Poor Man's CNC Machine, Note Tools Lined Up in Order of Use. Binder Bosses in Foreground

You guessed it. I whacked one off and it spun out of sight behind the lathe. Now there is not much real-estate back there so I should be able to find it. A quick visual inspection revealed that a quite a bit of lathe turnings and other debris had accumulated in that cramped space. I tried getting at it with my fox-tail brush and dust pan but they were simply too big and awkward. I finally found a wall board taping knife and a paint brush that fit perfectly. An hour later I had a nicely cleaned space, but still no sign of the wayward water bottle boss. I got out my magnetic wand and searched under the motor and in all the crevices and still no boss. By this time I could have made about six more of these little suckers, so I gave it up as a lost cause.

Tool Line-Up for Poor Man's CNC

Here are the Binder Boss and Water Bottle Boss Ready to Braze Onto and Into the Bicycle Frame

Path got a nice little tune up today. Earlier this week I removed the front suspension arm and wheel to get accurate measurements of the joint. I need to replicate the joint on the new bicycle. What I discovered is after nearly ten years the bearings were in really bad shape. There was nearly a sixteenth of an inch of radial play in each of the bearings. That means the suspension arm can wobble, tip and veer as I try to steer the bicycle. I bought new bearings and installed them today.

We immediately took Path out for a romp around the island. Wow, what a difference!

Even ordering the bearing turned out to be a challenge. The shaft size is three eighths of an inch and the outer race press fits into a one inch shell. All of the sources had no bearings that fit that specification. A couple nights ago I woke up with a brilliant idea. I would fit the one inch shell and then sleeve the shaft to fit. I couldn’t wait to search the internet the next morning. I searched for a one inch outside diameter ball bearing and to my amazement the first bearing in the list fit a three eighths inch shaft. Not once but each vender had the same sizes when you search by O.D. There must be some logic there somewhere, I just can’t see it.

It is time to wrap this up and ship it off. We are still at the Beachcomber Resort in Lake Havasu City and the weather here in the Sonoran Desert is getting warmer. Today broke into the seventies.

Gary and Judy

Here is a brief recap. We were in Lake Havasu City and headed for the grocery store with the cargo trailer in tow. I let the front end of the tandem drop off the curb into the crosswalk. I had the brake fairly tight and had one foot on the sidewalk. The left chain-stay on the front suspension broke right at the brake boss. To get back we loaded the tire and the front end of the bicycle in the cargo trailer and walked it home.

I stripped the old parts; the dropouts, the suspension shock, the brake bosses and the pivot assemblies off of the old suspension and proceeded to build a new stronger version. I carefully painted it three coats of green paint and gave it an extra day to dry. I was so proud of my new stronger version until I assembled it on the bicycle. I suddenly remembered why the old version was asymmetrical and had no brace on the right side. The chain needed to go right through where the new stronger braces were placed.

I carefully charted out where the chain needed to be, and with saws and files I removed a section of one brace and removed the other brace entirely. I had to strengthen the one brace with a section of flat iron and braze everything back into place.

Rebuilt Brace

This morning I put it all back together and we rode around the campground loop twice just to see if things are workable. Hooray! Everything is working in perfect harmony. I wasn’t so confident as to paint the piece before assembly, so now I must take it back apart and repaint it.

It doesn’t look like rain for the next few days, so perhaps we will ride the shiny metal version for a few days to celebrate the event.

We have just finished up a week with friends at the Escapee, Chapter 32 Rally at Pass Mountain Regional Park in Apache Junction, Arizona. We hiked many of the park trails including one hike of over nine miles. Now we have moved across the valley to White Tanks Mountain Regional Park just to the west of Surprise, Arizona. The reoccurring rain this winter has created a lush green desert all around us. The Saguaros are fat with water, the Ocotillo cacti are leafing out and the desert plants are starting to bloom.

