Hagg Leys Farm

Author: stephen (Page 57 of 61)

Live weather station

January 21, 2013 /
Weathereye

Weathereye WA-22 weather station.

I have just managed to get our weather station onto the internet.  You can access it via the menu button above or directly using this URL: http://www.haggleysfarm.co.uk/weather.

The weather is updated every 5 minutes, but you will find that the wind speed and wind direction is updated pretty much in realtime (updated every 30 seconds).  You can access this data using the gauges page (found here).  The weather station is measuring temperature, air pressure, rainfall, wind speed and wind direction.  The weather station is also providing a forecast.

As soon as I get time, I will write up some notes on how this all works.

BT Pole

January 17, 2013 /

There was telephone pole in one of the fields.  It didn’t seem to be connected to anything and had a coil of black cable hanging from it.  A nail on label (see below) seemed to suggest that it was surplus to requirements.

I sent the folks at BT Openreach an email via the BT website on the 10th December and I got a pretty quick response.  They pointed me at the External Network Relocation team (0800 917 7381 option 6) and they said that they would send out a survey team to have a look at the site.  All seemed pretty easy.

Well, at the weekend, I noticed the pole had been removed. Not sure when it was removed, but either way, I am impressed with the quick response.  Thank you BT.

BT Pole

BT Pole due to course

BT Pole to the left track

BT Pole to the left track

The importance of standing back

January 17, 2013 /

When building a dry stone wall, it is important to stand back and look at the work that has been completed.  It is often difficult to see potential issues when you are working right on top of the wall.  I have got into the habit of taking photographs at the end of each work day.  Often these photographs reveal issues that even standing back cannot reveal.

If you look at the top image, the far left hand edge of the coping stones (the ones on the top of the wall) you can see that the wall trends downwards.  This is more obvious if you look at the line of the wall directly underneath the coping stones.

The next image shows that this issue was corrected, but in the next section of the wall, the course of stones just underneath the coping stones now trends upwards.  In the bottom image you can see that this issue has been again corrected.  With a dry stone wall, it is relatively straightforward to strip off the coping stones and rebuild the wall and replace the coping stones.

So how do these errors occur?  Simply put, by not religiously following the line that has been set up.  On the other courses in the wall, you can deviate from the line of string knowing that this can be compensated for on subsequent courses.  However, on the final course (the one before putting on the coping stones), you have no such leeway and the line of the string must be following very carefully.

top line wall

Goodbye sheds!!

January 14, 2013 /

Well, two of them anyway.  Now we have got planning permission, we can start to “tidy” the site up.  Although we don’t need planning permission to remove the sheds, part of the justification for the extension was predicated on sorting out the overall use of the land – we didn’t want to start on any of the “tidying up” until the plans had been approved.  There are 2 large sheds at the back of the property and 2 large sheds in the orchard.  This weekend the plan was to remove the two sheds at the back.

The sheds are of a wooden construction and I have no idea how old they are.  Let’s just say they are not modern!  During their lifetime, they have been moved (the insides had markings for left and right) and repaired.  Although much of the wooden was rotten in places, they were still remarkably robust.  The plan was to disassembling them and burn the wood on a bonfire.  They come apart reasonably easily – the roof comes off first and then the sides are bolted together.  The bolts in the first shed were easily removed, but completely rusted up in the second shed.  In the end, I used the chainsaw to cut out the bits that were bolted together.  The worst part of the process was removing the roofing felt off the roof panels before putting the wood on the fire.

Burning the wood is the most economic approach of disposing of the material.  If these sheds had gone into a skip, it would probably have cost in the order of £200 to get rid of the wood.  Burning the wood avoids this cost just leaving us with a pile of wood ash that can be put on the fruit trees.  It is amazing how little ash was generated by burning two sheds (as well as a pile of cuttings from the trees).

It took a day to dismantle and burn each of the sheds.  The bonfire was going for the entire weekend.  Removing the second shed has vastly improved the view down the valley.  Since it hadn’t been used in years (possibly as many as ten years), I have no idea why the previous owners hadn’t disposed of it years ago!  Anyway, it is gone now!  Only 2 more to go (in the orchard!).

Shed 1 in the foreground and Shed number 2 in the background

Shed 1 in the foreground and Shed number 2 in the background

Shed 1 minus the roof and gable end

Shed 1 minus the roof and gable end

Shed 1: Nothing but the roof left

Shed 1: Nothing but the roof left

Shed 2: Roof half gone

Shed 2: Roof half gone

Inside Shed 2 with the roof off. The old bench and tools.

