220V LED light strips / rope lights

Feeling in need for a bit more light under the kitchen cabinets, I bought 1m of LED lights from ebay.  Where else?  It was worth the 10p, unlike the 0.5m 'power cord' which was a further £10 and I'd need to cut the plug off and extend the wires.
The spec was the usual vagueness for 'quality' products and is 60 led/m (5050 leds) IP66 - waterproof!.  Digging around a bit (there was a RoHS cert to con you into thinking it was CE marked, lol) the manufacturers site stated 12W/m
There was a bump in the cable and I was suspicious that this did something. A look at the rope showed that the LEDs  are not wired to take AC, so I identified the +ve terminal and put ~50VAC through a full wave rectifier 49VDC (8A one from the scrap box, but 0.5A is fine assuming it's rated for mains). This caused the LEDs to glow. Putting a full 240VAC gave a good brightness. Power consumption is around 10W.
DC volts measured 221V, DC current 27mA, which works out at 6W.  Why the disparity?  Probably the fact that the DC is not smoothed, so the meters are averaging a bit. The peak voltage would be around 240 x 1.4, so say 330VDC.
You have to get the correct polarity, but is shouldn't harm if it's the wrong way around.

I've read that these no-name and often found strips will lose about 1/4 of their initial brightness if run continuously for 2 months or 1440 hours, or a year at 4 hours per day. This is because the LEDs are no-name items, maybe even floor sweepings, or simply driven too hard. Part of the problem is the materials used which go opaque. If you want a nice system to light your house you'll need to dig deep and look for the likes of Philips etc.

If you've found this blog post and think you could also save £10, you need to understand what the technical terms are. Don't post a question asking me to explain, 'cause I won't. Darwin rules.

And the finished article fitting nicely into a surface mounted switch. A 0.8A fuse was chosen as I have a surplus. The connections are mad by pushing 1mm tinned wire 10mm into the rope.
In use, the brightness is a long way from a 12W fitting. Maybe 6W is closer.

Winter tyres

We had the first frost a few weeks back, but it's not been that cold.  This week the temperatures have dropped and the trend is getting colder.
Snow tyres on and chains in the boot.

New data cable

A cat 5 cable I pulled in alongside the main supply cable 3 years ago has been losing cores over the years.  I'm now down to 4 cores, 2 having failed together last week.  It was supposed to be underground grade, but the sheath was weak and I'm pretty sure it was torn in places when I pulled it in. I use this cable to monitor water usage (70m supply pipe so I want to make sure it's intact) electricity use, and to monitor the letter box.

New build properties require a number of underground ducts from the house to the road.  These are really useful when it comes time to change a cable.
For telecoms use, 2 ducts are laid.  1 has the phone line, and the spare has now got a new data cable, a cheap CCA cat 5.  I checked the sheath and its intact, put plenty of lubricant in the duct and the first few metres that popped out the other end are undamaged.  I didn't pull in another draw wire, as these invariably wrap around the pulled cable and make pulling in a second cable more prone to damage both, plus extra stress on the new cable.

I havent removed the dodgy cable, as it will be wrapped around the heavy supply cable in another duct, and would likely just snap.

I have another duct to the gates which has the dodgy cat 5 cable in, but this was pulled in with the power cable so very little stress.  So far.

Planting trees

Well, not planting trees which will grow.

This is a structure to replace an ugly chicken wire fence, which was put up in a hurry as the deer liked our veg more than us. It's slightly shorter than we wanted, but the bottom rail is one tree, and they are tricky to transport.  It's about 7m long. The top rail is 2 trees.

Most of the posts are ~2.2m/20cm tall pieces off a pair of adjacent oaks, dropped into a hole with some drainage and then the dug clay rammed back in. Very solid.

Whilst each post is very heavy, and the fence represents a few weeks of fuel for the fire, it was less effort to plant them, than to season, cut, split & stack.

Finished bringing back all the trees

Around Feb 2012, I got 2 years to cut the trees from the woods.  We had an unspecified time to get them home.  It's only 500m away, but it's taken until now to finish.  A friend with a couple of tractors got the last 5 stere back this afternoon in 2 loads.

So now all I've got to do is cut, move and stack it in the corner to season it for a year or 2.
In terms of economy, I think I'm better of buying it.  I paid around €75 for 15 stere, so €5/stere, a saving of around €55/stere, or a total saving of €825.  But there is the fuel for tractors, chainsaws, plus maintenance & time.  Today was 6 hours, and I've spent around 60 hours cutting, plus time for moving/stacking. Then the time you don't really count like the post-cutting drinking with your friends, or returning favours.
Mustn't forget that the stacked wood, whether home grown or purchased, still needs to be cut into lengths and diameters that the fire will swallow, then stacked in a dry area for use, then brought into the house as required.  It is a form of exercise.
I'd almost forgotten the push button convenience of gas central heating. Having a well insulated house, the 15 stere will last us around 7 years, but this amount is a normal annual usage for a classic farmhouse.
March 2016. Found another 2 car trailer loads and brought them back!

getting chilly

First fire this evening.  Wasn't really cold at 17C, but we're getting soft.

Window security grills

Painted with black hammerite type paint.
Date is oct/nov ish