26th September 2018
I drove to Damian’s house at Blissford near Fordingbridge, to cut up some logs for my new log store. He has a barn full of timber dating back to the time of the building of the Mary Rose, I think.
He asked me to help him assemble the log splitting machine he had bought a few months before. I was looking forward to it, and set off bright and early.
When I arrived, we walked towards the barn, he mentioned that the front of the barn had been pushed out due to the weight of the logs leaning against it. When I saw the condition I was a little shocked. The front right hand side of the front had fallen off the foundation, and had dropped about six inches causing the roof to sag in the middle.
The first job was to assemble the log splitter.
Damian does not have much patience, and that was evident by what he had done. The cardboard box had been opened, the machine, and leg frame components had been removed, and that was it.
The stables where the machine had been stored was about five minutes from the main house, we had brought a socket set and spanner’s with us for the assembly.
The first step was to remove the wheels from the main body of the unit where they were attached for transit, and re-assemble on to the frame. It entailed removing a circlip to remove the wheel, but we needed a flat blades screwdriver, that was at the main house. Off Damian walked to get the screwdriver. That enabled us to remove the wheels and fit them on to the frame axles. Then we had to assemble the main body to the frame, which meant removing a transit bracket held on with Allen screws. Damian then walked back to the house again to find Allen keys. This must have been the most walking he had done in weeks.
Finally the log splitter was complete and ready for its first log to split.
I pulled a few from the barn to test, and wow, that is a powerful piece of kit, and made the job so much easier than using an axe.
We split up enough logs to fill the back of my truck, we then looked at shoring up the front wall.
With no lifting gear we had to resort to primitive methods used by the Egyptians. Using pivots and levers we managed to lift the walls the eight inches needed to get it to rest on the footings. This will need additional work to make it more secure, but I can do this next time.
The final part of the day was picking up the MR2 from Bournemouth where it had a service. We set off in Damian’s Porsche which scared the shit out of me. I put on a brave face, but the speed of the thing is outrageous.
It was great being behind the wheel of my old car again, it had a good burst of speed, but it was a fun car to drive, and a memorable day.
I drove back to Barrington with a load of logs in the back and the smell of cedar wafting through my nostrils.
Another Lifetime to go 