Replacing a Cabin Air Filter on a 2006 Subaru Forester

There are SEVEN phillips head screws holding the glove box assembly, and that glove box is covering up the Cabin Air Filter. FIVE of the screws are exposed by opening the glove box.

The other TWO screws are found underneath the glove box assembly. This photo shows the bottom left corner of the glove box door, highlighted with the arrow, and the screw is circled.

The bottom right corner of the glove box door is indicated in this photo with the arrow. As you can see, the phillips head screw is holding more than just the glove box. It is also holding part of the dashboard cover, and I consider the entire thing the "glove box assembly" to include both the glove box and this part of the dashboard.

After removing the SEVEN screws, the dashboard assembly needs to be flexed so it will unhook from both above and below. Wiggle it around and you will figure it out. The next photo shows the fan housing and cabin air filter WITHOUT the glove box assembly in place.

The cover for the cabin air filter is now exposed and can be removed by unclipping two snaps at the bottom and unhooking it from the two top hooks. The cover plate has been outlined in red to help identify it, and the two bottom snaps are indicated with the arrows. Notice that there is a wiring harness in the way on the right side. It makes removal/replacement of the filter just a little bit difficult.

This is a close up of the filter cover plate. Again the cover is circled in red and the snaps at the bottom are indicate with arrows, but the two hooks at the top are also identified here. Pull the bottom of the two bottom snaps back toward yourself to unsnap them, then wiggle the cover plate and you will see how it comes loose from the upper hooks.

In this final photo you can see the rear edge of the cabin air filter cartridge. It simply slides out when you pull on it. Push the wiring harness on the right out of the way to get the cartridge out. Notice that there is an "UP" indicator on the edge of this filter cartridge. Don't get that confused with the direction of air flow, which is actually DOWN. When you take out the old filter you will see that all of the dirt is on TOP of the filter cartridge, so it is obvious which way the air is flowing.

Angry Skies

I thought I was taking a photo of our big oak tree, but the sky looked so angry in the background that I decided it's a photo of the sky as well.

Renton Antique Auto Show

Last weekend we attended the Antique Auto Show in Renton for the first time. Here are some photos of my favorite cars.

Hummingbird Wings

Here is an awesome photo of a hummingbird in our back yard. You can see the wings in mid-stroke as they scull from front to back.

To put the picture in perspective, here is the full frame. So you can see the bird's food supply, the red flowers, and you can see how really tiny he(she) is.

Cutting Down Alder Trees

Last weekend I helped cut down about six Alder trees. It's the most Alder tree cutting I've done since I was a teenager. This photo is proof that I am still able to stand up straight afterwards... ...and it's a nice three-generation photo.

Competition For Maria Parker

Here is evidence that a mermaid can ride a front wheel drive recumbent bicycle. All persons in attendance agreed that she looked a lot like Maria Parker. Maria, by the way, set another course record yesterday at Bessie's Creek, going 457.7 miles in 24 hours. I can hardly wait to see what this mermaid can do when she gets shoes for the clipless pedals.

Home Made Bow and Arrows

The bow in this photo was originally a reject during some experimental bow making that happened a few years ago. I found it in my wood scrap heap the other day and added some nylon twine to make a fairly decent archery bow. We needed arrows so we cut some Maple branches and whittled them down. We added some wing feathers that we found in the yard and they turned out to be fairly decent arrows.

Here's proof that even the Wee One can handle the bow and arrow. She struggled at first but eventually was able to shoot the arrow about thirty yards and make it stick into the ground.

Maple Tree Flowers

Did you ever notice the flowers in a Bigleaf Maple tree? They're green so they don't really look like flowers. They hang like a cluster of grapes. The actual flowers are about the size of blueberries but they're green. In this photo you can see how big they are relative to the size of my hand.

In this close-up photo you can see some of the detail of the flower. It has pistils protruding and a fuzzy grey ball inside the outer green shell.

