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I Forge Iron

Texan with a cold forge and silent anvil here to lurk and learn


Leather Bill

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My Father used to take us driving aged kids out to a big empty parking lot the first good snow every year and drill us on our slick weather driving.  I remember being up at college when the ice storms would hit and walking to class, about a mile.   My housemate once asked me why I walked as "You know how to drive in this!"  My reply was "Yes but all y'all *DON'T*!"   The side walk was safer and keeping an eye on folks driving to be ready to  get out of their skid path if needed.

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2 hours ago, Leather Bill said:

What is this frost free pump?  

I should have said Hydrant instead of pump. I think of it that way because of the pump handle. It drains all of the excess water out of a weep hole that is buried below the frost line. You probably already know that. I'll work on getting my terminology right! Anyway, it's saving our "you know what's" on having available water close to hand. Thanks for the info on solar heating. We have been looking into that as well and pumps or the building of one for the well also. We went from a well established farm a bit over an acre to nearly 12 wooded acres with lots of cleanup and basically wild, virgin land. The previous owner ran horses on it at one time, but many years ago and he is disabled. Still learning how and what to do in a completely different environment. Was ill prepared for this bout of icy weather

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Bill welcome aboard. I tore a rotator about 5 years ago doing things best left to younger men.

All houses here have frost proof spigots. 

CGL, many tricks to keep water from freezing. The easiest is to install a submersion heater if you are close enough to electricity. You can also fill a bucket with water then put it inside a larger container. Fill the space between with manure and straw. Bury or mound earth around the water trough. That will help insolate it. Then there is the age old method of a pump. Circulating water wont freeze. But again usually need electricity for a pump. Water will freeze faster in a metal container than plastic or rubber. Also a partial cover will help some. 

Fords were my least favorite to work on also. Especially now that the Broncos and Explorers are FWD. 

A note about winter driving, 4x4 does not mean you can drive like it is a nice summer day. 

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They also make the frost free faucets for the side of your house. They extend about 18" to 2 feet through the exterior wall to the inside of the structure or crawl space. For the exterior frost proof hydrant as pictured or the wall faucets, ALWAYS remove any hoses or outside appliance so that the faucets can drain back, thus preventing any freezing.

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One winter my dad left the garden hose out. I thought it was pretty cool how if you wacked it against a post it would break. So i did. When my dad seen his garden hose broke into 3" pieces all over the yard...i still have some trouble sitting on that side of my but. 

Last time i did any outdoor remodeling code here said that those frost free spigots  that are on the side of the house have to be installed at a slight angle so the water will drain out of them. If the water sits in them and freezes it can crack the pipe behind the stopper and a water leak in the wall, crawl space or basement can cost some serious money in damages.  

My memories of having a torpedo heater in the house to warm the crawl space and getting into said crawl space in the winter to thaw pipes out made me make sure that every house i have lived in has a basement. 

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I've been away from the party plowing my drive since yesterday so I need to catch up.   Thanks for that nice hydrant diagram arkie.  

Thomas,I actually enjoy forging during winter because summer heat is bad enough without adding more.  I never heat the whole shop.  I have a vent free infrared propane heater with one 5k and two 10k plaque burners that can be run individually or all at same time. Ambient was 10f while a friend and I were in the shop last night sipping the poison off a new jug of Johnny Walker and was quite comfortable sitting in front of the 5k and one 10k burner.  On occasions when I can't be near heater and need to heat some space I have 2 curtains made from foil faced bubble insulation I drop down to isolate 300 sq ft in one corner.  If I had a band of elves working I'd improve insulation and install a heat pump for doing mechanic and woodwork in summer.   As it is, the forge sits beneath a cover in the shade of a large oak all summer. 

BTW, you folks that plow your drive when it snow's must be weird.   I went up and down my drive with a chisel, a moldboard, a tiller, a bedder and a disc harrow.  My drive is such a muddy mess I'll have to wait til it dry's and bring in 3 loads of rock before I can drive my truck out.  

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19 hours ago, Leather Bill said:

BTW,you folks that plow your drive when it snow's must be weird.

Where I'm at my family just uses 4wd or all wheel drive. I only shovel when it gets over a foot deep. That's been rare and only every couple of years. Snow and ice makes it pretty miserable in the collision repair business. In and out of the weather a good bit and cleaning off multiple cars. Then what's left just melts to the floor and you have to squeegee and or work in a puddle. 

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3 hours ago, Daswulf said:

Snow and ice makes it pretty miserable in the collision repair business.

No slack time? :P We had to stop pulling people out of ditches with the service truck back in my service station days. The owners refused to buy a wrecker or nothing at the station would get done on icy days and they didn't want to call another man in.

Frosty The Lucky.

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That's the funny part. The worst time to deal with the weather is about the busiest time. Wonder why? Lol. 

Dead batteries, snow and ice covered vehicles, wet inside, hot/cold all day from the big doors opening and then closing and the radiant heaters compensating. No extra pay for misery lol. 

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:lol: true. I could even stay in state and move up to Erie to get the lake effect. We travel to buffalo ny for Elizabeth's family who live up there. It's usually a rough drive on the off years we go up for Christmas to stay with her family for the holiday. 

