Between the River Hills & the River Bottom

[cliftonbros89]

Is that a crack in the part that pipe plug is threaded in? I sure hope it isn’t.

After removing the pipe plug the first time I thought it was a crack as well. When I put the plug back in and started it up, which was when the oil really started to run out that’s when I thought it was for sure a crack. That was when I took the pipe plug out a second time. I didn’t see the crack going through into the threads where the oil actually is. So that was why I decided to try it again. That’s when it didn’t drip any oil at all.

So that’s why I’m going to look into it further. Because I’m really hoping it’s not a crack. If I’d have to replace it, it’d be $288 from Deere, $228 from A&I through Deere and $115 for an aftermarket from Worthington Ag.

 

[MacTexas]

Hows Ben? Is he running with the rest of the herd now?

 

[cliftonbros89]

Hows Ben? Is he running with the rest of the herd now?

That reminds me. Shortly after my nephew came up with the name Ben I found the extra hair on his belly wasn’t covering up what I thought it was. At that point Ben was in the barn and I’d just hang the bucket of milk on the gate every morning. I noticed some loose and light colored piles in the barn one morning so I grabbed Ben’s tail to check his rear end out a little bit and that’s when I noticed Ben was actually a little heifer.

But she’s been doing good. Right now she’s in the lot with a few old cows and one of their calves. They have a little grass to chew on and I regularly give them corn and hay. But soon we’ll be moving her with the other calves. The lot over at my uncle’s are due to get their shots so we’ll take her over there to get hers as well and then she’ll stay with that group.

Since she’s pretty well behaved and came from a good cow I’d say we’ll likely hold on to her to keep for a cow.

 

[1Garageman]

Quick farming question after I saw the picture of corn. Behind my mom and dads house is farmland and they have either corn or beans in it every year. They also have over 20 deer out there every night eating away at their crop! Do you have that problem? And do farmers usually do anything to keep wild animals from eating up their crops???

 

[cliftonbros89]

Quick farming question after I saw the picture of corn. Behind my mom and dads house is farmland and they have either corn or beans in it every year. They also have over 20 deer out there every night eating away at their crop! Do you have that problem? And do farmers usually do anything to keep wild animals from eating up their crops???

There are a few fields we have some problems with deer. We’ve had times when they’ve cleared out an acre or two of beans in a few fields. Then a few times when it’s been about 5 acres. But there’s really not much you can do about it. Unless they’d make an absolute disaster of things the conservation would maybe allow you to eliminate some deer out of season. But I’d be willing to bet it would have to be a rather substantial amount of acres before they’d even consider allowing that.

I know of one field that had a corner that’s a good acre that the deer have cleared out. With the river flooding so much of the bottom and backing up the creeks into the woods it’s pushed a lot of deer usually residing in those areas up into the hills. We’ve definitely noticed it around dad’s house.

 

[cliftonbros89]

Well today was another day.

Started the day by checking on all of the cattle.

But after getting the cattle lined out, and my dad and my uncle lined out I headed to the bottom.

Time to disk up some some ground. That ground that was never planted.



I worked over 100 acres. Had to skip a few spots because they’re still to wet. In September. This is the first time some of this ground has been worked since last spring. As you can see in the last picture there were plenty of times I had to stop to pick up large pieces of drift wood out of the way.

Then we had a seed plot demonstration to go. The same guys that took us to the farm progress show. So learned a little bit about some special kinds of hybrids, how the want us to spend some money and how the markets aren’t paying out to make up the difference. But at least they supplied the beer for the evening. That was the one plus.
Oh....besides my “free” hat.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[XJSuperman]

Lots of updates that were nice to see. Im jealous of the trailer as well.

The Farm Progress Show swaps between Decatur, Ill and Boone, Ia every year. Boone is 15min from me so I usually go when its there. One of these years Ill get to the Half Century of Progress. I always miss it.

 

[lis2323]

I had to scroll back to find the story on that stepdeck trailer.

Holy ****. $1500. That purchase was a no brainer.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[Farmall450]

Lots of updates that were nice to see. Im jealous of the trailer as well.

The Farm Progress Show swaps between Decatur, Ill and Boone, Ia every year. Boone is 15min from me so I usually go when its there. One of these years Ill get to the Half Century of Progress. I always miss it.

It was pretty good this year. Great weather, too.

 

[FarmerWill]

Just found this.
Greetings from South Texas.
Our place is semi-retired. Too small to make it on its own, leased out to someone else.
Still take care of it, still live there.
Nice to see someone still making it work.

