4 October 2012

ANOTHER nasty, rainy day was forecast… and proved true in the morning.  Finalized the design for the walkway Halfway There bench seat and landing, drew up the “cut list” (i.e., a list with the dimensions of the bench building materials that need to be cut from longer / wider stock), then went down to Giddings Equipment and Manufacturing in Pittsford.  Spent an enjoyable hour there with the owner, Bob Giddings, drooling over Kubota loader / backhoe tractors.  He made me an offer that I just might not be able to refuse on a 2012 Kubota B3200 HSD (32 horsepower with hydrostatic drive) tractor with a BH77 backhoe (means it can dig a hole 7.7 feet deep) with a 16” wide bucket and mechanical thumb, a LA504 loader with a much more rugged and wider (60”) upgrade from the standard bucket, a three-point frame (for skidding logs), and 42″ pallet forks (for carrying / stacking logs).  And, as I’m sure you were wondering, the difference between having green paint vice orange paint on a tractor? Pretty close to $10,000!  I did pass on the $8,000 enclosed cab with heat and air conditioning.  Back to dull old walkway building in the afternoon in spite of the intermittent drizzle.  Put in the third in-ground post for the 15° bend and the first of the two angled posts that will support the bench backrest, along with the two long stringers that connect those two posts. Digging in the mud is sooooo therapeutic!