animatedpomegranate

Councils and the way they treat business run from home is very much luck of the draw. I ran a fairly large furniture workshop employing on and off 4 guys, for 16 years. I started out really small in 85 in my fathers garage in sussex in a residential area. Within 6 months complaints brought the council round. It didnt matter that much cos the whole family were moving to wales. We had bought a rural property with a bit of land and in the workshop that was on site built the business over the following 15 years or so. Big machinery noise and dust, delivery lorries etc no complaints and little interest from the council who seemed happy to see small biz taking off. It was a time when being a small biz person was being encouraged. Labour came to power and all that changed almost overnight. Within two years the council were on to me. Paperwork to fill in to get permission to boil a kettle within the workshop was the last straw. My advice is see what you can get away with, but be sensible. There is plenty of info on the web which enables you to be informed without alerting undue interest. I always found the more I involved the authorities in what I was upto, the more interest they showed. This basically means you end up working harder and harder to keep a pencil jockey in post. Its up to you, but if you get a couple of years rate free, hassle free and pain free, you'll be able to channel that energy into your biz effort. Just my bitter experience thoughts.....maybe its the time of year....ba humbug

Just a thought to throw into this one. My wife is a college lecturer and everyday comes home with complaints about how the students fail to turn up to lectures, fail to hand in course work, don't show up cos they were drunk the night before then want the work handed to them on a plate. She says the standard of student now to ten to 15 years ago is shockingly low, quality has gone out of the window with increased numbers. I bite my tung but do feel that when a person wants something badly enough and they value it highly, they will move heaven and earth to get it. We've all done that here I imagine, investing in kit and skills and time with very little help. I'm not a huge political animal but I feel the government should be allowed to get on with putting a new value on education. Nowt is for nowt as they say. Quality does not come cheap and the colleges seem these days just somewhere to put many (but not all) youngsters who have no other motivation in life other than the weekend bender......I for one cant afford to sponsor that!

Hi - just wondered if anyone knew the answer to this. I have an Isuzu NKR on which I'm planning to put on a box arrangement to catch the chips from my chipper. I Know its Christmas but scruge was modelled on me. To that end I'v looked at having firms like tipmaster build for me but the prices blow me away. I've done a shed load of fibre glass and aluminium constructions through the years and know I can build what I want for a fraction of the cost. What I dont know is what legislation covers the build quality/construction methods/materials etc for this type of job and does it come under any form of vosa inspection, if indeed there are any? Also has anyone else done a home build like this?

are any of you fans of diybandmill.com? If so have any of you taken the plunge into making a bandmill and how succesful was it? Find the site really inspiring and often wonder if it would be fun or just an expensive waste of time to build from scrap/new a custom made bandmill

It was a general question really as all the various options have pros and cons. Just wondered if one stood out head and shoulders above the rest. I'm getting the picture that the alaskan is the easiest and perhaps most versatile. Thanks to all for your responses:001_smile:

just wondered what thoughts folks have with the regards to the pros and cons of an alaskan mill v a logosol mill?

Thanks for all you suggestions. Managed to get some funding via focus on forestry first, so that will be a great help to start on the courses route

like so many of these government organizations, they mean well but ultimately its pencil jockeys with very little grasp of the real material world who get to run the show. Microsoft makes making forms child's play and the more forms punched out by offices that the staff in them can show are being filled, the more secure thier jobs are. The size of mail bag is crucial to all gov departments as it shows they are important and should command bigger budgets.....I know I used to work in one. Its 'yes minister' all over. Seriously though I think my earlier post with that court case could be a direction worth looking at. The environment agency site is stuffed full of pressure articles to use chippings. So if they are going to be used in one form or another, what ever that may be, it is my argument that until they go for landfill the stuff is not waste and so how can it be treated as such. Why dont we get tangling with the pencil jockeys by bombarding them with letters outlining the double standards they willingly show on thier own website.

Found an interesting section on the EA website - Environment Agency v Armstrong Environmental Services Ltd: Timber waste to wood chip is exempt from waste licensing regime. [Restricted] At a hearing of the Administrative Court on 22 March 2005 it was held that the conversion of timber waste into wood chip was a manufacture from waste into a timber product and therefore exempt under the waste management licensing regime. Could it not be said that the brash was waste from the manufacture of log/timber and by converting it to chip you were making it into a timber product and as stated above exempt under the waste management licensing regime?

Missed it but will try and see the news later to see if it crops up again. What did it have to say?

Has anyone got any suggestions on the best start I can make in tree climbing. I'm not a tree surgeon or arborist but do clear fallen trees that ultimately go to my sawmill. Anything on the bigger scale or off the ground I call in the pros. However I'm increasingly being offered work that is beyond my current skill level and due to my contractors being fully booked I'm missing opportunities. I'm now starting to look at how to go about the early stages of climbing training to see how well suited to the work I might be with a view to undergoing further, more significant training. All this has to be fitted around current work loads, family and all that other stuff life throws at you. I'm based in Swansea and local training options do not seem to fit my needs. Hope some of you guys can give me some pointers other than pointing at the ground and saying 'stay there'

the mighty google what would we do without it .....washing up, chores around the house, shopping trips, etc etc.....thank goodness so much needs to be researched these days

It must be a rare collectors item then

Hey thats my web page lol!