 

[cliftonbros89]

Lots of updates that were nice to see. Im jealous of the trailer as well.

The Farm Progress Show swaps between Decatur, Ill and Boone, Ia every year. Boone is 15min from me so I usually go when its there. One of these years Ill get to the Half Century of Progress. I always miss it.

It was a good buy for sure.

I couldn’t remember where the other location for it was. It’s not a bad show. Lots of neat stuff and demonstrations at it. But I do get a little annoyed with all the companies just showcasing their outrageously huge stuff.

Then all the new innovations. I’m not saying some of this stuff isn’t a good idea. But they all want you to invest all this money into this extra new stuff. But so do the seed guys, so do the fertilizer guys, so do the cattle supply guys, so do the cattle barn guys. Everyone from every side wants you to invest this extra dollar cuz it will supposedly save you this much on something else. But when corn drops to $3.24 and you’re already a couple hundreds acres shy of what you usually have planted you don’t always have that extra money to spend on the stuff.

 

[cliftonbros89]

I had to scroll back to find the story on that stepdeck trailer.

Holy ****. $1500. That purchase was a no brainer.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

Yeah after dad seeing a lot of trailers sell online he was prepared for the guy to want at least $5,000. He said he really wasn’t sure what to do when the guy said he just wanted $1,500.

 

[cliftonbros89]

Just found this.

Greetings from South Texas.

Our place is semi-retired. Too small to make it on its own, leased out to someone else.

Still take care of it, still live there.

Nice to see someone still making it work.

Thanks. We try. But a year like this it isn’t exactly the easiest.

 

[cliftonbros89]

Today was just about a repeat of yesterday.

Checked the cattle, ground some feed.

We finally moved the “new” rotary hoe to the shed in the bottom.

Then I got back to running the disk.

I started in the bottom field where we have the lonely 20 acres of beans planted.


There were quite a few big weeds in that field. A few spots I ended up going over 3 times to get things knocked down and leveled up decent.

Glad the disk knocked everything down so I didn’t have to sickle mow it like these guys next to that place.


Then it was off to another field, where there is still some water out of the banks of a big drainage ditch.


I knocked out a pretty good chunk of it.

Dad drove around and picked up pieces of drift wood in the field while I was rolling.

We ended up quitting a little early again. Another dinner with a company wanting to talk about seed for next year again.

It gets a little old when they want you to book seed now for next year when this year’s crop isn’t even out of the field yet. But it happens every year.

I feel like I’m sort of getting something done this week for once. I guess that counts for something.

Markets are still ****, things are actually starting to get a little too dry for once. Beans sure could use a little shower again. A few combined are starting to get out in the fields for the guys who managed to get corn out before all of our monsoon rains we had this spring. But it’s been very minimal.

 

[cliftonbros89]

New tool for the week. Picked up this little guy online to pack along with my metal detector. Just not sure when I’ll get a chance to use it again.

 

[FarmerWill]

Thanks. We try. But a year like this it isn’t exactly the easiest.

Believe me, I understand completely! My leases are production based- while yields are up, our prices for milo and cotton are @#$)&!@#$ ****. I hate this trade war garbage!

Gotta do some maintenance on my stuff this weekend.

Glad to know we're not the only ones doing this stuff.

 

[cliftonbros89]

Believe me, I understand completely! My leases are production based- while yields are up, our prices for milo and cotton are @#$)&!@#$ ****. I hate this trade war garbage!



Gotta do some maintenance on my stuff this weekend.



Glad to know we're not the only ones doing this stuff.

I’ve heard down in the bootheel of Missouri and other places the cotton yield has been record breaking but I have also recently heard the market has really gone to hell.

I’ve got plenty of maintenance I need to get to myself. But I’m trying to get this disking out of the way first. Then I want to get everything with our calves out of the way next week so I can, for the most part, getting shop work done before we’re back in the field.

 

[cliftonbros89]

Friday was another day on repeat.

Took care of everything for the cattle. Then it was off to the bottom.





Another full day of disking.

I worked on disking up the rest of the ground and went over some places a second time where the weeds were really big and tall. Dad started going over some of the ground with the field cultivator behind me.

 

[cliftonbros89]

Saturday was pretty much the same.

Took care of the cattle. Noah joined me for the day too. We checked on all the cattle. Then off to the bottom.