Inside Shed 2 with the roof off. The old bench and tools.

Shed 2 meets the chainsaw

Shed 2 meets the chainsaw

This is where all the wood from the sheds ended up

This is where all the wood from the sheds ended up

All that is left the following morning - a surprisingly small amount of ash

All that is left the following morning – a surprisingly small amount of ash

 

We have moved….and you have found us!

January 13, 2013 /

I decided it was about time that we had our own URL.  So here it is.  Haggleysfarm.co.uk.  I have moved the blog from the Blogger site and installed Word Press on the server.  Blogger has served us well for the last 6 months, but we had outgrown the site and I was starting to run into problems with the number of images that we had included.  Yes, I could have got around it, but in the long run it is just easier to move the site in it’s entirety.

The format of the blog has changed since we have moved from one blogging platform to another.  I must admit that first impressions of Word Press are very good and it would appear to be more complete than the Blogger platform.  However, only time will tell.

Moving to our own URL and server also provides the opportunity to do some more things on this site, including publishing live pictures from our bird cam.  But I am sure that there are a whole heap of other things that we can try. But more on this later.

This site is hosted by WebFusion in the UK. I have used them before and have always been very pleased with the reliability of their service – it is also very competitively priced.  More information here.

Planning permission granted!

January 10, 2013 /

The plans for the renovation have now been officially approved and the status has been updated on the Kirklees website.  We know that they had been approved earlier in the week, but it is always good to sit it written down in black and white – somehow, it seems a little more real.

The only downside with the approval was that we had to remove the plans for the change of access.  However, our intention is to re-submit plans for the driveway once the building work is underway.

The application will be found here on the Kirklees website: http://www2.kirklees.gov.uk/business/planning/application_search/detail.aspx?id=2012/93474

Dry stone walling – Day 17

January 9, 2013 /

More of the same.  I started the day with the foundation stones and 3 courses complete.  I ended the day by putting the coping stones on this 3 metre section of wall.  Jo came and gave me a hand sorting stones, filling buckets with smaller stones and helping with the hearting (filling the centre of the wall with smaller stones that jam the others in position).  This made a real difference to the amount that was completed today. 

Scrapbook: Polished concrete floors

January 2, 2013 /
Polished concrete floors tend to be found more industrial and retail settings, but are becoming increasingly popular in residential situations.  When you consider their practical nature, you can start to see why.  Alternatives such as floor tiles are often very expensive.  I have struggled to find information on potential suppliers based here in the UK – let alone try to find someone who is relatively local!

Polished concrete floor

Polished concrete floor
HTC Superfloor – www.lazenby.co.uk

Here’s some example floor finishes below.  Unfortunately, from a company in Australia – but it does show the different colours that can be achieved.  If only, I could find someone in the UK that can deliver a similar range of finishes.

boral stone au

Dry stone walling – Day 16

January 2, 2013 /

Well, I started on this section of wall on 11th November and have spent 10 working days on it to get to this point.  Christmas, bad weather and the flu all contributed to slowing things up. You can start to understand how labour intensive dry stone walling is – particularly compared to putting up a barbed wire fence.

Dry stone walling – Day 16
Both sides to the wall are faced in the same way – the only difference is that the other side of the wall is around 5 courses higher due to the difference in the field levels.
There are a number of imperfections in the wall.  Let’s face it, the whole process of building the wall is one of managing imperfection.  Having said that the coping stones on the far left of the wall need to come off and the last course on top of the wall needs to be levelled up before they are re-sited.  I think this is more obvious if you zoom in on the above image (by clicking on it) and taking a look at the far left end of the wall – it seems to starting reducing in height.  I have actually fixed this issue now and you will see this in later photographs of this part of the wall.

Dry stone walling – Day 15

December 30, 2012 /

It has been wet today.  Really wet.  However, by the end of the day there is only a couple of courses to go and the coping stones can go on this part of the wall.  Once you pass the midpoint on the wall (and install the throughstones), the whole process seems to speed up – not surprising considering the top of the wall is only half the width of the base of the wall.

While it has been relatively warm today, it has been really windy and wet.  This has made working outside hard work.  The main issue is that the ground surrounding the base of the wall becomes very muddy and slippery – you would not want to slip carrying a heavy stone.  I made a “duck board” using some spare wooden decking.  This works a treat, although it could do with being a bit longer.

I reckon one more day and we will be ready to put the coping stones on the top of the wall.

Day 15 and a “duck board” to combat the mud!
 

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