Squaredy

I remember thinking back in the nineties that there must be a limit to how high house prices could go, as eventually if they got too expensive buyers would not be able to afford them. Sadly what has happened is that a mixture of foreign and domestic investors have kept pushing up prices well beyond what is healthy. And of course more and more people ending up going to the bank of Mum and Dad or Grandmum and Granddad. I can't believe that many people think it is healthy to have house prices in many areas totally out of reach of even people with good jobs. If I still lived in the area I grew up in (Kenley, Surrey) I would be absolutely certain that my children would never be able to buy a nice house in the area. Actually, that is almost the case here in Newport South Wales. A tidy house in a reasonable road near me now is at least a third of a million. Building plots can be over £200,000!

Look what popped out of a Yew log we were milling recently. Two young ones and the Mum or Dad. So glad we didn't mill them, as they only came out after about the fifth cut!

Where are you Philip?

Very interesting - I have never had a chipper, though many customers have approached me asking for chip. What is the method to avoid the problem? Or is it just a fact of life that handling large quantities of woodchip that has been hanging around is a dodgy business?

I did not know that. We almost always charge our car between 10 pm and 7:30 am (about once a week), but we do this just because we know that is when the surplus electricity is around - it saves us nothing.

Yes Mr Spaceman is right, we hardly touch the brakes in ours. Also the weight is only a little above average for the type of car....remember no engine, gearbox etc. Overall the maintenance should be a lot less than a traditional car as there are fewer moving parts.

Thought some of you guys may appreciate an update after having my company EV for just over one year. The car itself is fine, no issues and does the job really well. Charging at home is also a piece of cake, and cheap as chips. Charging out and about .... well that is a different matter. I think that if you have a regular route and you get to know the charge points (that actually work) it may well be good. Simply needing to find a charging point in an unfamiliar area is a nightmare. For instance, we were in London at the weekend, and then went down to Surrey. I found plenty of charge points near my hotel (Southwark) but could not get any of them working. There were four in the NCP where I was parking - all refused to work. Drove to another four or so roadside - none of which would work. One of them I had to turn the car round to point the wrong way down a one-way street to get the cable to reach (the road markings were put in front of the charge point not next to). Eventually my wife managed to download an app and we got one of the ones in the NCP to work. My experience is that if you can always charge at home it is great. If you ever need to travel beyond your realistic range then good luck. I will be contacting relevant MPs about this as I suspect most have no idea, and the above incident in London was not an isolated one. What is the point in pushing electric vehicles if they are totally impractical to use away from home? Re-charging will never be as quick as re-fuelling with petrol or diesel, but it should be as simple. To fill up with diesel/petrol you don't need an app or a special card - so why electricity? What a cock-up.

I suggest you need to split quite a few pieces of firewood and see if the holes go into the wood. If it is only the bark that is damaged then I would say you can stop worrying.

Certainly not furniture beetle.

I agree with most of what has been said already. My estimate of weight is 1.5 tons as the cedars are quite dry even when felled except the sapwood. Good to hear it is being milled. You could use the digger you want to hire to push it up ramps rather than to lift it…. And then lift the smaller pieces.

Do you mean £60 to £70 per cube including the cost of the logs? And one thing you have to remember is one of the greatest costs is difficult to quantify - the cost in time and space and tied up capital of having hundreds of crates of firewood slowly drying. For some people the space it takes up is just too much (this is why I stopped), whereas for others they may have loads of free sheds sitting empty.

Well yes I remember being told that the Whitehouse is built of Beaufort brick....but I have never managed to confirm it. Funny how there were brickworks all over the valleys and yet there is so little about this in the museums and online.

Yeah; but some say you risk damaging the brick and making it vulnerable to frost damage. I know how badly bricks can get frost damaged so I am wary... The Dangers of Sandblasting Old Brick | The Craftsman Blog THECRAFTSMANBLOG.COM Old brick buildings across the country have a tendency to get painted over the years by owners looking to “improve” their look. Whether its just a chimney or the whole building that’s...

I am after some advice...I am hoping to clean the paint from the brick of my house. I am considering soda blasting, and have found a local firm willing to do this, but as yet I do not know how effective it will be. I think chemical stripping is out of the question for DIY (45 square metres or so). The bottom couple of feet is sort of stripping itself, but sadly the majority is still sound. The reason I want to strip the paint off is largely about future maintenance, but also about allowing the bricks to breathe as I do have some damp here and there. Looking at the pics it is only the ground floor I am referring to - the upper section is painted rough cast which is fine.

The question that needs to be asked is "Why can't UK firms compete?" In the example given above GE are not a firm based in a developing country with super low wage costs, so how are they more competitive than us? I am all in favour of local industry (in fact I would describe myself as a globalism-sceptic) but I do understand why over the years so much manufacturing has left these shores.

I assume you have looked into (or already obtained) the felling license? I may be a little out of date but the lengths that are large enough to mill should be worth maybe £70 or £80 per ton. The lengths that are only firewood will be worth half this. Of course, this also assumes there is access for a full size timber lorry.

Are those dead branches on the right of the photo dead Elm trees?

Indeed if humans eat the leaves it will apparently stop the heart. Birds eat the berries with no ill effects, but the red fleshy part is not toxic and they just allow the pip to pass through.

I buy Poplar logs for milling. Not huge demand but still plenty of use for indoor projects. Could do with a lorry load soon actually.

Does depend on the quality of course, but fairly low value for Beech - if they are good quality forest grown milling logs then around £70 per ton delivered to sawmills.

Check out the competition; eg Yandles would be your customers' obvious choice. Some companies even have prices on their website which is really handy.

Woodworm can be a problem with Elm, though the heartwood should still last a fair few years. And of course look out for pockets of rot. Otherwise sounds like it will be lovely. Am jealous in fact - wish I had loads of Elm near me...

If you mean mid point diameter of 4 feet that is a big log, and will contain 3.5 cubic metres of timber. I have bought Sequoia recently and I paid £100 per cubic metre delivered, but then I pay over the odds to get logs that I know I will make good money from. In reality large Sequoia logs like that can be tricky to sell as most mills would have no use for them.

Don't worry it is not always so helpful and informative!

Lots and lots of Elms grow in hedgerows and they live for ten or fifteen years, and then the Dutch Elm Disease gets them. As you travel around look out for hedgerows with clumps of dead trees about ten to fifteen feet tall with a certain shape. This is my latest obsession, and once you recognise the shape of a recently dead Elm sapling there are a lot around, and of course lots of live ones also. I was on the Shropshire Union canal last week and saw many many young elms. There are loads in my village in fact near Newport, South Wales.