Things have been so hectic here that there has been no time to do blogs. Jeff promises some technical stuff when he gets a spare moment so I will just do a general updating.

We are, thankfully, as yet unaffected by the economic doom and gloom. Lots of enquiries, lots of orders for parts and a stream of work coming into the workshop including as well as tractors, fuel and oil pressure pipes being sent in for ends remaking or replacements, a conrod with problems for replacement or repair and a carburettor and distributor sent to us from Canada for Jeff to sort out.

The Mil Loader is now finished apart from cleaning and painting. Its been a pig from beginning to end- no replacement hydraulic rams were available unless we had them custom built at incredible expense, the bucket as mentioned in the last blog had to be kitted out with its pin mountings and catch and these could not just be replaced in the same place as the old one used as a pattern because the weight distribution was completely different and the thing has to be balanced to tip forward properly then flip back for its latch to catch properly. Of course, in the end, by clever thinking, Jeff has got the whole thing working perfectly. Steve started to clean off the rust and dirt for painting and got the bucket done before being stopped to get on with other jobs which were holding things up.

Ooh-Ah (the TED) has had its newly reground crankshaft refitted with new shells all round. Jeff will possibly put a picture on showing how the play on the crankshaft has work away a bit of the clutch housing.

Herbert now has his own bay in which to be rebuilt and with his crankshaft reground as well and his new main and con-rod shells and new pistons, rings and liners arrived should be under way before too long. Only problem is that with the arrival of two more vehicles, Deejay is in Herberts bay as well so no room to work.

One of these was a sad TEF who came in to be started. Jeff quickly identified a lack of fuel getting through to the injectors as an initial cause. One fuel pipe had started to disintegrate inside its metal outer and was totally blocked. When this was unblocked fuel was still not arriving in the right place. Further investigation revealed not bunged up fuel filters but NO fuel filters at all. Cruelty to tractors. Of course this meant that bits of muck including rubber particles had bunged up the injectors. I was busy elsewhere so didn't see what Jeff did to clean the system out but was then called over to see fuel spirting smoothly and evenly from each injector in turn (having been warned first to keep out of line as the force with which the fuel is pushed out is horrendous (Jeff has a nasty story of someone who said, 'Look there's no fuel coming out of the injector!' putting his hand in front of the injector just as it started to pump through. It blew a hole through the guy's hand).

When Jeff got the tractor running at last he diagnosed badly worn main and big end bearings. I rang the owner who informed me that when the tractor was purchased a few years back it was found that the previous owner had 'been running it dry' - no oil in the engine, no oil in the gearbox. Oh dear!

Owner sadly, decided to sell rather than have repaired so arrangement was made for owner to come in in the morning to pay us and the new owner to arrive in the afternoon to take the tractor away to break for spares. I was up at the post office in the morning when an agitated Steve rang me to say, 'Come back quickly, they are trying to take the tractor away without paying!' New owners had started to push the tractor up their ramp into their trailor. Jeff had pushed it down again! There was one of Jeff and seven! men arrived to collect it- had they anticipated trouble??

I'd planned my approach as I did 80 down the by-pass and, confident that Jeff would play the hard man and not let the tractor go, I played it cool, wandered up, said, 'Hi! Were expecting the owner in to pay in the morning, you in the afternoon. Suppose you come back later.' 'Can't' they said and went into a huddle. Eventually all was sorted amicably, we got the money from them, they got the tractor. We all had a cup of coffee and Jeff and Steve went back to changing the head gasket on a Mercedes van. No, we don't usually but this was a favour. Also, our truck (also a Mercedes) is dripping black oil and is next in line for attention.

Tommorrow we have a TEF and owner in for the day. More later...