Scrounging Firewood (and other stuff)

[muddstopper]

 

[James Miller]

I know they say ethenal is bad for your motor but this is ridiculous. Mice packed the intake tube on the Grom full of corn. Now there's corn down to the intake valve. Looks like I'm pulling the head and stripping it bare to clean it all out. Gona have it milled .020 while its off and probly do the DCR can. Should gain about 3hp pretty good on a motor that makes 10 or so now.

 

[Cody]

View attachment 620180 I know they say ethenal is bad for your motor but this is ridiculous. Mice packed the intake tube on the Grom full of corn. Now there's corn down to the intake valve. Looks like I'm pulling the head and stripping it bare to clean it all out. Gona have it milled .020 while its off and probly do the DCR can. Should gain about 3hp pretty good on a motor that makes 10 or so now.

I have an '07 ZX-10R that I put on Arrow headers and a Racefit Growler. Well, I should have stuffed a towel or something in it for winter storage as one year I started it and I could hear a rattling noise. Twisted the throttle a bit and bird seed went flying out the back. Thankfully the feline population now keeps the rodents at bay. I made it a habit to replace the air filter on our vehicles in December or January ever year as the mice would build nests in them, no longer a problem obviously. Worked at a shop for awhile and had a customer complain that we ate his candy corn out of his car one year. Came in a month or so later for an oil change and found that whole bag of candy corn in the air box, some of it quite gooey.

 

[MustangMike]

Over my objections, my bother put rat poison pellets in the cabin one year. Next time up to the cabin something (a pack rat?) had taken them and stuffed them in the snout of our coffee pot!!!

Have not used poison up at the cabin since!

We also now store the coffee pot hanging up side down.

 

[Cody]

Over my objections, my bother put rat poison pellets in the cabin one year. Next time up to the cabin something (a pack rat?) had taken them and stuffed them in the snout of our coffee pot!!!

Have not used poison up at the cabin since!

We also now store the coffee pot hanging up side down.

I tried poison one year, ONE. I found out that they stink like all hell if they die in a wall. It's amazing the difference the cats have made, might have one a year in the house. Wouldn't mind that one a year in the garage as they were efficient at scrounging spilled bird seed so I didn't have to sweep it up.

Does my use of scrounging make my post count now? I'll need to figure out how to upload pictures without the use of photobucket otherwise.

 

[panolo]

View attachment 620180 I know they say ethenal is bad for your motor but this is ridiculous. Mice packed the intake tube on the Grom full of corn. Now there's corn down to the intake valve. Looks like I'm pulling the head and stripping it bare to clean it all out. Gona have it milled .020 while its off and probly do the DCR can. Should gain about 3hp pretty good on a motor that makes 10 or so now.

You have no idea how common that is. I bet we did 25 a year where intakes were stuffed full. Exhausts, etc. Had permanent dents in one shop wall from acorns out the exhaust of an older R6.

 

[coryj]

The blower went out on our Buck 27000 insert yesterday. Well it hasn't gone out completely, but it turns off and on intermittently and doesn't stay on long enough to circulate enough air to truly heat the house the way we have grown to like it. The funny thing is when we bought this house last year we thought we'd use the stove occasionally, but have been using it as our primary heat this year.

When I was taking it apart to check things out there appears to be an existing three speed thermostat on the back, but our switch only ever worked as on (single speed) or off. Here is what the old thermostat looked like. None of those wires were connected to anything leading me to believe someone replaced it with a single speed motor at some point.



New three speed motor, three speed thermostat, wiring harness, switch, and some miscellaneous gaskets for less than $250 shipped. At that cost it's well worth what it saves me in gas and electric heat every month.

Will be out of town between Christmas and New Year's so I'll turn the heat down and replace the motor when we get back. Oh and to make this relevant to this thread, I burn scrounged wood in the stove.

 

[svk]

View attachment 620180 I know they say ethenal is bad for your motor but this is ridiculous. Mice packed the intake tube on the Grom full of corn. Now there's corn down to the intake valve. Looks like I'm pulling the head and stripping it bare to clean it all out. Gona have it milled .020 while its off and probly do the DCR can. Should gain about 3hp pretty good on a motor that makes 10 or so now.

Bastiges!

Mice filled my ATV airbox with corn and an outboard motor hood with dog food when I was at my old house.

(May have shared this story before)
My BIL worked at an auto shop and this lady kept bringing back her Dodge neon because it had no power at highway speeds. They couldn't figure it out but with the air box/plenum disconnected the problem was solved. Finally fished around in there and first extracted a mouse from the plenum and behind it was a weasel. Problem solved!

 

[svk]

Over my objections, my bother put rat poison pellets in the cabin one year. Next time up to the cabin something (a pack rat?) had taken them and stuffed them in the snout of our coffee pot!!!

Have not used poison up at the cabin since!

We also now store the coffee pot hanging up side down.

In our old shack (1960's era trailer home) the mice would somehow get to the top of the coffee pots (one 8 cup and one 20 cup) and crap in the spouts. The little pot was easy because the crap would fall into the pot and easily scrub out. The big pot had a filter and the crap would be stuck in the bottom of the spout. The mice also filled the insulated walls of our old oven with Dcon. When we used the oven, the food would turn green. That was not good lol.

