Member postings for Samsaranda

Thanks to you all for your comments, Martin I also suffer from Neuropathy which is gradually affecting my right side and I have noticed of late I am aware of balance issues so perhaps I should regard this latest occurrence as a wake up call, we all think we can do things that we did in our youth but it ain’t so.
Dave W

Hi Nick

Waterfall is intact, just feeling very sore today, my pride was damaged as well but thankfully nobody saw me make a fool of myself. Wife is watching me like a hawk today when I venture into the garden, I'm definitely confined to ground level for the foreseeable future!

Dave W

Not what did I do today but yesterday, not engineering related, I was carrying out repairs and modifications to the outside of the workshop, this necessitated climbing over the waterfall to my Koi Pond and squeezing behind some Rhododendron bushes to get access to the workshop wall. The work on the wall went well and then came the time to extricate myself, climbed up onto the waterfall then fate took a hand and I missed my footing, plunged one foot into the waterfall and by then my balance was seriously lost and I propelled myself out of the waterfall, which is about three feet high, and down onto the broken slate surface surrounding the pond, unfortunately my forehead was the first to contact the ground and I ended up streaming blood everywhere. I picked myself up very gingerly and decided that I was going to need the wife’s help to stop the bleeding, I grabbed some tissue and went in search of her, she was indoors drying her hair having washed it. She panicked, as I knew she would, but tended my wounds and managed to stem the blood flow. She was understandably worried about how much damage I had sustained so without my knowledge phoned our daughter who lives in the same village as us, she came round and unbeknown to me had called an ambulance. The first I knew of this was two paramedics in green uniforms came through the garden gate, one of the paramedics is a family friend so there was a lot of mickey taking, they were brilliant and when cleaning my wounds found that there small sharp pieces of slate embedded which they removed and cleaned it up. All this was taking place in the garden because it was a glorious day and was safer from indoors because of Covid. It was deemed not necessary to go to hospital but I was given strict instructions about possible effects from head injury and what I must do if I felt unwell. Today the wounds have scabbed over but I am feeling very stiff and bruised, only to be expected I suppose, my wife has yet again banned me from working at heights saying that I am dangerous enough at ground level, and to think 40 years ago I regularly worked at heights up to 100 feet off the ground, albeit with the appropriate personal safety equipment, any work above ground level means that I must now enlist the help of my son in law who is a lead worker and works at heights all the time, I find it frustrating to be constrained like that but I suppose it’s for the best, I had yet another lucky escape.

I used to sweep our chimney with drain rods and a brush and always incurred the wrath of the wife because of the mess that I created. When we graduated from an open fire to a woodburner I was banned from sweeping the flue and we now employ a chimney sweep who has all the correct gear, and I must say he is 100% cleaner than me, which pleases the wife. I must admit he sometimes struggles with getting the sequence right for reassembling the pieces of the woodburner that have to be dismantled for access to the flue, secretly I am glad I no longer have to sweep the chimney, there are much more appropriate tasks that I can be doing at my time of life.
Dave W

Had a succession of jobs when at school, remember one particular summer, during the holidays, when I was 15 had a job at grocers shop. In those days grocers used to sell bacon which came as a whole side of pig and had to be boned out and cut into manageable pieces that would fit onto the bacon slicer. The grocer showed me once how to do it and from there on it was my job whenever the sides of bacon were delivered, the knives used were scarily sharp, nowadays H&S would have a field day with a 15 year old using such knives without supervision and any personal protection but things were certainly different in the early 60’s. I had another good job when I was 16, Assistant stage manager at the theatre on the end of the pier in Eastbourne, only for the duration of the Easter show though, made up for by the fact that there was a troupe of dancing girls performing in the show. At 17 I left home and joined the RAF, I think my weekly pay then was £3. 3 shillings, life in the Air Force was a completely different experience which lasted 22 years and changed my life for various reasons.
Dave W

The applied lettering is identical to the asset numbers that local councils use for street lighting equipment, I have a lamp standard outside my house with identical lettering.
Dave W

Hello Pauline,

I have a Champion V20 mill and have fitted Digital Readouts, as David has said it transforms the mill, so much easier to use. I have an older Warco lathe which I purchased new 13 years ago, no problems with either supplier just need to remember these are “hobby” machines not production tools.

