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Sledgstone

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Blog Entries posted by Sledgstone

  1. Sledgstone
    Ok, This took me most of my afternoons all last week and two weekends, including this past saturday and sunday. I took some pics, but I'm not posting them in this blog entry. I just wanted to get the work done and messing with a camera took too long so I didn't get many pics at all.
    Parking brake/emergency brake/e-brake update!
    After grinding the brake shoes down a bit so they'll fit inside the rotors smoother, I realized the adjustment pins were rusted to all hell and wouldn't function correctly anymore. Whenever I pushed on the e-brake inside the car, the shoes would only move a centimeter. $20 at advanced auto for the parking brake hardware kit and I got everything swapped out except for the metal pivot piece. The replacement piece for that was rediculously small and would no way in hell work in my opinion. So I got the old ones cleaned up, greased everything with a lithium grease instead of caliper grease so there would be lease junk in there to mess it up, and after a long while I got it all working good again by holding everything in place while smacking the shoe into place. And after that, I put in the new retaining clip and those shoes were held in place tight and when applied, they moved a half inch. Yay. All done with that.
    After fixing the e-brake, the car still pulsated when braking. Everyone says its rotors. Seeing as the back rotors looked like shit since the back plates tore one up and the caliper pins caused the pads and rotors to wear uneven, I replaced the rotors and pads. I bought the parts from Napa this time. I had to file down my brake pad holding brackets to get some rust off. I also had to lightly file down the ends (not the nubs) of the brake pads so they'd have movement once they were in the bracket. And get this, the NAPA brand rotors and pads were a higher quality than what I got at advanced auto parts or autozone and where a little over $100 cheaper! I'll only buy parts from NAPA from now on. BTW, the NAPA back rotors were different on the inside than the wagner ones I originally got from autozone. Inside the NAPA rotors, it was a smooth tapered gradient inside the hat, compared to the hard edged line of the crap rotors that kept smacking my e-brakes. I may not have had to grinded my e-brakes at all if I would have had these rotors from the beginning! Fuck you autozone! Also, after doing the backs, I bled the entire brake system.
    After the back rotors and pads were done, the e-brakes fully done, brakes bled... The car still pulsated while braking, but! All the noise in the back end is now completely gone and the braking was a slightly different pulsating now.
    Now that all the rotors and pads are all brand new, I noticed scuff marks on my new front rotors from the pulsating bullshit. So I figured it must be the calipers. The front wheels were a bitch to move compared to the rears with the brakes off. So I picked up the front calipers with bracket for $54 a piece at NAPA, $90 a piece if I remember right at advanced auto and autozone. Fuck both of them.
    I replaced the front calipers, just like I replaced the ones in my Saturn blog. Turns out the front calipers were not fully releasing. After getting the new calipers on, the tires moved much much easier when the brake was off.
    Guess what tho! The brakes still pulsated.. But once again, it was a slightly different pulsation again and this time with all the noise from all the bad braking parts gone, I was able to hear a distinctive electric motor noise kicking in with the pulsation. Turns out I have an ABS problem on top of everything. I pulled the two ABS fuses, (the ABS light comes on on the dash now). With the ABS disabled, the damn thing brakes perfectly fine now. YATTA!
    I've let the blazer sit the past couple days so I can check the brake fluid level to make sure theres absolutely no leaking going on at all. Other than that, I'll give it another test run this weekend to some local stores to see if all my vibration problems were fixed too. If not, then theres something else going on with that, but I'll get to that some other time if its a persistent problem.
    As far as I can tell, the ABS problem is probably one, if not both of the front ABS sensors. Each costing about $70 piece. As far as I'm concerned it can wait until we're closer to winter because I don't want to fuck with this truck anymore.
  2. Sledgstone
    On Operation Locker, everyone just stands around shooting through major corridors and dropping resupply kits and health packs. Those resupply kits are very useful for EOD Bot attacks. Watch this video as I send a constant stream of bots into the enemy territory.
  4. Sledgstone
    A single setting on my test vbulletin 4 (which uses a copy of this forum's databse) screwed up all my blog attachment images. And they've probably been screwed up for about a week. I just found out and it really annoys the hell out of me because if I remember correctly, the damn setting on vb4 wouldn't let me change the directory, it only said "Click here to import your blog attachments into the new attachments structure." So I clicked it thinking nothing of it. The images loaded, except here it is a week later I finally realize that it moved the images from the directory on the live forum instead of from the directory from the test forum. Damn! POS! At least I still have copies of everything and I should be able to fix everything by putting the copies back into the right folder. I hate it when a program makes me waste time.
  5. Sledgstone

