Dispatches From The Farm

Straightlines

Posted on by The Lord of The Manor

Last night I brought my eight newly milled boards to the table saw to put a roughly straight line edge on them, then took them to the shop where I could use a #5 1/2 jack plane to make good on that line. They all stand in the shop against a rafter now, continuing to dry a bit out of the sun, and ready for me to put some more work into dimensioning them. Here is what I need.

The side of the barn in this location is good enough to repaint. There are other places where it would be bad practice to do so.

The boards are about 7 1/2 to 8 inches wide in a shiplap that has an angle at the deep tongue to allow water to flow off. The groove under the bottom lip is not too deep at only 1/2 an inch. It should not be too hard to make the boards into new ones, though I am a bit unsure of how much I can expect them to shrink along the width if I am to work them green and ready them to put up soon. I will of course go to the maximum width I can and put them up, though I may deepen that groove and allow for a bit more overlap, say 3/4 of an inch. I think that would be a no fail solution

When I nail the boards up, I figure it will be best not to put in many nails on the width of the board (top to bottom) so it can shrink. That should reduce the chance of the boards splitting.

The eight boards translate into about seven and a half once linear material is removed with bark on the sides that run too deep to remove when putting in the tongue and groove. Each board is about 9 feet long. I should net about 66 feet of boards, all poplar, to replace the bad sections on the barn. Shiplap should be relatively simple to remove and replace, something I think the old-timers factored in.

At $28.44 per piece, or $3.16 a lineal foot for 7 1/2 inch boards, the total value of the wood I have cut is $213.30. That is before it is shaped. The most similar shiplap sold at Home Depot is $210 without tax for the same amount, though it is sold in packages of six, and I would have to buy two of those, so actual amount is $280. But there would be three more boards. Those would require modifying as they are not really made for exterior use, as they have no angle at the bottom of the tongue and would collect water on a flat surface and rot. They are also pine.

My cost has to calculate the cost of the mill, the percentage of tractor use dedicated to wood milling, and saws and fuel and tools and so forth. I don’t charge me for my labor. Factor in that there is the truck and trailer to go get the wood, too.

What cannot be easily factored in is the most excellence of being able to take a log that was grown locally and make it into the wood necessary to repair holes in the barn. That satisfaction extends to the use of local material, DIYing, reducing waste, using slow growth trees, being old school, using hand tools, independence to a degree, and the development of personal skills.

Milling A Little Today

Posted on by The Lord of The Manor

It was not too hot today, so I got out to the mill and put the blade through some logs. There were three 6×6 inch by 9-ish foot posts against the granary when I started the day. Then I cut up another one to finish the corners of what I need for a woodshed. I then cut three 3×10 inch by nine-ish foot beams for the same woodshed. I’ll be double-checking my books before I decide where those are going to go. I also got a couple of four-quarter boards out of the wood, but they don’t have a straight edge, so they will need to be used for spares or small pieces in some project sometime.

After adding the fourth post to the collection I have a complete set of corners for a woodshed.

Incidentally, I have some spindles on order for the riding lawnmower, which ought to improve the shape of the yard. For now, the grass and weeds are getting a bit long.

After it got too hot to carry on, I leaned the wood I had finished for the woodshed next to the granary and went in for a needed break.

I may need thicker beams for the outsides of the woodshed at the tops of the posts. No worries. There are still several logs ready. Ideally, I would like to build a woodshed in the autumn, and load it up with enough wood to hold us through three or four months of winter, then add another shed or two next summer. This would be a first build for me, and I do have several other structures I could use, such as a place to hold the tractor implements as a sort of roofed rack. I’d also like to add a free-standing chicken coop to the farm! All need to be practice before I put together a fun structure as a work-shed or something of the sort. I have no building experience, so this is all a learning curve for me!

Back to School

Posted on by The Lord of The Manor

We have been so busy getting so little done lately. Sometimes that’s how things seem to go. There is a lot that needs to be done, and there is a lot that we are doing. But does it feel like we are getting caught up? No. I guess that’s just the way things go.

