Weather: Incredibly nice weekend. A couple of brief showers both days, enough to settle the dust but not enough to register in my rain gauge, maybe 5 minutes each time.

Gas: Ran to Bemidji Saturday. When I left GR gas was 3.899. Gas in Bemidji was at 3.789. When I returned to GR one station was at 3.879. This morning everyone in GR appears to be at 3.849.

When we primered the W6 grill it looked good, but when we tried to put the color coat on it didn't turn out so well. Not sure if the problem lies with the painter, the gun, the paint, or the thinner. Touched it up a bit with the same paint in a rattle can, looked better. I'm not too worried about it, I'm planning on re-doing it again anyways. At this point I'm mostly trying to protect the metal.

Sure looks a lot prettier than the pink primer with rusty patches that was on there before.

As of Saturday afternoon Matt and I were going on the tractor run with the club. We installed a shelf on the back to make it easier to stand on the back of the tractor and we installed a shelf on the right side of the frame by the engine to carry the cooler (picnic lunch) and can of gas. Everything was washed up, everything was lubed, we had a full tank of gas. I decided that Matt and I would take the tractor on a drive around the block to see how it ran down the pavement and to see how much fuel we would use. I told Matt that it shouldn't use very much, it's less than 5 miles around the block. I figured it should use maybe about 1/8" on the dipstick and if it used more than 1/4" we probably wouldn't go because we wouldn't have enough fuel.

Just for comparison, here is photo from when we brought it home:

Tractor ran great on the pavement, almost threw Matt off the back when I hit a bump while turning a corner. Just hummed along. But, when we got home and checked the dipstick we discovered that we were down 1.5" of fuel. WOW!! That's way too much. I don't think we can handle that, at that rate we'll need to fill up by the time we get to Blackberry. No way.

Then Matt noticed that the fuel line was dripping gas right where the line comes out of the fuel bowl, so he grabbed a wrench to tighten it. It was a bit loose, but the drip continued. So, we shut off the fuel and pulled the line off. Looked like someone wrapped teflon tape inside the compression fitting around the ferrule to try to stop it leaking once upon a time. I cut the end off and then we discovered that the pipe was actually cracked just behind the ferrule. This was about 7PM, and all the hardware stores in town except Home Depot are closed by now. I ran up to Home Depot, they don't carry soft copper tubing and fittings. Damn.

Sunday morning I ran down to L&M to be at the door at 9AM when they opened, must have been twenty other guys there at 9 AM, but the door didn't open until 9:05 AM. Finally found the 5/16 ferrule ($2!!), got it home and installed it. I could have caught up with the group by running direct to Warba, but decided that maybe we shouldn't do that.

So, we stayed home. Plowed and disked the garden once more, then I started transplanting my tomatoes and peppers. Matt also plowed and disked the front yard where we tore it up this spring moving cars and fencing. Then Matt went on to plow most of the 10 acre field. At the end of the day the fuel level hadn't dropped more than 1.5" from where we started in the morning. So, after fixing the leak, we would have had plenty of fuel to make the run. Oh well, we needed to get the garden in.

So, the garden is finally started, the tractor is in better shape than ever. Looks kinda funny with just the grill painted, hood will have to come off next and get the treatment. I won't rush that job quite as much as we did the grill, might even buy some better paint than the Rust-Oleum equipment paint.

Moved the cars around so Matt could plow the lawn. Pulled the battery from 92 Voyager and put it in the 69 Catalina, pulled the battery from the 65 Ford PU and put it in the 77 Catalina, pulled the battery from the WC and put it in the Ford. Both Cats fired and drove (no brakes). Brought the 88 Horizon home from Steve's with no brakes but I have all the parts to fix that. I need to remember to call the insurance and take the 92 Voyager off insurance. It does run but I need to pull the head and check out the coolant leak. After the 88 Horizon stops.