Craigslist and Ebay - Fueling the Shop!

It's been a while since I've taken the time to sit down and blog, but I thought I'd catch up on some of my projects while we're home. We're going to be sending another shipping container over to Bissau in January, for a big solar project at the center (more on that later). The container going over means there will be some extra space for other things, and we've set aside some money to round out the shop's equipment roster. For anyone not familiar with the project, we started documenting it (including a floor plan) on our website here.

I've been scouring ebay and craigslist in an attempt to make the money we've got go the furthest it can, and I've gotten some great deals! Some of the things I got were ready to go, some needed fixing, some just needed supplies bought, and many will require the motor being removed and replaced with one compatible with our power over there, and rewiring. For anyone interested, here are the main things so far:

Jet HVBS-7MW Horizontal Metal Cutting Bandsaw
A nice 7x12 metal cutting bandsaw! I got it used on eBay. We have an abrasive chop saw like this one already, but it's pretty obvious as we use it that it wasn't meant for the kind of abuse and level of use we're going to need in Bissau. Our current one will become part of our mobile setup, and will do a great job at that. Meanwhile, this new (old) bandsaw will give us a quieter (though slightly slower) way to cut steel in the shop. Since the center is a school as well, the decreased noise level will be appreciated by all. The saw is working great after some adjusting, but will need a new motor, pulley, and rewiring to make it compatible with our 50Hz generator power.

100 or 120 Gallon two-stage Champion R15 16cfm@175psi compressor
A sweet air compressor. We have a little portable compressor that I sent over last time, but it already wasn't in great shape, and doesn't have enough snort to keep up with several of our tools. It's making some funny noises since it wasn't meant for the power over there, so it will live longer if we can move it into our mobile setup which uses American power. This new one is about 2x as big, and is a step above in terms of durability, being industrial. It retailed around $2000 when it was new 15 years ago, but I got it for $275 without a motor, which I would've had to replace anyway! I found a replacement motor on eBay and lucked out, winning it for less than the cost of shipping it to me! There's some flaking paint on it, so I'm going to sandblast it and give it a new coat of paint, but other than cleaning it up, installing the new motor, and putting it back together, it should be ready to roll! It's big enough to be able to run all of the air tools we have over there, and the sandblaster I'm hoping to take over this time too!

Miller SR-300 DC Stick welder
A monster DC stick welder. We have a very nice gas driven Lincoln welder that was sent over last time, but with fuel being so expensive, it's a little stressful to work knowing how much every minute is costing! That Lincoln welder will transition to being the heart of our mobile setup. I paid $42 for this stick welder from the 80's. It will run from the youth center's power, so we can take our time and be more careful. It needs sheet metal repair, sandblasting, painting, and new welding leads, but then should be ready to rock! It's an 800 lb monster, and should be way more than we ever need - but for $42, who can complain, right?

Delta Industrial floorstanding 1HP drill press
This old drill press was a great find on eBay. I brought a used benchtop drill press over with us last time, and it's gotten a ton of use already. Unfortunately, it has a wobble which makes it hard to drill accurately and has snapped several smaller bits because of it. This one should be hardier and is supposed to spin nice and true. I haven't seen it in person yet, but we got a great deal on it - and as an added bonus it looks like it's motor is already dual rated for U.S. and European power, so the motor won't even need to be changed out! Unfortunately the seller lost the top belt cover, so I'll have to make and paint a new one of those, but other than that it should be ready to go!

Hobart Handler 180 Mig welder
A small wire fed welder. Much of the fabrication work we do uses thin metal tube stock, which is what's mainly available in Bissau. It's difficult to stick weld since it's so thin (19 gauge), so we're going to use this machine to make those welds stronger and work more quickly. Other than buying more supplies for it and changing the power plug once we're over there, it's all set and works great!


