Recent content by contadino

Does anyone know a decent supplier of single-glazed horizontal sliding sash windows anywhere in England? I keep getting "We only do DG units." It's for closing in a verandah in winter and the door will have a big dog-flap in the door, and the entrance to the house is already pretty well...

Enamel. The heat bonds the pigment, enamel and the surface of the terracotta together.

You could opt for Tadelakt (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tadelakt) It's a stainable waterproof lime render. Used in a lot of those posh Moroccan bath houses.

Mine has about 10cm of hardcore on top of solid rock, then 10cm of concrete. We are talking about the foundation slab, rather than the slab below the cooking surface, right?

Sound plan. He should also be able to point you to a workshop that does his repairs and either show you how to sharpen a chain, or tell you how to know it's blunt. To be honest, with something like a chainsaw, you're much better off not getting it from a warehouse like B&Q, and instead...

Yes, that's a very good point. Using a chainsaw is the one thing (apart from lifting a field of potatoes) that makes my back ache.

Petrol every time IMO, but buying one for so little ongoing work doesn't make sense to me. If you're cutting firewood every year then sure, get yourself a chainsaw, some training, and learn to sharpen chains. Otherwise it would be safer and more cost effective to get someone to do the job for...

If there's significant rubble or patches of cement in the soil, this is by far the best solution. If not, strim it all with a brushcutter, then rotavate.

If you have the space, use 2x30 degree bends to get the stove pip to enter the chimney centrally.

Nah! Expect to pay £4 to £5 per bird. When you say white, do you mean the likes of Ross Cobbs (for the table) of Leghorns (for eggs)? Best place to find a source is the Omlet (makers of the Eglu) website.

I've just done one using a wooden former and it looks pretty good. Mine's only about 1m across but I see no reason why the same technique couldn't work on a larger arch. Mine's in carved sandstone. The trick is to ensure that the joints have a consistent mortar space between them (i.e cut...

Strim it, then rotavate it every time it has been rained on (about 2 weeks after each rainfall.) By next year it should be pretty weed free, and the weed seeds in the soil should have all germinated and been rotavatad in.

I'm a farmer, so it's 7 days a week, 365 days a year. I do try to take it easy on my birthday, though. Christmas is another story - smack in the middle of the olive harvest.

Yes, it's a great book and more relevant than ever nowadays. Radio 4 are currently airing a dramatisation of it at the moment which is pretty good too.

Thanks for the advice. The valve on the bladder of the expansion vessel had gone. Replaced the EV. All fixed now.