2006 at the Hammond Barn

[Grant Bowker]

Yesterday evening I was summoned to the barn to view the latest development. Bob had, with no effort on his part, acquired an near Olympic sized swimming area. This was the result of the culvert under the access road to the barn having an ice plug frozen inside. Spring is definitely here with the snow melting and running off. Unfortunately this same runoff was threatening the access road, running over the embankment (a total depth of about 7 feet) rather than through the culvert. Since the road would have eroded without prompt action Bob dragged out the pressure washer and ran a water supply hose out from the house. It never fails, the faster you need a small gas engine to start, the more heaving on the cord it takes. Once it started Bob fulfilled every boy's dream, playing with water and tools to make a mess. The pressure washer was used to bore a smallish hole in the ice plug. Once a passage was opened we settled in to watch the water level upstream drop. The downsteam flow that had started as little more than a tickle gradually grew as the rest of the ice plug melted until the flow was more of a raging torrent than a placid trickle. Bob reports that 2 hours later after he had finally warmed up (did I mention that like all boys playing in spring runoff water he had not only gotten thoroughly wet but nearly frozen himself?) he was out on the back deck to feed the birds (or chase off a shunk or some other feeble excuse) and he could still hear a sound like Niagara Falls running. By this morning the stream was a more normal size and the road to the barn had been saved.

With worries over the road removed Bob and I set out this morning to finish assembly of Bob's C15A front axle. Steering bearing preload was set according to the manual, brake shoes and adjusters were put in place, replacements were found for small parts that had mysteriously gone missing, we speculated on whether early cab 11 trucks with small steering joints used different plates to hold the steering pivot plates in place since the early plate wouldn't fit on the later axle, put the hubs with brake drums into place, did a preliminary wheel bearing adjustment, replaced the tie rod ends with NOS parts that Max Hedges had sent Bob from Australia and insalled the tie rod assembly. Then we paused to take a photo and I promise you Bob was smiling.