natenaaron

I am thinking I am going to have to go down this road. I've done it before. I tore my right wrist up playing Racquette ball and the first doctor treated it as a sprain then when she thought it should be healed she told me I was faking the pain to get more pain meds. She never prescribed pain meds just put me on such a high dose of ibuprofen I almost ended up in the hospital. 1 year later it was finally fixed for the torn up mess it was. Because it was not fixed right away there is permanent damage in the extensor tendon. (that or the abductor I never got that straight) I had chronic tendonitis for a few years and no brace would work becasue other permanent damage in the wrist would cause problems. After a long discussion with the doc about requirements, and an open minded prosthetic builder I designed the perfect brace for me. With PT and my designed brace, which was xxxx awful ugly, The pain went away in about a month and never came back. The doc was shocked. He probably made a mint off the design after I showed it to him. The prosthetic builder did the work for free because he liked the challenge. I bet I can do it again. I doubt I'll find as open minded a prosthetic guy as before but with the flourishing of the interweb I can get most of the supplies on line. Now I just need to find a doc who will listen Still looking for off the shelf ideas though.

I'm starting the Glucosamine today. I took it years ago until I found a doctor who would listen and sure enough my rotator cuff was partly torn. Doc, yesterday, also said ibuprofen Tylenol or Aleve every day as well as the natural stuff. I'm hoping someone has a good leather design I can copy or find on the net. Nothing I have found, so far, seems blacksmith oriented. Lots of weight lifting "wrist supports" but I can't see how they support anything. They look like the thing Rory May wears in his videos, which I thought was just for show.

I went to the doc yesterday for two issues. Huge knee pain and a strangely swelling left wrist. I am being sent for an MRI and then to the specialist for the knee. It is what I expected so, aside from being very claustrophobic no issue. The wrist was not expected. I have worsening arthritis that is only going to get worse. The doc was super busy and I did not have time to really discuss the situation. He wasn't happy about this and neither was I. Not worth complaining about here. All he said was either stop trying to blacksmith or get some sort of wrist support. He glanced at my chart then said for both wrists. I knew this would come up eventually with my right hand since it has had the most trauma in the past but I thought the left good to go since that is the tong hand and seldom hammers. I have come to the conclusion that arthritis is punishment for having fun. I don't want to stop. I am having fun. I looked at the wrist supports at Wal-mart and they are going to get destroyed in no time. Is there anyone else using wrist supports, on either wrist? If so what are you using.

If you were in Texas I say to contact my cousin and her husband. The do repurposing on the side and LOVE this kind of stuff. I bet if you advertise it on a local sales site or in the decorating community you could make a pretty penny.

I use 220 extension cords all the time. I use them to hook houseboats up to power before they are hauled to the lake for prep and charging. Because they are so long mine are very thick Can't remember the gauge though. I also use them in the shop, when not hooked to a boat. When the shop was built the 220 plug in was not well thought out. First, there is only one, and it is literally right next to the back door. The extension cords mean I can have the welder positioned anywhere in the shop. Very handy. Pricey but convenient.

My brother travels all the time for his work as a structural engineer. He referred to his time in the cube as paying his dues. He told his boss he was willing to travel. A lot of the time we are not allowed to know where he has been or what he is working on. He is single and happy to be. I could not live that way. I could not be away from my family that long. To each their own though.

I get to play Frosty. Welcome aboard. Why don't you put your general location in, so folks know where you are and give you pointers to folks who might be able to help or a local smithing group in your area. I am guessing you are young, since you can afford to toss almost an entire summer's paycheck on a machine and nothing else. And you don't have a forge yet, I assume, but you want to start with a 5 burner sword forge because you can do most anything in it? You have high aspirations, I'll give you that.

Actually frosty, I did not see your response that way at all. Thin skins don't last around here. I must apologize Frosty, I misread your comment and replied based on that misreading. Yes you were helpful, but then again I have not noticed you being curmudgeonly lately.

We just found out the transmission on the Van is going out so two cars down. Time to start looking for a car. Sometimes it doesn't pay to get up in the morning.

No tag on the motor. It is no big deal, it gets the job done.

That's what I am trying to get too. It is mounted on a steel bench and even if I unbolted it, I could not move it. Darn things weighs a couple hundred pounds at least. More info coming soon.

