The last of the cascara tree

It was another good day to work outside.  I got the last of the cascara trees sawed up and hauled away.  I also took a couple of loads of branches broken off by the snow to the compost pile.

This evening I epoxied the two halves of the stabilizer to the fuselage.  I ended up getting everything I had planned done today which doesn't happen too often.

Spring Flowers

When I went out to the shop this morning the thermostat had not turned the pellet stove up yet so it was cool in there.  I decided to put my coat on and get some pictures of the Easter Lilies (Trillium).  This bunch is just North of the shop porch.

These are the daffodils along the driveway.

We have two different varieties, these are over by the ponds and there are more of this type South of my shop.

This azalea was given to us by Mrs. Larkin when we lived on Buland Drive and it has survived several moves.

The heather sure looks nice when you take a closeup with the camera's macro setting turned on.

This is my favorite of our primroses.

The primroses are sure hardy, it seems like I run over them every year with the lawn mower and they just keep coming back.  Maybe I will give them a little TLC this year.

Last year there was only one plum on this tree but it looks like there will be plenty this year.

We worked on cleaning up the cascara debris today.  We did three trailer loads and it looks like one more will do it. 

P-40's retracts

I got the P-40's retracts installed today.  Then I joined the two halves temporarily for this picture so I could show one up and the other down.  I have run them up and down quite a bit just to watch them turn as they move.

The full sized P-40 has stiffeners to brace the top wing skin.  I like to add them as it makes the wheel well stand out.  I also like to paint inside the wheel well to seal it from water if I am flying off of damp grass.  The green is close to the color of the zinc chromate that is used to stop corrosion in the real P-40.  I took a break this afternoon and hauled off a couple of garden trailer loads of limbs from the cascara tree.

Yesterday we started out to get the mail and some screws I needed for the retracts.  Michelle and Mik had told us about the good selection that Wilco in Kelso had so we took the scenic route down there.  They have a great supply and it is my go to place for screws now.  It was lunch time by then and we ended up going to Panera Bread.  I had their flatbread pizza and Vera had a salad, both were good so we now have another favorite for lunches.  It was so nice when we got home that I hauled off a couple of loads of cascara branches.

Falling the Cascara Trees

 

I have not liked these cascara trees for several years, they put down lots of leaves in the ponds.  Yesterday I took the top off the one on the right.  I used a small pruning chainsaw mounted on my 24 foot extension pole.  But it was really awkward to use and didn't feel safe.

Today I set up the ladder and tied it to the middle tree.  I put my fall arrester gear on and hooked up two safety lines to it.  I used my regular pole saw along with the small pruner chainsaw from yesterday and things worked much better.

Vera took lots of pictures and this one was the best at showing a limb falling.

This was about as far up as I could reach.

Vera asked for a smile as I was getting ready to come down, I had cut all the limbs I could reach.

I hooked a nylon rope to each tree and used the cable winch to pull them in the direction I wanted them to go.  I managed to get them to fall to the North even though they were all leaning South.

This is how it looked when we got done.  Vera moved a lot of the branches and piled them behind the rhododendron.
Two of the trees merged into a single stump.

I had been online looking about how to kill a stump and found a reference to using copper nails.  When I looked on Amazon they got good reviews so I ordered some.  I drilled 3/16th inch holes and pounded the nails onto them.  I put eight in the big stump and two in each of the smaller ones.  Now we will wait and see if they work.

This was a tedious job!

 

After getting the retract mounting block installed it was time start mounting the retracts and modifying the struts.  I had to shorten the gear leg by about a half inch.  Then take out the bushing from the part I cut off, figure out where the mounting hole needed to be and drill it.  Finding the three millimeter tap was next, then I tapped the set screw hole.

I had to do some trimming on the fiberglass cover to get everything working the way I wanted.  Now I just need to do the same to the right wing but it should go faster since I have a pattern to copy.

We have daffodils in four different locations around the place and they are all blooming so we have a little color to look at.  I did some cleanup on the limbs that got broken off this winter.  Some of them would have made nice fire wood if we still used wood heat.  Pellets are sure a lot less work.  I have a cart with a hydraulic lift that I store them on and just wheel it up to the stove, pump it up to the right level so I can just dump the pellets in the hopper without lifting the bag.

A nice spring day!

It was a beautiful day, lots of sunlight and fairly warm out.  The new solar lights showed up today to replace the ones that had quit.  I got them assembled and set out so they could charge.  Vera and I got outside and did some cleanup around the daffodils this afternoon.  It sure was nice to get out and enjoy the sun.  

When I came in from the shop tonight I decided to try the new phone's camera on the moon and it turned out pretty good.

On the way in I took this picture of the little pond where I had put three of the new solar lights.  A funny thing happened to me when I first went to the shop this morning.  As I walked up to the shop I heard a siren, I turned to look toward the road to watch it go by and it went off behind me.  I was a little confused for a moment until I realized I must have accidently turned that feature on in my new security camera.  Needles to say I called up the app and turned it off.

Hail

Boy did it hail once today at about 12:30.  It was so loud in the house that Vera thought it was a truck or some kind of machinery.  Luckily we had already unloaded the groceries from our Fred Meyer pickup this morning.  Of course later it was sun shiny with lots of blue sky, then back to rain.  There hasn't been much going on here the last couple of days.  I have been working on the P-40 and finally have the retract mounts installed, now I have started on the aileron servo mounts.  I finally went to bed at the right time last night so I think I am all adjusted to daylight savings time.  I was so far off schedule that I missed half of Lets make a Deal Monday!  I hope you all are adjusting well.

Five Meters

 

This is the balloon powered car that James made in my shop.  The car had to travel two meters to get full credit, traveling three meters got extra credit.  James ran it today and it went five meters.

