stormdog | (no subject)

Below is the slag heap outside the Quincy Smelter, up in Ripley. When the facility was operating, refuse from the smelting process was sent out along the tramway here, coming in from the right, and dumped. The resulting heap of slag spreads out wide and stands ten to fifteen feet high and towers over someone standing at the base. Still, when it comes to yet visible marks on the Keweenau landscape left over from the glory days of copper, this man-made hill is dwarfed by some of the other features I photographed.

(A lot of my pictures from the Keweenau aren't that great. I'm passing over a lot of them and picking ones that at least aren't completely dull. I could do a lot better if I went back, I think. I hope these are interesting to you anyway.)

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Igor has his new alternator inserted up into his belly. I have a healthy 13.5 volts or so when the engine is running again. However, I'm a little concerned. I was going to replace the belt when I replaced the alternator, but when I realized I had to remove the other drive belt to do so, I didn't. Now that it's running, its making a noise I don't remember and didn't expect. It runs just fine, but I have this worry that I overtightened or undertightened it, and that it's going to jump the track or break. This could be problematic far from home. To replace the belt, I have to remove the front passenger wheel, the splash guard behind it, the coolant reservoir tank, and the air filter box to have any kind of open access to the thing. Not to mention that, if I need to replace the belt, I'd have get at the A/C compressor to loosen it enough to get its belt off.

I'm debating whether I want to take a long trip today, without first being fairly sure that my repair is going to hold up for a good while. It did just fine when I drove to my parents' house and back to replace a faulty power supply in