It dawned on me today that the mill drill lathe I inherited with our business may have begun life as a 220. My father in law obviously put the 110 plug on. It is made out of what you wire a house with. There is no spec info on it anywhere that I can find. It was bought from enco quite a while ago. Is there a way to tell?

I will not worry then. Thanks

Yes there is. It is called the mass market manufacturing juggernaught that is China, and the internet. Type blacksmith into etsy sometime. How are you better than them? If you can't answer that to yourself honestly you have a problem. No one here is telling you not to do it but you have some serious questions to answer. Listen to rockstar.

Honestly I was worried about the welds coming apart and the burner coming out. Welds are good but being new I was not sure if cracking was possible with them getting very very hot then cooling. In the winter they will be cooling pretty rapidly.

Actually frosty, I did not see your response that way at all. Thin skins don't last around here.

I don't care about the looks. Just worried about the heat causing it to come apart.

See, can of worms. unknot your knickers, someone has contacted me with a way to get a hold of someone. None of you can answer this question because it is about the ABS and there is no information about this in their website. Yes Frosty, no one is perfect and there are some folk out there who are complete richards because there are a few letters attached to the end of their names. There are those who are kind to strangers as well.

Apparently I don't have the tools for a coolant pressure test so I have someone doing all the tests for me. Talked to that mechanic friend of mine who is, of course out of town. He said Alero engines do not survive trauma well. We'll see.

Everything except the rack. In truth most boats are open system cooled so mostly easy to diagnose. Steam cleaned spark plugs or steam evidence around the head is the most common tells. The closed systems are more time consuming. Show the plug ends and crush their vacation plans. If we could not find the issue the motor had to come out. Most folks would opt for pulling the heads first. Just pulling the motor was, with nothing else, 4 hours of labor charge depending on the boat. Boat engine compartments and boats in general are designed by failed bitter engineers who hate mechanics. One boat we had to separate the top from the hull just to get the motor out. That was a xxxxxxxx nightmare. We tried to explain the process to the owner over the phone and it would be cheaper to replace the motor. He said no and gave us all the reasons why we were wrong and sent an e-mail telling us to diagnose and repair. He obviously did not understand because he xxxx a brick when he came in and the boat was in two pieces all the seats were removed (so the top did not buckle) and the motor was on an engine stand with pieces covering a bench. I will be dusting off the scope and other items.

Once the oil is drained and refilled to the correct level I can do the compression test. The rest will need to be done by a mechanic and we are now looking for an honest one. In the last three weeks we have been lied to twice, and paid for an alignment they knew, or at least should have known would not hold. Three different shops. Two of them in town. Thank goodness I have a storage customer who has been a mechanic of one sort or another his whole life and made quite a bit of money so he must be good. He is also the most honest person I have ever met. Hard to get a hold of these days as he is "semi retired" and is always traveling.

He was definitely filled in. I was wondering those same things. Antifreeze is empty. There is a leak there. The oil is over full but oldest admitted to over filling it. It is not milky or peanut buttery on the dip stick. I no longer have what I need to get under a car that low so a mechanic is draining the oil sometime today I hope. Being a boat mechanic for a few years I am very familiar with over heated motors, the damage it can do and how much it costs, for both closed and open cooled motors. There were many times the dip stick did not show a problem. Needless to say I am worried. This is vehicle number 2 with major repair needs in the last 3 weeks. Telluride is definitely off the list now. I took the Business truck in Monday before I brought the car home because the side was painted with oil. Someone else's car must have blown something as they passed me. No problems with the business truck

The ABS tends to open a big can of worms. Because of this I was hoping someone could PM me the name and contact e-mail of a nice Master smith who would not mind answering a few questions. Thanks.

Once you pay to have them upgraded and looking all sexy they become cougar forges and take off with the first hot young smith they see.

I guess I am not understanding. The flames are not directly aiming at each other. I'm really tired so please forgive the ignorance. I am thinking this was a bad experiment and will need to be recified when I get some more Satanite. It sure gets hot in there though. I had a piece of two inch 4140 in it to see how fast it would get it hot. It got above orange in the ten minutes before I lost pressure. I removed the steel then so nothing was in the way. The way I read the burner to volume thread was a 3/4 inch heated 300-350 square inches to welding temp, and other threads varied. A 1 inch heated 600 square inches IIRC. I have 620ish. On one of my other threads you said I could turn the pressure down if there was too much burner. In my head this registered as it is better to have too much burner than too little because too much can be turned down. Was this wrong?