Couldn't get to my job today, on top of a steep hill on an ungritted back
road.

Took my granddaughter sledging instead. Amazing to see the variety of
things used as sledges; rubble sacks, estate agents signs, road signs, small
surfboards, wheelie bin lids, trays,

Built her the sledge from some scrap timber. Runners are 6 x 1 with
aluminium strips.

Wasn't as fast as I thought it would be, mind you, despite eating like a
horse she doesn't weigh much.

The plastic sledges seem faster. Is the idea to have narrow runners or are
you better off having wider ones to ride on top of the snow?

Any Eskimos on the group?


--
Dave - The Medway Handyman
www.medwayhandyman.co.uk

The Medway Handyman wrote:

The plastic sledges seem faster. *Is the idea to have narrow runners or
are you better off having wider ones to ride on top of the snow?

That depends on if you have the right sort of snow or not. If it's soft and
squashy then wide runners are probably best but if it gets frozen hard then
narrow ones would be better.

--
Mike Clarke

The Medway Handyman wrote:
Couldn't get to my job today, on top of a steep hill on an ungritted
back road.

Same here. So I stayed at home.

http://s428.photobucket.com/albums/q...t=100_0263.jpg
http://s428.photobucket.com/albums/q...t=100_0274.jpg

--
Adam

On Dec 1, 2:23 pm, "The Medway Handyman" davidno-spam-
wrote:
Couldn't get to my job today, on top of a steep hill on an ungritted back
road.

Took my granddaughter sledging instead. Amazing to see the variety of
things used as sledges; rubble sacks, estate agents signs, road signs, small
surfboards, wheelie bin lids, trays,

Built her the sledge from some scrap timber. Runners are 6 x 1 with
aluminium strips.

Wasn't as fast as I thought it would be, mind you, despite eating like a
horse she doesn't weigh much.

The plastic sledges seem faster. Is the idea to have narrow runners or are
you better off having wider ones to ride on top of the snow?

Any Eskimos on the group?

--
Dave - The Medway Handymanwww.medwayhandyman.co.uk

have you had a search back on here? sure this came up last winter?

Jim K

in 1005316 20101201 142337 "The Medway Handyman" wrote:
Couldn't get to my job today, on top of a steep hill on an ungritted back
road.

Took my granddaughter sledging instead. Amazing to see the variety of
things used as sledges; rubble sacks, estate agents signs, road signs, small
surfboards, wheelie bin lids, trays,


Nothing beats an inflated truck or tractor inner-tube.

On 01/12/2010 15:01, Jim K wrote:

have you had a search back on here? sure this came up last winter?


Yeah, but this year the regular 'air conditioning' thread failed to take
flight - and this is to make up for that.

Actually, I remember last snow season (Feb?) hearing a few horrible
stories of kids killed on make-shift sleds, including one made out of a
upturned roof removed from an old Ford Transit van.

Be careful out there!

--
Adrian C

On Wed, 01 Dec 2010 15:10:23 +0000, Bob Martin wrote:

in 1005316 20101201 142337 "The Medway Handyman"
wrote:
Couldn't get to my job today, on top of a steep hill on an ungritted
back road.

Took my granddaughter sledging instead. Amazing to see the variety of
things used as sledges; rubble sacks, estate agents signs, road signs,
small surfboards, wheelie bin lids, trays,


Nothing beats an inflated truck or tractor inner-tube.

Agreed. We've got a wide variety of sledding devices here (I'm in
northern Minnesota, where it's snow-bound for at least 5 months of the
year) and inflatable tubes are by far the fastest and go the farthest.
Just take a few puncture-repair patches out with you just in case!

The sleds that look like surfboards aren't too bad either, but they tend
to split and tear up underneath quite quickly and become useless.

cheers

Jules

On Wed, 01 Dec 2010 15:12:58 +0000, Adrian C wrote:

Actually, I remember last snow season (Feb?) hearing a few horrible
stories of kids killed on make-shift sleds, including one made out of a
upturned roof removed from an old Ford Transit van.

IIRC a Land Rover roof and the mistake was not to make sure the
bottom of the hill had a decent run off area and did't have a wire
fence across the bottom of it...

--
Cheers
Dave.

Mike Clarke wrote:
The Medway Handyman wrote:

The plastic sledges seem faster. Is the idea to have narrow runners or
are you better off having wider ones to ride on top of the snow?

That depends on if you have the right sort of snow or not. If it's soft and
squashy then wide runners are probably best but if it gets frozen hard then
narrow ones would be better.

