Unexpected success.....

 8:15 am - Friday - January 23rd - TWW - 37° F, humidity 41%, cloud cover 83%, wind 3 mph out of the south by southeast....cloudy today with a forecast high of 52° F.  The view this morning.....

....and on this date in 2017 TLE and I were in Quartzite.....

....watching an interesting sunrise.

Charles and Phyllis departed TWW early morning, and by 11 am TLE and I were finally getting dressed to head outdoors to do some work.  We needed to seal the base plate on west and east sides of the garage.  In addition to water intrusion on the north side where the garage doors are, water has been getting under the base plate on the west and east sides, too.  Using Flex Seal spray (rubber in a can) left over from the installation of the rain gutters on the greenhouse, I sealed the east side.....

.....Charles had bought this bottle of gray flex seal.  I used whatever was left to seal the east side, then turned my attention to the west side, and using a spray bottle I bought a while back (clear) I resealed the west base plate.......

....as you can see from the above picture, there was some sort of black sealant used back when the garage was built, but that sealant has fissures in it allowing water to ingress.  We're hoping the Flex Seal will do the trick.

Next up we needed to get the Ford 420 diesel tractor running again, as it has been sitting out by the entry driveway for a couple of weeks.  I've worked on it a couple of times, but was previously unsuccessful in getting it to run.  Since my last attempt I installed a new diesel fuel filter Charles purchased, and added some diesel treatment called 'Diesel Rescue' to the fuel tank, and filter to clean out any blockages.  That was about a week ago, so it was time to drag one of our 8d batteries, which used to be part of our house battery bank, to assist in cranking over the engine in order to get fuel flowing again.  Our first attempt didn't work so I decided to begin removing the steel fuel lines, one at a time, to see if there were any blockages.  I began with the 'L' shaped fuel line running from the fuel filter assembly to the base of the injection pump.....

The culprit

....when I attempted to blow air through the line I could tell it was constricted, so using a long zip tie I reamed it out several times, then blew through it again....success!  The constriction that was right at the bend in the line was now gone.  I reinstalled the fuel line, then turned on the fuel, and we attempted to start it again.  It took a few tries, but the engine finally fired, and came back to life.  How often is a problem like this so simple to solve?!  You just have to break it down into manageable pieces.  Fortunately, the first fuel line I removed was hiding the problem.  These old diesel tractors are not very complicated....no computers, no electronic fuel injection, etc....it's all mechanical.....

.....needless to say, but I'll say it anyway, I was elated.  Special thanks to TLE for her assistance, and great suggestions.  Once we had her running I immediately drove her back to the CONEX, parked her and plugged her battery into the trickle charger.  Now that we're back in business with the tractor we can do some more road work, and finish the new site for Phyllis' Newell.

By the time we parked the Ford 420 it was after 3 pm, and flush with the self satisfaction of success we headed for the warm interior of the Newell once again.  We've got a few really cold days and nights on the horizon where the lows will be in the high teens, but the days will be warm enough to get some work done around TWW.  By the end of next week we'll be back into the high 50's during the days, and low 30's at night.

Thanks for stopping by!