Repairing Chip in Stovetop

Flat top stoves are great when it comes to cleaning. The stove top can be bordered by an enamel trim. Our stove top border got chipped recently and I wanted to try and repair it. As it turns out there is a product you can buy called Rust-Oleum Specialty Appliance Epoxy Touch-Up. I found some at Home Depot for around $5.

It turned out to be a pretty simple process. Make sure the burners and oven are off and the appliance is cool to the touch. First you clean the area to be fixed. I used some isopropyl alcohol to clean. Next I shook the bottle of epoxy and then uncapped it. The cap has a brush. I lightly applied the first coat in to the chip area using a long stroke. Next I let it dry and then applied another coat. You do this till the layers build up and the chip is filled in.

As you can see from the below pictures it is not a perfect fix but it looks much better. From a distance and at  certain viewing angles one cannot tell it was repaired. What I am trying to determine if it can be sanded to make the repaired spot so it will be come flush with the rest of the stove border.

Repairing Garage Door Opener

Yesterday the garage door opener (Craftsman 1/2 HP Model 139.53975SRT1) stopped raising the door. The motor would turn but it would not move the chain that pulls the door up. In the last few weeks the door was not going all the way up on the first attempt so I sprayed silicon on the door joints. Since the temperatures in the area were at freezing or below freezing it seemed like the joints maybe getting stiff which caused the opener to stop due too much force being used to pull the door up.

One test I did was to detach the opener trolley from the arm that is used to move the door up and down. I then opened and closed the door manually to see if it was sticking or hard to move up and down. It was not.
Once the door quit moving, I took the casing off the opener and saw the issue. The plastic drive gear's teeth were stripped off thus unable to drive the gear moving the chain.

As it turned out a number of year's ago I was fixing another garage door opener that had been damaged by lightning. It turned out that replacing the damaged part costs just about as much as a new opener. So the homeowner opted to buy a new opener instead of waiting for a part to be shipped in. After working on it, I stored the old opener will all the other parts from the new one in the loft at my father's garage. Luckily, one of those parts (part # 41C4220A) helped fix the opener.

First, the eight screws need to be removed from around the opener outer casing (use 1/4" hex socket). The casing can then be removed. Next, the chain need to be detached from the trolley threaded shaft. This action allows the chain be removed from the opener sprocket on top of the opener. After this remove gear and sprocket assembly that has three hex head screws keeping it in place (use 5/16" hex socket). It is a little tricky removing one of the screws close to the motor. I had to use a couple of tools to leverage the ratchet to  remove the screw.

There is plastic gear at the bottom of the part shaft. It is called the limit switch drive & retainer. The plastic retainer clip needs to be removed which will allow the switch drive gear to be removed. The entire assembly can then be removed.

The new assembly can be slid into place and the three screws put in place to fasten it. Reattach the chain to the  opener sprocket and then fasten the chain to the trolley threaded shaft. Make sure the chain is not twisted when being put back on. The down and up adjustments might need to be made so the door will properly open and close. Last put the opener housing back on.

When I took off the housing the first time, white plastic shavings could bee seen from damaged gear. This opener had been in use 12 years before it failed.

Venus Flytrap

Pictured is the Dionaea muscipula or more popularly known as the Venus Flytrap. It is a plant that captures insects for food. The plant can be found in wetlands along the east coast of the United States.

Learn more about this plant at Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venus_fly_trap

Billbergia nutans Flower of 2012

Pictures of the Billbergia nutans (Queens Tears) flowers. There was 1 plant that produced a red bloom stalk. The stalk had between 6 blooms. The flower shown bloomed on October 14, 2012. If I recall, each bloom lasted a day and the plant allowed one and only one bloom per day.  I hope to see the plant bloom in 2013.

Merry Christmas

A couple of pictures I took of the tree while opening gifts with the family. Wishing everyone a Merry Christmas!

Peace and Prosperity in 2013!

Pepero Day

From what I read about Korea, there is a snack company there that makes a wafer like edible stick that is dipped in chocolate. It is call Pepero and since the snack is a straight narrow cylinder like food it reminds people of the number one.

So some clever Pepero person came up with 11-11 (November 11th) is Pepero day and Koreans go out and buy this snack.  See image of it here: http://twitter.com/SweetAndTastyTV/status/267719894479552513/photo/1

I was at Wal-Mart on 11-11-2012 and could not find this snack but I did find one called Pocky in the Asian food section.  See image.

Chili with Beans and Ground Beef

Now that autumn is here, it is time to start cooking chili, stews, and soups. Today was ground beef and bean chili that is pretty simple to make. It especially helps if you used canned ingredients to move the preparation time along.

I start with these ingredients, the rest of the garden grown tomatoes, Kroger hot chili beans in two cans, a medium sized onion, 8 oz can of tomato sauce low sodium, chili powder, basil, 3 garlic cloves, and 96% lean ground beef from Wal-Mart. Brown the beef by breaking into to small pieces in skillet at medium-high heat and mix in diced onions and garlic. In a pot, combine beans, tomato sauce, can of water, chili powder, and basil. After beef is finished (all pink and red color is gone), dump the skillets contents into the pot and heat on medium heat for about 5 minutes. Reduce heat to low-medium and cook covered for about 60 minutes. Pot chili ready to eat. Yum!