The last big tool is still in the planning stages. Like I said before, the chop saw we have wasn't meant for the workout it's getting in our application. The bandsaw will be great, for quieter, gradual cuts, but there will still be some times when we need a rotating blade for cuts. I did some research on industrial versions of the abrasive cut off type saw we have, and found out about saws like the Kalamazoo K10B. They cost a pretty penny, but have a nice powerful motor that won't wear out. I then did some more reading and found that there's a newer style of steel cutting saw called a dry cut saw, which works the same way, but uses a carbide tipped saw blade to do the cutting. This dry cut style is actually cutting chunks away instead of grinding fragments - so it cuts clean lines and cuts more quickly, doesn't heat up (and warp) the thing you're cutting. The blades are supposed to last about 10x as long as the abrasive disc kind. Sounds great, but since we'll have to send the blades back to the U.S. to be sharpened, we kind of need the best of both worlds. So, I'm going to build a saw from scratch that can do either - we'll use blades when we have them available, and then switch a pulley to be able to use abrasive discs when we can't. And, by building it, it's going to end up being a lot cheaper than buying either. Good plan, hopefully!

I've got big plans for the shop once we get back, and the new tools are going to put us in a good position to really be able to get stuff done. I'll try to post some updated photos as all of these various conversion and restoration projects have some progress.

It's been really fun being home and having the opportunity to find tough, well-engineered machines at used prices, instead of having to pay 2x for Chinese junk over in Bissau!

Njita

Sometimes in the process of learning another language you get an interesting peek into the culture of the people who speak the language. For example, in Creole there is a verb, “neni”, meaning “to run, greet someone, and hug them”. The fact that we don't have a word like that shows something about the way we greet each other compared to the way Guineans greet each other.

We recently ran across an interesting word. I have always known that the following mindset existed in Guinea-Bissau, but never found a word for it. We see things cobbled together all the time. Half of the taxis in Bissau are push started each morning by neighborhood kids because their starters don't work, it's routine to see auto repairs done with zip ties, I saw someone last week using cardboard as a replacement turbo gasket on an engine, etc. Doing things in an excellent way is not valued by this culture as it is in ours. This characteristic of Guinean culture comes largely from how hard it is to survive, I'm convinced. People spend so much energy on daily life (cooking, eating, getting water, caring for their health, etc) that there isn't enough energy to be worried about doing things better than they need to be done. If a zip tie makes your car work again, then it's a sufficient repair. Why spend the time and money finding someone to weld and repaint the broken area if the zip tie make the car work just as well?

So when Emily was glancing through the dictionary and found the word “njita”, we had an “Ah hah!” moment. Here is the dictionary entry:

Njita (v): To fix something temporarily

And some visual definitions I've been collecting over the last couple of months as examples of the way we're not going to do things:

I think this is a flagpole. Not that bad, but since they didn't bother to paint it, in 10 years that truck bed will have a giant hole rusted into it.


Our bike seat, worked on by a local mechanic while we were gone. Check out that craftsmanship.


The welder at the local building supply store.

I have been dreaming about the machine shop: how to set it up, lay it out, and how to impart a mindset of excellence; both in what we produce and in how we operate. Tools here are shared among many people because there aren't many of them, which is good as it promotes a culture of sharing, but also has the unfortunate side effect of meaning there are no complete sets of anything anymore because of tools that have been borrowed and either broken or never returned. Then, since someone only has part of the set, they use the wrong tool to do the next job and end up ruining the tools that are left over because they weren't designed for what they're now being used for. So, setting the shop up in a way that fits into the culture but also protects our equipment is a little difficult; we want to be good neighbors but don't want to lose 20% of our tools each year!

I am anticipating that a good dose of patience and perseverance will be necessary to change the mindset of the people that will eventually run the shop that it is worth the extra energy to build things stronger than necessary, spend the time to rustproof them well, and organize the shop in a way that it stays well supplied and won't allow tools to walk off. But, if it were as simple as just building a building instead of changing mindsets, we wouldn't need to be over here! :)

My Sweet Shirt

It's always funny when stuff from the States pops up over here and reminds us of home. There's a section of the market here that sells used clothes, most of them donated, from all over the place. Last week our teammates were in the "fooka" and bought a shirt for me.

It's pretty awesome, because everyone over here assumes I had the shirt made in the States and brought it over. When they find out it came from the market here, they all laugh. The story got funnier, however, when I looked for the website. The website isn't there anymore, but a google search lead to this "sweet" campaign video for Emily Hutchins for student body president from 2008. Awesome. :)

YFC Mansoa

One of the fun things we got to be involved in these past couple of weeks was checking out some new land that our teammates are buying to establish a new YFC center in another city in Guinea-Bissau. Wade and Katie McHargue & Family have purchased land in Mansoa, which is about 30 miles east of Bissau. The vision for the land is to be developed into a base which will host a discipleship program (Wade) and an agricultural training program to help farmers improve methods and help improve overall health with more availability of nutricious foods (Katie).

