(Written June 2nd and 3rd from notes taken previously)
Yes, if you were wondering, I was up very early again. 🙃
Good gravy.
I climbed out of my van, fed my apple core and cutie peels to the horsies, saw my sister Heather off to work, and set the horses out to munch on some grass.
Heather found another dead bunny, and I disposed of it today. 😞
Something is killing them, and we’re wondering if maybe blind Zora is managing to do that. It would seem really odd, given that she’s old and slow and blind, but those little baby bunnies don’t seem to get scared like the adults do.
The little babies have been a lot more willing to just hang out when I’m only a handful of feet away.
Managed to discipline myself to do some physical therapy today, and I had a decent little chat with the Big Guy.
As I was sitting on my bed in my van, I noticed a tick crawling up my pant leg. 😶
I’m grateful I saw it before it managed to bite me. I’ve got scabs on the inside of my belly button from the last tick that I think bit me twice there.
Punk.
Chatted with a mortgage lender, worked more on my file sorting project, and found more phone call recordings that were important to me from years gone by.
I had told our neighbor Otto that I was going to help him with his dump truck’s gas tank, so I headed over there to take a look, and while I was there, I decided to just go ahead and take the gas tank out.
I thought it was going to go rather quickly, because it seemed like I was going to be able to just undo a couple of tank straps, undo the electrical and fuel line, and slide the tank right out.
No such luck. 🙃
First, I grabbed some hose and started a siphon to drain the fuel out of the tank. That went relatively well, but lots of rust came out with the fuel. 😅
From the looks of it, the tank isn’t worth saving. There’s so much rust inside.
But I still needed to take it out.
For whatever reason, whoever designed the tank designed it to have two little nubs on top that prevent it from being able to slide out. The tank fits just perfectly in the slot, but those nubs made it so it couldn’t be removed without completely loosening one of the bracket assemblies the tank straps mount to.
😒
So much for speedy.
Eventually, after battling with it for a while, I was able to get the bracket closest to the rear of the truck loosened up, which allowed me to drop the tank a little bit further, giving clearance to those nubs on top (such a technical term “nub.” 🙃 One is a vent line and the other one is the fuel line with electrical connections, etc.).
Eventually, I got it all removed and then chatted a bit with Otto about his cistern set up. There’s a lot that I didn’t understand about how cisterns are connected to the water system in a house, but I’m getting a much better picture now.
After dealing with the gas tank and learning about Otto’s cistern, I headed into town. Heather had messaged earlier, because she was having some issues with her car.
Given the nature of the issues (brake and traction control), I figured it would be best to head into town and look at it before she drove it again.
She was out and about the county doing her job while I was there messing with her car. I had flashbacks of working as a mobile mechanic, the sun beating down on me, the car misbehaving while I’m trying to figure out what’s going on with it, etc.
At first, my scanner wouldn’t properly connect, but it eventually did. One of the codes was for the catalytic converter, but that’s not going to cause any issues with the brakes. The other code was for the right front speed sensor, which definitely can cause issues with the brakes and traction control.
So I took a look at the wiring on the front right speed sensor, saw that it had electrical tape wrapped around it, and noticed that the electrical tape must have been evidence of a splice job underneath the electrical tape because the wire was no longer long enough to follow its designed path down the front strut.
So I unwound the electrical tape and found that it was a jimmy rig splice job, but it wasn’t corroded or loose, so it didn’t seem reasonable for that to be the cause of the issue. It could be that the speed sensor itself is bad.
I tried to take the speed sensor out, but even with the bolt out, the speed sensor was just locked inside. Most likely the metal hub app has rusted and that rust has encroached on the plastic sensor inside, preventing it from being able to be removed.
It’s likely that in order to remove that sensor, I would have to break it out.
Unfortunately, I have no idea what happened to my pair of wire crimpers. I had some really good wire strippers and crimpers, but they’re nowhere to be found in Rover. I wonder if I lost them somewhere? Or maybe they’re back in Arkansas in my shed?
🤷
Not having the proper tools meant that I wasn’t able to properly repair the jimmied splice, so I just twisted it back together the way that I’d found it, wrapped some electrical tape around it, and called it a day (after clearing her codes).
Hans almost certainly has the tools needed, so we can properly repair the wiring harness later.
And leave it to crazy German engineering to have a wheel speed sensor wiring harness that’s wired into the main wiring harness without any separate connectors. 😶
Which means that if there’s a problem with a speed sensor harness, it’s not just that bit of harness you replace. You have to cut and splice in because the speed sensor harness is part of the whole engine harness, by the looks of it.
😶
After a long hot day in the sun messing with two different vehicles, I stopped by the grocery store and drowned my sorrows in a tub of ice cream. 🙃
Back at the ranch, I spent a fair amount of time working on sorting through files again. Gratefully, I made good progress. 🙏
I talked to Heather and Hans for a bit, and then just to Heather (after Hans went to bed?).
Pretty sunset. South Dakota easily has some of the best I’ve ever seen and… so frequently.
I veged out for a bit and then called it a night.
Lift the world.
Bring it on.
~ stephen
Lift the World 