Spread the Knowlege

Dudes and Dudettes, I’m sending this to you because I feel it needs to be passed on before November. Please help me to enlighten the American people.

The Washington Post babbled again today about Obama inheriting a huge deficit from Bush. Amazingly enough,a lot of people swallow this nonsense; so once more, a short civics lesson.

Budgets do not come from the White House. They come from Congress, and the party that controlled Congress since January 2007 is the Democrat Party. They controlled the budget process for FY 2008 and FY 2009, as well as FY 2010 and FY 2011. In that first year, they had to contend with George Bush, which caused them to compromise on spending, when Bush somewhat belatedly got tough on spending increases.

For FY 2009 though, Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid bypassed George Bush entirely, passing continuing resolutions to keep government running until Barack Obama could take office. At that time, they passed a massive omnibus spending bill to complete the FY 2009 budgets.

And where was Barack Obama during this time? He was a member of that very Congress that passed all of these massive spending bills, and he signed the omnibus bill as President to complete FY 2009. Let's remember what the deficits looked like during that period: (below)

If the Democrats inherited any deficit, it was the FY 2007 deficit, the last of the Republican budgets. That deficit was the lowest in five years, and the fourth straight decline in deficit spending. After that, Democrats in Congress took control of spending, and that includes Barack Obama, who voted for the budgets. If Obama inherited anything, he inherited it from himself.

In a nutshell, what Obama is saying is I inherited a deficit that I voted for and then I voted to expand that deficit four-fold since January 20th.

There is no way this will be widely publicized, unless each of us sends it on!

This is your chance to make a difference!

A Little Cheese With that Whine?

Projects are beginning to pile up around here.

It seems the young bloods (my son & his buddies) left my shop in total chaos.

Metric wrenches are mixed with SAE, sockets and ratchets can not be found and naturally when you ask where they are the answer is always "I don't know".

I ask myself "What ever happened to organizing this place?" That was part of the deal when they began working on their trucks this spring and soon it will be winter! They worked on 5 vehicles from May through July and only one is still running but it now needs a new window for the driver side door!

Two of them were trucked out of here to a real mechanic's shop.

 One is behind my shop without wheels  and my ol' 84' F - 150 still has the topper on it, he's still gotta pull that off yet. Then it can go to the junkyard. Someone will find clean body panels! I told him pull 'em off & sell 'em on eBay or something to pay for his parts in the other one.  All he has to do is the work!

It would appear we have been swapping tools around here, I am missing a 25 foot, grounded extension cord. I wonder where these two 6 foot, 2 prong cords came from. I can't use my crane without them now! Pisses me off as much as the half empty socket bars!

I guess I'm just a bit insane to think if I give him another opportunity I would get a different result this time. A friend told me, kids are like vampires, they'll drink your blood dry, but wont eat the flesh from your bones!

Another friend said "Let go & let God handle it!" He said it with the official AA emphasis and a silent "quit yer bitchin' ." Hmm... sometimes I still struggle with that one, and I've been sober 13 years now. Today, if its gonna be its up to me.

Remember Thursday the twelveth?

              Ah the joy of the finished project.

Nothing compares with seeing your creation come to fruition. It brings you to a point where you tend to forget all those hours of detail work with the raw metal under the ol' Eco-friendly helical green light bulbs.

You tend to notice the power bill up about 30% when you put a couple of weeks of cutting, grinding, sawing, drilling and welding on your utility tab. Even more if you are of the perfectionist persuasion.
I say that in a friendly sort of way. It's OK to be a perfectionist, you got your pride involved and that's a good thing.

This quickie tool cart project came as a challenge for my self imposed two week in process policy. Yup just two weeks ago I started the working phase of this job. I finished it up last night. It seems funny you miss some little imperfections until the paint dries, like that stubborn little BB that casts a shadow in the evening sunset. You chip it loose and where does it fall? In a corner or crevice! I'm a tellin' ya, it's "Murphy's Law".

It seemed the little details bit my butt all day long on the Thursday the 12th, only to realise there is still a delivery on Friday the 13th, and due date on 9 / 11. Go figure.

This Week's Project, Tool Cart

This is one of those projects where you may have to bend some 14 or 16 gauge sheet metal, but don't let that scare you away from a custom tool cart!

6 - 90 degree bends required so far,...

                                                                   This beefy 1/8 x 1" x 2" frame will feature 2 sturdy full length pull out tool drawers to keep your assortment of fixtures organized and easy to access.

Who among us hasn"t plotted out our bend lines and set out to pick up a hammer & commenced on our best attempt to beat that steel into submission?

Some call it the art of cold forming like the caveman, because the process tends to lend itself to brute force thinking, versus controlling the hammer with care to avoid stretching and distorting the surface.

Some have successfully scored the brake line with a wide concrete chisel, to focus the impact by pinching the steel to a weaker thickness, allowing it to fold along the intended fault line in the grain of the steel. My experience has been when you create micro cracks in folding the steel you greatly reduce its strength.

I am fortunate to have a heavy 3/4" X 24" X 48" table top from which could build a simple press to bend steel up to 14 gauge. I had been contemplating it for a while now. The picture shows the results. click to enlarge it and you can see there is still more radius than I wanted but then again this is a proto-type I threw together to get this job done over the week end.

I made the bending press by hinging a length of 3" X 3" angle iron over the edge of the table top. There's too much to describe tonight without a reference picture to go with that project story. I couldn't believe I pulled out the hold down bolts! I'll get a post up as soon as possible, it is an easy project for "make your own'ers" like us!