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So, it has been snowing in western MI for a month now. Much like Upstate NY, we get lots of lake effect snow. Last week there was 5' on the ground and the banks of my residential street were over 10'!I inherited my Father's 1978 Gilson, two stage snowblower with his passing last year. He was meticulous when it came to maintenance. I mean this 30 year old snowblower got waxed twice a year along with all the other regular maintenance like oiling and greasing the various parts.
Since I have been using it daily, I figured I may as well check the belts and stuff during a pit stop of routine maintenance. They needed replacement. Since I used this thing (and loathed it) as a teenager I never had opened the manual that came with it.
Inside the manual, along with every receipt for every part ever purchased for this thing, I find my Father's notations of what size the belts are, Goodyear part numbers, the torque specs for the belt's tensioner and a whole host of other information that I would have never even knew I needed until I had taken the thing to pieces.
I think my Pop knew his work would be appreciated.
So I start to round up the needed parts and lo and behold, this particular brand of snowblower seems to have a "cult like" following. They were absorbed by Toro in the '80's and promptly shut down production of this design in favor of the Toro design. The local outdoor equipment dealer told me that this thing will likely outlast me if I keep it up. There is even an online forum dedicated to the care and feeding of vintage Gilsons!
I have an "heirloom quality" snowblower?!?! Cool!
Thanks Pop!
--
Al G
Follow Ups:
Here's a blower that would make the Gilson whimper....
Disturbed is a life style...deal with it.
And I hope you get to use it soon!(Wait a second...Would that be considered a "good thing", or a "bad thing"?)
Anyway, if the weather forecast is true all of us here in the Midwest may be shoveling some white stuff soon enough. Good luck!
string and glue whipped handle and all, before we all went to Manly on a Ferry from Neutral Bay, to the beach and Esplanade and then the aquarium. He also took us to the Zoo. And, to the Sydney Cricket Ground to watch England play Australia.It was the first few weeks that we all* knew that Dad was in concorde Repatriation Hospital, with cancer of the bowel. * Not flown the coop from Sydney where he was working for Soul (Pattinson's) pharmacy network!
Pardy my Dad's Dad, was a Sergeant driver in the Artillery of the Australian 3rd Infantry Division's Ammunition Column in France 1916 to 1919. like all members of the 1st AIF, and the 2nd AIF in WWII.
In that war Australia suffered a higher per capita deaths from front-line servcie than any other country for which good records were available. Higher than the UK, Canada, even NZ, with the possible exceptions of; Russia where as in WWII we only have estimates, and Newfoundland whose sole volunteer battalion of TNR was effectively wiped out on day one of Haig's Somme offensive.
Two Australian Divisions (> 18,000 men!) also received their baptism of fire, in that long pursued effort - at Fromelle, and at Pozieres where around the mill's site the ground is more thickly sown with dead where they fell (all diggers) than any other ground on the entire Western Front.
Fromelle was a fresh salient, surrounded on both sides, into which the German's fired the heaviest bombardment, for rate, area saturation, and duration, than even those at Verdun in the same year.
A long time ago - when I was a callow young volunteer Sgt, I took all my accumulated pay, from my real job and the harmy, AND paid 'R&R leave' to travel. And I visited the North of France, where I had the singular pleasure(?) of having Waltzing Matilda sung to me at the public school of Villers Bretonneaux, in piping French and English for ALL the verses. And, so I tried to explain the story to them, and what a Billabong was (s'not a gilgai JBTW!), and a squatter, they knew what a thoroughbred was, but, they all KNEW!
Apart from my being in Northern France and knowing of Villers Bretonneaux where Monash and 2 AIF divisons ended the last big push of the 1918 spring offensive - Die Kaiserschlacht. This began in the famous destruction in the fog in ONE day - of the British 5th Army (Gough - one of the best- was sacked!?). Followed by Haig's 'Back's to the wall!' - General Order. So, back into the line went the Diggers the Kiwis, and the Canucks!!! Shock troops? You betcha!