    Updating

    By Sledgstone,

    Me n lady have been working on the site and forum alot over the past week or so and now we have a new blog system. This seems kind of option heavy for the simple blog system I thought it was. eh, I'll mess with the settings some more and see what happens.
  12. Sledgstone
    The brakes have been pulsating pretty bad for about 2 weeks now. The pads looked good, so it must have been the rotors. I replaced the front rotors, brake pads and brake hardware clips yesterday and now it seems to be braking good again. I still have to give it a longer road test, but it is braking pretty solid now. BTW, rotors at NAPPA were $18 a piece while Autozone was $38 a piece. But for some reason the brake pads were actually cheaper at autozone than either NAPPA or advance auto parts. Surprised me.
    I'm not surprised I had to replace the brakes tho, they were the same pads and rotors that sat for almost 2 winters with the car. The bolts that held the caliper bracket on were rusted to all hell. Freeze off, an 18mm wrench and a rubber mallet and bam. I'm lucky the damn bolts didn't break.
  14. Sledgstone
    We just got our 800 disk capacity dvd case in the mail today:
    http://www.cdrdvdrmedia.com/800pcs-aluminum-cd-box-white-128.html
    Now we can finally throw out half of these huge shitty dvd wallet/cases that have been falling apart since we first got them. Now I wonder how long it will take us to organize and catalog our entire collection of DVD-Rs full of anime fansubs.
  15. Sledgstone
    Read my recipe for Sushi for my sushi instructions, except substitute spring rolls aka rice paper sheets for the nori. With spring rolls you can enjoy sushi without having any fishy or seaweed taste.
    To use the spring roll sheets, get a pie plate and fill it with warm water, take one sheet of rice paper and soak it in the pie plate until its completely soft. Usually this takes about 15 to 30 seconds. Then place the rice paper on your rolling mat, make sure you use plastic wrap on your mat to keep the rice paper from sticking to it or ruining it. Then make your sushi just as you would according to my Sushi recipe.
    Heres some pics:
    Spring roll package purchased at local Wegmans:

    Sushi with spring rolls. I thought my spring rolls were too thin, so I used to sheets at once, but that wasn't necessary, the paper was strong enough with just a single sheet:

    Heres some pics with grilled chicken in them. Yummy.

