A brand new writing competition where entrants write a story in less than 100 words, with a given prompt.
Cash prizes coming soon. The current prize is a voucher worth $15/£10.
Be quick, the current competition closes on 3rd April 2015 at 18:00 BST, hopefully this will be a weekly competition.
Win a meal for 4 people cooked in your very own home by TV chef Peter Sidwell. This is a facebook competition and all you need to do to enter is add your details. The competition is being run by Simply Good Food TV.
Peter Sidwell is the presenter of Britain’s Best Bakery (on ITV)
Competition end date is 15th November 2015
If not done correctly Chair Joinery can become a headache, having the final project completed only to come crashing down when someone sits. In order to successfully make a chair by joinery, the woodworker needs to understand the process and techniques required.
When making a chair, it is important to comprehend that all chair joinery should have the reinforcement. This means that corner blocks need to be screwed in place. If screws are not desirable in your project, then you could use glue too. However, in order to use glue and gain strength, sophisticated techniques will need to be used. Gluing end-grain together will not give the strength needed to support the chair and is why corner blocks are put in place. The corner blocks give extra strength the keep the chair together if the main joinery loosens. Corner blocks should always be used and they allow for a convenient location to attach the seat.
Industry standard is to use the double dowel joint, but the mortise and tenon should be the joint of choice. Dowel joints have problems in loosening up and do not have good long-grain to long-grain glue surface, meaning that inevitably these dowel joints will loosen. When joining your chair, you need as much long-grain to long-grain surface as possible. The mortise and tenon will provide this and is why it is the joint of choice.
In order for the mortise and tenon to work well the inner walls of the mortise and the sides of the tenon must be smooth, flat, and in complete contact with each other. The joint should also be snug and not too tight so that you cannot push together by hand. The joint should also not be too loose in which it will fall apart if you pick one of the joints up. Dowel joints do give strengths like the mortise and tenon, but the quality is just not there. For dowel joints to be strong there needs to be lots of dowels spread out over a vast area. Biscuit joints can also be a possibility, but the shape of the biscuit can cause its problems in the joining process. The problem seen in biscuit joints is that it has a tiny contact out on its ends, and this is where the maximum force is placed in a chair joint with typical use.
It is evident with loose joints what problems will arise in a chair, but it is a common myth thinking that adding glue to the gaps will give real strength to the joint. The best method is to patch the chairs loose joints with veneer or something thicker and re-fit the loose joint. A joint that is too tight is also a problem. It is not the tightness that is a problem. The problem lies with the glue being wiped from the joints surfaces when the joint is fit together.
Whichever you choose, mortise and tenon or dowels make sure the techniques used put the joints together securely, adding strength to the chair. How embarrassing would it be for your good looking chair to fall apart right when someone sits down? Learn the techniques that will instill quality into your work.
This post was supplied by Lyndon who writes for Patchett Joinery, manufacturers and suppliers of wooden sash windows.
There are four forces that are needed on a plane to enable flight. Let’s break down these four forces for a better understanding:
Weight – Pulls the plane down with gravity
Lift – Brings the plane up by using the downward momentum and meeting the resistance of air
Thrust – Pulls the plane forward [Engines]
Drag – Creates air resistance pulling the plane back
To understand the basic physics of flight, think of air as a fluid like water. If you move your hand, palm flat, through a tub of water or hold your hand outside of a moving vehicle, you will experience a force of resistance. The resistance you feel is the motion of the fluid or air resisting the object or your hand. In order for a plane to take flight there has to be a careful relationship of the four opposing forces of weight, lift, thrust, and drag. You might think engines are all that is needed to make a plane fly but the four forces are needed and have to work together allowing planes to fly through the air.
A plane’s engines are designed to move the plane forward at high speeds that make air flow rapidly over the wings. The air flow is thrown down toward the ground, generating an upward force called lift. This lift overcomes the planes weight and holds it in the sky. A simpler explanation would be that an engine move the aircraft forward, and the wings move it upward. Wings make the lift and are the key to making planes fly.