How about a multigrade design. V section runners should present a narrow
strip on harder snow and ice and the wider part should help it from
digging into soft snow too much. Might have to play with the angles -
say about 120 degrees included to start with. Adjustable would be really
posh.
No sign of snow here in Southampton
Bob

On 01/12/2010 16:47, Dave Liquorice wrote:
On Wed, 01 Dec 2010 15:12:58 +0000, Adrian C wrote:

Actually, I remember last snow season (Feb?) hearing a few horrible
stories of kids killed on make-shift sleds, including one made out of a
upturned roof removed from an old Ford Transit van.

IIRC a Land Rover roof and the mistake was not to make sure the
bottom of the hill had a decent run off area and did't have a wire
fence across the bottom of it...

ISTR that the wire fence (since removed) was half way down a steep hill
rather than at the bottom.

Adrian C wrote:
On 01/12/2010 15:01, Jim K wrote:

have you had a search back on here? sure this came up last winter?


Yeah, but this year the regular 'air conditioning' thread failed to
take flight - and this is to make up for that.

Actually, I remember last snow season (Feb?) hearing a few horrible
stories of kids killed on make-shift sleds, including one made out of
a upturned roof removed from an old Ford Transit van.

Did you ever see the episode of Le Salvager where he built a boat from a
Transit GRP roof?


--
Dave - The Medway Handyman
www.medwayhandyman.co.uk

"Huge" wrote in message
...
On 2010-12-01, The Medway Handyman
wrote:
Couldn't get to my job today, on top of a steep hill on an ungritted back
road.

Took my granddaughter sledging instead. Amazing to see the variety of
things used as sledges; rubble sacks, estate agents signs, road signs,
small
surfboards, wheelie bin lids, trays,

Built her the sledge from some scrap timber. Runners are 6 x 1 with
aluminium strips.

I have a suspicion for some reason that aluminium may not be suitable;
does
it bind to ice, or similar?
Agreed. Aluminium is wrong. Its specific heat capacity is too small. Mild
steel is fine but, of course, will need rubbing down before each use.

Lawrence

Adrian C wrote:
On 01/12/2010 15:01, Jim K wrote:

have you had a search back on here? sure this came up last winter?


Yeah, but this year the regular 'air conditioning' thread failed to
take flight - and this is to make up for that.

Actually, I remember last snow season (Feb?) hearing a few horrible
stories of kids killed on make-shift sleds, including one made out of
a upturned roof removed from an old Ford Transit van.

Be careful out there!

It was in Rotherham last Feburary. One girl died.

Don't more people die every year by going into ice covered water to try to
save their dogs than in sledging accidents?
--
Adam

Bob Minchin wrote:
Mike Clarke wrote:
The Medway Handyman wrote:

The plastic sledges seem faster. Is the idea to have narrow
runners or are you better off having wider ones to ride on top of
the snow?

That depends on if you have the right sort of snow or not. If it's
soft and squashy then wide runners are probably best but if it gets
frozen hard then narrow ones would be better.

How about a multigrade design. V section runners should present a
narrow strip on harder snow and ice and the wider part should help it
from digging into soft snow too much. Might have to play with the
angles - say about 120 degrees included to start with. Adjustable
would be really posh.

Vee section sounds great! Getting the curve at the front would be
interesting....

No sign of snow here in Southampton

How about now?

:-)


--
Dave - The Medway Handyman
www.medwayhandyman.co.uk

On Wed, 01 Dec 2010 14:31:38 +0000, Mike Clarke wrote:

The Medway Handyman wrote:

The plastic sledges seem faster. *Is the idea to have narrow runners or
are you better off having wider ones to ride on top of the snow?

That depends on if you have the right sort of snow or not. If it's soft and
squashy then wide runners are probably best but if it gets frozen hard then
narrow ones would be better.

Last one we had was the only one locally that would run on an inch of fluffy
snow.
It was a sheet of varnished ply (can't remember th dimensions as it was
about 50 years ago) with thin ply nailed under the front end and held up in
a curve with string. A small length of pointy batten in the middle of the
back end would have made it easier to steer (like a skeg) but not on such
shallow snow.
It went rather fast and took some controlling to stop it turning and acting
as a shovel.
--
Peter.
The gods will stay away
whilst religions hold sway

On Dec 1, 2:31*pm, Mike Clarke wrote:

That depends on if you have the right sort of snow or not. If it's soft and
squashy then wide runners are probably best but if it gets frozen hard then
narrow ones would be better.

Agreed. If you've got a one day flurry of soft snow in a big park
(i.e. not all trampled) then a cheap moulded plastic sledge beats
grandad's beautifully hand-crafted wooden one with narrow runners.

