"I didn't know it was. I saw indications of moisture exposure and an old tag suggesting it had stuck after storage. I thought the engine might have failed in areas that could be repaired, but we didn't know until the inspection."
He raised his eyebrows slightly. "You weren't certain about two affected cylinders before opening it?"
"No, sir. That would have been a guess. The damage was confirmed later when the engine was examined."
They asked about the wet-sleeve construction and why measuring the block mattered. They asked which operations I'd personally performed and which had been completed by trained adults. I showed them the journal, where every safety-critical inspection carried Mr. Pittman's initials and every donated service was listed by name. The instructor examined my expense table and asked why the total project value was much higher than our family's cash expenditure. I explained that the parts fund, discounts, transport, professional testing, and volunteer labor were real resources even when Grandma hadn't paid their full market price.
"What did you do with the old Case?" the engineer asked.
"It's still parked at the farm. We haven't decided whether to sell it for parts or keep it for a future project. Grandpa would probably tell us to wait until we know what the Deere needs through a full season."
The retired technician gave a short laugh. "That sounds like reasonable advice."
One judge asked about an incorrect part number she'd seen crossed out in my notebook. I felt my ears grow hot. I could have said the supplier had made the mistake and left it there, but the truth was that I had copied the wrong number from an old catalog before ordering. I explained the error, showed where we'd caught it, and described how we changed the review process so part numbers were checked by two people against the correct service information.
"Why include the mistake?" she asked.
"Because it happened," I answered. "And because another kid might make the same one."
For the next few minutes the judges read in silence. I was sure they were finding every crossed-out line, every delayed date, every number I'd written sloppily during cold evenings in the shed. Then the agricultural instructor looked up and asked which part of the project made me proudest. I looked at the photograph of the tractor idling after twenty years. I thought about answering that. But the longer I considered it, the more I remembered the first afternoon with the three-column list.
"I'm proud we didn't make Grandma spend money on the next step until we knew what the last step told us," I said. "At the auction I wanted to be the boy who could fix it. By the end, I wanted us to be the people who fixed it right."
The judges thanked me and moved on to the next display. I spent the rest of the afternoon replaying each answer in my mind, certain there were ten better ways I could have explained things. Grandma bought me a sandwich from the concession stand and made me eat it sitting down. James walked around the exhibition with us, asking questions of other students as respectfully as he'd asked questions of me.