30 Sept - 15 Oct - Holiday!

MOT due a the end of Sept.
As a result of a challenging bonnet vs Motorway incident the bodywork is not in good shape and the interior is trashed as the car was used to transport all kinds of materials during construction period.

So before holiday departure made a one-way trip to the scrap yard and am now in train & bicycle mode, so far so good.

 

Took a very cheap flight from Bournemouth to Carcassonne and drove along the French & Italian Riviera to Tuscany to take part in a bike 'sportive' in the glorious countryside between Florence and Tuscany.  L'Eroica is an annual homage to vintage rides partly on white gravel Strada and on steel bikes of strictly pre-1987 construction.

  

Unfortunately I had a accident on day 2, misjudged a roundabout and at low speed went sliding across the smooth tarmac in the hot sunshine.  Mostly superficial burns and a swollen thumb.

With the aid of  Ibuprufen I enjoyed an adventurous day in the saddle and managed to avoid any punctures or mishaps on the treacherous gravel.

We returned to France with a brief visit to Florence and overnight stop-overs in Lucca and Arles

On my return to Bristol discovered that the swelling resulted from a broken hand so required 3 weeks in a plaster cast, not good!

Temporary Kitchen

Although I do not yet have any bathing facilities I have rigged up a temporary sink and microwave, using surplus materials.  Also a bit of an experiment into a totally cantilevered base design.

The kitchen larder unit you may recognise from the previous 68UPH, rescued from Jess & Petes garage in Cornwall after it was stripped out during a kitchen re-fit.  All on the promise that I split the proceeds if I sell it.

The worktop was a £5 bargain from the Ikea with a slightly dented basin.

All three items happen to precisely equal the width of the room!

Machines Delivery - 20 Sept

At long last the woodworking machines were delivered and installed this weekend.

They have been waiting outside in the farmyard in Lanreath since August awaiting an empty truck returning to Bristol, slightly reducing the transport cost.

Although delivery was planned on Friday evening the driver ran over his hours and so they were stored in the transport depot overnight and arrived first thing Saturday.

I had reserved parking spaces outside the yard gates so the truck could park and offload with a HIAB directly into the yard.  Very quick offload in 3 lifts onto hardboard sheeting.

Spent all of Saturday cleaning machines of Cornwall rust and farmyard detritus mud, straw and nesting swift droppings, to reduce the rubbish being taken into the new workshop.

Decided that I no longer need the big (and heavy) deWalt cross-cut saw and stand, so will be eBaying this and replace with something more mobile that will take up less workshop space.  This will need to be stripped down and cleaned up bit so was put aside as a non-urgent project.

After measuring the door openings I reluctantly removed one of the planer beds to make manouvering a little easier.  These things are often easy to take off but may take ages to set up again - we will see. This bed is a massive piece of cast iron, difficult enough to hinge upwards when fixed on the machine, lifting and walking with it took a few deep breaths!!

I built a kind of runway in hardboard on the concrete yard and two sheets of plywood patched together at right angles and packed up to give a smooth run into the workshop lobby.

I knew the lobby would be tight and as a precaution I polished the powerfloated slab with wax polish in case I needed to skid the machine around.

The machine has two pairs of adjustable roller wheels on one face (front) and a single jacking jockey wheel on the opposite face (back).

The biggest risk was the machine (which weighs a Tonne) running down the slope out of controI and through the wall at the bottom of the yard and definitely not making the right hand corner into the workshop, not to mention pinning me (if I was lucky) against the wall.

I placed a couple of heavy fencing bases about a foot from the machine to stop it running away (handbrake) and tied a rope from the machine to both gate posts, (parachute).  I adjusted the rollers up until we had a bit of movement and then by gently lifting the jockey wheel end found that I could get some forward movement and at the same time steer the load across the slope (footbrake).  Because of the uneven concrete there was a tendancy for the back to want to swing around and overtake the front, but I had a couple of timber wedges and a lump hammer that could be used single handed and could arrest any unwanted movement and give me time for a breather.