We got the girls registered for their respective schools yesterday. Our youngest has not been in public school before, and the oldest has not been in for the last five years or so. Hopefully this is a good choice for them. We got them into a district next to our catchment area where the classes will be smaller and they should have the opportunity to know everyone well, and for their teachers to give them the attention they should be getting in an educational setting.

So that is the close of an era for me. I have had a kid at home for homeschooling every year since 2006. Seventeen years! Now, at 52, I have to get things together and figure out what I want to be when I grow up. I have till a week from next Monday.

Also yesterday, I went out to check the feed in the chicken coop, and saw there was a dead peachick on the floor. The mamma bird was not sitting on eggs anymore by the door. Why she had to nest right in front of the door escapes me. I saw her in the back corner of the run, and walked over. Every bird scattered but her. She stayed sat. I hated to do it, but I got her to get up and reveal a day-old chick. The other appeared to be three or four days old, at least. So, to prevent another loss, I gathered the chick and took it into the house where we set up a box and put it in for the night. It will have to be caged separately to prevent it being run down like the other one appeared to have been. I can see it going out again in a couple of months, when it is big enough to stand up to a flock of chickens. It only needs to be as big as a hen. The hens usually don’t bother with the peafowl the way they will do bullying another chicken. As much as I hated to separate the mother and chick, there is no better way.

My latest shop project has been a simple one. I have assembled a stitch pony so I can do some leatherworking at the work bench. It is a simple one, designed to clamp under the force of the bench vise. All I have left to do is get some tacks and put some leather pads into the jaws of the pony, then I can use it freely.

The tractor is running low on hydraulic fluid. It has a leak in one of the pistons on the loader. Honestly, it is a little depressing. Who wants to have to put it in for service. How long will they keep it for? But at least I know why the bucket has been drooping or reacting a little slow, I think. I think I know. I don’t know for sure, but when I tightened the hose to the piston, it acted a bit better. It just continues to leak, and I think I may be a bit tight on the crush washer and want to have a tech service it correctly. Maybe they can do it onsite. Or maybe they can just take the loader, if they have to. Then I can continue to use the rest of the tractor here for some jobs. I think I am a bit spoiled having had that tractor to do my heavy lifting for me!

Well, it is nearly 3AM, and I need to get back to sleep. Or at least try.

Do I Need to Tell You?

Posted on by The Lord of The Manor

It is hot! Summer weather gets a bit unbearable at this time of year. I think there are places where the temperatures have exceeded their normal range by a bit, and records have been set. Our highs have been a bit more in line with the norms of the past decade, though I have not looked in the records to compare. It seems like fairly normal hot weather. So why would I be moaning about it then? I suspect that it is because summers in say, southern Nevada, get hotter, but winters stay much warmer. If the lows barely break into the freezing range, compare that to our winter low of -21F this year. Our total range has been closer to 120 degrees F in total. I am not speaking for anywhere else, so much as just saying that the reason I am feeling overheated may be because of the severity of our temperature swings throughout the year.

This coming week we have a lot of work to get done! The weather will give us a break, and it should be much more bearable for a bit, so we will be taking advantage. We have really got to get a few last pushes through in order to get our home-based businesses started. We have things to organize, and we have some cleaning to do. IT is time to see about things like windows on the house, too. I have a bit of work to do around the old chimney to try to prevent a leak where it meets the roof. I hope to see a man come by to offer a price on getting our septic redone, so we can get the yard into a state we can live with. There are many projects to get done!

My personal push needs to be to get the shop in a working state, with all the workbenches cleared off, and the tools organized and put in places. I have the likely last of any major purchases on order now. It is a set of blades for my plough plane. I’d like to do more than just build, though some of the blades will help with that, but also be a bit decorative, which some of the other blades will accomplish.

