It was a productive day today. First, I drove to the Army Navy Store in Ashtabula and purchased an ALICE frame and shoulder straps. But the clerk there told me that they sometimes have a shortage on backpads because this ensemble is obsolete. That which I was after was issued during Vietnam and was phased out of most infantry units by the time I was in The Old Guard 12 years ago. Looks like I'll have to get it shipped in, but the drive back from the Marietta area next week will probably mean that I'll have to come back with the trailer completely unloaded. And I don't dare take that over 45MPH, that means that I'll be criss-crossing the state on primary and secondary highways (state and US routes) on the way home. And there might be an opportunity to pick one up along the way.
After that, I drove to Lowe's in Mentor of Lake County and procured a Kobalt 4 Tool Lithium-Ion Kit, some saw and wood sawzall blades. The kit came with a light and I wish it was an impact drill instead because it's not very big, so I can afford the expense in space to carry it and it will make working on the car easier. The employee at Lowe's told me that the kit came with 2 batteries, so, I purchased an additional one for about $60. Also, I puchased a tool belt since, I'll be hauling these through the backcountry for miles. Lastly, I had to get a broom handle because the previous one that I had rotted and broke from being stored outside all winter long.
-A 2 year warranty was purchased on the tool kit.
I got 4 long sleeve button up work shirts from Sears in Mentor of Lake County to go with the two long sleeve shirts that I already own. I'm looking forward to image pressing my "Section," "Supervisor" Buckeye Trail base and my "whipple" rockers on to them.
I got a new 26L Aquatainer, also in said city and county.
-Storage B was emptied and swept clean as per my contractual obligations with Uncle Bob's Storage in Mentor of Lake County. It's ready to be surrendered now and have my service terminated with them tomorrow. My 8' x 8' unit was adequate and the staff was always friendly. They performed well.
Showing posts with label unit. Show all posts
Showing posts with label unit. Show all posts
2015/04/01
2015/03/29
Log 2015032801
Today, I went to my brother's house and hitched my Harbor Freight & Tools 4x8 Utility Hauling Trailer. Since I had the car's side of the wiring harness uncapped and exposed to the elements since October, one of it's ports was corroded and I was afraid that it would not make contact with one of the trailer's connections. But it did and everything works just like it should.
I drove over to Storage B today and started moving things over to my new storage location at in a relative's shed. Considering that I'll be on the road with most of that equipment, there won't be too much that will be stored there. And that which remains shouldn't be there too long.
One of the first things that I plan on doing once I'm in the Marietta area is getting another storage unit, this time smaller. All I need it for is to stage my gear so that I don't have to transport all of it, which all of that really taxes the weight capacities (in cab and the hitch) on my 2008 Chevy HHR LS. My plan is to sleep in The Cramper for at least a month before I rent a house or apartment in the area.
I now have a 30.3gal (121.1qt) Yeti Tundra 125 bear resistant cooler that I purchased from Cabellas in Tridelphia, West Virginia for $582 out the door. I've always known that I've needed this, but it's price has always been cost prohibitive. Nonetheless, I believe that it's a 20qt improvement over my previous Coleman cooler, which frequently ran out of space, it never sealed right, the screws stripped days after I bought it and it was never bear proof.
Years ago, the Whipple Section - Buckeye/ North Country National Scenic Trail was off-road between Cow Run Road and the Hills - Hildreth Covered Bridge. But enough property was purchased by one owner to necessitate shutting down a township road in the final leg that the trail was dependent on. As a result, the BT was re-routed to the north and according to Whipple's map, North Country remains rated on a truncated path to the Lane Farm Campground in the Wayne National Forest - Marietta Unit via a ford across the Little Muskingum River. I now have authorization to reestablish that footpath and white blaze it's route.
When you look at a national forest on a map, that which I call the "green blob" is it's administrative boundary. What most people don't know is that there's private property in there. But I have Global Imaging System (GIS) shapefile data displaying what the federal government actually owns. Without a guide, the spur to Lane Farm (as displayed on the map) is about 2 1/2 miles long. We have federal property well before that where hikers can disperse camp. This is where in the forest, camping is permitted 150 feet from the trail. So, with the BT/ NCT going in a new direction, the only thing I could see Lane being much good for is parking and campers.
