djbobbins

Sheet black ice across the whole road when I was driving to work this morning, owing to water run-off. What's worse is that it was round a blind bend, heading up a hill. Luckily the unfortunate lady who'd stuffed her car into another vehicle was kind enough to be flagging to warn cars to slow down, still hair-raising when I rounded the corner and found a car facing forwards on my side of the road, but sliding backwards down the hill in my direction. Pleased to say the other side of the road was clear so I was able to navigate through it (there was another car up my chuff so I couldn't have stopped on the ice anyway). Stay safe folks...

I liked the detail on sharpening with files and stones for traditional axes; I'll be giving that a go on my old felling axe for practice. I've bought the xsharp for the X27 though!

I read it that the OP's other half got the watch online, they couldn't it to work and so went to H Samuel for advice. Instead of helping them, H Samuel stung them for £20 to adjust the strap and gave a phone number for Casio. I think the OP has got two separate claims, one of which is more valid than the other... 1) Return the watch to the online retailer you got it from, in the basis that it is not fit for purpose if it won't pair with your phone. Not sure re: consumer law as to whether you will have to pay the return postage but morally your position should be strengthened by the fact that it wasn't made clear that the watch wasn't suitable for the particular requirements. 2) H Samuel maybe oughtn't to have taken money for adjusting the strap on a watch which the OP ultimately is going to return (and £20 seems excessive to me when the full toolkit to remove and replace links in a watch strap can be bought for less than six quid off eBay ) but the fact remains that they charged for a service to adjust the strap, and they did indeed adjust the strap. As such, I think you should get your money back on the watch from the watch seller, but your only claim against H Samuel is that their staff should have known better than to adjust the strap on a watch that's not suitable for your needs. I think that's a bit less plausible so you might be able to embarrass them into giving the money back but IMO it's hard to argue.

So... Having been given a new x27 for Christmas (woo hoo!) I need to keep it in tip top condition. The Fiskars Xsharp seems to get mixed reviews on Amazon, some people saying it's good but others saying it's flimsy; okay for knives but no good for an axe? If anyone's got one, or has bought one and got rid in favour of something different, your opinions would be very welcome.

Fiskars X27 and a new sawing horse! 😊

I certainly wasn't watching the way Jamelia filled that frock in the interview bit near the end... honest!

I drove a Thomas skid steer donkeys years back when I worked on a sheep farm for a bit. Great fun, although going from one end of the yard to the other in it just to make the brews was probably not the best use of cherry!

Man talks a lot of sense!

And apparently you need a chainsaw licence? Oh the irony, since (a) there's no such thing - Cs30 is not a licence, and (b) what you will really need after a few days of lopping and stacking inch thick willow at ground level is back surgery. +1 for doing it with a harvester, or failing that, going DIY by rigging up a saw just above ground level and a trailer behind.

I think block heaters are more common in places where the weather gets really cold (a guy I worked with win't over to Canada and had one). Also, don't the fire brigade have them in the engines at stations, so they don't get flogged from cold? Or am I dreaming that bit?...

BBC weather says sleet for about an hour very early Saturday morning for Warwick. I doubt we'll see any snow to be honest; hope not anyway as I've not got my finger out and put the winter tyres on the cars yet!

Good point. But I think jackdaw might be a better representation than magpie...

Thought it was just me - can't stand Citizen Khan, Miranda or Mrs Brown's Boys - all feel like they are trying too hard. I end up watching stand-up instead, although some of the acts on that are unfunny too - that Shappy Koorsandi woman (which I am certain I'll have spelt wrong) is about as funny as a dose of the squitters in a spacesuit.

I think I must be getting to be a boring sod in my old age; people (family) have been asking for ideas of things I'd like for Christmas and I'm struggling to think of anything. Trouble is, most of the time if I decide I need something, it's to do a task 'there and then' so I'll buy it rather than wait around. I don't want to ask for anything silly expensive, so maybe £20-40 range. I drink a few beers at home but don't go in for whisky etc and I'm not a clothes horse - I've got clothes and boots still that I bought the best part of 20 year ago! So can anyone help me out with ideas?!

