Ty Korrigan

Here, in France, every commune of 5000 residents must build a travellers site. Here in Liffré the site is close to a bus route, easy walk to commerces and adjacent to regular housing. It is spacious and well cared for. Not sandwiched between a rail line, sewage works and auto-route. The caravans of those 'registered' for an itinerant lifestyle, are financed by the government. Seriously, financed with zero interest loans and grants up to 100% I always know when a kid from the travelling community is placed in my sons class as he brings words and phrases home. The last one was bizzare, a belief that eating soup would turn him Arabic. Something the Manouche particularly detest is homosexuality. I'm not sure if this was the reason for appointing an obviously gay guy to the post of site guardian. He was our boss when we had the grounds care contract. He was a tall, imposing chap who told us to never take our eyes off our kit, keep the vehicules locked and don't take any shit from the residents. Even so, the police municipal would often drive slowly past just to keep an eye on matters when we were working there. One day, the site was empty. There had been a serious interfamily fracas and the Gendarmes had cleared the site the night before. Glass everywhere...

Read this: Gypsies all over are devote Catholics...

Once upon a time, my business partner won the council groundscare contract for the local gypsy camp just outside of town. Every visit resulted in anecdote material. It seemed totally surreal at times. These people were so very foreign to me. Once, I was strimming the ditch which surrounded the sites hardstanding as an obstacle to prevent them occupying the grassed areas. Disgusting, not a metre or two from their caravans, this was their toilet. We had to wait until the Summer when the camp was empty before trying to strim again. They would also shit in the grassed areas screened by bushes, then place obstacles on the shit that we had to remove before mowing or strimming.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=mNhYjB7n5B4

I'm waiting for the Jimmy Carr bill to be put to the Lords...

Here, in this part of Frenchland, oak lop and top processed and evacuated by the buyer in the forest is sold by the ONF (office national des forets) at around €25m3 To my client with the massive oak stem at the bottom of his garden, unless you extract it, process it, mill it gold plate the it is only worth €10m3 as firewood because this immovable lump needs ringing up, splitting, transporting, stacking and drying before it reaches the €90 per stere you think it is worth.

In the early 90's I lived in a touring caravan on a farm near Chichester. I woke one night, disturbed by noise and lights from the farm entrance. I roused the farmer who called the police. The gates had been stolen! A few years later having moved away, I called in to see my old landlord and he told me the gates were found at a travellers site near Petworth, alone with Quadbikes, saws, generators, the usual pikey fair. Then, THEN... The thieves came back and in an act of vengance, took an angle grinder to the hinges left in the stone posts!

You ought to use the 24 cooling off period from one of your flyers to wind your head back out of your arse and get a grip of reality.

A mate Tom Jenkins put a larger engine on his 252, 30hp I think. Made a difference

I've a pair to be sent to a mountain boot repair specialist near Lyon I had my Scafell lites done recently and they seem to have done a good job for €115 inc. postage both ways. They changed the entire sole unit.

Whilst I'm here, a question for the wise and experienced of this parish. How long would these leylandii stumps, large medium and small take for a 74hp grinder? I'm prepping them all, or rather my new fat groundy is, quick scratch around to make sure there are no stones, all cut low.

There is a gender fluid person on FB somewhere who would call you an incel for using a 'racist' term but here mate, you are safe amongst friends... Hairy Mary quite contrary Where does your gender flow? Have you got balls? Or dry snatch walls? With piercings all in a row...

61m3 of chip from 100 leylandii bordering a college on council land to be done during half term. I tried arranging for my client, a council, to get this done for free by a bio-mass company but the trees would have needed to remain stacked until May or June to dry out before chipping. As this is a pressing development, new skatepark, this was not possible. So the parks dept asked if I could quote and even kindly told me how much the competition had quoted some years before which made life easier though my own calculations came in lower anyway. I've subbed the stumps out to a man with a Bandit SG 74 so I'm spared 5 days behind the bars of my B20...

