What did you do today (2015)

[warwick wilton 1Participant @warwickwilton1]

On plant well over 50 years old.

[Michael GilliganParticipant @michaelgilligan61133]

What dd I do today ?

Had an Angiogram … Fantastic kit, superb facility, and a great team of people who clearly all knew exactly what they were doing & had sufficient time to do it properly.

All this in an NHS facility.

MichaelG.

[Boiler BriParticipant @boilerbri]

 

Finally got around to positioning some new equipment in my workshop.

The lathe went in easy but the Miller was a bit of a challenge. I had a good millwright with me though to help so it was not all hard work. The wife 😊.

Now I can get on with drilling the rims for my traction engine👍

 

Edited By Boiler Bri on 06/11/2015 16:54:25

Edited By Boiler Bri on 06/11/2015 17:05:04

[NJHParticipant @njh]

Michael

I too have just experienced our NHS at first hand (for some serious surgery) for the first time in my three score years and ten! Whilst I will not say that I enjoyed the experience I am very very impressed at the standard of treatment and care that I received. Whilst lying flat on my back and immobile I also noticed the good humour, care and patience of the nursing staff with even the most difficult of patients. Worth every penny they extract from me in tax I say. At present I'm told to take it easy so hey – who am I to argue!

I trust that your problems have a speedy and satisfactory outcome.

Norman

PS. So, to keep to the thread, "What did I do Today? " – not a blooming lot!

[Michael GilliganParticipant @michaelgilligan61133]

Posted by NJH on 06/11/2015 17:01:08:

I trust that your problems have a speedy and satisfactory outcome.

Norman

.

Thanks for the kind thought, Norman

Today's investigation seems to indicate that it's a bit too complicated to fix with a Stent … so I now wait for a couple of consultants to review the images before deciding exactly what plumbing repairs need to be done.

MichaelG.

Edited By Michael Gilligan on 06/11/2015 17:38:39

[Another JohnSParticipant @anotherjohns]

What did I do today? Our old building at work is being "refurbished" – 19 years bouncing between offices on one floor there. So what.

– some of my VR experimental stuff is now in Canada's Science and Technology museum – makes me feel old. (only 10 and a bit more years until the Canada Pension Plan kicks in for me! I'm getting there…)

– Canada's first satellite was built (and, basically designed, but some work subcontracted) in this building.

It think it needs a retrofit!

Anyway, they kicked us out a bit early, so home to the workshop – working on three hand-pumps, one of which will go into my almost completed Shay 3-1/2" locomotive.

[FatgadgiParticipant @fatgadgi]

Tonight I finished decorating the "master" bedroom.

But, whilst I was doing that, the last part from my recently acquired rusty Emco Compact 5 CNC lathe was being de-rusted by electrolysis. I tried (honestly I did, Neil) to get some of that super green de-rusting stuff that was featured in a recent MEW article, but it was out of stock at Frost. So, in desperation I tried the electrolysis method.

It is absolutely brilliant – I just hooked up a 24v power supply, a couple of steel plates for the negative, mixed some washing soda with water in a bucket and put the rusty part in the solution with a positive lead attached. Let it bubble for a few hours and voila, rust rubs off.

Very impressed.

The wife's also impressed with the wallpaper effort, so now settling down with a nice Merlot to consider my next task with the Emco refurb..

Cheers – Will

[BrevaParticipant @breva]

Warwick Wilton,

That unit you have sounds interesting. Any chance of a few more details on your set-up?

John

[Phil WhitleyParticipant @philwhitley94135]

Congratulations ChrisH, you have got all the myths into only two posts! Here we go:

Wind turbines do not need or use power "to keep them turning when there is no wind, Total myth put about by the nay sayers and nimbys and the Nuclear industry, Which incidentally has had billions of taxpayers money in subsidy since it began in the fifties, remember the otherwise honorable T Benn saying "nuclear generated electricity will be so cheap it won't be worth metering it" I do…….it is actually the most expensive way of generating electricity ever thought up!

