A relentless machine of studying, class and occasionally sleep

I'll start right now by apologizing for being aloof, but you must believe me, I would love nothing more in this world than to have the time to devote to updating you adequately.

In the weeks following my last blog post, I spent them up in The Garage working on the Maxwell, going on the Small Town Adventure and trying to do as many things as I could before summer ended.  My dream of finding an F1-related summer job didn't pan out, but I got to be the trackside reporter for every race at the Iowa Speedway, so that was fantastic.  Nothing like a Spa-Francorchamps or Suzuka, but it was fun nonetheless.  Plus when Indy came to town I got to be in my element.

As the only weekend of open-wheel racing passed at the Speedway, I got to interview Helio Castroneves and the eventual race winner Ryan Hunter-Reay.  I didn't know it at the time, but he would later go on to be this year's IndyCar champion---the first American in half a dozen years.

Then everything changed.  Orientation days.  Textbooks.  White coat fittings.  The works.  Med school began in a flurry for me, and while it started well, it has since become a relentless machine of studying, class and occasionally sleep.  The subjects are interesting, don't get me wrong, and the information is imperative to my success as a doctor someday, but one loses sight of such things with every passing day of six-hour study sessions.

Couple that with the fact that the work load is much greater than anything I've ever experienced in school, and it shouldn't be surprising that it's taking a while to get my sea legs.  If I were a sailor, though, I would have been kicked out of the Navy at this point for not developing those legs fast enough.  I won't lie, it's very difficult.  That's not to say that I can't do it, but often times I forget to tell myself that amidst the dissections, small groups, random assignments and weekly tests.

Along that same note, I talked to my great uncle Irvin on the phone today for about an hour.  His son is a doctor at the VA where Irvin, himself worked for many years.  His late daughter was a nurse there, and his other son is a doctor in my hometown.  I knew he might have some words of wisdom for me, and he didn't disappoint.  He told me stories of some of his doctor friends in the 1930s and of his son's difficult adjustment to med school in the '80s.  He spoke of the omnipresent geniuses that inevitably crawl out of the woodwork around the toughest test dates.  On and on we talked, and he helped remind me that there are worse things in life.

Just a year ago I was nervous about getting admitted to med school instead of completing it.  I was facing the prospect of a year of waiting to reapply, a year of boosting my resume and a year of paying for more school.  Instead of being faced with exams and projects, I may not have gotten in for another year.  I may not have gotten admitted at all.  This is what I wanted, as hard as it is to reconcile that these days.  I mention anything about that to my parents and it's always the same:  "It'll be worth it in the long-run."  That may be true, but it doesn't really help alleviate the stress or make a difficult concept any more tenable.  I appreciate their support, though, don't get me wrong.

But I digress.  As a result of school I haven't been able to work on any of my projects.  Heck, I don't think I've mentioned prior to this that I got a go-kart.  It needs a little engine work from a flood, but that's more than doable.  Plus it's a mini-Indy style kart that I'm planning to paint like Senna's old Lotus.  It will be so neat to get running, if that day ever comes.  God, I hope it does.

I haven't done a ton more to the Honda.  A leaky carb one weekend prompted the owners of my condo building to call me and ask if I knew anything about a leaky, smelly motorcycle in the garage.  I knew nothing of a leak prior to leaving, and I was just then hearing about it whilst driving down a country road literally two hundred miles away.  Awesome.  So I loaded the old girl into a truck and brought her back to my hometown where the local motorcycle mechanic took a look at the carb (those Japanese carburetors are beyond me).  He fiddled with it, replaced a seal, patted her on the rear and sent her back to me.  A fortnight later she was leaking again, so I'm leaning toward putting an external petcock halfway down the fuel line (as unauthentic as that will look).  I feel guilty, though; I haven't even started her in a month.  I haven't had the time to risk her leaking and losing another two gallons of petrol, so I just haven't tried.  Instead I've been riding the 'new' 1983 Raleigh cycle I received.

Since that was earlier in the semester, I had time to get the old Raleigh working.  She had a severely bent rear rim, so I had to replace that, put on a new tube and tire and figure out where an incessant squeaking was originating.  Some 30wt oil on the chain and into the pedals helped a ton, and now she runs silently and shifts smoothly.  I've been meaning to put my lock holder on for weeks, and the same goes for the rear light. I just put the front light on two days ago when I knew I would be riding home from a study session in the dark.  But in all, working on her has been fun.  I'm not terribly experienced in bicycles, but my motorcycle knowledge helps with that quite a bit.  I will admit, though, an occasional Google search may have helped, too.

I don't want to make this too terribly long, so I'll cut this short here.  I have plenty of other things to update, but I felt that after a long, difficult week (both in terms of studying and mentally) I needed to type something and get my mind off of school.  Writing and F1 have been the only things today that have been able to accomplish that feat, so why not?

Take care, all.  More to come, hopefully.

The time I spent just hitting this car with Thor cannot be overstated

Well today was certainly busy, but I wouldn't have it any other way.

I spent six hours in The Garage today working on the Maxwell brakes (and other projects on the side), and I couldn't be happier at the results.  So much has happened up there since my last post about the little Maxwell that I don't know where to start.

Last post I had just gone through the incredibly difficult process of getting the axle re-aligned and hooked back to the leaf springs.  I was aided by new U-bolts that were fabricated for free by some colleagues, and they ended up looking fantastic.  After the axle was hooked back on, now it was time to move onto the brakes, starting with the right rear (or the right, since there are no brakes on the front axle).

The first order of business was to remove the adjusting nut at the top front of the brakes.  The Maxwell had an ingenious system that takes all of two minutes to understand:  Rods connect the front brake lever to each of the rear brakes.  Where the rod comes in, there is a pivot point.  When you brake the car, it pulls the top of the brakes forward, squeezing the pads against the drum of the wheel (which, unlike modern drum brakes is inside of the pads).  Springs along a horizontal rod get compressed as that top moves forward, so when you're ready to let off, the brakes spring back to normal.  That's all there is to it, really.

The above is a picture from the rear center of the car looking outward.  You can see the pivot point in the center of the picture and the springs at the top.  The two pads are of some undetermined construction, so I'll have to do some checking to figure out what to use as pads.  Either way they're held on with brass rivets, so that shouldn't be a problem.