About that firewood…

I have a happy setup established with the trailer, a winch, and the tools required to bring home logs just shy of ten feet long. Those are great for the mill, and produce some scraps for the firewood pile. I also need to get some proper splitting rounds to add to the firewood pile. It has taken longer than I hoped to get the collection tools gathered and working properly, and while I can work in the mornings when it is still cool, it heats up quick and puts a damper on getting the job done in a day from collection to putting everything where it belongs here ready to process. It is best for me if I can do that. Hopefully a little break in the temperatures will turn into a long break, and I can get down to get more wood soon. It is always one of the things that is hard to get my head around; going out in such heat to get firewood! One has to keep in mind just how cold it really gets here in the winter!

It is getting pretty close to time to eat! I am off to have a lovely Friday evening and enjoy the company of family before we spend our last weekend as people who are not in a hurry running our own businesses.

Making Paper

Posted on by The Lord of The Manor

I woke up this morning and strolled through the house unable to locate my recently liberated corporate slave. I tried out in her craft cottage, and found her making paper. She is learning at the moment, but is determined to eventually sell home gown and spun llama fiber yarns wrapped with a home made label.

Paper drying on rack. Missus has included some leaves in her slurry to add interest to the finished product, and to gain confidence working with contents other than just plain pulp.

The paper she is working on this morning is practice, and the color and thickness may not quite be right, but as she progresses and works on what to put into the slurry, we hope to have a lovely finish that will take a label stamp.

The slurry is made by blending material then setting it aside to add to water where it loosens up to be collected with the deckle and mold to form individual sheets.

We have plenty of options for future paper to make, including essential oil scented, or with added mint leaves from the garden. She is also interested in commondeering wood from my shop to incorporate starting with sawdust or shavings from the hand plane.

The slurry is collected from the water with the deckle and mold, causing it to form into a useful sheet of paper, and forming it into a uniform shape.

If I do turn out to produce a useful waste that can be used in papermaking, then I hope to produce a lot of it for her! Of course, there is a lot to do with excess sawdust too, but that is a different story!

A finished piece lies next to the one currently being released from the deckle and mold by sponging away excess water.

The paper was then left to dry for the day. Future efforts will resolve a better color and texture as Missus refines her skill in the medium.

Transitioning to a New Life

Posted on by The Lord of The Manor

Two weeks now since the last day Missus reported into The Man. We are cut loose and flapping free in the wind. It is kind of nice. At the same time, it is scary, and it is a lot of work. We are trying to sort out some things in the house to clean it up and sort out livability. There are also workspaces to sort. Overall, it is not the worst situation we have been in.

Missus left the corporate world two weeks ago today. Since her volunteer departure we found out there have been layoffs. She feels it has been a good thing for her to go free on her own. The first benefit has been the extra time to work on the house and try to get things in order that have been put off due to lack of time while she was mentally and physically focused on her job. Despite the time, there is still a lot to do even two weeks later, thanks to there being so much to do! But we are keeping at it, and hopefully we will have things under control before too long. The heat is picking up, and that is not helping, but maybe we will switch over to a night shift to do things when it is cooler and sleep in the day, since now we can!

The scary part is of course keeping up with income. We have an egg to live off for a bit, but that won’t last forever, and who wants to give it up for an extended vacation when we could get earning and keep the egg? There are things here than need fixing, and the expenses with those also need to be taken from that egg, so it does add pressure to get earning before too long!

We have most of what we think we need to get the farm and business going. There are a couple of things left to get, such as a fridge for the eggs to sell in, and some other things along with them, should we choose to. The places we need to do the work we need to are pretty good. I have my shop, and it is almost ready to go up and running as it is. I would like to sort out a bit of an air system to remove the rubbish from the machines. Missus has her craft cottage, and the worktables in there to do what she wants to accomplish.

We moved to the US from the UK back in late 2010. We were dirt poor back then. We are better off this year than ever. That has come through our work and through some losses. It has all come at costs to us. We hope to be soon providing goods and services that will be a benefit to others, and at a fair price to keep us going too. As I said, this is not the worst situation we have been in, and now we hope we are well footed to move forward.

