[AT] Glow plugs

Sun Dec 27 10:49:29 PST 2015

Cecil,

Good idea .....always have one of those salt blocks available in the city. :-)

Dean VP
Snohomish, WA

If we can employ guards with guns to protect money, we can and should employ guards with guns to
protect people. Bernard Goldberg.

-----Original Message-----
From: at-bounces at lists.antique-tractor.com [mailto:at-bounces at lists.antique-tractor.com] On Behalf Of
Cecil R Bearden
Sent: Sunday, December 27, 2015 4:59 AM
To: Antique tractor email discussion group
Subject: Re: [AT] Glow plugs

Dean:
A trick I learned to keep those trailer sewer pipes running in sub-zero 
weather:  Chip off a chunk of a salt block and put it in the sink or 
drain so the water can drip on it.

Cecil in OKla

On 12/27/2015 2:14 AM, Dean VP wrote:
> Thanks Mark,
>
> I don't know if the corncob soaked in Kerosene has come up yet. I may have missed it. It seemed to
me
> as a young kid around my Dad that that was the tool of choice for so many things I don't know if
there
> is anything that really replaced it. Maybe the small hand held propane tanks come close.  I had seen
> that tool so often used for such a variety of things it kind of stuck in my mind so I remembered
this
> kind of tool and used it in a very dangerous manner.  Now that I look back on it I don't know what I
> was thinking other than I guess I was desperate with a new  bride in a 42' wide 8' long trailer that
> we lived in when we were first married, It was blistering cold, probably trying to reach 40 below
> which wasn't all that uncommon then and I had a frozen water line coming from the park service
> connection going into my trailer. We needed water and apparently the heating tape I had wrapped
around
> the copper pipe had failed. So I soaked something in Kerosene, we used Kerosene to heat the trailer
> out of a 55 gallon barrel, and laid it on to the pipe and used some baling wire to hold it on the
> pipe.  Then I lit it intending to thaw out the pipe.  Well the next thing I knew I had started a
fire
> in the insulation in the belly of the trailer where the pipe entered the trailer. Now it was panic
> time. No water to put out the fire.  Yelled at my wife to find any liquid we had in the trailer and
> said we had a fire brewing. She knew where I was working and where the water pipe entered the
trailer
> and lifted a cover off from inside the trailer and dumped a quart of milk on the fire. Luckily that
> put the small fire out.  Needless to say the pipe remained frozen  until I went to a hardware store
> and bought a small hand held propane torch and it didn't take long and I got it to start running
> again.  Took the heating tape inside the next day and found out why it wasn't doing its job and
found
> a loose connection. Soldered that up and put the tape back on the copper pipe and never had a frozen
> water pipe again.  It was so cold that if you left the water run just a bit to keep it from freezing
> the sewer pipe would freeze up. Due to the long run from under the trailer to the sewer connection
in
> the park. We ended up in Spencer, IA the next winter where we had 26 days in a row where it never
got
> above 0 degrees F and typical night time temperatures were in the 40 degrees F region almost every
> night.  There we had frozen water lines, frozen sewer lines.  And I even had the line from the 55
> gallon barrel of Kerosene to the trailer furnace freeze up one night.  Apparently there had been
> enough cycles in temperature that some condensation had collected in the 55 Gallon Barrel  which
> eventually settled in the low point between the barrel and the furnace. Took that line off and
soaked
> it in hot water rags until I got in unfrozen. . One morning I walked out of the trailer to go to
work
> and the lock froze open, with the plunger all the way in.  Moisture on the heated inside had
gathered
> around the plunger of the door latch and had frozen the minute I opened the door. Had to heat that
so
> I could lock the door. That was just flat a terrible winter. Wouldn't surprise me if that weather
> record still stands. For some odd reason our address for the next winter was San Diego California.
> Never went back to Iowa to live. Iowa had proved its point. It is one hell of a bad place to live in
> the winter with a trailer. A year or so later  we sold the trailer and purchased our first stick
built
> home and felt like we had really accomplished something. We were rich, I was making over $10,000 a
> year in 1964. Life was so simple then.
>
> Dean VP
> Snohomish, WA
>
> If we can employ guards with guns to protect money, we can and should employ guards with guns to
> protect people. Bernard Goldberg.
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: at-bounces at lists.antique-tractor.com [mailto:at-bounces at lists.antique-tractor.com] On Behalf
Of
> Mark Sargent
> Sent: Saturday, December 26, 2015 2:29 PM
> To: at at lists.antique-tractor.com
> Subject: Re: [AT] Glow plugs
>
> Cecil, Charlie, Dean, Greg--
>
>   
>
> Though I'm on the digest mode-   I nominate this thread to be one of the
> best threads ATIS on this year.
>
> It had it all- mechanical  fixes (you won't find in the text books) ---
> anecdotes and -----war stories( defined as real world learning by scary
> experience).
>
>   I got little teary eyed about the ' gas rag' trick (we did this and other
> un-Recommended stuff on Army vehicles in the 70's . It was amazing what  we
> would try - when you
>
> have no more options-the runaway Detroit Diesels also reminded me of some
> scary stuff.)     The driving stuff was well written-  I can' hear' you guys
> tell these stories-
>
>    all good entertainment.     Doesn't quite replace the old guys story's
> they would tell at the  gas stations when I grew up-but there are no
> hangouts for old men any more--- even in the small towns.
>
> And I qualify as old too!
>
>   
>
> Thank you for sharing- and your contributions to the list!
>
> Mark
>
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