Member postings for fizzy

Cant even get it into first gear - stuck in neutral! Having played email tennis with someone at UPS customer services (no names on their emails) and asking what/why/when etc they firstly explained that they could do nothing without the shipping number....that would be the line in big bold green letters which starts with Shipping Number (I kid you not). They then referd me to their request 16th March asking for "Documents". No emails from them whatsoever in March, so I asks What document". No answer to this, nor indeed to any of the specific questions I asked. Instead a few lines of waffle refering to me paying a return shipping fee. What Return shipping fee? Ive been asked to pay an Import Tax? Finally customer services have suggested I ring a department to sort it out.....you guessed it, Customer ruddy services! They even supplied a number to call, the very same number that I tried every day last week, waited what must have amounted to several hours on hold but no one ever answers. Do you thing they are trying to fob me off! I have requested a meeting with my MP to discuss this issue - not holding my breath!

Cant even get it into first gear - stuck in neutral! Having played email tennis with someone at UPS customer services (no names on their emails) and asking what/why/when etc they firstly explained that they could do nothing without the shipping number....that would be the line in big bold green letters which starts with Shipping Number (I kid you not). They then referd me to their request 16th March asking for "Documents". No emails from them whatsoever in March, so I asks What document". No answer to this, nor indeed to any of the specific questions I asked. Instead a few lines of waffle refering to me paying a return shipping fee. What Return shipping fee? Ive been asked to pay an Import Tax? Finally customer services have suggested I ring a department to sort it out.....you guessed it, Customer ruddy services! They even supplied a number to call, the very same number that I tried every day last week, waited what must have amounted to several hours on hold but no one ever answers. Do you thing they are trying to fob me off! I have requested a meeting with my MP to discuss this issue - not holding my breath!

So far since Brexit we have attempted to ship six boilers (so essentially each a cardboard box 44 x 33 x 32 cm @4kg) into France and Belguim.All were correctly packed and had the apropriate customs invoices attached. Here is the outcome. Two sent via Hermes, both landed back on my doorstep six weeks later having never left the country. Two sent via DPD, both landed back on my doorstep eight weeks later. Two sent via UPS, one made it to france. The other made it to Belgium but was immedtately returned with a sticker on it saying recipient refused to pay import duty - recipient was never asked to pay duty. And the icing on the cake - UPS today billed me for £112 import tax from Belguim to the UK. Thats for failing to deliver my very own boiler and returning it to me. The lost shipping cost alone is around £250! You just couldnt make it up. Impossable to speak to a living entity within any of these companies. Meeting with our MP to highlight these issues but seriously hacked off. Rant over. Nothing libelllous as its all true!

anyone got anything on this - looks interesting

75 psi is about 60 psi more than you will need, assuming its not doing much work. At high psi the steam pressure will cause the cylinder to lift off its pad thus defeating the point of using a high psi. I dont use 18g on any of our boilers as its not strong enough to use on an end plate which has a water sight gauge on it - the pressure will distort the plate and the gauge will break. 16g will do for your size of boiler. You could use 18g safely on the main tube but its so easily dented that its not worth it for us. Hope this helps.

Yo Duncan

Nothing political about it if its a fact! I sent five boulers to the eu, two via hermes, one via dpd and two via ups, cost including insurance nearly £400. One got there, the rest ended up on my doorstep, no explaination, no refund, nothing! All paperwork present and correct. My business is all but killed.

Ive used bitdefender for many years, you can add the out of date cert as an exception and it wont do it again.

As I suspected, but worth the ask - thanks all. For what its worth, the two genuine Mits I own have not lasted long at all - very dissapointed!

No imperial read out so not sure how to tell - seems too cheap to me?**LINK**

Dominic hit the nail on the head! When you try to light yours there will likely be a lot of flames from the chimney top and none down below. A 0.3mm jet is massive, you will get much better results using a no.3 jet or at a push a no.5 jet. Using your current set up, assuming you can get the burner to light will give off huge amounts of hydrocarbons so whatever you do, dont use it indoors. Gas burners dont work well with multi tube boilers, or at least not as well as they do in single flue boilers with cross tubes. I make boilers and burners for a living (well I did until Brexit!) and am happy to advise fellow enthusiasts so if you get stuck feel free to pm me. Boiler is looking sound and very well made!

I tried for years to get mine to seal using a 10 degree taper, then one day changed the taper to 2 or 3 degrees and never had one leak since. It takes a bit of practise but they work great now. Mine are brass in brass.

Stick to PLA - less voc's than the carpet in your house, and food safe. No burning smell, but a slight sweet smell depending on the colour you are using - and keep the temperature as low as you can. FF default is 220 which is mad high, i run at 210 to 205. Nylon is a bit tricky to use, and gives off much higher voc's.

colphos every time for me - machines like brass, very easy to work

I have this problem - I have a stick leaning against the spool, in contact with the filament to act as a restricter, works perfect

hey Duncan....jerry who is a good mate of mine has just perfected a new line (clevedon steam), email him for details...we might all learn something

I recently had a very bad experience with cutting fumes. Having run out of my usual parafin based mix for milling ali I resorted to using what I had to hand, Kerosene (It stopped the cutter from clogging-just about). There was a lot to mill and there was a lot of smoke. After about half an hour I realised that I could no longer concentrate and had a bad headache. I got out the workshp - felt terrible. An hour later was back to normal. Lesson learned, quite scary at the time though.

I occasionally get the odd joint which wont take (I do this every day near enough). You need tenicity flux, not easyflow, then get it real hot. Get it hot enough and the flux will do its stuff. It will flow into the joint by capillary action before the solder melts but it needs to be a lot hotter than normal - no idea why, but it works.

Vermiculite is the way to go - https://www.cupalloys.co.uk/store/Vermiculite-Brazing-Hearth-Laser-Cut-Metal-Frame-p276411644

At the most basic level there is Tinkercad - suprisingly good for 3d printing. You can 2d cad with basic Visio, I use F360 but it is far from intuative especially if you dont use it often, loads of tutorials on utube. Its not an easy thing to get into. Good luck

Ive just made some oilers for my Corliss model from brass and plexiglass. I bonded them together using loctite 272 but they came apart. Next I will try araldite but will it withstand being in constant contact with oil? thanks