Saturday, March 24, 2012

Rust In The Wind

Today it was once again time to saddle up ol' Larry the Volvo station waggon and drag the poor guy, loaded down with rusty hunks of rusty rust, to the scrapyard. Once again.

This time the main weight of it was this old Citroën engine that had been sitting smack in the middle of the lawn over by the shed; well, that and some truly scary jagged rusty bits vulture-picked off the carcass (ha! carcass) of Genviève the Citroën, as well as various bits and bobs raked up out of the dirt such as the odd shovel handle. Here's Larry's butt, as usual, for proof:



Tara for some reason has got it in her head that there aren't too many iron runs left given how much we've cleaned. She's had that idea for a while now; I'm pretty sure the psychological term is denial. And today she was all like, It just keeps coming! I just sort of shook my head and said, Yep. I think she's expecting that if we've got the place eighty-five percent cleaned by now (which is probably about right) it should start petering out, right? Yeah, well; fifteen percent of a million is still a lot.

For some time now, we have been working on the area over by the shop, where the pen used to be. And by some time I mean off and on since the fall; however, since it was only bits and pieces here and there, there hadn't really been anything to show. We've (well, okay, Tara did most of the muscle work) pulled out these absurdly huge creosote 'fence posts' (probably sections of telephone poles), which required a tripod and come-a-long, moved cars, picked up junk, gotten rid of an engine or two, taken the sections of stockade fence away, filled in holes, cut down a dead tree, burned brush, and generally tidied up. It's still not done (those old creosote fence posts are a bit of a puzzle; I'm not sure they'll burn, or, rather, I'm worried they'll burn rather too well), but here are some befores and afters.

The before is from last summer, maybe:



And the after, taken today:



And here's one looking towards the shed:



That bit of something in the middlish there is half of the back axle section of Genviève. (Yes, I'm sure there's a proper name for that part of a car, but, happily I've blotted it from memory.) It's half because Tara managed to saw the thing in two, length-wise. The reason it's still there is because we ran out of room in Larry, so it will have to wait for the next iron run. Yes, there will be another. Of course.

So, then, totals: today's iron run was the forty-second trip to the scrapyard, and got rid of another 700 pounds of iron (as well as nine pounds of aluminum specially for the smelter-man); that brings the total amount of iron removed from the property since oh whenever to 35,880 pounds, or 17.94 tons, just this close to a solid eighteen tons.

Which we will of course easily top on the next iron run, probably next week. Because, of course, there is still more.

5 comments:

Debra She Who Seeks said...

You've made an amazing difference in that spot! I don't think it would be wise to burn the creosote-soaked fence posts though -- it would release all those toxins into the air and into your lungs. Not a good thing. I grew up around creosote-soaked wood, which I believe is now classified as a carcinogenic substance.

NanaR said...

Wow! You are making so much progress! I try to check this blog at least every couple of days. Your story is inspiring!

Can the creosote-soaked wood go to the dump? So many things are classified as hazardous now that used to be commonly used. There's probably creosote in the ground those were pulled from too.

Keep up the great work!

Tonia said...

85%! That is just amazing. I feel so bad that I'm putting off cleaning my garage. How lazy I am in contrast to your progress.

That does it... you have officially inspired me. Garage will be cleaned today.

85% along. That's just mind-boggling.

Suella said...

It gets better and better. So impressive...

Could you use the logs/posts as part of a raised bank or bed perhaps?

It seems a shame not to be able to make them useful in someway.

AislingCat said...

Congrats on the continued good work!

I wouldn't recommend burning the creosote-soaked wood. It's highly combustible.

Apparently, chimney sweeps have to deal with it (it builds up in chimneys and causes chimney fires), so maybe calling someone in that line of work would be a good idea. They might be able to suggest disposal methods.