It’s a farm outside the levee that we were supposed to take over this year. But obviously that never happened due to the waters. So dad wanted me to start disking that ground up.

Due to some water stuck in low spots from the river the farm is split in two right now. Access to the one side is only available at an entry about a mile or so up the road into someone else’s field. Then of corse almost a mile down through the field to get to the second half of this farm.

While I disked dad had Noah help him pick up drift wood through the field.

It took majority of the day to take care of it. I went over the whole thing twice to really knock things down and break things apart. There was quite a bit of drift wood to pick up too.

So once we knocked that all out it was nearing 6 so we decided to call it a day early. The little, almost nonexistent, old town up the road a few miles from dad’s was having their annual end of summer picnic so we finished the day with a few burgers and a cold beer.

 

[cliftonbros89]

Today I was thinking of taking it easy. But I had planned to get up and get to it anyway. But we’ve had some surprise thunderstroms moving through this morning. Just catching the tail end of it. Which is ok. We could use a bit of rain. So I may end up taking it easy today anyway.

 

[cliftonbros89]

Sunday the rain didn’t end up amounting to much. But I guess it was better than nothing. But I decided to take the day off.

Monday was another day and pretty much a repeat of last week.

I checked on all the cattle. Fed some corn. Looked things over. Then it was off to the bottom.


I finished disking what I could and went over some spots a second time. I ran the field cultivator a little bit with the 8400 but had to quit early as I had a MU Extension council meeting.

 

[cliftonbros89]

Tuesday was a bit different for once.

I checked all the cattle over as usual. Then we moved the big calves around at dad’s.



56 calves total. We separated some smaller calves that could using some growing yet. Then we also held back a number of heifers. We’re thinking about holding on to some to keep for cows. But we’re going to work with them a bit and look them all over to decide which ones and how many we’d like to keep. But the remaining 31 we loaded up to take to one of the auction barns for a sale tomorrow.

So that took a good chunk of the day.

Since I finally had a chance I went to the shop to do some work.

After grinding a few batches of feed with the 4020 I washed it off to further look over the oil leak issue.

After cleaning it up I noticed that there indeed had to be a crack. I took the plug out and put some sealer on it just in case and snugged it up good. Then I decided to take a chance on a fix. I spread a little bit of JB weld over the spot where the hairline crack appeared to be. The final job looks better than it appears in the picture.

I also put the fixed tire back on that I picked up last week. I let the it sit in the shop for now. I’m letting the JB weld sit up good overnight. Then I’ll shape it up and try it out and see if it fixed the problem. Not exactly the type of fix it job I usually do. But hopefully it’ll get us by for awhile.

Next I moved over to the 4010. Since I’d been trying to bleed the brakes I’d been getting rather annoyed with the bleed screws.

Someone over time had just about rounded the heads off and as if it wasn’t hard enough to get them to turn that just made them worse. So I put in some new ones.

The tip of the old ones (left) were showing some wear anyway. So I plan on bleeding the brakes again and then pulling it out and calling it good for now.

So since that was finished for now and after I’d helped dad load the second bunch of calves I got back to the SCV couplers on the 7510. They’re easy enough to take out. But they’re a bit of a pain to take part after they’re out. Now of corse John Deere makes a special tool for this. But of corse it’s impossible to find without going to the dealer and there are no sort of aftermarket style options of the tool either. Not to mention I can only imagine what sort of price they’d have on it.

Now I looked in the manual and of corse they never show any image of what the tool actually looks like. So I decided to try what I thought just might do the trick.

I went up to the parts loft and grabbed a few old pioneer style couplers that we’re sitting around. I had the couplers out of the housing and just put the little ball bearings back in the front of the coupler with the bushing that keeps them in place and the snap ring for the bushing. I popped it on the male coupler and it worked just great to use the wrench to undo the back to take everything apart.

That worked great. But only for 2 of the 4 I was doing. The other 2 were super tight. Due to the ball bearings the female end would just spin on the male end which was in the vise. I’d put the wrench on the back end to undo it and it would just spin.

Now holding a round, oily, super smooth piece is about impossible when trying to unscrew a tight cap end from it. A pipe wrench definitely isn’t an option for this part. So I sat down a minute and got to thinking a bit. The male coupler worked great to hold it. But I needed something to keep it from spinning.



