percussive maintenance

Once again this house is full of fumes. This time it's the generously applied PB Blaster that my roller hardware is cooking in. I know what you're thinking, schoolhouse, countertops, laundry room - has this girl got the attention span of a goldfish?

Yes. Yes I do, now what were we talking about?

I have been looking for affordable barn door hardware (antique) since finishing the framing on our walk-in closet over a year ago. Living close to very rural areas I figured we'd find something local in no time. Well, I was wrong, and it took ebay to fill this particular hole in my heart.

The grime on these cannot be understated, and we had a momentary heart attack when they arrived and did not spin properly (as advertised). Scraping the pound of old grease and grime off of them didn't rectify the situation, but it did reveal that the inner wheel spun on it's bolt around several bearings.

an unprecedented mess for such small objects

all cleaned up

Google failed miserably when it came to telling us what to do, so we improvised. The trained monkey likes to hit things with the hammer, and hitting the bolt reduced the wheel's looseness somewhat. Then, after soaking everything in the lubricant he tapped on the bearings with hammer + every long/small/sharp object in range (cleaning out the crud as we went) until the bearings were free moving. The problem was the bearings were bunched up (instead of surrounding the bolt). Again the trained monkey and his trusty hammer lined the bolt up to the correct position and hit the wheel until the bearings were forced to spread around the bolt and they were was once again centered on the wheel. The rollers look quite lovely after a few hours of care and cleaning (even showing off some original red paint), and we're using the heat from the radiators to help the lubricant soak in.

Truthfully, this is not a high priority project, so don't expect to hear too much more about them for a while . . . As far as the schoolhouse goes, we're looking at the building this Saturday. I'm trying not to get too excited over it, but failing miserably, I mean, a BELL TOWER, seriously, of my very own!