Running Bear's January 2025 Coffee Shop

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chadbag said:
Christmas Eve day our furnace stopped working. The fault code was pressure switch issue of some sort. The service guy came (we rent this house so I’m not going to screw around with it) and checked and cleaned a few things including the flame sensor and it’s been working since.
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That is true. The first problem I had with our furnace turned out to be the motherboard. The second triggered the same code (pressure switch) One of the esteemed members of our coffee shop group recommended cleaning the flame sensor. Which solved the problem. God forgive me but I cannot remember who told me to clean the flame sensor. God knows and I'm certain God has or will bless him.

I keep a tool bag in the utility room to do service and maintenance. Since the flame sensor issue, I keep a roll of emery cloth in that tool bag. I now clean the flame sensor every time I service the furnace.

chadbag said:
we rent this house so I’m not going to screw around with it
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That is a smart move. You can't be blamed for anything if you don't touch it.

chadbag said:
the flame sensor is a common problem
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Modern gas furnaces (high efficiency) don't produce much soot. But the flame sensor is metal, and it does corrode over time. Clean off the corrosion and it is good to go.

I love my furnace; it is relatively easy to diagnose problems and simple to work on.
 
troyphoto said:
Well howdy there internet peeps across the pond who might be awake, and all those celebrating anniversaries!

It's Troy again.

Back ache Day #2 begins. Made it upright for the 3:30 pee run, and stayed up. I'm in the recliner with the heating pad. Seems the Sciatica was masking symptoms of a pulled back muscle. I tried to be careful shovelling snow yesterday. No sharp YOU PULLED ME stabbing pains during the shovelling process. But I stressed something back there.

In other news, my kickstarter for the new book is doing far better than I expected.
View attachment 208898
People have pledged triple the amount of the funding goal I set. The first three stretch goals (rewards for if we hit certain dollar amounts) I set are blown away, and this is only day 5!

My goal was to get enough $$ to pay for the audio book production. We've technically hit that in gross, but I need another three hundred or so to hit it with Net. I have to buy books, postcards, etc to fulfill the merchandise side of what I promised to deliver.

on the RR front... I'm reading the Kalmach book on yards while parking in my recliner. If I can get upright later today, I'll head out to lowes for more project panels. The problems with only having a Toyota Camry is my hauling capacity is limited to 6 ft long x 2ft wide sheets of foam.

I either purchase 2x2 project panels of 1 inch foam, or I purchase a 4x8 sheet and take a knife and T-square to cut it in the parking lot. I'm leaning toward the later. I can cut a 2x4ft section off an end, then cut the rest into 2x6 sections. and it's cheaper that way. Hmmmm.... I may have a plan...
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I recommend resting until the pain is gone. Lowes won't run out of stuff.

I'm glad to hear the good news about the book.
 


chadbag said:
I assume you don’t have a roof rack or at least rails on the roof? Some place to attach bungles? If you can stick the 4x8 sheets on the roof put either a piece of ply or OSB or a couple 2x4 on top of the foam sheets to keep them bending up, breaking, or flying away.
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No roof rack. I'd be worried about the roof mount foam sheet snapping in even a 35mph transport wind.

Bruette said:
I recommend resting until the pain is gone. Lowes won't run out of stuff.

I'm glad to hear the good news about the book.
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I did the resting part yesterday. I'm good sitting or standing. It's the in between parts that get to me.

And with the sciatica starting to progress (it's in the left hip now) I need to nip that in the bud. So, inversion table, and walking are the two best things. Just need to watch the bending parts of getting around.

Wandering around lows, and pulling a four lb sheet of 1 inch foam isn't going to strain anything. Just be careful of bending and twisting.
 
Good morning. It's 29 and clear in Washington, DC, where my weather app suddenly thinks I am. It's 38 and clear where I really am.
Troy, I'm going to have to measure my Camry now. I was able to load a 36"x6.5' layout in my Corolla. I haven't tried anything that serious in the new car, I would hope a larger car would have more room, but you never know.
 
Good Morning All. Clear and 32° to start what appears to be a nice day. While there is a north wind, high will dip into the 50's before returning to the upper 20's overnight. Same pattern for a few days. Snow is still here, although much melted yesterday.

