Marks Bolts

The Great Western Trail

As you know, Mark doesn’t sit around town on the weekends so we thought we’d show you another fun Saturday trip. The Great Western Trail is a 3000 mile backcountry route from Canada to Mexico. Arizona’s 800 mile portion of the trail uses back roads that traverse rugged and beautiful country.

Back in June we headed out from our weekend “home” in Munds Park to make a day trip along the Great Western Trail. We went to Williams for breakfast and then off we went! Next stop was White Horse Lake then on to Sycamore Point for a fantastic view of the Sycamore Canyon Wilderness Area. We continued on and looked out over the Verde Valley and ended up down at the Verde River at Perkinsville. Did you know that wild gourds grow along the riverside? We made our way back up into Jerome (looking down on Gold King Mine and Ghost Town as we approached) where we grabbed an iced coffee for the road. On through Cottonwood onto Sedona then up Schnebly Hill Road and back to Munds Park! Whoo hoo! It was a great day!

 

You can get more information in general about The Great Western Trail at www.gwt.org or for specifics about the Arizona portion go to www.blog.greatwesterntrail.org.

 

 

 

We will be open for regular hours on Monday February 17th on President’s Day. See you then!

You can find our nuts and bolts in all kinds of places but one of our favorite places is at Canyon Raceway. One of our customers, Diamond Mechanical, has a race team that we help sponsor. Thought you all might like to hear a little bit about how Bandit Racing is doing. Here’s an update from Ted at Diamond Mechanical for last weekend:

Aaron had a 15^th,  10^th, & 8^th place finish in the mains;Colton 8^th, 7^th, & 6^th finishes;Tyler 5^th, 2^nd, & won Sundays main event.The boys were trying all kinds of different fuel setups as well as chassis set up combinations all weekend long.Tyler first try at running mini sprints went off well for him coming from the Outlaw Go-Karts in California, definitely shows some natural talent. This week has the mini’s back on Friday and Saturday only taking the wings off which will make for some fun racing.Colby….what can I say? We first had a good run going in the main Friday night (getting up to fourth and trying for third) when the third place car didn’t realize Colby was above him and they collected each other hitting the main front straight wall causing major chassis damage. Saturdays struggle to replace broke and bent chassis pieces had everyone worn out by race time getting to the track just an half an hour before starting, but the racing gods were not through with us yet when on the first lap of hot laps the drive line stripped out and tore up the rear end.  We had to replace the rear end missing our heat race but  just in time to run the B-Main starting last.We finished high enough to make the 20^th starting spot in the main but on the first lap (in turn two) the same car we had collect us on Friday night came down across Colby taking out the front axle again.Done for the night but wore out to say the least. The boys put another front end in the car and we headed home for a well-deserved night’s sleep.Sunday brought more excitement when Colby beat everyone out and won his heat race, a good start, but something still not right.The car still not up to par, something just not good but we started the main event and ran strong until late in the race when the Gremlins started rearing up again and the car handling like a dump truck.Coming out of turn four and with five laps to go, a car not seeing Colby struggling, came down across us yet again folding up the front end like a piece of paper. Frustration and fatigue setting in so we called it a short night to regroup for the final three nights starting this Thursday night at 7, Friday night at 7, and then the finals on Saturday starting at 5.

We will be closing at 3pm on Martin Luther King Day on Monday January 20.

People often ask us why were aren’t open on Saturdays…. because we want to play in the desert! This run took us to the Florence Coke Ovens. You can see the brick ovens in the background of one of the pictures. The ovens were used to reduce mesquite wood to coke (a hotter burning fuel) for use in smelting gold and silver ore taken from surrounding mines. The beehive shaped stone coke ovens are each about 25 ft in diameter and 30 ft in height. Each has a ground level entry and a few upper level vents. The mesquite wood burned slowly for days in the ovens yielding the coke. The new fuel was then transported directly across the Gila River to the community of Cochran (now a ghost town) and the smelters. All in all, a fun day! (P.S. We did have to rescue another jeep!) [ws_table id=”2″]

 

 

2013 was a wild year for the Fastener Industry.  The number of major supplier/manufacturers that we use continued to decline with more bankruptcies and mergers than ever before which has made purchasing all the more challenging.  Factoring in the weak economic recovery as well and you’ve created a very challenging situation, especially with the broad range of inventory that we carry.

For the past 5 years we have been “treading water” ….waiting for the economy to come back. We’ve pulled every rabbit out the hat that we could; cutting costs, juggling the inventory and finally, much to our dismay, cutting payroll.  In November we said a sad good bye to our trusted friend and counter manager Richard Bower aka “HD”.   It will be new season for me as I haven’t run this business by myself in quite a long time, but I must confess, I am finding the challenge exhilarating!

Soooo, with 2014 now a reality and some breathing room in our budget, we are excited in our renewed focus on the growing the inventory and expanding into new lines.  We’ve even tried some advertising for the first time in over 20 years.  With encouragement from my wife, and the talents of my oldest son Ryan, we produced our own ad which has been running at the Harkins movie theatre at Happy Valley Road and I-17. The results and the feedback has been awesome!

As always, we are grateful for how the Lord continues to provide for us and we are very thankful for your support!

Mark

Our latest surplus deal has netted us a BUNCH of slotted machine screws! We have flat heads and round heads–100 pieces per box—–4 boxes for $1.00!!! Merry Christmas!