Dave W

About 25 years ago, I was the Quality Assurance Manager at a manufacturer of positive displacement pumps, we had a small number of apprentices who went to college full time for a number of months and on their return were put to work in production. They were hopelessly out of their depth when confronted with machining components on a lathe. My office was adjacent to the factory floor and the apprentices knew that they could always come to me and get whatever assistance I could give them, quite often I was out at their machines advising speeds and feeds so that they could achieve the required surface finishes. I didn’t serve a machine shop apprenticeship but drew on my learning when I had spent considerably more time at college than these apprentices. The management of the company were quite happy to take on apprentices and send them to college for a few months and that was considered an apprenticeship, from what I have read in this article, little appears to have changed and probably has got worse, a sad state for our engineering which used to have first class apprenticeships.
Dave W

Had to do some maintenance on my beehive yesterday, it was 33 degrees outside and I had to wear my bee suit, boy was it hot, I just about melted. My thoughts went back to the 60’s when I used to work outside in what was Trucial Oman and the temperature was regularly in the 50’s, can’t believe we survived it, certainly couldn’t now at my advanced years. Oh for a thunderstorm to break this heatwave.
Dave W

I think the modern thinking that flushing or syringing of ears nowadays is the cause of more harm than good, Ears are cleared of debris by micro suction.
Dave W

She has to accept her deafness as a first step, deafness is a disability full stop. I have severely impaired hearing and my wife is profoundly deaf, through illness, and we both use technology to assist us. It seems she is not prepared to help herself, the vibrating pad under her pillow connected to the smoke alarm is a brilliant bit of kit, my wife has had hers for years, if she will not accept that then I doubt she will accept any other technology solutions.
Dave W

We get a lot of bats flying around our house on summer evenings, they are feasting on the abundance of insects that fly around our village pond which borders our Close. I have put up a bat box on the rear of the house and it’s usually occupied. We live on the coast in East Sussex and some bats found locally have travelled across the Channel, probably hitching a ride on the ferries, bit worrying because one was found to be carrying rabies so glad Ian was using gloves.
Dave W

Isopropanol.

Dave W

We always seem to be so hung up with fuses that we relate to protecting the appliance where in reality the fuse is there to protect the supply cable. If an appliance, e.g. a lighting appliance comes with a plug fitted with for instance a 5 amp fuse then you will find in reality the cable will be rated for 5 amps and to change the fuse for a higher rating, say 13 amp, will compromise the safety of the cable if the appliance develops a fault.
Dave W

The ad lists a “monodex sheet metal cutter” how many readers remember or owned one of these, it was a very crude shearing device which was extraordinarily hard on your hands to use, I had one and during a recent workshop reorganisation I came across it, surprising how many gimmicky tools there were on the market then.
Dave W

Not cataracts but my daughter who is 49 had problems with glasses all her life, she decided to have the lenses changed in both eyes at the same time (same as cataract operation) she paid to have it done as a private procedure, she had a small problem with being allergic to the drops she had to use post operatively but that was minor, she is highly delighted with the results. Clive don’t sell your machines, the operation will make a tremendous difference and you will be able to go on enjoying your hobby.
Dave W

Bonded seals/ Dowty washers are used to seal banjo type fittings on hydraulic systems, a particularly specialised function.
Dave W

I had a Matchless 500cc single cylinder motorcycle of 1954 vintage which had manual advance and retard of the magneto ignition, I soon learned that you put the advance and retard in the correct position for starting otherwise it could kick back and possibly break your ankle, happy days.
Dave W

Hi Keith,

if you were fitting DRO’s would it have mattered if the machine was Imperial or Metric as the readouts would give either. I have a Chester V20 (imperial) fitted with optical DRO’s, fitting the read outs was the best move it makes it so easy to use.
Dave W

Have no problems with led life but changed all our light switches for MK a few years ago as we redecorated each room, I always go for the quality option where electrics are concerned, I got fed up with cheapo switches arcing when switched, you can’t put a price on safety.
Dave W