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Joined 1 year ago
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Cake day: June 10th, 2023

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  • I haven’t learned how to make my own 3D models yet, just slightly modify some existing ones. My fiance and I are planning on enrolling in s class for 3D modeling so we can both learn how to do it. There are still so many useful things you can find though. I was surprised how much more than just download the file and hit print there was to it.

    The Samurai is like a smaller Jeep Wrangler. I like going off-roading a lot. Mostly got the Samurai as a backup vehicle for when I’ve got bigger projects on my 4Runner going and can’t drive it.

    I’ve considered getting a bike before but would rather put the money into my other vehicles. We’ve had a few bikers in my town learn the hard way how dangerous it is to not be careful. One of my coworkers pulled out in front of someone thinking they’d be able to accelerate fast enough to avoid them and ended up getting t-boned, luckily the bike was more hurt than he was. Another coworker left work in the rain and tried to take off super fast out of the parking lot, lost control, and rear ended a parked semi. He broke both legs and his pelvis, it will be 10 weeks before he can start putting weight on them again, and then he can start physical therapy to learn how to walk again. I’ve seen 2-3 other news articles about similar incidents the last couple months too.




  • As someone who works on vehicles a lot, not a profesional mechanic but have a couple older vehicles that I’ve been repairing and modifying including rebuilding the engine in one so far, I can say getting belts to cooperate and go where they’re suppose to is often one of the most difficult and frustrating parts of repairs. There’s most of the time very little room to get to where you need to and the belts are tight even when they have as much slack as possible. This weekend I replaced a timing belt, water pump, motor mount, and serpentine belt on my fiance’s car and ignition coil packs, and dropped a gas tank to replace a fuel pump on a coworker’s truck. When I was putting the serpentine belt on my fiance’s car I got frustrated with it and moved on to something else for a little bit and then when I had nothing else except the belt and reattaching stuff that would be in the way of the belt, I went back to fighting with it. Especially for doing your first vehicle repairs you’re likely missing tools that would make the job way easier so you’re essentially doing the job on hard mode so getting as far as you have is still a major accomplishment. Some advice though, before you get the belt on go back over all the bolts and try to make sure they’re as tight as you can get them. Without having a torque wrench to make sure they’re as tight as they’re suppose to be it’s difficult to tell if they’re fully tight especially if you’ve been fighting with it and are physically worn out at the time. I’ve had times where I tightened bolts as much as I could but was so exhausted I didn’t have the strength to get them tight enough but didn’t realize it at the time.


  • Newer vehicles would not be too much of a difference depending on how much you let your vehicle warm up before driving during the winter. It runs less efficiently when cold but that would be offset by using the air conditioner in the summer. My primary vehicle is an 1988 4runner, it increases the idle when it’s cold to get to operating temp faster, I don’t have a/c. During the winter I get about 10mpg pretty much regardless of whether I let it defrost before driving or not, during the summer it goes up to about 15mpg. My fiance’s 2003 Jetta only varies by about 3mpg between summer and winter though.