Here you can see the whole cluster and how it hangs from the branch. This specimen is a little leggy since it is growing under the shade of a large Douglas Fir tree. Later, in the Summer and Fall, these flowers will turn into those winged seeds that fly like helicopters. As a child I would spend hours climbing in Maple trees and picking those seeds to watch them fly down.

Fire Drill

Ever since I was about ten years old I wanted to be able to start a fire using a fire drill. That's two pieces of wood rubbed together until they're hot enough to catch fire. Well now I have encountered a WONDERFUL eleven year old great nephew who is interested in doing that too. So now I have justification.

I started with a Google search of "how to" videos, then started corresponding with my youthful co-conspirator. We both looked at the videos and saw what we had to build: A hand board, a hearth board, a wooden drill, and a bow.

He was successful before I was, by getting the wood hot enough to smoke. He sent me a photo and to my alarm I saw he was doing this on his hardwood bedroom floor. Yikes! Fortunately I found out that his mother was watching and she stopped him before he burned a hole in the floor.

So I found some appropriately sized pieces of scrap wood and made an attempt myself. In this photo you can see the lubricated hand board, the friction burned drill tip and hearth board, and the little pile of dark brown, burned wood shavings.

In this third photo you can see how I held everything together, on top of a five gallon paint bucket. I'm too old to get down on one knee. Hey, but I got smoke on my first attempt!

Milkmaid Yoke

My niece is milking goats and sheep, and has been struggling to carry the buckets of milk from the milking shed to her house. So she asked me if I could carve a "bucket-carrying" yoke for her. This yoke isn't exactly like the American "milk maid" yokes that completely cover the shoulders, but possibly more like the Asian style which is more like a narrow stick carried across the shoulders. The wood I chose for this project was a stem of Hazel wood that grew with a natural slight bow in the middle.

One of the hooks is made from a forked branch I pruned off my Pear tree and the other, straighter hook, was pruned off my Oak tree. The idea for the hooks came from Roy Underhill, the host of the The Woodright's Shop TV show.

Cedar River Flood: Dec 2015

It has been raining for several days now, not very heavy but consistently, at the rate of about two inches per day. It's too warm to make snow in the mountains, so it's all coming down the rivers. They say it has been accumulating six inches per day in the mountains, so that's a lot of water coming down the rivers.

This flood isn't nearly as bad as the November flood about twenty years ago but it's still awesome. The muddy water is up to the top of the planter boxes in these photos and the high water mark is three to six inches higher. So the crest of the flood has passed. Whew!

Splitting Alder Planks

Yesterday James and I cut down an eighteen year old Alder tree and then harvested two logs from midway up the trunk. The goal was to split out some Alder planks for the purpose of barbecuing Salmon over charcoal. So we wanted clear grain with no branches. I brought the two logs home last night and this morning I did what I could to split them using my fro and the club I made years ago from a log of Boxelder.

As you can see in the photo, I managed to get two good planks out of the center. I was stopped by a knot on one side and the other side began tapering too much and I had to split it again from the opposite end. I managed to extract a third plank from that, with a bunch of scrap remaining. My poor Boxelder club suffered the most as it broke into three pieces. I had to finish the task with a rubber hammer.

The planks have a slight twist in them since that's the direction of the wood grain. The fro is stuck in the remaining slab of wood but I was able to extract it by hitting the log with a one-hand sledge hammer. Afterwards I was able to split that slab again from the opposite end and extract a decent plank from it.

Quest Crank Boom Repair #2 Part 2

Spreading epoxy with latex gloves is a messy endeavor. The glass fibers stick to the gloves and tend to pull apart leaving a tangle of glass fibers around the edges of the patchwork. In desperation I grabbed some plastic wrap from the kitchen and put it on top of the glass/epoxy mess. Then I took off the latex gloves and used my bare fingers to squeeze the epoxy and work it into the glass cloth, and I could feel the air bubbles and extra epoxy shifting around. In the end I was quite happy with the results.

