Things have been a little quiet on the H-34 rebuild project. Right after "Charlie" arrived we have had an unseasonal period of colder and wetter than usual weather for this time of year.Every time we announced a work party for a certain day, that day turned out cold and wet, and windy sometimes. So progress on the rebuild has been a bit slow.

We did get the nose doors on, the main cargo door installed, and all but one of the windows in. see picture.

Finally last Saturday the weather cooperated and we had five men show up to help.  Rich Faletto re-installed the axel nuts that had been removed in preparation for axel work;  Everett Wood made great progress in repairing our cyclone fence surrounding the enclosure, and Russ Fankell and I managed to get both main tires back together with tubes in them and actually got them inflated.  Not in stalled yet, but inflated and almost ready to install.  Roger King was the big help of the day.  He took the old tail wheel assembly that had the retaining nut frozen in place and unmovebable, home to his personal shop, heated the nut and managed to remove it.  Not only did he salvage it, but brought it back looking like a brand new one.  Thank you Roger!

The biggest problem we are running into is the absolute dearth of old H-34 parts.  We desperately need the large nuts that retain the main wheels onto the axels.  I called the Evergreen museum in McMinnville, OR, as I know they have two H-34's.  They referred me to someone who referred me to a business called Jack's truck sales in AZ.  Turns out Jack is in business with Tim, the fellow we bought the H-34 from.  Of course Tim and Carson are looking for said nuts, also.

  BTW, I neglected to mention earlier, that when Carson delivered the old H-34 and was so helpful in helping us put some major pieces on, he then turned around and handed me a check for $100 to help us with the project.  Thank you Carson!  Every donation helps.

So I spent the better part of a day looking for a machine shop to have the nuts custom made.  that turned out to be a minor quest.  After visiiting about 5-6 places, I was referred to Selkirk C&C, a very competent shop in Ponderay.  Marty said he could make the nuts for us, but he needed the axel to work with.. That precipitated trying to remove the axel, which did not work, and required Rich to later reinstall the axel bolts.  We then tried to remove the entire srut from the helicopter, but that did not work either.  DRAT!  We could have had axel nuts the next day could we have delivered the axel to Selkirk. Marty could not send a machinest to measure the axel in place, even though we offered to pay for his time, for fear of getting it wrong.
Next I went to a machine shop called Royal Precision Machining.  Roy (do you suppose his partner is Al?) Roy said he could do it, and would visit the helicopter to measure it, but he is very busy and could not get to it right away.

DRAT!  It looks like we are thwarted from getting "Charlie into the "Lost in 50's" parade Friday.

We also are still seeking liability insurance for the helciopter in case someone should be injured in or around it.  That also is another reason that we will not make the parade.

more soon