Tag Archives: museums

Building and Fixing:

This was the weekend for building things and fixing things.
Glen and I spent the day Sunday building a belt guard for the electric drive on Golanth, our new recumbent bicycle. We can ride it anytime as a true bicycle, and we have ridden a total of 84 miles since I completed it. As my friend Ed would put it, that works out to a tad over $68 a mile just for the cost of all the parts. Continue reading Building and Fixing:

Something Different:

After spending the winter in the desert chasing Bluegrass Festivals, hiking and bird watching, we just finished a week of something completely different. We met with our son, Glen and Barb and Bryce in the white hot intensity of life in Los Angeles. We chose a park on the northern fringes of the LA metropolis, in Santa Clarita. Glen and his family were in a hotel in Studio City. With me as navigator and Judy driving we tackled the freeway system. Down I-5 and I-405 to the 101, we tried to leave three car lengths ahead. That was quickly occupied by another car. That was nothing compared to the drive back to our coach at eight or so in the evening with headlights and taillights everywhere and not really seeing the exits until you are right on them.
Continue reading Something Different:

The Oil Pump Tester

There are lots of ways to have fun. For example, I have found a group of Bluegrass Pickers here in Morgan Hill near where we are staying. They get together a couple times a week and play Bluegrass together. Other times I have fun by volunteering at a small local Air Museum at the airport in San Martin called Wings of History. One of their restored airplanes is a Peitenpol Air Camper, a kit plane from the 1930’s. It is powered by a Ford Model “B” engine. It is nearing the end of its restoration effort. Recently a debate has been raging in the hanger around the adequacy of the oil lube system and a new improved Model “A” oil pump was secured. Last Tuesday I helped remove the engine from the Pietenpol one more time. We flipped the engine and removed the pan. We extracted the oil pump and the crew decided we needed to test the old pump compared to the new pump and see if it really was able to pump more oil. I more or less agreed to design and build a test apparatus for the pumps. Ideas were flying back and forth while I took some basic dimensions from the pumps. Continue reading The Oil Pump Tester

Frazier Lake Airport

Here is a story about one of the most unique airports I have ever seen. It is about five miles out of Gilroy, California where we have been staying for the past month. I have been volunteering again this fall at the Wings of History Air Museum. One of my fellow volunteers suggested that we should visit the Frazier Lake Airport open house this weekend.

Continue reading Frazier Lake Airport