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Jul 15, 2012
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Fairview, Alberta
VetteCoins
107
Car
2006 Z06
Good morning Gentlemen,

Well, three unexpectedly beautiful days, Sunday, Monday and Tuesday.

The final of the Wolves Cross Country series was in Grande Prairie. As I had to face replacing the front right wheelbearing/hub and CV joint on my Sentra I took the Z06 for one of its final road trips.

The race was an interesting one, a 3 runner relay race on a pretty hilly course. I needed to finish within two points of one runner in order for us to be tied overall and as I had results from a 4th race (top 3 race results nomrally count for overall series placement) I would win. I'm not as fast as this fellow but I'm lucky in that I ran some races in which he did not participate. He did finish ahead of me in the relay race but the division results were not broken down until last night and lo and behold he finished 1st for 10 points and I finished in 2nd for 8 points so we did tie and my 4th race result gave me the overall series win for the 2nd year!! Yep, a pretty happy and proud moment for me.

As well, some of you know that while sort of retired from my professional work as a research agronomist I still do some industry plot work. I have a small plot combine but have not used it in three years and spent some time this fall getting it going. In the end the little 4 cylinder VW engine fired up and I was off and harvesting yesterday. Some of you may be familiar with combines but this is a little Hege 125 from Germany. Works pretty well the same way but allows you to do plots that are much smaller in size than you would need if you were using a full sized combine. Here is a video from yesterday:

The World's Smallest Combine - YouTube

So the weather is turning to seasonal finally. Today is the last decent day it appears, 12 above, showers today and tomorrow, then 6 above on Friday, more showers on Saturday and highs of 2 and 4 on the weekend.

I've picked up my oil filter for the Z06 and will get the Mobil 5W-30 today for the storage oil change and hopefully can get it squeezed into the SeaCan with my Dakota. Battery minder to follow and then 5 or 6 sad months of snow and no Z06............

But if I enjoyed it year-round I would probably not appreciate the six months that I do get to drive it for up here.

Another reason Manny would never hire me - I printed off the instructions for replacing the wheel bearing/CV joint on the Sentra and in the assembly process got this silly piece of sheet metal 180 around. Garry the idiot was looking at the diagram for the LHS instead of the RHS! Of course you don't realize there is a problem until you go to put the brake caliper back on and you discover it won't fit! So you have to take EVERYTHING all apart again to rotate this piece. No job more hateful than having to spend another 90 minutes doing it all over again. On the plus side the car is nice and quite now. I have the parts for the LHS but as it seems they are fine I'll hold off on doing that for the time being.

Cheers,

Garry
 
Great job on the racing Garry!

Love the tiny combine. It would take quite a while to do a full size field. Last year I think I saw a Hege. It was tiny and had a cab on it. would be fun for a garden in the city. :D

Glad you got the mechanics figured out. Would hate for you to get it back together only to have one side of the car go backwards while the other side wanted to go forwards! :rofl:
 
So just about to leave for the oil change. Hopefully no surprises there. While it snowed last night there is nothing much remaining outside of some on the vehicles. Then this afternoon when the temperature is at its peak (+5!) the job is to drain the methanol tank, add the normal windshield washer fluid and then to see about loading it onto the tilt trailer for loading into the SeaCan.

I'm encouraged in that I thought it was going to be a very tight squeeze but upon discovering yesterday that the side mirrows can actually be floded backward into toward teh door of the car that this will give me another 2 to 3 inches of clearance per side which should make things much easier! I'll still have to exit through the trunk but that is fine.

Yes, this Hege is a fairly old one. There are a number of other manufactures including one called "WinterSteiger" that I have seen with cabs. These are made for harvesting plots that are say 10 meters in length and 1.5 meters wide. The drawer on the bottom that the clean grain goes into is maybe capable of holding 40 lb at a time perhaps so you can't go too far before it has to be emptied. I'm so impressed that after clearing the fuel lines and giving it a shot of ether it actually started and ran after sitting for 3 years. I think that I learned the lesson that I need to run it every year if I plan on taking it to the field or not. Fewer surprises that way................

Time for my final Z06 drive..............

Cheers,

Garry
 
So back from getting the oil changed. I have a new mechanic that I really like and more so actually trust, only the 3rd one in my life after Duane and Manny. Laurie is a great car guy, bracket races a V6 SC'ed Chevette actually and has a LS 2 6 liter that is getting a 671 SC for his Chevy Nova 2. Laurie understands why this car is so special and also answers all my general car questions patiently.

It was sort of a mellon collie sort of experience for my final road trip for the next 5 to 6 months. Also sad as I had carefully cleaned the exterior of the car and it rained and snowed yesterday so lets just say that even at 20 km/hr my fenderwells and the rear of the car are not so pristeen anymore! But also a feeling of how lucky I have been to have such a car and the driving experience it has brought to me. It is a privilage to own such a car and even as little as I may sometimes drive it the smiles and joy it brings are so out of proportion to what it actually is............a means of transportation.

Cheers,

Garry

So now to purge the Akly Control system after lunch.............

Cheers,

Garry
 
Done and done!

I went over to the farm to help my parents get Netflix savvy and so dad came over after lunch and we emptied the methanol out, added some regular windshield washer fluid. Much less intimidating than last year!

Then parked the tilt trailer perpendicular to a spot on my driveway that was lowest on the grass and highest on the crown on the driveway and backed it right on! Dad watched carefully and I don't even recall any front valence rubbing!

Then a hop, skip and a jump over to the SeaCan and lots of room on the sides with the mirrors folded in and then I took off my shoes and exited through the hatch!

Battery minder connected even!

Sadly not enough room left over for me to fit my lawn mower so it will have to go into the other shed.

I have great piece of mind! I was worried when I sold my house how this would go, if it would fit and all and it worked out just great.

Sweet dreams to my Z06!!!!!!!

Cheers,

Garry
 
Probably 4 inches of snow now this morning. yet other than winter being here maybe a week or two earlier than I would have liked, I feel content that the Z06 is in storage and everything else is put away other than my lawnmower which will go this week. I'm happy I have 3 of the 4 winter tires on my Sentra and hopefully the 4th tire arrives soon. I hit a pothole last January or so and it caused a sidewall failure and the only tire they had was a summer one so that ended up going on the back right side. I ordered a tire on the 13th but it has yet to arrive.........

Winter. Oh well, I still say it makes me appreciate the months I can enjoy the Z06 more than if I was able to drive it year-round.

Cheers,

Garry
 
it was funny yesterday... it snowed from 3pm to 11pm and the grass was still green.

Now a trace of snow on the grass... roads wet and not icy... and the two week forecast looks not bad... shortens winter!

I stored my ZR1 in Las Vegas one winter and it was nice to go down 3 times in the winter and drive it...... driving it year would would be nice.. not in Canada. Maybe in Vancouver/ Victoria you could???
 
We're going to see +6 on Friday. I can just imagine the mess it will make when it thaws everything and then subsequently re-freezes.

Storing the car in a sunny lcoal and getting down to use it is a nice idea, I may have to give that some consideration in the future if my finances change!
 
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