    Also, if you want to add extra flare to your spring roll sushi, put a couple drops of food coloring into the water you'll soak your rice paper in. As the rice paper softens up, it'll absorb some of the color too.
    I think next time I make sushi, I'm going to change up the amount of rice vinegar I use in it. The vinegar just overpowers too much.
    And yeah, use just a single spring roll sheet. The rice paper itself is quite starchy and two sheets means too much rice paper flavor in your mouth and that overpowers the overall sushi taste too.
  17. Sledgstone
    I didn't take pics of this fix.. but thanks to this website:
    http://anythingbutipod.com/2008/03/creative-zen-disassembly/
    I was able to figure out how to take it apart. Those are some really really small screws.. and thankfully her mp3 player only had a loose battery. Whenever the mp3 player was lightly shaken the power would cut off and only come back on after it was connected to a computer usb. After taking it apart, the solder connections were fine, but the battery wires seemed to be loose on the battery itself. Probably because the battery was floating around dis-lodged from its seat.
    After I fixed the connection on the battery and re-glued it into place (with double sided heavy duty glue foam), it works fine now. I wish I had an actual plastic tool for removing plastic shells because now the seem looks a little marred, but at least its working fine now.
  19. Sledgstone
    I replaced the thermostat today after work. Now that I had the right deep socket to get those threaded nut head bolts off the thermostat casing, I had no problem replacing it. The temperature seems to be reading correct now on the in dash gauge.
    But I still have an annoying ticking that happens when I start the car after its been sitting for a while. I have a feeling its an oil lifter, so I put some seafoam in the crankcase. I figure I'll drive it back and forth from work tomorrow and do another oil change to get the crap out. I used 'pennzoil synthetic oil/with cleaning additives' in my last oil change a week ago. I figure the engine will be pretty cleaned out with the cleaning additives in the oil along with seafoam, but the oil probably looks like crap already and will need to be changed again (especially since I put seafoam in it).
    If the engine still ticks after I change the oil again, then I'll have to take it to a mechanic to check it over. I hate cars.
  22. Sledgstone
    In this blog, I'll be making entries for the different youtube videos I've uploaded from my Playstation 4. Keep in mind, the game looks far better than what the quality of these videos are. For capturing and streaming, I do not have the PS4 set for maximum quality. But its good enough for what I want to show off. Please enjoy the videos I post.
  23. Sledgstone

    vBulletin 4.0

    By Sledgstone,

    I was looking at the vbulletin website the other day and they made an announcement about the newest version of vb they're working on, version 4.0. Aside from a 3.8x or 3.9 version thats supposed to come out in a couple weeks, the new 4.0 version is probably going to come out in a 6 months to a year (I base this on vb staff's inability to never announce anything anywhere near its actual release date). But it is interesting nonetheless, because version 4.0 is a complete rewrite of the forum code. But the nice thing, is that they announced that they are working with current code modders to make sure existing mods will directly work with the release of the new version. Which means we should be able to keep the arcade, mood feature, vbadvanced on the homepage, etc. even after a major upgrade like this. Very nice.
    http://www.vbulletin.com/forum/showthread.php?t=280752
  24. Sledgstone
    I made chicken wings last night and I figured I'd share my latest recipe.
    Instructions to make:
    Honey BBQ Chicken Wings
    Ingredients:
    - Package of Chicken Wings - 2 to 2.5 lbs
    - A couple cups of flour
    - 3 eggs
    - KC Masterpiece Original BBQ Sauce - 1 1/4 cups
    - Honey - 1/4 cup
    - Soy Sauce - 1/8 cup
    Instructions:
    1) Rinse off the chicken winds and cut them into three pieces, discarding the tips. I'm using a 4.5 lb package of chicken wings because half of this package are used for my Honey BBQ wings and the other half I used a McCormick Buffalo Wings Garlic and Herb dry rub.

    2) Pat the chicken wings dry with paper towels.

    3) Crack 3 eggs into a bowel and wisk it up to make an egg wash.

    4) Once the chicken wings are mostly dry, dip them in a ziploc bag of flour to coat them, then coat both sides into the egg wash and then put them back into the flour so you have a double coating of flour.

    5) Put your wings on your grill at a low temperature and cook them for about 15 minutes, flipping them once. Notice that the other half of my chicken wings look different (the ones on the left), those are the ones I patted dry and coated with the McCormick mix.

    6) While the chicken wings are cooking, mix the three sauce ingredients together. You can add more honey or soy sauce to taste. With the mix I made it turned out to be a bit more of a honey/sweet&tangy sauce.

