Barn

When I killed 'Granny Herald' and moved to this Blog the idea was that I would expand my musings to more completely reflect what I was up to and not just use it as a vehicle to vent my spleen on the Labour Government, idiocy, climate change bollocks etc. etc.

During the summer I managed to chronicle my fishing (not very good, was it?) and since we mercifully booted the last government into touch I have switched away from politics a lot. NZ politics is going through a period where it bores me. We don't have much of it as we have moved to a more business model of running the country and the current mob have eschewed all the hideous ideology and social engineering that had me tearing my hair out for the last nine years. This suits my ideas of how things should be done. I have taken the opportunity to write about jeans and the weather but we need something new - and some pictures.

So perhaps the time is right to do what I intended to do a couple of years back and expand these scribblings to new places. I'll start off with a tour of my playpen.

When we moved to the country eighteen months ago I inherited the mother of all barns. It has storage space for Africa (I mean you could put a couple of small African countries in it). It also has a mezzanine floor. I planned it that I would break the vast space into five distinct areas - implement storage, general storage, general workshop, metal working area and game lure manufacturing and sales. Having done all that there is still space to restore a 30 foot boat should I decide to do that. Or maybe three or four old Jaguars. Or maybe.......

Right,oh. This is what I need to keep the property spick and span

Couldn't do without a quad and it's yard trailer which I forgot to take picture of.A 250cc two wheel drive Honda - plenty for what I require. Also in this picture there are, from left, a 50 litre spray unit powered from the quad, an Echo chainsaw with a 16" bar, a Stihl 2 stroke hedge trimmer, a Stihl electric power washer, a Stihl weed eater, a 6hp four stroke Honda powered 30" self propelled mower (bought second hand from South Head Golf Club) a Hansa chipper also with a 6hp Honda motor, an old 18"mower (which I don't use) and assorted hand tools. The Hansa is that green thing and can take branches as thick as your(well, my) forearm - marvelous fun. The majority of the mowing is not done by any of that lot but by a 2.4 meter three rotor Fieldmaster park mower towed behind a 42HP Shibaura tractor. However they live in a different shed and ca have a separate post all to themselves later.

We need an area to store a fishing rod or two.

Two Shimano Tiagra 80Ws, four 50Ws, a 16 and a TLD25 and then assorted other bits and pieces. This includes a couple of Abu 7000s which are date stamped 1978. A testament to Swedish engineering that they still function faultlessly.

Now on to the general workshop bit. Nothing special here but I like things to be neat and tidy.

Lets pop upstairs to the gamefishing lure department. This is the Legend Lures headquarters for the Southern Hemisphere. First we have the heads and a few of the bins of skirts. Stock of heads a little low at the moment and I trust this will be remedied in the next couple of weeks

At the other end of the mezzanine is the assembly/rigging area with all the bits and pieces needed for that. Stools are to ensure that customers are all nice and comfy whilst they decide how many more lures they need to purchase - all heart, me.

Back downstairs to the latest area. I have recently rekindled an interest in metal work and machining. This was extinguished in 1966 when I was told at school that in order to enter Medical School I had to take Latin. As I was fifteen I believed them and swapped the micrometer for Caesar's Gallic Wars Book 2. Idiots. I no more needed Latin to enter medical school than I needed a firm grasp of the history of music. Anyway after a brief hiatus I have taken up where I left off 43 years ago.

From right we have a 4X6 bandsaw (I'm too bloody old and lazy to be sawing 2" steel rod by hand), A Ryobi variable speed drill press with a 13mm MT2 chuck and then my pride and joy, a Myford ML7 lathe.

This is the same age as me; we were both made in 1951. It cost me the same as a brand new Chinese 'mini lathe' would have done. Compared to the product from Beeston, the Far Eastern efforts are toys. The Myford is a delight to behold and built like a proper machine tool should be. Good grief we built an Empire with stuff like this. The plastic bins on the wall are filled with all sorts of stuff that you need to assemble around you for this nonsense - measuring devices of all varieties, change gear wheels, spare chucks, tool bits, spare tool posts and on and on. There is also a rapidly increasing library of manuals, reference tables, conversion charts, spanner sizes, thread characteristics etc. I ain't going to learn this in five minutes and I've already lost 43 years.

What am I going to make with this? Dunno, but that's not really the point. Most people seem to make tools. This is very strange. I've started making some aluminium marlin lures but there are many basic and not so basic techniques that have to be mastered before you can make anything.

I cut a piece of rod to diameter and threaded it to fit a nut on Sunday - because golf was cancelled

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