Member postings for Bob Unitt 1

I'm very sorry to hear that. He was a nice man, always helpful at his brilliant exhibitions. He will be much missed.

I just received a 10-page form to fill-in from the DVLA, with a letter referring to my 'recent' application (sent more than 6 months ago). Given that it's taken them 6 months to simply start the process, I don't see myself driving again any time soon . Needless to say, the form asks me for repeats of a great deal of information I've already given them...

Nice work. It looks identical to a Reeves 'Trojan', did the old Reeves licence designs to other countries ?

Tip of the week - be born to rich parents, and learn to spell 'intellect'.

Seconded !

I've refrained from repeated complaints ever since I was told by someone who worked for HMRC that a complaint triggered an update to your file, which was then moved to the bottom of the 'In-box'. Is that not the case for the DVLA ?

Edited By Bob Unitt 1 on 28/04/2022 14:06:47

Brian - Thanks. I've used Hobby's before, good firm. I'll get my plans there once I've decided what scale I want.

Bernard - There used to be a Guild of Model Wheelwrights, but they appear to have folded in 2018.

Bob

Slightly off-topic as it's mainly wood - does anyone know where I might get the plans for a traditional Welsh Gambo farm-cart, or can anyone suggest a better forum for this question ?

TIA

They're available separately from GLR, totalling about £70. Unfortunately I've recently bought a set myself, or I'd have been interested in making you an offer

Clive, have you got the bed (cast aluminium, about 12.5" by 5", 1/2" thick) and/or the flywheel (cast iron, 6" diameter, 6 spokes) ? you look to have the rest of it.

Thanks folks. Not sure I want to end up in prison though . I may well do as you suggest, SillyOldDuffer, thanks for the information.

Rant follows, ignore if you don't like rants !

Be glad you've got one. The DVLA is a disaster area, too busy playing macho-management vs. unyeilding-unions to actually look after the people they're supposed to be serving. I had to surrender my licence last march when I had a bit of a heart problem. Last October I applied for a new one, accompanied by a letter from the cardiac consultant saying I was fit to drive. Apart from getting my identification documents back a couple of weeks later I've heard nothing, zilch, zero. Sixth months later I'm still in the dark. I've tried ringing them, but there's no way through the telephone-tree hell that lets you talk to a human being for medical matters. I tried emailing them, all I got back was an acknowledgement and a reference number, but no suggestion how or where that number might be used. I live in the middle of nowhere, so my wife has to drive me everywhere I need to go, there are no buses, and a taxi to the nearest town costs £14 one-way. I'm beginning to wonder if asking my MP to look into it might prompt some action.

I'm 75. At this rate I'll be long-gone by the time they get round to doing their job - perhaps that's the plan...

Rant over.

It could be, I've had problems in the past with some internet providers - they sometimes 'blacklist' a particular web-page or site by mistake because they suspect them of 'spamming', or blacklist a large block of IP addresses because one individual address in that block is misbehaving. Who's your internet provider ?

I've thought about that, but my ceilings are in really good condition, unlikely to fall off. A builder I discussed it with said I should be aware that filling that space could cause damp problems on the underside of the actual roof structure and joists.

Who's going to pay for this 'remedial education'-mandated insulation ? I'm 75, and I live in a 150 year old house that leaks heat like a sieve. I've done what I can by way of secondary glazing, draft prevention etc., but the main problem is the roof - the bedrooms are within the roof-space, so there's no attic. I'd have to have the roof stripped, specialist insulation put in between the joists, and then rebuilt. It's currently a perfectly good roof in all respects except insulation. The cost of the above work would be in the tens of thousands, money I haven't got and, being retired, I'm not going to borrow it. I won't live long enough to repay the cost of the job with reduced heating bills. Governments promise help, grants etc. but it's all the usual puffery - last grant scheme would only apply to houses with tiled roofs, but mine (like most houses round here) is slate. I know what the problem is, what I don't need is some jumped-up council official giving me 'remedial education' - give me some grant money instead !

Today I finished refurbishing and repainting my Reeves Trojan. This was my very first build, back in the 90's, built entirely by muscle-power on a treadle lathe and a hand-powered drill - a good way of learning the value of sharp tools. These tools were a hand-me-down from my wife's grandfather, and were my introduction to model engineering.

Thank you Jason B.

Here's my approach to this issue. :-

I have a tap-holder (jacobs chuck) and two different sized die-holders on 1/2" shanks, and A pair of MT adapters for my lathe tailstock and mill spindle - on the drill-press I just use the chuck jaws. This set-up will deal comfortably with thread-sizes ranging from 12 BA to 3/8", and can be used to start larger threads which can then be finished by hand. If a non-cylindrical thread's position and alignment are critical, I'll usually set it up in the milling vice to ensure accuracy.

Use in lathe tailstock (the die holder is hollow) :-

Mill spindle :-

Drill-press :-

I too have suffered from the dread 'image rotation' issue, my apologies.

Edited By JasonB on 30/03/2022 14:50:40

I just squirt the aerosol into a jam-jar, and use the resulting liquid, which seems to work as well as the old-style plus-gas did.

I have the same problem, to the extent that I sometimes have to get my wife to look for things for me, only for her to find them in plain view in the middle of the bench-top. She reckons that it started after a minor stroke I had years ago.