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There were/are some amazing supper clubs jammed into Wisconsin backwaters. This page all about the Gobbler is an internet Khole http://www.lileks.com/institute/motel/ Sadly quite a few are shadows of their former selves if they are still operating today. And I'm sure covid killed a few. It killed the Chicago lawrys 
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Apr 5, 2021 10:54
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I was looking for a cheap air compressor and found one that fits in nicely with the thread on Facebook Marketplace. I have an old 1930s vertical compressor out of a gas station that lives in my parents barn and I love how quiet it is compared to modern compressors. So when I saw this I figured I'd take a risk.  Listing Pics    Got there and found out it was in an 1850s fieldstone basement with super narrow stairs so I took pics before pulling the motor and pump so it would be easier to get up the stairs. Haggled the seller down to $40 plus he helped me carry the tank up the stairs.  The cover plate is a bit sketchy  But the cloth wires inside were sketchier than the plate  Love the 1930s logo on the Capacitor sticker  Penn brand regulator and decompression valve  Archive has the 1947 Devilbiss catalog   I don't actually know that it's a 1947 production unit for sure but once I wiped the tank off I found this hidden under the dust and grime.  They also had the 1947 price list. $150 is around $1850 adjusted for inflation.  Googled an old Delta manual that covers the westinghouse motor  Had a 220 15amp plug but was wired for 110 so I switched the buss bars as directed  Rewired using modern shielded 12ga hidden in the original jacket  Exhaust valve was full of carbon that I cleaned up  Changed the oil, oiled the motor bearings, cleaned the regulator contacts and it runs great  All cleaned up after wiping all the oil I spilled off  Kitted out with the finest in Harbor Freight accessories  It's definitely not going to win any efficiency awards or be OSHA certified unless I make a belt cage for it but I'm pretty confident it'll keep putting along for at least a few more decades. my turn in the barrel fucked around with this message at 13:26 on Dec 2, 2021 |
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Dec 2, 2021 13:22
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I hit an interesting estate sale. Went to buy a lovely hassock fan a guy had listed on FB marketplace to restore. Got there and the guy asked what I came to buy. I said the green fan. I asked what else he had for sale. He said anything you see in the 2 barns and the house. Turned out the previous owner had passed away and the family didn't want to bother cleaning out anything and sold the place contents included. Guy said he bought the property for the 20 acres of farmland out back and wanted to split off the house and barns and sell them and he was just trying to sell everything off to make 6 months of mortgage payments on the place and clear it out so he could make more selling the house. From what I could tell the family only took or sold the guys record collection, stereo, and guns. There was an entire machine shop in the barn giant lathes, a forge, every tool you could imagine. I found all kinds of stuff but a few items fit in with this thread. There was tools everywhere and I know nothing about machining but I saw a box that said Starrett.  I threw it on my pile. I saw a depth gauge in a wood box.   Also went into my pile I saw a box that said spring winder.   Into the pile Entire folding table piled with tools, knife sharpeners and sandpaper/circular blades. Said gimme $10. I went back a few times and kept finding all kinds of stuff. Each time I looked at a huge assortment of photography/darkroom/camera stuff. I asked him if anyone had made an offer on it. He said someone bought the 2 Olympus OM2 cameras but nobody wanted the rest of the junk. Gimme $5 but you have to take it all. Welp.. I knew the enlargers and all of the camera stuff was worth taking but there were 2 crappy old studio flashes that I figured were pretty worthless but I made the deal so I loaded them up. Finally got around to looking a bit closer. Neither were photography related at all. The one in the case was actually an antique UV/Ozone therapy light with the original goggles.    I was going to turn it into a lamp but it seems like they are pretty collectible so I'll probably throw it on ebay. The second light had a spiral bulb and was on a super heavy metal base and had to weigh at least 75lbs. I assumed it had guards to protect the flash bulb.   Looked a bit closer and noticed how thick the cord was and how beefy the connector was.  What the ....  It's actually an old crouse hinds explosion proof industrial lamp. Opened it up and put in a led Edison bulb and plugged it in as a floor lamp.  I will need to strip and paint the base as the original coating is flaking pretty bad but it's a pretty awesome industrial floor lamp. Looking at ebay it seems like it must be worth a small fortune based on how much just basic explosion proof single bulb fixtures are selling for. I'm glad I took all the photo junk for my $5.
