well that didn't go as planned ..... was on site for 07.40 - no traffic .. rang Russ to see where he was as he'd been there since 07.00, doing a quicky somewhere on site and true to his word he came past me five minutes later heading for where we had to work for the day.
They'd put in a brand new stoned roadway for him and fair play it didn't budge a mm. ... backed him up to building, roughly where we reckoned he needed to be and swung the boom round for a test, then had to shift her over a foot - fly jib just catching on a purlin cleat, to get exactly over the lift point and still have room to slew it out ... levelled up, harness on, clambered up and slung the lump ready then dived in the cab for a cuppa and a crafty fag -- no smoking site
- we both do
one of the 'lads' who were also 'tending' to this job said we'd got at least an hour as the Italian engineer commissioning the machine would be late .. breakfast at his digs wasn't available 'til after eight
We'd barely finished and 'Antonio' arrived ... ran through what had to happen and then tells us that we'd not be assembling the flywheels into place today ... machine out - without disturbing its sub chassis - land it on the deck and then Antonio had to grout and concrete in the sub.s, so ... can you come back Saturday? .. Why he couldn't grout and concrete the sub.s with the machine in situ was beyond me ... could've got it all done in one day then .. but hey ho we were getting a day out of it ... and an extra one too
bit tight
still none the wiser as to what this thing does?
Russ was expecting this to be his last day here .... and has a boat to do Saturday morning .. might have to be an early one .. or a later start here ..
by 10.15 we'd pressure washed the Lieb off in the lorry wash bay -- lance/side each
....... covered in dust and glass -- they'd smashed his front top cab screen last week, letting a lump touch it and went off like a gun ... new one paid for and fitted the day after the 150'd been in ...
and we were ready to roll ...
left me motor there, and followed him back home with his van -- save faffing about for him and I was expecting to be out for the day anyway (and was being paid for it
) no odds to me and Russ was well happy ... got back to Russ's parked up
grabbed an empty gas bottle off his MIG and was going to drop me then head into Hereford ... rent free one, so said I'd come with him to see where it was in town and then drop me later.
Hadn't gotten 5 miles and the van goes into limp, then stops
cranked it over and away it went, but management light still on
... carried on ... two miles later down it went again ......and again a couple more miles down the road ... had about seven stops, by the time we got to the gas place on Rotherwas IE .. including stopping in the gateway to the gas sellers
Russ'd replaced the mass air flow on it a few weeks ago, which'd given similar symptoms...brand new OE Bosch ... played with the connector a couple of times but hadn't cured it
anyway .. 40 quid for a 10kg bottle later
and we were off .. sod heading into Hereford with the van like it was and headed back to his ... after three, maybe four stops, with about a mile and a half between, it suddenly stopped doing it and drove fine
... weird ... wondering if the hot wire had picked up summat that was pissing it off and cleared ... he was gonna put his OBD scanner on it this afters and see if it had 'anything' to say, before clearing the management light.
had a coffee at his and then headed back to Pontrilas in his RR Vogue
.. has had it 8 years and only put 32 k on it ... he's never stationary long enough to drive it
... says to me on the way back ... "
I'll drop you at the gate ..not taking this in there .. they'll accuse me of making too much money "
... I used to be the same .. always ran older vehicles, or people'd accuse you of charging too much ... P38 was just three year old, when I bought it and the comments I used to get were constant ...
... never had the issue with me SD,s or classic RR,s
anyway ... Pam was well surprised to see me at lunchtime
... ate me sarnies and then finished off raking the last of the haylage harvest .... ready to give it a 'nap of the earth' Dane-ing, which I'd gotten done by four
this is the pile of 'haylage' in a circa 5ft deep 'gap' behind the semi-dead hedge ... will rot down to very little in a couple of months and help to fill in/build up the ground on that bank
... looked like it was gonna lash down at any moment, but still hasn't despite ever darkening skies
gonna have to start again with the rake
.. but won't be as bad as the first lot
the remaining long grass is a strimmer job, to get down to a mow-able level .. that bit there's 'exciting', when it's the usual mow-able length .. sod trying that with the Dane .... 'least I got the rest of it down to 'the nap' before tomorrow's forecast 25+ mil., 24 hr downpour of rain
... that bank'll be soggy as, for some time ... still pretty iffy in places and the herring bones have give a few spots some grief ..... we've had
SOME downpours of late
found this fella scuttling around the kitchen floor last night ..... we get some pretty big spiders occasionally, but haven't seen a really big one for ages .. disposable lighter for some scale
one big mutha spider
.....
don't anticipate being able to do a lot tomorrow
other than keep out of the poxy rain
to finish off the afternoon I had to wash the Kia ..... it was a very light grey from all the dust in Pontrilas .... will be a sea of tish again tomorrow there ... glad we're not back 'til Saturday
...... perhaps you ought to capture it for a closer look