I had been standing in the square in Amiens, where this fighting was centred, looking at the several memorials to the fighting of Spring 1918, and to the famous later offensive Batlle of Amiens where Monash's system broke the German system. 'THE Black Day of the German Army'- wrote Ludendorf.
SO I had stopped at a cafe, for a cagnac and coffee, to settle myself down.
And the proprietress guessed and asked was I 'un Australie?' and 'familie?' Pointing at the one about Monash and the Australian Army Corps.
I nodded, and away she went, grabbing all the old men and jabbering away, about the 3rd Div'n and my 'grompear', and the Aussies unique brown boots (made here along with our unique dark kakhi tunic uniform!) The people of Amiens had been fleeing le Boche down their roads when they saw British infantry wearing THOSE brown booots (L'Australiens) and had turned their carts around and followed them back. "YOU will hold them!"
And then, very probably double locked their shops and daughters.
One of these old men took me, in his little very frog van, to VB.
WarmestTimbo in Oz
The Skyptical Mensurer and Audio ScroungerAnd gladly would he learn and gladly teach - Chaucer. ;-)!
'Still not saluting.'
they came from anew and sceptical culture - at the micro level of people - to do a job and get it DONE.They had little patience with miltary bullshit, rank, pomp and swagger, especially when it was wrapped in crap-performance, and incapacity, plus Upper Class Twit voice, aka Fraffly / earse for yes!
Which, in both wars, they noted by the bucket load.
It tells me and I hope y'all, a lot about us then at least, that TWO national referendums to introduce conscription so as to feed Haig/ Robertson's mincer, and Murray's incompetence, were rejected!!!!
And, that it was the diggers in France, and Palestine, whose votes stopped the idea - twice - especially in the near run 2nd ref'm!
? Yes!
They didn't want men there who were not committed, and who they felt could not be part of 'the elephant' - as their mates.
They were heartily sick of their job, and knew that it was permanently damaging them to their cores. Their many cogent and wonderful letters home are overwhelmingly united on this latter point, and the books based on research into this vast body of hand-writing are highly recommended. I will list some, soon.
You may be / not be surprised to find that the a/h who pushed the conscription idea so hard, splitting our young country in the midst of that most terrible of wars and his party, which he was supposed to lead and sustain (?!), was knighted for his war-time efforts by a grateful Britain, in THEIR honours list, mind.
SIR (!?!!!*&%$#@???) William Morris Hughes!!!
He had built his political position and power as a ferocious and public anti-imperialist, and then WWI happens and he can see the POWER he could have with the fearful and supine among humanity, and became a war mongering demagogue, a flip in deed!!!
Yet, post-war he was turned into 'the little digger' by the nascent RSL in Victoria. This lead to the quiet determination of many returned men to have nothing to do with the RSL, like my father, Pardy, my FIL, and me. After BOTH wars, and after Vietnam.
The incongruity of it is compelling, to me at least!?
Back when I was a lad the huge shortfall between the membership numbers, and the number of living returned men, just never came up in public debate until 'Nam. WMH was aging by then and was allowed to sit and be saluted during the Anzac Day parades, wearing a slouch hat to which he was NOT entitled, not having served.
Isn't it strange, and sad, that veteran's organisations tend this way?
Even more striking in countries when the two world wars have been costly and UNprofitable for their country.
But, why did they use Billy as a cat's-paw / figurehead?
After he had sought to force lots more young men to their death!???? to serve alongside men who did not want them to come!
No, not at all!!
Because he had, post-war, gotten behind the RSL's push for very special treatment of returned men, from tax-payers money> . Some of this was just, some extravagant and corrupting, some misconceived, of which some plans were VERY bad for our ecology.
There was corruption and 'placing' mind as well, but you had to toe the line or you could find yourself with NTBP on yr file. Even in the civil service when I joined! yep!