"It costs more in electricity to make a wind turbine than it will ever generate in its lifetime" another complete myth, which is quit obvious if you give it more than a seconds though. Last year I stood inside a 1/2 megawatt turbine, on a flat calm day, with just a barely perceptible amount of air movement, and as the blades went lazily round it was generating 28kw! Average British household uses about 12kWh per day (American household 25kWh)

The wind only blows 20% of the time This is true, but like all good propaganda, not in the way you think, because what you are being told makes you think " IF THE WIND ONLY BLOWS 20% OF THE TIME, THEN WIND TURBINES ONLY WORK 20% OF THE TIME" No, its another nuclear industry myth, and it works like this, what the Met office CLASSES as wind, only blows 20% of the time, but wind turbines will hit peak output long before the wind reaches that speed! IT IS A CON! On my way to work I pass about ten turbines , the smallest of which is a 20kW domestic, and the largest is another 1/2gW and they will all be running well when there is hardly enough breeze to stir the tree tops. Based on my drive to work 5 days a week I have estimated that they are operating above 50% output about 85% of the time. All the modern large turbines need is air movement, and as any sailor will tell you, in the morning the sun rises, heats the land, which heats the air above the land, the air rises, and an onshore breeze springs up as the cooler air over the sea rushes in to even out the pressure.

Birdstrikes? yes they happen at first, but nowhere near as many as we are led to believe, and they don't persist. If you erect anything in the landscape, birds will fly into it till they get used to its position, then they avoid it. On a recent project I was involved in, we changed the window glass in an old chapel from translucent white glass to clear glass, and we had bird strikes on every window for about three weeks, after which time they stopped completely. They do not whirl round in the air slicing up wildlife, it is yet another myth.

It is 23.12 0n 6/11/15 and at the moment wind is producing 12.37% (3.6gW) of the base load. The problem is that nuclear has a deal with the government whereby they keep all of the stations running flat out, and get to sell every Watt they generate, when demand falls, the call goes out to all the other generators to start reducing output, all that is except nuclear, and the first call to shut down goes to the wind turbines, because they are the easiest and fastest to turn off. That is the only reason you will see them idle on breezy days. Remember also that there is at least another 50% of un-metered wind turbines, the power from which is used where it is generated, and only seen by the grid as a fall in overall demand. Remember too that if these new French/Chinese power station ever get built they will be supplying power at three times what we are paying for it now, and no one seems willing to state who the new power stations will belong to! Has anyone considered the fact that if British industry ever got to the point where it was damaging the exports of China or France, all they would need to do is put up the price of the industries power supply to ensure that it could not compete? Our government is selling England by the pound!

Rant well and truly over, and I won't be a nuisance again, honest guv!

Phil

Ps, if you get 10x 24v wagon batteries and an inverter, you CAN store your solar output, and use it as AC, the inverter is not 100% efficient, but they are improving. I founded a company a few years ago which installs wireless broadband in remote areas, and we pioneered the use of a 12v dc wind turbine, a 12vdc solar panel, and a 12vdeep cycle leisure type battery to power a remote transmitter on a hill top to get the wireless signal into the next valley. Today the company (i am no longer involved) has many of these units all over the north of England, and they rarely if ever go flat! Thats it, no more!

[Phil WhitleyParticipant @philwhitley94135]

And if you really want to know what I did today, I spent most of it taking down the insulation in my workshop, sweeping up rat crap and inserting a couple of bait boxes into the roof, because next doors rats have chewed their way in AGAIN! My mood due to this fact may have coloured the above post slightly!!!

Phil

[john carruthersParticipant @johncarruthers46255]

For my 2d worth; the astronomical observatory and education centre at Monkton nature reserve run almost entirely on solar panels with a bank of batteries under the floor, mostly 12V dc but mains 240V ac is available via the inverters.
Even after a heavy public night slewing the scope around and using PC to point it we seldom have flat batteries.
The modern solar panels don't need direct sunlight like the older versions. UV penetrates clouds well enough to give a charge. Multi wavelength panels are getting more efficient.

[Neil WyattModerator @neilwyatt]

> we changed the window glass in an old chapel from translucent white glass to clear glass, and we had bird strikes on every window for about three weeks, after which time they stopped completely.

Possibly because all the birds were now dead

Neil

[Danny M2ZParticipant @dannym2z]

G'day all.

Today I just about eliminated all of the backlash from my C3 minilathe cross-slide (it's been bugging me for ages).

Careful testing with feeler gauges revealed a small gap between the cross-slide leadscrew bearing face and it's housing (about 0.0055 in) so a washer was manufactured from 0.005" brass shim material. This entailed a few hours manufacturing a punch and stripper, as the washer has an i.d. of 12mm and an o.d. of 15mm.

Much swearing and cursing later and I can now punch out washers galore – woohoo, it sure fixed that pesky cross slide.

