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Bad luck, bit close to me for comfort. Think I might be making a few arrangements. Alec

That looks to be an illustration from 'The Grafter's Handbook' by A.Garner.... I chose that as a school prize (how long ago I don't wish to think about!) and still find it useful. Alec

A dead hedgerow elm, about 6" across. Dig out the rootball with a mattock and trim up to as neat as you want it. You can then either drill it for a handle, or sculpt down the first bit of the trunk. Mine is not pretty but it is very hard and works for anything rough, from driving a froe to banging in posts. Alec

Yes, most people don't have any aluminium lying around Whether you need a thick rail or a thin rail depends a lot on how you use the mini-mill. If you are using it for quartering then you can start by skimming the top off the log, giving you a flat face to work from. This means you can use a very thin guide plank (mine is 6" x 3/4") as it is held flat against the 'true' surface of the butt. You can then do the leap-frogging trick, but some care is needed to keep it straight as you move it whereas if it's full length you don't have to worry about it. If you are using the mini-mill to take the sides off over-width butts or to make square beams with slightly waney corners then you have some or all of the guide rail in free space, so it needs to be stiff enough to support itself between supports. Alec

I'm very near Haverhill, we'll keep an eye out. Alec

You are just coming in to about the worst possible time to move them unfortunately. Can they wait until Autumn? If so, they will do much better. Otherwise, at least the root system won't have spread too much. Take as much of a rootball as you can (wrap it in a sack), stake well once moved, not high but securely so the roots don't rock, mulch heavily for water retention and water well. Should be OK. Alec

These are too far for me, but I suggest putting some dimensions up (diameter across the bottom end, and across the heartwood), plus length. It's not dead straight, so I suggest giving a length to the bend (ie the longest section you could mill straight) and then an overall length. Alec

This is about blue stain. Sycamore stains really easily at any damp spots on the surface. Removing the sawdust prevents trapped damp and if you stack it conventionally it stains where the stickers touch. Seasoning it vertically (aka 'reared') means only the very top corner and bottom corner touch anything. Once the surface is decently dry you can move it to a conventional stack. There is a sawmill in Yorkshire I think which has developed some special plastic stickers with a series of fingers that stop the contact area being large enough for stain to result, so they can now stack conventionally. The problem is that sycamore is not that high value a timber, so given that it takes a lot more effort than other woods it is very rarely worth the effort to mill, unless there is a specific use for it, or you are short of something else to do! There is a demand for it for kitchens etc, but they want it white, which means felling in winter. Felled now it will go darker, which personally I think is really attractive but isn't in fashion. I milled a tree felled last Easter, so pretty much exactly this time of year, and coincidentally almost exactly the same diameter as the one pictured. I suggest getting it done pretty quickly to get the stress out of it - it seems to develop end shakes far more easily than surface checks, so milled and reared in the shade it would be fine, although it will be a bit darker than is standard. Alec

Cord here too, but don't use anything frayed, as I found out to my cost. The frayed bit happened to end up near the edge and jammed between piston and bore - fortunately it was a big, heavy cast iron lump (Villiers engine on a Teles) and due force was applied, but it could have been terminal on a modern saw. Alec

I am now most of the way through an extension to my house, which is listed and the spec. was lime on the visible brickwork plinth at the base - I had to do a test panel to the Listed Building Officer's satisfaction. It got quite entertaining as originally she specified that non-hydraulic lime be used while Building Control required cement. We let them fight it out for a bit and in the end my architect suggested NHL5 which they both agreed to be a suitable compromise (it's what we had planned all along but much easier to get them to accept when it seemed like a compromise for both of them. The Listed Buildings Officer also kept telling me my joints were too wide - I am using brickworks seconds which are very close to the original 15th century bricks and anything but straight. In the end I put some bricks together dry, touching one another and pointed up the outside. She conceded that I couldn't make the joints any narrower as my minimum gap was around 2mm - she had got a vision that old brickwork looked like Georgian style work with tuck pointing. I enjoy using lime - I went on and used it for all the blockwork too. The roof ridge and eaves are done in Snow Cem though, on the recommendation of my architect, but still with sharp sand and brushed over. I use a stiff bristle brush just after the mortar is solid but before it has set hard. I must admit I prefer the carpentry though, particularly since I have milled or cleaved or hewn every piece of timber in the thing, right down to the tile batten! Alec