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Feb 15, 2022 09:36
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STR posted:That LED bulb isn't going to last long at all in there, if you didn't know. LEDs hate enclosed fixtures (heat builds up and kills them). An incandescent is best for that fixture; barring that, a CFL. That is a good point and worth mentioning. In this case I'm not concerned because the bulb was in an immaculate NOS vintage cordomatic trouble light I found at the restore for $5 and put in my garage. No pic handy so here is an ebay screenshot.  I assume they threw it in to test the light? I swapped in a regular led bulb since an edison led is a terrible rough service bulb. I always use bulb grease so between the edison led appearing to not have any drivers or heatsinks I figured that any heat would just conduct out the socket to the 30lbs of solid aluminum of the explosionproof lamp head. But your comment made me double check and according to the product page at Home depot the Feit 60w led edison lamps are enclosed fixture rated. https://www.homedepot.com/p/Feit-El...DRP-4/313397500 It seems like the Led bulb manufacturers are transitioning everything to dimmable enclosed fixture rated as LED tech advances and prices drop. I'm kind of curious if the actual LED bars in the bulb are somehow wired to take 120v ac directly without an additional step-down transformer since that's where most of the heat would be generated.
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Mar 4, 2022 05:29
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Mine was in absolutely perfect NOS condition except the rubber ball on the cord is partially eaten away like the rubber reacted with the metal lip it was snugged against in a box for decades. Though iirc when I got it I think I found somewhere saying the company was producing them up until the 80s or 90s so mine might not actually be as old as the 1960s picnic basket blue contact paper makes it seem. Edit pics:   
my turn in the barrel fucked around with this message at 09:17 on Mar 9, 2022 |
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Mar 9, 2022 06:05
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My brother called me asking me if I knew anyone who knew about old Buicks. I asked why and he said he had found one cheap but something was wrong with the driveshaft. I remembered you had found that 42 business coupe and figured you may know how big of a headache this is likely to be. Here are the pics he sent      Supposedly a 1939 Special Convertible According to the seller, it was restored at some point in the 70s, last on the road in the 90s. Apparently something in the driveshaft broke which lead to it sitting and 2 generations passing away in the meantime. The current owner wanted to see it go to someone who would put it back on the road. My brother said the paint was pretty rough but looking at the pics I'm wondering if the rust and crud would buff out. Apparently the interior, top and tires are in decent shape. I'm going to assume the motor/carb/trans/brakes are all going to be siezed from sitting but it looks like it was stored in a climated controlled building so they may not need much. Cursory googling seems to indicate the 1939 buicks used a one year only driveshaft design that used a torque ball that is unobtanium. I don't even know what a driveshaft torque ball is off the top of my head so I'm assuming it's some arcane buick innovation that will cost 5x what the car does to get a replacement.
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Jun 4, 2022 01:35
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I did find one place online that may still rebuild them. https://bobsautomobilia.com/shop/transmission-sifter-parts/1939-ser-40-60-torque-ball-tbs-39/ But in one forum post it says they stopped so unless they started up again it may still be unobtainium. 
