1973 Bus, they hauled it home, and in a later video the guy said he'd have to replace the tires because the ones on it were dry rotted.
...driving along at 60 MPH on dry-rotted tires in a vehicle with no seat belts. Well, I was young and dumb once, too, but I'm pretty sure I wasn't that dumb.
Not sure when VW switched the Type II from the original Type I engine to the Type IV engine, which was bigger and made more power. Their bus uses the Type I engine in its flat configuration, where cooling air is blown horizontally across the cylinders rather than from the top. But that's a 1600cc engine and it makes maybe 60 horsepower when it's brand new...and their engine ain't brand new. So the video where they're driving in the mountains is something of a cautionary tale: you drive uphill in second gear because the engine simply doesn't have enough guts to pull that big box uphill any faster than that.
Earlier Type IIs had reduction boxes at the rear wheels. Back when their engines only made 45 or 50 horsepower they needed that to be able to move, but of course it led to a lower top speed, and the typical VW air-cooled engine has a redline near 5,000 RPM in any event.
I'd prefer a Bus with the Type IV engine, even if parts cost more, because that engine makes closer to 80 hp in good condition. It's only 0.2 liter more in displacement, but the cam is better and the heads are a much-improved design over the Type I heads. (Even the "performance" heads for the Type I engine which are referred to as "041" for the last three digits of their VW part number. I recalled the number as "410"--right digits, wrong order.) Costs a bit more up front, but a VW air-cooled engine will run until doomsday with only basic maintenance.
Well, regardless, I really enjoyed that series of videos.
* * *
His premise is correct.
Communism is the Left, period. Or, perhaps more adroitly and accurately put, the Left is Communist. Dress it up how they will; hide it, disguise it, misnomer it. Call it socialism, call it Progressivism, call it liberalism (the most egregious misnomer of them all, and one that didn’t happen by accident)--Communism is Leftism, and Leftism is Communism. Period, full stop, end of story: a totalitarian, authoritarian ideology wherein the State is supreme; rights are not part of our natural inheritance as human beings but granted by the State, and subject to revocation or abridgment as the State may whimsically choose. Wherein individual ambitions and aspirations are subordinate to the needs of the collective as determined by the State. Wherein no individual right to petition the government for redress of grievances is acknowledged, much less honored or respected.That is exactly so.
All within the State, nothing outside the State, nothing against the State. This is EXACTLY what the Left wants, and they’ve come all too close to getting it. But it's as un-American as it’s possible to be.
* * *
Now, I know some people might have read my post yesterday, talking about how Apartheid was meant to keep white South Africans from being slaughtered by the blacks, and concluded I'm racist and no good. Well, Kim du Toit is from South Africa. He wrote, years ago, a post on Africa and its hazards. And this is what I was referring to, yesterday:
Among old Africa hands, we have a saying, usually accompanied by a shrug: "Africa wins again." This is usually said after an incident such as:And so when Apartheid was ended, and blacks were allowed to participate in government--well, take a look at the last two points. Understand: "white" is just another tribe to be crushed.* a beloved missionary is butchered by his congregation, for no apparent reason
* a tribal chief prefers to let his tribe starve to death rather than accepting food from the Red Cross (would mean he wasn't all-powerful, you see)
* an entire nation starves to death, while its ruler accumulates wealth in foreign banks
* a new government comes into power, promising democracy, free elections etc., provided that the freedom doesn't extend to the other tribe
* the other tribe comes to power in a bloody coup, then promptly sets about slaughtering the first tribe
Apartheid was racist and oppressive, but it was the only way for whites to remain alive and free in Africa. Because in its absence, white South Africans face ethnic cleansing and genocide within five years.
* * *
"Modern art is crap." Okay, it takes more artistic talent, training, and ability to draw a page of hentai manga than it does to recreate a Pollock painting.
* * *
CBS gets one of its gay actors to absolve Stephen Colbert for his homophobia. Well, that's convenient, isn't it? Kind of like buying an indulgence.
* * *
Because Verizon management doesn't mind putting its phone reps in difficult situations. One of the worst calls you can get as a phone rep for Verizon is when someone sees a deal that is only available to new subscribers. Management constantly hammers "use your resources!" but the resources available to reps don't explain how to answer the question, "Why isn't this deal available to loyal customers?"