Chicken and Wine Sauce

One of my favorite dishes to cook is simply called Baked Chicken in Wine Sauce. You start with the above ingredients plus Campbell's Cream of Mushroom soup and finish with the dish below. It is a dish my mother taught me to cook and I tend to cook it at least once every one-two months. I serve it a variety of ways one with rice or mixed with rice turning it sort of into a casserole. Growing up my mother served it with mashed potatoes. Vegetables that can complement this main dish are broccoli, corn, garden salad, asparagus, or spinach. One day I will try to post the recipe.

Over the years I have changed a few things, instead of cooking wine that can have a lot of salt, I use low cost dry white wine (1.5 L bottle). Also I use lemon juice instead of lemon slices when baking at times. Skim milk instead of whole milk for a lighter sauce and also in making mashed potatoes.

Cube Steak with Vegetable Stir Fry Rice

Here is a dish I cooked up which consists of grilled cube steak, vegetable stir fry rice, and cherry tomatoes. The vegetable stir fry rice contains: broccoli, carrots, spinach, yellow squash, and garlic. They were cooked in a vegetable oil and the sauce used was Kikkoman Preservative Free Stir-Fry Sauce with Reduced Sodium. It took about 30 minutes to prepare this meal.

All I can say is... it was YUMMY!

I will post the recipe in a future blog entry.

The Cereus Night Blooming Cactus

The Cereus peruvianus cactus bloomed on August 17, 2012. These pictures were taken about 11 PM EST and the flower probably fully opened up around 2 AM. It then closes by the time the sun is up. I assume the plant does this to conserve water being a desert plant.

Brussels Sprouts, Squash, and Tomato Stir Fry

Today I made a variation of recipe I found at a web site called yingsasiancooking.wordpress.com. That dish is called Brussels sprouts with Cherry Tomatoes posted on June 14, 2012. I added a few more ingredients to my version.

My father brought me the last of the cherry, grape, and Roma tomatoes from their garden. In addition, I had some Brussels sprouts in the refrigerator that needed cooking. So after a short Internet search I found an appropriate recipe to incorporate these two vegetables.

What we will need are Brussels sprouts, in this case about 8 ounces, 4-8 cherry & grape tomatoes (fresh from the garden, ummm!), a medium sized yellow squash,  garlic, a teaspoon of pepper, oil to cover the bottom of your pan/wok, and stir-fry cooking sauce. The website calls for Ying’s Korean BBQ Marinade which can be obtained from the web site. Chef Ying has a wide variety of sauces on her web site and they all look very delicious, I encourage you to try them out.

First order of business is to prepare the vegetables and heat the stove. Mince the garlic. Once completed, you will get your skillet/wok heated to medium heat with the oil in it. Place the garlic in the cooking pan.

Cut the ends off the Brussels sprouts along with any bad places on them. Cut the tomatoes and Brussels sprouts in halves. Slice the yellow squash and then quarter the slices.

Stir the garlic in the pan until its smell permeates the air. Blend in the cut Brussels sprouts and stir fry for several minutes. Add stir fry sauce and squash to the pan. Stir vigorously for several minutes. Add tomatoes and continue stirring for under a minute and move contents of pan to a plate or bowl.

Ta da a lovely vegetable dish with your main entree  In my case, a grilled steak with rice and a glass of water. It was enjoyed!

Harvest Moon

Here is a picture I took of the harvest moon. Happy Mid-Autumn Festival to you and if you are in Korea happy Chuseok.

The telescope is in storage so I had to use a 55mm lens on the DSLR which is not the best for astrophotography.

Hopefully next year by this time, I will have had a good crop of watermelons.

Dark Purple Grapes

Grapes are in season at the local grocery stores. After seeing a story on KBS World News (Dish TV channel 9394) about the health benefits of eating purple vegetables and fruits, I decided to buy these grapes at Kroger's.

Last Peach

The last peach left on the tree. I am contemplating letting the squirrels have it...

Tomato Harvest

It has been a good season for tomatoes at my mother's garden. A variety spherical, Roma, grape and cherry tomatoes are still being harvested.

My young nephew and I picked these tomatoes during the weekend. He has tendency to pick green ones though.

I have been putting the tomatoes on salads, sandwiches, diced into chili and eating them with cottage cheese.

Last of the 2012 Peaches

Peaches from the third peach tree. For some reason, its peaches ripened 2 months after the other two trees (June 2012). I originally was going to let the squirrels have these peaches but they do not seem too interested  right now. So I picked these two and trimmed off the bad parts and found the pieces shown above. They were pretty good. Hopefully, a good peach crop will happen next year as well...

Lightning from July 27, 2012 Storm

 I did not use a tripod when taking these pictures can you can see some blur in the images.