I got a chance to use a new nerdish piece of gear for the first time. So, courtesy of the sweet little bluetooth gps module that talks to my smartphone, here are some GPS tracks to show the trip (overlayed on satellite photos thanks to Google Earth).

(Click on the pictures to see the bigger, more detailed versions.)

Here's the location of the two cities, Bissau is the lower left tack and Mansoa the upper right one. The red line connecting them is the road we take to get between them (about a 50 minute drive).


Here's a closer view of Mansoa. It has a village feel, but has about 8000 residents. The yellow area to the east of all of the houses is the land, and the tack is the first well which is being dug right now.

As they make more progress on the construction I'm sure they'll be keeping their blog updated with pictures. To check in on their progress, check out their blog. The first step is digging a pair of wells, and then when the block making machine gets here in the container in a few months, we'll start their house.



Mansoa is a decent sized city by G-B standards. It's the 9th largest city in the country, but is 1/3rd the size of the 2nd biggest (after Bissau, the rest of the top 10 are within the 7,000-22,000 range). It's at a major cross-road between several other major cities in G-B, so it's a great spot for a new YFC base!

We're really excited for them as they're able to start developing the land!

The story of the trip...

(This is a long one, if you just want the more interesting stuff, skip to right after the second graphic.)

Our trips from the U.S. to Bissau have often been interesting. Fortunately, we got a good story out of this one as well! The part of the trip that we thought might be difficult went great, the dog was a trooper – we never heard a peep from her on either flight except when we stood up to get off of the trans-Atlantic flight! Not bad, Sydney!

The African section of the trip however, was... a trip. :) We landed in Dakar at 5am the morning of Thursday the 4th. (We left Detroit at 10:30am on Weds.) After going through customs (where the dog was yelping, unfortunately), we got our luggage collected (it was all there – nice!). We have never had good experiences in Dakar. Whenever we're there we're by ourselves, and since we don't know the city or the language(s), it would be stressful even if everything went right, which it never does. :) We had been dreading this part a little bit because we needed to get a taxi from the airport to the SIL guesthouse we were staying at, and we only had English directions (which the driver would never understand). Then the next day we needed to repeat the procedure from the guesthouse to the ferry port. Fortunately, God was looking out for us and a missionary friend of ours was at the airport that morning to pick up the luggage of a guest who had come in the day before without his bag! So, Mario (who does speak French) took us to his hotel to relax and stretch out, called his taxi driver, and told him where to take us and how to get there. Awesome.

We had a nice night at the SIL guesthouse, got to do a little Skyping to let people know we were safe, and got caught up on sleep (neither of us slept much on the overnight flight because of several crying babies). We woke up Friday morning feeling good (fortunately in Dakar they have power all night, so the guesthouse fans let us sleep.) The SIL workers told us the French words to tell the taxi to get us to the port, where we would take a boat from Dakar to Ziguinchor (bypassing two border crossings). Thanks to Pastor Mario and the SIL guesthouse, this trip in Dakar was a great success! So, the part of the trip we were worried about was no big deal... but then the fun started.

We got to the port and waited in line to get checked in for several hours (despite already having tickets, but on this boat they check your luggage like and airline flight). The whole time we were waiting we were worried they were going to see the dog and tell us we couldn't get on the boat (since the webpage about the boat is silent on the subject). Fortunately, no one said anything and we got in the line to board the boat. As we were getting on the boat, they did notice her, but by then we had already been put on the manifest, so even if they'd wanted to, I don't think they could've kicked us off. They did make her ride on the lower deck with the cargo, but other than getting mad at us for making her go all night without food or grass to go to the bathroom on, she was fine. We found a good secure spot for her crate under a big anchor that wasn't going to be moved, and headed upstairs.



The boat is very un-West African. It's beautiful, well run, and clean. We had tickets for two of the beds in a four-bed room (there are also two-bed rooms for $4 each more, which would have been totally worth it, but you can only buy tickets in person at the port, so by the time Mario got them the week before, those rooms were all full.) However, if he had gotten one of the two-bed rooms, we would have missed out on what came next.

