Member postings for ChrisH

SpeedyBuilder5 - That shovel on the lawn tractor looks good, is it fixed totally or can it be moved up and down a bit?

Chris

I bought the 'Economy' mill/drill (RF25 look alike) off Warco. Bought one of the last Imperial ones they sold, they were selling them off cheap so a bargain. Came in a crate - I didn't know how crap you could make plywood until I saw that crate but I wasn't buying the crate and it got binned anyway. The mill/drill has given me absolutely no problems at all. I had to modify the motor support as I didn't have the room for it to sit behind the mill as designed, which buggared the warranty straight away, but I took that chance. The only issue was the so-called 'manual' written in some sort of chineglese that made absolutely no sense at all and that disappointed me; after selling these for 30 years I would have thought Warco could have rewritten it in proper English. After sales very helpful when I needed to know how the table came apart so I could lift it in bits into position - it sits on a purpose made bench and I had to take it to bits to lift it all up on my own. I also bought a 460 belt sander - again exactly as they described and no problems with it, plus some other small tools. So for me Warco are pretty good-oh, I have no complaints with their kit, will use them again when I need to.

Can't say anything about Chester supplied stuff - not bought anything from them.

The only comment re one v t'other is that at the recent Midland Model Engineering show, I liked the stuff on the Warco stand better than the stuff on the Chester stand, but that's just personal choice. Thought the Warco stand didn't have enough sales folk about so difficult to get to talk with them, you sort of had to queue up, whilst at the Chester stand the sales staff were so busy talking to old customers about the good old days that there was no-one to talk with either. So I suppose you paid yer money (if you wanted/needed to) and took yer chance! Or not, as the case maybe.

So I suppose that is another point for Warco, but taken with a pinch of salt as nothing from Chester to compare with!

Chris

Hi - did anyone watch Guy Martin on Channel 4 and the building of a replica WW1 tank? If not, well worth a watch. Really amazing, what was done, how it was done and by whom not the least by the 20 year old German model maker's contribution, and the reality brought home of exactly what it must have been like operating those tanks for real at the time.

If nothing else, seeing how it was built today using modern machinery and methods I was left with profound respect for the skills and abilities of the workers - mainly women it seems - who made the original tanks 100 years ago using the methods and machines they had available then.

Typical last minute 'elf n safety' sting in the tail at the end by Plod but a brilliant recovery in choosing an alternative anniversary venue to Lincoln.

Chris

Duncan - really like that idea, think I will do likewise. Simples!

Chris

Hi Bear, I thought they were not allowed to drill into the tower to secure the scaffolding as presumably one would normally do but that they were going to brace off the tower, thus touching it but not secured to it, so as the scaffolding would not rock about in the breeze and that they had worked out that it would not impose excess loads on the tower in doing so. But you're absolutely right, the whole scaffolding bit is some stunning job in it's own right.

Chris

I thought it was an interesting programme although a little spun out with padding rather than facts; I would have liked a bit more on the bell casting. Although the narrator was usually clear she did talk over over contributors a lot which I found annoying, and when they built the clock they did so using imperial units so why refer to heights and distances in metres and millimetres now - we still use feet and inches in England, except the TV crowd (and the BBC mob especially) always use kilometres and metres despite us retaining miles and yards and feet.

I love the bit when they were talking of the "can-do" attitude of the Victorians, 'this is England and this is what we do'. That attitude still here in England, today, somewhere, but I wish we had that attitude in greater abundance today. People are so negative, "it can't be done because...." seems to prevail so.

Not surprised the cost has risen so much either, the scaffolding operation is a huge cost in itself what with the cranes and the special bridging beam etc., never mind the actual work, and the work will increase as they get to it as more will be found that needs doing for sure. I suppose the new estimate includes the cost of stopping the tower leaning any further, it ought to, they had to in Pisa! But at least it will be of value to many, as opposed to some other projects I could mention. And how did they lift that bell up that height and into position 150+ years ago, they didn't tell us that, they didn't have our cranes back then.

Made a change from the usual 'crap tv' programmes they all usually serve up.

