Craig Sawyers

There was a documentary series a few years back when the host visited the hottest, wettest and coldest places that were permanently occupied. The coldest place was somewhere in Siberia, where it would get down to below -60C. The kids did not get a day off school until it was lower than -40 (when C or F is the same). To get diesel vehicles going involved lighting a pan of warm fuel under the engine to warm it up enough to start. To bury the dead in the permafrost, they had to light a fire on the ground and dig out a few inches. Repeat as necessary until the hole was deep enough. But the problem was the ground behaved so oddly between summer and winter that the coffins would resurface after some years. So there was a continuous process of reburying the dead.

Oddly enough I envy those on this list that get real snow and some chilly temperatures. In the UK snow is now a rarity, and it rarely gets below zero at all - perhaps a degree C or two overnight but that is it. Last year we got about 5mm snow for a day, then it melted next day. The highlands of Scotland get some, but bugger all down South. Currently between 8C and 10C daytime temperature, which is bonkers for this time of year. The bloody rhubarb has started to grow!

That is seriously cold.

You thought 2021 was bad....

Happy birthday!

Oh shit Todd, that is rough. RIP Chris; far too young.

Completely agree. With heartwood being the dark area and lighter sap wood at the top.

Happy birthday Knucks!

Have a truly spectacular day! Happy birthday!!

OK - I'm a great fan of simple glued joints for long grain. But I have used other forms of joinery. My speakers (Linkwitz LX521.4) have the bass unit dipole assembled with biscuits (into marine ply, right angle joints), and I have a de-Walt biscuit jointer. And on my bench (a Klausz), the underframe is wedged tenons (sapele) and the top boards and apron are a mixture of glued floating tenon and dowel (I didn't have a biscuit jointer then). One of my cabinet making heroes is James Krenov. He used dowels in his exceptionally superb cabinets, usually on end grain to long grain joints. But in his later years he was clear that if biscuits had been available when he was making he would have used them in a heartbeat. I have to say that with biscuits you have to work fast. They swell once glued, so you have to assemble and cramp fast.

The alternative is to buy Linear Systems LSK170/LSJ74 matched pairs, quads and even octets from DIYAudio's store.

Here too. Plane the boards true and do a trial assembly, apply glue (I tend to use Titebond Extend), clamp up. Job done. I use homemade clamping jigs, pieces of chopped up bike tire (minus the steel beading) to protect the board edges, and ratchet straps. The clamping jigs hold the board flat. I'll see if I can find a picture of this arrangement.

If you find yourself in my neck of the woods near Oxford UK on your way back, there are cold beers in the fridge with your name on them...

PA Princeton did not come through. Trying again.

He designed the buildings I used to work in - PA Technology in Melbourn (near Cambridge UK) and in Princeton NJ, below (designed 1985) After that he became too famous and expensive to do little jobs like the above! But what an architectural titan. RIP Richard Rogers.

Norma Jean Mortenson, before she became Marilyn. Aged 20, in Kodachrome in 1946.

You telling me it arrived Naaman? If so that was bloody quick. UK to Arkansas in three days!

? I can't open that? What is it?

Hear hear!

Shit that is sad news indeed. RIP.

My cousin Roy was a set designer and head carpenter for Pinewood Studios. His two most famous ones were the original Superman movie (the ice palace was one of his), and A Fish Called Wanda. Alas most sets were (and perhaps still are) made from MDF. A lifetime breathing in MDF dust did him no good at all, and while working on a Bond movie maybe 20 years ago in the Philippines, had a recurrence of a breathing crisis and sadly died. Before breathing safety for lifetime professional woodworkers was a thing.