It’s about time for a Menard’s trip.But not today. Been hearing a noise from the right front wheel/axle area. They just did some paving on the road out of here and for a few days, it was uneven when they only had one side done and I noticed it would grab the truck and steer it and uneven pavement never did that before.
Jacked it up and I can move the top of the tire in and out over 1 inch. Yikes. Wheel bearing's shot and on this truck, that means a new hub assembly. O'reilly wants $150 for their store brand or $200 for some better brand that I've never heard of.
I can get one shipped from rockauto way cheaper or get a good brand name a little cheaper. Moog for $75, Timken for $125 or Genuine GM for $150. Won't be here until Thursday at the earliest.
Top of my To Do list is "check noise on truck". That snowballed.
Now I'm going to go do a complete front end inspection to see if I need anything else right now. Grab my pry bars to check for play in everything.
I knew the front end needed a lot done but didn't plan to start now. Needs to be good for Winter though. Another noise I hear and feel is that I have a u-joint going bad and/or possibly the rear end needs some things like pinion bearing. The whole rear chunk and rear axle assembly probably needs a rebuild. Better jack up the back and yank on those tires too and stick a 2x4 under to see if I can jiggle it up and down. Time to start chipping away at the suspension and drive train.
Wellhell, shipping for 4 packages of those gutter leaf guards is only $7.50 and I still get the sale price. Gas to drive there and back would be that much, never mind the $60 savings of the sale price. I'll just do that and get the top fence rail when the truck is right. If that takes 2-4 weeks, so be it. I can dump a bunch of money into it on the 22nd.
I've commuted in the car for that long with the electrical issue before and it seems like it started to fix itself towards the end. Charge light was only coming on 30 seconds a few times on the trip. Just started it and it fired right up and no charge light. Hadn't started it in a month or more. Still need to put on that new control arm I bought for it so I'll do that today or tomorrow.
I knew I would be in mechanic mode soon and I guess that starts today. Welding mode and soldering is along the same line so, here we go. Meanwhile, I'm gonna go mow for half an hour while it's cool. Need to mow around the shop and shed and move the mechanic operation down there. Been working on stuff up by the house but that needs to stop anyway.
Patching the old compressor might be the first chore so I can have that up here and bring the new noisemaker down to the shed. If I'm welding, I might as well narrow those tractor rims and put the new tires on. Will kill time for that new impact gun to show up today so I can use it on the car and truck. My air hose leaks like a sieve. Need to grab one from the local parts or hardware store next time I'm in town.
Haa haa; my $7.50 shipping from Menard's was an estimate and went to $36 during checkout. DELETE CART
UPS showed up at 10:30 so the new impact gun battery went on the charger. Was half charged. Thing is heavy and feels like it's got tons of torque. My 20 year old cordless drill likes the new lithium battery. Once it was charged I pulled a couple of lug nuts off the truck and put them back on. Works well.
Ended up being mostly a cleanup day. The place has been looking like a dump for way too long. Got my push mowing done down around the shop and shed. Then tossed all the trash off the truck bed trailer and brought it down there and filled it. Came up by the house and mounded it over, mostly with stuff from the neighbor's barn I cleaned out. I had tossed that stuff off up here to go through it and keep anything useful. Dumped the trailer load and parked it up by the house so I can fill it again with more stuff from that barn and some stuff in the house.
I've been working on vehicles up by the house but I should be doing it down by the shop/shed. With all the trash to look at down there and inability to cut grass for a long time, I did things up here. Nice to see it mowed and cleaned up and nice to get back to working down there.
Cleaned up the shed a little and pulled the seed rack out. It was blocking the back door that's been screwed in place with shims for a few years waiting for hinges. Stuff quickly got placed on the back wall and blocked it. Now I have flow through.
Over the next two days, I'll probably do a little more cleanup. Will give the truck a complete chassis/drivetrain inspection. Install the control arm on the car. Will unplug alternator and see about getting the female blade terminals crimped shut a little. Maybe the male blades are thinner on the new Chinese alternator and giving me the intermittent charging issue.
I have lights in the shed and a high bay light in the shop. Tomorrow when I wake up at 3 am, I can head out there at 4:30 am and do a little something. Need a little bit more light for the path to the travel trailer and can plug the trailer into power again and start moving stored stuff from shed and shop to trailer.