Tag Archives: strider gearbox issues

Wednesday 2nd October 2019 – REGULAR READERS …

… of this rubbish will recall that my writings ground out round about the 16th July for a short while after my elderly Acer laptop expired before I could upload to it the entries that I had made on board The Good Ship Ve … errr … Ocean Endeavour.

However, the more astute, cunning reader will have noticed that there is now an entry for 17th July 2019.

And if you aren’t careful, or aren’t quick, you might even find some subsequent ones.

Last night I had a very late, disturbed night because I was working. And working quite hard too. Not only have I finally succeeded in firing up the old Acer, I’ve even managed to salvage all of the data that was on it.

Those two years that I spent studying for my Diploma in Computing back in 1998/99 have proved their worth and I’m surprised that I could remember as much as I did. But then again, having one’s back to the wall is a very good way of concentrating the mind.

So the result of all of this is that we might be completely back in business sometime soon.

So with having had a very disturbed night, with one or two nocturnal voyages thrown in for good measure, I wasn’t in very much of a mood this morning.

There was also the school run too, but only for Amber because our little visitor is feeling under the weather. I think that the strain of life in New Brunswick is proving too much for her.

After dropping off Amber, I headed on down to Woodstock for my gearchange arm, and by the time we got … “you said that yesterday” – ed …

They hadn’t unpacked the deliveries when I arrived so I had to loiter around for a while. There’s a huge Amish community in the region so I spent some time watching their horse grazing on the grass verge while they went to the shops. I went to the shops too – for a few bits and pieces here and there

Eventually I returned to the garage and compared the old arm with the new one. The old arm had rusted and worn away to just a fraction of the thickness to I reckon that it was about time that it was replaced.

Mind you, it’s not made the gearchange any more precise, so there must be plenty of wear elsewhere. But I’m not going to strip down the column change mechanism. I’ll go with what I have.

Having said that though, regular readers of this rubbish will recall a few years ago the overdrive unit was taken out and repaired. I’m disappointed that the people who did it didn’t replace the mechanism – it must have been pretty bad even then.

Back at the tyre depot I’ve been labouring in the workshop, answering the phone, dealing with customers, all this kind of thing, and then I went to pick up Amber from school. She’s been staying late because they have a cheerleading competition coming up and they are rehearsing.

Later this evening I went out with Zoe. She’s recently bought a little house in Woodstock so I bought her a housewarming present – a water cooler for her kitchen. And then we spent an hour or so doing some tidying up in her house to make some room.

On the way back we had a moment or two of excitement as I screeched to a halt to let a family of raccoons stranded in the middle of the road escape to the verge out of my way.

So now I’m off to bed. I had a rough night last night and I need to catch up with my beauty sleep. And looking at myself in the mirror, I need quite a lot of that.

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Tuesday 1st October 2019 – A PECULIAR THING …

… happened during the night.

Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that occasionally (but far more frequently these days) I have sometimes awoken during the middle of the night and then gone back to sleep and re-entered a dream at exactly the same point where I left off.

But last night we had something completely different. I awoke in the middle of the night and went back to sleep again, stepping back into a dream not at the end where I left off, but right back at the beginning where I had started.

And furthermore, as far as I could tell, it went on more-or-less (as near as I can tell) exactly as it had the first time round.

That has never happened before, and it was certainly an interesting experience.

For a change, I was relieved of duty on the school run today so I was in no rush to start the day off. Instead, I had a lounge around and when Rachel sent me a text message to say that my gearchange cable was in, I went off down to Woodstock in her car.

By the time we got to Woodstock we were half a million strong so it was pretty crowded in the Golf, but I found room for the cable and some shopping from the Atlantic Superstore, including more of the vegan sorbet that we like and some fruit bread for me for lunch today and tomorrow – on special offer today.

Having stopped off at home to put the sorbet in the freezer, I continued on to the tire depot and had a look at Strider.

After much effort and difficulty, we managed to fit the cable. But now we have found another problem. The operating arm has a piece broken off it (which is probably what caused the fault in the first place) and the new cable isn’t holding on as well as it might. No point in spoiling the ship for a ha’p’orth of tar, so I’ve ordered a new operating arm and that will (hopefully) be there at Ford’s tomorrow.