And don't get me started on those completely non-standard and incomparable measures of "a load" or "a pickup". I don't think there should be anything to stop people selling logs and delivering them in a trailer or pickup, but it's got to be clear to the customer what weight or volume they are buying. I've said it on here before, I think logs should ideally be sold on by weight, with price adjusted on a net calorific value. That way, what is being paid for it what is actually useful, wet logs are worth less etc etc. This is exactly how industrial coal is sold on a bulk basis (the quoted API price references are adjusted for the actual NCV of the fuel when sampled and tested in a calorimeter, relative to the reference NCV of 25.121GJ/te), so coal with NCV of 26.5GJ per tonne would be priced at 26/25.121 of the quoted price.

About time someone sorted this out IMO. I'm sick of seeing tonne bags of logs advertised when it's blatantly obvious it's a dumpy bag holding about 0.6m3, so probably 400kg of logs at the most, less if they are thrown.

Yes, easier to keep lit overnight with smokeless fuel. The manual will tell you but if it's anything like our multifuel stove, you need to keep the airflow from underneath when running on smokeless, to avoid overheating the grate.

BTW, although there's no rule against it (providing the wall behind the stove is masonry) the back of the stove looks to be too close to the rear wall. This will tend to stop the air from circulating around the back of the stove. Once you find out what model of Aarrow stove it is, you'll probably be able to find a copy of the manual online and see what Aarrow recommend for a minimum gap.

Think that answers your question then!

Sounds like it is not a problem of your technique, or of the flue needing cleaning (although that might help). If you do the same thing on different days, but get different results, IMO that points towards design issues with the flue e.g. It being affected by wind. I'd also support the idea of trying an H- shaped or curved T-shaped cowl or chimney pot.

Nice looking 355 on fleabay at the moment, bidding was £235 earlier on this evening including some twin wall, scuttles etc.

My parents have a Rayburn No. 2 New Pattern, circa 1948 vintage and still going strong. AFAIK it is still on the original boiler and main components, but has gone through a fire grate about once every 15 years and the occasional fire brick. It runs predominantly on waste wood, does all of their domestic hot water and convection space heating for a 30 x 13 foot open plan kitchen dining room, plus 90% of cooking is done either in the oven or on the hotplate. It will stay lit overnight but that's best achieved with a shovel of homefire. If I had the space I'd have one in a heartbeat.

No, you can trade in either the physical commodity (in which case it would be expected to be delivered) but also paper products - so for example, paper oil. This means that you are effectively guaranteeing the future sale or purchase price of oil, without needing to actually buy the oil. You guys that buy lots of diesel could trade that way... say you look at future diesel prices now and you are quoting for a big job. The job price needs to be fixed, but you don't want to get stung by pricing the job now then seeing crude oil prices go up. One way to hedge the risk would be to buy a future paper crude oil contract. When it then comes to next year (or whenever the job and the oil contract are timed for) you then have to settle the difference between the forward contract price and the spot market price at the time. So you either pay out on the oil contract if oil prices have fallen (but will have made more on the job using the diesel) or vice versa. However you don't have to physically buy the crude oil itself.

For me it's all about maintaining a mix. I've only ever put about £1500 tops into a single company, plus try to keep a range of companies - so some miners, oil company, supermarkets, banks etc. I'd like to be able to invest in a buy to let property as well, but for the moment am looking to keep chipping away at the mortgage on the place we actually live in. The falls in share prices do hurt, but I've only ever put money into shares when I've had a bit spare, so I look at it as being something that's a nice to have rather than I'm relying on paying off.

Most things dry and free... but we went through some Euc and alder a few years ago; both were good in their own way. Alder a bit quick burning but hot. Euc nice and heavy and slow burning but a witch to split!