agg221

Flashpoint is 340degC, and it's not a crosslinked polymer but a modified thermoplastic, but it's still a petrochemical, although not subject to REACH. I know it's the residue rather than the container they don't like, but the truth is that with the amount of rinsing/washing/polishing we are all supposed to do on every item of recyclable food packaging that crosses our threshold before they'll collect it, leaving the lid off an Aspen container to lose the last ml (after all, given the price, who in their right mind is going to leave any in there:001_smile:) is hardly an issue. Alec

There are an enormous number of different petrochemicals. They vary initially in fractional distillation, subsequently in any further segregation, again in ongoing processing. Ethylene, for example, requires almost perfect separation to make viable polyethylene, whereas 'anything that boils in the right range' will do for diesel. More refining = more cost. Yes, it definitively is. Not every time, but sometimes. Remember the silicone incident a few years back? There was a recent batch kicking around in my area that caught a few people too (including myself and my neighbour). The RAC bloke knew what would be wrong with it before he arrived, and he was right, it being about the 20th vehicle he had attended that day with the same problem. Garage confirmed it when they fixed it, but still my cost as you can't prove it. HDPE (i.e. milk bottles) are also petrochemicals. Alec

I think you're thinking of child benefit. £50k after deduction of pension and salary sacrifices such as childcare vouchers (get these if you possibly can!) It was objected to on the grounds that if anyone in the 'household' earns over £50k it was switched off - that applied if you had a partner move in who was nothing to do with your kids and was paying maintenance in respect of a previous family, so didn't have much left over anyway, whereas two people earning £49k weren't affected. The objections didn't get anywhere in the end and it kicked in in January. Alec

Hi canoehead/Spud, Spud - do you remember my 066 did this and was a right pain? I did the oil tank full of petrol thing, which didn't shift it. Not sure what you did to it in the end? Alec

You have my sympathy. It was my wife's go today - ended up at the doctor's followed by the two of us administering eye-drops for conjunctivitis to a protesting 2yr old. Alec

I never thought I'd be one of those people who would say "when you have children...." but, when you have children..... The answer is, because they won't. When an adult is ill, they're typically pretty level. They also tend to be more logical than emotional. When a child is ill, they're up and down. A child of that age, however sensible, will go through troughs, when they feel rotten and need to cuddle up to Mum or Dad, and peaks when they feel better and get bored. You can't lock them in the cab, as they can't get your attention when they need the toilet, or if they start to feel much worse (not to mention any ethical considerations), or even just "Daddy, I'm bored" so they will suddenly pop up on the worksite - whose job is it to watch out for them? If you're up the tree, what will you do while Dad sorts them out (could take half an hour or so)? If you're on the ground and Dad's up the tree, Dad will have to come down to sort them out. What about safety issues when they first appear and don't fully get the dangers of the situation? Or, if they stay in the cab and get bored, what buttons can they press? Handbrake? Are you certain there's nothing sharp or otherwise dangerous (e.g. medicines) in the cab? It's hard enough to keep an eye on them while doing paperwork. Anything else, forget it I'm afraid. Alec

Hi Patrick, Ebay is the biggest source for choice. You need to be careful though - there are some real bargains to be had but also some things to be very aware of. Some faults are easily fixed with cheap parts, some easily fixed with expensive parts and others leave you set up for a lot of hard work and maybe needing specialist tools - judging which is not always easy, particularly for the unwary or inexperienced. Take four recent 076 sales on ebay. The first needed a new fuel line and not much else; the second needed a fuel line (following which it ran) but is in need of more attention, the third is held together with a rag-bag of bolts, many of which are wrong, and needs the fuel tank welding but will really only need a new plug (and lead as the old one is melted) and some service parts (no, I didn't buy three 076 saws, but I do know where these three are). The fourth, currently on ebay as spares or repair, will almost certainly need the entire crank case dismantling to replace the gasket between the oil tank and the crank case, together with new bearing seals whilst it's apart. This will be long, slow and tedious, but not cost much in parts unless something else is found to be wrong with it. If you buy 'spares or repair' assume the worst and be pleasantly surprised by anything better than this. If you buy a runner, I would suggest cash on collection. That way you can verify that it starts, idles properly (i.e. not totally worn out) and runs up nicely, then slows up straight away when you take your finger off the throttle (not got a major air leak). Then budget for a pressure and vacuum check and compression check before doing any serious work with it, together with basic service items. With the size of bar you're thinking of, I would suggest 070/075/076, as they will all pull it happily and the 066 will be limited to 36" and be slow as soon as the chain is anything other than perfect. The 066 also makes a lot more money, which is probably unnecessary to spend. You are unlikely to get a suitable size bar with the saw - you will almost certainly end up needing to buy one at the same time as the mill, but they're readily available to suit from chainsawbars.co.uk which is the cheapest source of a mill if you claim your Arbtalk 10% discount. Alec