But while we were underneath it, we did manage to find an aperture through which we can pass a cable or two. That means that I may at last be able to run a live cable or two through into the cab of Strider.

Apart from that, I’ve been going for parts, carrying sacks of grain about and answering the telephone as well as entertaining the customers. It’s all go here.

Later on, I went to pick up Amber from school (so I wasn’t totally relieved of duty) and had to fight the torrential rainstorm back home.

Tea was pasta tonight, and then I had a play with the failed laptop. Much to my surprise I managed to make it fire up and I can access part of the Windows directory now. Not the part that I want, but it does show me that the thing is not as totally dead as I was imagining.

That means that back home, I may be able to salvage some of the missing data, and that will be good news.

So now it’s bedtime. No idea what I’m doing tomorrow – I shall make it up as I go along. But an early night never goes amiss.

But remember the old Ford 1-tonne that mysteriously moved the other week? The old 20-tonne Ford that was next to it has also mysteriously moved today. But not as far.

After 20 years of standing it fired up first time with some accelerant and a new battery but the accelerator cable is stuck. It’s a long time since I’ve used a hand throttle.

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Monday 30th September 2019 – IT’S BEEN …

… a pretty rough day for me today.

What didn’t help matters was that I couldn’t sleep last night. 01:30 and I was still struggling away trying my best to drop off.

At some point I must have done, I suppose, because the alarm awoke me at 06:00. Just in time to catch the vestige of a nocturnal voyage disappearing out of my head, so I grabbed the dictaphone and dictated it before I forgot. The only one from last night, apparently.

For a change, I remembered the medication and then I grabbed a quick breakfast so that I could take the kids to school. And then down to Hartland to take Hannah the lunch pail that she had forgotten.

Back at the tyre depot there wasn’t a great deal to do today. In fact, I just mauled around a few sacks of feed when customers came a-calling. My new gearchange cable is a Ford main agent part and won’t be in Woodstock until early tomorrow morning.

At lunch-time I went off to buy a sandwich from the Irving garage by the Trans-Canada Highway and then went back to the garage. Where I fell asleep not once but twice.

That was the cue for Rachel to send me home as I was clearly in no fit state to do anything.

Once I’d regained my second wind I made a start on adding the blog entries for the second leg of my voyage across the Atlantic Ocean. To see how far I’ve advanced, you can go to THIS LINK and work your way forward.

There were just Hannah, our visitor and me here for evening meal so I made thin-fried potatoes with carrots, onions, garlic and chili with herbs, and vegan burgers on baps with cheese. And it was all so delicious, especially when followed by one of my chocolate soya desserts left over from Montreal.

Talking of Montreal, I have (rather regrettably) booked my bus back to Montreal, Much as I dislike the idea, I suppose that I ought to think about going home some time soon.

As well as the bus, I booked a room in Montreal for the night that I’ll be staying there before I fly out. I saw the ideal place – and for $20 CAN too. A bed in an 8-bed dormitory in a hostel for women. But they wouldn’t let me reserve the place.

Instead, I’ve booked a room at one of my previous haunts in the rue St Hubert at the back of the bus station, seeing as there was a place on special offer. But then I remembered that that’s the place that doesn’t offer breakfast, by which time it was far too late.

So that’s that. My route from here as far as Brussels is now arranged, for better or for worse. And I’m going to be having a hard time leaving, I reckon. One thing that I’ve always been wary about is putting down roots, especially in places where it’s clearly impractical, if not impossible.

And emotional attachments are the worst of them all.

But onwards and upwards, hey?

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Saturday 28th September 2019 – IT’S REALLY EASY …

… to see what’s going on when you have a lead-light, the correct facilities and the correct tools.

We managed to move Strider this morning by climbing underneath with a light and a spanner and manually putting him in neutral. Then I started him up and Darren (who is braver than I ever imagined) climbed back underneath while my foot was on the brake of course, and with the spanner knocked him back into second gear.

Like that, I could drive him into the workshop and straight over the inspection pit where we had a closer look from a much more comfortable position with a proper inspection light.

And sure enough, everything seems to work exactly fine as it should, except that we could see that the plastic clip that (in theory) holds the cable onto the pivot is no longer there.

