[New BMT Blog Entry] Paul's Tales - Late Winter Optimism

[WattsMack]

So - It's the end of February. Mud season has issued a warning to us that it's not too far away.

The snow comes overnite and melts to mud during the day.

But it feels good. The sun looks different and the light is better somehow.

Spring is close. It's lighter earlier and later in the day. Everybody just plain feels better.

And our building business has gotten a couple of shots in the arm. Work looks OK for the spring.

Still a long way to go to get out of the woods, but I'm pretty optimistic after a really bad spell.

The Mack hobby has almost taken on a life of it's own. I'm getting numerous calls for parts,

and have sold a couple of trucks just recently. It's been great fun.

The driveline choices have been made for the B-67. I'm using an NA-711 from my 1966 R Mack,

which has 198,000 original miles and runs like a top, and a nine speed overdrive duplex TRD-720

with the original 4.28 rear gears on tall 22.5 rubber. It should be a pretty good combination for a

comfortable 65 mph cruise speed at about 1800 rpm, yet have a little low end power for pulling a load.

My 2nd choice is a turbocharged ENDT 673-C engine that I have acquired. But I don't know much about

that engine yet.

I'm not going to install the Jake brake or the air ride rear cross member until I see how I actually use the truck.

Looking for all of the Bendix air valves and equipment needed to plumb a modern dual brake system in the truck.

Finding some things used on E-Bay, and getting quotes on a whole list of valves that I have made up from a couple

of vendors. (The Bendix Air Brake Manual is invaluable, if you have the copy that has the part numbers in it)

The prices look more reasonable than I originally thought. That's nice for a change.

So on that note - I'm signing off to go up to bed and contemplate just exactly how we, the 60% of us who actually pay taxes,

are going to increase our government spending to new lofty heights, extend health and welfare benefits to illegal immigrants,

lengthen the term for unemployment benefits, increase the unemployment benefits, offer unemployment to part time workers,

reduce your taxes, give you some great stimulating checks, pay your mortgage for you if you want and reduce the federal deficit

even though the budget actually increases the deficit by threefold.

I've never been real good at math, so I will have to think this through very carefully! It must be the latest, cutting edge math.

It looks a little like magic to me. Or voodoo.

I've said before that I believe that, although Mr. Obama was not my choice, he is our President, and deserves our full support and respect.

I hope that he and his administration don't make that too hard.

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