openspaceman
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Everything posted by openspaceman
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I think @Ian C and @Justme have covered most of what I understand but would add a couple of theings; When I applied for our yard to be used as an operating centre for a second company (it was already registered as one for a tenant) it was made clear that reversing out or into the yard was a no no. The area in front of the gate had to accommodate the longest vehicle coming or going when the gate was closed. The Highway Authority were the only objector on the grounds the bigger vehicles needed to cross onto the opposite carriageway when turning left out of the yard. We would have had to expensively widen the splay but fortunately when we turned up for the public hearing, booted and suited, the traffic commissioner took umbrage that no one attended from the HA and granted the application as it was. The chap on the estate behind me used to park his local authority highways truck in the close with nothing said.
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Exactly that so you match the curve of the handle against the nearest curve on your cleft bit of ash and then shape it with a draw knife (or in my case a billhook held in both hands)
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I thought that was a benefit as you can move the handle to a point where it matches the grain. Holly is useful for small handles but it has half the modulus of hickory, most axe handles in shops seem to be imported hickory. Beech is up there with hickory for elasticity and is the preferred wood for pick axe handles but not used for axes. Yes the worry is that ash from diseased trees will have hidden loss of strength and will be used...
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Because I am old and non pc I meant what I wrote. Up till recently I worked on a gang with two or three young ladies and they were excellent in most things except the sound and feel of a motor saw cutting correctly. This is just my observation as there are plenty of mechanically sympathetic women out there,
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If it were that critical I would seize one every outing when in fact I have only seized a 268 back in the days of four star when I picked up the wrong can. I think only red metal cans were legal then. Trying to teach young ladies to hear the engine note and not cut at part throttle is a difficult job which I failed on but lack of mechanical sympathy is what contributes to most problems. Back in the day it was blokes tweaking the HI screw to get more revs and not realising it reduced cutting power that was the problem. Presumably less so with modern saws.
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It looks like a good start, that little beech will look after itself if the squirrels don't get it. One of the good things about oak is they respond well to being given room for a free crown at virtually any age. The ash would normally be a short term crop on any but the best brown earth sites and given ash dieback even more so now, so simply do not favour an ash over a decent oak. At this stage I wouldn't over worry about a few bends but the straight ones should be the champion trees.
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Yes and the aluminium pick up will need chemically removing. It looks messy but as the ring hasn't smeared over with aluminium I'd say it was no a bad seize however the piston and ring are toast. The light colouring on the exhaust port and piston crown suggest to me the fuel to air mixture was a bit weak (lean), I am not sure how that can happen where the fuel is adjusted electronically.
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Elm Tree- Can It Be Saved?
openspaceman replied to Rob. T's question in Homeowners Tree Advice Forum
Sensible move, the way the tree reacts is to block vessels where it is aware of the disease, as english elm depends entirely on the current annual ring if the tree blocks all the vessels in that ring every part of the tree above that point dies. Wych elm is not so dependent on the current annual ring so often when you cut a tree that has been infected you can see the results of previous infections as black tyloses the tree has produced to fill cells in the rings -
Elm Tree- Can It Be Saved?
openspaceman replied to Rob. T's question in Homeowners Tree Advice Forum
Me too, the woodpeckers and other birds have found the beetle breeding galleries in the phloem and have stripped the bark seeking the larvae out. A bit hard to tell with no leaves to show dieback but if the scolytus beetle is present so will the elm disease fungus. Depending on species, if it is english elm then the top of the tree will soon be dead, wych elm may survive to flush in the summer but if and when it is re infected... Chances are the root will survive after the top has died if it is cut low so suckers can get away till reinfected. Typically english elm live till the phloem is thick enough to support the breeding galleries after 15 to 25 years. -
It seems to only affect robur and even then the oak seedling understorey is dense in the secondary woodland (less then 100 years old) opposite here, even though I see it on all the regrowth before autumn.