* Danny M *

Edited By Danny M2Z on 07/11/2015 10:11:17

Edited By Danny M2Z on 07/11/2015 10:12:24

[Danny M2ZParticipant @dannym2z]

The edits were to get rid of that grinning smiley face (delete ", insert "in" ), surely in 2015 you can catch up with many other sites that offer the option "Turn Smiley's Off"?

* Danny M *

Edited By Danny M2Z on 07/11/2015 10:17:09

[Michael GilliganParticipant @michaelgilligan61133]

Posted by Danny M2Z on 07/11/2015 10:16:26:

The edits were to get rid of that grinning smiley face …

.

Thanks for taking the trouble to do that, Danny

I agree … The insertion of Smileys should be a deliberate action, not an "autocorrect" function.

MichaelG.

[AjohnwParticipant @ajohnw51620]

Posted by ChrisH on 05/11/2015 11:06:58:

Muzzer, Not Daily Mail at all – more an appraisal of hard facts.

Solar Panels generate only during the day, you can't store the energy they produce and they don't produce at night, fact. Interestingly ,Australia which has masses of barren, uninhabited, fit for nothing but lizards and snakes land and has very bright sunshine all day every day has no great solar farms. Plus in the UK productive farmland is lost for each solar farm. We also need to eat.

Wind generators can only produce energy within a specified band of wind speed, above and below that, nothing; in between generation is a variable, fact. In winter when it's very cold and more energy is required it's usually because we're in an area of high pressure which means no wind, so then it's another consumer of electricity rather than a producer when we need power the most.

So we always require the coal, oil and nuclear power generating back ups. Hinckley Point, like all nuclear stations by the way, is able to produce all day every day other than when refuelling.

Look also at the gridwatch website mentioned by others above. Last night nuclear was producing over 22% of our needs, as was coal, wind just over 2%. And 2% is good, I have seen it up around 4% on one occasion, but also often at less than 1%.

So not political, just factual – and whoever believes what they read in that rag the Daily Mail for goodness sake!! I suppose there will always be someone……….

Chris

It would be nice to hear truly unbiased facts about all energy sectors Chris. Unlikely to ever happen.

However I did hear one once idly watching the box. The 2 founders of Green Peace apologising for campaigning against nuclear early on. They reckoned an absolutely enormous amount of coal has been burnt as a result. They had finally realised that people need power so their is a need to be realistic. What ever is done has it's problems.

Another but from a newspaper so dubious as always. People being phoned up and asked to start generating electricity from north sea products. Don't worry about costs you'll get a cheap loan. My impression was from gas but may be oil or a mix. Rather a waste cost wise from the UK's populations point of view. It would be better used purely for what oil and gas are primarily used for in the UK to save on imports and keep costs down. Short termism instead. I actually tried to research this once but got no where. Paper – Sunday Times. We import gas now, it comes in via ships. Not sure how true this is but some one who was involved in the pipework needed reckoned it will last circa 30 years. No more Victorian engineering these days.

Many moons ago what was probably a truthful statement. If the UK doesn't build a nuclear power station now and again we will loose the skills. Also that they have to be replaced at some point.

Meanwhile while this has been going on Sweden circa 50% nuclear, France much much higher. Germany was similar to the UK, many protests about nuclear there. Sweden I understand is switching to biofuel but they have circa 50% hydro.

Maybe the UK should have gone very nuclear and later started phasing it out but in real terms given the amount of it that is about should it be totally phased out. Much of the reasons for doing that are mostly down to a few instances that in real terms are circumstantial. All we will get is the yah boo from the various sectors rather than facts.

John

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[JimmieSParticipant @jimmies]

Can confirm about turbines working in almost still air. Our 'town hall' 800kw turbine can turn all day yet the clothes on the line hardly flutter due to a lack of breeze.

What did I do today? Got angry at the number of businesses who completely ignore requests for price quotations.

[Speedy Builder5Participant @speedybuilder5]

Some sewage plants produce methane – why don't all plants do this and then burn it as fuel. Same goes for the rubbish tips, could they become more efficient in producing fuel. What I feel is a blot on the skyline is solar panels which are just 'dumped' onto a roof. Why can't they be tailored to completely cover a roof so they look like they were meant to be there in the first place. COST – but then what is the 'cost' of living and looking at these hideous additions.
Grumpy BobH !

