a record of what I'm up to. Please do feel free to post your own. One of the things I've wanted to build for many years is a model of what my Ole Man drove from back in the mid 1980s. Oil tankers that delivered #6 factory oil. 3 years ago this April I bought an IHC 4300 tractor by AMT and Testor's reissue of a 1960s tanker trailer. I got to measuring the trailer. It's designed to be built as either a single axle short tank or add the extension and use 2 axles to make a longer trailer. Still..... really not that long even for 1960s rigs. Then I got to wondering.... what if I had two trailer kits.... If the tank rear is meant to glue on either the front section separately or the rear section in combination - why can't I use a second kit for a rear extension?? So here's something neat. Look at the tank tops here. The left side is 8.25" long. The 2 right pieces are the back half of TWO trailer model kits. If I add the second back half to the first back half added to the front half ... It comes out to a scale model size of 21.5 inches total length. I remember pretty well that Bruce's oil trailers were 45 feet long. An odd length even back then. This model scale adds up to 44 feet and 10 inches!! This is the model kit of the tractor that I have. My Ole Man drove International S2500s. This is a 4300. Same basic shape but this model is a little longer nose. That was IHC's fancier road tractor back then. The 2500 series was the worker of the fleet. I'll take the chrome off the grill and only use one exhaust stack. The sleeper will be removed in favor of a large hydraulic pump. That basically turns it into an S model. I'd like to go weathered & worn. Never done one.... Tank will likely be a faded aluminum with stains. Internet find picture: This was one of several late 70s IHC S models that the company had. At least 2 were green on a red frame. That's what @Qball drove. Odds are almost 100% he drove THIS TRUCK. Stay tuned.....

My wife surprised me with this for my birthday.

Part 2660 Final install, fits good & tight.

Ventilation for a belt guard ala @cleat with a Greenlee punch. Bit different pattern Cleat but should work. Coulda had the spacing a little closer. Deburred with a step bit. Speaking of step bits... @Pullstart was here...

February 1, 2004, “Nipplegate” controversy at the Super Bowl XXXVIII halftime show. A singularly sensational event occurs during the halftime show of the Super Bowl. While performing a duet with Janet Jackson, Justin Timberlake briefly exposed one of her breasts in what was later described as a "wardrobe malfunction."

It's been a few months since I put a new starter on the K-181 for the reborn B-80. I purchased the rebuild kit for the old one but have yet to find one with the correct bushing on the gear end. The brush end was correct. This morning I just decided to clean it up, lube the bushings and put it back together. It's just going to be sitting on the shelf as a spare. I cleaned up the important stuff, put new brushed in and reassembled it. Leave it to an old electrician to use a 4" sq cover to whip up a hold the brushes down while you put the end cap back on tool. It worked great. Tested and It's good to go.

I had a factory set on a 1277 so these are from memory, “might be a bit different!” (Standard 12v tractor lights) Used a knuckle, that’s what I call it, on the end of a 30” x 5/8” steel rod, drilled tapped 3/8-16 utilizing a stud and cap nut. Two wire assembly to assure a solid ground Crimp on connection for hassle free hood removal There’s two 3/8-16 bolted to a threaded rectangular plate between the frame, mimicking factory Closer look at the stainless hardware, that is a metric thread in the knuckle, (euro part) The soft bend sweeps buy the cradle front tightly, has to be just so, plumb to clear I preferred the standard 12v light assembly with options to twist in all directions, do not care for the little bug eye looking factory assemblies! The 5/8 hot rolled steel can be formed quite easily by hand just make identical measurements on both sides. Basic & simple See the hood is very close and the button I put in from a very unstable method used by who-ever owned this hood, bought at big show over a decade ago! Don’t find these as often anymore but I perused eBay, they were actually IH Red!

Anyone heard from @953 nut ? I'm missing his daily post.

January 30, 1933, With the stirring notes of the William Tell Overture and a shout of “Hi-yo, Silver! Away!” The Lone Ranger debuts on Detroit’s WXYZ radio station.

Drove around in the snow. It'll be gone by Wednesday, so I had to play a little.