You've slightly mis-read me there. They will be peaceful and quiet -without- the Nurofen. Give them the Nurofen and they will be back to normal, i.e. racing round the house! The point is it's tempting to withold the medication to get a quiet life (but of course we don't!). It's not long-term usage - we're talking about a couple of doses for a couple of days, then they probably won't need any for a few months. As it happens, they probably won't be going in today as No.1 daughter woke up with a temperature of 39 and No.2 daughter looks terrible, even though she seems happy enough and her temperature is OK. We will probably give her a half dose of Nurofen, which takes away the swelling around her eyes, making her more comfortable, and then play it by ear. Alec

I would go with iroko - it's the small paler 'flecks' of the open grain. In beech, the small flecks would be darker than the bulk rather than lighter, and would be closed (solid) rather than open (slightly sunken). I've seen iroko remain pale like this. It used to be used for solid wood benchtops in laboratories and Dad salvaged some from one once which was this colour on the underside. You are also likely to find that on the unfinished surface some parts almost 'shimmer' as you tilt them, depending on the cut. There's quite a lot of silica in iroko, which will make it a bit hard wearing on tools and abrasives, but it will give a good durable finish (as witnessed by how long the floor has lasted). Alec

I know what you mean about not good - sometimes the peace and quiet is welcome...! It lasts about 4-6hrs too, which is pretty useful. Tomorrow the plan is that we dose our elder daughter up before she goes in, then I will nip over at lunchtime and administer more. Should see her through to the end of the day with a bit of luck. Can only do this with an accommodating pre-school though. Alec

Both our two (2 and 4) currently have bad colds. On the face of it they look a bit bunged up and bleary eyed but sit quietly and watch the television. What you can't see is that they would normally be racing around the house. The childminder will still take the younger one as she can sleep most of the day, but the older one is at pre-school and they simply haven't got anywhere for her to quietly go to sleep for a couple of hours. Got away with it for the past couple of days by picking her up a bit early, but they may refuse to take her if she isn't better tomorrow. What you also can't see is that the elder one had a temperature of 39.5 before the Nurofen kicked in. Alec

That one isn't for the faint-hearted! This model has the oil tank built into the front of the crank case and it looks like the seal between them has gone. If so, it's not particularly expensive in parts but you do have to split the crank case to do it and renew all gaskets etc. Probably worth doing the bearing seals at the same time. It's do-able, but will need the right tools and a fair amount of time. Alec

I like my Gomtaro 300. I use it for pruning fruit trees and it's quick enough at taking large branches (I've done up to 8" apple) but precise enough for neat cuts and leaves a decent finish. I have nothing to compare it to though. Alec

If you just want it to go to a good home and put a few quid in your pocket, I think you will achieve this easily. The other practical point is moving it - these things are very very heavy and you'll need rollers. When I bought my Royal I picked it up near Nuneaton in a Ford Escort van. It was already outside on a pallet (covered in snow) and was loaded using a teleporter, but I unloaded it using an engine hoist. I could just about stand it back up on my own, and rolled it on short lengths of scaffold pole. It's currently dismantled and when I finish the extension it will be going for re-enamelling in a nice dark blue, then it will be installed. Alec

Yes - I've got some. I bought a big box full of two wrecked TS760s (top end gone) and most of the parts are interchangeable. Alec

I know this sort of thing by reading it on: Model Profile: 123 This site contains more information than you could ever want on most models! I suggest buying a bigger mill than you need, probably 36". If you find you enjoy it and end up with a bigger powerhead, you can then run a 41" roller nose bar which will make best use of the mill. In the meantime, the extra length of the connecting bars isn't a problem as they just poke out of the end. If you do ever look to upgrade, don't write off older Stihls - the 075 or 076 is a very good value powerhead for this kind of thing, as is the 070. Parts availability is excellent (OEM and non-OEM) and they are built to last, just very heavy, which is less of an issue for milling. They can be had for a lot less money than an MS880. Alec

Hi James, do you want a clutch cover with or without the chainbrake? If you don't need the chainbrake I may have one available - drop me a PM if it's of use. Alec

