Dont mind a bit of DIY myself. Most 'at home' jobs end up getting relegated behind small holding jobs. My latest discovery has been PostCrete. Had a 12 foot gate that latched into a 4 inch wooden post. Horses kept breaking the post by pushing against the gate so replaced it with a galvanised metal post. Dug the hole, filled the hole with water, squared the post and poured in two bags of dry PostCrete. Was solid enough to support the post in an hour or so. 24 hours later, job done. Wont be mixing concrete for posts again. Great stuff.
Most chuffed bit of DIY you've done? Got a Neff integrated pull-out larder fridge in the kitchen for everyday items - far better than the normal hinged door type. They don't make them any more but were a common fridge across the Neff/Seimens/Bosch range up until about 15 years ago - mine has got to be 20 years old at least. If you want a pull out door/drawers rather than a hinged door/fixed shelf type, I think only Leibherr (who make Miele's fridges) make them and they're mega expensive. Anyway, the pull out door runs on 4 roller bearings in runners and one had collapsed making the door almost unopenable unless you used brute force. Tried to get replacement runners from every possible source but were told the part numbers (which I had off their website) were obsolete. So removed the fridge and dismantled the left and right door runners for a butchers. Measured the bearings which were nylon covered 28mm OD/8mm ID and 8mm width. Had a look on Amazon/ebay for roller bearings of the right size (there are fecking thousands out there) and found a pack of 8 on offer at exact size for less than a tenner. Couldn't believe how cheap they were - Chinese made but what the hell, they were perfect. How are they so cheap? The other problem was that the originals were riveted to the runners. Drilled out the rivets and removed the old roller bearings and used some stainless M8 bolts and nuts (Toolstation) to refix the new ones. Ground off the excess head and nut thickness to the correct width to fit in runners and reassembled Smooth as silk and ready for another 20 years - after that, if I'm still here I probably won't care........
Well I have got into opera due to my youngest son singing in Frankfurt opera house children's choir. He got a few solo shots before he finished when his voice broke. Last night I took the family to watch Aida in Verona...small issue..it's tonight. On my way again now. Otherwide it's a bit of mining finance work and sailing!!
Our 27 year old tractor lost all drive. 4 levers to play with. Hand throttle, shuttle, gear lever (semi-auto) and range selector. Push the shuttle forward to go forward. Pull it back to go back. It was all loose and floppy. A bit of reading on 'the farming forum' and I found what I needed to know. Had to take the floor out to get to the top of the gear box. An hour or so getting the floor out to find the bracket where the cable connected to the gear box had broken where one of the bolts held it so there was a lot of play preventing a clean selection. Replacing the whole thing would have been another hour getting the housing for the levers apart to swap out a £50 cable. Used a couple washers to spread the load of the bolt across the remaining part of the bracket. While I was in there, removed a lifetime of grease and muck along with a thorough wire brushing of lots of rusty bits and a coat of hammerite. Always meant to go back and do a proper job, but 2 years on its still working. I'm sure a permanent fix will be needed at some point, but until then......
Opera! Good man. Regarding your timing issue, you could have got it the other way around and completely messed it up. Enjoy your evening
That reminds me, one of the hinges on my Neff freezer broke months ago and one day I came home from work to find the freezer and contents had defrosted. Binned all the food, turned the freezer off and haven't got round to ordering a new hinge. I'm not even missing the frozen food and reckon I don't actually need a freezer. It's one less appliance to run in this time of high energy costs.
Before ill health I used to work for RAID (Rhondda Against Illegal Drugs) In my 68 years I have worked at 16 firms hated some of them but enjoyed my time at most of them.
