agg221

Well, it's not on the bench as it's too long to fit, but the Teles DW4 lives! Finally got round to sorting the timing out on the engine and it fired up second pull. If anyone thinks an MS880 is big and loud, try a 250cc engine with no silencer. Fortunately I have no neighbours, as I've literally just come in from starting it. Now just need to sort out a few bits and pieces, bolt it back together and it's ready to roll. Alec

Yes. There's a statutory minimum width, which from memory used to be 3' but is now something like 1.5m. I haven't seen any stipulations over the maximum height, so standard 6' fence panels should be fine. The same footpath that runs through my parents' next door neighbours' place also runs through theirs. It's been fenced for so long that we get away with the 3' width, and use chainlink as it's harder to break down than a fence panel. It also has a bridge in it (we go under, path goes over). Not sure if it's strictly within the rules, but it does the job! Alec

You also need a really good justification. "Because it's a bit inconvenient" or "they trample some of my crop" really won't cut it, as my parents' next door neighbours found to their cost. Alec

Ah, that makes more sense. Your original post said 60cm x 150, which I assumed to be cm, but if it's mm then yes, you do need something significantly bigger and Big J's Alaskan is probably ideal. Alec

How big is big? With a 60cm depth on your throat, you should be able to halve a 4ft log, which is bigger than the 42" that BigJ can do, unless I'm missing something? If I'm not missing something, then propping the half up on edge and then running through at full depth again should give you your quarters for 'sensible' sawing. In reality, you can afford to do something a bit bigger than this by going full depth, then taking a few full width boards (which will be quartered) until you get down to the halfway point on the log, or just beyond it. The other problem could be getting bits that big onto the mill though. In which case, I'd use an Alaskan rather than the mini-mill, as keeping the far end of a 4ft+ bar from drifting up or down is hard enough when it's supported. Alec

Believe me, it's small compared with the 2-man version with a 6ft bar on it! Alec

How much are you thinking of? Alec

Nice saw - I like the old ones and have a particular liking for Teles Smith as they were originally from Saffron Walden which is near me. I have one of the 2-man versions. Alec

That could work out handy. If there's a small power hammer wanting a home I could be persuaded - forging inch square rosehead nails in wrought iron by hand is not a pleasure. Mind you, not as entertaining as forging hammer heads as you can't get them really hot or the carbon burns out, so a lot of heavy sledging is involved. Alec

Si, probably better off leaving the dogs on then most of the time, but you might want to know they're free enough to get off if you have to. I've taken them off mine before to get the extra couple of inches. The sprocket, mill frame and dogs together mean you only get about 27.5" max through the cut on a 36" bar and it gets annoying hacking the sides off of a 30" log! Alec

Where's yours leaking from? Mine doesn't leak round the screw thread, but it does leak through the breather in the cap if it's not pointing the right way. The breather hole sticks out of the side of the knob and you have to screw it in so it's pointing upwards. Other option is to only fill so it doesn't come up to the cap when turned on its side - it's easy enough to refill in the cut with a funnel if you do long stuff. Alec

They look pretty handy. There's another way of making tongs that doesn't involve twists - you basically hammer the bar flat two different ways instead and then offset it. Hard to describe but it does the job. Haven't forged over charcoal, only coke. I haven't fired up the forge lately as the extension has become all-consuming, but I have some curtain poles and wall lights to do which will make a nice change from the heavier stuff I normally end up doing. Alec

Si, if you've bought the saw specifically for milling, I'd ask Spud to free off the dogs while it's there. They're no use for milling and lose you another couple of inches of bar. Alec

Setting up for blasting is surprisingly realistic with a bit of ingenuity. I have an old land rover to do, and couldn't be bothered to ship the parts around. I also want to do it a bit at a time. You need a decent sized compressor (£150 secondhand on ebay), a small blasting pot and gun (£50 new) and some media (price depends on size and type but approximately £7/sack). The clever bit is, use a tent as a blasting cabinet. The flyscreen works fine to keep the media in, with a couple of cut down jeans legs sewn in as armholes. I bought mine for a fiver on ebay. Just buy a tent as big as the biggest thing you want to blast. You do need to be aware of noise, grit in eyes and silicosis though, so you need proper eye, ear and dust-mask protection, together with heavy rubber gloves and tolerant neighbours! Alec

