Cheap screws and good threadlocker

Never a good combination

Having nice weather today, I decided to flip the blades on the chipper, which were getting dull. No big deal, pull two machine screws on each blade and turn it around, then put the screws back. Uh huh. Let me mention that I put penetrating oil on them a few days back, just to ease things.

One screw came out ok. One came after some bad words and fiddling. And both on the other blade stripped. Hex-head screws, yet. So get the drill and the broken-screw pullers, and drill through both screws and turn them out(I highly recommend these tools, by the way; every home should have a set. I use the things 2-3 times per year, but on those occasions nothing else would do the job). The first two didn't show any, but the stripped pair seemed to have some kind of threadlocker on them. I'm wondering if someone picked up the wrong damn tube and put the high-strength or stud-grade stuff on them. Anyway.

So now I need two metric machine screws, not something found at Wally World. So get the helmet and start the bike and go to Pep Boys. Always a good place for stuff like this, as they've had bins of bolts and screws of different types, standard and metric both. Guess what? Pep Boys doesn't have those bins anymore; they've got about six or eight feet of fasteners in little packages. No bins, no large or odd stuff anymore. Crap. Then I see a rebate on the new Sylvania halogen headlamps, which my son swears by. Except they don't have the size for my truck. Double crap. Where now?

I remembered there's an Ace Hardware on the way home, so I swing in there, and lo and behold! I find them. Bigger heads than the originals and a little longer in the shank; big deal, both fixable. So home. Chuck the shank of one in the cordless, turn on the belt sander and cut down the edge so, although it'll stick up a bit the edges will curve down nicely and leave no step for anything to catch on. Do that twice, then cut the shanks to length and use the sander to clean up the ends. And while it's out, use it to sharpen the dull side of the blades. And THEN, put a drop of medium(yes, I checked) threadlocker on each screw and turn them into place.

So a job that should have taken half an hour if I sharpened the blades took about two damn hours. And a sliced thumb. No, not from sharpening, that happened when trying to get the two #*%)$(*!! jammed screws out.

And the gas bill came in today. DAMN! Almost double what it was last year at this time! I'd expected higher, it was warned of, but it's still a bloody shock. Damn hurricanes.

Speaking of hurricanes, read earlier that someone started a petition to recall the governor of Louisiana for poor performance. The Gov. was not available for comment, being in the Netherlands. Probably looking for wooden shoes for office decorations. While they're at it, they need to do something about Schoolbus Nagin. And has anything been done yet about the Chief of Police of NO? Not about the gun seizures and connected mistreatment of people, I mean about the ghost officers, and the looting officers and the deserting officers? If not, something should be done. And while we're on the subject, the dickhead I mentioned earlier still hasn't contacted my ex and daughter to repay them for the gas; somebody needs to feed parts of him to a gator, or a snapping turtle. Bastard.

Yeah, I am in a mood today.