doobin

You can't nip up bearings too tightly on the modern Ifors- they are sealed bearings which you torque up tight against the inner race. Also, taper bearings done up too tight will self destruct in a lot less than two years- more like two weeks. It's something to do with the braking system. Are you sure it's getting 'too' hot? Braking will generate heat. 'Too hot' is with smoke visible in the mirrors! Had that on an Indespension, when one hub out of four kept self adjusting, but that's a different self adjustment system to the Ifor so less likely on an Ifor and wouldn't affect all the wheels at once. As said, best to lift it up and check the wheels spin freely. Ifor brakes are simple to adjust- there's a nut on the back (21mm from memory) which you tighten until the wheel doesn't spin then back off half a turn so that the wheel spins- although slight rubbing at a couple of points is acceptable. You can also pull the individual brake wires with a pair of mole grips- 4-5mm freeplay is correct from memory. They are really simple to work on. Grab a big bar and pop a hub off, see what condition the brake shoes are in. Also wobble the wheels whilst jacked up- any freeplay on those bearings means they should be replaced. This is NOT the case with taper bearings and castellated nuts- these are best left on the castellation that leaves them very slightly loose, otherwise they will fail in short order.

You can't really break em mate. They are a great help.

Great minds think alike

More like 12 mm, plenty strong enough, crank doesn’t matter as you cut most of it off to match the other.

You really don't have a clue here mate. Go on, try it. How many staff do you have currently, out of interest?

Haybob tines are dirt cheap, about £3.50 each.

As retired climber says, artificial separation. He’d be hauled over the coals and the VAT backdated.

But cumbersome as hell I'd warrant. It works really well in a rotating grab in a digger (as you can sweep side to side or at angles), but for the time it takes to change attachments on a loader you might as well have it direct mounted.

There's nothing whatsoever a good accountant can do to stop you from having to charge VAT other than to tell you not to earn more than 85k in a 12 month period.

Sounds like as much of a bubble if not more than Central London!

I can't get anywhere near those kind of rates for small domestic jobs, which is why I don't do them. This is down South too. I cost labour in at £250 a day, add materials and then multiply by 40% profit margin and I still don't win them. Is your brother a hypnotist or simply knobbing the housewife (or even husband?) 🤣

No, you are the self employed bloke with no staff and few overheads, as both Steve and I alluded to. I even went so far as to say that 85k/year with few overheads was respectable!

Good point. This surely reinforces my original post (Holy thread revival, Batman!) whereby I implied that being more profitable via the use of machinery is encouraged by VAT registration, yet this benefit is hard to quantify. If a non registered company has swallowed VAT of tens of thousands on the machinery you list, then that implies (say two tens of thousands, 20k VAT) the purchase of assets worth 100k, and they are big enough to be VAT registered without worrying about it. Non VAT registered competition is a secondhand Transit and old Timberwolf and maybe a secondhand digger or loader. All these devalue to a lower floor whereby VAT is not really relevant any more, and indeed are often sold by non VAT registered individuals anyway. For a one man band with occasional help, £85k turnover a year with the above kit doing smaller jobs is respectable, achievable, profitable and can make you a thorn in the side of other VAT registered businesess competing in the domestic market.

If you are VAT registered, you must collect 20% tax on all your turnover, whilst only being able to reclaim 20% of your costs. A non vat registered company can charge this extra 20% as 'the going rate', and keep it. Sure, they can't relaim VAT, but that's only on a proportion of their turnover, and plenty of suppliers to small businesses may not be VAT regeistered anyway. So dependant upon profit levels, they'll probabbly be around 15% up on the VAT registered company. I did then go on to list harder to quantify benefits of being registered, but in pure figures being VAT registered leaves you less profit if a non registered firm is able to do the job for the same price

How many people on other business sectors have experienced the same due to Covid? Yet instead of ten days, for many it's been a long, drawn out process- stop start, yes you can, no you can't, borrowing desperately to pay the commercial landlord. We've not yet seen the scale of defaults on the CBILs in particular, and you can bet that currently there are families falling apart over the borrowing. If you are an ADI then you will never be short of work. Or there's always firewood processing. You know, actualy productive work.

Those that can, do. Those that can’t… well, you know the rest. Let’s not loose sight of the fact that trailer training was not regulated. There was no exam to pass before being allowed to call yourself a trainer, unlike a regular driving instructor.

FFS you barely got round the headland! 🤣

Fully agree. We need less regulation not more. Plenty of young lads with souped up Corsas (at least, that what they had when I were a lad! 😀) will have passed a driving test... doesn't mean that you want your daughter in the car with them.

That’s mostly what I use my blowtorch for too 🤣

It’s a fuel gas, a blend of propane and something else I think. Plumbers use it in a blowtorch for brazing as it burns hotter than butane. I have it in my blowtorches and I think you can buy big bottles of it, although I use oxy propane for workshop heating and cutting. I’d guess that set has mapp gas as it’s safer than acetylene yet can produce a neutral flame for welding

You could always drill, syringe in herbicide and then cap with a wooden plug. Plug cutter sets are cheap enough- probably less than half a dozen eco plugs!

For years I used an old oil tank with a door cut and welded. I recently moved to a new yard and have a 9x7 container which I just forklifted into a corner, but that’s probably a bit big for you.

Guess I’d better go get me a box of Shreddies….

Well then they can keep increasing wages for current drivers or loose out on work can’t they?

Result. Very happy here. We are starting to see proof of the benefits of leaving the EU.