Manhattan Beach Pier -- September 28, 2020 (Monday)

Marine layer rolling in.  Can barely see Hermosa Pier...

 

Ramen Noodles...

30 serving of freshly made ramen noodles, from San Diego.

CM drove down to Irvine yesterday morning to meet the people making the noodles in San Diego to meet them.  The whole order/activity was organized by one of CM's friends in Torrance, who got friends to order over 100 of these packages.

Helping this small family business survive the Covid times...

Ate two servings last night...

Phil & Enzo - part 3

Manhattan Beach Pier -- September 25, 2020 (Friday)

Phil & Enzo - part 2

Manhattan Beach Pier -- September 24, 2020 (Thursday) -- three pairs...

My usual resting benches are occupied.

Three pairs of people...

After not riding for about two weeks, this week I've ridden four days straight.

I'm feeling a little tired and the average speed has been dropping slightly every day.

Good to see people out riding.  Seems about a third of the bikes I see are electric.

Couple of squirrels in the back yard...

Phil & Enzo - part 1

This is a very large format book of a a first hand perspective from the only American F1 world champion, Phil Hill, a native of Santa Monica, California.

Manhattan Beach Pier -- September 23, 2020 (Wednesday) -- nice but a little hazy...

Can't really see Palos Verdes Peninsula today...

Flag is flying at half-mast (in honor of RBG until she's interned...).

Two Gerstener Tool Chests

These two chests are not too old (about 20 to 40 years) and are in very good condition.

Manhattan Beach Pier -- September 22, 2020 (Tuesday) -- nice day at the pier (mid 70s)

Old & Rough Tool Case - part 3 - removing the front lid

The front lid has metal pins on either side that slide in slots.

In order to remove the lid, there's a technique to follow.

First, remove all the lower full width drawers. 

Then, slide the front lid all the way out.

Finally, tip the lid up about 60 degrees (actually, the lid will hit the bottom drawer's wooden slides on the side of the case).

Then, while keeping one side pulled all the way out, push the other side back so that the lid will be askew and the pin on the side that's being pushed back into the case moves back and inwards towards the middle of the case (it's basically trying to make a triangle).

Although I used the technique, the lid didn't want to come out.  I could see that the pin was very close to coming out but it still needed about a mm to clear.  I carefully used some extra force and the pin came out of the left side of the guide with some slight gouging of the side.  Nothing broke and the gouge is pretty minimal.  It can't be seen when the drawers are in place.

So, I'll count this one as a success.

The top of the lid is broken about at the tongue in groove joint.  I'll glue it back together, being careful not to get glue on the floating middle panel.

There's a portion of the lid that's also cracked but not separated.  I'll apply some glue here also.

Manhattan Beach Pier -- September 21, 2020 (Monday) -- nearly empty...

Fewer people than usual at lunch time...

The air quality is finally reasonable (below 100 AQI - Moderate)...

The picture below was taken by accident, while riding.  The phone is mounted on the handlebar and the camera is pointing down.  The shadow shows my position on the bike (not in the drops).

Old & Rough Tool Case - part 2

There are six drawers.

Interesting that the upper drawer guides in the center of the chest are on the vertical floating piece...

Most of the drawers have what looks like galvanized steel bottoms.

On the bottom drawer, there's a "shadow" of where the Gerstener label used to be.

The only drawer without a steel bottom is the very bottom drawer.  It has a thin plywood bottom.  (looks to be three layers)

Inside view of the lock.

The drawer pulls have an "escutcheon"  behind them.

The felt in the bottom of the drawers are still there but are a little rough.

I'm tempted to just clean the drawer front and leave all the scratches in the wood.  After cleaning, I'll probably apply a "wood restorer" or a Danish stain to just protect/preserve the wood.

The lock plate on the bottom surface of the top of the case.  The screw just below the plate is a "stop" so that the lid is positioned correctly to match the lock and lock plate.

Top corners of the case have protectors.  Will remove these, since they're held in place with screws, and just clean them up with a wire wheel or steel wool.

These are the feet and bottom corner protectors.  This is a picture looking at the bottom of the case.  There's a large split-rivet (or pin) on the bottom side that acts as part of the feet of the case. 

View of the bottom of the case.  Not too bad.  The leatherette isn't torn.

This is the RH side of the case.  The leatherette is not too bad.  Just a little bit of tearing on the front edge.

Handle leather is largely dried out and quite a bit of it is missing/falling off.

The ends of the handle are attached to the top of the case with split-rivets.  If you remove them, the rivets will need to be replaced.  I'll probably leave them as is and clean them up with some steel wool.

As for the leather handle, I'll use a long strip of leather and wrap the handle as is so that it's covered (kind of like how a tennis racket handle is covered).  It won't look original but it will keep the rest of the original handle from falling apart even more while making the handle usable.