Solid and reliable. I have used mine quite hard for milling (Ripsaw band mill) with no problems, and did once stick a 36" bar on it to split a couple of butts down on the Alaskan - I wouldn't say this was a happy experience though, for me or it. Try to get the later one if you can, with the 12mm wrist pin (gudgeon pin) as opposed to the earlier 10mm version. It makes it easier to get a replacement pot and piston should you need one at some point. Alec

Cutting with the grain is ripping, same cut as in milling timber. The same chain (ripping chain) will help. Ash can be surprisingly hard to rip cut but with a very sharp ripping chain it should be OK. Alec

Yes, all varieties are susceptible to some extent, although my observation was that Williams was far worse than Doyenne de Comice. I don't think soil type makes much odds, so long as the midges can bury in to it. There's a story in one of my books (by Raymond Bush, written c.1942 I think) of someone getting so fed up with it that he stirred cement into the topsoil in the autumn. Apparently the following year he had an enormous crop and couldn't work out what to do with them so he never bothered again. If you do follow the mulching with cardboard route, do the autumn mulch after the leaves are off. Ben - with pot-grown trees it's good practice to dig out the top inch or so every winter when the tree is dormant and replace it (John Innes No.2). If you do this then you should wipe out the midges. Alec

I'd agree with the pear midge diagnosis. If you wait until autumn, then mulch with cardboard (bark/shreddings over to weight it down), they get trapped under it and wiped out. Renew the cardboard in spring to kill weeds and retain water, and again in autumn etc. but rake the mulch back each time rather than just piling it on top, as you want to keep the layer no more than a few inches thick. Alec

Sweet chestnut is indeed resistant, about as good as oak. Robinia is good too. Might be able to help - do you need it green or seasoned? Alec

After cutting down to the ground, I would be inclined to chop through under the bramble crowns with a mattock and lift them. I find anything up to a few years old can be cut with a single swing of the cross-wise blade straight underneath, so it doesn't take long (it's not like digging out a stump), and since they issue shoots pretty much only from the crown, rather than anywhere along the roots as suckers, there is then no re-growth at all. Alec

I presume sweet chestnut? Alec

I haven't plastered over any yet so can't comment on consumption. I don't think it will be too bad - they're fairly flat and I reckon I won't need a total thickness above half an inch including snots to get the coverage. I don't mind if it's a bit 'wavy' as a surface - if I wanted flatness then I might as well use plasterboard! One other thing, which I've never seen mentioned anywhere but I've found helps. Once I've got the laths into the right length and width, and cleft as thin as they're going, I true them up with a billhook. I try to do this mostly on what will become the back face, but I also deliberately leave the billhook dull, and run it down the grain, not across as you would with a side axe. This creates a combination of tearing and 'furring' on the surface, so if it has to be used as the front face, or bits of it do, the plaster will stick well. Good luck! Alec

I've never done it, but a lot of people register previously unregistered/registration lost classic vehicles (my knowledge is only of land rovers which seem to have been bought as estate vehicles and never registered). It seems it's fairly easy to do - simple form, chassis/vin number needed depending on age. If it's a classic and hence tax exempt you seem to get a bit more of a serious looking at to check it's legit, and getting the relevant owners' club involved seems to be the easiest route as they tend to get the job of vetting them eventually for validity anyway (this is now official policy). Otherwise it just means normal road rules (e.g. MOT if necessary) apply. Alec

At first glance I wondered how on earth you'd got those bits hanging on the wall... Nice slabs though, and come out very square. Alec

I think to some extent it depends on what you're trying to produce. A bandsaw takes a far smaller kerf for a given throat. A racksaw takes a bigger kerf but can, with care, go in from one side only to quarter up a log. Personally, I wouldn't go for a chainsaw mill on a carriage if I was building it, as for me the two points a chainsaw mill scores on are low cost for a given throat size and portability (offset against low speed and wide kerf). On a carriage you lose some of the cost advantage by the time you've built it, and all of the portability. Kerf becomes more important the thinner the section you're trying to make, so for inch boards it's a big issue but for fenceposts, gateposts or beams it's less of an issue. Not that it's the league you're thinking in, but the biggest commercial mill in the UK runs circular saws - one comes in from the top and one from the bottom, with a gang of them in parallel to cut all the planks at once. The reason is speed - apparently you can't run logs down a bandsaw line faster than about 120m/min while a circular saw will do 170m/min. Kerf is 4.5mm, which overall makes less of an impact than the increased linespeed on all out production. Alec