As you can also see above, I'd been dousing the moving parts of the brakes with penetrating oil every chance I got.  When I first began tinkering with the car long ago, nothing moved on the brakes.  By the time that picture was taken, I could pivot the arm and thus apply the brakes slightly, but there still was not much movement.

The first order of business would be to get the tire off---something I've never done on this car before.  I had attempted it long ago but soon gave up to go work on other things, as the wheel puller we have was not quite the right size to aid in the removal of this particular wood spoke wheel.

When taking the wheels off the Maxwell, first one has to remove the main lug nut and then a washer that comes off of the spindle.  From here, theoretically, with some force the wheel can be removed.  Not so easy in this case.

I bashed on the tire relentlessly for quite some time before attempting other methods (prying, wiggling, lubricating, etc.) until my father arrived home from work.  He bashed it a few times before recommending that we try hitting it a slightly different way.  The last time he had removed a wheel this old was when he was a young child and his father (the first Woodsie) restored a ~1903 Franklin.  Eventually we were successful, although the locking pin inside the wheel gave much sooner than I anticipated, thus injuring my leg as it leapt joyfully from the car.  This came after my father set a giant, super heavy mallet on the tire, only to have the tire rotate and send the enormous mallet crashing into my knee.

With the tire off I had an unabated view of the brakes like I'd never had before.  The scene did not look promising, though.  So much rust and so few moving parts meant that I would risk breaking a few old pieces if I struggled too much with them during removal.  With that in mind I gathered WD40 and a newly-discovered old can of PB Blaster, alternating use between the two on whatever part I needed freed.

I also tried my hand at mixing my own penetrating oil based on some wives tales I'd heard on the internet.  After gaining access to a new bottle of acetone, I found a 1980s bottle of automatic transmission fluid (ATF) and a 1960s Vlasic pickle jar in which to mix the two together.  Pouring my home brew over the parts, I soon found that the combinations of my three oils were actually loosening some of the rusted pieces.

I removed the brake adjuster (as seen above) and found that there were little swatches of the original blue paint still on it from 1910.  At the same time I also learned that this always-black piece (which I assumed in the past to be Bakelite) was actually brass!  I can't imagine how gorgeous it must look clean, but the aforementioned swatches tell me that it was once painted, so I may have to cover it in the end.

I used my grandfather's tap and die set to clean the threads on the adjusting nut and on the brakes as well (I love that set, by the way.  It always makes me so proud and honored to use it).  Then I scrubbed a little on the brakes themselves (seen below).  I soon realized that in order to make them work again I would need to take them entirely apart; as a result, my task just seemed a whole lot bigger.  I would begin by using the super large rubber mallet---which I now affectionately call Thor---to hit the brakes in every direction I could just to free them up.

After a while I could get the shoes to move inward and outward slightly, but not much.  Without the impediment of the wheel I could, for once, take a full swing when hitting the car.  I'm sure Thor loved this as much as I did.  Eventually I also spent some time hitting the pivot point (parallel onto the leftmost part of the spring in the above picture).  After a while this too could actually pivot and move for the first time in my life.  I soon realized that the little pin that held the threaded piece onto the arm would be a beast to remove, as would the one below it where the arm attaches to the rear brake pad.  Both would have to come out, though, if I hoped to get the thing working again.

The time I spent just hitting this car with Thor cannot be overstated.  I would work up sweat after sweat, spending five or ten minutes at a time repeatedly hitting different parts of this car and seeing them move millimeters at a time.  I would sometimes switch to the regular metal hammer before going back to Thor, but in the end I had always made a little progress.  If I combined my hitting episodes, though, I imagine I spent a few hours of my life hitting that car.  In the end, though, the arm would pivot easily and the springs would actually spring the arm back into place!  In essence, the brakes were extremely close to working!

I knew this was not good enough, though, and that the car needed to be done correctly, so I persisted.  I whacked the brake pads far enough apart that I could get the forward spring off the adjusting threads, then eventually I wiggled the pads enough to get the whole adjustment thread piece out of the center guide on the axle.  This meant I was free at the top of the brakes and had just one nut at the bottom to remove before the whole brake mechanism could come off the car.

In the meantime I tried hundreds of different ways to get those pins out.  I pried, I hit them, I grabbed them with vise-grips, I jammed different sized screwdrivers under their heads, I used a propane torch to heat the metal before hitting them and prying them and grabbing them some more.  On and on I went to no avail.  This was turning into the hardest part of the restoration so far.

The elements of my home brew of penetrating oil.

Part of the ongoing trouble was the fact that early on I planned on making my own pin-remover with a socket and a clamp, but the only clamp that we had was (1) old, as expected, (2) didn't have a rotating head on the threaded end, and (3) was not in the least bit square and straight.  As a result, when I tried to screw the clamp inward, it pushed itself off of the pin or off of the socket.  When I tried it the other way the old metal on the clamp would give way and the socket would gouge into it.

After some time I decided to move onto that bottom nut that would free the brake mechanism.  Oddly, this was incredibly easy to remove, which was a byproduct of soaking the whole thing in penetrating oil repeatedly.  And with that, I became the first person in 100 years to be holding the Maxwell's brakes in my hands, which was a pretty amazing feeling.

But this blog post is far too long as is.  There's so much more to talk about, but that will have to be in the next post.  In the meantime feel free to get (mostly) realtime briefs on Twitter at @WoodsiesGarage.  Thanks, all!

My interview with American GP3 driver Conor Daly: Barcelona, Force India and Hares!

American Conor Daly has been working his way up the racing ladder steadily for the past few years, but many more Americans took notice when the 20 year-old won the second of two GP3 races in Barcelona earlier this season.  Following that with a straight-line test for the Force India F1 team before heading to Monaco, Daly’s first full year in GP3 has proved to be a busy one, but I caught up with Conor for a candid interview about this whirlwind of a year shortly before the Monaco round of the GP3 championship.

