The Saga Continues......
It took a while for us to get the details worked out about the truck and the crane, but in late October, we found ourselves heading north once again. The plan was to get in and get the debris cleared, the crankshaft jacked up and the grout broke loose so that the crane could pick the pieces out the next morning.
Here is Paul again, dressed a little warmer this time. The ground there was soft and the wet snow didn't help. We were concerned that the ground may be too soft to get the crane and truck in and out. Just a few nights earlier, 6 inches of snow had fallen about 30 miles north of here and it seemed it was going to be there until spring. Winter comes early in northern Wisconsin and we hoped it wouldn't come tonight.
Even though we were a little nervous about the weather and a few other things, we had a good time. Bill is our expert when it comes to jacking and blocking, so he and Paul went to work on getting the flywheel and crankshaft jacked up while I went to work cutting off the pipes and then starting on the grout.
Here you can see the results of their work. The crankshaft is just starting to come up out of the bearing box on the engine frame. The foundation under the outboard bearing had settled quite a bit and it took a lot of going back and forth from one side to the other to get it to come up nicely.
Here they have the crank clear of the outboard bearing and blocked up. I was bent over near the front of the engine when I heard the commotion that ensued when the crankshaft started to roll out of the bearings. Funny how that sort of thing warms a guy right up.
Here I am, stopping for a moment while we were packing up our tools to go get a room and some lunch. We were as ready as we were ever going to be and now we had nothing left to do but wait to see what the weather and morning would bring.
