My day off this week - Some metalworking - Sorta

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Well it's good to hear you're having a "miserable" time😏

Hadn't heard anything from you recently and was hoping you were still okay. Hearing the heat warnings on the news from down there everyday had me wondering😬

Five years ago I bought a new winch bumper for the front of the Jeep. The box has been laying on the floor in that work bay ever since. Well yesterday I threw that box away and now there is a lot less room in that bay to work. There is a Jeep parked in there (its shorter than the boat and trailer), and there is a bumper and air dam that came off the Jeep laying on the floor. The new bumper atleast isn't also laying there. I set in the back on the welding table so I could extend the pigtails. I would have finished, but the LED "fog" lights in the new off road winch bumper are just pig tailed and the stock ones mated with pigtail plugs on the factory wiring harness. I'm not sure I want to cut those plugs off so I can hard wire in the lights in the new bumper.

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Amazon sells kits of waterproof automotive connectors that you could Y splice into the plug leads, or just add flat "SAE" trailer connectors.

If you do cut off the factory plug I'd leave about 6" of wire attached to be able to reuse it. Marine grade heatshrink has hot melt glue inside to seal the splice.

I didn't think there was any chance at all, but this looks like it.

Just cut off the end that matches the plug on the jeep, and wire the other to the lights in the bumper. Then it can always be swapped back to the stock bumper.

I didn't think there was any chance at all, but this looks like it.

Just cut off the end that matches the plug on the jeep, and wire the other to the lights in the bumper. Then it can always be swapped back to the stock bumper.

Bob La Londe CNC Molds N Stuff

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Yeah I saw that one too. Its pretty pricey and appears to be a replacement for the one on the wiring harness. Not the one that plugs into it.

To be fair I do not think I have ever turned on the fog lights on the Jeep, and at the moment I'm not even sure I know exactly how. Its like extra fish hooks or a bigger motor. Its better to have it and not need it than to need it and not have it.

To be fair I do not think I have ever turned on the fog lights on the Jeep, and at the moment I'm not even sure I know exactly how. Its like extra fish hooks or a bigger motor. Its better to have it and not need it than to need it and not have it. Bob La Londe

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Arizona has fog??

Yeah, about once or twice a year actually. It usually lifts/dissipates with the sun. I'm not sure where it comes from, but we do have a direct path to the Sea of Cortez with no mountains in between. You old farts would have been taught to call it the Gulf of California. I guess a fog in the gulf could push right up the Colorado River valley.

Dust is more likely, but the way my life and business are structured these days I almost never "have to" go anywhere "right now." The exception being if a family member is in trouble or if one of my four friends needs me.... and three of them don't live here. If they are in trouble its possible they went off the road in the fog.

Send me a pin and give me a few minutes to gather up emergency gear. I still don't have a winch installed on the Jeep. Ha! Id be more likely to bring the truck anyway due to the weight advantage, and close to the house I might bring the tractor.

Interestingly I have gotten both the truck and the tractor stuck before, but I have not yet gotten the Jeep stuck. If you jack it up and fill in the holes the truck usually will drive right out if I flatten the tires. So far anyway. The tractor (also 4wd) can drag or push itself out with the loader bucket. I could claim that's why the Jeep is getting the winch, but the honest truth is its vanity. I hate the look of the plastic bumpers on the Jeep. I guess not that much since its taken me almost 6 years to start swapping them out. Maybe by the time its worn out and blown up I'll get rid of those stupid looking plastic wheel fenders too. Anyway, if I'm going to swap the bumper on a Jeep it should be to winch bumper, so when people gather around the sugar barrel at the general store to lie about their hotrods I can honestly say, "Well my Jeep is modified too."

Its funny, when I first bought it I had half a dozen people ask me, "So what are you going to do with it?" like it was just assumed anybody who bought a Jeep was either building a rock crawler or a swamp buggy.

My answer was always the same, "Drive it." I wouldn't mind someday driving the "modern" Devil's Highway along the border, but not enough to build a special rig for it. Then I ran trap lines with a station wagon my first year doing it. LOL.

Well, the bumper is installed. The plugs I found on FleaBay seem to be the right ones. The lights work anyway. Yes. I am certain I had never turned the fog lights on before. I had to hunt for a while to figure out how.