We got on the boat at 6pm or so, the boat left port at 8:30pm, and we went to the onboard restaurant to have dinner. The food was really good! In many other cultures where equipment and floor space are more important than your personal space, it's normal for several parties to share a table, so all of the chairs are being used. We sat down with a nice couple (he was German, she was Senegalese) with a pair of 18 month old twin girls. They were trying their best to wrangle the kids and eat at the same time so we played with the kids a little and got to know them. We found out that they hadn't been able to get tickets for a room at all, the coach tickets are for seats in a big room. The seats are nice, but they're still seats. So we offered to give my bed to the mom and the two kids (kids don't count for tickets on the boat, so she could have bought that ticket the same as I did and been within her rights to have the two girls there with her). The family gratefully accepted and I headed to the coach seats with the dad.

I fell asleep pretty quickly, thanks to how tired I was and the sweet travel pillows that my brother Sam got for Em and I for our birthdays. I woke up to Em standing in front of me shaking me. I was awake pretty quickly, wondering what had gone wrong (there were many possibilities, as my wife was sleeping in a small room with one strange man and two other women, with all of our stuff and a big load of currency as well.) Apparently the guy who was in the 3rd bed had come back to the room a little drunk (we found out later), heard one of the twins fussing a little (there are shades over the beds, so he couldn't see them), started yelling about a baby being in the room, found out that it wasn't Emily's, that I had given away my bed, gotten really mad, and started yelling. This of course made the baby cry more, which led to more yelling. He seemed genuinely offended not necessarily that I had given up my bed, but that I had given it to a woman! (Because obviously women should be in coach and men should have the good spots.) Oh, how cultures value mothers differently!

So, the mom started crying. The guy called three cabin stewards over, alternatively yelling at them, the mom, and Em. The mom and the twin she was holding were taken to the room the boat uses as the clinic, leaving Em and the second (still sleeping) twin in the room. Em sneaked away to come wake me up, and we headed back to the room, ready to give the yelling guy a piece of my mind for yelling at my wife. Fortunately, by the time we got back to the room, the stewards had calmed the guy down enough that he kept his trap shut the rest of the night. We took the second twin down to the clinic, where they let the family sleep, headed back upstairs to our room, and fell asleep.

We woke up the next morning (Saturday) on the boat, went to find the family to make sure there weren't any permanent emotional scars left the night before, and walked around the decks a little. We arrived in Ziguinchor at about 9am, and Pastor Mario (who had already had plans to drive from Dakar to Ziguinchor) met us at the port and took us to a hotel restaurant where he was having some meetings. Our travel plans for the 80ish mile trip were to ride with one of Mario's project leaders, who was driving up from Bissau for a meeting with him in Ziguinchor that day, and then driving back down. The timing worked out great, we were able to just bum a ride with them.

We waited for Mario's guys (Andre and Benjamin) to arrive, but got word that they were moving slow because the truck they were driving up in was making a strange noise. They got to Ziguinchor near noon, took the truck to the mechanic who said it was fine, and then had their meeting. We left Ziguinchor at 3pm. We knew we needed to make good time because there is a ferry several hours into the trip that stops running around dusk.

We drove two cars down to Bissau: the truck they brought up, and Mario's Jeep, which was going to be stored in Bissau. An hour into the trip, the truck died, and we started towing it with the Jeep. The towing implement was a thick Nylon rope with hooks. The rope broke three times as it presumably slid under a tire when the lead car slowed down, melting it in two. Each time we tied the two halves together and started going again. We got to the ferry at about 6:30pm, and saw the ferry on our side of the shore! That's good news, because if it's just leaving when you get there, it's another hour and a half for it to get to the other side, unload, reload, and come back. Unfortunately, it was on our side and full, so it loaded, left, and we watched it come back around 7:30. The ferry started to load, and when we got to be the 2nd vehicle in line, it was full again. We watched the ferry leave, get to the other side, and unload... and then it got dark. Everyone on our side assumed the ferry was coming back, but by 9pm, it became clear that it wasn't coming back. A canoe came from the other side to take some of the people over, but since we had cars, that option wasn't available to us. The canoe driver said the ferry people had said something about an engine problem. Hmm... now what? We decided to make one last desperate attempt.