Many in Melbourne just would not salute Billy, nor later the chair and hat - after he died and went off to burn for ever!!!!! Fights would break out when this was noted by the bullyboy types.
NB You didn't HAVE to be 'in the rissole' to march with your unit, or with your neighbours.
(So, very many would never march with their old units that was solidly Rissole politically - and it's original initials were RSS&AILA. A rissole is a - CHEAP - bread-crumb-laden minced-beef and onion, pattie, fried.)
Nor to benefit from the care made available. They wouldn't help you with the bureacracy though, until quite recently.
There is/was another alternative grouping called Legacy whose work and outcomes are entirely funded by donations, along with volunteering.
FIL and I are adult members, and we kids were 'junior Legatees'*, from Dad's death onwards. Kind of like the YMCA? gym, etc, and trips all over and 'vigorous' holidays, and I learned to fence, foil mostly!!!
And, I learnt to ride and love horses ever after, at two pony camps in Narrabri - outback. The Association did not charge Legacy any fee - so it was entirely free to us - these associations in many centres had own links with Legacy via the Light Horse units, and 'bush rifle' battalions,
this was in the spring hols in my teens. Even the very good horses were supplied for no cost to Mum. And, I got new boots both years as I shot up!!
I also went on a kindof outward bound program, learning to row, rock climb and abseil, bushwalk, and camp out!
Serendipitously, 'Legacy' in Necastle's city centre, was just down hill from the Cathedral, to which I caught a bus twice a week anyway!
WarmestTimbo in Oz
The Skyptical Mensurer and Audio ScroungerAnd gladly would he learn and gladly teach - Chaucer. ;-)!
'Still not saluting.'
...
Great story Al. I am sure pop is proud.Here in Missouri we are having a heat wave, mid 60's today.
...I hope all is holding together ok for you.Sorry to hear about your Mom.
--
Al G
.
NT.
Great that your dad really did such a meticulous job of keeping the machine running - he obviously knew value when he saw it.And Toro obviously adhered to that time honoured business practice: If you can't beat 'em, buy 'em. Then kill their product and keep marketing your inferior but cheaper to make and more profitable product.
Happy blowing!
Gather 'em up, tie 'em down, and shoot 'em like the hogs they are.I love "shirts".
****
If I had more money I'd soon be broke...but I'd have more LPs!
...Ya know, the shitty, cheap, and smokey 2 cycle powered lawnmower people.IIRC in the early to mid '90s.
I *HATE* to say it...Honda makes pretty good outdoor power equipment.
Even Troy Built is owned my Murray now. Might as well buy a hardware store brand instead of the once famous build of Troy Built.
--
Al G
......I’m not quite sure why you “hate to say it” about Honda but their four stroke engines used in outdoor equipment are second to none. I think the superiority of the Honda engines has lead to the vast improvement of engines from the likes of Briggs & Stratton. That is a good thing right?Smile
Sox
At age 12 I built a mini-bike out of a 10 hp Briggs and a discarded Cushman Eagle frame. That sucker would survive stuff that killed the neighbor kids Honda 50's! Bone simple were those Briggs. Simple to repair and maintain also.It's not that I dislike Honda, it is more of a lament for the small "Mom and Pop" equipment manufacturers that all seem to have been "conglomorized" into huge corporations. Honda stuff represents the monolithic corporation to me I guess.
To prove my "sickness", I have a good dozen Briggs & Stratton and Tecumseh small engines in the shed. When I find old roto-tillers and stuff in garage sales for $5 i just have to buy them and bring them back to life.
My signature here was once "Born To Tinker". I am afraid it is true!
--
Al G
........IMHO they lost their way, in relation to the opposition, in regards to performance and features.However, they have certainly lifted their game and are now comparable with Honda (Honda engines just keep getting better & better)
I have two B&S four stroke engines – a 6HP & 13HP – both do a good job. ON critical gear however I use Honda. :o)
“Tinkering” is a great pass time.
Smile
Sox
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