Well you just invite your sister along and spend ten days showing her everything that you normally enjoy at a leisurely pace. For ten days we went Bluegrassing, mud stomping, Clydesdale spying, museum hopping, birding, caving, hiking more birding and even more hiking.

First we took in the Casa Grande Pinal County Bluegrass Festival. Many good bands and lots of parking lot picking. Gary entered the band scramble and his band, “Keeping the Faith,” won first place. Voting is done by noise level, Judy and Holly almost screamed themselves hoarse. The festival was preceded by a very heavy rainstorm, so we had to contend with a lot of mud all weekend. Several of our bluegrass friends showed up and we spent hours picking bluegrass favorites with them.

Next we moved to the Tucson, Arizona area to a state campground called Catalina State Park. We timed it perfectly and found a nice stall to stay in. The park filled to capacity every day. The had miles of hiking trails and two birding walks while we were there. We joined both walks and added 14 new species to our lifetime list of birds. Of course our list is not very long, so it is still easy to find new species.

We spent one day driving Holly’s rental car to Benson AZ, and toured the Kartchner Caverns. These are some of the best caves you will get to see. They work hard at keeping the cave pristine and unspoiled. The groups are small and the guides are excellent. Cost is about $20 and there are two separate tours to take. We took the Rotunda/Throne Room Tour. If you are in the area this is a must see: Don’t go without reservations, however. By the way, they have a nice campground on site. This time of year it was only partially full.

Harris Hawk in Free Fly Demonstration

One day we spent in the Saguaro National Park and the nearby Desert Museum. This is also a “Don’t miss” stop in the Tucson area.

Finally we spent a full day in Sabino Canyon National Recreation Area at the edge of the Tucson metropolitan area. We took the tram up the canyon and hiked the five miles back to the visitor center. The Sabino river was flowing strong so we got lots of practice doffing and donning our shoes to wade through the icy water flowing over the bridges.

Finally on Monday we sent Holly off into the morning rush hour traffic in Phoenix to catch her plane home, and we relocated to Lake Havasu on the California border to attend another bluegrass festival. Oh yes the weatherman is predicting another rain storm just before this festival starts. I hope it is not too heavy, we are camped in a dry wash.

Holly and Judy Fording the Sabino

Bare Feet Across the Sabino River

We had delightful weather in Indeo. In Blythe we survived a dust storm but by the actual festival time the weather was again delightful. In fact we were feeling just a little smug about it, because we kept hearing about how bad the weather was in the rest of the country. Just about the time the rest of the country warmed up, we have started to feel your pain. We did get a little sprinkle the last night of jamming in the Blythe camping area. We all quickly got our instruments under cover. We later resumed a limited jam inside our coach.

Tuesday started out a nice sunny day with no clouds. We pulled up stakes and drove to Quartzsite where we were to pick up our mail. We parked at the east end of town and made quick work of the one mile walk to the post office. Whoa; a few hundred people had the same idea so we stood in line for about an hour. We then crossed over I-10, again on foot, and visited the “Big RV Sales Tent.” We picked up a couple presents for Arcturus and then we noticed there were big black clouds to our west. As we hurried back to Arcturus the nearby hills grew indistinct and then disappeared before our very eyes. Soon came the spattering of a few raindrops and we redoubled our efforts to get back to the coach. We were about 200 feet away when it cut loose.

We drove about six miles out of town in a driving rain and at the designated point we bravely turned off into the desert. We joined about 50 Alpine coaches parked in a naturally gravely area of the desert.

Once again today, Wednesday, January 20^th the Sonoran Desert is sunny and warm. Alpine coaches have been streaming in all day long. The weatherman is promising us an even more spectacular rain storm for tomorrow. Stay tuned.

Heavy Rain Turns Camp Area into a Lake

Wow! With the Thursday sunrise there came the rain. The rugged hills bordering this sector of the desert have all disappeared from view and the rain marches through driven by a southwest wind. Most of the group activities have been cancelled or postponed and all of the participants are holed up in their coaches. We pulled in the big slider to keep the wind from damaging the rollout canopy and I note that several of the neighbors have done the same.

