Squaredy

8 hours ago, Mesterh said:

Bleedin hell, who pissed on your chips!

 

It's about kids getting one decent meal a day. If the house is on fire you don't start asking who's fault it is, who's making money out of it you pot the fire out and ask questions later. 

 

This is the UK, kids should not be going hungry, if a free school meal helps reduce that then that's good news imo. Maybe some of the parents are idiots who didn't think it through or maybe a partner died or just fcked off, or they just fell on bad times, who knows. As long as the kid isn't the victim because of those circumstances then that's all that matters imo.

 

 

I think the point you are missing is we have been debating feeding ALL children in primary school.  The poorest already get free school meals and have done for decades.

1 hour ago, AHPP said:

 

See my reply to difflock on economies of scale themselves. Also consider this on the cost of doing something privately vs the cost of government "doing" it. The government way will always be more expensive. The labour, fuel, materials etc all costs the same on both sides of the equation but when government is doing it, you're paying extra for the extra layer of bureaucracy, politicians, civil servants etc. A government administered service is always more expensive, whether you can see the cost or not.

Agreed.  In fact both my kids used to complain about the quality of the bought in meals, and in the end asked for packed lunches, which of course was a fraction the price for us as parents.

1 hour ago, Steven P said:

 

 

Yup, if they got an increase in budget to cover the meals then all is good.

 

My thoughts on this is that you know 63 get free school meals, probably could identify which ones too, don't think we should be able to do this. At secondary school the 'free' meals got tokens, we paid in cash and knew who was 'poor' - I think this is an added pressure to kids that can be avoided by keeping payment or not discrete from the children.

 

If the catering staff are there and paid for regardless, the kitchen is there and paid for anyway, then the cost of a meal is just the cost of the food? So the paid for meals can be 'at cost' - and all can get a school meal (parents pay, school pays, state pays, however)? Economies of scale should make a school lunch cheaper than you can make at home.

Well yes; but of course in the long run we all know there is pressure on budgets, and something ends up giving.  And in the case of a school it will be lack of staff, maintenance, facilities

And no, many schools (certainly all the state schools in my area) simply buy in the meals from a large caterer so the cost is per pupil.  So in my kids old school the cost really would increase by £124,000 per year.

And these days the payment is online by parents, so the kids have no idea who gets free meals and who has it paid by parents.

2 hours ago, difflock said:

all school children from all backgrounds, should be provided with a hot dinner when attending school

Even if this means the school is two teachers short or has to teach in crumbling buildings? 

If budgets were unlimited I might agree, but of course the sad fact is that most schools are struggling to make ends meet, and every £ spent on giving meals to a child who does not come from a poor family is a £ less to spend on teachers, assistants, repairs.

The primary school my two boys went to has around 350 pupils and currently about 63 get free school meals.  When the Welsh scheme kicks in next year and they all get free school meals this will increase their yearly costs by £124,000.

1 minute ago, Mesterh said:

Well, I had no idea that it was up to those figures!

 

Scandalous to say the least.

 

 

And now the Welsh government have decided that every primary school child in wales should have free school meals.  That will cost about the same as employing 2000 teachers.  And of course the pressure is on for the schools to also feed those kids in the holidays as well.

I dare say this will reach England eventually.  And some people are daft enough to think that children go to school to be taught stuff!

9 hours ago, Mesterh said:

 It costs the nhs, and therefore us millions, probably tens of millions, actually I bet it's into the hundreds a year for drugs that cost feck all.

 

I would like to say that prescriptions should not be free as it would save at least a squillion pounds a year on wasters that only go to the docs for a day out and a gab but you will get those that really need medical care but can't afford to pay for it which outweighs the scroungers.

 

 

 

 

It actually costs Wales £630,000,000.  England’s population twenty times wales; so on this basis it would cost £12,000,000,000.

3 hours ago, PeteB said:

I just got back from the pharmacy - I got to take some stuff to help with a busted lung. I got the txt to say they were ready and went up there to collect. Name/address usual thing and she plonked the box on the counter and walked away as I whipped out the phone to pay for them. "You were 60 the other day so everything is free from now onwards" was all she said over her shoulder!

 

I knew I had got to 60 but I never realised that proscriptions were free! I thought that happened at Government retirement age!!!