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Same here but all the cracks had little globules of mercury in which we would tease together with a compass point to make them coalesce
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I got a few boot loads of exotic hardwood parquet flooring when the parish hall flooded, the tar they had been glued with certainly went up well as fire starters.
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I have no experience of reds, only ever seen them in the lake district, but the bark stripping by greys is specific to the frustrations of displaced males which cannot establish a territory, so I doubt reds will do the devastating sort of damage greys do. When I started planting in the early 70s, mostly softwoods, the spacing had just increased from 5' x 5' to 6' in the rows and 8' between rows, ostensibly to allow tractor access and reduce planting costs but I expect there was a change in grant rules too. Spiral guards existed but not tubes and conifers were fenced rather than individually protected.
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What size are your rails? I cannot remember doing any oak rails but chestnut, which has far less sapwood, needed to be 9" before we cleft rails. When it comes to thinning oak is a bit different from other woods as it needs to reach a large diameter to have a usable width of heartwood. This means conventional thinning and a long stem, as practised in France, takes the rotation length well past the maximum mean annual increment. This lead to the practice of growing standards with an understorey of coppice in order to grow short fat butts in as short a time as possible. A consequence of this is the tops being very coarse with large limbs and the large branch unions which made jowl posts and ships bends.
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I agree with @slack ma girdle, the final crop oaks will benefit from having free crowns. I am surprised at needing to use a motor saw for formative pruning as it risks compromising the branch collar compartment boundary. I always aimed to prune branches less than 1" diameter and before the main stem at the branch was 4" diameter. Pruning to 20 foot and always leaving a crown length of 40% of the height.
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Never seen one but it is probably because the engine is a modern stratified charge one. As the piston rises to compress the charge a depression is formed in the crankcase, this sucks fuel and air into the crankcase. As the piston reaches the top the main choke is cut off by the piston but windows in the piston allow air only through the other choke to pass into the tops of the transfer ports. This means after the charge fires above the piston and the piston descends and opens the exhaust port the first gases coming out of the transfer ports are just air to scavenge the cylinder. This reduces the carry over of unburned fuel to the exhaust.
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Yes they will lose some but doubtful it will be enough even with decent air flow. It's the summer months May to October when most drying takes place.@cessna why not weigh a billet mark it and pull it out to weigh again in a month, as long as you keep rain off it.
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Trouble with that is that it is aluminium under the plating and that will fizz.
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I remember his design, a similar rotating valve in the head but it was conical. At the end of 1940s the piston engine had just about peaked with things like the rotary valved sabre and even the diesel nomad but jets just eclipsed them. Much of the reason the techniques (other than multiple valves per cylinder and double overhead cams which are ubiquitous now) didn't transfer to commercial engines was the reliability and in the case of rotary valves and uniflow engines oil consumption. Valve stem seals and tighter bore tolerances have virtually eliminated oil consumption on engines now compared with the 60s when there would be a plume of blue smoke from cars waiting at traffic lights.
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I like the look of them too, @Billhook on here has built one with a refinement to ensure the log drops cleanly before the next pass
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Yes once I zoomed in it does look like the plating has come off, it is only about 0.4mm thick IIRC.
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I don't know but if you move the chimney away from the ridge why not stay double skin stainless? Poujolat do a range of prefabricated false chimneys but I bet they are expensive.
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Yes the party wall act would need to be considered.
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I would say those six little patches of grey could well still be aluminium pick up. Can you smear some oven cleaning gel over them with a cotton bud and see if it turns white? I use Oven Mate | Oven Cleaners & Cleaning Equipment WWW.LAKELAND.CO.UK Shop our range of Oven Mate cleaners & cleaning equipment. Powerful formulas leave ovens, microwaves & hobs looking... and just do it repeatedly until it stays clear.
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While @spuddog0507looks you may like to peruse https://cdn.forestresearch.gov.uk/1975/03/fcbk039.pdf I think table 66 will give you much of what you are looking for