So I took the male coupler. Knocked the center out with a punch and hammer. Then I put it on the female end, which I took the ball bearings out of and marked where one of holes would line up on to the male end. Drilled a hole all the way through with a 3/16” drill bit. Then I used a heavy gauge wire (that we use for fencing, the likes of corner post and what not) and stuck it through both couplers after having them together. This allowed me to still hold the whole thing in place in the vise and kept the whole thing from spinning while I broke the back end loose with the wrench.


I take that John Deere!

I have to say I was a little impressed with my quick thinking on this one. Not much to it but it definitely helps out. It’ll be a big help for reassembly too. Homemade tool to the rescue.

So I put the order in for parts tonight. Not sure when I’ll get them. But we’ll be back to dealing with cattle tomorrow so I doubt I’ll be getting back to it for a day or so.

River is slowly, slowly falling. It’s finally under 20’. Markets went up a few cents. But not much. They’re still down there. Supposed to be a new report come out tomorrow, we’ll see if it goes up anymore.

Also, it may be September but this week it’s like July. Mid nineties with humidity way up there too. I’m not enjoying it very much.

 

[mudcat]

Just a FYI for ya. Parker Hannifin builds those couplers for John Deere. They use a custom socket that has ball bearings that line up with the ball holes for torqueing them together. I do appreciate your creative homemade tool. I am curious what parts you ordered. I would have assumed they only sell the whole coupler all ready assembled.

As a guy that grew up as a farm kid, I greatly appreciate everything you do and really appreciate you sharing some of your work here.

 

[cliftonbros89]

Just a FYI for ya. Parker Hannifin builds those couplers for John Deere. They use a custom socket that has ball bearings that line up with the ball holes for torqueing them together. I do appreciate your creative homemade tool. I am curious what parts you ordered. I would have assumed they only sell the whole coupler all ready assembled.

As a guy that grew up as a farm kid, I greatly appreciate everything you do and really appreciate you sharing some of your work here.

I assumed it was probably Parker. I’ve noticed a lot of that type of stuff has gone through Parker.

I may have to try and find it through Parker just to check it out. But I was assuming it probably had bearings on it to lock it in place. That was how I came up with a way to lock it in place.

I’m just getting all new seal kits for them for now. I can get the whole assembly as one piece. But do redo the seal kits plus a few other small things it’s going to only cost $68. If I’d go the route of replacing the full assembly plus seal kits for the housing we’d be looking at the neighborhood of around $550 to do everything. So I’m just going with the seal kits for now and cleaning everything up good. If problems develop further. Then I’ll replace the assembly. But I think they’ll hold up for awhile.

Thanks!

 

[cliftonbros89]

So I had a few minutes and decided to try to contact Parker to see if they could assist me. Just being curious. So I found the department to contact via email on their website. Then shortly after I received a response,

“All of our product to John Deere is proprietary. You must contact John Deere. We are not allowed to assist.”

Who would’ve guessed it? Go figure. I guess it was worth a shot. I may try to dig a little deeper when I get a chance. I think my little set-up I came up with yesterday will work. But I’m just curious to see what I may find. The 8000 series couplers show a similar tool in the manual for the 8400. However, it’s a different part number than the tool for the 7510 coupler. It’s easy to see they are made different, so I’m sure there are some differences between the tools.

These types of things always interest me. The way Deere always keeps things secret and keeps you from finding things without going through them.

It reminds me of people who use the internet or parts stores like O’Reilly’s for everything for vehicles. They have no idea what it’s like to deal with stuff for tractors. Aside from some filters, nuts, bolts, basic hoses and a few electrical things it’s almost impossible to avoid buying directly from the dealer.

 

[GGB]

Impressive fix! I’ll be passing that along to our nephew to see if we can duplicate. With current prices, we need all the help we can get.......

GGB

 

[cliftonbros89]

Impressive fix! I’ll be passing that along to our nephew to see if we can duplicate. With current prices, we need all the help we can get.......



GGB

Thanks. It was a pretty quick setup.

 

[cliftonbros89]

Well things, naturally, didn’t start as I’d thought.

I checked the retirement farm cattle.

Got to dad’s and he decided he wanted to sort through the rest of the calves. We cut out 12 heifers from the lot and loaded up the rest of them and one of the old cows to haul off to the cattle barn to join the calves from yesterday for the sale today.

While dad took those off to the auction, and had a flat on the way, we let the heifers just relax at the barn.


When he came back we ran the weened calves through the chute for their shots and castrated the bulls.

Then we moved them over to dad’s.

Ben is now with them too. She got her shots too. It’ll be interesting to see how she does with the rest of them.