But the problem with the ford is that governmental agencies aren't probing the Little Muskingum's water temperatures and publishing them in real time to Internet. But the nearest information that I can currently find on water temperature is the RECR8 Ohio River Report for the Meldahl Segment near Cincinnati. The more local reports only cover things like the flood stage, which I'm not too particularly concerned with considering that the river can be seen from multiple point on the spur and rather early along it. In person, it's the first thing that I'd recommend looking at. 2 1/2 miles is a long way to go to find out that it's not safe to ford. And this really only affects hikers in the clockwise/ westbound direction. According to Whipple's 10/2010 map, they're routed on the edge of that river about 5 miles prior to the Lane Spur (unofficial, that's my own name for it). On this map, the spur is marked in red diamonds.
I drove over to Storage B today and started moving things over to my new storage location at in a relative's shed. Considering that I'll be on the road with most of that equipment, there won't be too much that will be stored there. And that which remains shouldn't be there too long.
One of the first things that I plan on doing once I'm in the Marietta area is getting another storage unit, this time smaller. All I need it for is to stage my gear so that I don't have to transport all of it, which all of that really taxes the weight capacities (in cab and the hitch) on my 2008 Chevy HHR LS. My plan is to sleep in The Cramper for at least a month before I rent a house or apartment in the area.
I now have a 30.3gal (121.1qt) Yeti Tundra 125 bear resistant cooler that I purchased from Cabellas in Tridelphia, West Virginia for $582 out the door. I've always known that I've needed this, but it's price has always been cost prohibitive. Nonetheless, I believe that it's a 20qt improvement over my previous Coleman cooler, which frequently ran out of space, it never sealed right, the screws stripped days after I bought it and it was never bear proof.
Years ago, the Whipple Section - Buckeye/ North Country National Scenic Trail was off-road between Cow Run Road and the Hills - Hildreth Covered Bridge. But enough property was purchased by one owner to necessitate shutting down a township road in the final leg that the trail was dependent on. As a result, the BT was re-routed to the north and according to Whipple's map, North Country remains rated on a truncated path to the Lane Farm Campground in the Wayne National Forest - Marietta Unit via a ford across the Little Muskingum River. I now have authorization to reestablish that footpath and white blaze it's route.
When you look at a national forest on a map, that which I call the "green blob" is it's administrative boundary. What most people don't know is that there's private property in there. But I have Global Imaging System (GIS) shapefile data displaying what the federal government actually owns. Without a guide, the spur to Lane Farm (as displayed on the map) is about 2 1/2 miles long. We have federal property well before that where hikers can disperse camp. This is where in the forest, camping is permitted 150 feet from the trail. So, with the BT/ NCT going in a new direction, the only thing I could see Lane being much good for is parking and campers.
But the problem with the ford is that governmental agencies aren't probing the Little Muskingum's water temperatures and publishing them in real time to Internet. But the nearest information that I can currently find on water temperature is the RECR8 Ohio River Report for the Meldahl Segment near Cincinnati. The more local reports only cover things like the flood stage, which I'm not too particularly concerned with considering that the river can be seen from multiple point on the spur and rather early along it. In person, it's the first thing that I'd recommend looking at. 2 1/2 miles is a long way to go to find out that it's not safe to ford. And this really only affects hikers in the clockwise/ westbound direction. According to Whipple's 10/2010 map, they're routed on the edge of that river about 5 miles prior to the Lane Spur (unofficial, that's my own name for it). On this map, the spur is marked in red diamonds.
2014/09/08
Log 2014090801
I'm at Days Inn in the City of Athens for a night. I still have yet to complete New Straitsville Section - Buckeye/ North Country/ American Discovery Trail, Pts. 19 - 27. The place where I intended to road side camp is a designated parking area in the Athens Unit of the Wayne National Forest, which may be construed as a "trailhead." Road side camping is prohibited within 150' of trailheads and I don't know of another suitable spot around there.
Anyways, I really needed a NiMH battery recharger. My previous unit was lost and I was getting low on charged AA's and AAA's. These batteries power the flashlights and hand GPS and I didn't want to risk loosing both on the next route. I lost my paper map on the previous route and the only thing that would back me up would be navigation by waypoints only on the smartphone.