Daly, the son of former CART and Formula 1 racer Derek Daly, is a former World Karting Association champion and multiple winner in Skip Barber and Formula Ford.  Originally entering the Road to Indy, which aims to aid racers in ascending to the IndyCar series, Daly won the Star Mazda Championship in record-setting fashion in 2010 (nine poles and seven wins) before moving on to Indy Lights the following year with Sam Schmidt Motorsports.  After capturing victory in Long Beach, Daly competed in GP3 with Carlin Motorsports (splitting his season between Europe and the United States).

But throughout all of these accomplishments, Daly has perhaps garnered the most attention in just four races in GP3.  Currently fifth in the championship standings with 23 points, Daly won the Barcelona sprint race on the opening weekend of the GP3 season, but it wasn’t easy.

What many people didn’t realize was that Daly had already been offered a spot testing the Force India before the opening weekend of the GP3 season---something he called “a nice little incentive” for those first two races.  However, that didn’t make things simpler for him in the feature race.

After a great qualifying, Daly dropped several spots at the start, from which he was never able to recover.

“I saw the pole sitter, [António Félix] da Costa jump and I released the brake just slightly which made me pull in the clutch paddle so when the lights actually went out I was slipping the clutch way too much,” Daly said.  As a result the car stayed relatively stationary before creeping away slowly.  Despite the disastrous start, the clutch had only been slipping for a total of 2.4 seconds.  “It was definitely my fault, and it was sad because I was in a good position to try and win but unfortunately I wasn't able to do so,” he lamented.

Over the course of the race a difficult battle with Marussia Manor Racing’s Tio Ellinas developed until a late safety car bunched the field together.  In the ensuing sprint to the end, Daly’s main focus was finishing the race in one piece and setting himself up for the sprint race, which would invert the top eight finishers from the feature.  He would go on to finish P6, which meant he would start P3 on the inverted grid for the sprint finale.

More jump starts saw penalties befall those in front of him, and the sprint race quickly became a one-man show with Daly pulling away.  He later revealed that in the final few laps he had to keep himself from thinking too much about what would happen if he won.  Instead he made himself concentrate more.

“The car was so good that I was able to focus on hitting my marks and just finishing out the race,” he said.  “I had to manage the tires towards the end and was able to finish with a good gap behind me so I was quite happy.”

 One of the best moments of the weekend for American fans was seeing Daly holding the American flag as he celebrated in parc ferme after the race.  Where did the flag come from, though?

 “I made sure to have my Dad bring the American flag from home because I knew I would get to use it at some point this year, I just didn't honestly think it would be this soon!  I was so thrilled to hear the American national anthem.   It was a very emotional moment and I can't really describe the feeling I had.  I was relieved because I knew that I was starting to prove myself in Europe.  I was extremely happy but it’s just the beginning and I can't wait to get to the next race in Monaco!”

For the rest of the weekend the young American was approached by numerous luminaries of the GP3, GP2 and F1 worlds.  At one point he was even congratulated by Ferrari F1 team principal Stefano Domenicali---the importance of which was not lost on the Indiana native.

“It is always nice to know people are watching,” Daly smiled.  “I don't want to get too caught up in it, though, because it’s a long season and I just want to focus on keeping the good finishes coming and scoring points to be there for the championship at the end.”

I have to ask, then, are any future deals coming out of some of those important conversations?

Daly laughed.  “Not that I know of at the moment!”

Fast forward to the Force India test a few days later. This was Conor’s first taste of a Formula 1 car.  Obviously he had grown up hearing about the machines, but the jump between GP3 and F1 technology had to be a great one.

 “They are indeed massively different cars.  The F1 car was absolutely incredible.  I was pretty much living every childhood dream I ever had!  There are just so many different settings on the steering wheel and it is a far more technically advanced race car than anything else in the world,” he explained.

But the coolest thing, if he had to choose something?

“Ultimately, though, the coolest thing had to be the sound under hard acceleration; just absolutely beautiful.”

Since the test was a straight-line test---one of the few types of testing that has been allowed by the FIA over the past few years---Daly had plenty of opportunities to accelerate and decelerate, sometimes being told to accelerate as hard as he possibly could (which he described as being “the best part” of the session).  There was a brief moment, however, when he got to test out the handling as well.

Somewhere around 150 mph a hare ran out onto the Cotswold Airport runway where Daly was testing (located in Gloucestershire, England).  Although it wasn’t as much of a near-miss as some would like to think, Daly said he ‘did have to make his way around [the hare] as it sprinted away.’

Surprisingly, having worked with the Lotus GP3 team and now Vijay Mallya’s F1 team, Daly says that the two squads are extremely different, but only because the Lotus GP3 team is really ART GP.

“It's funny because everyone thinks because we have the same name that we are heavily affiliated with the Lotus F1 team but really we aren't,” he explained.  “Lotus GP is really ART GP which has been one of the best teams in the world competing in junior formula car racing.  Fortunately, though, the [ART GP] team has aligned themselves with the Lotus F1 team which gives us the cool color scheme and a great historic name.”

 Even so, Daly says with a chuckle that he is yet to meet anyone from the Lotus F1 team.

From there Conor was going to be heading to Monaco---somewhere he had never raced but had always dreamed about experiencing.

“I have been looking forward to this race since it was announced on our schedule.  I love street courses,” he said.  “I have raced on many street courses in America, and I've thoroughly enjoyed every single one.  Now I get to race on what is arguably the best street course in the world!”

Citing the 27 cars that will be taking part in the race, Daly noted that he may need a little luck when it comes to avoiding the inevitable traffic jams, but through simulator work and studying the track, he felt very comfortable leading up to the race.  He even mentioned that he was most looking forward to “pushing the limit in qualifying and using every inch of the track to try and get the pole.”

So, with one victory in the first two races, Daly would head to the French Riviera to the legendary and dangerous streets of Monte Carlo, where few could have predicted the outcomes of that weekend’s races.  We’ll catch up with Conor and get his thoughts on Monaco and the following round of the GP3 championship (Valencia, Spain) next time.

