Mike Dempsey

Just bought the top and bottom cover for the air filter from a guy on ebay who was breaking one for spares. £13 inc postage which wasn't too bad. Also found replacement air filters as well.

I phoned my mate a wee while ago and he said the filter cover was long gone. Need to make one but that shouldn't be too hard. I will get a mac filter for it. Looking forward to using it. He has an unused brushcutter blade for it in his workshop though which I will get next time I see him. Brilliant

Have you tried your council's Environmental Services Dept. If something is causing a large number of children to come out in a rash/hives etc they should be informed so they can investigate. Failing that I am sure your local paper would love to run a story on it!

Thanks for all your help. It seems like my mates dad has taken off the top and bottom cover of the air filter and it also needs an air filter. I will phone him later to see if he has the covers lying about in his garage and buy a new filter anyway . Once again many thanks. Mike

My mate has just given me a Mac Cabrio 310 strimmer which was his dad's and who no longer uses it. Its had minimal use since it was bought and the owner wasn't a hashy bloke so I am keen to get it going. Its possibly missing one or two bits but I am not really sure and needing an air filter.. Does anyone have a manual/parts list they could email me or point me to a source. The McCulloch website in the UK doesn't list that model. Finally where's the best place to buy spares for it. Cheers Mike

just finished a commission for a few of these hangtags. 150mm long by 20mm wide and engraved using the laser. Double-sided engraving and made from locally milled beech, they will be used as hangtags on the Throwpods.

total scam!

A 75Kw oil-fired kiln wont half be expensive to run I think. Might have difficulty selling this unless it can be converted to another fuel source, preferably logs.

My nephew is in the Bomb Squad. Maybe they could do it as a training exercise in return for a few beers. Don't know if they are allowed to do homers though!

Big mistake mate. I do my own accounts with Sage and I am self employed. Its not very difficult and a local college may even have some one day courses on it. £350 pcm is far too much for what will amount to not more than 5 or 6 hours work a month. You have to be dispassionate about this and think with your head and not your heart. Your main priority is you and your family, and their future. Your sil will always outearn you as an accountant and in time you will regret this decision and it will knaw away at you till you really resent her. As other posters have said here there is no business now. You are back at being a self employed worker with some assets which were jointly owned by you and your late brother. Have them independently valued and offer her half the value, maybe you could pay her out of your earnings over a 5 year period. The money could go into a trust for your niece and earn her some interest. Get this agreement written up by a solicitor so it is legally binding and she cant change her mind about it. This will allow you to continue to earn money and have all the equipment and plant to do it with. She wont have any control over you and if you want to pack it all in sometime , sell all the gear and pay of the money to your niece with some of the proceeds. I am sorry if this sounds a little harsh but money/finance has ruined lots of relationships in families and it is better to get independent legal advice at the cost of a few quid than follow her proposals and regret it for years. Mike

I actually asked in the bank last week about this and Bacs transfers can reversed only on the day they are made so if you wait a day you will be safe. They can only put money into your account and not take it out. For big invoices myself all my business customers pay me by Bacs. You can even do a same day transfer. Whilst cash is good how do you know you aren't getting dodgy money?

very interesting Dave. Thanks for the link. There's some amazing ingenuity out there. Think I will start with a one briquette at a time press. The ones who do quite a few at a time seem to mix their sawdust/paper with water which is easier to press and then have to dry them out. I don't really want to be messing about with water in the workshop as I am trying to keep the atmosphere as dry as possible as I have stacks of dried timber in there and I don't want to redry them again.

That's the way I am looking at it. Nothing ventured, nothing gained!

I've used an arbotech for years. Get the chains from my local Husky dealer instead of Arbotech suppliers. Far cheaper. Brilliant bit of kit when attached to an angle grinder.

There isn't anyone local to me who makes briquettes. The whole point of the exercise is to use up waste already in the workshop and instead of storing it in bags, to minimise the amount of space it takes up by converting it to briquettes. This is going to be done it the true spirit of British bodging by converting a machine into using it for another purpose. The press isn't going to cost me anything apart from 30 minutes of my time in going to pick it up. The steel plate I can get free or for pennies. I have 2 good metal chop saws and a mig welder. My hero is Fred Dibnah and I admired his skills , knowledge and ability to make anything from scrap. I don't know how long it would take to make briquettes with the press but I am not going into this to sell them, just use them in my stove myself and give some to a couple of mates who will help me churn them out. If it works quite well I may investigate how to automise the process but that is not for the first stage. Its all experimental at this stage and it may not work, who knows. If it doesn't work I can always flog the bearing press!

I was thinking of about 3'' square and about 4 inches long for a finished briquette. The box would be fabricated from 6mm thick steel and would have a sliding plate at the bottom which could be slid out and the briquette could just be pushed out by hand when the plate was removed. I think I will make the box about 10'' deep and fill it to the top and try and compact it before I put it in the press. I wont get the press for a few weeks so I have a little time to play about with ideas. Thanks for everyones input so far

I thought that the lignin in the timber would bind it together. The press is rated at 25 tons which would probably be more than enough to compress it I would have thought.

I have a possibility of getting a large bearing press at zero cost which has hardly been used. As a cabinet maker I have large quantities of sawdust and woodshavings created throughout the year. I can burn the stuff no problem as I have a top loading stove but in the summer when I am not burning I have to bag it up and store it or dump it. I have a welding fabrication workshop near me and accesss to their offcuts skip and I am a good welder. My mate is also pretty good with designs and thinks this could be a goer. Has anyone done this before and could post up some info/photos or knows of any links to plans etc? I know it wont be as fast as a proper bricqetting machine but it will be a hell of a lot cheaper. If it works out another mate is also a cabinetmaker with piles of sawdust/woodshavings who is very interested in the idea and is willing to help me.

Not now NZ Paul, its raining in Glenrothes

Hi Dean you could check out this group in the States. very interesting and one day I will eventually do their course. Log homes & log cabins from scratch - Don't buy kit log homes I found this site a few years ago via a google search whilst looking for info on log home building. Mike

John You have a pm

Some of her decisions like the privatisation of national assets were scandalous and we are still paying for the mess. We have one of the worst rail systems in the world - fragmented, heavily subsidised, foreign owned and bled dry by shareholders rather than money spent on improvements and safety (even the older Tories agree with this). Our water companies are now just about all foreign owned and ripping us off as well as being highly inefficient. We have only one deep mine still open despite the country floating on a sea of coal. I could go on and on though. Having to rely on foreign companies for our water, gas, electricity, half our communications systems, airports and other basics doesn't make for a country on a sound footing and these national assets should have all been put in separate trusts for the good of the nation. She did however have balls and wasn't scared of a fight unlike our present leadership. During our current economic crisis we need strong leadership and a sense of purpose instead of the muddle through approach that this country is getting at the present moment. When we eventually get through this crisis it will be despite the current coalition and their policies and not due to them!

I have a throttle spring on order from Jonsie to fix my husky 281XP. Is there an easy way to do this or is it one of these strip down half the saw to get this located properly? I have checked the maintenance manual and it looks pretty straightforward but I know it probably wont be!

Here's one that I was involved with. I made the stoppers from the cask and laser engraved the cask number onto the circumference. The oak block is quite big and has metal lettering stuck on the front and the block was spray lacquered. The tolerances for all dimensions is +/- 0.3mm. The only snag is the price - at £3000 a bottle its a bit pricey! It has just won the best design award at the world whisky design awards.

I have actually mixed stihl and husky 2 stroke oil in the one container and I am using that no problem in 4 saws. Been using it now for the last 3 months or so.