Photos of the wet desert. Click to enlarge>

Note Tent Beyond Second Coach

Judy is busy baking an apple flake and pear scones. Running the oven is helping warm the coach. The solar panels are only delivering 0.3 amps, so we are relying on the big Onan generator for power. You can see from the photos that the desert is awash. There ought to be a beautiful spring blooming around here with all of this water. The wind gusts probably reached the predicted 50 mph between 4 and 5 pm and the activities tent had to be struck. The gusts are coming broad on our side and we are just rocking and rolling.

Tent Was Struck Due to Wind

I have been practicing the fiddle this afternoon. I bought a new lesson book at the Blythe Bluegrass Festival from Jay Buckey. I am dedicating myself to learn the fiddle enough that I can debut at a jam session in one of the next festivals. Meanwhile I am still practicing in the bedroom behind closed doors. If you check out Jay’s web site you can get a bit of an idea what his program is all about. Jay Buckey.  You get to download music (.mp3) files of each lesson and that way you have something to practice against.

Meanwhile we are counting on the weatherman’s prediction of warm sunny weather after today. I am sure L.A. will breathe a sigh of relief also.

Tonight I am at peace with the world. We are camped out here in the Sonoran Desert near Quartzsite Arizona. There are thousands of people dispersed over miles and miles of the desert but each has carved out their own place. We are camped near friends, some old friends that we met two or three years ago. Some are new friends we met only a few hours ago. I sang songs for over an hour around the campfire, and then Judy and I walked away from the camp hand in hand into the quiet desert in the twilight of the sunset.

Later, just before the moon came up we walked back to the coach from the dying embers of the group campfire. We looked up into the inky darkness and stared at the beauty of the Milky Way spread out from horizon to horizon. We could make out the golden color of Mars and Orion was spread eagle over our heads. Then we watched the loom of the impending moonrise began to take form over the hills to our east. First a little sliver of gold; now a half round globe with a pinnacle of a mountain top framed in the glow; finally a great golden orb sliding diagonally across the jagged hilltops and climbing toward a bank of high Sirius clouds near the horizon.

Tonight I am a richer person for the experiences of the day. My friends I implore you to seek out beauty wherever you are. Find a calm moment to observe what is around you. And seek out experiences that will enrich your personality.

With love from Gary and Judy

Did I say hot! We are dreaming of at least warm. Today it barely topped 50 degrees and the wind was 15 to 20 mph from the north and simply whistled through two sweat shirts and chilled us to the bone. We are attending a rally of 100 plus Alpine motor homes just like ours. Quartzite is an RVer’s paradise with all kinds of shopping opportunities. We brought out Path, our trusty tandem recumbent bicycle, and wheeled around town yesterday. Sure enough we to were able to find a bargain, we bought a used solar panel. This will supplement our solar energy, reduce our dependence on fossil fuels and thereby reduce our carbon footprint. What could be better, unlimited solar power, free camping, perfect cell phone and internet, lots of friends around and whistling air conditioning?

I spent most of the day creating mounting brackets for the new solar panel. I had my shop just a humming. I would fire up the gen-set and drill a bunch of holes. Then I pop riveted the bracket assemblies together. Fire up the gen-set again and drill some more holes. Break off a bolt in the solar panel and spend the rest of the afternoon extracting the broken stump and re-threading the mounting hole. You know, just an average run of the mill, humdrum day in the desert.

We had a spectacular sunset this evening, see photo below.

Tomorrow we are off to Blythe California for their annual Bluegrass festival. This again is in the hot, low, Sonoran Desert so we expect another 50 degree day with 15 to 20 mph air conditioning. Perhaps we will get some warmer weather by the weekend.

So we close with warm greetings from the Sonoran Desert.

