[ihc] This is getting embarrassing!

[John Hofstetter <hofs@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Digesters, 

Some of you will remember that about a month ago, I was with the Tierra del
Sol group down by the Salton Sea, and broke the front shackle mount out of
the front spring on my Terra. I posted a URL where you could see the field
expedient tool (Granite boulder) being used to hold the spring in place
while I limped to the BF Goodrich Racing Support team to have them weld the
mount back in place.

Well, I was out with some of these same guys this past week and my main leaf
broke on that same front spring. I was surrounded by Jeep guys who couldn't
wait to make fun of my overweight Terra.

Fortunately for me, one of the Jeepers was my auto tranny guy, who had
recently given up his Scouts and had become one of "them". He had an
on-board welder and lots of other stuff that he used to weld and strap my
spring back together so that we could get back to Shoshone.

Oh, my, the abuse I took that night. They even made up songs about my Scout,
and they weren't particularly flattering.

While at the Salton Sea I had contemplated buying a Premier Welder from the
nice old vendor that was there, but didn't.

Richard's welder was a Mity Mite or something like that which used the
regular high output alternator and a control box to put out 133 amps at 42
volts in his case. About $500 and takes up almost no room under the hood.
When you put a load on the control box, the alternator is disconnected from
the vehicle's electrical system and starts its welding duties. He had to run
his engine at about 2000 rpms to get the output that he wanted.

This may be old news to some of you, but I had never seen this particular
little unit. I can attest to its welding ability.

John Hofstetter