    7) After the first 15/20 minutes take your flour coated wings off the grill (I did it right at the grill, one at a time) and dip them in your honey bbq sauce. Then put them back on the grill and turn the temp up to medium. Keep flipping them every 5 minutes or so and cook your wings until their internal temperature is 180 degrees. It takes about a 1/2 hour to 40 minutes. To do this easier on a grill, cook only a 2 - 2.5 lb of chicken wings at a time and place them on the top far left of the grill. Turn off the burner directly below the wings, the left one and crank the temp on the right burner to full. Because the chicken wings get cooked with indirect heat you don't need to keep flipping them constantly and they should cook faster.

    8) Finished Honey BBQ Wings. They look burntish, but they taste good to me. The only problem I had was that the wings just weren't crispy. I think breaded wings cook best fried, but in the end grilled wings turned out pretty decent and the sauce tastes quite good.

    9) Finished McCormick Garlic and Herb Wings. Cooking these on the grill, they turned out very crispy and tasty. Of course being a dry rub, there was no flour or sauce involved to moisten the skin. I honestly think for cooking wings on the grill a dry rub has a much better result.

  25. Sledgstone
    Instructions to make:
    Lasagna
    Serving size: 12+
    Ingredients:
    - 1 package of Lasagna noodles
    - 2 1/2 pounds of hamburger meat (browned)
    - 2 cans of pasta sauce
    - 1 can of diced tomatoes
    - 1 jar of parmesan cheese
    - 2 eggs
    - 1 1/2 - 2 pounds of mozzarella cheese
    Instructions:
    1) Gather your ingredients.

    2) Brown your hamburger meat and strain it. I like to break the meat up pretty fine while it is browning. I don't like meat chunks too big in a lasagna.

    3) Start boiling your lasanga noodles as per the instructions on the package.
    4) Use a mixing bowl and combine the browned meat, 2 eggs, 1/4 to 1/2 of your parmesan cheese, and diced tomatoes (strain the liquid from the tomatoes first).

    4) This sauce is thick and good for a single pan of lasagna, but I like it a but saucier so add another can of pasta sauce.

    5) Don't overcook your lasagna noodles! If they are still slightly firm, good. Strain them and then place the noodles in layers on a plate in a criss cross pattern so they can maintain their shape while you are making your lasagna.

    6) Lightly spray some pam or another non-stick spray on your bakeware so your lasagna does not stick to your pan. Also, start pre-heating your oven to 350 degrees.

    7) Start off your lasagna with a layer of meat sauce

    8) Then a layer of noodles. Then repeat with another layer of meat sauce and noodles.

    9) Usually around the first or second layer of noodles I add a layer of mozzarella cheese. You can use pre-shredded cheese, but like all pre-shredded cheeses, the little pieces of cheese are covered in a layer of wax, and that creates a greasy lasagna. So get a brick and shred it yourself or cut pieces that will melt in the oven. Also, layer some parmesan in there too if you want the extra cheese.

    10) Keep repeating your layers until you get close to the top of your pan. If you have extra ingredients, make a second lasagna in a smaller pan like in these pictures.

    11) When you get to your top layer, finish off your lasagna with a light layer of sauce, generous amounts of parmesan and a generous amount of mozzarella.

    12) Now cover your lasagna with aluminum foil (this prevents your top layer of cheese from burning during the cooking process), wait for your oven to finish pre-heating and put it in the oven on the center rack for about 35 minutes.

    13) Take your lasagna out, take off the aluminum foil and it'll look something like this. Now put the lasagna back into your oven for another 10-15 minutes with the foil off to melt down the top layer.

    14) And the lasagna is done! If you have a good brand of mozzarella, cutting pieces usually works fine, but the store brand that I was using didn't melt perfectly, but you get the idea... its still incredibly tasty.

    15) Let the lasagna sit for about 5-10 minutes to cool and solidify, then cut into pieces and eat!







    When I have leftovers, which I usually do because this is alot of lasanga... I put individual servings into ziplock sandwich bags and freeze them. To eat them from the freezer, put it on a plate, set it to auto-defrost for 1 pound, break it up with a fork and heat it again for another minute and it should be perfect.
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