Vera was excited to find this early crocus in bloom, it looks like spring might be here.

The first daffodil also bloomed today and it looks like we will have a bunch more in the next few days. 

It was a nice warm day, I spent the afternoon without a coat working in the yard.  It looked like there might be a lot of color in the sunset tonight but it never happened.  We stood outside watching until a mosquito landed on my head.  I spent the evening finishing up the P-40's left retract mount.  Now that I have a pattern the right one should go pretty fast.

3-10-2022 this was the view of Steve and Dianne's roofing job this morning from my shop.  I looked out once in a while, they are sure a lot faster than I would be.

A New Project

 

I got this P-40 Warhawk down last night and decided to build it.  I have had it for years, I started on it once but didn't like the retracts that came with it so it went up on the shelf.  Retracts have gotten better and I had an extra set that looked like they would work great.  While checking it out this morning I noticed all the shingles were off Steve and Dianne's house.

Of course I had to wander out and check out how they were doing.  All Weather Roofing was doing the job, the same ones who did ours a couple of years ago.

I had a great time watching the progress today, this is where they quit for the day on the West side.

I went around to see how the East side looked and had to climb up into the tree house to get a good picture.  It looks like they have most of the shingles on this side.

As I was heading out after dinner to work on the P-40 some more I stopped and took this picture of the shop as the sun was setting.  I made good headway this evening and have the second retract all fitted.  I am also adding a six millimeter carbon fiber rod to each wing to reinforce the area where the retract goes.  It was a good day, lots of activity around the neighborhood to watch, I saw Parker outside so I went over and had a nice visit with him.

Vera had brought in some rhubarb crisp from the freezer today.  I had it with caramel ice cream for a treat as I did today's blog.

Test Flying

 

I have four planes that I built this winter ready for test flights.  Today I loaded up the two gliders that were ready and we headed to Toledo.  This is the Electra that I built with a Vee tail.  The fog had lifted enough by ten thirty for me to test fly it.  It flew great and only needed a couple of minor trim adjustments.

The transparent covering shows better in this picture.  When the sun came out later it looked very nice in the air with the sun shining through it.

This is the Radian I won in the raffle at the Mt Rainier Radio Control Society meeting last month.  It flew great also, I found some nice lift and stayed up a long time with it.  I have to change the programing in the transmitter so I can have the timer running.  I also got the Extra 300 out and put a couple of flights on it.  I only made seven or eight flights today but the ones with the gliders were nice and long.

Mt St Helens was sure showing up good this afternoon.  When the sun came out I was able to take my coat off but I still had my heated vest on.

There was lots of activity at the airport this afternoon.  As I was out taking pictures of the mountains this Piper Tri-Pacer flew by in the pattern. 

I realized it would be coming by Mt Rainier so I got ready and took a couple of pictures as it turned final.  It was a good day, we had a nice lunch of left over pizza that Michelle had given us yesterday.  I was going to set up the satellite tv but the inverter wouldn't stay on, then I couldn't find the remote.  I finally gave up on that idea and went back to flying. 

The Gierloff Visit

Today Raymond Gierloff came up to visit.  He brought with him his granddaughter Madison, grandson Rhett and Richard's son Todd.  Todd lives in Longview and I learned he had seen me fly one of my planes at Chris and Marge's place when he was a teenager.  It got him interested, he and Chris built a Senior Kadet (which he still has) and learned to fly radio control.  When he was older he got a pilots license and told me I was his inspiration to do all that.  That sure made me feel good. 

I had mentioned my blog and had the latest book sitting on the coffee table.  Pretty soon three of the books were in use.

Cathy, Michelle, Mik and James came up.  James got there first with pizza from Lexi's in Lexington and it was really good.  Cathy brought a chocolate treat that was really popular as there was not much left.  Madison is a teacher, she and Michelle seemed to really hit it off.

Raymond sat in my chair for a few minutes but seemed to prefer visiting in the kitchen, he and Vera spent a long time visiting in there.  Michelle had gotten some information from Rhett, Madison and Raymond that she added to our family tree in her Ancestry account.  It was a good afternoon spent getting to know cousins we had never met before.  When the weather warms up we are going to make a trip down to see them. 

Richard

3-1-2022 

I got a call from Barry this morning and found out we had lost cousin Richard Gierloff on February 27th.  He was a nice guy who really enjoyed the wildlife around him.

I got these first two pictures from his Facebook page and there were lots of comments from family and friends about visiting him and enjoying the firepit.

Vera and I visited him on our anniversary in 2019 and got to enjoy the firepit with him.  We talked about a lot of great memories.

2-28-2022 Boy did we get a lot of rain today, the driveway looked like a creek was flowing through it.  The last time I looked we had two and a quarter inches of rain, then the power went out and it reset to zero.

3-1-2022 We made a run to town and stopped by Lions Pride Park.  A couple of days ago there were eight vehicles parked over there fishing now it looks like they will not be back anytime soon.

3-2-2022  Vera had bible study today, this afternoon I had a dental appointment at the Salmon Creek Kaiser in Vancouver.  From Kalama to past Woodland it was a terrible drive with lots of rain, fog and spray from trucks.  We got there early so I played with the new phone.  I was able to hook up to the security camera at home and take this picture.  I could also move the camera to see other parts of the room.  It will eventually be outside and has a tracking feature so it will follow people around. 

On the way home we stopped at Pacific Northwest Best Fish in Ridgefield to try their halibut fish and chips.  They were great and are now our favorite place to get them.

The drive home was just as bad as the trip down.  It finally cleared up when we got to Kelso, I stopped on Holcomb road to take this picture of the sunset.  It sure felt good to kick back and relax this evening.