There is certainly more investment in sites in France. Waste disposal is easier though selling scrap is now highly reglemented. Scrappy prints a cheque, no cash transactions, business need to open an account. In all my dealings with them, even ones I quite liked, they are all to a man, bred to the idea that ordinary people are there to be exploited and that is literally a God given right according to their traditions. I'm occasionally taken for a gypsy even by Gendarmes, working with my brown skinned wife, The Afghan when he was around and Komatsu Clive who really does look the part so now doesn't wash his white van, no gypo would drive a dirty vehicule. Most of the real crime though around here is Romanian Roma based, not French 'Gens de voyage' Last Summer I gave a witness statement involving a Roma gang. They had been engaged in distraction thefts here on this sheltered housing project we live on. They are easy enough to spot. I know beauty is subjective but... The large catalogue of mug shots I was shown of rogue Roma looked like a couch casting for Orcs in Lord of the Rings. The Gendarmes credited over 80% of all theft in our town down to one group of Roma. A few days later I chased another door knocker off attempting to gain access by selling ordinary sponges and wipes from a satchel.

I never see a French 'pikey' with a chipper. I put this down to the logistics of an extra towing vehicule, local green waste tips that are easier to access and the French gypos general maniac level of hygiene which makes them stand out from regular tree surgeons. Every gypo tipper or flat bed looks like showroom condition. When I had a groundscare contract for the local council run gypsy site, the men were either out in the grift or washing their caravans and vehicules. They looked at our truck with disgust.

I wish a Manouche would pinch that bloody 150P from the mechanics yard and end our suffering at the hands of Briggs.

Cheers Swinny. Signing for the house in a few weeks but the final 'act de vente' won't be until May. Half way between where we live now and Mont St Michel. It is only just habitable in the Summer months, zero insulation, no plaster, just bare stone and wood. Ideal as I won't need to strip anything much out. It did once have spiral stairs but only the curved stonework of the wall remains. It will be a couple of years before we can move into it. There is a date on a lintel, 1675 or 1615, hard to tell but the neighbours is of the same age and has a 'garderobe' toilet still present on the back wall. I found it after working for the neighbour and almost bought it back in the Summer but the sage of our Efi engined chipper meant that funds had to be diverted to buying a new chipper so we let the idea of a house purchase drop. THEN... I Last month I noticed that it was still for sale at a reduced price and so we made an offer not really believing it would be accepted. My wife is sick with anxiety, we have zero reserves now except what I can earn and so need that 150P back running in order to sell it so we can pay ourselves back and buy materials and sewage system for this Summers renovation-fest.

Funds will never really allow for a larger machine. I recently crunched the figures. 142 hours in 3 years 6 months. A very profitable 142 hours but insufficient to warrant the investment in a larger machine. I was very close to buying something this year but we've decided that a house of our own is more important. Instead, I've found a guy who runs a new Bandit 75 and just does stumps and is keen to fill his books (a rare thing here) so he'll be doing my 50 conifer stumps instead which as just doubled to 100 at the request of the town hall. Hopefully he'll do all my larger stumps in less sensitive situations (unless I invest in some ground mats.) A bit like hedge cutting, I feel happy to let stumps go to another in order to concentrate on pruning work and removals. Stuart

This Euc was back in the Summer and was about 50min grind with 20 min prep and 30min clearup taking barrows of chip out to the truck. It still ran smoothly then, the vibration issue is really quite recent.

I run a wee grinder, FSIB20. Had an hour clock installed since new and now shows 142 hours. For the last 10 hours or more I've noticed that my hands have suffered painfull aches after about an hour. Painfull to the point I thought I really couldn't continue using a handlebar machine. I first put it down to grinding in the cold and wet but now I've come around to the idea that the real cause is the side play in the bearings. Despite being enthusiastic with the grease gun, grinding is certainly not as smooth these days when I think about it. The rubbers in the bars are still good though and I will buy a pair of gel gloves So I've ordered a set of bearings from my local engineering shop who will extract and refit them for me, as I've a 50 stump marathon coming up. In terms of bearing wear, what is average for a pedestrian grinder? We managed 450 with a Carlton 4012 until the side play became too great and the belt shredded, bearings still ran smooth regardless. Stuart

I was considering one for the Ifor tipper, mounted to the draw bar if skinny enough and easily removable. I see a French company advertising in a FB group offering a high side 3.5t tipper converted for a mere €27'000. Upon closer inspection it does appear to be a knuckle boom. Claims a ton lift. Stuart

You sure you are feeling O.K tonight?

O.K, I'll look at that. Thanks

Or why don't I just Google harder? Because asking on here creates a conversation from which I might learn things. You O.K tonight Mr Dempsey? Is the responsibility of GM150 ownership getting you down? You could just call GM direct instead of asking on here... See what I mean? Stuart