And in Wales they are always free for everyone.  Which costs the Welsh NHS over 600 million per year.  That is the wages of about 15,000 nurses.

9 hours ago, Joe Newton said:

Who cares for a garage heater? Nobodies going to check. 

HMRC stopped my local garage selling red for a time as he wasn’t keeping proper records.  Now when he sells red he asks you for your name and address and what it is for.  

3 minutes ago, GarethM said:

It's a heater, 35 Sec heating oil is red diesel.

So this is legal for heating?

15 minutes ago, GarethM said:

Get yourself a 5kw vevor diesel heater.

Mine is exhausted through a brick wall, for less than £100 on eBay.

 

I should say as long as your running on red it's cheaper than electric.

But it probably needs to be pointed out that it would not be legal to run it on red (unless it as part of a forestry or agriculture setup of course).

6 hours ago, Stihl123 said:

@Squaredy

Thank you for the mention.  I could potentially be interested, but it is in Durham, so a hell of a long journey to even look from South East Wales.

5 hours ago, Whoppa Choppa said:

I have a small quantity (maybe max 150 tonnes) of very straight and clean poplar timber. As far as I know, it's either firewood or kindling. Bigger logs only fetch £70/t delivered (best offer so far) so just as well firewood it right? But then it's about the worst firewood going? None of it is much bigger than 16".

I buy decent poplar logs for milling.  I will pay probably £75 per ton delivered.  I am South east wales, so if you are near me give me a shout!

1 hour ago, Johnpl315 said:

Any demand for box wood timber? 

If you are near me I might buy it.  Are they big enough pieces to mill?

3 hours ago, angusmunk said:

hi woodcraft forum peoples. am keen to start carving abstract sculpture out of timber. I have a background in traditional furniture making and the normal set of hand tools that come with that. but i'm curious to know what is the best method to sourcing some timber and what to look for? cheers

I would say you need to develop relationships with arb workers in your area.   Also try and work out which species you want to work with ideally.  Some will be easier to work than others; and some will be durable for outdoors and some will not.

8 hours ago, sime42 said:

Wowsers!. It was neither an April fools nor bear baiting.

 

Why's it such a bad idea, why are golf courses so great? Or are there just more golfers than I realised? If we've got to build more houses I'd rather they were built on golf courses or brownfield sites rather than farmland.

 

 

Many golf courses have closed in recent years and some are indeed being built on.  Near me Dewstow had two courses - one is now houses; Alice Springs is also being partly developed as housing; and Oakdale is also now housing.

In my village 40 acres of grazing land has been turning into 1100 Redrow homes over the last four years or so.  There are now plans for a further 2500 homes on adjoining farmland.  Personally I value golf courses a little more than farmland.  I regard most farmland as an ecological disaster.  The golf course by me has public access through it and is a very pleasant backdrop for many local people.  The golfers can be very obnoxious however - it was so much nicer during the lockdowns!

8 hours ago, R Ashley said:

Hello, 

 

I have 125 Oak planks ranging from 3-6m, approx 0.5m wide and 2-3 inches thick. All sourced from the Uk, been air dried for 8 years. I am looking for help selling these, who would be potential customers?

 

I have attached 6 photos but I have photos of all lengths along with a spreadsheet giving all dimensions. If you have any further questions please call 07828808975.  Many thanks

Timber Inventory.xlsx 14.46 kB · 6 downloads

The first three pics don’t look like oak to me.

23 hours ago, Harry the Hatchet said:

Hi,

 

Can anyone help?

 

I am looking to purchase a bulk load of felled trees that I can cut up into firewood logs for personal use.

 

Does anyone have any info of who to contact? I live in North Yorkshire.

 

Thanks in advance

If you mean a whole lorry load (26 tons) then you need to contact forestry firms or contractors in your area.  Or even speak to lorry drivers.  Keep your eyes peeled for timber lorries nearby.  Also look out for forestry operations nearby.  
 

Of course you need to think about access .  Do you have a suitable site for a 44ton lorry to turn round?

 Maybe I have the wrong end of the stick, and you really just meant a couple of tons?

1 hour ago, Big J said:

 

Whilst it's favoured as a firewood species, it's regarded as a weed in forestry. It's never planted, and always regenerates in clearfells, meaning that it has to be cleared several times before the first thinning with clearing saws (to make way for the spruce and pine). 