On 01/12/2010 16:56, Bob Minchin wrote:

No sign of snow here in Southampton


Not on topic, but how do you find road signs that tell you how to get
out of the city? Daughter lives just down the coast in Portsmouth and we
paid a visit there some years ago and I couldn't find my way out. It
reminded me about visiting Glasgow many years ago, I had the same
problem there, so I picked a road and drove along it until I found some
road signs to take me back to New Cumnock.

Dave

The Medway Handyman wrote:
Bob Minchin wrote:
Mike Clarke wrote:
The Medway Handyman wrote:

The plastic sledges seem faster. Is the idea to have narrow
runners or are you better off having wider ones to ride on top of
the snow?

That depends on if you have the right sort of snow or not. If it's
soft and squashy then wide runners are probably best but if it gets
frozen hard then narrow ones would be better.

How about a multigrade design. V section runners should present a
narrow strip on harder snow and ice and the wider part should help it
from digging into soft snow too much. Might have to play with the
angles - say about 120 degrees included to start with. Adjustable
would be really posh.

Vee section sounds great! Getting the curve at the front would be
interesting....

No sign of snow here in Southampton

How about now?

:-)


About 120mm this morning. I think the last time we had this much was 1985
Bob

On 01/12/2010 14:23, The Medway Handyman wrote:
Couldn't get to my job today, on top of a steep hill on an ungritted back
road.

Took my granddaughter sledging instead. Amazing to see the variety of
things used as sledges; rubble sacks, estate agents signs, road signs, small
surfboards, wheelie bin lids, trays,

Built her the sledge from some scrap timber. Runners are 6 x 1 with
aluminium strips.

Wasn't as fast as I thought it would be, mind you, despite eating like a
horse she doesn't weigh much.

The plastic sledges seem faster. Is the idea to have narrow runners or are
you better off having wider ones to ride on top of the snow?

Any Eskimos on the group?



Old car bonnets go like stink...

--
Ron

In article , says...

On 01/12/2010 16:56, Bob Minchin wrote:

No sign of snow here in Southampton


Not on topic, but how do you find road signs that tell you how to get
out of the city? Daughter lives just down the coast in Portsmouth and we
paid a visit there some years ago and I couldn't find my way out.

Didn't you know where you'd come from ...?

I'm sure I've found plenty of signs when I've been in Portsmouth and A3, A27 and London
have a sort of 'gets-you-out-of-town' feel to them ...

Or, for the coastal routes, which seem to suit you better, the dockyard and ferries are
well signed. When you get to water, turn left or right as appropriate ...


It reminded me about visiting Glasgow many years ago, I had the same
problem there, so I picked a road and drove along it until I found some
road signs to take me back to New Cumnock.


Dunno about that - it's foreign, innit?

Now let me see ...

Ah yes! If I reach over the back there's this Road Atlas of Great Britain thingy, should
give a few hints ...

Surely, in any large town, driving as far as posible in a straight line should get you
somewhere - even if it's The Solent - that gives you a point of reference.

It's also useful if you know where North is but I admit that isn't always easy!

You must have had some way of finding your destination in Portsmouth and Glasgow, so why
not do the same thing backwards? Or, in Portsmouth, ask your daughter ...?

--

Terry

In article ,
ARWadsworth wrote:
Adrian C wrote:
On 01/12/2010 15:01, Jim K wrote:

have you had a search back on here? sure this came up last winter?


Yeah, but this year the regular 'air conditioning' thread failed to
take flight - and this is to make up for that.

Actually, I remember last snow season (Feb?) hearing a few horrible
stories of kids killed on make-shift sleds, including one made out of
a upturned roof removed from an old Ford Transit van.

Be careful out there!

It was in Rotherham last Feburary. One girl died.

Don't more people die every year by going into ice covered water to try to
save their dogs than in sledging accidents?

Talking of ice covered water... wtf:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...indscreen.html

(the bit at the bottom with the canal)

Darren

On 02/12/2010 18:19, Terry Casey wrote:
In , says...

On 01/12/2010 16:56, Bob Minchin wrote:

No sign of snow here in Southampton


Not on topic, but how do you find road signs that tell you how to get
out of the city? Daughter lives just down the coast in Portsmouth and we
paid a visit there some years ago and I couldn't find my way out.

Didn't you know where you'd come from ...?

I'm sure I've found plenty of signs when I've been in Portsmouth and A3, A27 and London
have a sort of 'gets-you-out-of-town' feel to them ...

I think he means he visited Southampton. Portsmouth has signs that say
Out of City. For Southampton, I usually need the sat nav if I'm not
simply back tracking the way I came in.