The Magic of Monaco

As we get ready to begin the most important weekend of the motor sports calendar, who can blame me for being too excited to sleep?  Aside from watching the Indy 500 on Sunday, I plan on getting up tomorrow morning at 4am to watch the final Formula 1 practice from Monaco, going back to sleep an hour later, then getting up at 7am to watch qualifying.  Such is the difficult life of a die-hard American F1 fan, but you certainly will not hear me complaining.  Quite the opposite, actually.  I'm thrilled to do it.  I'm beyond ecstatic to witness every moment I can from the Côte d'Azur, whether it be over the internet, television or Twitter.  Why does this Grand Prix get my heart racing more than any other (possibly excluding Spa), though?

There are many reasons to count against Monaco for being an awesome race to watch.  Some past races have been outright boring.  The track is as narrow as the room I'm currently occupying, and overtaking is supposedly impossible.  At less than two miles per lap, the circuit is far from modern F1 venues in both circuit length and safety, and the cars barely average 100mph over those 2.075 miles.  What makes the Monaco Grand Prix so fascinating, then?

I'll start with my background to the race.  As I've mentioned before, I was first introduced to the sport by my father who had been a passive fan since the 1950s (in the early days the occasional "Wide World of Sports" was the only F1 exposure Americans like him received).  The first race he ever saw covered on American television, broadcast in black and white on the television in his childhood home, was the Monaco Grand Prix.  He remembers seeing Stirling Moss and Graham Hill climb the podium over the ensuing years.  He remembers the early days of the tunnel and the many names of the hairpin.  He also remembers the cars that landed in the harbor ten years apart as well as the horrific death of Lorenzo Bandini broadcast live, the flames of his boiling Ferrari fed by the wash of the television helicopter's blades.

My father has seen a little of everything over the years, and he thought it was my turn.  He woke me up early one Sunday morning because he thought I would appreciate the technical nature of the sport and the extreme talent of the drivers.  That morning was the Monaco Grand Prix, barely a few laps old.


Of course I had no knowledge of the drivers, the location or the history of the race, but I was beyond awestruck.  I won't go into why I was blown away by the sport (I could fill a long blog with that), but part of the allure was this whimsical location:  A tiny principality situated on the French Riveira, the epitome of old world opulence and modern glamour, contrasted by these sleek, sexy hypercars that seemingly defied physics.  Seeing the cars blast past the historic casino or traverse the harborside, meters away from the Mediterranean was something so alien from any other form of racing.  I was immediately hooked.

As I've come to immerse myself in every aspect of Formula 1, one facet that I cannot overlook is history.  Always a fan of the tradition, stories and ghosts that surround such events, Monte Carlo has a bit of everything.  The race has been run on virtually the same roads since 1929, which isn't hard to discern through the grainy footage of those early Monaco Grands Prix.  The track was a treacherous one when it was first defined.  Its mixture of road surfaces and vulnerability to the Mediterranean's changing weather was a perfect way to test cars and drivers alike, and even 80 years ago there was little room for error within its narrow streets.
As the cars grew faster and the principality thrived, the face of the Grand Prix changed in some ways.  Racing was dangerous, the drivers were a mix of aristocrats and mechanics, and Monaco soon gained importance in the international motor sports scene.  One could see a little bit of everything in this tiny principality's races.  By 1936 the race was a part of the European championship and helped pioneer the use of lap time-based qualifying (rather than the balloting procedures used in the early races).  The Regenmeister Rudy Caracciola won that year for Mercedes-Benz.

By the official start of the Formula One World Championship, it saw Juan Manuel Fangio secure his first F1 win (in 1950, and he would win again later that decade).  Stirling Moss, the British legend, won three times on the Monte Carlo streets, although an overall Championship always eluded him.  Jackie Stewart won thrice here, too, as well as a slew of one-off victors whose racing immortality was wrought by the twisty streets of the Monegasques.


The statistics that always sit in my mind, though, are the drivers who have won at Monaco more than any others---a virtual "Who's Who" of timeless champions.  Only a dozen drivers in history have ever won here more than once.  Alain Prost earned four Monaco wins during the 1980s.  Almost a third of two-time World Champion Graham Hill's F1 victories came here; his record five wins earned him the nickname "Mr. Monaco," although others merely called him "The King."  His record stood for decades, and is now tied by seven-time World Champion Michael Schumacher (who, shockingly at the time, did not win the first Monaco race I ever watched).  For me, though, the jaw-dropping statistic that resonates is the number of times Ayrton Senna found the top step of the podium here:  Six.  That record includes five straight victories, only broken one year by Prost.

I found it very interesting hearing Michael Schumacher talk this weekend about his memories at this circuit.  He was asked about his favorite moment, and the first that came to mind was in 1994.  It was that year, he reminisced, that he first experienced "flow" in a race car---the otherworldly moment when you lose consciousness of the world around you, when every inch of the car's carbon fiber skin becomes an extension of your own.  It was in Monte Carlo that he first experienced it, and he'll never forget that moment.


This may bring back the words of Senna from years before, popularly known nowadays for the voice-over they provide during his pole laps in qualifying.  He spoke of the spiritual moment when he was no longer driving the car with effort, it was just happening.  It was automatic and flawless.  Few drivers truly experience this, although many will claim to have tasted it briefly.  For those who are genuine, the fickle circuit rewards them greatly.

This is another aspect of the race that fascinates me.  To succeed at Monaco, you have to be perfect.  Any incapacity, carelessness or neglect will be punished by the guardrails that now patrol the circuit's extremities. The corners approach so quickly that a driver can never afford to be "behind the car" as he drives.  The incessant bumps and greasy pavement require the utmost feel for the car and management of the tires.  And the layout demands entirely new parts to be machined in European factories and baked in multimillion-dollar autoclaves.
If anything, the challenge of the Monaco Grand Prix seems perfectly suited to test the F1 circus.  Remember, though, this is a track that is relatively unchanged since 1929.  Eighty-three years ago, Grand Prix planners had no notion of downforce, 700+ horsepower and carbon fiber.  The track was designed to test the drivers and cars of that age.

