Well, here we are, back to standard time. Just like clockwork, the semi-annual debate about whether to switch to daylight saving time will rage for a week, with some arguing to stay on daylight time and others insisting that standard time is the one true clock setting ordained by God and the Union Pacific Railroad. It does take some adjustment, and personally, I like it lighter longer in the afternoon than in the morning. So I’d prefer to stick with daylight time. But I don’t have to get kids up and on a school bus in the dark, and my commute consists mostly of walking through the kitchen.
I wonder, however, if there isn’t some potential for traffic mitigation in the time change. The ski resorts can’t open until it’s light enough for people to ski safely. So if we stayed on daylight time, and pushed the resort schedule to 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. instead of 9 a.m. to 4 p.m., it would delay the resort traffic by an hour. The school traffic would clear, and then the resort traffic would hit. The morning rush hour would be spread out. But you would still have to get to PCMR before sunrise to find a parking place, so maybe it won’t work.
The real problem is that it is just too dark in December and January, no matter how you set the clocks. I don’t hear anybody offering to fix that.
I fall down some strange rabbit holes now and then. The other day, I needed to use an implement that was mounted on my 1943 Farmall tractor. It wouldn’t start. The battery was dead as a boot. The tractor lives in an old barn that doesn’t have power in it, so there was no way to put it on a charger. It was also parked where I couldn’t get at it with jumper cables. Using a traditional blend of ether and profanity, I got it started with the hand crank and drove it to my shop to sort it all out.
The battery is an 8 volt. Most of the old tractors were 6 volts, and the new ones are all 12 volts like your car. The 8-volt option provided a little more mustard for cold-weather starts. It worked, though we also had a magnetic oil pan heater for the really cold mornings. But how to charge an 8-volt battery? The charger has settings for 6 or 12 volts.
So I Googled it, and things got weird in a hurry. I am not alone with this problem. There were dozens of discussion boards on the topic. Some insisted that the 6 volt would eventually get a full charge. Others swore the 12-volt charger would do the trick. Another camp insisted that hooking the 12-volt charger to the 8-volt battery would result in an explosion, death or dismemberment — or worse, ruin the battery. Karl, from Minnesota, said he had been using 8-volt batteries in his equipment for 70 years and always charged them on a 12-volt charger and not once had he blown anything up.
Electrical engineers responded with math proofs of why that will kill somebody. “Minnesota nice” went by the wayside and the threads became absolutely vicious and personal. I don’t know about the batteries, but when you get a bunch of old farmers going at it on equipment maintenance chat boards, the sparks fly. Facebook arguments over abortion look tame by comparison. And it didn’t end with the proper voltage. There were lengthy tangents about the 8 volt being a stupid idea in the first place. People in warm climates insisted it was unnecessary, and the Wisconsin contingent said it was a life saver. Then others asked why the cheap s.o.b.s hadn’t just converted the whole thing to a modern 12 volt. And Karl was a moron who surely would get somebody killed. His defenders said it works; they were alive to tell about it.
The conflicting advice was irreconcilable, and completely useless in terms of what to do. I could put it on the 6-volt charger, and it may or may not get it fully charged, or I could put it on the 12-volt charger and run the risk of a minor explosion. Or depending on the commentator, blowing the tractor, shop and everything in it all the way to Tabiona. Well, alright then, the choice was obvious. I was connecting the 12-volt charger and plotting my strategy for the explosion that may or may not happen, when I realized that the battery was immediately beneath the gas tank. Like less than an inch. Pulling the battery out of the tractor is pretty complicated, and even a small explosion next to the gas tank seemed like a bad idea, notwithstanding the assurances from Karl.
So I went with the 6-volt charge for 24 hours and all is well. Aside from the raw anger and rage on the discussion boards. That was kind of unsettling.
Tom Clyde practiced law in Park City for many years. He lives on a working ranch in Woodland and has been writing this column since 1986.