Chris

Like Dave (SillyOldDuffer), I also use neat cutting oil on the mill, from Warco in my case. I have a flood coolant system but use it from an oil can at present as, also like Dave, I find flood coolant ends up being splashed everywhere; I need some guards making to contain the mess onto the table - another job to do on the "to-do" work list! I have also (yet again like Dave!) wondered if I spent wisely buying a flood coolant system, but as it was on a 'special offer' and under ££100 and a few years ago now it's now a case of "oh well.....", money well gone and out the budget now and forgotten!

However, I do find that use of flood coolant/cutting oil is a great help when milling steel both in getting a good finish and getting the swarf out the way plus helping extend tool life, I use HSS tools. Just my experience on my machine.

Chris

Mike - precisely!

Vic - a compression ignition engine runs on what is known in the subject of heat engines as the diesel cycle, named after Rudolf Diesel who designed it, so Russel and Neil very correctly pointed out that it is a diesel engine and that it doesn't have to run on diesel to be called a diesel engine, it can use many different fuels as well as diesel fuel.

Look in the field of model aeroplanes, plenty of very small engines there are called diesel engines as they are compression ignition engines. They do not have a spark plug and fire as a result of the heat of the compression igniting the fuel/air mixture, whatever fuel that happens to bel They do not run on diesel fuel as you seem to understand it but on a fuel that is a mix of ether, kerosene, castor oil and a dash of isopropyl nitrate, which fuel is also, in the model airplane world, known as diesel fuel.

It is not a question of called it what we like but of calling it correctly for what it is - a diesel engine.

Chris

I agree with what you say Dave, and it won't affect me either as I shall also be long gone, but like you I feel more than a bit sorry for our grandchildren and grandchildren everywhere when I consider the future.

The problem is really one of rapidly rising population world wide. That is fuelling the ever increasing need for more and more fossil fuel for all the various forms of transport and power generation, generating the increasing pollution. But it won't end there, because there will be a similar need for more and more food and water for this increasing population, with less and less land available for producing food. I think long term the increasing need for fuel, food and water as the world population continues to rocket will produce war; that war will be very nasty (aren't they all?) and will result in a serious reduction in world population. Whether or not civilisation will then sort themselves out in a sustainable way will probably determine whether mankind continues or dies out I guess.

Anyway, this is all a bit morbid, I have a perfectly good pint of Spitfire getting warm; I shall go and drown my sorrows in it and follow that pint with another!!!

Chris  

PS  I see Martin is seeing the same future for mankind, our posts crossed!

Edited By ChrisH on 04/11/2017 19:44:49

Go back about 1000 years and we were growing vines up Yorkshire way and making wine. The vines were originally introduced here by the Romans 100's of years before that. If it was that warm to enable vines to flourish then, what produced the "global warming" then? Hardly humans, not enough of them and none burning petrol or diesel.

Then in the 1600's it was so cold for so long that the river Thames froze over for months on end, ice thick enough to support fairs and stalls selling goods and even support bonfires and coaches and horses. What human intervention caused that "global cooling"? Certainly not humans stopping burning petrol and diesel, we still hadn't got them then.

I am not saying we are not contributing to CO2 emissions today, or pollution which we need to control, reduce and restrict on a global scale which is not without huge problems as Clive suggests, just suggesting planet Earth has natural global warming and cooling cycles that we don't control, and those are facts not wishes. Clive above raises some very relevant issues.

Chris

Edited By ChrisH on 04/11/2017 10:38:43

It's not a question of liking or not liking progress Vic, and progress isn't always a good thing, but of accepting the reality of life today, as we live it, as it is presented to us, as is factual today, not as we might like it to be in some dreamy wishful way. We have what we have.

When technology has moved on then something else will be presented to us, but in the meantime diesel - and oil of other extractions - powers all transport of goods as well as most folk, except for some electric trains, and will do for the forseeable future. It also powers some of the electric power station that supply the national grid, so even if we use electric power oil is sometimes the provider of that electric power.

It may not be what you want but is what you have, and will have for quite a while yet.

"I mostly work to units of "that'll do"......"

Sounds much like mine - "she'll be right"......

Edited By ChrisH on 03/11/2017 21:00:21

Diesel haters as maybe, but the reality is that diesel haters could not live if they boycotted buying any and all goods that didn't come to them under diesel power. It's all well and good having these green feelings, but real life doesn't work like that!