The smartphone can eat batteries when navigating. The phone's aftermarket application wouldn't take my Buckeye Trail tracks (the line you follow). But it was good with the waypoints, which is a custom file that i wrote corresponding with the points in a Buckeye Trail map. Those points have a descriptive guide that without digital copies from the Buckeye Trail Association, would have taken a considerable amount of time to transcribe myself. And there was no promise that the text would have shown up on either app, or the hand GPS (since i haven't experimented with it yet, I felt that the project was too risky to undergo considering the fixed amount of time I was under to prepare other things.
The track on the hand GPS is based on the the BTA's GPS/ GIS Depository. They are somewhat beta and work as well as displayed on Google Earth. I've only been lost once and that was on an off-road portion where there was a 5-way intersection and for some reason, the trail wasn't blazed there and I had to guess. Well, I guessed wrong. But it didn't take long to know that I wasn't traveling the same course as the track and I promptly fixed that. These days, my hand GPS is my primary means of navigation, even with a map.
2013/07/26
Log 2013072501
Today, I took The Cramper down so I could drive to Walmart and get some supplies in Mentor and drop off a few unnecessary items. After that, I still forgot to drop off some items, such as a towel from my former apartment back into storage. But I might still use it (come to think of it) because I'm using a small, 15" square, super absorbant towel that I use tent during times when multi-day hiking when The Cramper isn't available. I'm still set up to hikes like I use to. There may come a day when it is more efficent in time, money and fuel to do a hike like this.
The typical strategy for The Cramper is to dissemble it, drive to route's Point B and park the bicycle. Then drive back to Point A, hike to Point B and ride the bicycle back. Because the bike's drive train distributes force better than just my muscular system, it is more efficent. On flat land, physical exertion (in miles) of my muscles to hiking to riding the bike is about 1:4. County roads are more improved than township roads. And state roads are usually more improved than county roads. Even though the direct course may be shorter, sometimes it's worth a extra few miles to parallel the trail back on a state highway.
But on an extended trip, the bike would be parked about 60 miles from the car for a 3 day hike. The 4th day after would be comitted to riding back to the car all day. But because off road trail is more "undomesticated," it usually turns more. So, if I were to bike from pt. B, it might only be a 35, or 40mi ride back on easier terrain.
Today, I picked up a 96" sheet of 3/8" plywood out of storage for the redesign of the heating and air conditioning unit. I also picked up some dry sacks there to help me organize my storage bins. At the store, I picked up more roof straps, dry sacks and a compass to help me draw angles on wood.
I was looking for a method to quickly connect and disconnect the deep cycle battery that I'm mounting to my trailer for boon docking to and from the car's battery, located in the rear. The problem is that the deep cycle can produce up to 850 amps if the car was started on it. But typical AC connections at Lowe's only handle 50 amps.
The associate told me that I could get electrical bullets that could do the trick, but they didn't have them for 6 guage wire, which is just about like a battery cable. The idea is to charge both batteries from the alternator when the car is hitched. Another thing is that the deep cycle batter might come in handy if the temeratures get real fridgid this winter.
Today, I started working on a luxury item. I had a 3 port USB hub that was not power assisted. So, when I plugged my bluetooth headset and my smartphone, the phone would loose and regain power every 15 seconds. So, I got my AC conversion to DC powered unit with 6 USB ports and it's working great.
In The Cramper, my ceiling is only as high as the interior my tailgate. And still, I can't sit all the way up in it. Anyways, the door frame is lower, the car's ceiling isn't much higher. So, crawling around to change my Star Trek epidsode can be a bit of a hassel. So, months ago, I purchased a small keyboard and attached trackball. It's like my remote control. And I had to get the hub to power it because my laptop's USB ports are all occupied and I needed something more reliable.
Well, the computer recognized the new hardware quickly. But the keyboard fails to respond. I switched it's stock alkaline batteries with some NiMH rechargable batteries that I charged about 60 days ago. The batteries in my bicycle rear illumination units still work and they were charged then. I do have spare AAA alkaline batteries on board, I might check to see if they work.
Otherwise, I found some of the USB transceivers on the floorboad as they pulled must have away from the old hub. It may be possible that one is floating around down there? Otherwise, I did cram this little keyboard in a bag with my laptop and tablet. Maybe it took too much abuse in there? Before the roof bag was weatherproofed, every bag took on some water. Maybe that did it. I remember the manufacturer having some troubleshooing tip, if I get the booster up, I might try them.
