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Hey there. I'm no use whatsoever for a park-up site, but if you're on the northside of Swindon there's an absolute top class kebab van , at the layby opposite Groundwell bus park and ride. Super meats, in volumes you cannot believe, cheap and immensely popular so you may be in a queue. Do burgers as well, but never tried them - I'm a kebab man.

Twice as less... ?? Is that proper english language? [emoji12]

As young fools we would spend hours shooting the insulators on the poles with air rifles. Eventually it would start to chip off the glazed surface especially with the old steel darts with coloured feather ends (can you still get these? ), then a few dozen more splats with lead pellets it would possibly split. We always expected a fantastic shower of sparks like they showed on the A Team, but shooting at phone lines, it never happened! Used to do it with the hv lines on the pylons, too but the huge insulators were both too distant, and too strong to do anything other than ping to let you know you'd actually hit something. The age of bsa airsporters and meteors that we used to shoot each other with, as long as you were wearing body armour - an old leather jacket. Ahhh wonderful times, we were so innocent- and stupid ! Shaun

If you're insisting on using the digger, drop the grab off it, that should release about 150kg, and use a single chain on the log. Lift one end at a time onto the trailer, then you're only lifting part of total weight.

Too true, I'm also a victim of the end of the 80's early 90's. No loaders, no bollards and lowering devices, no srt. Everything was left as long as could possibly be carried by exceptional human beings, even if it took two people to lift it onto your shoulder - at least it saved 2 maybe 3 runnings from a back garden, up the owners back passage (!) and out to the truck. I used to wonder why the old treeboys looked like dwarves and their hands were curled inwards like bear claws. Then ,2 rotator cuff ops with 9 months recovery each ,ankle fusion as cartilage has eroded completely, and I'm starting to feel knees and hips with impending dread, I now know where that image came from. You know what though, I wouldn't have missed the experience for a minute. What a fantastic career, pushing to the limits, with a truly great bunch of guys , in every company, enjoying life to the full. Perhaps there's something missing in the lift less, strain less H +S world, but it keeps younger guys than us enjoying it for longer. Proud to have been part of it.

Cor , what a great way to show the thieving bastads which containers are worth turning over. Won't even need to use torches, they'll just memorize the pictures and feel their way to the appropriate shelf.

Make sure you've not got a chisel chain on. Contra to what you expect the super sharp angles actually produce a rough cut. Semi chisel is acceptable and easily found, old fashioned, round cornered chipper chain when you can find it is excellent. Whatever you use, get a set of calipers for sharpening to make sure all cutters are the same length on both sides. Look down the bar with the chain in place and spin it round to make sure you dont have any bent teeth - it easily happens on cheap chains when you smack into hard knots across the grain. Knots and twisted grain in your logs will always force deflection in the chain. It does the same on bandsaws just the visible results are finer as the cutting area (the tiny tip) is so much smaller. Let the chain dictate the forward speed. Putting on more pressure almost always produces more deflection in the chain and in my experience was most guaranteed to produce the effects you're getting or worse. Fresh felled timber produces your results less than older dried logs . Cutter angles of between 0 to 10° would rarely produce washboard effects but speed would be painfully slow. As I was cutting commercially on contract I would increase cutting speed with between 15 - 20° cutter angles but the quality of cut surface would be rougher. You'll be astounded how often you have to lightly polish the edge on the slabber. I would always go to work with 6 spare chains, and edge them gently at end of each day and lunch breaks with a cheap lidls electric sharpener off an inverter on the land rover . Dont forget the lucas is a primary converter of timber unless your going over previously sawn and dried stable boards with a planer head. Its always going to be rough, not finished quality. Once its dried and done all of its movement , plane it out. Shaun

Not saying your sharpening is out, more like if he's racing against you to prove his saw's the best , is he piling on the pressure?

If leaning/pulling really hard cos teeth are dull, on a saw with dogs on one side only, you can twist the saw in the cut, causing curved cuts. Natural instincts with dull chains is put on more pressure with inevitable more wayward cuts ?

Didn't they also do " headbutts "? about yeah you guessed it givin out headbutts. Mad as a bag of cats.

I had a 1980 volvo 245 estate. Working on a site at maidenhead, at end of the day, the rest of the team with truck and chipper set off home, leaving me with another groundy to do the final brush down of the road. Found numerous piles of hornbeam cord lengths left behind, and being in days before moblie phones couldnt call the crew back. Nothing for it but to stuff it into the Volvo. Kept finding more and more piles of branches! Car was absolutely stuffed to the gills, difficult to even get the brooms and rake in. Tyres rubbing on wheel arches and smoking all the way back to yard - about 35miles away, exhaust rubbing on ground at every wallow in the road and potholes sounded like it was going to split in half. They dont make em like that anymore !!

Roof down,really easy to fill with chip or cord. [emoji1][emoji1]

I can't stand using a cord strimmer on rough grass etc. I don't like wasting my precious strength and energy! Much prefer to use a good heavy 300mm three point star blade. Stihl and Oregon ones are good, flimsy lightweight and cheap ones are next to useless. Lose inertia and speed at the slightest touch of anything stronger than clean lawngrass. Stone strikes sound dramatic but actually lose very little metal. - Teaches you to be observant! The blades are easily sharpened and dont spatter you with wet shite unlike cord. They also lay the cuttings in rows better and with less operator effort than cord. Great for cutting around trees too as will only nick the bark in one place with a gentle accidental strike (or a fell to ground level with a full on power stroke !!) whereas the cord will always whip around the full circumference of the tree with the inevitable result.

Have you eaten the scab yet? Yummy yummy my favourite.

Would've been poetic justice to see it parked on top of the chevron sign at the next roundabout, with the ifor's hitch poking out from where the gearstick should have been. Some peeps don't even consider or remember there's a trailer behind them

The change from 12"LP record to CD to mp3 to download, has deprived possibly 2 generations now of the sheer pleasure and magic at times, of album artwork, which would be studied all the way home, and was often more of a talking point than the actual music within.

Have a cup of tea, have another one.... Oh those pothead pixies!!

When I got the tour, they were focusing on engines for Middle East power stations, but definitely that scale. They were so huge, as to be unrecognisable as engines, to my 16 year old eyes

Makers of the biggest diesel engines ever seen. I lived all of my schooldays in Poynton, about 5 miles away. They were always hunting down new engineers and draughtsmen at yearly recruiting and apprenticeship fairs. Not my bag at all, but went to see the plant out of curiosity. Still got (and listen to) my Gong flying teapot album - absolute madness

If you can give your sawn timber even a month of air drying it will harden and lose a surprising amount of water (and weight). Freshly sawn long spans will sag - great for character but not for straight lines

Gosh Mark, that's a deep and subtle one. Took me a while ..........to see the point

Bloody hell, your friend's good at capturing the exact moments.

Actually I'm not an avid whiskey drinker, I'd love a pint of warm tasty hoppy English ale, from a handpump not some tin or bottle ,but can't get over there as we're still in bloody f@@kin purgatory lockdown ,probably forever it feels.

....You,ll find me an Mr 12 bore waitin at the gate. [emoji12] [emoji12] [emoji12]

No different speciality casks (yet), everything in oak. Using standard ex bourbons, virgin American oak, ex cognac, ex Bordeaux, ex port, ex sherry, ex rum, retoasted Bordeaux, lots of different American ipa's and stouts - we do collaborations with a growing number of USA breweries. Hopefully getting some Japanese oak casks in the next month. Reputedly real problems to keep from leaking. Also doing some of my own shaving and retoasting/charring for experimental stuff.