More Maytag things......

Since getting my Maytag ice cream maker I have taken a bit of a liking to the little devils.  They are noisy, smokey and rattly,  but I think that's all the more reason to love them. A few months back Allyssia had a horse show to go to down in New Glouster.  That left Roland and myself home alone all weekend so we invited my buddy Spenser up to visit.  Spenser showed up Saturday morning and we puttered around before ultimately deciding to go visit Grampa and pick up a few project Maytag engines that Grampa had laying around.

Spenser and I started with the Maytag 92 single cylinder engine.  Grampa had gotten a new coil plate with new points and condenser for it some years back but never got around to firing it up.  After a quick cleaning and adjusting the points we had the old girl running great.

After the 92 was running we tried to get the 72 twin cylinder running but could not get any spark out of it.  We tried for a while to no avail until it was decided that we needed a new coil.  That was the last of messing with the 72 for a while since Spenser headed home the next morning.  In the coming weeks I priced out a new reproduction coil to the tune of $200.  Not wanting to spend that much on this Maytag that was missing parts I researched other options.  My next option was a $50 Harley Davidson motorcycle coil.
                                                        Maytag's Plus One
With a little bit of fancy wiring and a battery I think I have the easiest starting Maytag 72 twin out there.  Quite a few of the hard core Maytag collectors would not agree with this and I even had a few people tell me I should fix it "the proper way" but myself and Grampa both agree that it is running so that's what matters most!  Until next time stay tuned and check back often!
                                                           

Lighting for this Winters Projects

Jumping right back into life here at the farm, my garage finally has some real lighting! I had been planning on putting in LED strip lights and I still may because you can never have enough light.  Before I bought the LED lights a set of 2x4 t8 lights and a box full of bulbs fell into my hands.  The t8 lights are almost as efficient as LED lights and these being of the free nature they sounded great to me!

This first photo needs more explaining in another post but you can see just how dim it is working in the shop and if you reference one of the many Oliver posts from last winter you will see how dim the lighting is and probably even see me wearing a headlamp.  Well headlamp no more because we have lights!

I put the lights right next to the existing lights so that I could daisy chain power off from them easier and to keep them centered in the garage.  Just on the Bongo truck you can see an amazing difference on how bright it is. 

 The Oliver has not moved much but someday soon I will get back to it and have it running nicely.  On the plus side at least now I can see what I am working on! For Christmas Santa brought me even more lights so that it looks like daytime in the garage at night.  With four lights to work with I picked the dimmest working areas of the shop.  Over my bench, over my toolbox and the front of my garage bay.

The picture quality is pretty bad on this last one because taking pictures of lights doesn't always come out to well.  Now in the shop i wear my sunglasses BUT I haven't needed a headlamp while working so I guess i have to pick my battles! Until next time stay tuned and check back often!