Holee molee Batman we got a bleeping buch of snow! I haven't seen this much since 1999, when we got over 20 inches. We are now at 10 to 12 inches, and it's still snowing! We usually get wet heavy snow but this stuff is powder. I've never seen that here in NC before. And the first day we are supposed to get above freezing is Tuesday. Even then only about 40 degrees. I hope to get some better pics tomorrow but this was 5 hours ago:

Reminds me of driving in my first snowstorm. I was heading to the gas station in my pickup with no weight in the bed, thought I’d impress my friend in the passenger seat. Gave it a little gas, thought I’d drift around in bend in the road but lost control. Slid across the oncoming lane (thank goodness nobody was coming!) hit the telephone pole with the passenger door. We didn’t get hurt, we were probably only going 15-20 mph. So I drove back home and went in the house. First thing my dad says is we have no power in the house. Then he said, and this is the part I’ll never forget “ First snowstorm of the year and our power is out. I’ll bet some A hole hit a pole and knocked out the power!” I then had to sheepishly admit it was me!

After the walloping we got Sunday into Monday I used Mongo to clean up. Mostly it did great but it started running rich. I think the snow was so fluffy it was getting in the air cleaner. Wanted to use it the next day to clean up the plow berms at the end of the driveway and the bendix wouldn't engage. Took the cover off and there was a nice chunk of ice in the tin. Cleaned that out and still no engagement. I ended up using a propane torch on the end of the starter for maybe 10 to 15 seconds. That was all it took.

Wow, $400 for the hub caps and a free 416H.

Gotta get all you us ole timers on Karl's emergency call list. Never know when you might climb up in your tree stand and forget to come home.

Not a darn thing, it's too cold, BUT, with the advice of 2 members I consider my mentors, I bought a 416H for $400 and the front blade rear axle bracket for $40. @ 55lb wheel weights for $50 & 2 smaller Sears lawn tractor weights & chains for $55. Only issues with the 416His the seat strut. screw missing from fuel pump & hydro creeps. Now I need ideas how to mount the smaller weights on the draw bar. Is something missing from the parking brake lock lever. Seems awfully short? Ordered the missing seat bracket.

Well it finally stopped around 1:30AM. I decided to measure a few spots and it fluctuates between 10 and 13 inches. For central North Carolina, that is huge. As I said before it's been 20+ years since we had snow like this. I'm gonna just have to drag out a tractor or two tomorrow and play in it!

Ooooooooooo, Me likes model building! Did tons of those kits when we were kids. Not sure how we survived sucking in all of that nasty glue vapor. Then somehow got started with doing originals like this one. (For those that may not have seen this before)

Yesterday I was in town and saw they began to demolish the old Baptist Church, daycare and gym buildings. There is a large commercial playscape at the daycare that about 25 years old, but is in pretty good condition since it had a shade structure over it. The is a excellent Nonprofit called the ARK. https://arkofhighlandlakes.org that service our greater Highland Lakes area. One of their many programs is a large duplex housing community which has program to mentor and train families to transition them from the street and poverty. The director had previously said they would like to have a playscape for this property. So it hit me and I got the wheels turning to try and recycle this playcape. The demo contractor project manage was agreeable, with a few conditions that we could agree to and a fairly fast removal time line. Thankfully this is a large property and it will take them 3-4 weeks to get enough dumpsters for all the building material. The ARK directors asked if i would take on this removal project and temporary storage. I was able to contact the playscape manufacture and got and original layout drawing and a few removal recommendation. They said they can provide new parts for a few of the domed windows and parts some vandals had dammaged. This morning I took some tools and tested removing bolts from the main frame which went well. Unfornatualy the short Allen bolts with the flat round domed flush nuts on the panels just spun when I tried to remove them. If anyone has a suggest how to get these out, there is roughly a 100 of them. My one idea is to get a battery powered grinder and tried to cut a screwdriver slot in the domed head or grind the head off without damaging the pannel. There are about 20 post or legs with concrete footings. I dug down at a few of them and found there is about 1 ft. of gravel fill above the concrete footing. The demo contractor offered to provide a machine (skid steer or excavator) to pull them out when we had everything else removed. I have two thoughts on post removal which hopefully can be done without bending up the post or other legs One is to dig down to the top of the post to get to the concrete so a choker sling can be attached to pull up right at the top of the concrete. The other is get a jack hammer and hit the footings around the post to see if the concrete can be broken up some. (which would be a lot of work) The ARK will help me get a couple of volunteers for the disassemble/removal. My first order of busines is making some sketches with a numbering routine to mark all the parts for reassemble. I thinking of using a paint pen for marking, and appreciate any suggestions for marking that will last a while. I don't know if we will get the shade structure as someone else (a demo boss?) was looking at it. So this will keep me busy for awhile. then installation will be an even bigger future project.

