openspaceman

10 hours ago, JaneH said:

never heard or seen a woodpecker in our garden and it seems an unlikely target tree being so small.

It is a the result of a woodpecker boring in after grubs, the eggs would have been laid, probably by a moth, when the wood was already under stress.

44 minutes ago, Dan Maynard said:

I used to have a lot of trouble with 3kW compressors , but I think a lot of that was bad wiring in to the property so voltage low. To get round it I installed a couple of blue 16A sockets on individual 16A breakers, which is what I now also run the log splitter from. If I recall my splitter says not to use a normal 13A socket anyway.

Same experience here and unless you have the old fashioned solid brass pins on the plug you will find it gets very hot above 10A.

13 hours ago, PeteB said:

Loaved

 a sort of love/hate

14 minutes ago, GarethM said:

That's how I store mine, not sure it's 50% air.

 

Plus an IBC is 1.2m3

Can you weigh a fresh one?

3 minutes ago, Johnsond said:

Agreed 

The light pollution from just one at  New Deer is nuts. 
I do wonder how this would go down if it was ran through the Surrey countryside or one of the other prime locations down south. 

Light pollution here is already so bad I can barely make out the Plough or Orion.

On 26/05/2024 at 18:50, openspaceman said:

 

I chop  four solid cubic metres of logs to last me the winter.

I need to revise that figure as I just measured my log store at 3.4m by 1.6m by 1.6m so 8.7m3 of carefully stacked wood, allowing 30% air space that is 6m3 of solid wood. With an average basic density (hardwood which is the bulk) of 400kg dry wood per m3 that makes it that I burn it to produce 12,000kWh of heat, that is a bit much for a small house but it leaks heat. It would cost me £1750 extra to do it with gas.

4 hours ago, GarethM said:

An IBC cages of firewood will weigh about the same as one filled with water when unseasoned.

I would doubt that. True most green wood hovers around 1m3 to the tonne but cut and split, then jumbled into  a 1000 litre container there will be 50% air space which will only weigh about 700 grams.

@lurkalot runs a forum

Lawn mowers

THEGARDENMACHINERYFORUM.CO.UK

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This board is for all lawnmowers including ride on mowers. If you're looking for advice on how to fix your lawnmower, or...

15 minutes ago, organic guy said:

Rachael Carson talks about the spread of DED in "Silent Spring"

I wasn't aware of that, I did read some of the book, mainly about DDT and dieldrin.

I was planning a different career path, so took little notice of trees, but was aware of the disease from seeing the trees dying as I drove west through Wiltshire in 1969, by !972 it was over with virtually all mature elms dead. Later we were still felling them  in 76, I felt very guilty  about felling one that was in rude health, it was isolated and on RAF Kenley. At the time we were told the runway was unused, so guess where we parked the lorry? On the second day and as we arrived to start work a plane landed.

2 hours ago, Steven P said:

Higher voltage overhead transmission lines are not insulated so don't suffer as much

Which is much what I said, there is a big difference between air and seawater.  All transmission lines can be modeled as a pair of wires with resistors and inductors along each wire and capacitors between them in a ladder like formation, with AC there is always reactive power involved and that causes increased I2R losses. HVDC only suffers resistance losses but the cost of the equipment for inverting HVDC to HVAC is much greater and was near enough impossible when the grid was built from 1931 onward. Transformers for stepping up and down AC were well understood (as were the losses). It's 55 years since I studied transmission lines and that was mostly to do with high frequency signals transmission.

It's a strange thing but before the gas and electricity grids homes had to manage their own energy requirements, with the economies of scale of fossil fueled generation we became dependent on pipes and cables across the country and into our homes. Now with the advent of cheap PV panels and lithium phosphate batteries a high degree of independence is possible.

5 hours ago, the village idiot said:

 

Our amazing volunteer Pete is in his mid 70's and still does a full day on the saws with us. He's a great role model for showing what is possible. He does do a yoga class once a week which probably helps a lot.

 

 

Good on Pete, I suppose I fit into that age class but half a day wears me out, I find the main problem is keeping the heart rate below 160, but then I was always nerdy rather than athletic.