For me my spare time is getting out on my kayak and seeing the views landlubbers will never get to drool over ..I live in Dorset most weeks and it really is another world off the coast
Its great when hobbies take you places or shows you things you wouldn't normally see. Been a keen fly-fisher for over 45 years. Without looking for it, and for no extra effort, you see superb scenery and lots of wildlife just because you're there. Sunrises, sunsets, storms, sun kissed hill tops, shaded valleys. Badgers, otter, hares, deer. Buzzard, kite, peregrine, kingfisher, dipper, sandpiper and myriad waterfowl. Spent one autumn taking photos of fungi while on a week fishing the upper wye. No real interest before or after, but got a book to work out what things were. Can still identify quite a few. As attributed to Dame Juliana in the 15th century. Piscator non solum piscatur. (There's more to fishing than catching fish.)
Funny how you get 'dragged into things' with your kids. Squeezes out some of your own stuff if you're not careful. Spent a lot of time with our daughter and her horses. Still do, and she's 27 now. Saying that, the horses led to sheep and cows. Wouldn't be a 'tractor mechanic' without what the horses started. Do you sail on lakes or sea? What size boats?
depends on my boss really and how many days off I can beg..I live in Turktown but work in Bournemouth airport - 11 days on 3 back home, on a wet day I get out on a mountain bike but clear skies and I try to get out in all the various bays so far this summer I've gone to Studland bay, Kimmeridge bay (Old Harry rocks Photos) Worbarrow beach (You all need to go there as no tourists) Lulworth Cove for Durdle Door, Poole harbour for Brownsea Island etc ... haven't done many rivers this year as they;ve mostly dried up
Healthy hobbies. Yeah, rivers have been dire this year. Still waiting on a good dump of rain so I can get up to Scotland salmon fishing. Crossed the Welsh Dee, Severn, Wye and Taff on Thursday. No water in any of them.
Lakes at the moment but will graduate to the sea I'm sure. Two of my sons do it with me and they have ambitions....the youngest one is persuading his brother slowly to live on one. Been sailing a Soling recently but play around on lasers and toppers too. The two boys have got certified on a catamaran this week. Not convinced myself by that but will have a bash in the coming week.
Not something that has appealed to me though I know a few people who sail. A few of the reservoirs I fish have sailing clubs as well. Wonderful that you have something to share with your sons. Make the most of it.
Come on guys - let's keep this going. Here's another DIY story for you in this football hiatus - if you're even remotely interested and have the time to read it that is. Kitchen sink mixer tap is a chrome Blanco Adelphi swivel spout monoblock - I do love German branded products. Had it for probably getting on for 20 years - a nice chunky tap with single lever loop handle for smooth on/off/mixing H&C in one action. About a year ago it started to stiffen up and prone to drip now and again - no salacious alternative thoughts here please! Right, new cartridge called for here - seems simple doesn't it? Model was discontinued 15 years ago and Blanco had no replacement cartridges. Hawked around the usual online spares companies but with no success. As a result, I bought another mono sink mixer which looked very similar for less than 50 quid, but compared to the original, it was crap and no substitute so never fitted it. I knew from my time working with appliance manufacturers in the last century that this Blanco tap (and many others) were actually made to their specification for them in New Zealand by a manufacturer called Greens. Found them online and asked if they could help. The email came back saying as manufacturers, they couldn't deal direct and I'd have to go through one of their distributors which were only based in New Zealand and Australia. Tried an Aussie one but they were as helpful as a box of frogs. Then I tried a Kiwi company called Pink Plumbing Shop (honest ) https://pinkplumbingshop.co.nz and the response was so different. It may have been something to do with the fact that I'm from Wales and he mentioned the All Blacks had just stuck about 60 points on us (about last November? - I'm sure remote will know), and took sympathy on me. Anyway, a guy called Kent responded and said they did indeed have the correct ceramic cartridge in stock because it was the same one as fitted to Green's own Starmix tap sold currently sold in NZ. The cost was $130NZ and he agreed to ship it to me for another $45NZ - about 80 quid all told in real money. That's more than I'd spent on the replacement tap but what the hell - have want you want don't accept second best. Paid him by EFTPOS and the cartridge was with me about a week or so later. Fitted in no more than quarter of an hour and back to brand new operation. The moral of the story? Never give up on anything - unless it's Watters....