Then dad headed out for some things.

While dad was gone I went to the shop.

The 4020 seemed to be good to go. So I put it back together and go it out of the shop.

Took care of a few other things. Got some things from town. Dad had to make some stops in town too.

Cleaned out the waterer for the calves too.

Did a few other jobs in the shop as well.

When dad came back we took the 12 heifers over to my uncle’s to run them through the chute for a round of shots and ear tags. Then we took them back to dad’s. We’re going to keep them out in a lot by themselves for awhile. They’ve got a bit to go before we put them with a bull.

 

[Farmall450]

Nice job on the tool. No surprise that JD has parker locked down; just gotta find a friendly insider and get the P#.

 

[cliftonbros89]

Nice job on the tool. No surprise that JD has parker locked down; just gotta find a friendly insider and get the P#.

Thanks.

I can’t say I was surprised either. You don’t become on of the largest corporations in the world, with the second largest part distribution center in the world without tying up all your loose ends.

 

[cliftonbros89]

Started the day just like most days.

Checked on all the cattle and fed some mineral. Trying to get a better head count on how many more calves we need to ween.


Unloaded the feed supplement that dad picked up yesterday and ground a batch of feed for bucket feeding.

Fed the heifers corn. Then I drove around and walked around all the fences where we’re planning on letting the heifers out. Then also checked the fence around the pasture where we moved the smaller calves to dad’s yesterday.

Luckily all were in good shape.

Since we’re going to be weening some more calves I drove over to my uncle’s to clean out the barn where we feed the calves. It was pretty messy.

The regular bucket for the 4020 is currently on the 3020 out at the retirement farm. So I used the other bucket. But it has prongs on the bottom of it making it hard to scoop up at the end of the shed.

So I pitchforked several buckets full of straw and manure on the loader.


I cleaned the shed out at the barn at dad’s too which the 4020 just barely fits in. But I cleaned it out.

All together I ended up with two rounded over dump bed loads for the 4440 to haul off.

I finished with all of that by 1. So I stopped for lunch and took a little bit at lunch looking some things up that we’re thinking about picking up. Also some parts and the like.

After lunch I went to the shop.


I pulled the service truck in the shop to look it over. It was due for an oil change. So I changed the oil and checked majority of everything else over while it was in there once.

I also replaced the oil pressure sender on it. What a pain in the *** that was. It was a good thing I had this sender crowfoot. It would’ve been even worse without it. It was a reminder why I mainly work on tractors. Everything isn’t all crammed together like a truck.

I finished up a little before dark and fueled it up. I didn’t realize I didn’t have the inline fuel filter at the shop that I’d planned to replace. So hopefully I can get one tomorrow and replace it and the water separator filter with it as well.

That pretty much sums up the day. It was a hot one again. But supposed to be a little bit cooler tomorrow.

Markets didn’t really change any today. They started out up but corn prices fell a little after the USDA report that was released today.

 

[cliftonbros89]

I stopped by the Matco guy’s house last night.

I picked up this Mini-Ductor to try out. It’s older and used. But he’s just letting me do a test run. The guy who it belongs to is no longer going to be doing mechanic work and is selling it. The Matco guy has been telling me about them and I’ve been interested in it so he set things up so I could try it out.

It has coils that you can wrap around seized up bolts and things like that and it’s supposed to heat them up in just seconds. Kind of eliminates having to use a torch for that sort of thing. He said it really worked well in tighter spots or somewhere that you really don’t want to risk damaging something trying to heat things up with a torch.

The Matco guy said they work really well and he’s sold quite a few of them and has never had any complaints. The newer ones are designed different but they do the same job. So I’ll have to find something to try this thing out on. I’m really interested to see how it works.

 

[cvairwerks]

I’ve used some much earlier versions and they will heat up anything that is steel in a hurry. We used them to heat up some glued on nutplates and it only took a few seconds to have them hot enough to weaken the glue and be able to pop them off.

 

[Farmall450]

I stopped by the Matco guy’s house last night.

I picked up this Mini-Ductor to try out. It’s older and used. But he’s just letting me do a test run. The guy who it belongs to is no longer going to be doing mechanic work and is selling it. The Matco guy has been telling me about them and I’ve been interested in it so he set things up so I could try it out.

It has coils that you can wrap around seized up bolts and things like that and it’s supposed to heat them up in just seconds. Kind of eliminates having to use a torch for that sort of thing. He said it really worked well in tighter spots or somewhere that you really don’t want to risk damaging something trying to heat things up with a torch.

