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To help drying paint, someone suggested a hair dryer. I pained a wheel rim with rustoleum silver spray paint it was like 40 deg outside, after maybe an hour outside I brought it in the basement and gave it a good blast with the hair dryer, waited maybe another hour and mounted a tire on it no problem. Pretty sure 2 hours outside air dry @ 40 and the paint would of been soft and rubbed off.
 
I finished splitting, hauling and stacking the firewood for 2016-17. This past Wednesday was the first day that we could not find snow in the woods. There is still 5 foot snow banks in some parking lots where it was piled sky high from the graders they use to plow them with. It's going to snow tonight and tomorrow morning, then a gradual warming to 60F (15.5 Celsius) by this weekend. If the blustery winds we have been having abate when it gets 60 I will start painting.
 
Rollfast parts roasting by an open fire... Jack Frost nipping at your nose..
Come on you know it, sing along!

Just kidding, Rollfasts are near and dear to me and I am loving this build. I am also sooo freaking glad I'm not a yooper, I am so glad our snow is in the past!
 
sludgeguy said:
Rollfast parts roasting by an open fire... Jack Frost nipping at your nose..
Come on you know it, sing along!

Just kidding, Rollfasts are near and dear to me and I am loving this build. I am also sooo freaking glad I'm not a yooper, I am so glad our snow is in the past!
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Most Yoopers either never leave here, they just find low paying jobs with no benefits (like me) or they leave for a good job and return here to retire. The only time in my life I was away from the U.P. was the 2 years I got drafted into the US Army. My buddies uncle was from Hubble and after he mustered out after WWII he returned there and never left Copper Island for the rest of his life. I'm at an age now where I hate the Spring time warp season; it can't decide if its Spring or Winter. Today started out Winter but now it is Spring. I would like to spend April and May in Arizona and New Mexico. I woke up this morning and the roofs of all the neighborhood houses had snow on them and my yard, deck and the woods behind my house all had a layer of fresh snow on them. The higher elevations must have got hit pretty good. The good news is that it all melted off form 9:00 AM to 9:45 AM. It too cold to work in my shop, too slippery and muddy for a single track ride, and too windy from the north right off Lake Superior for a road bike ride. Even the dogs were reluctant to go outside. If I get inspired I might build my wheel today.
 
I like your paint curing stand. I use a yard sale multi-towel rod mounted to my shop cabinets.

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It started snowing again around 12 PM. So, I took advantage of being stuck inside to clean my New Departure hub. It's just me and the dogs, my wife is hiking on the North Country Trail with her hiking club. Because of the USA National Park Centennial you can get a patch if you walk 100 miles on it. The section she is walking on runs along Lake Superior in Luce County so she should be freezing. Last week they walked on it but got lost as it was a remote section and not well marked. She was gone 9 hours. They finally used the car location as a way point on a cell phone and scrambled cross country, jumping creeks and climbing rock bluffs, but they made it. There were 11 hikers in two groups (fast walkers and slow walkers). She was exhausted when she got home so I got takeout as I had just gotten home from wood splitting and was pretty much toast myself.
 
What a bizarro world. Your dealing with snow and I'm dealing with 90 degrees and humidity.
 
It's 5:30 PM and it is still snowing so I laced up the New Departure hub. Nothing else I can do on this build off with this weather. I painted a rack for another bike project. I shouldn't have as the rattle can just splattered and the paint didn't flow on the rack. Too cold for paint. Good enough for that project. Here is the wheel I built today. Old rim from a 1967 Monark and spokes from a 1980s Huffy mountain bike.

Pulling spokes.

Drive side done, 4 cross.

