Mtn. Don

[PEG688]

So , Mtn. D,  ya git anythin done while youst was gone  :-/ Photo's ??

[fourx]

.....didn't just drink beah up there, and dream, did ya..?

[MountainDon]

I FOUND IT! (PEG's referred to topic....)  

Drank beer, dreamed a lot, and carried on! Pictures will follow.

[fourx]

Great! Post them, please, as you can see we are all agog...

[glenn kangiser]

Shouldn't have said that Pete -- In a weird synapse malfunction, you have caused me to have to get up and get myself a grog.  Sounds good right now.  Don't mind if I do.

[MountainDon]

Okay, where do I start?  :-/   I think I'll go have another ice cold Harp before getting along too far.  

The first thing to get set up was our cast aluminum Chiminea, so we could have a nice safe campfire and drink beer while we did our dreaming.



We got the RV up the big hill after smoothing out the bumps with the neighbor's skidsteer. No pictures of that.  :'(  We parked the RV in the trees, unloaded the trailer and settled down in the NE quadrant.



The first order of buiness was to complete the cleanup of the deadfall and standing dead trees. Here I am hard at work with a borrowed old '85 3-wheeler Honda, pulling a tree considered too rotted for good firewood off to the designated burn area.



Here's the other half, Karen, doing her part... cleaning up all the small crap.



Here's DW (Karen) sitting by the fire waiting for her Mike's Hard Lemonade, after a hard day's travail.



The area behind the trailer was one of the areas in contention for a cabin building site...



... this open area from a different viewpoint.  



However, it slopes more to the south and lost out. I did prefer this site as it is closer to the solar PV site to the south. But it's only 75 feet, maybe a hundred feet of copper...  :'(   Still more ground cleanup to do there on the left (east).    

....continued...

[glenn kangiser]

Nice very neat camp.  PEG will be proud.  He's so structured.

[PEG688]

Not bad for a former Nob eh   And Mtn. D feel free to start your own titled thread , I just ahd seen you post and wanted to put you on the dime / spot  

Nice lookin land , looks plenty dry   Fire must be a issue eh?

Oh BTW , Hey Glenn , Bite me , eh  

Oh another BTW , thats a LOT of  camp fire wood  

[MountainDon]

When we'd left home I had been on a precription antibiotic, azithromycin, for a respiratory infection. I had to go back home for a re-visit as it was not getting better as fast as I thought I should. The doc determined it was a viral infection because the azithromycin I had been taking did nothing good at all. Gave me the runs. The doc gave me an Rx for albuterol inhalent to assist in clearing up the residual inflammation. That helped. We spent some time exploring in the Jeep and on the 3-wheeler instead of working all the time.

We drove a 12 mile rough road up to a Forest Service lookout and were invited up by the Ranger for a look around. There was a fair amount of haze in the air due to smoke from a couple prescribed burns, one as far away as 100+ miles. Didn't bother with any pictures. I discovered a shortcut "home" on an even bumpier trail only about 4 miles long.

In the middle of all this the RV furnace decided it had worked hard enough for 24 years and quit working. Bad bearings in the motor wouldn't let it blow hard enough to allow the gas valve to be opened.  RV furnaces can be finicky things. I'll tell you more about their workings if asked. It gave me trouble a few years back too when the circuit board gave up.

There is still more cleanup work to be done on the east side and the south end...



Here we're looking from the still to be cleaned up southeast back up towards the RV and one of the wood piles.



Looking up the west side to the north. These were taken on a wonderful overcast morning. I love this lighting as there are no harsh contrasting light sunny spots and hard dark shadows.



The south end, opening onto a meadow and future home of a PV solar array. We've already done some cleanup down here.



My one and only Oak tree, such as it is, all twisted... Surrounded by a whole bunch of little Oaks...



The south end is also home to several new Doug Firs and old, dead and new Aspens...





A final view of what we consider "home base". The 14x26 cabin will likely go into the area beside the RV, with the removal of a couple of trees.

[MountainDon]

Not bad for a former Nob eh   And Mtn. D feel free to start your own titled thread , I just had seen you post and wanted to put you on the dime / spot  

Nice lookin land , looks plenty dry   Fire must be a issue eh?

Oh another BTW , thats a LOT of  camp fire wood  

I think I'll link this back to the "My 14 x 26 Plan" topic, and vice versa...
http://www.countryplans.com/cgi-bin/yabb2/YaBB.pl?num=1166598189/40#40

Yes, it is dry. The Forest Service fire hazard rating went from Low to High over the space of a month. There was a small, 12 acre, lightning caused fire during the first week of June about 12 miles from us.

As for a LOT of firewood, you're right on that! And there's more to come. At least here, even after a rain, it's still easy to find dry wood to burn.  
[edit]Now Glenn, I know you're thinking, "yes, that's a lot of wood, but how much? I need to know the numbers!" I don't have a clue Glenn, too much of it is in funny lengths, not yet brought into perfect order.      However I can tell you that it would appear that so far I've used about 1.875 gallons of gas/oil mix... It was gas purchased last year and stored with Sta-Bil. So, the gas was approx $2.50 a gal then. I used a little more than 1 oz. of Sta-Bil, that's a cost of say $0.70 for 2 gallons. Add in the 2 stroke oil at 40:1 mix and that's $0.60. Then there's the chain/bar oil at $5 a gallon. Looks like I've used about 1.75 gallons, so that's another $8.75. Adding up the numbers for the fuel and additives we get 6.30 for 2 gal. Having used about 1.875 gal. of that would be $5.90. Adding in the chain/bar oil $8.75 we would have a total (so far) of $14.65.