In this photo you see that I have removed the plastic wrap. The epoxy is still quite lumpy but it sanded down easily with 60 grit sandpaper.

While working on sanding the two patches I noticed that the center seam was opening up as shown here. So I decided to put a patch on that as well.

In this final photo I have added all three patches along with plastic wrap, and I have already worked the epoxy thoroughly through the glass cloth. All air bubbles have been squeezed out. I even discovered that I can slide the glass cloth around while squeezing the epoxy into it. I was able to get much better alignment of the new glass. This is probably the nicest glass/epoxy patching I have ever done. Now I have four layers of glass over the area where the bolts will go through. That should hold things together nicely.

Quest Crank Boom Repair #2

It was two years ago this week when I finished repairing the crank boom on the Quest velomobile. See my blog post of Nov 2, 2013. It turned out that I should have also reinforced the fiberglass where the aluminum connects to it, holding the front end of the crank boom in place.

As you can see in this first photo, the fiberglass has broken and the aluminum support has fallen down into the nose cone.

This second photo shows how the original construction contained two layers of fiberglass, and they were not bonded properly to each other. The two layers have delaminated.

The other side doesn't have two layers of fiberglass. I wonder why not.

Here you can see how the aluminum structure aligns with the fiberglass. I have two spring clips holding the aluminum structure up against the fiberglass. Not really a good match, but that would be because the aluminum crank boom broke at the weld and was re-welded two years ago. I think it came out about one quarter inch shorter than the original, causing this mis-alignment and some fairly ugly matching between the top and bottom fiberglass shells.

This last photo shows how the headlight, mounted on the crank boom, nearly aligns with the hole in the center of the nose cone.

I need to think about how I am going to build up that fiberglass again, without causing additional alignment problems, and correctly locate and drill some new holes for bolting the aluminum to the fiberglass.

A Day at the River and Lake

Today we took The Merry Yarn and one kayak out in the river, then out to the lake and back to the river again. It was so hot we all went for a swim too, and for the first time in about 15 years I swam in that cold river water.

Our first photograph, taken from the shore by our intrepid photographer shows Lief rowing The Merry Yarn with mermaid #2 as a passenger. Mermaid #1 had already jumped out to swim in the river.

The next photo shows mermaid #2 in the rear hatch of my kayak and mermaid #1 swimming with her daddy.

The last photo shows that since mermaid #1 was too big to fit in the rear hatch, she was required to paddle the boat herself. She did so remarkably well for her first time paddling, in spite of the wind and current pushing her in opposing directions.

Ultra Marathon Bicycle Race Across Washington

Last weekend I had the privilege of driving the chase vehicle behind my son Lief as he raced across the State of Washington. He started from the Canadian border near Oroville and rode practically non-stop to the Oregon border near Pasco. The clock started when he began riding and it kept running even while he rested, and while he sat at stop lights.

This photo, taken at the Canadian border, was time-stamped 4:54 AM PST, showing that my camera clock is about 20 minutes faster than actual time. Light from the coming sunrise was beginning to appear in the northeast horizon. An hour later a deer hopped out onto the road, then ran across in front of Lief, narrowly missing a collision.

We were so busy watching for traffic, and monitoring Lief's needs, that we didn't take any more photos until we reached the finish line, 12 hours and 28 minutes later. This photo is time-stamped 5:25 PM PST.

With only 40 miles to go, after straining into a horrendous head wind and experiencing a spell of unanticipated overheating, Lief was on the verge of giving up. His brother James poured a gallon of cool water over him and told him to take it easy and just get to the finish line. Then only a few minutes later we came upon a giggle of mermaids who were there specifically to cheer Lief on. It was an enormous boost in morale. They leapfrogged ahead several times and then met us at the finish line.

The posed picture shows Lief next to the "Welcome to Oregon" sign, holding his bike up in victory. We wrote the elapsed time on the back of our chase vehicle.