Although the doors and lobby were tight the above technique gave me all the control I needed and skidding the front end around was not necessary.

LOADS of room!!

This is all quite a relief and the job was easier than I expected.  The jockey wheel did not crash through the deck as happened on the way out and the slope was my friend.  Getting the machine out and UP the slope is something I will leave to someone else!

Bristol Green Doors Weekend 13/14 Sept

Bristol Green Doors open house weekend was a big success and very enjoyable.
Over the 2 days 60 visitors were given guided tours whether they wanted it or not, on the  topics of;
INSULATION - AIR TIGHTNESS - VENTILATION
although many interesting discussions on unrelated subjects and penetrating questions from leftfield made the days unpredictable.

I was fortunate in having great volunteers on each day who signed visitors in and managed the between tours entrance room - it all ran very smoothly, thank you Lee and Jennifer.

The weekend coincided with Bristol Open Doors weekend so there were a lot of passers by who dropped in and people & neighbours who just saw the balloons and guessed there was an event happening so strolled in.

The website for those interested;
 http://www.bristolgreendoors.org/events/september-2014

and the Case Study for 70 Upper Perry Hill (House 18);
  http://www.bristolgreendoors.org/case-study/6341

The lack of guarding on the stairs did not prove to be a problem although about 4 children under 6 were getting bored at one point on a large tour, and were all magnetically drawn to any hole that they could fit their head through*. Since there were so many holes to choose from, children were confused, the risk was soon averted and the tour continued.  Amusingly all the parents were focused on my talk, whereas some of the non parents were flashing their eyes between me and the children interspersed with cringes or closing eyes in disbelief.

Childrens Activity Playground (How many gaps over 100mm can you spot!)

I plan to open the house again next year when more data on energy usage & running costs will be available and perhaps some of the fit-out has progressed.

*Building regulations state that for stairs no gap shall allow a sphere to pass that is greater than 100mm diameter, being the size of a small persons head who if passed through balustrade etc. is liable to get stuck or fall through completely.

13 August - CORNWALL via Chagford

Enthusiastic welcome from Percy at The Chagford Inn

Great food and beer in Chagford at Johns new establishment - perfect stop halfway to Cornwall!

Machines all ready to go from Lanreath, waiting a part load back to Bristol.  Suspension close to breaking point with a full car on the way back.

Spotted some nice galvanised troughs at an agricultural supplier near Launceston wonder what price?  notice the distorted bases that caused me a problem and the sledgehammer solution

Adult section in Cereals - ?!

2 August 2014 Tidy for a few days

28 July 2014 Planters

 

Installed the planters this afternoon, plenty of exercise lugging them up 2 floors on a hot, humid day. No major snags although the holes drilled for draining the zinc and for services required a lot of cleaning up, fiddly because they are all quite inaccessible.  A trial offering of a pair of planters also showed that the bases had suffered a lot distortion in the galvanizing process.   The resulting bulges used up all design tolerances making the threading of securing bolts through the handrail standards impossible.  A few well aimed (and one not so well aimed) bashes with a sledge-hammer pushed the bulges in-board and although a tight fit, the bolts now just about work.  

The planters look good in the sunshine when they all reflect light, less good when overcast because the differing galvanizing patterns are more evident, but longer term they should all go matt grey with a more even appearance.

I plan to plant in the autumn but need some irrigation up and running.  Also thinking of insulating the planters internally, they really heat up in the sunshine, this should also provide some protection against frost in winter wind.

Some final touches for now; block the drainage holes with bungs, except perhaps one per planter with a short length of overflow pipe / pack up the outer edge on the brickwork to level the planters up and check for even spacing.

 

Planters give more of a sense of enclosure and when combined with the planting will soften the views in and out. The species of plants can be fine tuned to give varying heights to suit each location - (these photos are taken from seated position). The aim is to blend the planting in the foreground with more distant greenery