Fozzie

Are they actually sharpened, or just given a chamfer to look that way? Either way, it's a good way to announce you like phrases like "ride or die", and should be avoided

Nothing says "we're sure we can do this legally" like sacking hundreds of staff, and trying to pay them off... Hope they get dragged through court. Hopefully their boss will be able to do it in person, and not via a video.

There's rumours running around that Putin is in poor health, which is likely conspiracy, although some stuff looks to have some kind of merit. There's been claims of poor mental health, right through to rectal cancer, which has gone terminal. Guess this is the reason you don't wish some things, even on your worst enemy. Especially with ones with insecurities around legacy, and a big red button.

This is the ideal time to buy a PS5/Xbox series X and enter the world of Call Of Duty, or Halo

What a day this is quickly becoming... 9:30am - In the most positive way possible, dismantle the work done by an engineer who has a track record for copying, and pasting. A dangerous move in a job role where everything is bespoke. 11:30 - Currently on a meeting, listening to a poor mechanical engineer get torn to shreds as we've broken contract. I know it's sales and the engineer I gently tore down in the previous meeting, they mis-sold the job. At least when they go into the contract (which I have nothing to contribute), it gives me time to come on here, eBay, Rightmove etc. As I'm not allowed to leave meetings early "just in case".

It was the 0 confidence this chap had, which I found a mismatch with his background and favourite sport. I think I mentioned earlier he vanished, and the first thought was there was something mental health related going on, which had finally surfaced. My boss stepped up, who himself had dealt with serious problems in his life recently, and I think he feels very let down. I’m still looking at it like “maybe he really was just disinterested”, but it doesn’t weigh up well in my head. Im probably the reverse of you, as I’m told I’m fairly reserved in person, with a very dry sense of humour. When I had a run in with mental illness, it flipped things, and someone remarked that it looked like I was almost cheerfully trying to burn my life to the ground. In the end I did time with a BUPA psychologist, and now volunteer with a mental health group local to me. Some stuff still irks me, and I used to wonder how do you know that you’re “better”? My brother had some good words, which were “sometimes you lose a piece of yourself, and it doesn’t come back… But that’s ok. That’s the bit you don’t hear about”. … Bit heavy for a Tuesday night this, isn’t it?

I think he had probably thought for a while he was going to start fresh somewhere else, so let things pile up. But there was a member of staff warning he'd been doing it more or less since he started 3 years ago. I thought it was poor confidence, as his CV is academically very impressive, but recently it just started to look like someone who had no interest in what he was doing, and let it build up knowing he was just going to dump it on his co-workers. It just seemed the furthest thing away from what you expect from someone with that background, and a big rugby player (130kg, 6ft 4). At least if I decide to go I can't do worse, and it has crossed my mind as I'm pushing for a promotion, or at least the company car as the competitors are offering me these things. The system at work has a marker against old staff, which basically alerts future managers if that member of staff tries to come back. It tells them whether to re-hire or tell them to get stuffed. I think I know which box this chap has just ticked.

Morning We lost a member of the team this last week, and he's really left the boss reeling. A lot in the team knew he was sitting on projects, and basically letting project managers chase him without reply. I think in recent weeks, his emergency contact (mum) had to be called to find out where he was as we work from home, and he didn't reply to any messages/calls. First concern was his mental health was in the toilet, as he'd struggled with working from home. He finished last Friday, and left me an e-mail at 5:30 (we finish at 4) to drop a project on me. He mentions there being issues, but doesn't say what they are, just signs off quickly, and says goodbye. Leaving me with the task of figuring it all out and sorting it. It kind of baffles me, this guy was young, big rugby player type, from an affluent area, grammar school student, and masters degree. But 0 confidence, and 0 drive when it came to work. I thought he'd sweep by me in no time, and leave my career in the dust.

Good morning Bracing for a family trip down to London this weekend, and I'm driving. Spending nights in the garage trying to get it all sorted out, as I'm trying to hook up the generator and battery to the relay board I've knocked together. Found out the other day a tank of fuel on the Honda genny lasts about 3 months with the way I use it (mostly battery charging).

Up to Burscough to work in a garage, followed by working in my own garage, followed by a walk with the girlfriend if weather allows. Probably a takeaway and a quiet night in as we are both trying to save at the moment. Last free weekend for a while, I'm booked up for a few weeks after this. Most of it obligatory family visits, and fixing peoples stuff.

I'm similar, stuck out school until 18. Found my way into an apprenticeship when I was 19 with an oil company, who then stuck me back in college/uni, that I'd tried to avoid. Got to do a lot of machining and welding though, which was fun, and with my job on the line I suddenly found I could do maths

I think I've seen you say you work in a power station, and I'm curious, what type and what role? I'm E&I in CHP and localised power gen (Typically under 50MW). We get away without using urea dosing in some of the MTU engine types we use, but even the "low" stuff is now under pressure. You can see this in the SCR kit we get as well, I think the amount of sensors has doubled in the past 5 years to maintain that umbrella effect, otherwise the rated 99% reduction in NOx becomes a dream. To bring it more on topic, I suspect the price of Urea will go up further as it's one of Russia's exports. Uralchem I think it is? And they've just applied sanctions on us... Which I can't fathom as they are the ones hurting most in these sanctions. I've seen too many Russian officials just deny an invasion of Ukraine is even happening. All theatre to keep as many people back home in line I guess.

Be good if true, but I’m skeptical. I sized up a job in Belgium last year, battery production plant that produced syngas as a byproduct. By the time we’d costed and sized up the plant needed to process the gas for use in jet engines, a 25MW plant was down to 7MW net power production. The issue with hydrogen is it’s usually stuck to something, or needs processing to remove impurities. Just read that the USA has approved 13 billion in aid for Ukraine. Not sure how quickly that translates into getting weapons into the right hands, but fingers crossed.