 

It grows very straight and clean due to the fairly minimal wind and consistently sunny summers. 

 

I'm not really bothered what I burn personally. I prefer a mix.

 

Is it not milled or peeled for plywood?  Surely Scandinavian furniture is renowned for using birch? 

I understand that birch plywood here in the UK is really pricey.

I don't usually like seeing videos in this thread, but this one is worth it.  Be patient, it gets better and better...

15 hours ago, sime42 said:

 

 

 

 

 

Found inside two bird nesting boxes this afternoon. It looked looks like some kind of cocoon structure, all glued together with silky stuff. Incredibly strong, it was a real struggle to prise the lids of both boxes open.

 

Any ideas?

 

 

 

As said already, wasps.  There are thousands of species in the UK alone.  I have seen this sort of malarkey in my nest boxes and elsewhere.  Usually in conjunction with rotting wood.

3 hours ago, scoobysrt said:

Is your radiator system as I describe with the only difference of having a pump?

Off the top of my head I am not quite sure. 

There is a small rad in the airing cupboard directly above the woodburner which gets hot through gravity.  The pump is also in the airing cupboard and the header tank (which is metal) is also at the top of the airing cupboard.  It is a very simple system, but you have to assume it will boil occasionally (if you have a power cut and the pump is off for example).  So it needs to be designed to allow for this, with no plastic pipework.

5 hours ago, scoobysrt said:

Thank you for your reply.

 

I was thinking of having a towel rail radiator in the bathroom which is downstairs and a normal radiator in the kitchen/diner then two radiators upstairs in two of the three bedrooms.

 

How i was planning the system to work is I will have one of the bedrooms as the heatloss radiator and the other 3 on a normal 15mm loop.

 

I'll come out the top boiler connection and go straight up to a vent in the attic in 28mm pipe, I'll tee off that pipe and go to one of the bedroom radiators as a heat loss radiator.

The bottom of the water tank in the attic would go to the other side of this heat loss radiator and tee off in 15mm to supply the other upstairs radiator and then go down to two downstairs radiators before returning to the bottom connection on the boiler.

Would that be correct?

 

 

 

Sorry for all the questions, I should have clarified although experienced in using log/multifuel burners my dad plumbed in the back boiler at my old house and I've not done a system on my own from scratch before so am quite wet behind the ears regarding the actual boiler plumbing.

 

Thanks again..

I have a back boiler just heating radiators in my house.  It is a very simple system and works really well to heat the whole house.  It does have a pump in the system and without that switched on it will boil rather quickly.

But in principle I think what you are suggesting is feasible though not compliant with modern regs (neither is my system).

On 16/11/2023 at 20:34, Alastair643 said:

2x oak stems approx 4ft at the base and around 10 metres in length. First time milling and dealing with boards/planks/milled timber so have no idea about price of selling this and availability with people buying it. Based near Solihull does anyone have any contacts or know about pricing/people interested in this? 
Or would someone maybe be interested in milling this on site? 

As others have said the stems in the photos are way too knotty.  Small low branches can be ignored, but limbs of that size will result in almost no clean timber.

 This is why as a sawmill I would not have looked at stems like that.  You could still mill them of course, and it would not all be waste.  But the chance of you ever breaking even would be slim indeed.

1 hour ago, Amateur said:

Thanks for the replies everyone 

If you feel like it let us know what you go for, and maybe upload a photo or two.

36 minutes ago, Amateur said:

Hello,

 

 I am wanting to buy two fir trees for my garden but thought I would ask the experts for advice before I do this. Is there anything you think I would need to know in advance before I buy them?
How much should I be looking at paying? 

Is there anywhere in particular I should look to buy from?

How should I tend to them? How long before they really begin to grow? 
 

Thanks for your help

I am no garden expert but avoid any type of Cypress.  In fact what you refer to as "Fir trees" are generally not good for normal gardens.  If you are sold one that is not a dwarf variety it will rapidly get too big.  Most varieties of cypress are impossible to re-shape or trim smaller (you will be left with only dead foliage).

If you really want an evergreen you could try Yew, especially Irish Yew.  Or there are numerous other shrubs and small trees that would need very little maintenance and be attractive.  Fir trees originate in forests which is why they tend to be large trees.  Britain's tallest trees are Fir (Douglas Fir) and are over 200ft tall.