Baldbloke

Greening up in Morayshire at last

Thanks for the heads up! I’ll have to check the one I bought recently [emoji1303]

As someone stated earlier, the craziest thing is allowing old classic/vintage/ veteran vehicles on the road without a safety check. Or road tax. These vehicles generally had poor brakes from new let alone 40 years they later. They also often smell as oil burners. So what makes a hobbyist an expert maintainer of some old boner? I’m lucky in that my local garage knows that any vehicle I prepare for mot has been well checked over prior to being brought in. I also appreciate a second pair of expert eyes checking over anything I might have missed such as a brake imbalance.

To put it in perspective at 16 and a newly employed farm labourer I was being paid £18 a week in 1976. The air fare to New Zealand was much the same price as it is now, but my wage there in the same industry a year and a half later was more than 4 times higher. As stated by Billhook, the price of machinery is the killer.

A second hand McCulloch 250 super. Stupidly gave it to a neighbour, and now wish I’d kept it

By law any public body has to supply an answer to a Freedom of Information request within a certain time period. They are duty bound to tell you how much money was used for their mail shot. I recently asked our local council how much their retrospective works costs after they fucked up by granting planning permission after my objections were ignored. It involved engineering works to cut into a bank, move a Hydro electric pole, and take the brow off an A road. 68k. It still doesn’t comply, but they know I’ll go to the papers to release those details if they ignore me again[emoji12] I loathe our council.

Who took the wall away[emoji3]

Supposedly is just EU input. UK motoring organisations that advise government were perfectly happy with existing regulations and actually objected to the new regs. You are partly correct: That is what happens when successive governments sign away our UK powers to unelected EU bureaucrats................. After all, the only vote us mugs were allowed was back in the 70's when we voted to join a common market, and nothing else Where's my ladle to further stir matters up

I don’t want to run a dangerous vehicle, but merely resent this EU led legislation.

But if there’s a dodgy spark plug or coil your fuel won’t be being efficiently burnt which will come back to an emission fail. Unburnt fuel entering your catalytic converter will also f*** it up. So although not dangerous still not good enough.

Not many of those around nowadays as too many spot checks have weeded them out

Correct. It’s going to cost your mate a small fortune. I’m looking into getting an historic vehicle and putting modern engine and running gear into it. No mot and no f****** road tax[emoji121]️

Busy at the moment trying to get all 4 of the Baldbloke household vehicles through before the critical date[emoji23]

Mot test getting a lot tougher from 20th May. Any drips of oil (LR) = fail, as does any interference with emissions equipment ie removal of egr valve.

Guessing at £350 given that a new equivalent is around double that. For an electrical/hydraulic new six tonne 3 kw Handy (that the wife uses) cost me £500 a couple of years ago and it’s relatively quiet in operation compared to a B&S motor.

And here’s his final say (received just now) on the matter: Dear Mr Baldbloke, The regulations require that an MCS certificate is issued, the restriction in place from MCS is that only plants up to 45kW in capacity can be issued with a valid certificate. As such your installation cannot have a certificate issued nor can it be eligible on the scheme. Kind Regards, Chris Baitrum Domestic RHI Officer Domestic RHI Commonwealth House 32 Albion Street Glasgow G1 1LH Tel: 0300 003 0744 www.ofgem.gov.uk Follow us: From: Baldbloke [mailto:*****@gmail.com] Sent: 26 April 2018 00:54 To: Domestic RHI Subject: Re: Domestic RHI and whether I can apply.

F***, I'm now officially bald and fat. 28.7 on the BMI scale. Ideal weight is supposedly 8st to 12.2 st rather than 13.13st. However I've been that weight since I was 16 and playing school and then club rugby. Think if i lost 5.13 stone I'd look positively ill Load of bollocks IMO, although there are a lot of unhealthy people waddling about these days.