Yes, it’s very power hungry. When brought up, its nearly always in context of using excess from renewables like wind. So during times of low load where there’s ample wind generation, rather than disconnect, divert the power to either a hydrogen production plant, or a large battery. About half our power is produced by gas in the UK, so the situation in Russia has rung the alarm bell on that. There is blue hydrogen, which is made from reformed methane, but I can’t get my head around the argument that it’s cleaner than methane, it comes over as a bit of a scam to me. That carbon has to go somewhere, and you release more powering the process to reform the methane, so if it’s carbon capture there’d be better places to use it in my view.

Good description, this has been a discussion in my industry (historically built a lot of gas engines), especially in regards to mixing different reactants into the methane, such as hydrogen to try and control levels of emissions. We can reduce the CO2 output, but due to the higher burning temperatures of hydrogen, NOx output becomes a problem again. I’m currently working on a job in London, which is part of a district heating project. We’ve gone for a urea dosing system combined with a low NOx MTU engine. Before this goes too far off topic, Russia has hit my companies future plans hard. Not least as we own British Gas! Who last year hoovered up customers from collapsed energy companies, honoured fixed rates for 1-2 years, and is now having to foot the bill until their tariff changes. And equally in my side of things, its highlighted the need to shift sooner to hydrogen.

Good afternoon! This week has dragged on a bit, just want to get working in the garage and only managed a couple of hours. Blew up a relay, after I wired it into my garages power panel, it had been damaged in postage and there was a short across it. Bits of semi-conductor everywhere. Was in the office earlier and it's like the 6 month after shot of a zombie apocalypse, everything looted, ceiling panels missing, flickering lights. Kept thinking "Has this place fallen apart, or did I just not notice when it was full of people?"

Fuel prices are driving me round the bend. Last night, a warning was given at a local station that diesel would jump from £1.71, to £1.81 as soon as it hit midnight. This was because of the oil price spiking. After this, the Emirates agreed to boost production, and it's expected others will follow, with this causing a huge 12% drop in the price of oil yesterday (Wednesday). But when these drops happen, you can guarantee 2 things. 1. The petrol companies will buy competitively, there will have been a surge yesterday. 2. They'll either hold the price where it is, or let it trickle down slowly, as why not profit more when you can blame Russia?

The idea behind using wood, is you plant it to burn it, not deplete naturally occurring reserves (causing a net carbon release). And creating a cycle of trees that grow, capturing C02, and are then cut down to make way for a new tree that absorbs the carbon released by burning the tree it replaced as it grows. When you burn coal, there's no way to easily recapture that released carbon. So while wood releases more, you can recapture it, so long as it's sourced properly. With coal, there's no chance of that, so it's a bad idea to turn back to coal for power generation. And C02 emissions aren't the only factor, just have a read of what it does to air pollution, even with clean coal technologies reducing the ash and sulfur release.

Colleague at work has her combined tariff coming to an end, and she's told me her £50 a month combined usage is rising to about £190. She can't find a tariff that is competitive. My current tariff ends in June, I pay about the same for my flat, and when I looked all the prices were £200 a month. I'm going to have to go on a cheap electricity tariff with night time low prices, and put 4 or 5 big electric radiators in.

The Tesla has the best range, but I've heard it suffers with build quality. Hopefully your son has a good one! I've heard the complaint about the charge points, all the managers at my place complain that they arrive at a services and someone eventually comes over to say "Sorry mate, these haven't worked for 6 months". Really need the big wigs, BP, Shell, and the supermarkets to jump on the electricity band wagon. Also is good for my business, as they come knocking for a more effective way to buy electricity, by making it themselves.

Is this recall widespread knowledge? *fires up eBay*

My uncle did the reverse, was going for the Tesla but saw sense and got the Hyundai Kona. And I've done the similar previously, I was looking at BMW 2/3 series, Audi A3/TT, and got a Ford Fiesta ST. It has loads more kit, and the 1.5 engine got rave reviews. Never regretted my choice, so hopefully wouldn't if I got the Hyundai... But I do like that Polestar First world problems eh?

They look great, but I hear they fall quite short of the range they reckon they can do. There are cheaper options like the Hyundai Kona electric. Where I can get the "ultimate" version for almost half the cost of the Polestar 2's basic version. Similar power output as well. And I'd have more money free for bikes, and a boot still big enough to ferry frames to powder coaters

Bet his ex wasn't much too happy to see him do all that I've done the reverse, with no pressure I drift away from the idea, but maybe this explains the recent questioning, they thought I'd go the other way. Good morning! I'm going back in the office to do actual work for the first time since 2020 on Thursday. This working from home lark was getting a bit monotonous, but I'm also trying to get a company car, and all they offer are electric models. One is the Polestar 2, which I quite fancy, and the best bit is that as we build power generation sets and test them at a factory attached to the office, we can charge the cars up for free as the load helps ramp the generators up further without exporting too much. So if I can get a 300 mile range car, I'm in with a shout of some seriously cheap motoring.

Depends how you look at, wood pellets are carbon neutral if they are replaced with a similar tree that grows in its place. The cycle of this means no additional CO2 is added to the atmosphere. It's just a constant cycle of chopping a tree down, burn the wood, release C02, grow a new tree, trap C02, and repeat. But when you include the emissions from chopping them down and processing them, it isn't neutral. Coal's replacement rate is in the millions of years, meaning its burning will only add to the atmosphere. Most of our power is made by burning gas. And seeing as the price of that is not coming down soon, how stupid was that!?