Colin Bignell

On 01/12/2010 14:42, Huge wrote:
On 2010-12-01, The Medway wrote:
Couldn't get to my job today, on top of a steep hill on an ungritted back
road.

Took my granddaughter sledging instead. Amazing to see the variety of
things used as sledges; rubble sacks, estate agents signs, road signs, small
surfboards, wheelie bin lids, trays,

Built her the sledge from some scrap timber. Runners are 6 x 1 with
aluminium strips.

I have a suspicion for some reason that aluminium may not be suitable; does
it bind to ice, or similar?


It is quite a sticky metal, I would guess because it is covered in
aluminium oxide.

I suspect that the best design for the powdery snow I've seen today is a
flat surface, to spread the load, a slightly curved front edge, to ride
over the snow, and small ribs underneath, just deep enough to provide
come directional stability. Much like the moulded plastic ones, in fact.

A sled with runners probably need packed snow or ice to run on.

Colin Bignell

On Wed, 01 Dec 2010 14:23:37 +0000, The Medway Handyman wrote:

The plastic sledges seem faster. Is the idea to have narrow runners or
are you better off having wider ones to ride on top of the snow?

Road signs are the DBs for speed. Though not manoeverability (sp?)
http://alderbridge.net/features/201001_snow_days/
(videos at the bottom of the page)

--
John Stumbles

My karma ran over my dogma

In article , "Nightjar \"cpb\"@"
"insertmysurnamehere says...

On 02/12/2010 18:19, Terry Casey wrote:
In , says...

On 01/12/2010 16:56, Bob Minchin wrote:

No sign of snow here in Southampton


Not on topic, but how do you find road signs that tell you how to get
out of the city? Daughter lives just down the coast in Portsmouth and we
paid a visit there some years ago and I couldn't find my way out.

Didn't you know where you'd come from ...?

I'm sure I've found plenty of signs when I've been in Portsmouth and A3, A27 and London
have a sort of 'gets-you-out-of-town' feel to them ...

I think he means he visited Southampton. Portsmouth has signs that say
Out of City. For Southampton, I usually need the sat nav if I'm not
simply back tracking the way I came in.

Colin Bignell

"Daughter lives just down the coast in Portsmouth and we paid a visit there some years
ago" says Portsmouth to me ...

--

Terry

On Wed, 01 Dec 2010 16:47:47 +0000, Dave Liquorice wrote:

On Wed, 01 Dec 2010 15:12:58 +0000, Adrian C wrote:

Actually, I remember last snow season (Feb?) hearing a few horrible
stories of kids killed on make-shift sleds, including one made out of a
upturned roof removed from an old Ford Transit van.

IIRC a Land Rover roof and the mistake was not to make sure the bottom
of the hill had a decent run off area and did't have a wire fence
across the bottom of it...

I remember as a kid that was the whole object of going down our preferred
hill - to duck at the appropriate moment so that you didn't get
decapitated by the fence, crash through the few bushes just beyond, and
land on top of the (hopefully frozen) pond just beyond that.

(I think I must have been incredibly lucky not to have severely maimed
myself when I were a lad!)

Makeshift sleds we often used to make from thick sheets of cardboard
wrapped in bin liners, by the way.

cheers

Jules

On Thu, 02 Dec 2010 18:36:35 +0000, D.M.Chapman wrote:

In article , ARWadsworth
wrote:
Adrian C wrote:
On 01/12/2010 15:01, Jim K wrote:

have you had a search back on here? sure this came up last winter?


Yeah, but this year the regular 'air conditioning' thread failed to
take flight - and this is to make up for that.

Actually, I remember last snow season (Feb?) hearing a few horrible
stories of kids killed on make-shift sleds, including one made out of
a upturned roof removed from an old Ford Transit van.

Be careful out there!

It was in Rotherham last Feburary. One girl died.

Don't more people die every year by going into ice covered water to try
to save their dogs than in sledging accidents?

Talking of ice covered water... wtf:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...d-police-stop-
snow-covered-car-pensioner-struggles-peer-windscreen.html

(the bit at the bottom with the canal)

Heh :-) It all freezes pretty solid over here for several months - here's
a pic of one of the local lakes in mid-winter, with vehicles and ice
fishing houses on it: http://www.patooie.com/icelake.jpg

I remember as a kid in the UK regularly walking along frozen canals with
my dad, though. What with the milder winters, I didn't think they ever
froze up enough to even do that any more - let alone try to drive a car
on them!

cheers

Jules

On Fri, 3 Dec 2010 01:10:36 +0000 (UTC), Jules Richardson
wrote:

Makeshift sleds we often used to make from thick sheets of cardboard
wrapped in bin liners, by the way.