[Bob Brown 1Participant @bobbrown1]

The problem with renewables is having to have enough flexibility as a whole to allow the lights to stay on when wind speeds are low and light levels are low. Nuclear runs better at a constant load and as the fuel is low cost that's what they do hence very little fluctuation in output. CCGT is fast to bring on line so is well suited to take up any slack in renewables. Coal takes a while to bring on line so less suitable to take up any slack. BUT you still need to have an over capacity to cope with still nights e.g. low output from wind and zero solar. Renewables are not free once built as there is still a level of maintenance needed and when the wind turbines are off shore they may not be accessible due to the weather conditions. Nuclear seems to be misrepresented and although there is a major waste issue the safety record (deaths/MW generated) compared to other fuel sources is still very good.

[Clive HartlandParticipant @clivehartland94829]

There was an item on TV a few days back as a chap stood at ground level and the Anemometer he was holding read, 'Zero'. He then went up about a 100 ft on a building and the anemometer was reading a significant air flow so a wind turbine on a roof would be in an airflow, hence big fans turning when no wind at ground level.

There is so much Bio mass now that burning in a controlled burner can be better than letting it make methane. Everything will burn as you just need a high temperature and then re-burn the combustion, this is like cabin heaters where they have a double tube, one above the other to re-combust the gases given off.

I come back to the point about community heating as individual heating is costly and wastefull.

Clive

[Ian S CParticipant @iansc]

Dunedin uses gas from an old landfill site, and I think there maybe a similar site in Auckland.

A few years ago I was looking into wind power in a small way, and read a bit on the net about someone (I think in USA) who wanted batteries for his wind power system, so he went to the local electric fork lift servicing centre. The fork lift trucks were having there batteries changed annually, and they were quite happy to get rid of them, only thing was, he had to take the lot. Five years later and all the batteries were OK, that would have been six or eight years ago, I don't know if they are still working, but I suppose he should be able to get more at the same place. Cost, the price of transporting them home, the company normally had to pay to dispose of them.

Ian S C

[Neil WyattModerator @neilwyatt]

Posted by Clive Hartland on 07/11/2015 12:16:23:

There was an item on TV a few days back as a chap stood at ground level and the Anemometer he was holding read, 'Zero'. He then went up about a 100 ft on a building and the anemometer was reading a significant air flow so a wind turbine on a roof would be in an airflow, hence big fans turning when no wind at ground level.

Not always a solution, a big bank in Birmingham had four large ducted wind turbines fitted to its roof ten or so years ago.

They disappeared a year or so later, apparently the updraft and turbulence meant that they spent all day hunting around trying to find the wind direction generating very little energy, as the wind flow was deflected up and past them.

Turbines on long poles are likely to impose unwanted stresses on roofs (which are rarely the strongest part of a building). A compromise solution would be vertical vane turbines, less efficient but cheap and they don't care about winds that change direction rapidly.

The ideal answer, of course, is that buildings and their turbines need to be designed to work together.

In hot countries, one way might be to use the building's sun-facing facade as a heat trap to power small embedded turbines and provide semi-passive air conditioning.

Neil

[Phil WhitleyParticipant @philwhitley94135]

Hi Guys, completely agree with using sewage works as methane generators, and using the gas to generate electricity, Can't understand why it is not done. My late father was an electrician like me, and he worked on the sewage plant at Esholt near Bradford which does just that, and the great thing about anaerobic digestion is that it turns sewage sludge and water into a clean liquid fertiliser and a solid dry fertiliser. The problem with the process is the liquid detergents and toilet cleaners we have been persuaded by the manufacturers that we need to throw down the toilet to "save your family from GERMS" as this kills of the bacteria that does the digestion. That is why you should not empty an autowasher or dishwasher into a septic tank, unless you use a product and a toilet cleaner that is safe for septic tanks, because a septic tank is a mini digester, and if yours needs emptying every two years, it aint working!

Phil

[Neil WyattModerator @neilwyatt]

> Hi Guys, completely agree with using sewage works as methane generators, and using the gas to generate electricity, Can't understand why it is not done

It's a big capital investment, so it tends to happen as part of site reconfiguration – and sewage works tend to have very long lives are they don't really wear out much.

A surprising amount of landfill is used to generate methane – I visited the one at Packington (a huge 'hill' of Landfill near Birmingham airport) which had two turbines running (the same turbo-prop units as fitted to the Hercules, but with a genny instead of the prop). You could talk inside the building and outside it all there was was a faint hum.

Neil

[Richard MarksParticipant @richardmarks80868]

When we lived in New Zealand back in the 70s the water heating was automatically switched on in the middle of the night by the generating company, they sent a pulse down the supply line which switched a contactor which turned on the power to the water heater and it was then switched off after a set time thereby using power which was being generated but not used.

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