It helps if it confirms an owner, but if not it just tells you that the land is not registered. Alec

This is very true, but from experience it is no better if they are already providing their best service and you incentivise exceeding it. This is how my second example ends up. To extrapolate from your example - imagine they were achieving a clutch change in a day, but you give them an incentive to achieve two clutch changes in a day. They get themselves organised and really efficient, and by parallel working etc they can cut the time to 12hrs for two - looks good, you are in profit, they are paid more. But, actually they are working 12hr days, you are paying them for 10. Anyone who needs to get away (maybe to pick up the kids etc) is seen as not being prepared to pull their weight, so you let them go. That encourages the others to up their game - maybe 14hrs a day will be better. After a while, you have a really shattered workforce who are run-down and drained, on the treadmill. Any sense of work-life balance has gone. They are getting their 'bonus' but they don't really care anymore as they are too tired to use it. Then they don't need a decent pay rise as the 'bonus' covers it. I don't know how the above ends, as we haven't quite got there yet, but I don't see how it ends well. I do know that most of my team will respond if I drop them an email now, with a fair number still responding up to midnight and a couple at one or two in the morning, and they will all be in by 8 tomorrow, and this goes on 5 or 6 days a week, with probably some work on the 7th day too. Not suggesting that all bonus schemes end up this way, but it's certainly food for thought. Alec

Bear in mind this experience isn't in arb, but I've worked for two companies which had incentive schemes, one very small (5 people) the other very large (900 people). A few comments from my experience. The two schemes were very different in their reason for existence. The first one was a non-performance related bonus. Jobs had contingency on. At the end of the year, the un-used contingency went in the pot and was shared out between everyone, based on days worked, regardless of salary or anything else. The second one is a very complex performance-based structure which defines objectives which every function in the company can contribute to, with a threshold value above which performance is high enough that the function is making a contribution to the total. This includes things like profit targets for the income generating functions, safety (measured against accidents), appropriate investment in new equipment (purchasing function) etc. If enough functions exceed threshold, and there is enough profit, a pay-out is made. Having worked with both, I liked the former, I don't like the latter, even though it pays out a lot more. The former had no real bearing on the job, other than making people happy and being a good reason not to do something stupid and raise costs. The latter, which in theory looks like a better way to incentivise, by allowing everyone to make a defined contribution, actually drives a whole load of short-term and conflicting behaviours - burn the orderbook now, don't worry about long-term investment as you will get a pay-out today and who knows what tomorrow will bring. There is also an unofficial, discretionary bonus scheme for senior staff based on local profit, which makes things even worse (if I have won a job, I am better off getting my team to do it badly than to let another team do it better as the former will get me a bonus, the latter will get me a slapping and the other manager a bonus as his figures will look better). Large, complex bonus schemes also become used as an excuse not to make reasonable pay rises, which then leaves people dependent on the bonus, which puts them at financial risk. It's also worth thinking about the scale, the impact and the timing. An extra hundred quid is very welcome in the November pay-packet as it pays for Christmas, whereas a well-meaning extra two-hundred to the wrong person in February/March could see them just pushed over a tax/benefit threshold and see them filling in a tax form, or failing to do so and getting fined most of the bonus back (or having to pay an accountant more to straighten it out for them than the bonus was worth in the first place). FWIW, I once had a bonus paid out at the wrong time, which I resolved by deferring it to the next tax year, but you look really ungrateful when you do it. Overall, something token and simple (like the first one was) worked much better - the latter is better replaced with a modest pay rise in my opinion. Alec

