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June 10, 1980 Around Adair with Ed Waggener The article below first appeared in the June 10, 1980, issue of the Adair County News. Topics included the high price of gas, Carson Wheeler's and Terry Shively's propane powered pickup trucks, a prank played on unsupecting station attendants, and a honeysuckle cake baked by a graduate of Ellen's House School for Little People. --Pen By Ed Waggener Windwagon Smith, where are you, now that we need you? The $1.35-cent-a-gallon gas situation has gotten out of hand. It's gotten to where you can't get to where you're going without an awful lot of planning, and then, quite often, you have to say "I didn't want to go, anyway." Windwagon Smith was a character in one of our books at Columbia Grade School. He was an inventor who planned to build prairie schooners powered by the wind, using sails like the ones used on Yankee Clippers I think he had planned to set up a freight line from St. Joe, Missouri, to Fort Smith, Arkansas. Or maybe it was to somewhere else. I don't recall exactly. 1 don't remember how the story of the trial run of his invention went, but I do know, today, that the plan never got franchised and that there are no Windwagon Depots in this town. It mey be that is for the best. It's hard to envision a wind wagon pulling Jamestown Hill. Still, even that alternative, of sails on your wagon, looks good alongside the gas station lines and the pump prices. Especially when the alternative seems to be to stay home and mow the lawn when one would rather be a-moving. An alternative has been worked out by some enterprising Adair Countians. What they've done is hook up propane gas tanks ("profane gas" in Adair County-ese). Carson Wheeler, who is a propane gas expert, and the first one I ever knew, operates a propane-powered truck. The savings are enormous, especially on trucks which get 15-20 miles per gallon. Propane, Wheeler says, actually gets about one mile per gallon less than gasoline will deliver. The advantage, he says, is that propane will cost from 70 to 80 cents per gallon, against $1.20 to $1.35 per gallon for gasoline. Wheeler's Ford pickup has a system which will use both gas and propane, simply by flipping a switch. He has special carburetor adapters and a couple of extra switches in the engine compartment, and lines were installed to run to the bottle of propane gas in the pick-up bed. Other than that, his truck looks, sounds, and drives like any other Ford pickup. The conversion kit, which Wheeler says would cost in the neighborhood of $400, would be paid for in about 10,000 miles of driving on propane gas. "You save again on oil changes," Wheeler says. "The propane burns cleaner and raw gas never touches the cylinder walls, as it does in gasoline powered engines." Wheeler estimates the life expectancy of the propane fueled engine truck at one and one half to two times that of a gasoline engine. So far, Wheeler and Terry Shively are the only persons I know of who have converted to propane in this community. Shively is converting all his vehicles to the fuel. He's a propane gas dealer here. According to Wheeler, even more money can be saved if a vehicle is converted to operate solely on propane gas. "The state usage tax doesn't have to be paid if you use propane only," he said. "And that's another nine cents a gallon saved." The savings using propane still doesn't quite equal that of using diesel, considering the greater economy of most diesel vehicles. And those who only drive a few miles a year might not find the change worthwhile. But for those who do drive 10,000 or more miles a year, the savings look really big. Wheeler tells an interesting story about one propane powered Volkswagen. This man did away with the gas capacity of his vehicle altogether. The tank was in place, but never used. When he'd see a service station, he'd coast in and announce to the attendant that he'd run out of fuel. When the attendant would start to put gas in the tank, he'd halt him. "Have you got a water hose?" he'd ask. The VW owner would fill the tank with water and then reach in his pocket and get some aspirin, which he'd drop in the tank. After the pills were in place, the owner, a big man, would give the car a good shake. "You've got to get them dissolved well," he'd announce to the bewildered attendant Then he'd get in his car and drive off under propane power. Down the road he'd turm a valve and let the water run out. As time would permit, he'd repeat the spoof at the next stations. Science and Cooking and More Energy Alternatives Department I stayed home over the weekend, maybe because of the high price of energy. Or maybe it was a providentially-inspired means of teaching me something First, my wife and son Thomas became honeybees and strained honey-juice from the honeysuckle. "We're going to make a honeysuckle cake," Thomas announced. The cake was made from scratch, with the juice, some real bees honey, and Grandmother Waggener's From-Scratch Cake recipe. The cake itself wasn't too sweet, but the brown sugar icing made it sweet enough to eat. Wasn't too bad, after all. But we've lost our honeysuckle squeezers. Sorriness on the part of the momma at our house. And Tom has gone on to science. "I am going to show you something, Thomas," his mother announced to him later. "I want you to look out in the darkness and see something." She is an incurable romantic--a lover of art, old things, and pointedy-ended ice cream cones--whose major hard-facts choice was made in sensibly selecting a husband. He is but a boy. But already, he is a graduate of Ellen's House School for Little People, has finished his sophomore year at Head Start, and is off for Colonel Casey next year. Years of the Electric Company, Star Wars, and science studies on his own have made him wise to romantic notions about things. "Those are just lighten-bugs," he said. "What makes them work?" I asked, as an interested bystander whenever his mother gets scientific. They have lightbulbs on their hindies," he said. Another Windwagon Smith I'm raising. Maybe he'll be the one to grow up to harness firefly power for mankind. Or be President or a speed car driver like the Dukes. He is getting a good upbringing. This story was posted on 2020-07-05 08:35:40
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September 1977 Around Adair with Ed Waggener April 13, 1978 Around Adair with Ed Waggener May 31, 1978 Around Adair with Ed Waggener June 13, 1980 Around Adair with Ed Waggener April 15, 1978 Around Adair with Ed Waggener April 14, 1978 Around Adair with Ed Waggener September 29, 1977 Around Adair with Ed Waggener November 2, 1977 Around Adair with Ed Waggener May 5, 1978 Around Adair with Ed Waggener January 18, 1978 Around Adair with Ed Waggener View even more articles in topic Around Adair with Ed Waggener |
 
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