The new winch was supposed to arrive today, but its coming by FedEx. I'll be happy if it arrives intact. On time? That's not even an option.

Well, the bumper is installed. The plugs I found on FleaBay seem to be the right ones. The lights work anyway. Yes. I am certain I had never turned the fog lights on before. I had to hunt for a while to figure out how.

The new winch was supposed to arrive today, but its coming by FedEx. I'll be happy if it arrives intact. On time? That's not even an option.

Bob La Londe

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Here is a rooftop accessory you might like:

Some warbirds have them in the wings, remotely operated. I watched a P-40 and a replica Zero meet head-on, then the P-40 did a surprisingly quick and nimble wingover turn and dropped onto the Zero's tail, firing those guns, while the Zero made smoke.

Sounds like a fun air show.

If I could find the right mount that might look cool to put on my dad's '42 Willys Jeep. His is painted olive drab of course. I think he had some olive drab paint surplus from something because I remember him painting file cabinets and benches with the stuff long before he had traded for the Jeep.

One day I was out fishing in a local irrigation canal, when I heard a shot way to close. I was ducked down behind the Jeep hand on my pistol before my front brain even kicked in. When I'd stopped there I hadn't seen anybody, and I'm not terribly in observant. Very carefully I checked the area, not really knowing even what direction the shot came from.

Finally I saw an automatic propane cannon in the corner of a field. they use them to scare birds off fresh planted fields and emerging seedlings. As I stood up to figure out where I had dropped my fishing rod when it went off again. I still jumped.

It was some 20-30 yards away, but it sounded like a big bore rifle going off right next to me. Like an old Sharps or something like that. Sharper crack than a typical BP cannon, but maybe not as sharp as a high power rifle like a 30-06 or a 270. It wasn't even pointed in my direction. No sonic boom of course.

Yeah, propane guns can be quite good gunfire simulators.

I've read that acetylene does it better ... haven't tested that myself but I've been tempted .

I haven't tried it with propane but one of the students when I was at college filled his lunch bag up with acetylene and oxygen mix from a torch and ignited the bag, it made a very very loud bang in the next workshop and the next thing I saw was the lecturer running through the workshop, not a common occurrence, to find out what had happened. The student was in shock, temporarily deaf, and the lecturer didn't berate him as he knew he was never likely to do that again.

Pinch off the hose of an OA torch then use the torch to blow up a baloon - about 8 inch diameter. Tie iot to the radio antennae of the car or truck (not a convertible) then stick a cigarette on a rod out the slightly opened window to set off the "bomb". One HELLUVA" bang!!!!!

Sounds like a fun air show.

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It was. The old airport at Manchester NH was scheduled for a major upgrade and they went all out to celebrate, with 12 Mustangs, the replica Zeros from ToraToraTora and US, British, French and Soviet jets taking off in full afterburner that may have damaged the runway including an F-15 immediately pulling to vertical in front of us and screaming straight up to 20,000 feet. An A-10 demonstrated strafing runs with cropduster turns (wingovers) at each end. I watched some of it from the top turret of the B-17.

Pinch off the hose of an OA torch then use the torch to blow up a baloon - about 8 inch diameter. Tie iot to the radio antennae of the car or truck (not a convertible) then stick a cigarette on a rod out the slightly opened window to set off the "bomb". One HELLUVA" bang!!!!!

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A party popper on a LONG string is safer.

I tend not to not play with acetylene. I've seen an open air detonation with no apparent ignition source. I went and got a welding glove to reach in and turn the bottle off. I'm pretty sure this group back when it happened.

That being said when I was a kid there was a well drilling outfit that used the lots between our grocery store and our hardware store when they were working in our area. On the fourth of July they were filling balloons with acetylene and dropping them into a burning barrel. I don't recall if they were running straight acetylene, or if it was an O2 mix. They were igniting them by tossing a burning piece of trash into the barrel. It made a pretty satisfying boom.

I've seen videos of small balloons going off . Convinced me that I don't need to try it myself . If I want to make boom-boom noises I'll use gunpowder ... it's more stable .

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I've a neighbor ~1/3 mile away that detonates Tannerite now and then. It shakes the house windows, even from that far away🙂

Carbide Cannon.

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Joe Gwinn