powerrabbit

Perhaps he's waiting to pick the blackberries! Been installing the flue system for the AGA today. It's up and running but still have to put another pipe on the outside stack and make up another wall bracket to stabalize the height and has to be a lot stronger than the crappy brackets that were supplied but then, nothing is perfect without a little tweaking. Anyway, the AGA is now going again and all seems to be working ok, touch wood.

The waterboard that was Sean used a similar sort of thing to clean out the feed pipe from Fernworthy reservoir to the Tottiford and Trenchford reservoirs beside me, it was a sort of 'torpedo' scraper that was propelled by the water pressure behind it, open up the vent valves so far apart along the length of the pipeline and as this thing passed it would send up a spout of water through each valve together with the crap, travelled at around 90mph and was all done by gravity.

Talking of wiring and tight spaces, did you know that the British aircraft building companies right up to the 1990's used ferrets to take wiring through the trunking? If your man Bill was a combined sparky, plumber and heating engineer then he must have been as big as three men. I am one of three as well, me, myself and I.

I got hold of the eventing set last year, paid a little less than that for it and it to was in a very good box. What year is yours marked? Not certain how long a run it had without looking at the catalogues but I think there were a few differences , like there was in the riding school set, of which I picked up a boxed example of a little later. You don't often see these sets now so a good find. The set to really try to get hold of is the equestrian 'show' set, that one is quite rare.

An hours tractor driving lesson to a young woman who has a field next to me.

I have a wooden horse cart, the old proper farm cart, made very well with all the chains and 'greedy boards' that slide on with brass fittings. I say it's big, you have to have one of those Beswick type large china Shire horses on the front (which I have) to compliment it in scale. It was made by a local coffin maker who made a few in his spare time out of off-cuts from the coffins. Looks realy good behind the Shire all harnessed up.

The old addage, where you gain on the roundabout you loose on the swings. Absolute wast of time puting money in the Bank for a mingy 1.5 to 2% annual interest, invest in certain antiques and models, follow the trends, watch a lot of daytime tv likes of 'Bargain Hunt' and 'Put Your Money Where Your Mouth Is' stuff like that and learn the tricks and what's in demand and go out and spend that pound coin and speculate. My Father always used to say, 'dirt in one hand and wish in the other and see which hand fills up first'

I think it may have been to tilt the bottom plate and share Bill to angle the furrow or to ajust the pitch and depth of the plough in the real world. Ploughs of this era tended to be of a slight design difference from one part of the country to another, also made by local blacksmiths who all had their own variant takes on design and function.

I've got a suitcase full of older Britains wheels tucked away. Tractor and implement ones, all sizes, all colours.

Couldn't agree with you more Andy, the older Britains stuff was and still is far better for its niaevity and character more than its accuracy to detail although most of that detail is there and what's more, you could actually use them for what they were intended for. Nowadays I think that modern tractors and machinery, especially the tractors, are basically all the same and lack the individuality of the old stuff which also depleats the character and a child of 5 to 11 years old will always look at a tractor as just a toy and not compare it in its accuracy of detail to a real one, if it's blue and has NH on it or red with Massey Ferguson then that's all that really matters. I will carry on with Britains, all the other stuff is really in a different bracket apart perhaps from Siku and Bruder. There are still some nice farm toys out there, the emphasis being on toys.

Most collectors I know around me Mark are doing the same as you, me included and this is bourne out by what Ed, my tame dealer told me a couple of weeks ago, people of the farming fraternity and those connected or have an interest in it will nearly always buy a Britains, Siku or a Bruder, which he says sells better than all the rest, for their little Son at a show or rally but the collector is now buying less of 'just everything' and going for the more limited stuff or just what they want specifically spending less all at once. He told me that the acid test will be at the end of the season, last of the shows and rallies and to a greater degree the end of year toy fairs, to see if everyone has been saving up to spend a wadge then. Time will tell, but then, there's always those that will spend out for what they want regardless.

Some good news for the tractor enthusiasts using their tractors for shows and rallies etc. http://www.nfuonline.com/News/Use-of-red-diesel-at-shows/

Kicking my heels a bit today waiting for the man to come and fit the liner and flue in the chimney that I knocked down the other day. Cut a hole in the outside of the chimney breast yesterday for the flue, very hard bricks and they were 2 deep so it was tough going, drilled a series of holes around a foot square with a borrowed large hammer drill and then chopped it all out with the spike, like a mini kangol.

Obviously someone's got money to burn and they say there's a recession on! In the words of Victor Meldrew, 'I don't beleeeeve it!' I must say, I've been following it, will these get even more 'valuable' I wonder?

So what are the barns going to be then old massey? Restore or convert? About time something was done with them.

Just chilling most of the day after yesterday meself and the builder taking down a chimney on the end of my house. Started 8.30am, had it down to the required level by 3.00pm but then spent the rest of the day to 10.00pm taking away all the brick rubble. Pictures will be posted in the thatching topic. I'm as stiff as a crab today!

It appears that the part you want to repair is a mirror image of the other side so you could repair it reasonably easily by taking a mould of the good half and making either a cold cast or resin cast of it and then after a little trimming, drill a small hole in the jointing ends and glueing in one a wire pin and then dropping a little glue in the other hole and assembling together and when set smooth the joint and when painted again you would never know.

Dear Mr UH. Please will you put a label either in or on the box of your limited editions showing the number of the model in the run. This will help us not having to tease the model out of its box and unravelling all that fiddely wire to know what number it is. Thankyou in anticipation.

You could always re-decal the combine Baz as a Ransomes! The David Brown cab is too small and lacks the rear bottom window, but then, I am a purist where D.B. models are concerned. My white MF 8690 arrived today, nice model, have'nt looked to see what number it is, too well secured on the box insert so I'll leave it alone.

Should be going but unsure as yet to what I may bring home, have to see what's left in the bank after having the house thatched and a few other jobs. Going to be a lean year is 2010.

I was pleasantly surprized with the freebie offer Bill, thought all Scots had a reputation of being as tight as a ducks backside.

Mark has to wait 2 days for the valves to warm up on his picture machine before he can upload them. Mfjack, which of us do you want to know where we live in Devon? I'm on Dartmoor.

I was there Jack although only for a couple of hours in the afternoon. Not as many people there this year so Mike was saying but there must have been a fair crowd as all the food was gone when I got there, just the smell of burgers lingering in the air and the ice cream waggon was leaving just as I arrived. The usual fine display with a few new additions and nice to see old faces and have a chat to people that I had not seen for a long time and have a catch-up. I didn't take the camera.

Yesterday at Mike Thorne's two David Brown operators handbooks, one for the 25 and 30c from 1954 and one for the Trackmaster, early 4 cylinder petrol/kerosene type.

I've just bought one, probably from the same seller as you Murray, same price but I had £5.70 in 'vouchers' to redeem so that brought it down to a total of £41.28. I'm happy with that as a dealer I was talking to today was saying that they are dissapearing like snow before the sun and will soon be changing hands for a good three figure sum, which in some places apparently they already are. If anyone is thinking of getting one of these now's the time to strike.