Here I am waiting for the ferry's 2nd trip back to our side.

Wait you say, there's a bridge in the background! Correct. This bridge was finished a couple of months ago and it waiting to be “inaugurated” before the wire rope barring entrance to it is removed and people can use it. So, we decided to walk to the other side of the bridge and see if the soldiers there could be “convinced” to let the fence down and let us pass. No dice, apparently the person in charge of the project had forseen the guards' susceptibility to bribery and not given them a key. So after setting foot on the side of the river we were trying to get to, at 10:30pm we walked back over the bridge to the cars, and decided to sleep and wait for the first ferry the next morning.

Emily and I tried to sleep in the Jeep, and Andre and Benjamin took the truck. The problem was, Bissau is really humid this time of year, 15 degrees hotter than Dakar, which had already seemed hot to our unadjusted bodies, and since we were by a river, the air was full of mosquitoes. (The malaria carrying kind which I now work hard to avoid.) So we tried to sleep in the car with the windows rolled up. Sweating profusely, sleep wasn't very possible, so we decided to roll the windows down just an inch to see if the breeze would let us get cool enough to sleep. Still not doing it. We rolled them down several inches, started swatting mosquitoes, and trying to sleep. The pools of sweat still made it difficult.

Finally at about 2am I had the brilliant realization that the car had A/C. So, despite not being sure of exactly how much gas it would take to get to Bissau, we decided we had to chance it. We ran the car five minutes every hour, and it cooled the car enough for us to sleep with the windows up. We got up at 6am and waited for the ferry.

At 9am we crossed over, started the drive, and soon after broke the nylon rope again. By this time it was too short to keep tyeing, so we looked around for other options. In the Jeep there was a rope, about 1/4” thick. The kind of rope you might use for a laundry line. They said, this will work, no problem. They just laughed at my response: “N ka fia chiu” (I don't believe it much). They doubled the rope over and tied it on. The Jeep started moving slowly, and the truck did follow. Since we hadn't planned on such a long excursion, no one had brought extra water, so by the time we hit a major city at 11am, we were glad for the ability to buy more water.

We had about two hours of driving to do (at normal speeds) to reach Bissau from the ferry. The rope broke every time we went over a big bump, and we kept tyeing it back together. Eventually we did reach Bissau, making a four hour drive of a two hour trip.

We were veeeery glad to get to the youth center and relax. What's the fun if there's no adventure in the trip? :)


Update 6/18: Apparently early this week the bridge was officially opened, which will be awesome for trips up to Ziguinchor in the future (in combination with the motorcycle getting here, of course!)

Sydney the Australian Cattle Dog

Well, we thought we were busy enough the few days we have left before we fly out, but when opportunity knocks you have to answer! A few months ago Emily and I thought about the possibility of bringing a dog to Africa with us. I was really interested in a breed called an Australian Cattle Dog because they are great natural herders - so in addition to being a dog, which is already awesome, these can "earn their keep" a little by helping out when we start our farming project and have animals to watch.

We contacted a rescue society for this kind of dog, but then we gave up on the idea when we saw how expensive it is to check a dog on an international flight! Driving to the dentist yesterday, Emily spotted a sign saying that a family near us had Aus. Cattle Dog pups for sale! We talked about it, and in the intervening time I had learned that a couple of dogs per flight can be brought as carry-on luggage for a lot less money. So, we called Delta to find out if either of the two spaces was still available on our flight, and there was one left!

So we headed to Walmart to get a pet carrier and some basics, then to the family's house, and picked out our new pup, Sydney!


Here she is looking at her adopted mom for the week, our family's golden retreiver Anna. (Click here for the bigger version)

The flight over is going to be a rough 10 hours I'm sure, but I think we can manage it as long as we can get her to stop crying in the night, but she seems to be assimilating well, so I think we'll be able to manage it. Then, we'll get her to Africa where she can romp around and chase animals to her heart's content!

Very exciting!


She does seem to be a little confused about the fact that not every dog is available to nurse, but she does drink regular milk and eat food once she's given up on Anna, so at least that's good. :)

Dun da da dun dun da dun!!!

Finished late last night, it's putting out good voltage and spinning well in a gentle breeze! Today, it will get taken back apart and put in the crate to make it's African debut in mid July. Exciting! So gorgeous... :)