bluh

Neglected this thing for too long. Tired of putting stuff up on Gesichtbuch, where they get to make money from it.

Up “soon” – the worst washing machine I have ever used and updates to Rental Cars I Have Driven.

Today’s high: 19°C. Going down to 13°C tonight. Partly cloudy with a brisk north wind.

Autumn is in the air, friends. And I can’t wait.

Ever had the exhaust fall off your car? It’s LOUD… all the clanging, scraping, donking & sparking. You’ll notice. The Cabrio’s driver seemed perfectly happy with this situation this morning on the JFX. Or maybe he was busy talking into his blootoof earpiece. I hope he fixed it, or at least wire tied it out of the way. The muffler I temporarily put on my Golf for inspection came loose at one end on my way home from Rob’s, but I immediately pulled into a parking lot and called for my wife to bring me the tools & ramps. Fixed it on the spot before driving the rest of the way home.

It’s crap like this what kills motorcyclists. Thanks a ton, useless & ineffective ‘safety’ (State-mandated cash grab) inspection.

Admit your jealousy.

DO THIS:

Preheat your oven to a billion degrees. Or 260°C / 500°F, which is about as hot as most will go.

THEN GET:

Two liters of tinned peaches, preferably in pear juice instead of heavy syrup. Duhmerikans, this is four small cans (15 oz) or two big cans (30 oz).

One 355ml can of 7-up or Sprite.

One box of yellow cake mix.

One stick of butter, cut into little chunks.

MIX everything in a bowl, peach juice and all.

POUR into dutch oven. Place lid on, put into oven. Let it cook until the top looks delicious. Maybe an hour or so, you’ll have to check it every so often.

EAT.

Still here. Still alive. Moving soon.

The Doctor got her dream job. Congratulations!

Spent 2 weeks in Slovakia for work. I liked it there.

Found out work won’t have a position for me where we’re going.

Had a fast roadtrip down to see the fam over the holidays. Everybody seems to be doing good. Found out what “PDM” stands for.

Turned in my resignation notice at work. Looking for a J-O-B in the Baltimore area. No offers or interviews yet.

Slowly panicking.

Not as much packing, mostly throwing junk away.

Trying to get the house repaired good & on the market fast.

Still rock my khakis with a cuff and a crease.

Now that it’s fall, suddenly it turned warm and humid. Exactly the kind of weather I don’t like when running the presses out on the pilot line. Which I plan to be doing most of the day tomorrow. At least doing that is more satisfying than spending all day doing statistics, which I did today.

Big ups to my living-free-or-dying holmes Chris and his lovely wife Sarah. Had an excellent visit with them this weekend. And Dollar Rent-A-Car, you’re on notice.

The Maytag didn’t cotton to my Goop repair as the seal flexed too much and the adhesion to the seal itself was fairly low. Stripped it all off by hand, unsurpisingly it all came off in one big chunk. During the test load it still only leaked about 10 drops instead of the 1.5 liters that it did before.

Having forseen this, I picked up a tube of Permatex waterpump gasket silicone RTV – p/n 22071. Put a tiny dab in the actual split in the seal and a very light coating on the outside. Let it cure overnight and a hot water & bleach test run today showed it’s holding fine.

Lightly sprayed the rust spots inside of the cabinet with some Liquid Wrench Super Lube and buttoned it back up.

Wound up using Automotive Goop (not Household, as I initially thought) on the Maytag. About to go try a new load to make sure it held. It went on pretty well and smoothed out well overnight, despite how sticky it was when being applied with gloved hands.

My $15 Zenni Optical glasses also came apart. Again. For the third time. Disassembled all the threaded connectors, applied high strength (red) threadlock compound and reassembled. We’ll see how well they hold up.

In this case, my Maytag Neptune washing machine. It’s leaking water. Just so the googles will find it, how about Maytag Neptune Washer Leak and Water leaking from Maytag Neptune front loading washer. There, I feel better about it. I also feel pretty good about diagnosing broken appliances while wearing just underwear.

This guy seems to leak water from two main places:

1. The inside door panel will leak like a sieve if you try to wash a rug in it, because a rug (fairly stiff) will scratch the everliving shit out of the door panel (relatively soft plastic). Don’t do this. If you do, it can be patched by hand-laying up a couple layers of fiberglass. We did this repair about 3 years ago with some generic autoparts store fiberglass cloth and JB Weld as the resin.
2. There is a circular diaphragm that acts as the seal betwixt the door frame and the drum frame. At the bottom of this is a drain hose to permit any water that falls in there to drain back into the drum. The interface of the seal and the hose is prone to cracking. Ours did and was patched about 3 years ago with JB Weld. Unfortunately this area is fairly highly stressed and the rigid epoxy doesn’t move with the rubber seal (I assume EPDM, nitrile or buna-n).

Here’s the leaker in question, showing the transition between the semi-circular diaphragm and the drain hose.

And a better shot, showing the water fairly well pouring out .

After this load of laundry is done (nothing like killing two birds with one stone – diagnosis and regular chores) I’ll let the joint dry and probably use one of the myriad more flexible sealers I have around the house. Black RTV, silicone caulk, latex caulk and Household Goop are all calling my name. I’m leaning toward the Goop, but we’ll see what I eventually wind up using.