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Jun 4, 2022 03:12
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Didn't get numbers but I think the price is in the free as in beer range. I'm assuming everything except the axle/trans whatever caused it to be shelved will be relatively easy fixes but I'd rather assume the worst. Previous owner stated car would do 75mph but was scary AF while doing so because he had it up to that last time it was on the road in the 90s. Guessing he joyrode grampas car and hopefully blew out something dumb like the torque ball mounts rather than serious damage. Will only find out once the car is in hand and ready to be gone through. And I 100% agree. Most old motors are low compression and have loose tolerances so they are usually pretty hard to lock up. I once tried to buy the Mars OG "Light From Mars" off a 49 Seagrave pumper that someone had dropped off at a local metal recycling scrapyard. Long story short, they wouldn't sell me the light unless I bought the whole truck for $500. Had to hire a semi for $200 to get it hauled home. It had a v12 pierce arrow block that seagrave bought the right to when PA went tits up and used until the 50s. Firetrucks needed redundancy so it had 24 spark plugs, 2 distributors, 4 coils, 2 batteries etc... It had last been driven about 30 years before I bought it. But plugs, oil, gas, batteries, wiring and some ether had it running and driving. 15 year old potato quality videos https://youtu.be/VZXdHR4i_z0 https://youtu.be/QlEDHMldnHQ https://youtu.be/FSP58I-nxeI my turn in the barrel fucked around with this message at 08:59 on Jun 5, 2022 |
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Jun 5, 2022 08:55
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My brother is going to take the car, it was a few hours away and he didn't have a trailer with to haul it back. From what he said the price was negotiated dependant on getting it back on the road so the PO could drive/possibly break it one more time. I'm also near the IL WI border so even a free car would cost more in gas than it's worth to your neck of the woods. In other news, I slacked and forgot to upload pics from my dslr but I took my 4 year old son to the Sharon, WI Model A Day this morning. Probably 200+ model As lining a few city blocks. Flappers, gangsters, newsies wandering around. Bank robbery skits on the streets with blank firing Thompsons. There was also a 2 block long street of swap meet parts. Most vendors had model a parts exclusively. Having gleaned some great banger info from your posts it was neat seeing what old speed parts were scattered around. Only thing that seemed legit was an old Riley OHV conversion that I would have never recognized nor realized the significance of had you not posted about your Cragar setup and Model A OHV stuff. Edit: ended up the seagrave was purchased new in 49 by Crystal Lake, IL a local town, I found original production photos of the truck during assembly and newspaper photos of Santa leading the 1949 Christmas Parade when it was brand new. The previous owner was the Mayor of Hoffman estates and had used it as a campaign/parade vehicle from the door livery and campaign signs. The saddest part was.... as I was loading it at the scrapyard one of the workers came over and said it was brought into the scrapyard on a gooseneck by one of the deceased PO's daughters in mint but rusty condition with all of the doors/cabinets/ladders etc.. intact. They told her it had no scrap value but they wouldn't charge her to recycle it so She essentially gave the Truck away. The scrapyard even said they would unload it off her gooseneck as a favor. They unloaded it by grabbing it with a giant Claw and roached the ladders and sheetmetal on the right side. As such I tried to get someone local to give me the $700 I had in it if they wanted to restore it. Local fire museum told me they didn't want it unless it was free. A few other leads all fizzled out when it came time to make a deal. I was young and broke and didn't have the $700 to spare so I ended up ebaying it for $1500 iirc. Buyer planned to pull the motor and grill to fab into a hot rod and scrap the rest. The one thing that few people realize is that most old Pumpers have a ginormous solid bronze water pump behind the transmission so you can usually recoup a fair amount of cash scrapping the pump to get the truck on the road if you aren't planning to use it as a pumper. I found a site with non potato engine/cab pics of a similar truck to mine. https://barnfinds.com/monster-v12-1939-seagrave-canopy-cab/ Seagrave used that exact block for a few decades. my turn in the barrel fucked around with this message at 18:27 on Jun 6, 2022 |
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Jun 6, 2022 08:53
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I just got a text from my brother with this picture  I'll try to catch up with him tomorrow or next weekend and get better pics
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Jun 11, 2022 16:58
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Didn't get a chance to see it yet but He sent me a few more pics.     