Somehow the ingredients were just right.  Somehow a race was created that was perfect enough to throw the biggest of loops at the cars and drivers of yesterday and today.  Yes, the circuit in Monte Carlo is extremely out of place compared to the rest of the F1 calendar, but the Grand Prix is a welcome anachronism that exists outside of the rest of Formula 1's guidelines and norms.  It's the perfect mix of high society, the latest technology, plenty of prestige and history.  Drivers may win on brand new $1 billion circuits in faraway lands where speeds reach 210mph, but every driver out there would give it up for a win in  the narrow streets of Monaco.  To reach the top step of the podium here (where you will receive your trophy in the royal family's skybox) means you have tested your mettle and supreme driving talent and have been deemed worthy by the racing gods.  Your name will forever rest beside Senna, Schumacher, Hill, Fangio and others under the heading of "Monaco Grand Prix winners".  Simply put, there's nothing like it in Formula 1 or anywhere else in motor sport.

And just like that, the plucky, rusty little Maxwell had its rear axle back

There's nothing quite like the advent of summer when I get to wake up on my own accord, throw on some ratty clothes and head up to The Garage to work.  I'll take a pop or two to drink, turn on the Oldies and wander around doing whatever job catches my fancy.

To start this summer, which is the first in ages where I'm not taking a class or needing to be in another city, I've already spent two days exclusively up in The Garage working on the Maxwell.  I have a long list of things I want to accomplish this summer up there, but the Maxwell is first on the list.  Over the last 48 hours I've probably spent eight or more up there squatting down behind the Maxwell formulating a plan, hitting it or spraying it with WD40 (I'll explain shortly).

Yesterday I started things off by inspecting the new U-bolts the gentlemen at my dad's workplace made for the car.  They used a couple of the broken off originals to fabricate new ones out of incredibly durable grade-8 bolts, and I must say, I'm extremely impressed with their work.  The old ones are on the right in the picture, and one of the original square nuts is sitting among all the new ones.)  I was apprehensive about how they would fit, and after trying to put them on, my fears were confirmed.  Three of the four refused to sit down over the leaf springs, and bashing the heck out of them with a hammer wasn't working.  First off, there was absolutely no room under the car to get a backswing when I wanted to use the hammer.  Second, even when I could made contact with the new bolts, nothing would happen.  They would wiggle one way and go down slightly, then they'd wiggle another way and raise back up slightly.  It was maddening.

After trying various implements of destruction for a while, I grabbed some oversize washers and managed to get the newly-fabricated square bolts started on a couple of the threads.  Using the longest wrenches I could find, I grunted and pushed against the whole car until I managed to get the U-bolt pulled down slightly.  I then put the other side's nut on and tightened that.  Alternating back and forth I eventually got all of the U-bolts down.  As you can see in the picture, they contrast quite clearly with the rust and with the leaf springs that I've already primed.  I let them sit for a few weeks to relax a little since I was needing to finish the school year anyway and wouldn't be back to work on them until summer.

The problem yesterday was the fact that the threaded areas (I'll call them legs) of the U-bolts weren't even close to lining up with the holes on the axle.  That's not good.  I precariously balanced the axle on our old two-ton jack and slowly raised it off the ground where it's been sitting for nearly a year.  It was quite apparent when I got the axle up to the bottoms of the legs that this was going to be far from easy.  I mentioned on Twitter (@WoodsiesGarage) that this probably wasn't going to be a quick job, and sadly I was right.

I sat back and stared at the car for quite some time contemplating what to do.  I could maybe get a couple of the holes to line up, but as I jacked it up farther, it would push the U-bolts that weren't lined up off of the leaf springs.  I'd be back to square one with them.  I proceeded to try a few different, wild ideas to get them right.  I hit them with rubber mallets, with regular hammers, with wrenches, I tried to pry them sideways, on and on.  Eventually I got the left rear one to line up (you're looking at the right side in the picture above, so the one on the right is what I'm considering "front") and got the bolts on.  That put me a little closer with the four on the right side, but still not quite.

I began pulling on the axle in every different direction, often to the point of rocking the car almost off of its stands.  Soon I had a couple of the right side legs lined up, one of which was even extending through the axle hole.  I could just barely get a nut on it, so I then employed a potentially injurious method of using two large wrenches hooked together to get more torque.  Slowly but surely the bolt pulled down, and soon I was able to get it tightened.  I then got the front right tightened the same way (only smashing my hand a few times as the wrenches slipped), but the left front U-bolt was eluding me.  Unlike all of the rest, this U-bolts legs spread outward instead of going straight downward, meaning I'm about half an inch off of the holes.

After trying various methods of squeezing them together, I bashed the U-bolt a thousand times and managed to get it to pop off the leaf springs.  Putting a bolt on each leg so as not to damage the threads, I then squeezed the thing in the vice to close the legs together.  My dad arrived to make sure I was still alive and took the U-bolt to grind on the inside.  After nearly burning his hands on the hot metal, we had ground and bent enough so that the bolt slid right over the leaf spring and fit perfectly!  And just like that, the plucky, rusty little Maxwell had its rear axle back.

Look Ma, no jacks!  The axle is hanging perfectly!

I think that's probably good for this post.  More to come about my activities today, but that will come later.  Ah how wonderful it is to get back in The Garage again!

Diligently filled with my grandmother's beautiful cursive

I realize that an insane amount of time has gone by since my last post, and I assure you there are good reasons for this. First of all, I'm still in graduate school for the next few months, and that's unquestionably keeping me busy. Also of note, I received word a few days ago that I'm #5 on the waitlist to get into medical school (on a list that moved 26 spots last year). Needless to say I'm quite thrilled with that, although until I get the actual note telling me I've been admitted, I'm not breathing yet.

I'll try to keep what would be a lengthy update brief. Regarding the rental house fiasco, we went to court. I accompanied my father to the wood-paneled courtroom in my county's courthouse and waited for the happy couple to arrive. Thankfully only the guy did. The girl not only didn't show up, she didn't even respond to the court papers delivered to her (where you normally plead your guilt or innocence). As a result, all charges against her were applied by default. That meant that the guy (who wasn't there for most of the awful things that happened to our house) was alone to defend against our slew of pictures and bills and receipts.

In the end we won the case hands-down. The court even awarded us our filing fees and court costs, too, so we were quite happy. We told the guy later (with whom we were very civil) that we were sorry it came to this, and if he wanted to he could go after the girl in court on his own. "Believe me," he told us, he's "thought about it."