Hydraulic lime is fine in damp conditions due to the chemical set. There are different grades which determine both set and ultimate hardness - as with a cement mortar you don't want it harder than the stones. Unlike a cement mortar, you should use sharp sand so you need enough lime in the mix to fill up the gaps between the particles. This means you can't deviate much from 3:1 - 2.5:1 so you control hardness by selecting the correct grade. This is likely to be NHL5 but could be NHL3.5 if the stone is soft. If you want the right look, use well washed sharp sand, keep the mix stff and ram it down the joints hard with a blunt ended stick (I use an old bit of ceiling lath). Overfill the joints slightly above flush. Once the mortar has gone crumbly, scrape off flush and level with a stick, allow to dry a bit more until part-set and brush off with a stiff brush to remove the lime from the surface and expose the aggregate - this makes it weather much better. If you want the look with less effort, use snowcem instead of lime as it doesn't need to be kept so stiff or rammed in. You do need to be very aware of timing for brushing off though - lime is next day or later, snowcem is a couple of hours or you're too late. Alec

Big old Stihls are good as they keep going, parts availability is excellent (OEM and pattern) and the fact that they are heavy is less of an issue when milling. They also tend to have manual oilers which helps for long bars. I would suggest keeping an eye out for an 075 or 076 (see current thread) or an 070. An 090 would be great, but they tend to make a lot more. Alec

I would welcome it on my field - any that anyone wants to tip here will be stacked through until harvest, meanwhile I'll add as much green stuff as possible to maintain nitrogen balance and accelerate decomposition. Depending on how well broken down it is, it will either be spread before ploughing or after sowing. I'm on heavy clay and it will give me better soil structure and ultimately better yield. Alec

I use a 6"x1". A lot depends on which approach you want to use. I mill the surface flat first with the Alaskan so I don't need rigidity in the board (it's on a flat surface) so would rather keep it lighter and have the extra depth of cut - even with a 36" bar on it doesn't always go clean through when quartering big stuff. It is also easier to counter any warp the board develops as I can knock the nails in to hold it flat to the cut. If you want to use it for edging up logs prior to milling, a 6"x2" will support itself better in free space above the edge of the log. Alec

Eucalyptus is pretty heavy, as Jon (Nepia) and I can attest! It also turns out to be pretty hard. It can be extremely challenging to season though. I do have a lump which has been kicking around in my garden for about 10yrs - probably wide enough and long enough. It may be dry by now - I can have a look if you like? Alec

The Stihl online policy no longer applies Rob D has what you are looking for. Alec

Yes it can be done, but ideally you want to put a crosscut chain on. It's all in the set-up so consider your pricing carefully. To get it right you will spend a lot of time setting levels and positions relative to the very short time actually cutting. In a typical milling job you bang out board after board after board and the customer forgets the set-up time (if they're watching then it's all the in the building excitement phase). I would make the cut by pivoting about a single point at the powerhead end. Anything else is hard to avoid rocking the nose end backwards, which will create ridges on the surface. I love this kind of stuff, Burrell hates it (he likes flying through the boards) which is one of the reasons we work together well! Alec

Pear may be worth a go. Very very heavy and about the hardest thing I've milled. Big enough too, but would need staining if you want it dark. Alec

It is impressive - you could drop in on Kew whilst you were there too! I can't find a close-up picture of the dates, but this link (assuming it works) is quite informative. Cathedral Grove | Big Trees: Pictures & Politics | Big Trees as Trophies Alec

Link works fine on mine (smiley is at the end), however yes, I did mean that one. I was at a conference at the Materials Department of Imperial College a few years back with a couple of my people - one French, the other Italian and now the Natural History Museum is free it's possible to just drop in for ten minutes so I took them to see it. They were both seriously impressed. Alec

I like this one File:Sequoiadendron giganteum wood - Natural History Museum of London.jpg - Wikimedia Commons Alec

I bought a backing pad and a box of discs for the angle grinder from my local welding supply place. Very cheap and extremely effective. Alec