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Jun 12, 2022 23:36
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Late but I took the kiddo down for a pool and pizza party today and got to see the car. Not sure if the storage sucked or the prep/paint from when it was restored was lacking but the finish is pretty roached. The top and interior being in good shape lead me to belive it was prep/paint that caused all the rust. None of the rust is bad enough that any panels will need to be replaced the car will just need a new paint job. Also found service manuals and the drive shaft and several parts in the back seat.           Love the Safety First text above the speedometer 
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Jun 20, 2022 08:45
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Speaking of 50s GM dreamcars... Usually anything rare in Chicagoland rusted away years ago or is locked up tight in a museum. But someone in the area owns a 57 or 58 Eldorado Brougham and drives it to just about every large car show within a 2 hour radius. I usually end up grabbing shots each time I see it.    That stainless roof is one of the most eye-catching things I have ever seen on a car. Then I googled it and realized 1. They are super rare 2. They are never going to be in my budget 🙃 https://www.hemmings.com/stories/2021/10/06/a-dream-realized-with-a-rare-example-of-gms-ultimate-in-1950s-luxury
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Jun 27, 2022 09:09
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I know you had posted some of your vintage toolboxes and found what I think was a decent deal at goodwill today. There was what I thought was a jewelry box sitting on a wire cart to be shelved. As I got closer I noticed it was solid and had beefy hardware so I figued it might be an antique shooting range case.  I looked closer and it said Sir William Cosmetics and Marilyn E Bennett on an engraved plate so I was guessing it was a cosmetic rep salesman's case.  But on closer inspection it must have been a well heeled cosmetic company because it's actually a Gerstner Journeyman Tool Chest.   Missing the Key and labelled with model 168C on the bottom which I can't find a reference to online so I'm wondering if it was custom ordered for the cosmetic company as I'm sure they didn't want the Machinists book if they were using them for cosmetics sales.  I hit it with some scratch cover and will throw some paste wax on later.  Was $15 a good deal ?
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Feb 19, 2023 00:24
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Based on the dimensions and features it's a model 42 according to their website Cosmetics company being an Injoke sounds more plausible to me. I wonder if the wife bought it for a machinist husband or something because it is a very expensive toolbox to be given for something other than it's intended use and the plaque is definitley tacky and cheap for a company to put on anything they would give a rep if they spent that much on the box itself. It was at the goodwill in Huntley IL across from a del webb retirement community so it's likely to have come from a deceased retirees house. The chest itself definitely looks 80s or newer production to me. Update: found a super detailed site that has the stamping info to know it was made in 1980. https://sites.google.com/site/theguideforwoodmachinistchests/pg-210-gerstner-stencils-nameplates?authuser=0 
my turn in the barrel fucked around with this message at 03:04 on Feb 19, 2023 |
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Feb 19, 2023 01:05
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I would say I'm lucky but I haunt thrift shops, HFH restores and Garage/Estate sales on my lunch breaks. For every score I probably came up empty handed 20 times but persistence pays off. I bought a Mid Century Modest 1965 Ranch time capsule house a year ago and have been trying to track down period stuff because MCM is my jam and I'm to lazy/cheap to remodel. Listing     Progress     I'm know nothing but I must have good taste and have realized that when something catches my eye it's 99% of the time worth buying and figuring out what it is later. $15 desk at restore   $2 clock at an estate sale   $50 room divider   $15 chairs   Just today I sold these 6 Herman Miller Aeron chairs I scored at HFH restore for $10 each.  Guy took all 6 at $275 each Etc.. I feel like I'm threadshitting and need to start my own thread my turn in the barrel fucked around with this message at 06:32 on Feb 20, 2023 |
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Feb 20, 2023 06:24
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Raluek posted:no, but I had but recently sold my 66 impala 4dr hardtop. It was a survivor I didn't have the time or cash to play with much anymore.  When I have the finances and time I'd like to track down a 70-72 skylark to teach my son to wrench on. My taste in motorcycles is 50s but my budget and the fact that I actually put on miles made getting anything from that era rough. I do all my own wrenching so I sold out and switched to harleys a few years ago so I can skip valve adjustments. My first harley was this 2002 Sportster 1200. I bought it in full Grampa trim.  Harley makes a 48 sportster and a 72 sportster but they never made a 57 that looked like the original K model that became the sportster to compete with the British bike invasion in the 50s.  So I kit bashed it with harley parts off other models and some poo poo I made like the fork boots I made from 4x4 shock boots I cut down.    I put about 30k miles on it before I got tboned on it by a driver who didn't see me and blew a stop. I fixed the bike but my tailbone got hosed up and the seating position isn't comfortable for long rides anymore. So I needed a wider seat.. So I tracked down a Fatboy lo  Of course I needed to make it look more 50s.  With quick detatch everything to turn it into a mini roadking   Eye bleach to makeup for my fatass  I don't ride the sporty anymore but have kept it around to give to my soon to be 5 year old son when he's old enough 
