It's been a right old "Bitsa" weekend this week, that's "Bitsa" as in bits of this and bits of that, starting with an epic endeavour with the van. For weeks now, the bits to change the Cambelt and give it a good service have been cluttering up the shed. Unfortunately, until this weekend the weathers been against me and whilst I'm happy to get wet, even I'm not stupid enough to consider laying under the van in the rain. To make matters more interesting, whilst I'm allegedly a fully qualified aircraft engineer, I've always shied away from pulling car engines apart, so changing the Cambelt on the van was going to be a steep learning curve. With an extra day off on Friday and the weather set fair for a couple of day's, I could put it off no longer though, and with some trepidation decided to bite the bullet and get on with it. As I mentioned above, with a long background pulling aircraft to pieces, you would think that car's would be child's play. Well, I can tell you for a fact that anyone that works on cars deserves every penny they get paid, because they're horrible dirty, rusty, shitty things, that just get abused and misused. Every nut and bolt is normally rusted solid and those that aren't are impossible to get at. The only time bit's aren't rusty is when there covered in oil, or buried under tons of pointless plastic covers which are nearly impossible to remove without breaking. They're designed to look nice on the outside and screw the mechanicals. I mean who buys a car because it's easy to maintain? No one that's who. It's just got to look nice and don't worry about the poor mechanics who have to fix it when it goes wrong. As should be befitting a man of my expertise (or not as the case may be) I had no problems getting it apart and was fairly flying through the job. Don't count your chickens until they hatch though, because putting it back together totally threw me. No matter what I did, I couldn't get the new belt tensioned correctly. I had it on and off, half a dozen times, I looked at it, I swore at it, I cut my hands too bits down the side of the engine trying to adjust it, and I lost my rag with it. Eventually, having scratched my head for most of the afternoon and having run out of options, I tried putting the old tension pulley back on and you know what, instantly sorted. Having got this far though, there was no way I was sticking the old one back on, that's just asking for failure, so que a 16:30 run round the local motor factors trying to get another Cambelt kit. I mean what's the chance's of the new parts being wrong? And here lies the problem with doing something for the first time, you've got no idea if what your doing is right. You have to figure everything out for yourself as you go along. Having managed to get hold of another new kit, I had it back together within a couple of hours, but I'd spent the entire day trying to work out what I was doing wrong. What I was doing wrong? Nothing as it turns out, except cutting my hands to bits, bruising my back and getting bloody frustrated. Arrgggh! Either way, the jobs done now, plus new auxiliary belt and tensioner, new glow plugs, filters, oils (engine and gearbox) and a good clean around whilst I was at it. Now I've just got 6 months of worry and self doubt to look forward too, whilst I worry that I've done something wrong or not done something up. I might have managed to replace most of the engine for the same cost as a garage would have charged just to do the Cambelt, but for the time it took, the struggle I had and the worry, I'm not sure it's worth it. If it wasn't for the sense of satisfaction in having done the job myself then someone else can definitely do it next time and I'll go and play bikes whilst they're doing it. After Fridays back breaking efforts rolling around on the floor (and I'll tell you for a fact that I'm not getting any younger), a change of pace was required for Saturday. Up well before the normal people, I grabbed the opportunity to get in a quick run around the local area. Most of my miles recently have been either too and from work or away from home and it made a nice change to revisit one of the local routes that I know so well. With the early morning sun shining, the birds singing and being on familiar roads, the time fairly flew by and I was back well in time for a second breakfast and a brew with "The Emma" as she surfaced. Stretched off, showered and changed ready for a full day of odd jobs and pottering around, with 7 miles in the bag before most people had even got out of bed. What's not too like about that? Most of the morning was taken up with wrapping up the last little jobs on the van, but after lunch I managed to get up to the allotment for a good few hours. The last few days of sunshine have made a real difference up there too. Having moaned on a regular basis about how the cold and miserable May weather has been slowing things down, I can confirm that it's definitely "all systems grow" now. A good afternoons pottering saw the greenhouse fully planted up and the staging moved back into storage. Well I say storage, more like somewhere where I will endlessly trip over it and have to keep moving it throughout the summer, but you get the idea. So that's, Chilli's, Peppers, Cucumbers and Lettuce in to join the Tomatoes which are going great guns, with just some Basil plants to join them once they get a bit bigger. On the plot itself the Leeks, Courgettes and Pumpkins, plus a few leftover Tomato plants from the greenhouse are now in and the Parsnips, Beetroot, Spring Onions and Peas I sowed the other week are showing through. It's about time, but things are definitely looking up. The gardens at home are doing Ok too, over the last few days I've finally got the summer bedding into the borders to join the hanging baskets I planted up last week, and most of the summer bulbs have started to show their heads above the ground, joining the Aquilegias and Clematis which are in full bloom.
