Peasgood

I picked the last of my tomatoes on Christmas day last year out of my tunnel. Well impressed with that.

I have a Nordica range cooker and yes there should be an access point in the flue. Something like in the pic below. The screw comes out to remove the round plate so you can get your brushes up. I don't think you are going to access it any other way unless you go on the roof and push the brushes down. The soot will fall down the back of the oven box and to clear it you have to remove the plate that you can see under the oven when the door is open. Remove the two Allen bolts and the plate comes off, you then rake the soot out. Take the rings off the hob and give everything a damned good clean from in there too and if it has been swept there will be a build up behind the flap that the oven/water control operates. Don't forget to clean the ash off the water pipes in the firebox and on top of the oven while the rings are off. Good idea to do that more often than you get your chimney swept as it makes a big difference to how the fire and oven work. Very good stoves, this is my second (moved house) and my heating, DHW and cooking rely on the stove.

Neither is difficult but I wouldn't be drilling into the frame, it will weaken it and will break the galvanising layer. Mine is one of those mentioned with a wooden rail at approx navel height. Great idea but it's not so great in practice in my experience. Next time I cover it I will have a bigger sheet and bury along the sides. The whole point of a tunnel is to get that earlier warmth and I find you lose that advantage with the flappy sheet below the rail letting in draughts and cold. If you can figure out a good way of securing the bottom edge of that flappy sheet it could well work but I haven't. People say they can get too hot or there's too much condensation on fully clad but you can always open the doors at both ends to cure that. I only have an actual door at one end, the other has the frame but mesh over it instead of polythene. Quite fine mesh, a wasp wouldn't get through for example. As for heat, it gets to some extreme temperatures in there but never had anything suffer as long as whatever it is has been watered. I have a full range of plants in there from the usual lettuce, cucumbers, tomatoes etc, veg such as caulis, kale, cabbage and also strawberries and apple trees that I have propagated and grown on. The apples will be planted into a new orchard but there are some already bearing fruit in there. Had a couple of cherry trees do well too. I think (hope) buried polythene will be better at keeping slugs out which is a major issue this year. Most unusual thing in there this year is a nest of pheasants that hatched just a few weeks ago. I wasn't expecting them but they did a good job of thinning out the crickets and grasshoppers that were thriving in there. If you want to fasten a rail to the side use exhaust clamp type U-bolts. Timber on the outside and U-bolts around the hoops, also an effective way of joining timber lengths if you can get them to meet at the same point as the hoop.

The tape will increase the life of the polythene and it is worth taking off the old if you are fitting new. I'd suggest using a hot air gun or similar to assist with taking the old off. You need to work out the value of the year or two extra life of the polythene against the cost of the hotspot tape, money wise I doubt there's much in it but reskinning sooner can be a bit of a ballache. An assistant helps reskinning but it is no big deal on your own, all the assistant is good for is having someone to blame if you put a hole in it. Reskinned mine plenty of times on my own, 18'x64' so not a small one. Warm still evening is favourite, perfect conditions here right now.

I once had a load of pallets that had originated in New Zealand, they were made of some extraordinarily nice hardwood. Probably made from offcuts from a sawmill Point being it could have come from anywhere in the world and be some exotic hardwood that nobody on here has ever seen.

Until you realise the plastic used in an ibc is impermeable to moonbeams.

Not according to the dictionary it isn't.

I used to do a lot of turning this sort of shite Into this kind of stuff. Clarke 205TE is what I used. Still have it and still use it but for much more agricultural type of welding these days. .6 wire and Argoshield Lite gas from BOC. I think if I was doing much these days I would be looking at R-tech welders but a good used 205TE would not be a bad choice.

As you have already bought it you may as well just take the sellers word for it. I once bought an Ifor Williams that I later suspected may have been stolen, deeply regretted being so naive as I would never buy anything I believed to be stolen. I think karma must have got me as by time I had fixed everything a brand new trailer would have been cheaper. It sounds like you bought it in good faith so leave it at that and carry on. It is people that knowingly buy stolen stuff that are the scummy ones, they are as bad as or maybe even worse than the ones doing the stealing.

At least one reversing light must be fitted and in good working order otherwise it's a MOT failure but only on vehicles registered after 2009. edit: UK

Drove a horse and caravan from Bentham Fair to Chester single handed, took 2 days (100 miles). No idea what the rush was.

That's fierce. You will notice a lot more damage in the days to come too unfortunately. It will leave marks on leaves and shoots that haven't shown up yet. Didn't have it here, two big thunderstorms passed either side of me but nothing more than a bit of rain. Have suffered tremendously in the past, especially on my apples. Doesn't do rhubarb crops much good either.

Air fried? Works well

Windfalls aren't great to start with. They have fallen off early for some reason, usually due to insect or fungal damage or maybe an over burdened tree (very rarely due to wind). As they are early they are very under ripe and have little sugar content and have yet to develop their true flavours. I would think mixing them with ripe fruit after freezing them is just going to bring your quality down. No harm in giving it a go but don't risk too much of your good fruit before figuring out what it will end up like.

ps. BASC is worth a look on the discount front but you do need to have been in for 12 months first. Again, I don't think it is worth it.

Not nessy celery. The dealer is usually much more interested in finance. I have heard there is a fair bit of stock about that they are trying to shift so who knows. I also heard Elvis was alive, the earth is flat and the weather is controlled by the government. Personally I don't think any modern vehicle is worth the money and the government couldn't organise a pissup in a brewery never mind control anything.

Sounds like a good mate 👍

I fitted one of those grippy ends on mine, have to say it was a game changer as far as I was concerned. For hard to get at nipples taking them out and replacing with an angled one often helps. For my next trick I am going to try the Fuchs screw on cartridges as mentioned above, work out a bit dearer but if it saves all the mess when changing them it might well be worth it.

I was asked about a month ago how my apple crop was doing, I just said it was looking good and I was about halfway through picking them. Their response was to say well done. My missus put them right at that point.

Got any left?

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Even when they are leafless and dead from DED they take a long time to actually fall down. It would stay up for many years causing no more risk than any other tree. Tell them to bugger off and you will do it when it is dead if it ever happens.

I remember a lot of folk having similar in their coal bunker for breaking up the big lumps. I have always known such things as coal hammers.

I wouldn't like to use a billhook in anger without the tang being fastened to the handle in some way. As said, this is normally by peening it over a washer or by riveting through. They are particularly prone to slipping out during use, especially if the handle gets dried out. I recently bought a new handle off Ray Isles and iirc it even came with the washer. Mine too was a bit short so I carefully heated the tang and drew it out on the anvil, I have welded a bit of rod on if necessary in the past.

Might be worth getting an exorcist in too once you've done all that.