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Feb 22, 2023 05:38
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Barnfind Hunter posted a video with an interesting model A if you skip to 10:40. https://youtu.be/IBslSrw12uw?si=uQO0TUVdQydi66Ss
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Sep 19, 2023 16:46
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Not sure how hard you want to look or how much you want to invest but there were both factory and aftermarket spring reverbs specifically designed for cars from the 1950s - 1970s. I think many were setup initially to add a 2nd speaker in the rear seat that would play back an echo of the music coming from the front speaker to provide a faux stereo experience. Like this unit https://www.ebay.com/itm/3750809893...emis&media=COPY This site has some info about later 64-74 ones http://www.hawestv.com/amp_projects/reverb/reverb_car01.htm And you can find old units on eBay. https://www.ebay.com/itm/1719888581...emis&media=COPY How they work is you are literally pushing the audio signal into a long spring and then piping the audio back out of the other end of the spring. Some units like the one below would have been setup with a small control box that wired to a separate large spring box that you would hide in the trunk or under the dash. So it wouldn't work without the spring box. https://www.ebay.com/itm/2353120876...emis&media=COPY They were also sold for home audio use during the 50s and 60s as kits you could add to Hifi consoles or component stereos. I have the control/tube amp part of the one that pairs with my Fisher 400CX tube preamp but I don't have the spring box for it https://youtu.be/9Vy1uNEcMqs?si=SciG_K9Yu7mdLeJo I also have one of these Sansui Reverbs I found at a church rummage sale https://youtu.be/VtTgZOxwLq4?si=R78sOu_PSNfFdr1W Knowing your penchant for tracking down vintage speed parts and collectibles you might want to do some googling and get an idea of what vintage spring reverbs would pair with the era of the car you're putting it in and then hit up a few swaps and ask vendors selling old car radios if they have any collecting dust. I doubt they have many buyers asking about them but they are weird enough that I bet someone has a few. And obviously you can check eBay/FB marketplace/Craigslist and you might get lucky eventually. You may also be able to use one of these mini karaoke units to get the same effect depending on how your current mini Chinese stereo is hooked up Bluetooth 5.0 Stereo Amplifier, DC 12V Digital Reverberator Karaoke Mixer System Dual Microphone Input https://a.co/d/d649cx7 my turn in the barrel fucked around with this message at 21:10 on Jan 7, 2024 |
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Jan 7, 2024 21:01
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The older under dash car spring reverbs take in the amplified signal from the stock radio speaker output and then send it back out to the front speaker and then send a 2nd signal out to the rear speaker. I did find a recent (2019) blog post with more info and it references an audio shop in Pomona that specializes in installing modern spring reverbs and the color bars you mentioned. They would probably be the best resource to get you setup. https://phscollectorcarworld.blogspot.com/2019/02/modern-reverb-spectacular-whats.html?m=1
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Jan 9, 2024 23:19
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I'm pretty sure you could use the Karaoke BT device I linked earlier if it will see your phone as a BT Microphone. Then just run the signal out from that into the signal in on your amp with a headphone to headphone aux cord.
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Jan 11, 2024 06:59
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I just took my son to Volo Auto museum in Volo IL on Monday since it was kids free for presidents day. In the auto museum they have 3 restored moldaramas from Disneyland that have the original molds to make a Mickey, Donald and Goofy. Each statue costs $10 In the dinosaur "museum" they have 2 more moldaramas that make a brontosaurus and a Trex. The dino statues are only $5
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Feb 22, 2024 21:13
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| # ¿ May 12, 2024 04:50 |
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https://www.facebook.com/share/GCRx93KaQi2ZpjAF/?mibextid=kL3p88 This popped up on Facebook and I don't have a spare $2,500, I also don't have a way to verify it's actually out of a p-38 and I doubt it's very comfortable as an office chair but if I won the lottery.....
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Mar 26, 2024 23:06
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