Pictures of Miscellaneous Stuff & Things

[Mumbleypeg]

What tremendous character the older cars had.

Two years ago I had the privilege to visit the Owls Head Transportation Museum, located in Owls Head, ME. (See here for a sampling of the collection there http://owlshead.org/collections/category). By far the finest and most extensive collection of automobiles, bicycles, vintage airplanes and motorcycles I have seen anywhere! While we were there looking at a 1933 Packard convertible on display, one of the museum guides made the observation that people didn't realize at the time that they were driving works of art.

Ken

[jmh58]

[steve99f]

Rolling sculpture! Gorgeous.

[Quick Steel]

ken & jmh, Thanks so much for sharing those wonderful photos with us. Interesting that bicycle design was established by 1898. Many of the bikes look very similar to contemporary bikes.

Our newer model cars give us greater mpg but often less fmpg. [fun miles per gallon.]

[philco]

Pics from my Oregon vacation.

[gsmith7158]

Beautiful pics Phil! Looks like a great trip.

[Quick Steel]

Great photos. All nicely framed. You and Miss Vicki make a handsome couple.

[jmh58]

Very NICE Phil!! Gotta put Oregon on the Bucket List.. John

[jerryd6818]

Minion%2013.jpg (34.05 KiB) Viewed 946 times

[steve99f]

That's funny, I don't care who you are!

[RobesonsRme.com]

I didn't know that Marine officers fraternized with enlisted men.

Charlie

[Just Plain Dave]

In my opinion (and yes we all have one) the most beautiful design ever minted on a coin!

[jmh58]

2017-04-13 07.06.05.jpg
In my opinion (and yes we all have one) the most beautiful design ever minted on a coin!

Dave.. That is KOOL!!! John

[jmh58]

[QTCut5]

Anyone up for a game of grassketball?

Other shots from the 'hood

~Q~

[philco]

More pics from my Oregon vacation

[KnifeSlinger#81]

Phil what a beautiful place.

I was at home depot today getting some weed eater cord and I spotted this mean looking stuff. I decided to try it out, night and day difference I tell ya!

[Mumbleypeg]

Driving across west Texas a few years ago, my wife and I saw what appeared from several miles away to be a huge plume of smoke rising from the ground and across the sky. As we got closer it turned out to be hundreds of thousands, maybe millions of ducks, landing in a huge several-hundred acre wheat field. It was a beautiful sight I'll never forget.

Last week, at the same location I saw the hideous sight below stretching for miles along the highway. The scale of the west Texas sky makes it difficult to envision how really huge the turbines are. These wind turbines at this location have been erected in the past two years, and they're putting up more all across west Texas.

I guess this is progress? I'm sure the environmentalists are thrilled. Especially since they don't have to look at them. The ducks? Not so much.

Ken

[gsmith7158]

Ken I couldn't agree more. They are hideous and are popping up all across the country. It's not until you see one of the wings be transported on a huge oversized trailer truck that you realize just how big they are. I'm sure that the sight of these windmill farms has brought many a tear to the heart of an old cowboy.

[Quick Steel]

Ken I have seen these driving across the Texas panhandle and in CA as well. Obama signed a directive permitting the power companies to kill up to 4500 Bald Eagles per year via their wind turbines. I have encountered various figures for the total birds killed. I think it is close to a million of all species throughout the country. The heaviest toll I am sure is during migrations.

[Mumbleypeg]

I've always found the old water-pumping windmills to be aesthetically pleasing and nostalgic. In fact I have an Aermotor 602 model that's at least 70 years old on my place. But those water pumpers were typically on 30 ft high towers and placed at distant intervals or at a farm or ranch house. You will seldom see more than one in an area as far as the eye can see. But on these newer wind "farms", the wind turbines are on probably 180 ft high towers and often placed on high ridges or flat prairies, visible for miles away, and there's rarely fewer than 20 of them within a small area. More often there's hundreds of them, in rows visible as far as you can see - truly a blight upon the once-beautiful Texas sky.

Rant over, return to normal activity.

Ken

[Old Hunter]

Dinner at The Crab Shack at Salter Path NC on Bogue Banks. Nice view from our table looking out on Bogue Sound. OH
Ps touch the picture and it will expand and right itself.

[RobesonsRme.com]

So, what happens when 4500 bald eagles have been killed? Do they shut the turbines down or just start counting from zero again?

And the turbines are all made made in China. You'd think we could manage to build them here.

The Chinese manufacturers probably have a wall where they paste little bald eagle decals every time one dies. Probably have office pools to see who can come closest to the weekly total. There's money in them thar eagles!

Charlie Noyes

[Dinadan]

And the turbines are all made made in China. You'd think we could manage to build them here.
Charlie Noyes

Actually, there is a rather large GE plant in Pensacola, Florida, where wind turbines are built. I have worked there several times. Now I do not know exactly what components are made there and what might be imported, but the completed turbines leave that plant by truck and by rail. Always headed west!

I vividly recall the first time I saw a wind turbine farm. It was in Oklahoma in 2008 and I was reminded of the alien war machines in War of the Worlds. My daughter was as fascinated as I was by a kind of science fiction machine become real.

[Quick Steel]

With this as with so much else, the limitation was a Kabuki performance, quite meaningless. Both wind turbines, solar energy, and ethanol remain subsidized by our taxes. None of them are independently profitable. I'll stop here or I'd have to transfer to a more appropriate thread.