Due to impending demolition and contruction, it looks like the Shed in Ryde will not have power come the next shed night. We have graciously been offered a generator though!
I also wanted to thank all those who have made generous donations to the Shed of late with stuff like tools and projects. Thanks!
March Shed Night is looking like being a good one!
As Tim the tool man Taylor said, “If it doesn’t say “Binford”, someone else made it.”
We have no photos from Shed Night #6. I completely forgot to pick up the camera… but here is a run down of the night’s events!
We ate the beautifully cooked dinner I had prepared, slaving over a hot bbq plate. We drank a variety of beers and some Cider that Terrance brought along.
We then had our “Repair Race”. We divided into two teams. One team had the task of getting the garden blower to run. The other team (my team) had the job of getting the Ryobi wipper snipper to run. Both garden appliances had been found on the side of the road and condition of both was unknown. While the blower team was farting around Frank and I quickly drained out the old fuel before re-filling. I said to Frank, “How bout we give it a go and see if it fires”. He agreed. It fired and roared into life. The other team looked sad!
The blower proved to be difficult to get going. Both teams came to focus their attention on the blower. Fuel was an issue so we watched “Big G”, the “G-man” strip it and clean it and put it back together. Then, for what seemed like many hours, the “G” pulled the cord and fiddled with little screws. The blower seemed to make it’s own decision about when it would and would not start. It seemed to know when we were losing heart, and would then roar into life, bringing laughter, smiles and backslapping. It would then die and remain dead until once again it sensed that we were loosing heart.
We then pulled out another very sorry looking mower with a 4-stroke Briggs motor. The oil smelt like dead fish and it looked like it had been sitting outside for several years. We changed the oil and fueled it up and away she went. She sounded like a Harley, the exhaust was gone. Sadly, after running for a while she was not turning over very smoothly at all. In a future shed night we might pull it apart and see what has gone wrong. Pulling things apart is always a great opportunity to learn!
Finally I pulled out another mower that was brought along to Shed Night #5. It was a young mower that had been brought up in a very abusive home. When I had attempted to clean out the carby last time I had broken a plastic fitting and given up in disgust. So this time we tried to make up a linkage to replace the broken part. We did this and got it to start, but it would only really run flat out of nothing, so we need to do some fine tuning to work out why.
All up, a successful night with some lost souls being brought back to life!
Future Shed Nights we have the following planned:
* An excursion to a bigger and better shed for a night (“The Big Shed Out” night)
* An engine strip night (“Shed motor mayhem” night)
* A construction Night (“Shed Extension” night)
* A night when you can bring something broken, and we will try and fix it (“Shed Fix” night)
Remember, we can make the world a better place one shed at a time.
There is a good mechanic in the Chipping Norton area. The website is on our links page, or you can go straight there from here! Tony owns and runs the shop so you know you are getting good service!
I will see if one day we can feature Tony’s shed on the website. He has so many great toys. I mean tools.
This Friday will be our 6th Shed Night, the first for 2012. It also means we have been shedding for 6 months now. Cool!
So, to mark the occasion we will be having a “Repair Race”. This means that each team will be given a broken piece of garden rquipment which involves a combustion engine. The team that gets their machine to run first, wins. The state of each motor is unknown. They have all come from the side of the road.
We will also have the usual bbq and beer with stimulating conversation. Email for more info!!
This photo is from a shed trip back in about 2005 where a bunch of us went out to Gilgandra. A gentleman by the name of Ross Stockings showed us some “Agricultural Blasting”. We will NOT be doing any of this at the coming Shed Night. Not intentionally anyway. :)
Everything have been quiet in the Shed over Christmas. We will be having our 6th Shed Night on the 2nd Friday in February. Stay tuned for more details!
I only have time for a quick review of our shed night last night. We had some visitors and newcomers which was cool. We started a mower to edger conversion. Perhaps what exactly it is will become clearer later…
We also got a wipper snipper working that had not run for several years, a mower that was not going (we got it going… but then it died :()
Some arts-farsty photos below taken by Ken… edited by me!
Some of us discussed the ins and outs of camper trailer design. I love how Dan pretends to actually listen to me when I talk. Leon could learn from Dan. Photo by Tom!
And as always we adhered to OH&S requirements…
This Friday evening from 7pm we will be having our fifth shed night. It is a special christmas night. We will be putting the canoe to one side and have some other little projects to do. Once again a very basic bbq tea will be available. More info can be had from emailing me at dave@ashedinryde.com
Another enjoyable night, though I really do question our work ethic. Too much eating, drinking and chatting – but we did achieve some good stuff, and more good photos!
Photo above shows some of the toys before the lads arrived. Honda Cb450 and GB400 plus the old Stihl 08s chainsaw from around the 1960′s. It got a new chain and bar this week so I needed to show it off. Goes well for an old saw. They just don’t make them like that anymore!
Michael rode his bike to the shed night, and Tom took a great shot of it. It is a Suzuki Harley look a like. Lounge on wheels!
But, back to the canoe!
We removed the remaining plywood attached to the flotation foam stuff. This took a little while. Shot below show Ryanin the fore ground working hard at this while Tom is in the background cutting out some ply on the bandsaw ready for the new seat that will go in the middle of the canoe.
Finally the seat was ready for a trial fit. All this took a while as the bandsaw is having issues. It would appear as though the rubber on the top wheel of the saw has stretched and does not want to stay in place. The job got done finally and is a rough fit, pictured below.
Frank seemed pleased with the results!
So we celebrated by eating some No Frills fruit cake. The cake did not do justice to the enormity of the achievement.
So we played with the chainsaw. Should you “play” with a chainsaw? We weren’t juggling with it or anything…
You should not operate a chainsaw while using your mobile phone. Thanks to Tom for the pic, and for the one below to finish off. A lovely shot of the beautiful tank on the Honda GB400.
Stay tuned for future Shed Night info. December will be our end of year Christmas Shed Night bash.
On the 11th of November is our next Shed Night. Hopefully we will continue the canoe and the tasting of fine imported and local beers! If you want more info email me, dave@ashedinryde.com
In the mean time, here is a cool picture to look at!
Last night was our third Shed Night. We welcomed a visitor/new bloke, ate a bbq tea, drank beer, and worked on the canoe. We also talked a lot! The dog joined us.
Thanks to my son Tom who took the photos. The dog is not allowed in the shed (he decided to mark his territory outside of his territory and has not been allowed in my territory since). Tom took some nice shots of the bikes which had to be moved out of the stable for the evening.
But the night was not all about bikes. It was about the canoe which we are going to try and fix up and sell for charity. It is an old canoe which, as the night went on, showed signs of numerous repairs. It had been painted by the previous owner. Our aim was to try and remove the paint and repair a few chips in preparation for a coat of flow coat to make it look like new again.
The shot above is the canoe at the beginning of the night. Last month we removed the wooden strips that run along the top edges (whatever they are called (gunwhales?)). You can see the red paint is worn off the bottom to show the red gel coat. Lots of bog repairs!
So sanding was the order of the day. We got a fair bit of the paint removed but we must have talked too much. Considering how late the night went we had time to finish the jolly thing – but didn’t! I must have done too much of what I am doing below… eating and judging beer. Which reminds me, for any discerning beer drinkers out there, we are hoping to offer a bit of a beer review of one of the beers drunk at a shed night. I am not doing this, someone who knows something about beer is. I assume they will include in the beer review whether or not it is a beer that promotes a good shed work ethic or not.
