Saturday, February 01, 2014

There is always one.

It's true! There is always one, in this case a bolt that quite simply refuses to cooperate and won't come undone.
Ellen Jane has a cart, a little, light-weight trotting cart, and she wants rid of it. It's been stuck on top of the stable roof for God knows how long but we finally brought it down for her the other day, me and young Charlie. Anyway, Charlie pumped up the tyres after breaking the first pump and we got the thing harnessed up to Samson. Off he went, Charlie, round the block, no bother. So Ellen Jane gets up with him for the second circuit. I stayed with Charlie's Ma waiting for them to get back. They came back with Samson untacked and being led by EJ, Charlie was pulling the cart, a broken shaft.
No harm done, all I need to do is take both shafts, shorten them by about three inches, put them back on and she can flog the useless thing and get another cart.
Easier said than done.
Each shaft is held by two bolts, all I had to do was remove the bolts, shorten the shafts, reseat them, drill new holes and put the bolts back in. Three came out easily, not the fourth. Three times today I have been driving back and forth getting tools, monkey wrenches, grips, socket sets, spanners, allen keys and in the end I got a hacksaw and sawed the bastard off altogether. I'll replace the shafts when my stress levels recover.
There is always one.

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