So that was a huge relief for my father and mother. It was also a big weight off of my shoulders, although my parents both say they doubt we'll ever get a cent out of that worthless girl. But she has the charges against her, so anytime she applies for a loan or anything else the banks will know.

In the meantime I've been cleaning up the fruit room downstairs (the one they tore through), and it has been fantastic learning so much about its contents. Even the stuff that wasn't taken out of the boxes I made sure to inspect, and I've gained so much knowledge about my family's history. Some of the things were sad (hand-painted canvases from WWII Japan of Mt. Fuji tossed on the ground like scratch paper, one of my grandpa's baseball uniforms from the 1940s crumpled on the ground under a chair), but some of the things were fantastic (pictures I never knew we had, plates from my great-great-grandparents, etc.). It was so touching at times to hold something I knew my great grandmother held nearly a century ago, and it was beyond moving to find my father's baby books diligently filled with my grandmother's beautiful cursive. She kept the books so detailed because when my dad was born my grandpa was away in Korea during the war. There were a few times when I was almost moved to tears.

But as of right now the house is put back together. I spent so much time during my winter break and on weekends since then painting, scrubbing, fixing things, redoing the floors, on and on with my parents, and I'm happy to report that we have two great renters back in the house---one of whom was my mom's physical therapist when she broke her hand a while back.

Another project of mine has been to ready the Honda S90 to come to school with me. Especially now that I know I'll be in this town again next year for medical school, it's been fantastic to get the old thing running consistently to be able to bring it. I'll have to post some pictures soon, but with any luck the bike will be brought here on Sunday via a friend's truck.

Another fun project I undertook during spring break was to use Craigslist to hunt down an old helmet I've been looking for. Given its perfect shape for the task at hand, I spent all week stripping it down and repainting it in the iconic paint scheme of Ayrton Senna. It turned out unbelievably well, but I still have quite a bit of touch-up to do as well as applying the sponsor decals. So pardon the roughness, as it was my first ever helmet paint job, it's not done yet.

I'll try to keep this post short, so that's about all for now. I've also been writing quite a bit for F1 Austin, and as always you can follow my F1 and life musings on Twitter at @WoodsiesGarage. More to come soon, my friends!

Liars, tramps and thieves

I had hoped that after my semester-long absence from this blog that I would have something a bit more cheerful to relay, but instead I'm writing again out of emotion. It's not the death of a loved one or a competitor like in the last post. Tonight it's the culmination of a long and draining battle we have been having with our renters living in what used to be my paternal grandmother's house. I'll warn you now that I won't be proofreading this, nor will I include every detail. I plan on leaving out a lot, even though the end volume may seem otherwise. But I digress.

For some background, my dad grew up in that house. The Garage is in the same area, and I spent countless summers up there with my grandma. We both spent years up there, but after her death in 2001 we completely restored the house (built in the early 1900s) to pristine condition as it would have been in its youth. We refinished the original hardwood floors that were hidden under carpet, we cleaned and redid the ceilings and put up crown moulding. We replaced light fixtures with vintage ones and repainted all of the walls. We redid the kitchen and repainted the house. We put a new roof on it, new storm windows, new storm doors, new fixtures, cleaned the clawfoot tub, on and on and on. I would devote whole summers to cleaning that house from previous renters to get it ready to rent again, and those summers were exhausting.

We would get my friends out here to help paint and clean, and my mom and I would listen to NPR and satellite radio while painting moulding and redoing the parquet floors. Every inch of that house I have memories scattered from all ages, spent both with myself, my father, my relatives and my grandma, whether it be the corner where I would sit and listen to her read Roy Rogers stories or the kitchen where I would help her make TV Mix and hand-cut french fries.

Over the past decade we've had every type of renter, but sadly the best were also the most short-lived. Some took great care of the house, but some put literally hundreds of holes in the walls and deeply scratched the 100 year-old hardwood floors. Some moved their boyfriends in with them and some refused to mow or clean or care for the house at all. None of them, however, were like the renters we had. Or have. Hell, I don't know what to call them. Technically they're gone, but as you'll hear, the story is far from simple.

The renters have been there for a year, originally taken in by us as being a married couple with a young daughter. As the story unfolded, some of their quirks began to show; none were big, but outside of a general lack of knowledge about living in the country and being accident prone, they were more of an inconvenience for us as landlords. We were fine with it, though, because they kept the house clean and were quiet, and their young daughter (who was around ten) was enjoying herself at this new residence.

For a year they were fairly quiet, but a few weeks ago (shortly before my Christmas break began), everything turned in the opposite direction. The girl claimed the guy left her with no money and for no reason (oh, I failed to mention that they actually weren't married, but more on that later). Upon later seeing the guy he expressed his shock at getting thrown out and how 'he didn't ask for this.' Seeing as how this was the opposite of the girl's story, we knew things were up.

Within a week there were three and four cars up at the house at a time. Rusty, ratty cars would come at literally all hours of the day (we kept track: Over time we've seen a car/a person/people come/go at least once during every one of the 24 hours in a day) driven by equally as ratty people. Tattooed low-lives with hoodies and baggy pants, mostly all guys, or greasy, scuzzy looking girls with piercings would crawl out of their automobiles and slink into the house without knocking or announcing their presence. The girl's car would sometimes be one of the group of cars in attendance, but most of the time it wasn't, so my dad began taking down license plate numbers. Twenty three we have since amassed from at least four different counties, too.

Around this same time a large pile of garbage began to collect on the back step in plain view of the road and the neighbors. When asked about this, the girl said she would take care of it "right away." Over a day and a half later she finally tossed some of it in the garbage barrel, but none of it was bagged; thankfully the trash collectors took it anyway. Around this same time she began to be later and later on her rent. In the lease was a phrase about a $25 late fee for every week late, but given her situation with her daughter (before any of this happened) we allowed them to be late. As long as we got the money, that's what mattered.

Come December, though, we weren't paid at all. As time went on we grew concerned. Cars were coming and going throughout the night and early morning hours, and our neighbors grew more and more concerned. We stopped seeing the daughter outside playing, and her toys never moved positions in the yard. Lights were always on and the blinds were always closed. Most of the time the girl was never there but people were coming and going as they pleased. Some would enter the house unannounced before leaving a minute or two later. Others would stay for days at a time. We asked her about this and she adamantly said that no one is living there.

