Sparks of Inspiration: Embracing Hobbies for Mind and Soul

Delve into the world of hobbies in this episode, where I revisit the joy of being a DIYer and explore the art of welding after two decades. Discover how hobbies can clear the mind, offer creative solutions, and add a touch of joy to life. Tune in for a lighthearted conversation that might just leave you inspired.

Chapters

• 0:01 Showing My Hobbies
• 4:33 Working on a DIY Welding Project

Transcript

Breach: 0:01

Team one stand by Copy. Team one stand by Breach, breach, breach. So at dawn, don't me a couple days ago, that I tell people all the time that you should find a hobby, something to keep your mind moving, keep you distracted from things that may be bothering your life or things that you know maybe you just need a little clarity on and something to kind of help you get there. But in thinking about it a couple days ago, it dawned on me that I haven't really shared anything that I do, and this was confirmed when my daughter told me that she was talking to someone and telling them about how or the hobbies that I do, and the person was surprised, you know, didn't know that I had done this or any of the things that I had done, and that's when it clicked that you know it helps people a whole lot more when you're actually showing them what you're talking about, and that's what we're doing. That's what this one's about is me showing you a little bit of my hobbies, things that I do that you know help me keep my mind moving. I do love hobbies. So that's what we're going to be doing now because, you're seeing, I love learning, I love having new hobbies, I love to be able to do things myself and I strive for that. I'm a person that believes I shouldn't have to have somebody else do something that I can do for myself. So I'll learn it probably never become really good at it, but I do, and in doing so I acquire a lot of hobbies and it's been fun. I really enjoy it. I learned that I love learning new things and well, it's made me more useful person as well. I like that too, and in particular, today's hockey is welding. You guys can see it, but this ain't supposed to be like that is broke, big broke, big hole right there, not supposed to be there. And several years ago I was taught how to weld. I say taught, I was shown how to weld, and once I got out of that job I never welded again and had been trying to find a reason to need a welder. And well, this happened. So I got one.

Breach: 2:41

Now, and after doing some research and finding out that this mower deck, my little mower was going to cost almost as much as the mower itself, and not wanting to go to someone else, we're going to try welding again. I mean kind of like riding a bike, right, that's what I'm thinking Should be. Let's see. Yeah, I have those moments where you kind of feel like you shouldn't be doing the things that you're doing. Maybe it was a bad idea. I haven't gotten there yet. Whoever put these little screws in here remind my big pile of grass. They didn't think this process through.

Breach: 3:31

As I'm looking at it, this little cover, while it is beneficial, it actually is a pain in the butt. Not too bad, but it'll suck at wrench here. I'm going to play around a little bit. We're going to keep going. Not like. This is like terrible. Plenty of mechanics I'm sure that are looking at what I'm doing. I'm not a pair of guys or whatever your job title is. It'll be easier if you did it this way. Why are you complaining? It's that Because I don't do this every day? It's a hobby, I don't know what you're going to call it. It's a necessity. That little screw doesn't like to stay in there. It fits perfectly. We're going a couple more and this one will be done. We can move on to the next step. Look at that little guy. There we go.

Breach: 4:33

For those of you that are not able to watch this episode, or maybe not in any of the episodes, I'm sorry that the episodes have gone more to focusing on the video aspect of it, but I mean, that's kind of the world and you can at least still hear. I'll try to describe things the best I can. Hopefully you guys will be able to get a good enough picture of him. Oh no, that won't do. Don't look at that. You know what to say. Nothing in life that can't be fixed. Where are you at? Hey, get that one. Yep, we're getting it.

Breach: 5:20

And, by the way, if you thought that thing's probably going around, if you thought this was like a how-to video or something, it's not. It's just me being me and my natural habitat. I'm in my shop either. It's a little messy Now. Where's that punch? Ha-ha, eureka Found it. Probably not the right one. See where I can sit this down. That's not going to work. Yep, see, folks, it's not going to work in production. Let's see what this means. Ha, got it. Let it do it. Crap, okay.