The one thing that I don't like about snow blowers is that it is usually cold out when you need to use them.

I sent a text to the number I have on file I will let you know if I receive a response.

The 520H had been acting like it was starving for fuel during the tail end of the last storm clean up. I actually had to leave the warm cab and brave the cold to finish with the 312H. I had installed an epump last fall and she had been running fine till now. Time to find the problem before the next storm that is coming this Sat. I pulled the line off near the carb and turned on the epump and got barely a dribble. Nice thing about the epumps..you don't have to crank the engine to check for good fuel supply. So, I went to the other end and pulled the line on the fuel tank petcock....not even a dribble. from the tank. The petcock was clogged with dirt. A good cleaning of the petcock and flushing the tank and back together and running like a happy ONAN should. When installing this I like to coat it with vaseline then just start the valve in the grommet before pushing the grommet into the tank then push the valve barb into the grommet.

Got to play today in the garage and work on this weak corner of this 48" deck. Wasnt sure how to go about making the patch with all the angles and round overs but it worked out. I cant weld worth a crap to be pretty, but it holds and solid. I just got a 220 Harbor Freight flux core mig welder. But Im learning. I plan on get some 75/25 gas to see if I can do better maybe. Plus thin gauge metal aint my thing, I can do better with the thicker stuff. Lol

One of my faves in the '50s. As kids, we spent 90% of our daylight hours outside. Except on Saturday mornings when The Lone Ranger show was close to coming on the TV when we raced home to watch. I still remember my baby sister that was falling behind in the race home yelling "don't turn it on till I get there cause I don't want to miss it". My gang...where's Eddie?

Wasn't there a penalty for "Unnecessary Holding" called on that play??

January 29, 1936 First players elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame: Ty Cobb, Babe Ruth, Honus Wagner, Christy Mathewson and Walter Johnson.

So sorry Joe. Listen to what your body is telling you. 11 yrs. ago I started getting acid reflux after eating out for my wife's birthday. I never get acid reflux so I let it pass. 3 days later I'm at work and start getting it again. Plus I'm really feeling crummy. I had gotten a flu shot the same day I started having issues. I thought I was coming down with the flu. I went home at noon. Had to pick up an item at a friends house. On the way back as I was stopping for an intersection, both of my hands fell off the steering wheel. I managed to drive the remaining half mile home. Told my wife what happened and she called my doctor. He says get to the hospital. One blood test showed a marker for a heart attack. I get shipped to the city for an angioplasty. I had the "Widow Maker LAD blockage and got 2 stents. At work with other guys if I get tired I stop. If any of the young guys say anything I tell them they will most likely be in the same boat someday. I fix stuff with what I know. I tell them push that or turn that. My hero days are behind me.

You mean to tell me @Pullstart isn't obligated to keep the medical field pushing ahead with medical advancements? I just wish our hospital would get rid of the guy in charge of purchasing so we can get a boiler fixed before we actually have to have it!

Done

With the supporter program, I have most addresses and phone numbers. Anyone can opt to add their contact information into the system, even without being a supporter. This doesn’t answer your question exactly, but I do have many phone numbers and addresses. The other thing that could be done is to create another forum similar to the talk to the moderators where anyone can enter their contact / emergency contact information and it would be viewable by only admins. If this is something which people would like, we can make that happen. Hopefully we hear from Richard soon. https://www.wheelhorseforum.com/clients/info/

Eatons in particular, act very different from cold to warm. It's best to drive it around for 15 mins or more to warm it up before jacking the rear wheels and adjusting the cam. Even then, I have to set my brake just to be sure it won't creep. Looks like a solid tractor. Rare to see hubcaps nowadays that are relatively rust free. That tells me it was stored indoors at least. I certainly would have grabbed it for the same price you paid. Well done! Change all your fluids and filters and put it to work!