Gary and Judy

An "Alpine" Sunset in the Sonoran Desert

This evening after we got camp set up we saddled up Path, our trusty tandem bicycle, and set out to explore the camping areas nearby. We also intended on getting in a nice five mile ride for exercise. We barely got started when we observed some folks across the way, perhaps a hundred yards from us, waving their arms and yelling at us. Now normally people don’t get hostile about you riding near their camp until you try to cut between their fire ring and their rig, so we decided they were trying to attract our attention rather than run us off. Well it seems we had happened across some old friends from last winter on Mitry Lake, and they recognized Path. We certainly had a wonderful time camping with these folks and singing songs around the campfire last March. If you want to review, go to our web site and look up the blog called “Dust and Mosquitoes” (under construction, link to come ) Even the title brings back memories.

We chatted for a while with this group, and then renewed our quest for exercise. This time I think we made about a tenth of a mile and we located an Escapee group called the Elk BOF (BOF stands for Birds of a Feather.) Well sure enough we recognized another new “old friend,” and stopped for another chat.

Well you can see where I am going with this, most of the exercise we did get was for our jaw bone, and we barely rode a mile on the desert.

So I propose a question. Why can we live in a neighborhood for years and never know the people across the street or down the block? Why do we need to retire and go into a campground to meet people and make wonderful new friends?

Well all right I will propose an answer also. I admit that we have a tendency to be outgoing, but that isn’t the whole answer. In a camping situation people tend to live outside their rigs. They walk around, sometimes because they have a dog. Also they may have a campfire to sit around, and it is easy to say “Hi,” as you walk by. People like to find something common to talk about. It may be where you are from – perhaps they have a friend or relative that lives near where you lived. It could be where have you been or where are you going next? Many times you find a common interest and you find yourselves exchanging cards. Oh, yes we all have cards to pass out. We have learned to immediately write on the backs of these cards the place and date we met, and the common experiences we shared, otherwise they become a source of great puzzlement. A few of these new friends have joined our ranks of faithful blogee’s. Then we can discover when our paths are crossing again and arrange a meeting. When we do we get to share where we each have gone since we last met. We tell our tales of harrowing adventure and learn about the best places to visit on future adventures.

People with like interests tend to travel similar routes it seems. Almost like Birds of a Feather, and of course that is why people join these BOF groups.

So where does this lead us? My advice to our friends back home is to take a walk. Walk around your neighborhood. Wave at the neighbors and strike up a conversation. We keep a bag of doggie treats on the dash of our coach. When someone walks by with a dog we grab our bag and introduce ourselves. We get to enjoy petting a pampered pooch; we strike up a conversation and once in a while we make some wonderful new friends.

From somewhere on the desert near Quartzsite Arizona we send our love to all of our friends and relatives around the country.

Gary and Judy

This mine has everything. A Glory Hole, a 3,000 foot deep mine shaft half full of water, tumbledown buildings, cyanide laced tailings, rattlesnakes, scorpions, ghosts and a hanging tree. Apparently the mine closed at the beginning of World War II. Everyone just walked away from the mine and the buildings were just left to tumble down. The big equipment has mostly been stripped out, but the cookhouse still has a huge wood or coal fired stove in it. The five door ice box stands open and dishes are drying on the drain board. The Assay office reminded us of the lab at Boise Cascade in St. Helens. There were pipettes, burettes and crucibles scattered about the work benches. This building is built from some of the same rock that was mined, and is rumored to contain near a million dollars worth of gold and silver. The mine produced over $200 million in gold and silver before it was shut down in 1942. They estimate there are two or three times that much left in the mine. Anyone want to buy a gold mine, I hear tell it is for sale. Some of the buildings at the mine were built in 1884, but they don’t look a day over a hundred years old. We cautiously ventured into some of the buildings, but often the rafters were sagging and the floor boards were loose or missing. There is a huge ironwood tree in front of the ruins of Henry Wickenburg’s house. This is the infamous hanging tree where eighteen men were rumored to have been hung for “high-grading ore.” Apparently the owners didn’t take kindly to the workers helping their selves to the good stuff.

