Replacement door progress: almost there!

May 8, 2020 / Re-Farmer / 3 Comments

Today, I finally got a chance to continue working on the replacement door for the sun room.

Cutting out recesses for the hinges.

To line them up with the recesses that are already in the door frame, I dragged the broken door over and lined it up with the replacement door.

After making sure they were facing the right way, I used one of the hinges we took off to line up the recessed area, then traced around it.

And only now, as I look at this photo, I realize that for all the care I took to line it up and facing the right way, I got it backwards.

Dangit!

Ah, well. We’ll work it out.

*sigh*

I ended up carving out the recess with a combination of chiselling it, and shaving it with a utility knife.

My daughter then turned the door to access the outside of it, painted the carved out areas, and gave the outside of the door a final coat. It’s got some rough areas in the wood, so she really wanted to make sure it was well coated to protect it from the weather.

Now that I realize I goofed on the recesses, I’ll just carve out the remaining bit, so the recess runs across the door, then we’ll paint that over, too.

Ugh. I can’t believe I made such an obvious error. I even remember telling myself, when thinking about it a couple of days ago, to make sure I didn’t do that!

What a goof I am! :-D

The Re-Farmer

Not the problem I expected to have!

November 10, 2019 / Re-Farmer / Leave a comment

When we rigged up the shelf outside the sun room to be a cat shelter, there were a few things I identified as potential problems. The tarp is staple gunned in place, for example, and I could see those giving out easily.

What I never imagined happening, however, is what I found this morning.

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Headlight fixed

September 22, 2019 / Re-Farmer / Leave a comment

Have I mentioned before, that I have the most awesome brother?

Maybe just a few times.

Because it’s true!

After spending about 6 or 7 hours working on the garage door, while packing up his tools, he remembered he also wanted to fit the headlight on my van.

We burn lights out on the van rather quickly; there seems to be an electrical problem in the system. My driver’s side low beam bulb was burnt out again, but the passenger side low beam light would sometimes be on, sometimes be off.

When I bought a new bulb, I got a pair of them to replace both bulbs. While changing the bulb on the passenger side, I discovered why it was doing the flicky thing.

A wire was breaking. While changing the bulb, it finally broke completely.

There was not a lot of wire to work with there, but when I sent a photo to my brother, he said he thought he could fix it.

And he did.

After stripping, cleaning and tinning the wires, he slipped a piece of shrink wrap over one wire, then soldered the exposed ends together. There wasn’t enough wire available to twist them together, as I would normally have thought to do. I couldn’t even help him, other than to hold a light for him, because there was just no room for more fingers in there! He managed to hold the wires together, while also holding the hot soldering iron in one hand, soldering wire in the other.

The shrink material has adhesive on the inside, so after using a heat gun on it to shrink it, it formed a permanent, water tight seal.

Which didn’t stop him from also adding some electric tape around it, too!

There used to be a both soldering irons and soldering guns here, and while packing things up and looking around, I have found soldering wire, but that’s it. I do have my own soldering iron; just a tiny thing that’s part of a wood burning kit. This is one thing I might have been able to do on my own, and now that I’ve seen it done, I know I can. I don’t have the shrink wrap or a heat gun, so I couldn’t do that part, though.

The main thing is, I now have two working headlights again! :-)

The Re-Farmer

Fixing the garage door

September 22, 2019 / Re-Farmer / Leave a comment

The last couple of days have been very, very wet! :-D First, we had a series of thunderstorms that lasted all day Friday and on through the night. On Saturday, we were no longer getting thunderstorm warnings, but we were still getting weather warnings for heavy rain.

As usual, the weather systems were more to the north and south of us, but we did still get quite the light show, and a lot of rain.

Oh, and our internet cut out.

Repeatedly.

So I have some catching up to do!

The rain and damp did not stop my amazing, fantastic, wonderful brother from coming out to fix our garage door!

I honestly thought it wasn’t going to happen, and we’d need to get a new one – something we certainly cannot afford – but he found a way!

Have I mentioned my brother is amazing?

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Adding gate bumpers

July 7, 2019 / Re-Farmer / 2 Comments

After installing the gates this morning, one of the things that we saw as a potential issue is how the gates are, when fully open. Here’s what I mean.

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Gate installation: it’s done!

July 7, 2019 / Re-Farmer / 4 Comments

I have the most awesome brother in the world.

He made the hour + drive out this morning to get the gate up for us, early enough that it was finished well before I drove my daughter to work! He even had enough time to swing by and join my mother for church before heading home.

What a sweetheart!

I got to help. :-)

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Gate posts: progress – first coat of paint done

July 3, 2019 / Re-Farmer / 1 Comment

Yesterday, we went into the city for the last of our Costco shopping. In the process, I swung by a Canadian Tire and picked up the cleaner my brother recommended to get rid of all the lubricant used to get the old hing pins off.

Gotta love all those warnings.

EXTREME DANGER
VERY FLAMMABLE, POISON, IRRITANT

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Main gate: straight

June 30, 2019 / Re-Farmer / 2 Comments

My awesome brother did it again. After I left to pick up my daughter from work, he went at the gate again. By the time we came home, he had straightened the posts and was finishing the job!

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Gate Repair: removing damaged hinges and adding new

June 29, 2019 / Re-Farmer / 1 Comment

I’m absolutely thrilled that my brother and his wife are over for the weekend! Their RV trailer fits in the inner yard, so they even brought their own “house” with them.

My brother, being how he is, was soon working on the damaged gate. More specifically, the gate posts. He’d actually been working on it for a while before he asked me to come and document what he was doing, so he’d managed to get the first of the remaining hinges off by then.

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