Every valve I have pulled had a partially clogged and collapsed screen so I always remove the screens so any dirt can pass thru the valve to the inline filter that I can easily replace. I have thought of replacing the valve and grommet with a 1/4"NPT bulkhead fitting that would have a much larger opening that would allow the dirt to exit the tank to the filter. May have drill and tap the tank boss to accept the bulkhead fitting. I have an inline filter near the tank and near the carb. with the epump in between the two filters. The plastic tanks are not as bad as the metal tanks, but they still get dirt from the funnels and cans used during filling.

Well a little bit of thawing seemed to really help. Wet concrete grips better than frozen. So got a couple driveways done. Then my friend and I got a Wheel Horse Man Date in as we plowed the parking lot for small school. Mine is the 416-8 and his is the 417-A. We were plowing after dark for a few hours. First time I needed the headlights for work. Was glad I had them though. Parking lot lights were out. But we got it cleared off pretty good.

Took advantage of being snow bound. No reason to get out and too cold for me to enjoy being out so I went through our hundreds of slides and transferred them to the computer. Fun to look back to the mid 1960's of family photos. Lots of memories and things I hadn't thought about for years. For one, that's me on my first mower. I don't remember what it cost. I'm pretty sure was a Montgomery Wards, one forward speed and one reverse speed. The blade was a direct drive--If the engine was spinning--the blade was turning. I believe Ward's mowers had tread on the tires and Sear's mowers were smooth. I'm guessing that if it was in gear and a lad pulled the starter rope and it fired off, said lad would be slow chasing his mower.

Yep, Phil will see his shadow this morning. 13* and bright sunshine here in PeeeAaaa.

Yep, About 10% better than the Meteorologists.

January 31, 1990, The Soviet Union’s first McDonald’s fast food restaurant opens in Moscow. Throngs of people line up to pay the equivalent of several days’ wages for Big Macs, shakes and french fries.

I know a lot of guy want to keep things "original" but if it was mine, I would chop the wires out of the block and get individual weatherproof fuse holders. I went a step further on the 520 I had. I got some 4 wire flat trailer wires with a long pigtail and moved everything including chopping out that crappy 9 pin Molex connector to the opposite side of the tractor to get it away from the exhaust heat. I used electrical wire markers and 2 trailer plug sets. I marked one plug "A" and the other "B" and documented which electrical circuit was in each plug and what color the wire was. This maintained the ability to disconnect the engine side of the harness.

January 28, 1985, Music stars gather to record “We Are the World” The special instruction Quincy Jones sent out to the several dozen pop stars invited to participate in the recording of “We Are the World” was this: “Check your egos at the door.” Jones was the producer of a record that would eventually go on to sell more than 7 million copies and raise more than $60 million for African famine relief. But before “We Are the World” could achieve those feats, it had to be captured on tape—no simple feat considering the number of major recording artists slated to participate. With only one chance to get the recording the way he and songwriters Michael Jackson and Lionel Richie wanted it, Jones convened the marathon recording session of “We Are the World” at around 10 p.m. on the evening of January 28, 1985, immediately following the conclusion of the American Music Awards ceremony held just a few miles away.

My wife came out to the shop to see what I was doing and took a couple of pictures of me on the tractor. Of course no shoes are allowed yet, have to keep it clean. My truck and her Explorer are sitting under cover waiting for spring whenever it finally gets here. Hopefully by mid April.

Spending a cold, dreary Saturday at the office:

I found this from an Aries and it has the same Welch Style connector with a roller pin setup. It's local for sale. I'm going to see how this look...hope not too funny but if it functions for me, may be worth it? I'll send some pics after.

My brother had all of the Aurora Monster models. The Creature, Dracula, Frankie the whole bunch. He painted them all up and had red paint dripping out of their mouths and hands as blood. He glued silver glitter in their eyes. I hated those things. When he graduated from HS he gave them all to me. The day after he left for college there were some unexplained explosions and plastic bits in the back yard.

I built a few in my day with the neighborhood boys. Then taped model rocket motors to them and lit em off. Never a really great job since I have the artistic skills of a cantaloupe. Some came out ok tho.

Late post from the weekend storm, but wheelhorse 414 w/ bervac got it done. central jersey, 11" snow with ice cap. 24" drifts against the garage. fun day cleaning the snow. the mailman loves the tractor, bogs down a little when going into the deep wet road plowed pile but as you can see from the picture it makes it happen. IMG_2654.mov