They also began to adopt a policy of parking up by our garage where we couldn't see the cars from our windows. They would park directly in front of the door (thus blocking in all of our things) and would sneak into the house as best they could. In the lease it was explicitly stated that no one was to park directly in front of that door (for a few reasons), but they did anyway. We told the girl this and she heartily agreed and apologized and said it would stop. To this day a fortnight later it hasn't.

On the 21 of December she called us to let us know she had most of the rent money and would deliver it to us in a week. We said that was fine, but amongst ourselves we decided that since everything was going on up there, she needed to leave. My dad had wanted to throw her out three weeks before but my mom persuaded him to wait until after the holidays 'for their daughter.'

Go figure that at this point the girl was starting to show her true colors. Covered in tattoos, she'd admitted doing some bad things in the past but didn't want to end up like her mother. Go figure that she's been fired from jobs before for mouthing off (including her most recent) and apparently has two other kids out there somewhere from a different father (or fathers). This, coupled with the traffic patterns and quality of people we saw, meant that we were quite concerned.

When the 28 of December arrived we were called by her to say that she didn't have the money but was going to try to get some more. She had said days before that the traffic would stop, but it hadn't, so we were skeptical of her word on the payment, too. As more time passed we decided that we probably weren't going to get money from her, so we offered her a deal: Rather than giving her a strict three-day-notice to leave, we would give her five and only have her pay her late fees and a tiny bit of December's rent. That was dependent on her being gone, though.

She wholeheartedly agreed and thanked us profusely. She was excited and said she would be 'right over' to our house to sign the paperwork and give us the money. A couple of hours later she hadn't arrived yet. We got a call from her saying "Well I just need a little more time to get the money, but I'll have it soon and I'll be back and sign things in a few minutes. I'm sorry, I'll come get it now. Yes, you guys have been good to [her daughter] and me, I know. I'm on my way." She never showed up, yet the traffic up there continued.

As the license plate list grew and her deadline neared, my dad decided to take action. We sent two eviction notices on consecutive days via certified mail. He hand-delivered two copies on consecutive days to her door and even had the official guy for our county serve her papers (she refused to answer the door, though, so he couldn't). He later talked to her and she acknowledged she had received the papers and "would definitely" be out by January 2.

We watched the house over the next few days off and on as we would pass by the window and saw very little activity related to moving. Overweight guys in hoodies smoking cigarettes would walk in and out of the house, and one day as I entered our drive a grungy girl thing with splotchy skin, a pierced lip and black clothes stared at me with a sullen face as I drove through. That was bizarre.

Finally, on January 2, just hours before the papers said she was going to be out of the house, she called. My father expertly grilled her on just about everything, and she had answers for just about none of it. She claimed the daughter was with the daughter's grandparents and that people weren't living there and that we were wrong about seeing them come in at all hours of the day. Dad explained why the parking was an issue (fire hazards, snow storms blocking in the tractor, etc.), and she relented and said that would stop (it hasn't). She also begged and pleaded that she needed a couple more days to get things moved out. My dad was semi-happy to oblige (although emotionally he wasn't happy), but she would have to sign more papers saying she was going to be out by the 4 of January. She claimed that the papers delivered to her, according to her union-supporting dad, weren't legal because of the way they were given to her, but we checked and this was completely false. We've done everything by the books (in accordance with an attorney we know).

So my dad sought her out and managed to get her to sign a TON of paperwork that he had written regarding when she would be out (noon on the 4 of Janaury), no recourse, how being there later would be trespassing, all deals were off the table, etc. And thankfully she signed every one without hesitation. She even said she'd been packing and should have everything ready soon.

Her boyfriend later came to us that same day and dropped off his key and paid his damages and such (not the late rent or anything, though). He said he was still in shock about it (whatever "it" is) and said that if there's anything more he can do for us or needs to pay, let him know. We appreciated that and sent him on his way. In the meantime it was obvious that the house wasn't being touched. There was no movement up there outside of the sleazy people coming in and out, and on the afternoon of the third I was sent uptown to talk to the attorney.

I asked her what our options were if she didn't move out, but she said they were limited. We would have to pay $500 to file forced eviction papers, which would then have to be served to her. Only when they are served will an eight-day period begin whence the trial cannot commence. After these eight days, although not necessarily on the eighth day, we will go to trial. Until then, though, she'll continue to live in my grandma's house rent-free and with tons of guys up there at all hours. Nevertheless, I told her to ready the paperwork and we would let her know the next day.

Now comes today. Even though the deadline was still a couple of hours away, nothing was happening at the house. A couple of cars would come and go, but that's it. When I saw them carrying in a new gallon of milk yesterday I had my suspicions, but now I knew they weren't leaving. So early this morning my dad headed up to the attorney and handed over a check for the paperwork. Around three o'clock, though, we received a call from the girl. Sobbing and crying she talked to my dad about how she hated her life and was going to live in a motel (my mom had earlier suggested she stay with her many friends 'since she's obviously very popular'). She also said she wasn't going to have everything out and needed to leave just the big stuff to be picked up another day. We agreed, but Dad said he would need to get her keys from her. She adamantly opposed. She said he would 'go through her stuff' and was worried about her boyfriend coming back to claim things.

He assured her we wouldn't go through everything and wanted to know when he could come up to get her to sign some papers. She said she was up at the house and he could come now, which he did in a heartbeat. She staggered her way out to the car looking quite unstable and handed over the keys. She also signed paperwork saying she would be gone and that if she returned without my dad being there, it would be trespassing. She signed quite a few lines and agreed to be gone by 5:30, she just needed to move a few more things and to get her cat. We said that's fine and that she should call us when she's done. And so we waited.

When 6:30 came around and nothing much was happening up there, my dad just decided to go up there and lock things up anyway. All the lights were out, so he called the police and had a deputy meet him and me at the house to walk through it. I was concerned someone would be up there waiting for everyone to leave only to unlock the house for everyone again. Before long we met and headed inside.