Like Geoff I am lucky in having a local dealer, which helps. I could buy in bulk, and since it keeps forever it wouldn't be a problem, but some thieving git would probably set fire to it to cover their tracks, so I'm not inclined to. On costs, I think it's a more difficult equation. Pump fuel round my way is about £7.15 for 5l. Stihl 2-stroke oil is about £1 to add to it, so 5l of mix is £8.15. This compares with Aspen which is currently £17 at my local dealer, i.e. an extra £9/5l can. I can't talk about arb work, and how many litres you would get through in a day, but milling using efficient kit, last time I measured it I made 108 sq.ft of cut area from 0.9l of mix (an extra cost of £1.62). This is difficult to equate to cu.ft as obviously the thinner you cut, the more fuel you use for a given volume of timber, but it's still priced the same per cu.ft. However, take a worst case scenario (thinnest planks) of milling 1" boards, that would be 9cu.ft, so adding 18p/cu.ft. In my case, I'm not selling it, but assuming I was then £20/cu.ft would be a reasonable baseline figure. That would be 1% of my total price. I also suspect that if I put my price up to £20.20 per cu.ft it wouldn't lose me any customers. In practice though, this is irrelevant - I use Aspen because I like a whole load of things about it, so I'm happy to keep buying it, so long as the price doesn't rocket Alec

I mostly agree with Rhob. I'm not sure Rob D is the only importer, but he's certainly the cheapest (if you claim your Arbtalk discount!). If you buy your ripping chain from him at the same time you can probably save on the postage too. I don't know the Dolmar 123, but 70cc on an older, high torque saw will work quite well. I've stuck an 044 (72cc) on a 36" bar before and used it full width for milling. It wasn't a pleasure, but it did it. I would suggest buying the 36" mill and a 28" or 30" bar. You're much better off with a roller nosed bar than a solid nose as the latter takes a fair bit of the power out of the saw, and also tends to get hot more easily which can be a problem on long cuts. Once you've lost the 2" at the dogs end and the 4" at the nose end, plus 1" for each of the mill clamps, a 30" bar will give you about 22" of cut width, which the saw should handle fine. I've not tried leylandii, but I've seen it used on Grand Designs once and it sanded up nicely so it can't be too bad. It won't be that durable but for internal work I would have thought it should be fine. Alec

Yes, this is always possible, but I'd be surprised if it ran at all in that case Alec

In the UK they're not making as much - see Ebay completed listings. A clean solid fuel one is currently making about £200-300, depending largely on location, although a lot more for a commercial one (£2-3k). There are more Royals about than No.2s - main difference being the top which has a hinged cover on the Royal, and the flue design. Many of the frame parts are interchangeable (have the same serial numbers if you download their respective manuals). A set of firebricks is about £80, the grate and frame £50 and the ashpan about £25, so about £155 in parts, plus about £20 in postage if you can't get them at internet prices locally. If there's £175 to spend, and you can get a working one for under £300, it's not surprising that converted ones aren't making much. It does look nice and clean, but it's a shame they went in through the front with the oil pipe, rather than the side. Alec

I think what you've got is an air leak into the crankcase, through the base of the pot where the bolts were loose. This has been causing the saw to run lean, resulting in damage to the piston on the exhaust side. The bigger saws tend to keep running with some damage to the piston in my experience, but there will be considerable loss of power as there will be leakage around the piston. Far more significantly, there will probably be some aluminium transfer to the pot, but if it's running this may be minor at this stage. A non-OEM piston can be had for this model, but not the pot. I would therefore very strongly recommend having the pot off now, getting it properly cleaned up, checking what state the bottom gasket is in (likely to not be great if it's been running loose, and may well still leak) and then fitting a new gasket and piston. This will cost less than £30 all in, rather than several hundred if he wrecks the pot! Alec

I don't know, but I will be very interested when you get an answer, as mine does something similar. I'm in the process of changing the fuel line and impulse line as first contenders for this, then going to be pressure tested to look for leaks in the gaskets. Alec

This may be of interest: Welcome to InCrops Note - it's in Norwich, and free for small companies from East Anglia to attend (pre-registration required). Not sure if those from further afield can go or not. Alec

Ah, 'proper' trees! I like MM106 - takes a bit more work but very forgiving. 11 acres is a fair scale. I planted the smaller trees in Kent from the late '80s onwards, also as a teenager. I've planted a third of an acre at our place as a mixed smallholding type orchard for our own use. I propagated most of them from scratch over the past few years - I enjoy starting with stock and getting to the first fruit, very satisfying. Alec