sime42

Bear in mind that any knot is going to be a lot more sticky and awkward in the wet. You could try something like a distel hitch instead, (with a slack tending pulley). This is so much nicer to use than the horrible old basic prussic hitch. But if you do try it make sure it's on a few "low and slow" climbs first, just to get used to it as it will feel much less grippy and freer initially. Also the performance of any knot system depends on your rope/prussic cord combination, I don't know what you've got. I think the only reason they still teach the prussic on the courses is because it's so simple and so hard to get wrong hence safer in that respect. Any knot in the family of "more sporty" friction hitches is actually much better in terms of performance. I'd never go back to a prussic for climbing. It is useful for rigging though occasionally. I think the Distel, (or similar), is particularly good as a compromise between the sluggish prussic and very rapid but potentially unforgiving VT. Btw; a Hitch Climber pulley would be a very useful purchase.

Then Ash

Nice one, thanks kkk2. It does look fairly easy to do. Though I'm sure not as easy as the guy in that video makes it look!

How about Stormsure?. Great stuff in my experience, sticks just about anything and it's flexible. They use it for making and repairing neoprene wetsuits.

I've been aware of this stuff for a while now but not had a use for it yet. How exactly do you go about welding it?

I'm in the Erbauer camp too. I've had their tools for years, corded and cordless. Their performance and robustness is excellent for their very reasonable price. As others have said I think they can't be bettered for value for money. My only quibble really is that the rechargeable batteries don't seem to last much longer than a couple of years. After years of cheaper brands, (mainly Erbauer), I decided to treat myself to a couple of Makita tools, firstly a drill driver and then an impact driver. Mainly to try to overcome the short lived battery issue. The impact driver is great. The difference compared to a drill driver is dramatic I think, so much faster and more torque. Well worth having one if there's lots or some tough screwing to do! The Makita drill driver I'm not so sure about;- I had to send it back once already for a wobbly chuck, and its still not right now. Wish I'd registered for the guarantee in time. Battery life, it's a bit too early to tell yet how they compare to cheaper brands.

I think that's a good idea Stuart, sounds feasible, especially with the rooting powder. It'll be an interesting experiment anyway. I've noticed the new shoots coming from the cambium roll around the top of the cut stem as well on Poplars.

Yeah, I think you're right, thanks Paul. I was so busy looking at the ground for chestnuts that I didn't really notice the trees apart from chestnuts and some oaks. But as you say they're definitely pine needles and that bark looks like a big pine tree as well. I'm pretty sure now that it was a Sparassis crispa. A new fungus to me, my lesson for the day. Common name Cauliflower Fungus. It's edible apparently.

This is the beast;-

What is this?!!! Looks like a real sea sponge. Never seen it before. Found it this afternoon when out collecting chestnuts. It was at the base of a chestnut tree, or possibly an Oak, (wish I'd taken more careful note at the time).

First snow here in Birmingham. Not frosty but feels that "raw" kind of cold.

Yeah, good point. I think resistance to wear is not exactly the same as strength in terms of material properties.

I didn't know that. That's surprising. I knew they made lawn bowls from it but just read that it was also used for other sporting stuff like cricket balls and croquet mallets.

Interesting. So I wasn't quite right, they were using wood for gears at the same time as iron. It was more for quietness and easy of replacement. It shows how hard the wood is anyway if it was rubbing against iron.

Greenheart is also denser than water, ie doesn't float. That's quite interesting to see.

If they've come from a beach then it'll probably be the embedded sand grains doing the blunting as much as the wood.

Hornbeam was used to make the teeth on gear wheels in mill machinery, because of its hardness and strength. Before iron was readily available. Whilst Elm was traditionally used for the hubs on cartwheels, due to its toughness and resistance to splitting. The old craftsmen were certainly far more in touch with the properties of natural materials.

Cheers mate. That's informative but depressing information ..........

Yeah good point. I do this to an extent already;- I give customers the name of a local guy that I've subbed for in this past, if I don't fancy a particular tree job or haven't time or resource. Not sure that I would be able to persuade him to give me a cut of the profit though! I could start doing more subbing work for him on a more frequent basis probably. It's one idea that's crossed my mind, stopping the tree work for myself but instead doing it for others as a subby. Not ideal in terms of freedom to schedule my own jobs but could be the best comprise solution.