Lacing done, drive side.
 
kingfish254 said:
What a bizarro world. Your dealing with snow and I'm dealing with 90 degrees and humidity.
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It's a fair sized country we have here in the USA. Your a little over 1300 miles south of me. Or like I live in St. Petersburg, Russia and you live in Rome, Italy. One of my biking buddies is an engineer for the local nickel mine and he is from England. He said that Michigan has the closest number of square miles to the UK of any of the States. This includes Michigan's territorial waters of the Great Lakes (Erie, Huron, Michigan and Superior) when measuring it's size. It is the biggest State West of the Mississippi when you include its official size with the Lakes, even bigger than Maine. Weird, eh.
 
The snow was supposed to head east today and it was predicted to get a little warmer. They got that wrong, it has been snowing all morning and blowing up a gale from the north. I finished raking the yard in the snow and my hands and feet are stinging. The only thing I can do for the build off is put the guts back in my New Departure hub and work on my battery power supply. Then I am out of work until it gets warm. This is pretty bad weather even for us up here, otherwise I wouldn't be constantly sobbing, whimpering, wailing and groaning with frustration. I can't take it, the heck with the light snow and wind, I am going single track Klunkering on my 1940 CWC. I just have to use chemical toe and hand warmers. All I need to wear is blue jeans, duct tape for your pant leg, gloves, a poly under shirt, a light ski under shirt, gum rubber skate shoes and ear muffs; you get hot after you climb and warm up. You just can't stop, that gets really cold. I put up my Spring Avitar, a stone boat; it fits right in with the surrealistic weather we are having.
 
us56456712 said:
It's a fair sized country we have here in the USA. Your a little over 1300 miles south of me. Or like I live in St. Petersburg, Russia and you live in Rome, Italy. One of my biking buddies is an engineer for the local nickel mine and he is from England. He said that Michigan has the closest number of square miles to the UK of any of the States. This includes Michigan's territorial waters of the Great Lakes (Erie, Huron, Michigan and Superior) when measuring it's size. It is the biggest State West of the Mississippi when you include its official size with the Lakes, even bigger than Maine. Weird, eh.
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Actually Maine farther down the list. Georgia is the largest Eastern state by land area. But if you count water as land :crazy::D, then Michigan, Florida, and Wisconsin are ahead of us.
 
Temperatures have finally returned to average (60-70F) for this time of year. I am going wild leek digging today and then to camp for several days to put up 2 back splashes and trim on my 3 year shed project. I think the weather has finally turned to spring so sanding and painting the frame will start next week. I will take the New Departure hub guts to camp so it could be assemble it on the porch as the black flies might be too bad to work outside?
 
There are few things that compare with the intensity of the black fly season in the U.P. Your description took me right back to early season hiking in Marquette area when my buddy lived up there.
 
I painted the Rollfast head badge today. I first clear coated it, then paint. I am very shaky so I took two Beta Blockers that the Doc prescribed to even out the ginger jakes. I can't see well either so I sat by the window with a shop light on the badge. I have a hard time getting a screw driver into the screw head and building wheels is a challenge because the shaking makes it hard to put the spokes in the nipple plus I can't see where it goes. I use feel and get frustrated. I plan to give it one more coat of paint, scrape the excess paint away with an Exato knife and then clear coat it again.
 
Head badge turned out great! You and I would make a great pair in the shop. With my arthritis and inability to hold on to anything we'd have tools flying all over the shop! Your perseverance and adaptability will continue to serve you well.....and, at least it's not in the 30's any more right?! :)
 
OddJob said:
Head badge turned out great! You and I would make a great pair in the shop. With my arthritis and inability to hold on to anything we'd have tools flying all over the shop! Your perseverance and adaptability will continue to serve you well.....and, at least it's not in the 30's any more right?! :)
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50s F here in Marquette today (still slightly below average) but at our camp inland it was 78F today. The buds have started leafing out in the last few days so I think spring has sprung. Only about 20 more days before the days get shorter.
 
Yeah, that's a brief Spring / Summer up there for sure. I directed an adventure camp on Lake Superior for 3 yrs on the south shore. We did training in the lake that required 15 mins of treading water in case of a canoe capsize....in the first week of June. It would take an hour in the sauna before you could feel anything below your waist....
 

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