Breach: 6:15

Anyone else ever wonder if engineers take the time to work on the things they design? I'm not saying anything bad against them. We need them, they're important, but that may be hard to tell. It's a big hand and Well, for whatever reason, they don't design things for people like me, and I don't think they work on their products, because if they did, maybe we wouldn't have such a hard time sometimes. I don't know, maybe it's just me, brian, that's not safe. Ha, jokes on you. I never said it was.

Breach: 6:54

This is not a how-to video on how to work on your lawnmower or how to weld anything like that. This is just a how-to on having a hobby. Ha, got it Never. A solution you can't find. Well, that thing is dirty, one of the biggest problems of having ADHD. Like, I'm focused on that. That's a big hole, naughty. Anyway, I'm focused on that. That's why I'm supposed to be focused on it. However, all I can see is all this grass. So now I'm sitting here, instead of welding, brushing a bunch of grass that shouldn't be there Because, for whatever reason, whoever engineered this thing decided that all these grooves were necessary.

Breach: 7:45

Not only that look at here, that's a hole, that's a hole, hole, that's a hole hole in there. There's grass in it, and my brain won't let that go, because now I'm going to have to get my air hose and blow that out, not because I need to Probably best to keep a rest from being in there but because my brain won't let it go. I have to do that. So I'm going to do that now. You guys can't see it. I was too excited, just meant like five, ten minutes, looking for my little air gun here, and Then I thought I hit record because, you know, like I said, grass in here, that's nowhere near exciting, because all of it blew out. I thought I was recording the whole time and I guess I could have shoved grass back in there. But yeah, yeah. So unfortunately you guys must out on that. But Is all that necessary? No, but it's my project and that's what I'm. Do you even have a shop if you don't have a hose real? Thank you, harbor Free. Like my organization is not great, but I got me a hose real and I was happy about that Time.

Breach: 9:08

For the next step, apparently, and welding it makes a difference on how thick things are, and I thought originally like I'll just go at it. You know why not? You know I never measured thickness before. It didn't really matter to me. So why do I need to worry now? Well, because this is the only deck I got and yes, I know I could always get somebody that knows what they're doing to come do it, but I don't want to. I want to do it myself. So how do we do that? I have a micrometer yes, I think that's what it's called, and if it's not, don't correct me, because I don't really care. I'm not a scientist and I think that that metal should be roughly the same thickness as the rest of the metal.

Breach: 9:50

So, and this is point one zero nine inches.

Breach: 9:56

We got over here. Point one zero four. I'm going to assume that through the pressing process, that some of that change, but that's roughly about the same. And so Point one zero Four. One zero nine. There's about one thirty seconds of an inch. And yeah, but you didn't think I knew that. But, uh, yeah, I did jokes on you. I knew that I'm lying, I didn't know that.

Breach: 10:26

I had to Google it. That's my hat crooked. There we go. That feels weird. I had to Google it because I don't know fractions like that or just someone's like that. Yeah, I'm not a math guy. So I had to Google what Point one zero four, point one zero nine inches was in fractions. And those of you that are like Savants or math people or whatever, don't, don't get on here and say something about it. I'm not really that concerned because Google is a thing for now and as long as it is I can use it and I figure I Can't think of anything when I really need to know it. Outside of that, it's not my job, but we'll figure it out. I Google it. It's one thirty second an inch and that makes a difference on how hot the water is. So Next thing, we got apparently clean off the surface.

Breach: 11:16

It's filled, but that's dirty, that's really dirty. And uh, what'd that bracket go? There it is, yeah, equally is nasty, and apparently welds don't like to stick to painted surfaces or rusted surfaces and, like I probably should make sure I put this back on here, right, somehow, you reckon that hole is supposed to be in there? Probably not, huh? Why does this look like it's smaller than the hole that was there? Doesn't matter, I have a hammer and we can fix anything with a hammer. Let's turn this thing off. Safety squints activate. Okay, update. They're getting there, at least on this piece. I didn't touch that bracket yet. We're getting there on this. But why, any of you guys that are welders? Why Now I'm trying to grind that off with that flapper disc?

