2015 Bernardston MA (US) Engine and Tractor Show -- May 23-24

[vtsteam]

I just wanted to remind people in the area that the Bernardston, MA Engine and Tractor show will be held:

May 23rd and 24th
Exit 28, I-91, Rt. 10 East Bernardston, MA

There's tons of interesting stuff to see and buy, flea markets, tools, IC engines, steam engines, hot air engines, parts and supplies, tractors, lawn tractors, powered equipment, classic and antique vehicles, madmodded curiosities, plants, livestock, just about anything you can imagine of interest to madmodders. It covers acres of fields. Location is at the hub of Vermont, Massachusetts, and New  Hampshire and directly off of Interstate 91, practically at the exit.

I'll be there Saturday for sure, and probably Sunday as well.

Admission is free, though a donation is requested.

[vtsteam]

Show today. 

I'll probably be there most of the day today, and early tomorrow.  Will take pics. 

[RobWilson]

Show today. 

 Will take pics. 

We will hold you to that Steve     ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, I hope you have a canny time 


Rob

[vtsteam]

  Got over the Mass state line before I realized I'd left my camera on the breakfast table!

Well I'll try to get some tomorrow. The show was outstanding today with perfect weather, blue skies. 60F with a breeze -- actually felt chilly early on. I haven't seen so many engines, and other interesting things, and so many tools for sale at this show as I did this year. Kinda mind boggling.

I can post pics of some tools I brought home. This is one, buried in one table I kept coming back to, and finally bought. I was just so nicely made I couldn't pass it up. Well, $10 and I knew, nothing I'm likely to ever see again, unless I took it home. A screwplate.

[vtsteam]

I wanted to see if I could find an old torch to experiment with compressed and air propane for brazing. I looked through a lot of tables and had just about given up when I found this one:

[vtsteam]

Other tools and supplies:

I needed an adze to trim the timbers on a bridge I built. They are a bit scarce and pricey these days, but I spotted one for $20 mixed in with some pickaxes. Pretty clear it was fully hand forged with the weld marks on it.

At a remaindered supplies booth I often check I bought a stainless steel brush ($2) and a package of ten 24tpi Lenox bimetal 12" hacksaw blades ($5).

And finally for pulling a case hardening pack out of the furnace and the very occasional forge work I do, I bought an old blacksmith tongs. Needs a little work on one jaw, but it was only $10, and was the longest set I saw at the tables.

All in all, happy to get things I (mostly) needed today!

[RobWilson]

So very nice old tools you got there Steve  , and ye well be just the man to put them to good use    

Tongs are always worth having any day of the week .


Rob

[vtsteam]

Thanks Rob. Sorry I never made it to the show today -- and I've fallen down on the show photos promised. I had to do outdoor work here I'd put off -- road work garden and more mowing, yard cleanup, and work on my wife's car - oxygen sensor. Bleh.

And a lot of carrying water. it looks like we're in for a drought. A bad one if we don't get rain soon. Usually wet this time of year -- worried about July and August.

Seems we are in the same arctic flow pattern as we had this winter, only warmer. I mean it's beautiful dry weather now, clear high pressure blue skies and unusually cool strong north wind and daytime temps in the 60's (F). We had frost the night before last. I'm wondering is this going to be a weather pattern that continues? I sure don't want to go through another winter like that last one!

The frog pond I dug a few years ago has dried up, and Broad Brook which runs through our property is very low. There's a fire ban, so I can't use charcoal in the foundry, and reluctant to use the iron furnace as well. A weird spring, after a weird winter.....

[RobWilson]

No worries Steve  , well at least you got a few tools to add to your shop arsenal     

What !  your working in snow one week and now your in drought  ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,at least the UK weather is predictable , rain  and fookin lots of it      me being at 55 deg North put me a tad cooler than you 



Rob

[DMIOM]

Steve,

Re weather behaviour - I wonder if its a consequence of El Niņo / the Southern Ocean Oscillations?

The latest NOAA ENSO bulletin (May 2015), from which I've snipped the Sea Surface Temperature anomaly chart below, starts:

"Synopsis: There is an approximately 90% chance that El Niņo will continue through Northern Hemisphere summer 2015, and a greater than 80% chance it will last through 2015."

which seems to echo a broad agreement on the El Niņo prognosis from the various forecasters.

Dave

[vtsteam]

Thanks Rob! We had another drought maybe 4- 5 years ago but it sure didn't start this early -- more like late June,/july so I'm worried. Then it didn't rain for 2 months, and we were without water for much of that. Broad Brook dried up completely and all the fish died. I hadn't seen that in the dozen years we'd been here. It normally flows year-round.

Iron casting is out now because of the outdoor burn ban. Funny, when I first built the iron furnace and wanted to test it out, it seemd to rain every day for weeks, and I couldn't because of standing water all around!

Dave, that would explain it, because this is definitely abnormal weather we're getting. This is temperate forested land, without extremes of weather, usually.

I sure hope they are wrong about the coming winter!!!

[tom osselton]

Looks like you will have to cast with propane under the barbecue laws. We haven't had that much rain up here either.

[awemawson]

Steve, I feel for you with the lack of rain - hope  it comes soon. We went through a few weeks of no rain just as the temperatures were rising enough for the grass to start growing (8 deg C), and for this reason our grass is nothing like as lush as it would usually be this time of year. The rains did come eventually but the delay has had it's effect.

[vtsteam]

The hay is all heading out at half height now, Andrew. I talked to a local farmer at the show. He said it was hurting. This is dairy country, and only small family farms hanging on. When I was young in the late 50's they used to say Vermont had more cows than people. There are probably 10% of those dairy farms left now.

The amazing thing to me is this drought has happened so quickly. Seems like we just had 4 feet of snow on the ground, it melted and we had mud season as usual. Just a few weeks later all the water is out of the ground. May just isn't a drought month!

[DMIOM]

......The amazing thing to me is this drought has happened so quickly. Seems like we just had 4 feet of snow on the ground, it melted and we had mud season as usual. Just a few weeks later all the water is out of the ground. May just isn't a drought month!....

Steve that's possibly a similar issue to us - where in your case the underlying soil has got less water in than usual. Here in the Isle of Man we've recently noticed unusual variations in the height of the water table.  Prior to this year, we've had a couple of very wet springs with areas flooded where my 96 year old Father can never remember being waterlogged - the Northern part of our farm is relatively sandy, so it doesn't hold the water of its own accord, and it wasn't just surface run-off either, it was the overall ground water table rising - the winter ground water level was at least 6" and at times we think nearer 12" higher than the normal winter peak. The trouble is that whatever little drying there is in winter didn't really make any impression on the whole soil-borne reservoir, and there were parts of fields that, for the first time in living memory, never dried up completely in summer.  Then, in early Autumn last year (2014) we had a wet spell and the water in the fields was quickly back up to/beyond the levels we'd expect in March after a wet winter, not September! - then, things very slowly dried out again over the winter.......

Whatever the cause of global warming, the extra water in the atmosphere is definitely increasing climate instability & bringing more extreme swings.

Dave

[tom osselton]

I've been wondering if all the cutting of emissions by the green people (California)  has reduced the particles required for droplets to form?