When we built the new cabin which was connected to the porch from the former trailer house, those damn things would come in to the ceiling up where the buildings met which was a problem until we sheeted the walls. I more or less have them figured out but the occasionally can still gain access to the dormer. I have traps and dcon up there in case they do.

 

[svk]

The blower went out on our Buck 27000 insert yesterday. Well it hasn't gone out completely, but it turns off and on intermittently and doesn't stay on long enough to circulate enough air to truly heat the house the way we have grown to like it. The funny thing is when we bought this house last year we thought we'd use the stove occasionally, but have been using it as our primary heat this year.

When I was taking it apart to check things out there appears to be an existing three speed thermostat on the back, but our switch only ever worked as on (single speed) or off. Here is what the old thermostat looked like. None of those wires were connected to anything leading me to believe someone replaced it with a single speed motor at some point.

View attachment 620227

New three speed motor, three speed thermostat, wiring harness, switch, and some miscellaneous gaskets for less than $250 shipped. At that cost it's well worth what it saves me in gas and electric heat every month.

Will be out of town between Christmas and New Year's so I'll turn the heat down and replace the motor when we get back. Oh and to make this relevant to this thread, I burn scrounged wood in the stove.

I have found those types of shadetree repairs often in the places I have lived over the years. Guessing the single speed motor was probably half the cost of the variable one so they said "fuggit" and used that one. Especially if it was only a backup heat supply.

 

[coryj]

I have found those types of shadetree repairs often in the places I have lived over the years. Guessing the single speed motor was probably half the cost of the variable one so they said "fuggit" and used that one. Especially if it was only a backup heat supply.

Yeah it's an old farm house and calling their repairs "shade tree" would be a compliment or an insult to actual shade tree mechanics.

 

[svk]

Yeah it's an old farm house and calling their repairs "shade tree" would be a compliment or an insult to actual shade tree mechanics.

Sounds like our previous home owners used the same repairman.

In one house I lived in, they put in a jacuzzi tub some time after initial construction. The drain was right over the floor joist so they just cut the entire section of floor joist out of the way.

 

[James Miller]

I did do some work with my scrounged wood today to make up for my off topic post.Better pic of the pile so far. All the big stuff I had done is split with more that needs cut.Started moving the kindling over cause I want a break from the big stuff. Couple of bigger loads had me working the brakes to keep the front end from floating.

 

[turnkey4099]

I tried poison one year, ONE. I found out that they stink like all hell if they die in a wall. It's amazing the difference the cats have made, might have one a year in the house. Wouldn't mind that one a year in the garage as they were efficient at scrounging spilled bird seed so I didn't have to sweep it up.

Does my use of scrounging make my post count now? I'll need to figure out how to upload pictures without the use of photobucket otherwise".

I use Decon. Keep packs in the trunk, the engine compartment and the cab. Also in the house. In all the years I have only had 'musty odor' from decon killed pests. I see it is time to refresh the baits. Signs of mice in hte house again.

 

[woodchip rookie]

Bastiges!

Mice filled my ATV airbox with corn and an outboard motor hood with dog food when I was at my old house.

(May have shared this story before)
My BIL worked at an auto shop and this lady kept bringing back her Dodge neon because it had no power at highway speeds. They couldn't figure it out but with the air box/plenum disconnected the problem was solved. Finally fished around in there and first extracted a mouse from the plenum and behind it was a weasel. Problem solved!

Mice chewed through the spark plug wire last year on my mower. War has been waged since. Several have died due to 9mm gunshot wounds, others have fallen to the boot. Shortly I will be adding 5gal bucket traps

 

[MechanicMatt]

9mm??? They make .22's ya know....

 

[JustJeff]

Looks like I better bring a load of wood up!

 

[LondonNeil]

Is that F or C? Never mind, it's cold and that is all I need to know.

 

[dancan]

LOL. Dan was talking about going to somebody's property to cut and I warned them what it might look like after the AS most prolific scrounger was done!

I think I was talking about taking a trip down South to Cliff's place to give him a hand scrounging up a bit of wood on his property maybe .
He never did send me his address though ...

 

[Cody]

Mice chewed through the spark plug wire last year on my mower. War has been waged since. Several have died due to 9mm gunshot wounds, others have fallen to the boot. Shortly I will be adding 5gal bucket traps

First off, I'm not an easy person to scare and claustrophobia is about the only thing that causes me to panic.

One winter working at the shop, guy brought in a Grand Prix, can't remember the year but the ECU is in the airbox. A rat had found its way in there and chewed up many wires, setting off a ton of codes which also caused the car to be undriveable. Wires were fixed up, no CEL and customer drove the car home. A week later car is back because it's misfiring, that was the only code thrown as well so should be an easy fix. Pop the hood and see a tail hanging out from under the beauty cover, I go and grab a long nose pliers to grab the tail before removing the cover. The owner had also grabbed a pair of long pliers and as I'm taking the cover off he pinches my leg from behind with the pliers, you could have seen me jump from a mile away. Anyways, the rat was dead. Must have been chewing on a spark plug wire as the car was being cranked or something.