Thanks, I'll give them a try.

Ok thanks for that. So if I am breaking the law by not having a second climber present, under what circumstances could or would I be prosecuted? For instance if I did have an accident leading to injury or worse and the HSE found out, would they still come after me even if no-one else was involved?

Fenn Trap, mark 4 model. Effective and supposedly humane, but not very pleasant. Pine Martins are apparently very good predators of grey squirrels. They have them in Scotland I know but I don't think they are as far south as Somerset. It would be great if they could be re-introduced in the south of the UK as well. Grey squirrels are a huge problem all over the country.

I fear that I may be opening a can of worms here, and putting myself up for some abuse;- but I'm stuck anyway so here goes! So I've recently found myself in a sticky situation. I called up my Insurance Brokers, (one of the big, well known Arb insurance specialists), to renew my Public Liability policy. As I've done annually for the last 8 years I think, with no problem. This time they questioned the fact that I don't also have Employers Liability and then proceeded to give me a very hard sell, and I would say actually tried to bully me into taking it. I firmly refused as it's not worth it for me so they eventually said that they could not even give me the original Public Liability insurance. Their argument is that according to the HSE it is against the law to climb without a second climber on site, so the Public Liability would be invalid anyway if I was working alone. And if I am doing it "properly" and using a sub-contractor then I need the Employers Insurance to cover them. Some background. I'm a Sole Trader, doing a mix of tree surgery, general gardening and landscaping work. I occasionally have other people to help me out on bigger jobs but it's only a few times a year and always either my brother doing it for the crack or a mate for some beer money, so all very casual. Also, I only do this over the summer as I have a completely different job during the winter. I was paying about £350 for the P.L., if I was to have the E.L. as well it would be double that per year. It really wouldn't be worth it financially given my circumstances, the amount I earn from the tree surgery work. There's a few issues here, one obviously is the whole lone working thing. I didn't really want to get into a debate on the rights and wrongs of this here, it's been covered quite a lot already on Arbtalk. I recognise that it is a risk of course, but it's one that I am willing to take for now given the relatively small amount of climbing work that I do. As long as I am not endangering others then I believe that it's my risk to take. If I am using anyone else to help me then it can be their choice, I will be open about the fact that I have no E.L. insurance. The other issue is that of being correctly insured for all work that I do. Working without Public Liability is very much NOT what I want to do. I have always tried to "do things properly", in as much as being fully insured and having all my kit up-to-scratch w.r.t. Loler regs. I'd been with that insurance company for a number of years, they'd never asked too many questions and never pushed the E.L. on me. I don't know why they are suddenly insisting, I asked if the law had changed or something but they said no. I've not yet tried any of the other companies around but I'm concerned that they are going to take the same approach and say both policies or nothing at all. If that happens then I'll have a few options, none of them at all attractive. a) Lower myself to the ranks of the cowboys and work with no insurance b) Give up the climbing work altogether, (I could get P.L. but it would be limited to 5mtrs effectively meaning no climbing) c) Bite the bullet and take out the annual E.L. as well but that would mean very little profit from my tree work I'm now in a right quandary about what to do. Has anyone else been faced with a similar situation? Are there any companies that anyone knows of that will provide P.L. without E.L.? Or, if I could get the E.L. on an ad hoc basis that would be ideal. It makes no sense to pay for a whole year of cover if I'm only going to need it for a few occasions. If I could get the cover as needed on a daily basis I could be all "above board" with a clear conscience, without wasting lots of money. I'm sure this is an impossible dream unfortunately. Is it indeed strictly the case that it is against the law to climb without a second climber on site? I get the impression that it's a bit of a grey area. Cheers guys and gals.

Thanks for the recommendations for the time serts, I'll bear them in mind in case I ever need to do any thread repair work in future. I did find the helicoils quite a struggle to get in, really fiddly. Obviously worse since they were only M5. But anyway they are holding strong so hopefully they've done the trick. After Spuds work on the saw it now runs like a dream. It's an animal in fact cutting through timber!

Very nice. How long is the handle on that? The simplest solutions are often the best.