The Glory Hole deserves some special comments. This was a cavernous mine, apparently hand dug. It was mostly a large room and the original miners left large central columns to support the roof. In later years seven men and their mules were in the Glory Hole chipping away at the high grade ore that made up the columns. They calculated a little too close and the whole shebang caved in on them. Their bones are still under the rubble with their mules.

One has to speculate, are the ghosts from the eighteen hanged men or the seven foolish miners and their mules? We didn’t stick around after sundown to check out this part of the mine ledgends.

This site is also used for filming movies of the old west and occasionally for centerfold photo shoots. If you go to our website you will see our version of a centerfold. www.dinsmore-enterprises.com/20060110.html

From Arizona we all send our love and greetings – Peggy, Ray, Judy and Gary.

Our Pinup in the Bunkhouse

Sourdough Prospectors Strike a Pose at Vulture Mine.

Who Am I?

When I was just a wee little people and had my first birthday I was about the size of a kernel of corn. I was green all over, and I was hiding under a nice big Palo Verde tree. My Palo Verde tree was like a nurse maid to me. It shaded me from the fierce sun in the Sonoran Desert. It also protects me from the frost of the cold desert nights. Some of my family was not so lucky. They germinated out in the open and they didn’t survive. It is like a million to one that I made it to my first birthday.

By my fifth birthday I was nearly the size of a ping-pong ball. Even if you found me under my nurse bush you wouldn’t want to play with me. I have lots of thorns to protect me. By my tenth birthday, I was still only the size of a golf ball.

Like many teenagers I really started to shoot up. By the time I was fifteen I was almost a foot tall. When I was about 35 years old I was getting to be taller than my nurse tree, and then I began to put on a crown of white flowers every May. I could produce millions of seeds in these flowers, but I needed the help of the night flying bats, birds and insects to pollinate my flowers.

About the time I turned 75 I decided I needed to grow some arms. I can grow more flowers on the tops of my arms and that way I can produce millions more seeds. Two arms were not enough for me. I grew more and more arms and by the time I was a hundred and fifty years old I had eleven arms. Now I am fifty feet tall and I expect to live for another fifty years. Perhaps when you grow up and come to the Sonoran Desert you will visit me on the side of Ajo Mountain. I can’t move, I weigh about eight tons so you will have to come visit me.

Some people come into the desert in the middle of summer when my fruit ripen. They like to knock my ripe fruit off and make jellies out of them. These people have lived in the desert since before I can remember. They tell their children stories about me and how I and all of my family growing on this mountain look like people standing in the moonlight.

Who am I? You can find the letters of my name by writing down the first letter of each word in the next sentence. “Soon all good used axles run out.” To pronounce my name say the “gu” like a “w” and say Sah-WAH-roe.

Below are  some pictures of me.

This was written by Papa and Nana Dinsmore. We hope you have enjoyed the story.

I am a Saguaro Cactus, I live on Ajo Mountain

I am a Saguaro Teenager, I have lots of thorns

We got an early start this morning from Benson Arizona, one of our Escapee Co-Op parks. We planned a short drive, and we pulled into the Pima Air Museum in Tucson, just after it opened. We spent most of the day looking over the museum airplanes. We also took a bus ride tour to the Davis-Monahan Aerospace Maintenance and Regeneration Center. That is a big name that boils down to an acronym, AMARC, and is a parking lot for over 4,000 military airplanes of about every type you can think of. Red Bearon, my Beanie Babies aviator bear, got to get up close to several airplanes and get his picture taken. I think his favorite was the Super Guppy built in 1962 to carry Apollo space craft components. Check out the photo below. You will have to squint to see him, he is pretty small.

We send our New Year’s greeting so all of our friends and relatives.

Love from Gary and Judy.

By the way, you can hardly call this roughing it. We have cell phone, internet and electricity. It might get down to freezing tonight, however.

Gary

Red Bearon Checks Out the Super Guppy

Cactus Trail in Tucson Mountain Park