mickeyd
Well-known member
So I don't know where to begin with this miracle, not on the Hudson, but actually in Lancaster. On August 8, Launderess created a thread about a very rare Blackstone washing machine made in 1953. Rare because it has an automatic timer and even more rare because it sported the infamous Hydractor, an agitator whose wonders we haven't yet seen and rumored to be in the possession of a few members but not in operation anywhere in the known cosmos. Unfortunately, I missed this thread in the Shoppers Forum which I check into from time to time and when I discovered it, the machine was gone, apparently very quickly and for a measly and unbelievably cheap 50 bucks .
I booted myself in the butt so many times that I hit my funnybone. Not only was this thing in near mint condition but it was right in my own backyard, Lancaster being two suburbs away, 20 minutes as the Suds fly. Utterly disappointed, I had to act to discharge the negative energy somehow. So I e-mailed the seller and told him the whole story about us, (Awrorg), the rarity of the machine, the lack of any extant footage of the Hydractor, and offered to pay him a fee if he would let me know who the buyer was and/or call the buyer and offer him a fee to let me come and take film footage of the Hydractor in motion.
I poured my heart out about it all, not just to intimates, but to about 4 or 5 members at the convention and one amazing guy, Dave Smartdrive of California, told me that he had seen the Hydractor in action and it basically was like hurling buckets and not at all like we suspected as you can read about in the thread that Launderess linked about another Blackstone just like this one a couple years ago. Being unable to let this go I talked about it high and low, so much so that people would go running when they saw me coming and say oh no it's the horrid Hydractor man. RUUUUNNNNN. Almost three weeks later, I was still checking emails at the Holiday Inn Lobby's computer in Beltsville for the convention. Not a word back from the seller. Maybe he thought me a kook, a prankster, or a scam artist. Felt like a huge loser.
Fast forward to yesterday: (Now, Wednesday)~
Still haven't heard anything in almost 2 months and luckily for me, my depends were on nice and tight or I would've crapped my pants when I opened my e-mail and here was the dude from Lancaster telling me his machine was available again! Are you fookin’ kidding me? Again, I about crapped my pants. I called and told him I’d t be right over. So Paul Francis and I took his giant Titanic-- whatever the hell big white monstrosity that all you vehicle people love--and we went over to get the machine for 75 bucks. Unbelievable. What a dramatic turnabout! Was it just a bad dream, Tinman? No, Dorothy, we're all still here.
Regarding the performance of the hydra ~ it is shocking: it yanks it scrubs it hurls it turns it flings then swallows everything up into those mysterious hollow forms of the sideways buckets. Did anyone say cement mixer? Well Founder Chuck Diehl said paint mixer. Loading it up with the quickest stuff available, clean rags stored in a nearby dryer, I couldn’t give it enough to eat, finally adding two more old rag towels I lay on when going under washers. One rag, a sleeve from an old thick terry robe, had chances of dried mortar adhering, like large grey sequins that had survived many many washings; the Hydractor knocked ‘em loose. Big Smile.
When I drained the Blackstone into the Speed Queen and tried the same load in her, she was overloaded, and the water level was just below the agitator cap, almost two inches above maximum. The Blackstone has a very large capacity and holds over 20 gallons of water which I have yet to measure precisely, but will. I have been studying this machine for a few days now, non-stop, missing afternoon bike rides — That Bad. While not the ultimate reason for being, nor the be-all and end-all of existence as we know it, the Blackstone Hydrcator sure is fun: thrilling and amazing, and so interesting. The movies I made are not uploading to Youtube (new phone needs reconfiguring), so I have to take care of that. But I can’t hold off any longer. Only you will appreciate this, so please enjoy the October Surprise.
Looks like a submarine cutting through the Pacific.
www.automaticwasher.org
I booted myself in the butt so many times that I hit my funnybone. Not only was this thing in near mint condition but it was right in my own backyard, Lancaster being two suburbs away, 20 minutes as the Suds fly. Utterly disappointed, I had to act to discharge the negative energy somehow. So I e-mailed the seller and told him the whole story about us, (Awrorg), the rarity of the machine, the lack of any extant footage of the Hydractor, and offered to pay him a fee if he would let me know who the buyer was and/or call the buyer and offer him a fee to let me come and take film footage of the Hydractor in motion.
I poured my heart out about it all, not just to intimates, but to about 4 or 5 members at the convention and one amazing guy, Dave Smartdrive of California, told me that he had seen the Hydractor in action and it basically was like hurling buckets and not at all like we suspected as you can read about in the thread that Launderess linked about another Blackstone just like this one a couple years ago. Being unable to let this go I talked about it high and low, so much so that people would go running when they saw me coming and say oh no it's the horrid Hydractor man. RUUUUNNNNN. Almost three weeks later, I was still checking emails at the Holiday Inn Lobby's computer in Beltsville for the convention. Not a word back from the seller. Maybe he thought me a kook, a prankster, or a scam artist. Felt like a huge loser.
Fast forward to yesterday: (Now, Wednesday)~
Still haven't heard anything in almost 2 months and luckily for me, my depends were on nice and tight or I would've crapped my pants when I opened my e-mail and here was the dude from Lancaster telling me his machine was available again! Are you fookin’ kidding me? Again, I about crapped my pants. I called and told him I’d t be right over. So Paul Francis and I took his giant Titanic-- whatever the hell big white monstrosity that all you vehicle people love--and we went over to get the machine for 75 bucks. Unbelievable. What a dramatic turnabout! Was it just a bad dream, Tinman? No, Dorothy, we're all still here.
Regarding the performance of the hydra ~ it is shocking: it yanks it scrubs it hurls it turns it flings then swallows everything up into those mysterious hollow forms of the sideways buckets. Did anyone say cement mixer? Well Founder Chuck Diehl said paint mixer. Loading it up with the quickest stuff available, clean rags stored in a nearby dryer, I couldn’t give it enough to eat, finally adding two more old rag towels I lay on when going under washers. One rag, a sleeve from an old thick terry robe, had chances of dried mortar adhering, like large grey sequins that had survived many many washings; the Hydractor knocked ‘em loose. Big Smile.
When I drained the Blackstone into the Speed Queen and tried the same load in her, she was overloaded, and the water level was just below the agitator cap, almost two inches above maximum. The Blackstone has a very large capacity and holds over 20 gallons of water which I have yet to measure precisely, but will. I have been studying this machine for a few days now, non-stop, missing afternoon bike rides — That Bad. While not the ultimate reason for being, nor the be-all and end-all of existence as we know it, the Blackstone Hydrcator sure is fun: thrilling and amazing, and so interesting. The movies I made are not uploading to Youtube (new phone needs reconfiguring), so I have to take care of that. But I can’t hold off any longer. Only you will appreciate this, so please enjoy the October Surprise.
Looks like a submarine cutting through the Pacific.
Blackstone Wringer Washer
Have seen a few of these on CL and elsewhere lately. Nice looking unit and while tempted, only just. Parts are probably difficult to locate and sort of like the idea of Maytag's self adjusting wringer rollers versus those with a manual setting...
www.automaticwasher.org
