On Wed, 05 Sep 2007 19:42:56 GMT, "George"
wrote:
mans ect
Just saved a fire surround out of a local skip,its a replica of georgian
style surround its made of thick fiberglass but is in very good condition.
Why do people throw out some good decent stuff?
I recent fitted out a 'new' kitchen with almost all items sourced
secondhand or from the tip.
I had a choice of two sinks, both brand new and still in
boxes/wrapping - one a bog-standard stainless steel affair, the other
an Astrolite (?) jobby ( £5 each, so I bought both and fitted the
Astrolite ).
The brushed stainless steel monoblock came from the tip...found it on
the floor behind the aly bin ( £2 ), the cabinets were given to me by
a colleague who was ripping out two perfectly decent kitchens - and I
picked up some brand new solid beech worktop offcuts from a skip
outside a house where a new kitchen was being professionally fitted. I
have at least enough to add a couple of 'cheeks' either side of my old
Rayburn.
Even the lead-free solder, flux, PTFE tape, pipework and pipecutter (
brand new ) was sourced from the tip ( £2 the lot ).
The Hotpoint Aquarius dishwasher came from a friend of a relative who
never really needed the thing in the first place and thus hardly used
it ( so now I have four dishwashers in total, two by Bosch...at a cost
of £15 ).
While I was at the tip buying the monoblock I also picked up a couple
of 18v PowerPro batteries for my cordless drill ( £1 the pair ), one
of which holds a decent charge - and a HP Omnibook 900 laptop ( 450Mhz
PIII ) for a fiver..complete with a battery that holds about an hour's
charge.
A couple of months back I bought a Cluson Clulite CL2 for 50p...a big,
chunky torch with a detachable lamp, takes those Yaesu 12v batteries (
also 50p a pop out of the battery bin ). Turns out these things have a
1,000,000 candlelight bulb and cost nigh on £100 from Clusons.
....and then there was the Samsung 17" TFT monitor for a tenner...and
the 3.75 hp lawnmower that still had fresh grass in the box and a
busted front wheel mount ( £5, plus two pop rivets and a bolt to fix )
Thing is, I remember going to the local tip as a lad some 30 or so
years ago - when my father would take a few odds and ends up there of
a Sunday...and despite being able to have a good rummage round we
never really found much that was any good. Either the totters are less
observant these days, or people are simply chucking away stuff that
people in years gone by would have sold or passed on.
I'm not complaining...
Regards,
--
Stephen Howard - Woodwind repairs & period restorations
http://www.shwoodwind.co.uk
Emails to: showard{who is at}shwoodwind{dot}co{dot}uk