So, this doesn't surprise me one whit:
When Verizon FiOS unveiled a $70-per-month gigabit Internet plan two weeks ago, the company's existing customers quickly discovered that the deal was too good to be true. It turned out that only new customers were eligible for the $70 price, even though Verizon's announcement didn't mention that caveat. Worse, existing subscribers who tried to upgrade were told that the standard price could be as high as $200 a month.And there's no way the phone reps can get you that deal. It's simply not possible; the system won't let you do it. Go ahead, ask for his supervisor; the supervisor won't be able to do it, either. Nor the manager on duty in the call center. Go as far up the chain as you like; it's simply not going to happen.
Then Verizon wonders why it can't keep subscribers.
* * *
YET ANOTHER hate crime hoax. A gay activist vandalized his own church with Trump and Nazi slogans.
It was immediately thought to be a hate crime because the small Episcopal Church is a progressive congregation that welcomes gays. The graffiti spray painted on the church walls read "Heil Trump" and "Fag Church."To me, "Episcopalian" means "run away, no God here". Thus I am not terribly surprised at any of this.
But during their inquiries police quickly came to feel that the vandalism was done by someone familiar with the church and began looking at the crime as an inside job. After an investigation, police arrested Stang.
The church organist allegedly admitted to the crime telling police he did it because he wanted to "mobilize a movement after being disappointed in and fearful of the outcome of the national election."
In a three-page confession entered into court documents, Stand reportedly said he was trying to spark his congregation into activism.
* * *
Woman on beach taking selfie of her swimsuit crotch. I can't think of any good reason for this to be happening. I can think of about 50,000 bad ones.
* * *
For grins I looked through Craigslist last night. I found a sand rail frame for $500, not welded but most bars tacked in place. Roller, though, with front and rear suspensions in place, "some assembly required" to get it fully welded and assembled. No other parts. Another guy offered a fully-assembled rolling chassis with transaxle for a mere $1,200.
Meanwhile, down south, this dude bought a complete rolling chassis for $200:
He took the big tires off it, sold them for $200.
*sigh*
It's a series--up to fourteen episodes now--starting from those humble beginnings and ending with a complete, street-legal sand rail. He had a VW transaxle on hand already, and got a good running engine from Craigslist for under $400. I could probably get to where he is at the end of the first video for a bit under $2000, living as I do in the Chicago area.
For fuck's sake, it seems like people around here think their junk is iridium-plated gold.
Well, none of that is happening this year, in any case. We have a lot going on, and with me still out of a job it's going to be another year of getting caught up. The thing that really grinds my gears about losing my job in February is that I had just managed to get caught up from the last unemployed period. I was suddenly finding I had money left over after paying bills.
NO, the universe said, YOU ARE MY BITCH. BEND OVER.
*sigh*
* * *
So, last night I dug into the boom box to see what I could see.
There are a couple obvious places on the circuit board where I could wire in an aux input. My thought had been to use the cassette input, as it's obvious and close to the edge of the circuit board--and furthermore the cassette won't actually be feeding anything into that unless you press "play", since the cassette deck circuitry doesn't energize until you press "play".
My thought had been to sacrifice the cassette adapter I have absolutely no use for since this boom box is the only cassette tape player in the house that can't be hooked to a stereo system. I'd take it apart and use its cable: solder the wires to the cassette input on the amplifier board and just run it outside the casing. But then I thought, "Let's try the cassette adapter one more time."
Worked a treat. Worked perfectly. Didn't shut off, didn't do anything but work. Which is not what happened the last time I tried it, in 2008, when I wanted some music while I was painting the kitchen--but oh well.
Audio quality is a bit off, though. I'm now thinking that I should perhaps use the headphone jack as an aux input and wire the tape deck to it, so that with nothing plugged in the tape deck is routed to the amp, but when you plug something in, the tape audio is cut off.
And maybe I'll just scrounge up a 1/8" stereo jack and hack it in somewhere. We'll see. It's not an emergency.
Plus side, I was able to correct the CD skipping issue with a little Tri-Flow. As expected, the main problem was that the grease on the rails was 20 years old. Looking it over, I saw that most of the ICs in the circuit board were Toshiba, leading me to conclude it's a Toshiba CD mechanism. Once reassembled, I played several CDs last night--including the first CD I ever burned, vintage 1997--without a skip.
So, boom box is functional, which means I can go ahead and deploy it to wherever I care to use it. Win.
* * *
You know, if I'm so damned eager to tinker around with machinery, I have a dirt bike I could work on. Why don't I go do that? *sigh*