But Glenn there is still a detail that worries me and that is the pro-rated cost of the chain itself. I don't know how long it will last. Can you help me there, Glenn. You are after all the Chain Saw Maven!   [/edit]

[fourx]

Looks like some fantastic mountain views you have through the trees, Don. How high up is it? It looks like it is still cold, from the way you are both dressed....no shortage of firewood in the forseeable future, it seems.

[glenn kangiser]

Lots of firewood -- or cordwood rounds for walls --- pine is a good building material for cordwood walls, like the ones Andrew and family made.



Bite you PEG --- Sir, yes Sir.

[MountainDon]

Lots of firewood -- or cordwood rounds for walls --- pine is a good building material for cordwood walls, like the ones Andrew and family made.

Sometimes when I looked at those stacked sections of wood they morphed into walls. I thought it was the beer.

Glenn, did you catch the 'edit" in my previous post? Important details there. You are up early again!

[MountainDon]

Pete, the elevation at the preferred cabin site is 8750 feet. Yes, it was cold at times. Most days would warm up to where we could work in shirtsleeves by the afternoon, especially if in a sunny spot. I don't know how cold it got overnight but in the AM, after the RV furnace crapped out it I saw a low inside temp of 53.4 degrees F. By 9 AM tho' it was warmer outside than inside.  

[glenn kangiser]

Ahh -- the edit --- I missed it. :-/

We are still short numbers, Don. :-?

I am unable to help you with the chain life on the saw as you failed to provide the numbers for gallons of beer consumed (G)  over (N) number of (D)days or (H) hours.  Chain life is inversely proportional to the ratio of beer to days and really goes down if you have an entry in the beer to hours column.

Chains and pumice don't mix well.

[MountainDon]

Oh dear, how negligent of me.

Then there's also the cost/life ratio of the round chain saw file to be considered. The file holder itself is something like 27 years old so it can be left out of the equation. The file though was new, $3.96 plus tax of 6.875%, last fall. Filing can both be life extending as well as life shortening so that calculation gets to having too many variables. Have another beer.

[glenn kangiser]

A battery operated chain sharpener can speed up sharpening a bit but if overdone can shorten chain life too.  Using the hand operated file technique can give you more time to consume the beer though.  Then you probably won't be concerned with the numbers.

[benevolance]

well there is the fact that if you are filing your saw yourself you are king of men...

Growing up...My great grandpa was a sawyer...and my grandpa was too part time... My dad worked in the forge as a kid...Welding bands and blades and sharpening... for his grandfather...

I was like 25 years old before I was trusted by grandpa and my father to even sharpen the damned chain saw.... or a hand saw.... if I went near the bandsaw blade it may have started a riot...

everyone has their best technique...For me it is get the saw somewhere comfy for filing..stable...

when at the shop I just put the chainsaw in the vise on the workbench... it is quick and easy when the saw is secured and you just roll the chain along use both hands on the file....You can get a damned good sharpen on the chain this way....

Not able to even come close to that kind of perfection in the woods...

[benevolance]

btw

awesome piece of land....

I am not in love with pine trees...So I would be planting some cedar and oak, and thinning the pine whenever possible

How much land you got there Don...

[glenn kangiser]

My favorite part is sliding that extra inch or so with the file and putting that nice half round slice across my knuckle.  Ouch. :-?

[John_C]

My favorite part is sliding that extra inch or so with the file and putting that nice half round slice across my knuckle.  Ouch. :-?

Time for the Country Plans community to take up a collection to buy Glenn a pair of leather work gloves.   Good ones that can be worn while holding a beer.

[glenn kangiser]

Funny you should mention that -- I hardly ever wear gloves except when welding.  I like pain.  It feels so good when it stops hurting. :-/

For some reason I just like the direct contact on the material --  lack of slipping - firmer grip --- stupidity?  I don't know.

No soft lilly white office worker hands for me.

[GunPilot]

Hey there neighbor.  We have a little prop-itty south of you down by Datil, NM.  Our current homestead pictures look a lot like yours.   We are in the clearing/planning stages.

If you ever need a hand raising some rafters or something, let me know.. we'd love to help and learn something as we do.

-George

[benevolance]

Glenn

I welded on the week-end...All day long with shorts no shirt and sandals without socks...

The wife dropped me off at the shop and took off with my work clothes before I could get em out of the trunk

It sucked! half a dozen hot pieces of slag burned into my feet between the toes... had to dig some of em out with the toe nail clippers that night

the beard kept my face half protected from the grinding sparks...

What was it...They used to look at your hands to see if you were honest or hardworking?

So I guess you are in like flinn Glenn...

[benevolance]

Well I know what you mean about cutting your hands...

Last week the hot water heater exploded on me... in the 3 foot crawl space under the house...

Went to Lowes.. got a new one brought er home... had to remove the access door and door frame to get said heater in under house (joy)

So I am down there in the dark... working off the light the propane torch lit provided...I had the mini pipe cutter and I am going around and round on the copper pipe...I gripped the pipe cutter too deep in the palm and went around and  jammed the palm of my hand  between index and middle finger between the pipe and cutter...Cut right through the callouses on my palm...Bled like a mother eff 'r.... Sort of like a paper cut deep in the palm

Basically no job is complete until you are bleeding and cursing

Then it is time for a beer