The Matco guy said they work really well and he’s sold quite a few of them and has never had any complaints. The newer ones are designed different but they do the same job. So I’ll have to find something to try this thing out on. I’m really interested to see how it works.

I used the same one in HS. They work great.

 

[Toothaker]

So I had a few minutes and decided to try to contact Parker to see if they could assist me. Just being curious. So I found the department to contact via email on their website. Then shortly after I received a response,

“All of our product to John Deere is proprietary. You must contact John Deere. We are not allowed to assist.”

Who would’ve guessed it? Go figure. I guess it was worth a shot. I may try to dig a little deeper when I get a chance. I think my little set-up I came up with yesterday will work. But I’m just curious to see what I may find. The 8000 series couplers show a similar tool in the manual for the 8400. However, it’s a different part number than the tool for the 7510 coupler. It’s easy to see they are made different, so I’m sure there are some differences between the tools.

These types of things always interest me. The way Deere always keeps things secret and keeps you from finding things without going through them.

It reminds me of people who use the internet or parts stores like O’Reilly’s for everything for vehicles. They have no idea what it’s like to deal with stuff for tractors. Aside from some filters, nuts, bolts, basic hoses and a few electrical things it’s almost impossible to avoid buying directly from the dealer.

Parker might have to keep the JD stuff secret, but maybe a Parker dealer can assist. I don't know how far you are from St. Louis, but you might try Hyspeco. They are based in my hometown, but have locations all over Kansas and Missouri.

 

[cliftonbros89]

Parker might have to keep the JD stuff secret, but maybe a Parker dealer can assist. I don't know how far you are from St. Louis, but you might try Hyspeco. They are based in my hometown, but have locations all over Kansas and Missouri.

I saw that name pop up when I did a search for a dealer on Parker’s website. I might have to check that out.

 

[cliftonbros89]

The day started off like most.

Checking cattle. Except today I locked the cattle up in the lots. Time to ween some calves.



We ween calves out of each herd of cattle. Another 17.


So we’re all caught up on that job for now.
Moved 56 big calves, kept 12 for heifers, ran 21 previously weened calves through the chute and moved them to pasture and weened another 17. All together had we not gotten rid of some big ones we would’ve had 94 calves all together. Not counting the ones still on the cows.

Went to town and picked up parts.

Finally got the stuff for the SCV couplers on the 7510. So that might be underway tomorrow.

I spent some time cleaning up the shop and get things ready to work on the 7510 and getting things prepped to do some other jobs.

I also, had some not to helpful help in the shop.

They decided the shop floor was better than being out in the yard since we’re having July in September.

We’ll see how tomorrow goes.

 

[cliftonbros89]

Not a very eventful weekend. Noah joined me Saturday. We took care of the cattle and checked everything over.

Bled the brakes on the 4010 finally and got it out of the shop.

Had a flat on the Kubota and took it to get fixed. I had Noah wash up the 7230 and the 4440 while I had the tire fixed.

I pulled their service truck in the shop to replace the fuel filter only to find out that the lift pump went out. So without that it wouldn’t prime. So no start. I’m going to get a new pump Monday and get it fixed up.

With the frustration of getting that job figured out we called it a day early by about 4:30.

 

[cliftonbros89]

Sunday morning, today, I looked over all the cattle and fed the calves and the heifers.



Even though it was super warm in the shop I decided to start cleaning up the parts for the 7510 SCV couplers.

Making sure they’re free of dirt and old oil. Also making sure there aren’t any major scratches of pits on any of the parts.

I replaced the seals on one coupler. I started to assemble it.

But then the snap ring that holds the spring in place on back came loose and is now sprung out of shape. So since I didn’t have a replacement I couldn’t put it back in.

On the other hand the coupler I fabricated to hold everything in place for assembly looks like it’ll work great.

So I put in an order for another snap ring. I ordered 2 to be safe. But I likely won’t get them until Tuesday or Wednesday.

I had the tool holders arrive from Atlas46 for my padded mat.

Two holders that are technically made for sockets but should likely hold several things in place to keep me from loosing them if I’m working on something in the field. Also, a magnet to attach to the mat to, to hold tools or parts.

 

[cliftonbros89]

Since I wasn’t going to be able to complete the 7510 job I called it quits by 3. So I took an hour or so to take the metal detector around in dad and mom’s back yard.

No great finds. But something is better than nothing I guess.