Waving Goodbye to ‘The Man’

Posted on by The Lord of The Manor

It’s already Thursday of the first week of since Missus left her posting working for QuickBase. Missus and I have been working to catch up on things that have not been gotten to due to time constraints on her calendar. With both of us free, we hope to be able to catch up some things around the house, then get into this whole self-employment thing.

Ordering the house means getting things out that we don’t use, and putting things in the new shed that we will still use. It also means organizing the spaces where the old outbuildings are. There is a lot to do! We got a good start on the upstairs, and now the biggest obstacle up there is my den.

Yesterday we took a day to go into town and sort some things out and visit the salvage yard. Wouldn’t you know that before we could go, we had to deal with escaped goats? Could it have been the male? Could it have been the girls? No! It had to be goats gotten out of both pens! Did he have time to have his wicked way with any of them? I hope not! The escapees from the girl’s pen were his daughters! I guess will know for sure come December! Anyway, we got them rounded up and back in and pounded away at the fencing till it was in good enough order hold them for a bit again. Then we left for town.

FedEx is due to empty a truck out on our doorstep today. After that, I will have the packaging to take up to town for recycling and other things to take to the dump. The trailer is already full and waiting!

The house and workshops need a bit more work before we can get fully into this new life we are attempting.

So, what is this new life we are going to try out?

Missus wants to take her artistic skills off and make a bit of money with them. But mostly she wants to share in them with others, such as weaving and spinning, painting, wire weaving, and millions of old-time crafts she has learned over the years. I will be putting the farmland to work and giving a try at chandlery, as a sawyer, and hopefully getting my skills up at some furniture making. That’s a basic summary. I’ll get a proper post up announcing when I have things in order and am getting started properly.

She is now a registered business with Antiquary Artisan LLC, and I am registered too, as The Peasant’s Manor Farm LLC. More to come on that later, too.

Gardens and Goat Pens

Posted on by The Lord of The Manor

It was a very wet spring here. The grass is off to a roaring start as it grows up almost to my knees already. I have put the tiller on the tractor, and got to work on the garden beds, tilling the soil clear of grass and weeds, and hopefully any hope they have had of settling into the space. I have also started clearing animal pens, and moving the hay and other natural contents into the garden bed, and tilling it in.

Our garden space is fair sized, though I would not think of it as large, considering the space our property has. I have animal pens in front of it, relative to the street. And behind it I am squeezing in an orchard, and will soon be setting up a sawmill. The sawmill requires the space to work, keep logs, and put wood that has cut to the side till it can be stacked and dried properly. So that’s a fair amount of space on its own.

I got to work on the pen next to our dog, Bandit. There was a pen in this space, but the goat destroyed the fencing, and it all required replacing with a stronger type of fence. We had originally put in a welded wire fence, but now I am putting up horse fence, which is far more resilient to the efforts the goat puts into its destruction. Welded wire is not worth putting in for any animal larger than a chicken, as far as I am concerned. But we were on a tight budget then, and had to go with what we could afford. I will likely finish the pen today, then I will be moving the buck into it, and letting him live in there. Then all the girls will come out of the pen in the back yard, and move into the pen the buck is in now with the sterile doe. That will give them more room than where they are at, and I will take out their current pen, and make that into a back yard, again. We need an open space in the back for our grandson to run around in. It will also be a step towards just making a lovely space for humans to hang out and give the animals a more defined space of their own in one part of the property. We will likely be removing part of the chicken run, putting in a storage shed there, and I think the rabbits will likely get a space between the sheds where they can have the freedom to run around a bit. But all of that is a mile away, still.

I am not sure if we will garden this year or not, which is a little late in deciding. We need to have a new septic installed, and we don’t yet know for sure where that will go. If it ends up under the garden beds, then it will ruin whatever gets planted. I am sure of being able to use part of the beds, though, so I can see putting in some gourde tunnels. Once the farm is esteblished as a business, which should be today or Monday, the biggest client I have wnats gourdes. That’ll be Antiquary Artisan, my wife.

