Member postings for Rod Renshaw

Hi Clay

In addition to the use described above by Oldiron, it is useful sometimes to use accurate "normal" parallels to rest the work on, and use slightly lower wavy parallels between the normal parallels to keep the normal parallels from toppling over.

Rod

Well, that was good for a laff!

Bits of truth buried in there as well, we can be a pedantic lot.

At least there are  few really nasty or personal comments as seem to be the norm on some forums.

Rod

(edited for missing word)

Edited By Rod Renshaw on 17/02/2021 16:12:45

I have used Buffalo Pertex/ fibre pile mitts for some years with every success. They are flexible and give reasonable manipulation ability. they are lightweight and showerproof warm when wet, and they dry while you watch. Buffalo are made in Sheffield and AFAIK don't have retail outlets so are well geared up for mail order and exchanges etc. There is a website.

Watch the sizing though. AFAIK Buffalo only make one range of mitts. So the Small fits a smallish child, the Medium fits a smallish female hand and the Large fits my small man's hand. They make sizes up to about XXXXL One good feature is that one can wear one size on top of the next smaller. So I wear Large in normal bad weather and put Extra Large in top in the worst weather.

I have also found that if I wear really warm clothing on the rest of me, my hands don't seem to get cold at all even without gloves, unless there is a very strong wind or freezing rain. So many jumpers and a thick woolly hat makes for warm hands - which is handy for manipulating things.

I have not had much success with Thinsulite. This seems to make thin dress gloves, OK in reasonable conditions around town or as inner gloves, but little use in real cold, wet or wind.

Rod

Edited By Rod Renshaw on 15/02/2021 11:45:27

We seem to return to this time and again.

The basics, as I understand them, are:

No moisture producing things allowed inside, so no wet bikes, no (or only very small and brief) soldering and brazing flames, and not too many spectators who will persist in breathing out.

Seal against draughts

Effective vapour barrier in walls, floors and ceilings. Vapour barrier must go inside the insulation the air inside a building is almost always wetter than the air outside and we don't want that wet air to saturate the insulation, which would render it nearly useless.

Insulate, to prevent any rapid temperature changes, which will often cause condensation. Foil is not an insulation, it may be a vapour barrier and a draft excluder but insulation must be thicker than that. Though I think there are products which have several layers to provide both the vapour barrier and the insulation.

Heaters which spread the warm air around, for comfort.

Consider the relative costs of fuel for the heaters, before deciding on the heaters, mains gas is much cheaper than electricity per KW hour for example, Though the exhaust must be piped outside, and this example may not be true everywhere.

If you have poor or no insulation, and I agree it can be expensive and difficult, then covers on machines with small black heaters underneath and hand tools in cupboards with similar heaters is effective. The purpose of the heater is to make the machine warmer that its surroundings so any condensation goes elsewhere. So low consumption heaters and no thermostat. You want the protection to be on all the time, at least in the colder months. If a thermostat exists to do anything then it exists to switch on and off. Anyone have any practical experience of the relative merits of plastic covers versus permeable fabric ones? Heaters also have the benefit that the tools feel a little warmer when you are using them on cold days.

Finally, the late great Tom Walshaw, writing as Tubal Cain, responded to this problem by asking his wife to knit him an extra thick sweater and he had no heating at all, and his shop was in Westmorland where they know a thing or two about cold and rain.

And really finally, the Americans say your tools don't rust when you are using them!

Rod

Had my first jab (A/Z ) on Monday evening. Very organised and smooth process. The doctor who did the injecting told me that I might have a reaction - headaches, stiffness and/ or flu- like symptoms, but not to worry as this was a signal that my body was reacting to the injection by developing antibodies to the virus.

So I was quite pleased to get a headache on Tuesday! All gone now.

Rod

Perspex/ Plexiglas sounds like a good idea but I remember reading in one of the Tubal Cain's (Tom Walshaw) workshop books that he made a splash guard for his Myford to contain cutting oil splashes from the chuck.

This was after he had fitted a pumped cutting oil system to his lathe. He commented wryly in the book that after some years the Perspex he had used had gone opaque and he might as well have made the guard from aluminium.

Rod

Enough already. Others apparently have bombs in their workshops to worry about.

Yes, something needs to be done about flooding. In my view, developers have contributed significantly to this problem by building in areas that were traditionally used as floodplains.

Lots of info about waterways in the link, but there is also a lot that could be done to reverse the changes in land usage that have happened over recent years, like deforestation, which have reduced the capacity of upland areas to absorb heavy rainfall and then allow the water to flow slowly into the rivers.

Rod

When I started this thread I did not mean to suggest that there is not a very serious problem. The pressure on the hospitals makes the problem obvious, but rather to point to what seems to me to be a difficulty with the definition of a virus related death, which potentially gets more serious as the number of tests goes up. In the early days ,when the definition was devised, the effect would probably have been very small, but perhaps not so small now?