Hi Callum, Our system was also installed by Athol Ducat (A.D. Heating). They also did a great job on the installation in 2013. Unfortunately, (after I'd followed Athol's advice about having a 60 Kw boiler) a retrospective consultation by the DECC excluded me from accessing the Domestic RHI as the boiler was then supposedly too large. Luckily I retained my oil boiler for those days when we are both away during a winter and cannot set a fire. Turn two levers in the system and the oil system is ready to go. It just needs occasional use to keep the seals lubricated. Do you find with the 3000 ltr tank and 45Kw boiler that it is easy to over cook the tank?

I find that very strange when ofgem/Domestic RHI have replied stating that my 60 kW boiler is too large for Domestic RHI payments......

Here is my recent mail. Don’t appear to have been lied to[emoji3] Dear Sir/Madam, I have just spent a morning trawling through guidance on whether I am able to apply for Domestic RHI tariff payments for a 60 Kw log biomass boiler installed in March 2013 by an MCS approved installer, but unfortunately am no wiser than when I started. Shortly after the boiler was installed there was a consultation limiting a Domestic Consumers' home to a wood log boiler of 45 Kw. At the time the MCS approved installer insisted that he could not install a small biomass boiler that was not capable of sufficiently heating a home. This had the result that my boiler was deemed too large to comply with the regulations. Having spent over £25,000, I then found I was ineligible of getting any sort of subsidy payment to recoup some of my outlay. However I now note that there does not seem to be any sort of restriction on boiler size, but do see payments are being capped so that a larger house does not over benefit from the scheme. My wife and I are joint owners of our home and fully paid for the biomass plant without any grant assistance. I do have an EPC certificate although it is now over 2 years old and improvements to roof and loft insulation were carried out after following its' recommendations. A new survey could be undertaken to reflect the improvements. Given that the original installation was in 2013 I would simply like to know following the latest criteria requirements whether there is any point in me applying for domestic RHI? Could my installer recertify the installation to comply with the current regs if that was needed? Kind regards, Baldbloke And here’s the reply received today: Dear Mr Baldbloke, Part of the eligibility requirements to apply require that a valid MCS certificate is issued for your installation. Even though the biomass plant may have been installed by an MCS accredited installer, your biomass plants capacity is over 60kW and cannot be issued with a certificate from MCS. As such, your installation is unable to meet the eligibility criteria of the scheme. Kind Regards, Domestic RHI Officer Domestic RHI Commonwealth House 32 Albion Street Glasgow G1 1LH Tel: 0300 003 0744 www.ofgem.gov.uk Follow us: From: Baldbloke[mailto:*****@gmail.com] Sent: 06 April 2018 12:25 To: Domestic RHI Subject: Domestic RHI and whether I can apply.

Good point about the insulation of housing. However our place is a Georgian granite manse and to insulate it more than the existing double glazing would mean losing much of its' character as you'd need to insulate within the existing room spaces, so wainscoting, ornamental ceiling plaster work, window shutters and fireplaces would all look out of place as they'd have to be either removed or covered over.

Very good advice concerning the biggest buffer tank fit/afford. Our insulated buffer/accumulator tank only loses a degree or two C a day if it's not utilised, so it appears to be very efficient. If I was to add an additional tank of say 2000 ltrs to my existing 4000 ltrs it would mean that I wouldn't often overcook the tank on 9% of my burn.

I stand corrected

We have a 60kw log boiler that heats a largish 3 floored house. It has a 4000ltr accumulator which in retrospect should have been bigger as the boiler can easily over cook it if you are too generous on the loading of wood. Our boiler was too large to qualify for the domestic RHI but we are still pleased with the cost savings as I generally cut my own wood supply. One burn a day in the winter, and once every three days recently. That is because our system is fitted with a weather compensator. We used to use some oil heating supplemented with back boilers in log burners in some rooms. Absolute waste of time for a house of this size as it involved continual topping up of wood burners in the house as well as paying for oil. Our system is fully programmable and costs me bigger all in money to run, whereas we used to have substantial oil bills and used more wood in stoves than we do in the efficient biomass log boiler[emoji1303]