Nearly everything was still in the house, and it was a mess. We didn't go through her things, but we checked in every room and under the beds and everywhere we could think to make sure no one was there, but when we got downstairs my fears from another subject were confirmed. In the basement is a room we keep padlocked containing some of my grandma's old things that we didn't have room to bring back to our house. There are also all of my dad's childhood toys and some of mine, as well as some of my grandma's things. The screws around the door and lock were all loose, and in fact two had been changed to a completely different type of screw altogether. It took us a few minutes to get the key, but when we opened the door my stomach turned over.

Everything had been overturned and thrown on the floor. Every single box inside had been opened, and every cardboard box was torn so its contents were revealed. The entire floor was covered in things that had been pulled out of boxes and inspected by grubby, sleazy fingers of low-lives who had nothing better to do. My dad's toys and childhood possessions were haphazardly thrown about the room. Pictures of my deceased relatives littered the floor in one corner, some of which were torn. Some of my toys I used to play with when I would stay with Grandma were taken out and placed on the shelves as if they were looking at them, too.

I felt like I had been kicked in the stomach. Some things looked untouched, but most of it looked like it had been rummaged through and torn apart. I still don't think I'll sleep too much tonight as a result, nor would I consider myself the most calm. My dad has been trying to keep it out of his mind, but we called the girl and confronted her about it. She claimed to know nothing and further said she couldn't know everything people are doing inside of her house at all times. She didn't have any answers, nor did she seem to care that much. Needless to say we're looking into more legal action, and considering she owes well over $1,000 to us anyway, this ordeal is far from over.

It's taught us all valuable lessons, though, in terms of knowing people. My grandma, who lived in that house for 50 years before her death, once said "A leopard can't change its spots," and she was completely correct. That's why I still don't like Michael Vick or Tiger Woods, and that's why we were right to be concerned about this girl. Her splotchy skin, constant sunglasses use and instability definitely points to disconcerting things, but it's not like we didn't have warning signs. What hurts more is that the heirlooms and history, about which I care so much, was so unabashedly violated for no good reason. My parents and I were played by a liar and a cheat, and we trusted her far too much. I suppose it's good that we've never been lied to so shockingly before, nor have we seen such a dense accumulation of the lowest tier of people this town has. Of that I am glad, but unfortunately it came back to bite us.

I can only pray now that nothing up there was taken and for the safety of my family and the house. And given the loopholes in the law and thus the fact that we may never see our money or any repercussions for breaking into that room, prayers might be all we have. The sad reality is that in this country there are far too many protections for 'the poor' like her and for the kind of scum that was always visiting/living up there. We've had quite a few people acknowledge that those types of people know how to work the system since that's all they do, but because of legislation passed through mainly-Democrat measures, we have to be nicer to 'the poor' like her. While there are people who legitimately need those provisions, a majority of landlords are having to deal with the same sorts of things we are. My dad was able to predict every excuse she gave us for why she couldn't leave, why she was late on her payments, how to make us feel guilty, on and on. If it was up to us we would have been up there with a deputy at noon today, escorted her out whether she was ready or not, locked the house and then put all of her stuff out in the yard to be picked up by her countless friends. But unfortunately the law says we can't do that.

Instead we have to wait to see what the next few days brings. We have to hope everything is out of there tomorrow (she says she's coming back at 2:30 to move out some of the big things) and that from here on out the house will be safe. We have to hope that we will get our money somehow (although that will probably require more cost to us for court proceedings, where she probably will fail to appear, so we'll be out of luck), and we have to hope nothing was stolen that was of importance to my family, my history, or myself (which, odds are it was). I don't know. I'm still pretty sick about it. I was hoping to have a relaxing night, maybe do some reading or writing, but now I'm not sure. It's a mess that has ruined all of our Christmas breaks and will thus leave my mom to try to clean up the rental house with her one good hand (since the other is still recovering from an horrendous fall she had a few months ago that shattered her fingers and knuckles) before we can get it rented again. Moreover we will have to re-write our lease agreement to add more provisions to try to avoid a complete disaster like this again. Even if we do, though, I think I'll always wonder for the rest of my life if anything was taken out of that room sometime in the past two weeks (my dad was up there a fortnight ago and everything was fine in the room). I'll always wonder whether a small knick-knack my grandpa brought back from WWII was put in some druggie's pocket and whisked away or if some little token that my great grandma liked to wear is gone forever before I even really knew about it. That's why I've been begging my dad to take me up there sometime so we can go through everything in that room. I'll mark down what it is and the history behind it so that knowledge will never be lost. Some of that stuff only my grandma knew what it was and why it was important, and since she never passed that on to my dad, that history is forever lost. I don't want that to be the case here, either, but we haven't done that yet. We haven't had a chance to go up there and catalog things, and that I will forever regret.

That's why I work so hard in The Garage, too. That's why I made this blog. To catalog. To remember. That way the things I learn and experience up there are not lost, and I can give items and cars their history back. They can continue to have their stories retold. That's why I love what I do and why I care about my history. The biggest regret I have in life is not getting to know my family members really well before I died. Sure I knew them and grew up with them (it's not like we were estranged or anything remotely close to that), but I was a little kid when so many of them died. I wasn't old enough to ask them questions about their childhood, their parents, their grandparents. I was too young to appreciate that they had their own lifelong stories and memories of times I have never and will never experience. Some would say that's not my fault since I was a kid, but it still bothers me. Now that I'm older I wish so much that I could ask my grandma about when she was young or what she remembered of that house when she first moved there. I wish I could hear my grandpa talk about working in The Garage after he built it and knowing what he'd done on the Maxwell. I wish I had questioned my great aunts and uncles about their parents from Czechoslovakia and what this town was like when they were young. So to have the potential history in that room so vandalized and violated just kills me. Most of that stuff are things I refused to let my parents part with at the auction after Grandma died. I wanted to save it and to keep it safe. I wanted to have it forever and cherish it, maybe even someday put some of it in my future house. Never did I once imagine all of it being so carelessly tossed around and broken like a pile of junk in a dumpster. I never would have envisioned worthless people tearing through boxes of our things and crumpling them up on the floor. It really opens your eyes to the kind of people that exist in this world regardless of where you live or how 'safe' your environment seems. We've learned a lot in the past few weeks, that's for sure.