The Mud is Gone!

Posted on by The Lord of The Manor

The mud has gone from all parts of the yard. Some patches had to be buried to vanish them, but after I did that with the tractor, I let things sit a couple of days and then gave it a go in the garden with the tiller. I was able to till without striking mud or sinking down too mauch anywhere. This morning I tilled the whole garden space again with the back flap on the tiller dropped all the way down, and it levelled the garden pretty good!

We had a gopher digging back in the orchard next to an apple tree. Yesterday I dug down and found the opening to his den and stuffed a pipe into that. Then I closed everything off again around the pipe and stuck the other end of it into the tractor exhaust pipe. I let that run till it was too hot to hold anymore, and then shut it off, pulled the pipe, and sealed the den. No more fresh tailings in front of the den this morning. I suppose that instead of eating the tree’s roots, the tree is going to be fertilized off the gopher.

I worked in the shop a bit today. The workbench by the south wall is finished for the time being. I only need to get a couple of fixtures and some bulbs to put some lights above it. I am happy with how it came out. I am happy that I got it pretty much the same height of the main workbench across from it, so i can span larger items from one to the other. I do need to get some electric power to it. I’ll be setting up my beeswax melters over there, and an oven to reseason my cast iron, too. That will get the stench of that chore out of the house, and make it easier if I find myself stripping old seasoning off the iron first.

I just have a lot of stuff that could use a home out of the workspace.

Missus is setting up to run an at home business with quite a few possible products. We have got a 60 inch loom set up now, and there are a lot of thigns she wants to make on that. We also have a potter’s wheel and a kiln set up, ready to start throwing. We both have lathes, and plenty of other tools for making all manner of things. I still need to get the sawmill set up. But that will come soon. It is getting time to get firewood going, and some wood to saw. It is also getting time to get the llamas shorn. We have busy days ahead of us!

The kids are finished up with their homeschooling. They will both be going to public school in the autumn. One is accepted to the school we wanted, and we are still waiting for a reply for the other.

This summer brings a whole change of pace for us here on the farm. It ought to be an advanture! With us both trying to earn here at home, nothing will be the same again.

Hydraulic Toplink

Posted on by The Lord of The Manor

Well, that’s one hydraulic toplink installed on the tractor. I did not make a video of it as I wanted it done. Besides, there are loads of videos on the internet already that show how to do it on the same or similar tractors. Any of those is sufficient. I watched quite a few and anticipated troubles before I started mine, so I had a goodd idea of what to expect, and it went on quite easily.

As you can see, I put the check valve on the bottom, and have not yet done anything about the wire to hang it from when not in use. That is not a huge concerne as I have so far never had the tractor without an impliment on the three point. It doesn’t make sense to if constantly or even unexpectedly using the loader is benefited by the extra weight on the rear of the machine.

When fully lifted, the hoses will bump into the fuel tank, which is not satisfying. The curve of th hoses bumps into the angled arm of the box blade, too, which is also not satisfying. So there may be a change when I work out how it needs to be directed for that not to happen.

The ability to just flip a lever in the cab to lengthen and shorten the toplink sure is a lot easier than getting out and turning a huge turnbuckle to do the same. That’s better in the weather, and it is much quicker and easier when an angle would highly benefit the drag of the box blade.

I founf that tilting the blade fully back is relatively non-destructive for the grass, and cutting down mole hills. Tilting it fully forward digs right in! That is very destructive. Perhaps I will fine the tile back much better for snow removal next winter, since there is obviously not going to be any more measurable snowfall this year. Obviously. Which, by the way, today’s snow did not amoung to much, so that is a relief. I think tilting back is good for simple smoothing. That ought to come in very handy while doing further driveway repairs after this hellish mud season! Tilting back should hopefully be less destructive while clearing snow off any of our grass driveways, so they hopefully won’t turn into mud in the first place!

Finally, I can think of the scarifiers digging in deeper when the box blade is tilted forward during use. Handy or not, now the angle is up to me, and easily achieved.