In principle, we could quite simply wedge the cable in place with some kind of Heath-Robinson invention, but there’s nothing as permanent as a temporary solution, I’ll forget about it, and it will let go when I’m somewhere in the depths of darkest Labrador 300 miles from any kind of help, in the middle of a snowstorm.

May as well do the job properly first as last, and I’m not so desperate for transport right now, so there will be a new gearchange cable and clip coming on Monday.

Last night despite an evening rather later than I had hoped, I had a decent night’s sleep. But still tons of stuff has mysteriously found its way onto the dictaphone during the night. So I wonder what that’s all about.

I didn’t have much time to lounge about though because I had to hitch a lift up to the tyre depot with Rachel who starts work at 08:00.

Just settling down with my morning coffee and my bagel for breakfast when Rosemary rang me up. She’s in the UK right now watching the chaos as the UK sinks beneath the waves. It seems to be quite exciting there right now, but I’m not in a hurry to find out.

We were quite busy today and it wasn’t until about 11:45, 15 minutes to closing time, that we could deal with Strider.

For a change I came home with Darren in the big Chevy lorry, bringing my bass with me. High time I had another run up and down the scales.

The girls all left to go shopping so I made myself some sandwiches and then knuckled down to work.

What I’ve been doing today is to start to add into the blog the missing entries from when I was on board The Good Ship Ve … errr … Ocean Endeavour. I had hoped to wait until I was back home when I could deal with the photos as well, but my fans are clamouring to know what I got up to while I was away and I can no longer resist the pressure.

At the moment I’ve just come back from visiting the Dynjandi waterfall in Iceland and by the skin of my teeth I’ve managed so far to avoid too many faux-pas like treading on the bombe surprise, whistling on board ship or knocking someone base over apex out of a zodiac.

But it’s early days yet and there is plenty of time for me to get into mischief. If you start here and work your way forward, you’ll see how far I’ve come to date.

Another thing that I’ve done is to book my flight in the general direction of homeward. And, sad as it is to say it, my regular hotel in Brussels is booked up so I’m having to go to another disreputable cat-house somewhere.

God help me!

Tea tonight should have been a flatbread pizza but could I ‘eck as like find them. That is, until I was halfway through cooking something else when I put my hand straight on them. They will have to do for another time now.

So now it’s late. Darren is asleep, Hannah is back but the others are still gallivanting about somewhere. And why not? Tomorrow is Sunday, a Day of Rest with the wonderful Taylor Breakfast Brunch that brings visitors from miles around.

High time we had a few luxuries around here.

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Friday 27th September 2019 – I’M BACK …

… at Rachel’s house tonight.

But, unfortunately, Strider isn’t. He’s parked up at the tyre depot with “an issue” and I need to look at it properly this morning.

At the motel this morning I started him up and put him in gear … and nothing happened. The cable had become detached from the gear selector. With some help from a nearby guy I managed to put the cable back on and I drove him gingerly back to the depot.

But as usual, I was the last one out and when I went to put him in gear it came off again. But this time, he was in second gear and I was on my own so I couldn’t move the gear lever AND couple up the cable.

Apart from that I was lying on my back on a rough gravel surface rather than a comfortable paved surface, and the exhaust was this time thoroughly stinking hot so I have a nice big burn on my lower arm.

With it being stuck in second I could in theory have driven him, but there’s an inhibitor that prevents you from starting the car when it’s in gear. So I was looking for the wires to disconnect on the inhibitor when Rachel turned up to see where I was.

So that’s a job for tomorrow, on a ramp.

Last night’s sleep was exceptional. I was in bed at 21:00 and stark out until 06:00. Tons of stuff on the dictaphone so I wonder where I was and what I had been doing. And, even more importantly, to whom I was doing it?

Leaving the bed early, I did quite a lot of work before leaving the motel. And then we had the difficulty.

Taking it easy, I fuelled up Strider immediately and headed for home. And, once more, I was the only one keeping to the speed limit. Everyone else was going past me as if I was standing still.

Now I’m back at Rachel’s. I’ve had tea and I’m in bed. I’ll look at Strider tomorrow. But once more I’m impressed. Just a tiny fraction under half a tank (but that’s meaningless of course) and 396kms on the clock.

So hats off to him for that performance.

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