Paul and I got caught up on chores at Haggin today. We put the carburetor from old #5 in the Bitterroot Alpine II and put the hitch back on the Beast that Paul had fixed. Since there is a bunch from the Club doing the moonlight ski tomorrow night, we went ahead and groomed the lower loops. Paul used the Beast/Ginzu and I used the Bitterroot Alpine II to pull the TiddTech and then the tracksetter. Although the temp got above 32, we made it without serious mishap.
The Alpine II worked fine, although the idle still had to be set high. The primer failed so we replaced it. One fix remains to be done: the fuel line still runs under the engine and is prone to vapor lock. On the other Alpine II's we rerouted the fuel line just inside the cowling on the clutch side with good results.

Who would like to groom on Friday?

Saturday Grooming Plan

It looks like there will be 5 of us for Saturday: Gus, Ray, John E, Paul, and John L. The weather seems to be following the forecast so we should have new snow to work with. Assuming there is a fair amount we'd better plan on using the rollers first. Maybe one guy can work with Paul on the lower loops and be available to help turn the Beast on some of the Sugarloaf fall away corners. The other three guys could drop the tracksetter off at the lower end of Li'l Cal, take the TiddTech, a roller, and an empty machine to the upper end and go around clockwise. Then they could turn around and lead the tracksetter around counter clockwise, dropping down Sleepy Hollow with the implements while the tracksetter finishes Li'l Cal. If there isn't too much snow, maybe the Li'l Cal crew could use a compacter rather than a roller. If there's a lot of snow, they may need to use two empty machines for the clockwise pass. Anyway, the two-way cut/fill should leave Li'l Cal in good shape, even the creek bottom.



If there is enough time, maybe we could reset the Ginzu tracks at least on Crooked John.
 
See you all at 9:00.

Grooming Schedule for weekend of 1/22

Based on the forecast, I wonder if we should wait till Saturday to groom since the snow is supposed to peak about Friday night.  Even though not much is expected, we all know what dustings can be like at Mt. Haggin.  Comments?

Note:

The brake cable on #3 (Alpine II) still locks up periodically.  Usually it will free up if the brake lever is squeezed and released a couple of times.  If that doesn't work then you have to lift the hood and grab the stub of cable on the unused side of the Y and pull it out.  I put a pair of vice grips under the seat to grab the cable with.

We also rearranged the equipment so we could lean a compacter against the smaller container where it is normally kept.

John L

Friday grooming for January 15

We have 2 plus inches of new snow from this last storm earlier in the week, so there will be snow to work with to cover trails torn up by snowmobile intrusions. Start grooming at 9 am our usual time. We'll see what the Thursday night crew reports. I talked to Kim and she indicated that the trails were pretty rough from the snowmobile activity.

Thursday night grooming report

Thursday night crew

Todd, Chris, Nick? - Thursday night grooming could be brutal. I hope everyone is prepared for extreme conditions... There should be quite a bit of new snow, drifts, etc... Any comments from anyone who has been up there recently?