10 hours ago, Steven P said:

The capacitance in a cable is within it - between the phases rather than it's surrounds, sea water won't affect it much

"Long undersea or underground high-voltage cables have a high electrical capacitance compared with overhead transmission lines since the live conductors within the cable are surrounded by a relatively thin layer of insulation (the dielectric), and a metal sheath. The geometry is that of a long coaxial capacitor. The total capacitance increases with the length of the cable. This capacitance is in a parallel circuit with the load. Where alternating current is used for cable transmission, additional current must flow in the cable to charge this cable capacitance. This extra current flow causes added energy loss via dissipation of heat in the conductors of the cable, raising its temperature. Additional energy losses also occur as a result of dielectric losses in the cable insulation. For a sufficiently long AC cable, the entire current-carrying ability of the conductor would be needed to supply the charging current alone. This cable capacitance issue limits the length and power-carrying ability of AC power cables" Donald G. Fink, H. Wayne Beatty, Standard Handbook for Electrical Engineers 11th Edition, McGraw Hill, 1978, ISBN 0-07-020974-X, pages 15-57 and 15-58 via wikipedia

20 minutes ago, Steven P said:

 

Not sure if they are dong another link but the Norway - UK link lands at Blyth - allows the UK to buy spare hydroelectricity from Norway... and in reverse we could sell them spare wind power to top up their hydro reserves.

 

 

 

Efficiency: At higher voltages you need less current (amps) to send the same power down the line. It is the current that causes most power losses - such as heating the wires - so if you can reduce the current it is more efficient. We can't go high voltage in the house else Mrs Miggins would blow her head off doing the toast in the morning, most of the power supplies in or around towns are no where near the 400kV in the question (You'd know if they were, the substations for that is quite large). 40KV will generally be well away from the population - soiling the view perhaps going over the endless plantations of spruce.

The under sea ones are all HVDC because the capacitance of the water would increase losses for AC. The buzzing from HVAC is worse in wet weather and represents transmission losses. I think AC is cheaper  overland up to1000km but because of planning concerns there will be undersea cables to avoid some overland connections from the north.

1 hour ago, AnnieDee said:

There's no sign of Beetles, I think they only move in when it's properly dying is that right?

The beetles carry the fungus, the females lay eggs under the bark and the larva  eat their way out, so the phloem layer has to be thick enough. Once hatched out the beetles then eat the leaf stalks and this infects a new part of the elm. The presence of the fungus triggers a response from the tree to block the fungus spreading, If the infection is present throughout the annual ring this  response prevents sap flowing, hence the parts of the tree upstream wilt and die.

3 hours ago, Steven P said:

I don't store many multiple years of firewood,

I don't and cannot because my log store would take up too much of the garden if I attempted it.

I chop  four solid cubic metres of logs to last me the winter.

As long as the store is full by the end of May and I use the first bay loaded in early April  first it will all be less than 20% mc when burned.

3 hours ago, sime42 said:

Excuse my lack of knowledge here, but how come everyone seems to have a Kukri? I've got one, two actually, that I inherited from my grandfather. I never talked to him about them though, so didn't hear the history. Were they handed out to everyone in the Services as a matter of course?

 

 

My father was a RAF radar fitter in Burma so I think he acquired it, probably as a swap on the year long trip home. I also have an SS dress dagger brought home by an uncle, who landed on D day with the pioneer corps, and a Wehrmacht dress bayonet found in the peat after a flash fire. My guess is that was a trophy too and one of the kids took it onto the common for war games.

BTW I cannot understand how a kukri was much use as a weapon, more a good general utility knife/slasher/chopper.

9 hours ago, roys said:

Usually the two smaller knifes served different functions, one was blunt (chakmak) and used for removing burrs from the main blade and the other was a small utility knife (Karda).

My dad said the small blunt one was for cleaning animal skins on his issue one, and the notches near the handle for opening bottles. I wonder what happened to it after he died.

4 minutes ago, roys said:

Good info and picture, what do you mean by “caulked handle” I am guessing it is the flatter profile rather than round but as I say only a guess?