By Sunday with the sun still shining and the back broken on most of the odd jobs I grabbed the opportunity to get out on the bike for a few miles. Like with Saturdays run I stayed local (ish), but it seems like a fair old while since I'd been out on most of these roads. I suppose with having been up and down to see the "Old Cheese" on a regular basis and a few more adventurous weekends thrown in in-between it has been a while since I've actually been at home. So it made a nice change. I'll tell you what made the best change though. Finally getting the winter gloves and boots off and being able to actually use my fingers instead of struggling around with thick winter gloves! I really can't believe that it's taken to the end of May to be able to get out in shorts and summer gear, but there you have it. Spring, Pah! Bank holiday Monday saw another trip down to see "The Old Cheese" and an opportunity to test out the work I'd done on the van over the weekend. Luckily, I can conform that at the moment all the valves are still in the engine, how long that's going to be the case for I've no idea. But, I'm sure that another few weeks of listening to every noise with paranoia and fear is on the cards, so we'll see what happens. Of more interest, is the fact that I noticed the other day that I only needed another 13 miles of running too take May's total to 200 miles. Whilst that's not a massive number by some peoples standards, it's the most I've ever done in a month by a small margin, so it seemed rude not to at least try. It's hard to believe that there are some people out there that are putting in over 100 miles a week. 200 for the month is an average of 6.45 per day and my legs certainly know about that, so I'll take my hat off to anyone that's averaging 14+ a day for 100 mile weeks. Having taken the van down Sunday night I was up early to get my 13 miles in and headed uphill from Steyning to pick up the South Downs Way towards Chanctonbury Ring. It's 3.5 miles of uphill, but in the peace of the early morning it was well worth it. The only other people up there that early, were a couple just packing up from an overnight bivvy, which pricked a real pang of jealousy in me and a couple of mountain bikers. 3.5 miles doesn't get the magical 13 though, so having taken in the view, it was back down before taking on the climb up towards Lancing Ring. With the Skylarks singing their morning song, the sun glinting off the sea in the distance and the temperature quickly rising in the clear morning sky, it made a real change from the last few times that I'd been up here. Both of which were on recent running's of The Steyning Stinger, when miserable winter weather had obscured any view, I'll happily admit that it's better in the sun, although maybe not quite so much fun. A quick loop around the hill and back down, to follow the South Downs Way down to the River Adur provided a bit of respite for the old leg's, which for some reason were weren't feeling at their best, before the final leg back to the van. It wasn't fast my any means, at just under the 2 hour mark, but I was happy enough with that and at the end of the day the whole point in going out had been to get those last 13 miles, which I'd achieved. 200 miles for May then, I'm more than happy with that and I suspect that it may be a while before I even come close again! Not really worthy of mention, but I had a quick detour up to the Devils Punch Bowl before heading for home and back to the monotony of work on Tuesday morning. Days for playing bikes don't get much better though, so it's worth sharing the couple of pictures below.
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Paul PerrattOld enough to know better, young enough to still feel invincible, stupid enough to keep on trying the same thing again and again. Cyclist, Gardener, Runner, Hiker, Cook, Woodworker, Engineer, Jack of all trades and master of none, Anti social old git and all round miserable bugger. Archives
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