Breach: 12:17

Does it look like the paint is smearing Like wet ink, like I don't know if you can tell there's areas where there are red, there is red paint. Get that from there. Why it don't make any sense. It's paint. It should just grind away. And also, I had to put up my canopy because the weather's decided it wants to. You know, do what it does in southeast Georgia and uh, yeah. So hey, back to it. Yeah, instruction said use a wire brush to remove rust and or paint. Instructions unclear Got rust and that paint are going anywhere. So we got to use the grinding wheel again, but I had to remove this pulley. So thanks to the Uggadugga, we got that out the way. Now we can go back to cleaning. Maybe one day, sometime soon, hopefully, I'll actually get to like screw up welding. Let's see. Nope, I am your father. So new update Grinding creates a lot of dust, a lot of it, and while normally I just hope my breath will get good, especially here that is a lot of dust, that rust, this thing puts it off.

Breach: 13:55

Watch your ears. Yeah, that's a lot of dust. I don't want to breathe that in. So got the old mask on. Here. They're still cleaning, still hoping to get the weld, but based on the way this is going, welding's not going to go well either.

Breach: 14:24

All right, it's about ready to get started. I am satisfied with my cleaning job. Probably shouldn't be, from what I understand, but Nonetheless I'm about to do this. The only way I'm going to find out is if I do just that. So I hope my next update is not from hospital bed. We'll see.

Breach: 14:58

Alright, well, who started? By the way, I like my helmet. Yeah, definitely out of practice. Any of you guys actually weld like as a profession, or not even a profession like you can at least get weld halfway decent trying not to laugh too hard, but like I'm getting something there. What I understand. The biggest thing is making sure you got penetration, and I know I've gotten penetration because I had the heat turned up too much and I was melting away my material. But the thing is this one down look at there. I mean it's on, it's functional, and functional is what I'm looking for right now. So with it, I wish it were better, but we're making progress and at the end of the day, if I can get a bunch of that stuff filled in I got a grinder I can make it look somewhat pretty. Let's see. Get back at it, alright, so back at the project that will never end. I finally have my backing plate on.

Breach: 16:10

I had a friend suggest that putting on mower decks is, or welding mower decks is, something that typically they would put on a backing plate, which is just a big plate that you could web crap to. Sorry for getting so close. So he suggested that I do that and I did. It is ugly, it's homemade soap, and I don't mean the good soap Like people are like. Oh, I'm going to go in and be like Dr Squatch. No, I'm talking about the people that are taking out every little sliver of soap that they have, heating it up and mashing it into one ball. That's what I'm referring to. Those of you that are welders y'all are probably just. This is a travesty, but it's functional.

Breach: 17:13

I do know that it is adhered and, at least for now, it's going to get the job done. So I'm going to finish welding up the bracket on the backside, on the top side, finish welding up the bracket on the top side I don't know, I've got a backing plate and then, once it gets nice and cooled off and dry, we'll throw some paint on there so that we make sure we kind of inhibit any rust as best we can, which, let's be honest, there's going to be a lot of rust. Once we get that done, put the mower deck back on. Have that done. See you in a minute. Alright, so you guys are kept in the loop.

Breach: 17:59

I have decided I am done welding. I am only making this thing look worse. But I have done a considerable amount of grinding and I just I know it's not factory, it's probably not even square. I also know that there's a lot of room for air in the welds. That I did, but at the end of the day, what I was looking for was functional and that it was there. And I think I accomplished that. So I'm going to let this paint dry and then we'll get her back installed on the mower and we'll see where it goes.

Breach: 18:41

Alright, guys, several hours later and the mower deck is back on. It's functional, it is level. It's a puller, right mate, but it is level and it works. Are the prettiest welds in the world? No, would I trust anyone else's life to it? No, I say anyone else's because I'm pretty stupid. I risk my life for a lot of stupid stuff I do. But it's functional and at the end of the day, I've worked on a new skill. I now have a welder so I can get better at it. It's a useful skill and it only gets better with practice. Like everything else, I haven't wasted my day and I actually accomplished something, so it was worth it, and that's the whole reason behind it. So, like I said when I began this video, if you don't have a hobby, find one. You don't like it. Keep going until you find one you do. Until next time, guys, appreciate it. Bye.