Nothing of note happened yesterday. Watched snow melt and brought in firewood. Sat in front of the computer for too long. Wife made pot roast instead of stew with the Chuck Roast yesterday, same thing except you cut it up on your plate instead of ahead of time.

I'll venture out in the car today to pick up the mail down the road, (mailbox is 1.25 mi away). Haven't been there since before Wednesday's delivery.

Nothing new out in the train shed yesterday. I turned the corner and started along the north wall with the cleaning project.
IMG_0024.JPG
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The two red structures are wired in for lighting. I had to disconnect and remove the taller elevator and take it to the bench, but the feed store has a removable roof so it was easier.

Tom O - Good to read that Terry is home and seems to be recovering.
Len - Best wishes on the move. Be safe.
Louis - Congratulations on the easy fix for the heater. And congrats also for your Ravens.

Everyone have a good Sunday. Hope your favorite football team wins if you follow that.
 
Well, I'm back from the foam board run.

DAVID: In the immortal words of Genesis/Phil Collins: "I CANNNNN'T DANCE..." Really, I cannot. No sense of rhythm, can't hear a beat unless a loud drum is front and center with it.

However, I was careful of twisting.

foamboard.jpg

Two 4x8 sheets of 1" board, and one drywall 4' T-square = $75 (brought my own snap blade knife)

About 5+ minutes to cut them down to 4 each 2x4ft sections which fit into the car. That row of blue lockers was great to lean the panels against, then apply pressure to do the SNAP after the cut. Did that all while kneeling in front of the lockers. I was waiting for a customer to stop and ask what I was doing. I was planning on saying "Making a sacrifice to the Model Railroad Gods..." But no one asked.

I can now make the mail level of the layout 2 inch deep on foam, with larger panels for where the trains will run. Why? So I can excavate down as needed for gorges and rivers, or valleys and quarries. Plus, I get less of a bumpy subroadbed from the foam I've been glueing then removing foam risers to. That layer can be the bottom of the stack.
 
Good morning all!

Its currently 32F and its not going to get any warmer. In fact the winds are supposed to kick up later this afternoon dropping the temps down some. We are also getting some light snow. Just supposed to receive a dusting. Still haven't had to use my snow blower yet this year. That is very rare. I imagine the luck is going to run out at some point.

going to meet my parents for a late lunch today at Applebee's. Haven't seen them since Christmas, so it will be good to see them again.

Not much else going on here.

Have a safe day everyone!
 


Good mornin' y'all. Good to hear from the crew. 34 and partly cloudy Nac this am. w/c 34 - high today 53 low tonight 28 no precip in the forecast.
Slept in this am. Warm bed hard to get out of ... Nothing much going on here today. Enjoyed last night's NFL game but that was enough of that for a while.. Back to History, Smithsonian and Nat Geo channels, Curiosity stream etc. I'm an MLB/Astros fan so until spring training starts, I'm sort of in a lull here. . Usually during baseball season I watch the Houston RSN on FUBO TV but it's not available in Cheyenne. I see that Wyoming is not in the MLB-TV Astros market area so I can get real time games. Not sure I want to do that. I spend too much time in front of the TV as it is. We're trying Sling tv for 3 months. I like it 'cause it's the only way I can get History Channels and Turner Classic Movies and some other stuff. I'm a big fan of 40s and 50s film noir movies and some select silents - has anyone watched "Metropolis?"
Might get out later for a nice sit-down dinner with Nurse Judy. Like most college towns, Nac is overloaded with fast food places but we do have 3 or 4 nice restaurants with good food and decent service. and real tablecloths no less.
Y'all take care and have a good week.
 