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Weather conspires to throw a monkey wrench in plans and activities. Every good sky watching period for the past 4-5 years has been overcast. 

A cold weather trick for vehicle batteries. If you haven't drained your battery trying to start the engine stop trying and turn the headlights on for a couple minutes the drain will warm the electrolyte a little and increase the charge.

The best bet though is start your engine for 15 minutes or so a couple times a day to keep them charge OR put a trickle charger on them, the charge will keep them warm enough to crank it.

Funny idea Thomas, when Deb and I got married she lived about 10 miles from Superior in the UP of Mi. She kept expecting some legendary, mythical Alaskan winter. What she got instead was an average annual snowfall less than a moderate snow effect dump, moderate winds and crazy icy road drivers. She'd lived on a hobby farm so only those blazing fool teenagers drove 40mph!:o Winter roads were hard packed snow and folk drove in the 20s. 

The commute from Wasilla to Anchorage on a sometimes icy highway tended to be almost bumper to bumper at 70. 

She adjusted quickly but had my Eagle Talon AWD to cope with the roads so it was all good. Man I loved that car.

Frosty The Lucky.

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On 2/15/2021 at 5:56 PM, Leather Bill said:

BTW, you folks that plow your drive when it snow's must be weird.   I went up and down my drive with a chisel, a moldboard, a tiller, a bedder and a disc harrow.  My drive is such a muddy mess I'll have to wait til it dry's and bring in 3 loads of rock before I can drive my truck out.  

That gave me a good chuckle! Us Texans excel at a lot of things (;)) but coping with this crazy weather stuff ain't one of them. 

I was watching the news and the guy was saying that it was the same temperature in Texas as it was in Alaska and I thought of Frosty. It was -6° this morning y'all... messed up and forgot to run the water so it's frozen. We are also in rolling blackouts. Both of these things are a first for me. The frost free pump is really saving us as we are hauling water up from it. I'm thankful though because all the critters are alive and there's folks here that are going through very hard times. It's supposed to start warming back up Thursday. It can't come soon enough

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Another cold weather trick is to have a battery heater besides an oil heater on your car.  Even if the oil heater keeps the crankcase oil from having the consistency of tar you still need some amps in the battery to turn the engine over.  Cold will reduce the cranking capacity of a battery to a fraction of what it has at, say, 70 degrees.

For you southrons who are unfamiliar with cold weather technology oil/crankcase heaters come in several varieties.  The simplest is the dip stick heater which replaces the oil dipstick but may not work for modern engines that have long, flexible dip sticks.  Then there is the kind which is a flat heating element that attaches to the bottom of the crankcase.  It works well but can get scraped off going through deep snow.  The best one and most expensive is one that permanently installs through the freeze plug in the side of the crankcase.

I've seen battery heaters which are sort of an electric blanket to wrap around the battery and ones that are a heating pad to go under the battery. 

If you are going to be in subzero weather for extended periods and don't have a heated garage both are worth the investment.

"By hammer and hand all arts do stand."  

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CGL,is your house on slab or sitting above ground?   I can understand a pier & beam foundation alowing pipes to freeze but not a slab.  I hope there's no busted pipes when they thaw.  I suggest leaving one hot and one cold facuet open until everyone go's to bed.  With temperature rising it's possible the frozen pipe will alow a tiny bit of water to pass.  If that were to happen full flow would be restored within a few minutes.  It's also possible that supply is off to intire community like many places today.  

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We're sitting above ground. Im pretty sure it's just us because our neighbors down the road have water. They didn't last week, now we don't this week. Completely my fault because we had running water iast night. I hope they aren't busted either. And we are leaving faucets open just in case. But if it's a few days, we will be ok. Just a lot of extra work that wasn't necessary. Sorry, I'm just angry with myself for letting it happen. Thank you for the advice. I appreciate it

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Das:  I have spent many Christmases in the Buffalo, NY area.  That is where my late wife's family was from.  They do know how to do winter there.  It is the only place where I have seen a wall of snowfall like a wall of rain at the edge of a thunderstorm.  It was about one block of distance to go from a few flurries to a full white out blizzard condition.

They were in East Amherst off Transit Rd, NE of the City of Buffalo.

"By hammer and hand all arts do stand."

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The worst blizzard I drove through was coming home from there. We had gone up with my dads truck and trailer to bring back a car her dad had bought her. We had to trailer it because of goofy laws that we had to have the previously ny registered car at the pa place to register it. We felt it a safer bet to trailer it then risk any fines. Elizabeth was pregnant at the time and it was a total whiteout driving back in the dark. Couldn't see the road, was in a long one "lane" line of cars going slow with blinkers on. At times I had to guess where the road was when I couldnt guesstimate from faint tail lights in front of me, and the snow just piled up on everything even gumming up the windshield wipers and headlights several times. Most of the time it was too dangerous to even stop to clean off the wipers. It wasn't the best time for hauling a trailer with a car on it lol. 

We got through it slow and steady tho and only damage was a side marker light and the license plate for the trailer got lost along the way due to the snow.

 

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