Got another item for the "That'l Come in Handium" tool shelf today from Lidl - a cordless (once it's heated up on it's stand) Hot Glue Gun for £7.99 I think it was. Didn't have a glue gun, so thought 'this would come in handy...... '

Chris

Whilst I accept that eventually we will be all driving around in electric powered cars the technology and infrastructure is not here now.

As pointed out by Martin above, that power has to be generated somewhere to replace the power generated in vehicles, which means more power stations to be built; we don't seem to be cracking on with that one, rather we seem to be shutting the ones we have, so thats not going be there ay time soon.

Plus we must have the capacity to enable all of us to charge our vehicles overnight. Then there is the additional distribution network to be installed, and all the charging points, how many per house? Minimum one, sometimes, often, more. Houses with no driveways, that rely on street parking, will need a succession of roadside charging points, rather like the old parking meters that were, plus the problem of training cables on the walkways will have to be resolved. Charging points will be needed wherever people live, not just in cities and towns. Again, that's not started yet, to my knowledge.

And in addition there needs to be a bit of a leap forward in battery technology, it's improving but we're not there yet.

There is bound to be lots that I haven't touched on but the little I have indicates a huge investment in money, resources and labour plus acceptance of the attendant disruption will be required. How much? No idea other than it will be big, big bucks, for each of us, that we all will have to pay for. And will we all be happy for that? For that will have to be paid for while we are still running about in petrol and diesel powered vehicles, unlike when these first arrived a century plus ago when people still walked, went by train or horse, and only bought into the new mode of transport when they could afford to do so. Plus the fossil fuel power stations will still be producing pollution to satisfy the new demands. A bit of 'be careful of what you wish for' maybe or perhaps?

In the meantime I'm just off out in my diesel powered car which is probably deteriorating vastly in value as I type!

As Howard intimates, there is no alternative - certainly at present.

Chris

Neil - a bit off thread this, but we have one of those fans in our place in Brittany. All our heating for the whole house is by two wood burning enclosed stoves; As it had been recommended to us, I bought one of these fans for the main stove which does most of the heating work: it does seem to work, very gently air movement but it does seem to circulate and give a more even temperature in the room.

Chris

Dave - I am designing a two cylinder sleeve valve two stroke IC engine, but, it's only very much in the embryonic stage; whether it goes any further will depend on whether I think I can make it work and I only get to designing when I am stuck for something to do which being retired is not very often! So yes, there is at least a few of us designing engines.

Chris

Dividing 40 by 4 is only simple basic mental arithmetic, helped by learning the "times tables", which was how things were taught when I was a little lad at school. Trouble is, that teaching of the three R's of which basic mental arithmetic was part, which served us oldies so well, has been dropped from teaching now, along with common sense in favour of new more fashionable teaching methods which are still to be proved it seems, and certainly don't provide the same basic understanding of numbers.

My wife was a teacher, thankfully gave it up and became a 'classroom support' worker for the last few years before she retired. Again, back in the day (our day) such a position was unknown, the teacher was expected to teach on their own and did. One day about 15 years ago she came home and described to me the latest 'approved' method of teaching division to primary school children. I could not believe how complicated and long winded the method was or how many chances it gave for the pupil to get it wrong and how long it took compared to the method we were taught as kids. The chances of the children readily understanding what they were doing was very small and my wife totally agreed - and she is no mathematician - but that is the method they had to use then.

I don't blame the folk that can't divide 40 by 4, I blame the trendy modern teaching methods that are failing to get the message across, that do not work and of allowing the use of calculators to do all the brain work for them instead of actually teaching the subject properly first so the child understands what they are doing without aids like calculators. The kids are not being taught to think for themselves first - just get a machine to do it.

Rant over for today!

Chris. Confirmed Anorak.

Andrew - I like you method of working, very sound, but not all - perhaps very few, I don't know - of us have the grinding facilities to accurately grind hole plug gauges parallel and to size, we have to make do with the measuring tools we have, but as you say, you can't have too many micrometers, inside and out! I need a depth one now too.

thaiguzzi - quality verniers are very good but the problem using them you have identified, eyesight. That doesn't get any better as you get older and a lot of us here are not so young as we like to think! (Think mind making promises the body can't keep anymore. You think you are still 27 but the reality is more like 72!). That is why digital and to a slightly lesser extent dial calipers have their attraction, big figures easy to read.

Chris