I have no special insight into the internal workings of the NHS but I have collated National stats from numbers complied by large numbers of local observers. One of the most important parts of such exercises is devising a very robust definition of which cases are to be included and which are to be left out.

If the definition is not precise this leaves the decisions on inclusion to the local observers' individual judgements and leads to stats of doubtful value. So I do wonder if the "within 28 days definition "is being used by the clinicians - whatever their individual views on which deaths are "obviously" not virus related..

Rod

The definition of a coronavirus death used by the Brits is a death for any reason within 28 days of a positive coronavirus test. So someone who dies from stroke or heart attack or diabetes or cancer or is run over by a bus within 28 days of a positive test counts as a coronavirus death. There are quite a few more total deaths in England each day than those counted by the coronavirus deaths. So more tests will lead to more deaths being captured by the " within 28 days " rule.

So, suppose for a moment, just for the sake of argument, that the incidence of coronavirus in the population at large is constant or only increasing slowly. Could the large increase in the coronavirus stats be partially or even largely due to the increased number of tests? Discuss.

Rod

Edited By Rod Renshaw on 14/01/2021 12:31:34

Edited By Rod Renshaw on 14/01/2021 12:32:07

Keep well Raphael.

I remember your posts during the first wave lockdown and I remember comparing your apparently dire situation with my retired and isolating one. I wondered whether we would hear from you again or whether your posts would just stop, and we would be left to guess the worst.

Good to hear you are still with us.

Regards

Rod

Native mica is quite brittle and I wonder if a single point hole cutter, as used by plumbers to cut holes in water tanks might be safer than a punch. This would leave a small (1/4"? ) hole in the centre of the window but this is unlikely to matter in a greenhouse heater.

If there is little air movement in the greenhouse, then a paraffin heater may work well enough without a window at all.

Rod

Rob

Useful tip, thanks.

Just re-read this thread ( in lockdown) and it reminds me of a conversation I had with a museum curator about bakelite exhibits which apparently just disintigrate without any warning about 80- 90 years after manufacture when on display in temperature and humidity controlled exhibition cases. She said it was a well known problem and threatens whole collections of 20th century household and electrical objects.

Rod

br

Buyer beware, I suppose.

Perhaps Ebay can improve their algorithm to watch out for postings with a remote location, a 24 hour listing, little feedback, a note of urgency and mention of bank transfer etc ( rather than Paypal) If a single posting has all of these elements then perhaps a warning to potential bidders could be added ( like Facebook, or was it Twitter, has apparently been adding to President Trump's postings ) Just dreaming.

I will certainly look at postings in new light now!

Rod

Interesting and precautionary thread. Once one looks carefully at the different elements of the advert one can see how cunningly the scam works, though without this thread I would not have noticed the trap.

I wonder if he/ she really lives in Dunoon or chose to represent him/ herself as being based there because it is so remote?

I do buy things off Ebay but only low value things and, so far, I have not been stung, perhaps it's not worth the effort for scammers to bother with small items.

I am surprised that eBay has not taken action because they have a reputation for taking the buyer's side in most disputes, which suggests they are keen to protect their overall reputation for running an honest market.

I notice the lathe is on sale again with a single £400.00 bid.

Rod

Edited By Rod Renshaw on 06/01/2021 11:23:59

Modern pewter has antimony instead of lead.

Rod

Michael, Thanks for the link.

This seems to confirm my general overview above, and makes a distinction between buying directly from abroad (where the seller will collect the VAT) and buying via an "Online Market Place" (like Ebay) ( where the OMP will collect the VAT) I also agree with others who are waiting to see what happens in practice.

One might imagine some sellers being better than others at keeping records and handing over the VAT they have collected, and one might also wonder what penalties HMRC could impose if any non UK based sellers default.

These official links say nothing about delays and handling charges, which are not part of the legal import charging process, but if these are short and not expensive then this change seems to be generally good news for those buying low value items from abroad.

I will wait and see how it goes!

Rod

This is too complicated for me!

Does this mean that, under the new rules from today, if one of us orders something worth less than £135.00 from abroad then only VAT is chargeable, and that VAT has to be collected by the seller in, lets say, China? And the seller has tp pay the VAT they collect over to HMRC?

If so, and if the appropriate paperwork has been completed by the seller, then the package comes through customs etc with nothing to pay and thus no delays or local handling charges by Royal Mail etc?

Does it make any difference if one orders from Alibarber etc (based in China) or from or via someone advertising on Ebay etc., based wherever?

Sounds far too good to be be true, even accepting that sellers abroad will have to increase their prices to cover the VAT which they don't presently pay, What am I missing?

Rod

My old ML7 has white metal bearings. I don't remember any trace of bronze colour when I last dismantled the headstock.

Rod

My newsagent tells me that, by his count, some 75 UK magazine titles have ceased publication altogether this year including some very long established angling titles. I think there are probably a lot more anglers than model engineers so I am grateful that we still have our magazines - even if there are some delays in delivery.

Rod