The shaped one, a bit like a pistol grip, the oval section also give one a feel that the orientation of the blade to the target is right.

11 hours ago, sime42 said:

 

Yes please to photos. I think you're talking about socketed handle fitting, but I'm not sure.

Second attempt at posting.

@organic guy mentioned straps which I think mean two straps of metal on opposite side of the handle, I take a socket to be a frustrum of a cone attached to the blade. Ours were an incomplete socket formed by two cheeks of metal extended from the blade and folded around to form a  socket as in the slasher marked 1 in the attached picture. You will see a ring of steel has been driven down this incomplete socket ant then rivets fitted to hold it all in place. Our work ones were the same but the head was a double bladed yorkshire style. You would see these in many agricultural shops until everyone had a chainsaw.

Hook 2 is a round handle and you see the tang is peened over a washer to hold it.

Hook 3 was my goto billhook given to me for coppice work, when the tang broke I added a bit and it looks like I brazed the nut on. I prefer these caulked handles.

Hook 4 was the hook I used when picking up and dressing PSR material that was going to be peeled, it has measurements  filed on the back for checking top diameters and a hook filed in the beak so it was used as a pickaroon until the tang broke. After 1987 I never got involved with softwood first thinning and caulked handles are expensive, my carving skills mean this never got repaired.

The others are various swap hooks showing the peened tangs and one where the washer has rusted away and the tang is pulling out of the rotten wood.

1 hour ago, Steven P said:

Can you just poke some plumbing through it, a threaded connection with a washers and bolts to seal it and then any old ball valve? (I haven't ever looked at this but you must be able to get a suitable externally threaded pipe)

I have "joined" my two plastic drums for use as butts by filling a hose with water, weighting each end so they drop to the bottom and looping it between both drums while not allowing any air in.

23 minutes ago, difflock said:

From memory this engine is capable of being, or is inherently  "fuel agnostic" to sound all hi-faluting.

I think the multifuel engines would run on anything from gasoil through kerosene, avtur and low octane petrol. As they depend on compression ignition they will not fire on neat high octane petrol or avgas as that would need a spark.

The thing is they run well on gasoil/diesel but white smoke badly on kerosene, at least the K60 in the 432 I tried did.

40 minutes ago, Will C said:

The tang on my hook has been peened over but I can’t comment on if that is correct

Yes the few I have  the tang pokes through the handle and the tang is either bent  or passed through a washer and them peened. I also have two blades where the tang has broken short (one I welded a threaded rod on and secured with a nut.

The long handles one have side cheeks and two rivets through the handle.

When we used Yorkshire style long handled slashers, before chainsaws became ubiquitous, they also had a collar that was driven down the side cheeks before the rivets were driven IIRC, it was a long time ago.

I could take some pictures tomorrow if wanted?

13 minutes ago, GarethM said:

 

 

Plus aren't most tank engines turbines to utilise whatever fuel is available.

Most tank engines were multi fuel to satisfy NATO requirements but they  dropped it in favour of single fuel turbo charged diesels, or gas turbine in the american mbt.

All these later opposed piston engines were based on a 1930s Junkers Jumo diesel aero engine which in UK Napier developed into the most efficient engine for maritime patrol aircraft, the napier nomad, a hybrid turbo assisted diesel. It never went into production as jets took over.

The deltic was the boat and train engine that came from the same firm.

When the requirement for multifuel armoured vehicle engines became a requirement Rolls Royce developer the problematic L60 and K60 engines.

The major problem with this type of piston ported engine was excessive lubrication oil consumption. A trade off in war time but an expense and pollution issue nowadays.

I wonder how Arcate are addressing this.

On 21/05/2024 at 12:48, roys said:

As an update, my mate has turned a bit of hickory to make a new handle. 

Smart but what's to stop the head flying off? Does it look like the tang has bent straight again?

I was given this, and some other stuff, from a house clearance today.

It is a Kent style felling axe but the handle was not original and too short. It weighs 0.8kg or short of 2lb.

The inscription is:

       4

D?. B&Co Ltd

       ?

Warranted

Does anyone know this manufacturer?