WorcsWuss

I don't think the Arb degree has been knocked... it's a proper science based subject and to reach the highest levels of the profession a sound academic qualification is a must if you're giving advice. And it's not the sort of thing anyone would just wander into uni and do, it's a conscious step down a decent career path... It's kids merrily going off to do 'law' or English or 'travel & toursim' or 'great biscuits of the early 20th century' because they either don't have the imagination to research a career, any passion to follow an interest or subject , or are simply too idle to get a job, who I take issue with. It costs the country a lot for these wastrels to toss off 3 or 4 years doing a pointless degree, only to then whinge about not being offered a CEO position at 25 years old 'Because I've got a degree you know'.... And they never pay their student loans back either! [Fees may as well be 100 MILLION POUNDS... makes no difference in reality....] Just hopping off my soap boax to get a coffee.... !

I thought self awareness was quite a few rungs up the evolutionary ladder....?

Fair point.... Like you I chose not to go for a degree but did choose to pursue a career which was perceived to need one. Actually, as it turns out, you don't need one and experience is just as good! I do feel that the Commies obsession with making everyone equal and encouraging EVERYONE to go to university [and making it some kind of divine right & essential qualification to exist] has devalued degrees a lot.... A 'degree' in leisure & tourism is not quite the same as a degree in quantum mechanics is it....? And as you point out, suddenly there's lots of people out there with BA's who are baffled as to why the haven't got a 40% taxed job.... Er... Media studies from an ex-poly is not quite in the same league as maths from Cambridge!

God bless the internet.... infinitesimally - definition of infinitesimally by the Free Online Dictionary, Thesaurus and Encyclopedia. Omnipotent | Define Omnipotent at Dictionary.com

We all do it now and again.... you all think I'm an average 30 something married Englishman.... I'm actually a 16 year old cheerleader from Arkansas.....

Most peculiar.....

I have to admit that it's easy for me to give an opinion, I don't depend on it for a living.... The project I'm quoting now is budgeted at £1.2m and I expected the electrics to come in at about £300k... so far I've got a price on my desk of £170k, one I'm told is going to be around £400k and one at over £800k is coming tomorrow..... so £150 quid extra in your pocket for doing a dangerous job, even if it is any easy one for you, doesn't seem like such a big deal to me..... If it's there to be made, take it and enjoy it!

No, robbery would be doing a crap job and charging 300 quid.... If you do a great job and the customer is happy and you charge 300 quid that's not robbery, that's good business.... You've got to get over your shame at making a decent profit people, it's what we're all here for after all!

That's easy for the man with the MASSIVE axe to say....

Eh? I thought America already was god....? They did invent the internet afterall...... Oh.... hold on......

£210 in the beer jar....

I use this for splitting SW kindling.... Stihl Swiss switch | F R Jones and Son Just mind, you can have fingers off with it!

Quite right..... I only ever win tenders with the cheapest price if I cock something up [it does happen, like mis-typing £10000 as £1000.... even with a £9k advantage I was only hundreds cheaper!].... but I've won plenty of jobs by being the most knowledgable & helpful, even if we were a few grand dearer.... There will always be competition on price, but there are also plenty of people out there for whom service is the most important factor..... I'm a great believer that more of us should be building businesses around profit and service rather than low prices, turnover and speed.... And it's easier to get into this position if you're starting out than it is to change an established business.... Start as you mean to go on....

In our world & understanding anyway.... could be something entirely different out ther.... Uuuurrrrr.... I need a lie down.... Oh, and I think the sun-laser-powered-sailing-space-ship is just about the coolest thing I've ever heard....

The police haven't got time to waste on trivial things like stolen equipment.... tsk.... What sort of 'forestry bits & bobs' was it? Chains & so forth...?

Sounds like a great little enterprise... take him round the local petrols stations, if they don't have it ask them if they want to stock it.... if they do have it, see what they're charging and find out what they pay.... Good on him!

Anyone remember the problems with construction cartels....? It's why we all have to sign anti-collusion certificates when we tender for council work now... I vote we start an Arb Cartel... like an Arbtel.... If someone reckons they will do this for 150 quid then go for it, but you still have to charge £300 but put half of it in the beer fund.... Hurray! We all win! I would go £300 incidentally... Just because you can do 3 jobs in a day doesn't the customer is entitled to just pay for a 3rd of a day, and it doesn't mean you should only charge a 3rd of a day. What if you don't have another local job to go onto the next time they ask you for the same sort of thing...? Do you try to charge for the full day then? Charge a full day for each and it means on the days you're quiet you're not on the verge of folding up. It also means that everyone's not scraping along at low margins buying work which will soon see the industry on it's knees, just like construction.... Don't sell yourself short! If you want £300 then ask for it!

I just got this! Stop Steve Bullman... freedom of speech for all!

Don't get it.... I know that wikipedia is offline today in protest but as I have no grasp of US politics this goes way over my head....

Looks like a slightly newer version of the type.... If the cable is too thin you won't do anything with it yet. But assuming you get it set up with the right cable then you could certainly try pulling stumps with it, that's what mine used to be used for by the previous owner....

This presumably is SRT & lets you set your climbing line in the same way as DdRT..? I have thought of installing something like this for DdRT for the purpose of lowering a climber which has 'ceased to function', but with a pulley set on the line at the top, opposite side of the anchor, with the climbing line running though the pulley so that if all goes fubar the whole anchor can be lowered from the ground without having to perform aerial rescue... Obviously it would only work if there there are no other lanyards attached to said climber, which is unlikely, as I would have thought that if you end up unconscious it's having been clobbered by something you cut off so there is going to be work positioning involved... so I've never actually bothered to try it....

Of course, but sometimes you need to be where you need to be, that's when I have a problem, when I'm working across a lean and have no choice but to be in that position. One of the ash I took down had 3 limbs off the top of the stem, each one came down in one piece dropped with a portawrap, but to get at the one facing the road, which was the one which needed to come down first, I was forced to work from the side with the lean across me...

Are we talking about a stem leaning away from us or across us? That might explain difference of technique...? If the stem's leaning away from me then I just pay out some more line as others do, no biggie.... but if it's leaning across me then I'm like a kitten on ice....

I tried that but the stem was so thin it was difficult to get away from the stem, it was pulling that hip into the stem and letting the lower hip swing out....

I find this puts even more leverage on the line and makes it even harder to stop myself swinging round.... I have to get as close in to the tree as I can without gaffing out, [bow-legging helps me a bit] and lean right into the harness.... I was on some thin ash stems along a roadside the other week and they were all leaning out over the road away from the bank hunting for light, I needed to cut across the lean so that they'd fall parallel with the road & power lines [ish! they were rigged down], I really struggled to stay in the right place, I could only get comfortortably [relatively!] positioned by pulling in a lanyard from the up hill side and pulling against that as well on my down hill D ring. Was a bit cluttered but did work... You can clip both ends of the flip onto the ventral rather than D's in this configuration as well, avoids the 'circle of death'