There weren't such things as bin liners when I was a lad...

Coal sacks, perhaps :-)

--
Frank Erskine

On 3 Dec,
Frank Erskine wrote:

On Fri, 3 Dec 2010 01:10:36 +0000 (UTC), Jules Richardson
wrote:

Makeshift sleds we often used to make from thick sheets of cardboard
wrapped in bin liners, by the way.

There weren't such things as bin liners when I was a lad...

Coal sacks, perhaps :-)

And the challenge was to get through the legs of the milkman's horse.

--
B Thumbs
Change lycos to yahoo to reply

On 02/12/2010 22:33, Terry Casey wrote:
In articlem5Wdna9LJo0vcGrRnZ2dnUVZ8g2dnZ2d@giganews. com, "Nightjar\"cpb\"@"
"insertmysurnamehere says...

On 02/12/2010 18:19, Terry Casey wrote:
In , says...

On 01/12/2010 16:56, Bob Minchin wrote:

No sign of snow here in Southampton


Not on topic, but how do you find road signs that tell you how to get
out of the city? Daughter lives just down the coast in Portsmouth and we
paid a visit there some years ago and I couldn't find my way out.

Didn't you know where you'd come from ...?

I'm sure I've found plenty of signs when I've been in Portsmouth and A3, A27 and London
have a sort of 'gets-you-out-of-town' feel to them ...

I think he means he visited Southampton. Portsmouth has signs that say
Out of City. For Southampton, I usually need the sat nav if I'm not
simply back tracking the way I came in.

Colin Bignell

"Daughter lives just down the coast in Portsmouth and we paid a visit there some years
ago" says Portsmouth to me ...


The preceding bit

No sign of snow here in Southampton


Not on topic, but how do you find road signs that tell you how to get
out of the city?

combined with the fact that Porstmouth is quite well signposted, while
in Southampton I have to rely on the sat nav, suggests Southampton to me.

Colin Bignell

In article , "Nightjar \"cpb\"@"
"insertmysurnamehere says...

On 02/12/2010 22:33, Terry Casey wrote:
In articlem5Wdna9LJo0vcGrRnZ2dnUVZ8g2dnZ2d@giganews. com, "Nightjar\"cpb\"@"
"insertmysurnamehere says...

On 02/12/2010 18:19, Terry Casey wrote:
In , says...

On 01/12/2010 16:56, Bob Minchin wrote:

No sign of snow here in Southampton


Not on topic, but how do you find road signs that tell you how to get
out of the city? Daughter lives just down the coast in Portsmouth and we
paid a visit there some years ago and I couldn't find my way out.

Didn't you know where you'd come from ...?

I'm sure I've found plenty of signs when I've been in Portsmouth and A3, A27 and London
have a sort of 'gets-you-out-of-town' feel to them ...

I think he means he visited Southampton. Portsmouth has signs that say
Out of City. For Southampton, I usually need the sat nav if I'm not
simply back tracking the way I came in.

Colin Bignell

"Daughter lives just down the coast in Portsmouth and we paid a visit there some years
ago" says Portsmouth to me ...


The preceding bit

No sign of snow here in Southampton


Not on topic, but how do you find road signs that tell you how to get
out of the city?

combined with the fact that Porstmouth is quite well signposted, while
in Southampton I have to rely on the sat nav, suggests Southampton to me.

Colin Bignell

No. He is and, presumably, lives in Southampton and says he visited his daughter in
Portsmouth ...

You can twist that to suit yourself but, unless the OP comes back with some
clarification, I'm sticking to my interpretation ...

--

Terry

We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the
drugs began to take hold. I remember Adrian C
saying something like:

Actually, I remember last snow season (Feb?) hearing a few horrible
stories of kids killed on make-shift sleds, including one made out of a
upturned roof removed from an old Ford Transit van.

Yebbut, that was a barbed wire fence that did the fatal injuries, not
the old roof.
Certainly a tragedy, and one which I'd hope not to be repeated, but such
things are usually walked away from unhurt or with minor injuries.

in 1005857 20101203 181012 Terry Casey wrote:

No sign of snow here in Southampton


Not on topic, but how do you find road signs that tell you how to get
out of the city? Daughter lives just down the coast in Portsmouth and we
paid a visit there some years ago and I couldn't find my way out.



No. He is and, presumably, lives in Southampton and says he visited his daughter in
Portsmouth ...

You can twist that to suit yourself but, unless the OP comes back with some
clarification, I'm sticking to my interpretation ...


Read it again. The subject was Southampton.
OP (from wherever) said he was visiting daughter (in Portsmouth) and they paid a visit there,
meaning Southampton.