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I'm all most done redecorating the layout space and since I spent so much of my railroad years on an ALCO RS 3 I wanted to include it on my wall art. I started drawing one and then realized this could take a while. I found one and only one basic drawing on the web. I'm adding lots of detail to the drawing new brakes trucks and the like. After this I'll start working on the layout part of the renovation.
Swal

NYC_RS_3_87.png
 
I got some wheels under my RS 3 drawing project. I'll have to switch over to my Coral Paint Shop program to get the wheels painted correctly. It has much more capability than the standard paint program that comes with Windows. I like to get things going in the Windows program though.
Swal

NYC_RS_3_70.png
 
Well howdy there internet peeps, and those watching sportball

It's Troy again.

foam.jpg

Had to break out the good stuff to put distributed weight across the new foam.

As I mentioned earlier, got my foam boards home in 8 pieces. Got it glued to the main U of the layout. One entire 4x8 (cut into 4 2x4 ft sections) are left. I started laying those out on the far left section (other side of the backdrop on the left) where the main Yard is planned)...

And I realized I need 2-inch foam, not 1-inch. I could go back, and get another sheet of 1", and then go back and get another 1" sheet for the upper deck. Or, just get a 2-inch sheet, and use the 4 sections I have left now for upper deck. Pricing comes out the same within pennies.

The reason for 2" foam in the yard is the mainline coming into the yard at the backside will be up 2 inches. have enough room to do a 2% drop of an inch before the yard at the wall end, but not a 2 inch drop. I do have room at the front end of the yard, from that black and yellow toolbox on the left foreground is, to drop another inch in four feet. So, put the yard between the two down grades, leaving the yard A/D track flat with no grade, nor any grade on the yard. But the yard has to be an inch above the rest of the main grade in the pic above.

In other news: wife is going on a Whole food kick, and pushing me to get back into my keto routine. I need to drop a good 30 pounds. So she tried a keto pizza crust. Mozzarella mixed with almond flour and some other stuff. It was decent. Not the crust I want, but one I can live with. I normally like to each three slices. This one, I was ready to stop at 2 slices. It was "heavy" in the belly.

pizza?.jpg
 
Good early morning all. 12.15 am 13th Jan.

Dancing. Way back in time (when I was nine years of age) my cousin said she would take me to dance classes she was attending. I wasn't really keen, but I went anyway. I thought I would learn to dance with her as my partner. Wrong!!! I was partnered with another girl (around my age). She taught me well. :cool:

Time to close down. Goodnight.
 
troyphoto said:
Well, I'm back from the foam board run.

DAVID: In the immortal words of Genesis/Phil Collins: "I CANNNNN'T DANCE..." Really, I cannot. No sense of rhythm, can't hear a beat unless a loud drum is front and center with it.

However, I was careful of twisting.

View attachment 208928
Two 4x8 sheets of 1" board, and one drywall 4' T-square = $75 (brought my own snap blade knife)

About 5+ minutes to cut them down to 4 each 2x4ft sections which fit into the car. That row of blue lockers was great to lean the panels against, then apply pressure to do the SNAP after the cut. Did that all while kneeling in front of the lockers. I was waiting for a customer to stop and ask what I was doing. I was planning on saying "Making a sacrifice to the Model Railroad Gods..." But no one asked.

I can now make the mail level of the layout 2 inch deep on foam, with larger panels for where the trains will run. Why? So I can excavate down as needed for gorges and rivers, or valleys and quarries. Plus, I get less of a bumpy subroadbed from the foam I've been glueing then removing foam risers to. That layer can be the bottom of the stack.
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Great progress, you will have trains running in no time!

If you do go with 2" foam, look for the boards that are pre-scored. Just put a knee on the back side and snap it. Saves a bunch of cutting in the parking lot.
 
santafewillie said:
They're like mini-chicken houses, each hen has her own. When it's breeding season, a select rooster is enclosed with her and the eggs are removed from each one, kept separate and moved to the brooder house for incubation. Most of the female chicks are culled and destroyed since he is raising fighting cocks. He tightly controls the breeding and lineage.
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Re: the breeding… I would look for a Little Jerry type…
 
Bruette said:
Modern gas furnaces (high efficiency) don't produce much soot. But the flame sensor is metal, and it does corrode over time. Clean off the corrosion and it is good to go.
Click to expand...
Being a low bid house we’re renting it has a standard contractor grade 80% efficiency furnace. The service guy said it was good and dirty. But of course it had not been serviced in who knows how long.
 


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