Wings of a plane have a curved upper surface with a flat bottom surface, creating a cross-sectional shape called an airfoil. When air moves over the curved upper wing surface, it has to travel further and go faster than the air that passes underneath. Basic theory of physics states that fast-moving air is at a lower pressure than slower moving air. This means that the pressure above the wing is lower than the pressure below, creating the lift that holds the plane up. This is an excellent explanation of how wings work, but it is not the only factor involved in making the plane fly.
Creating the lift has many factors to consider, wings are not completely flat. They are tilted slightly back so that they hit the air at an angle. The angle directs the airflow downward, pushing the wings upward to produce the lift. Have you ever wondered what the flaps are on the wings of a plane? Flaps are there to increase lift during take-off as well as create drag when landing. During take-off, the plane is moving at a slower speed, so the flaps will extend to push more air down to produce the lift the plane needs to take off of the ground.
There are still many more other factors that allow a plane to fly, but hopefully you get the basics and understand that the wings are the key but not only element needed to fly a plane. Remember the four forces as these are the basics of plane flight.
Thanks to Lyndon for this post, Lyndon writes for Custom Fittings. Custom Fittings supply Stainless Steel Hydraulic Fittings and Aerospace testing adaptors.
Utility providers answer to their shareholders and it is their interests they have at heart. It is important at year end to post a healthy profit if you want to see your share prices increase. The government should have the people, their voters’ interests at the heart of their decision making but this only seems to become an issue during election campaigning. It seems the consumer has not received a fair deal from either the Utility Provider or the Government when it comes to Utility costs which in this time of austerity is hard as the utility cost is the highest cost in the monthly budget.
The government, or more to the point, the labour opposition have suggested they would freeze energy prices. Is this the answer when many providers enable their clients to freeze energy by fixing their tariffs against any future increases? This tariff is higher than the current tariff to hedge against any future increases that may occur and is where the consumer meets the provider half way. If the tariff doesn’t already reflect current International gas cuts then this may not be the route the consumer will want to follow. So the government’s idea to cap the tariff rate may not benefit the consumer and certainly seems to have worried the suppliers who believe they could be trapped into an unprofitable tariff that would be inflexible.
Consumer lobbyists are researching why suppliers have been so slow in reacting to Gas cost cuts and why the cuts are not reflective of the International decrease they feel the 3.1%-5% is too small. There is also the question of when the price of gas increases, the suppliers are quick to increase prices as reflected in the increase in late 2013 of 5.1% it seems the excuse of forward buying delays only applies to price decreases. Perhaps, instead of fixing prices, the government needs to cap the maximum price to a percentage above the base International gas price that suppliers are allowed to charge. The results of these enquiries are being passed on to the Competition and Market Authority and the HM Treasury who are both conducting investigations into the energy market. This places a question mark over whether households are getting the fairest deal from the supplier of their energy – the top of every householder’s outgoings.
The Government as well as suppliers need to be more proactive. After pressure from the government EON quickly lowered their rates in January of this year but the other major suppliers have been slow to follow and seem to be waiting for the winter to draw to a close before applying any cuts or perhaps they are waiting for the election results before committing. These costs should be independent of politics whoever is in power should have the people at their heart not the shareholders. Perhaps it is time the consumer took some control by ruthlessly swapping suppliers and informing lobbyists of any concerns they may have. If we don’t say something we will be at the mercy of the suppliers.
First Utility is the UK’s largest independent energy supplier, the company offer cheap gas and electricity tariffs. Here is the First utility customer services number.
Deal or No Deal competition. Win a Fiat 500 and a UK Break.
To get more information and enter this competition Click Here!!!
This competition is open to anyone, anywhere in the world. First Prize is a Paul Young Chocolate Hamper, 4 runners up will recieve a box of chocolates.
This competition will close on the 9th February 2015.