Gary Sighting

He said he got in at 12:30 last night, found the camper without waking us, as always, the gentleman. I was up at 6, his car left while I was in the shower and then he was back with coffee.
Dick Price and Jim Hanks came over so we could help distract him while he fitted new bags in the trunk, tonneau pegs, and vacuum line. Remarkably, all that he left was his needle nose pliers with the red handles!
Anyway, the car is still doing well, and he plans on being in Denver tonight.
He left a couple of hours ago with the stereo up (neat set-up, speaker in a battery box) and a smile on his face. I forgot to tell him of the shortcut to the freeway :)
His wife makes some nice bags!

"Gary Sighting"
Too cool....

I think I have his cell # somewhere....May call for an update...

That term is courtesy of Kim, who used it down in Iggy's report from last night.
And Kim, how is the charging situation?

I tried calling Gary twice today, but had to left a message. Maybe he was out of range...

Anyway, we're now in Nashville, Indiana (Bloomington area). Charged the battery in the room last night, ran all fine today (no wipers needed, although it was overcast...) Still not charging, but Phil's meeting up with us tonight with a regulator, so hope that will do it.

John, didn't get a chance to test the generator as you said, because someone else has Gary's voltmeter buried in his trailer. But we'll get to it this evening.

Had a GREAT drive today along the Ohio River in southeasternmost Indiana, then cut up back, curvy roads all the way to here. Had a few moments of excitement when the back country road we were on was closed for high water ... About 2.5 feet deep, so WAY too deep for a B!

We found an alternate route, but that, too, was washed out. (See, I told you we were getting too much rain out east here....) At the second washout, one of the Bs in the back lost its clutch. Apparently the master cylinder decided to let loose just then. One other guy in the group is a master "clutchless shifter," so he took over the car and got it to the hotel safely.

So, I'm in the hotel room to connect up and give you guys a progress report, then we'll go see what there is to see around here.

More later. I'm going to try to reach Gary, too.

Kim, my B had a sympathy break down today, alternator bad. nice to have a spare, so I beleive it's back up and runnin.

I just talked to Gary on the phone and he's at a gas stop in Idaho. Runnin a tad warm but should cool back down on the highway. Still plans on being in St Louis on Wed

You don't need a voltmeter to check a generator or alternator when putting power direct to the fields. I've done it so many times I didn't think to mention that. If it's working you'll hear it. Remember I said that when you energize the fields with a jumper a good generator will charge full tilt? It will slow the engine down notably, you've never heard one charge full blast, they really pull some power when they do. An alternator will whine and the engine will slow down when you bypass the regulator, you could do it on the old Delcos and some others.

Getting to Chris's place at 12:30 wasn't too bad. I can't get used to the times posted with our posts and thought he was in Seattle early last night. I'm glad he's stopping in Denver, he had originally planned to run directly from Chris's to St. Louis and that really bothered me. Denver to St. Louis takes in the neighborhood of 12 hours to drive at 70 MPH. Seems like the super slab speeed limits are 75 in Colorado and Kansas. It's 70 in Missouri, but you can run 75 and nobody pays any attention to it.

That's faster than I would run out here at night, but he's a big boy. Getting to Denver tonight is beyond me also. I just don't drive like that anymore. Maybe I should!

About a 14 hour stretch is all I want now-a-days. I was on the road 25 hours out of 30 recently, but actually driving only 12 of that. Then was going for another 9 hours the next day and glad to not get called out the day after that. I like to drive, but wouldn't want to be a truck driver and live in a vehicle. Living in a big diesel pusher RV coach is a whole 'nother thing, I could do that from now on.