The back canvas and awning went up better than before today. It was the sequence in which I did the side folds. The back cooking area was really stubborn and it needs to be plained out. It rocked the bottom beam out of position and had to get jacked up again. There's been problems with the securing foot pins. Apparently, the foot and the main floor aren't matching up like they use to and need to be bored out. Right now, one will insert and the other will go half way with some coaxing. I prefer to do this back home in port if I can. In Star Trek, they like to go back to starbase for structural things... so do I.
For the first time, I put the sheets on the mattress. They're light blue. I sure wish that it came with two pillow cases. Oh well, it's a twin mattress. I have one pillow with a sheet, and one without. If I have time, I might introduce The Cramper over video to the Buckeye Trail's Facebook group.
The typical strategy for The Cramper is to dissemble it, drive to route's Point B and park the bicycle. Then drive back to Point A, hike to Point B and ride the bicycle back. Because the bike's drive train distributes force better than just my muscular system, it is more efficent. On flat land, physical exertion (in miles) of my muscles to hiking to riding the bike is about 1:4. County roads are more improved than township roads. And state roads are usually more improved than county roads. Even though the direct course may be shorter, sometimes it's worth a extra few miles to parallel the trail back on a state highway.
But on an extended trip, the bike would be parked about 60 miles from the car for a 3 day hike. The 4th day after would be comitted to riding back to the car all day. But because off road trail is more "undomesticated," it usually turns more. So, if I were to bike from pt. B, it might only be a 35, or 40mi ride back on easier terrain.
Today, I picked up a 96" sheet of 3/8" plywood out of storage for the redesign of the heating and air conditioning unit. I also picked up some dry sacks there to help me organize my storage bins. At the store, I picked up more roof straps, dry sacks and a compass to help me draw angles on wood.
I was looking for a method to quickly connect and disconnect the deep cycle battery that I'm mounting to my trailer for boon docking to and from the car's battery, located in the rear. The problem is that the deep cycle can produce up to 850 amps if the car was started on it. But typical AC connections at Lowe's only handle 50 amps.
The associate told me that I could get electrical bullets that could do the trick, but they didn't have them for 6 guage wire, which is just about like a battery cable. The idea is to charge both batteries from the alternator when the car is hitched. Another thing is that the deep cycle batter might come in handy if the temeratures get real fridgid this winter.
Today, I started working on a luxury item. I had a 3 port USB hub that was not power assisted. So, when I plugged my bluetooth headset and my smartphone, the phone would loose and regain power every 15 seconds. So, I got my AC conversion to DC powered unit with 6 USB ports and it's working great.
In The Cramper, my ceiling is only as high as the interior my tailgate. And still, I can't sit all the way up in it. Anyways, the door frame is lower, the car's ceiling isn't much higher. So, crawling around to change my Star Trek epidsode can be a bit of a hassel. So, months ago, I purchased a small keyboard and attached trackball. It's like my remote control. And I had to get the hub to power it because my laptop's USB ports are all occupied and I needed something more reliable.
Well, the computer recognized the new hardware quickly. But the keyboard fails to respond. I switched it's stock alkaline batteries with some NiMH rechargable batteries that I charged about 60 days ago. The batteries in my bicycle rear illumination units still work and they were charged then. I do have spare AAA alkaline batteries on board, I might check to see if they work.
Otherwise, I found some of the USB transceivers on the floorboad as they pulled must have away from the old hub. It may be possible that one is floating around down there? Otherwise, I did cram this little keyboard in a bag with my laptop and tablet. Maybe it took too much abuse in there? Before the roof bag was weatherproofed, every bag took on some water. Maybe that did it. I remember the manufacturer having some troubleshooing tip, if I get the booster up, I might try them.
The back canvas and awning went up better than before today. It was the sequence in which I did the side folds. The back cooking area was really stubborn and it needs to be plained out. It rocked the bottom beam out of position and had to get jacked up again. There's been problems with the securing foot pins. Apparently, the foot and the main floor aren't matching up like they use to and need to be bored out. Right now, one will insert and the other will go half way with some coaxing. I prefer to do this back home in port if I can. In Star Trek, they like to go back to starbase for structural things... so do I.
For the first time, I put the sheets on the mattress. They're light blue. I sure wish that it came with two pillow cases. Oh well, it's a twin mattress. I have one pillow with a sheet, and one without. If I have time, I might introduce The Cramper over video to the Buckeye Trail's Facebook group.
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