Archive for the ‘Uncategorised’ Category

The shed gets a roof.

Thursday, September 29th, 2011

One of Frog’s fellow volunteer firemen works for a roofing company and we scored about 300m of used, galvanized corrugated steel in 8m, 6m and various other lengths for $500 along with wire roofing mesh and a bucket of roofing screws. Enough for my shed roof, to seal up the front of the new pole shed around the roller doors and about as much again left over. I’d already put up the rafters and arrived home one day to find that Frog and his carpenter/cabinet maker mate Ant had got bored with what they were doing and faced the front and back and started framing at the hole spacing in the used steel. I had an early start for a conference call and a meeting the next morning, but I flexed the afternoon off. When I got home Frog and Ant had finished framing and had started putting up the used wire roofing mesh. I gave them a hand finish that and then we rolled out the silver paper, layed the steel and screwed it down with the used screws.

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Frog screwing down the roof steel before Ant and I join him.

Frog had also aquired a glazed, aluminium framed door and a couple of windows that were surplus to requirements for the pole-shed. I framed up the back wall for one window and I’m halfway through framing for a window in the side wall.

We had to extend the tracks that came with hand-me-down roller doors as they were too short. Again, I prepped the steel and Frog welded it – he does it so much quicker and better than me, but I really must practice more. I fitted the tracks which is a fiddly business when the fabric tape along the edges is all twisted and hardened in the sun.

Finally, at the, ahem, third attempt, Frog stick welded in the door frame. First we had it in the side wall at the back, but realised this wouldn’t work without moving a car back out of the carport whether the door was swung in or out and cut it out with a grinder. Having then moved it to the front of the side wall we realised we had not left enough space for the roller door track and had to cut it out again. I guess it happens when you work mainly at the weekends and make it up as you go along. Anyway, the door is now screwed in place. Next job is to finish the second window frame and then the rails for the steel for the walls, but we need to mill some more 4″ x 2″ to do that. Still a long way to go, but good progress.

The shed is happening!

Sunday, September 4th, 2011

Frog and I have welded, well he welded and I held bits and looked away, the frames for my shed. It will be 6m wide and 7m long with two roller doors 2.8m wide. The front and centre bearers are I-beams aquired for very little money. Ordered and delivered, but never picked up, a 12m 150mm x 200mm beam is something you would get pissed off tripping over every day and Frog was happy to take it in a stock-take clearance.

The skeleton of the shed

The use of an I-beam for the middle bearer means that there is no post required in the middle of the shed. If we had a 5.9 metre wide roller door we could have skipped the centre support there too.

Seafield Road Motorcycle Hillclimb

Monday, April 20th, 2009

My good friend Steve TXT’d me about a hill climb, or sprint, whilst I was in Washington DC at a workshop in mid-March. I’ve been to hill climbs at Te Onepu and Salisbury Rd a few times to watch a variety of cars give it a go. However, I missed the point of Steves TXT when I was in DC. On Saturday past I got a TXT from Steve about another hill climb. I called him that evening to discover that he and a group of local bikers had arranged for the road closure at Te Onepu and now at Seafield Road to allow bikers to legally thrash up the road as fast as they dare.

The road was closed from 0900 until 1630. In that time they hoped to get as many runs as the time, number of riders and any incidents allowed. On the day there were 35 bikes and they should manage maybe 6 or 7 runs through the day for the princely sum of NZ$40 (GBP15). If I had the DRZ ready with the supermoto wheels I would have given it a go. But given the fact that I had way less than 24 hrs notice and the fact that I’m a bit rusty having not ridden much over the last month or so, I wasn’t prepared to risk it on the Speed Triple which could bite back much harder than the DRZ. I’m definitely up for it next time.

In the meantime, some photos from the day.

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Steve launches the CBR off the line and keeps the front wheel on the floor

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Haven’t seen one of these for years. Well used, but smelled and sounded the same!

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Familiar sight of the day – big thumper hoists the front off the line…

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Not sure if the full moon was out….

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… but more sane than this in my book.

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Thankfully the owner/rider didn’t attempt to run this up the hill. With a 350 c.i. Chev motor in there it is extremely long, wide and heavy. Must handle like a pig, but sounded pretty good.