Daily Archives: March 12, 2016

March 12, 2016   Uncategorized

Oil Can Gregory . . .

We did get in our walk this morning, the first one since Monday, what with the bad weather and all. But we did have to dodge a lot of mud puddles and soggy spots along the roads.

Coming back we sat outside to have our coffee, while Karma stayed at the screen door, meowing. So I bought her out on her leash for a while. And like every time we do this, she gets a little calmer. Shirley, her previous caretaker, came across the road to say ‘Hi’, and although Karma was a little skittish, she did allow herself to be picked up.

Coming back in for a while, I drilled a couple of holes in my prototype Slobber Can collector and headed outside and under the rig to figure out how I was going to install it.

Slobber Can Kit 3_thumb[1]

Once I got under the rig and looked everything over, I decided to push the tubing up over the slobber tube, bend it away from the oil pan and then hang the can by the coat hanger so that the can supports the vinyl tubing and keeps it from falling off.

Slobber Can Install_thumb[8]

It does look a little kludgey, but It’s just a test model so I can see if this fixes the problem, or if the problem is still occurring at all. I hope we’ll know more tomorrow after our trip back to Lake Conroe.

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Now that I had the slobber can in place I wanted to top off the rig’s oil level that I discovered was down a little after our trip over from Lake Conroe two weeks ago. But I quickly discovered that the gallon jug of 15W40 Engine Oil that I thought I had in one of the bays was actually a jug of truck antifreeze

So now it was off to the O’Reilly’s Auto Parts in Columbus for a couple of  gallons. And lucky for me, Rotella 15W40 diesel was on sale for only $14 a gallon until the end of the month, so stock up now.

Getting back, I got a funnel out to help me add the oil to the rig. And it’s not exactly easy.

Rig Oil Input_thumb[3]

Even using a funnel only helps a little since the tubing and large hose behind the filler port means that the funnel is always tilted and that makes it hard to pour in the oil. In addition, because of the low overhead it can be hard to tilt the jug up high enough to drain it completely.

But I got most of one gallon into the engine without too much spillage, and then let it sit for while before checking the dipstick. Finding it just a hair below the full line, I closed everything back up and called it done.

Next up I started dumping the black tank and then checked the truck oil and added a quart to it. Coming back to the water bay, I closed the black and opened the grey valve, while I disconnected the shore water hose and stowed it away. Then I finished up by putting away the sewer hose and I was done with that too.

I try to always do as much as possible Saturday afternoon, which means that much less to do on Sunday morning before we leave. And of course it also helps since we’re going to have our usual breakfast buffet at Schobel’s down in Columbus before we leave. And even better we’re meeting our friend’s Jim and Peri Dean there at about 8:15. Really looking forward to it.

 

Thought for the Day:


Knowledge is knowing a tomato is actually a fruit. Wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad.

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