Wednesday, 29 July 2009

Rain Rain Go Away

harvest
Most recent harvest - then it rained. And rained ...

This was our harvest from Matt's Patch last weekend. Lettuce, cucumber, courgettes, raspberries and some rocket that has come under attack from caterpillars. Not bad I think. Since then it has rained and rained and rained. I can't believe how much rain there is up there!

tiny green peppers
6 Pepper plants - all with peppers like these

In the raised planter I have 6 pepper plants which are doing quite well despite the efforts of the weather to stall their growth. They all have peppers of various sizes now but I know that if it warmed up a few degrees and stayed dry for a week they would come on tremendously.
I have toyed with the idea of putting perspex screens around the edges of the planter to give more shelter to the plants in there but it's just a pipe-dream at the moment.

Wednesday, 15 July 2009

First Cucumber

first cucumber
This is our first cucumber - with plenty more to come

Tonight I picked our first cucumber. I thought it was plenty big enough and when measured it was about 12 inches long (more if you take the curve into account - the EU won't be pleased). Looking at the plants there are plenty more to come so we'll be having cucumber sandwiches all summer. Well, I'm more sure of having cucumbers than I am of having a summer! The variety is Aurelia F1 and it's an all female variety which means there are no male flowers to risk the fruit getting pollinated and going bitter. Saying that I have not tasted it yet! The four seeds were planted on 7th May so have produced fruit in about 9 weeks. They have been getting regular feeding once the flowers appeared so that should have helped.

Along with the cucumber I dug up the remaining Charlotte potatoes from the recycling container. We want to eat them on the weekend and I've dug them up now to give their skins time to mature. The others we've had have lost their skins during boiling and I think this is because they are too fresh.
This is the last of our early potatoes. The rest are King Edwards and Desiree which are still going strong in their corner of the garden.
potatoes and cucumber
Today's harvest - Charlotte potatoes and Aurelia F1 cucumber

Sunday, 12 July 2009

Project Scythe : Success

[Following on from this post]

Blimey that was quick! I only ordered the replacement parts on Friday morning and they arrived the next day (yesterday). I was too busy then to try anything out so today was my first chance to have a play.

First thing was to remove the whole tank and carburettor assembly. This wasn't too tricky - the hardest bit was removing the throttle cable.
old carburettor
The old carburettor still attached to fuel tank

Next up was to remove the carburettor from the tank. This is a simple case of undoing the 5 screws holding it on. Once it was off I gave the tank a good clean to remove all the crud that had built up around the mount points.
both carburettors
The old and the new

Although the new carburettor came pretty much assembled, there were still a few screens and springs to put in position. Once these were in place, it was a case of placing the diaphragm and gasket on the tank and then positioning the new carburettor on top. After doing up the screws the job was done.
new carburettor on tank
New carburettor on the cleaned up tank

Then came the tricky bit of putting the tank/carb back on the mower. Again the throttle cable tried to be awkward but after a bit of negotiation it was back in place and all tightened up. I then replaced the spark plug. However I left it unplugged as a precaution.
new carburettor in position
The newly assembled carburettor and tank in situ

Then it was ready for testing. I moved the mower outside and onto a piece of lawn. I primed the carb three times with the new bulb. It seemed to work perfectly, I could hear the fuel squirting up! Then I pulled on the started cord.
Nothing.
Again. Nothing.
Feeling slightly deflated I realised that I was no further on than I was before. So I walked around the front of the mower and ... hah! I'd forgotten to reconnect the spark plug! I quickly plugged it in and pulled again on the cord. Still nothing. I re-primed the carb and then pulled on the cord once more.
Success! With a puff of white smoke the engine burst into life for the first time in over a year!
working lawn mower
Success! The mower is working!

After that it was a case of working out how the mower worked. Then off to mow the lawns in record time. So much easier when you don't have to mess about with power leads.

The next things I need to do are get the blades sharpened and replace the air filter with the one I bought.

But Project Scythe has been a complete success and I'm hugely pleased with how it's turned out.

Friday, 10 July 2009

Project Scythe

Our electric lawnmower has given up the ghost. It started producing smoke from areas where it shouldn't - namely the motor! I can still smell the electric burning smell now.

The electric mower was getting to be a bit of a pain anyway, mostly because we have two lawn areas at the front of the house, an L-shaped lawn round two sides and a triangular lawn where the greenhouse is. So when we mow the lawns there is a lot of plugging and unplugging of electric extension cables to be done. A petrol mower would solve this particular problem. However, petrol mowers are much more expensive than their electric equivalents.

As luck would have it, Mrs. Matt's sister has donated her old petrol mower which fails to start. I have a few weeks to get it working before the grass gets over our heads.

Welcome to Project Scythe!
project scythe
Project Scythe - the mean machine

Now, there is one slight problem with this kind of project - I know next to nothing about engines. But why let that stop me.
First off was a quick bit of cleaning around the engine, removing bits of grass that were there from the last time it worked, over a year ago.
briggs and stratton powered mower
10 year old lawnmower with 3.5hp Briggs and Stratton engine

Then the investigative work began. It's a Briggs and Stratton engine, 3.5hp. According to the engine plate on the front, it's Model 9D902, Type 2006 E1, Code 98072954.
I've since learned that the Code is the date when the engine was made, in the format YYMMDDxx. So this engine was made on 29th July 1998 - almost exactly 10 years ago.
All this information is essential when ordering replacement parts as B&S make so many different engines.

Once I'd got some petrol and fashioned a funnel out of an old pop bottle, it was time to put some fuel in the tank and see what happened. Once the fuel was in, it needs to be moved into the carburettor, ready to go into the cylinder for ignition.
The thing that moves this initial bit of petrol is the primer bulb, a sort of rubber suction device. The little label next to it says to press it three times. Well after the first press it never came out again. I tried pressing it in a few more times to see if it would pop out but no. Anyway, I thought I'd try and turn the engine over and see what happened. It seemed to turn over ok, but not do a lot else.
carburettor primer bulb
The primer bulb refuses to pop out once pushed

So the initial diagnosis it that there's a problem with the primer bulb or some of the jets and tubes feeding it. I tried removing the bulb and then the carburettor but had no luck with either. I did all this after unplugging the spark plug just in case of a discharge while I'm messing with the fuel feeds - I read that somewhere. I think. So I decided to put things back together and then retreated to the PC and did some searching.
I found one site which gives details of removing a very similar carburettor. You need to remove the carb and fuel tank as one unit first, then remove the carb from the tank. It also details how to remove the primer bulb!
After looking and reading about all the bits that could be wrong in there, I decided to buy a whole new carburettor with all the gubbings (including the primer bulb assembly). While I was ordering I also picked out a new spark plug, air filter and some fuel conditioner (apparently petrol goes old and can gunk up the workings when left for a while). The whole order has come to £28.48 at the moment. Plus the £3 I've spent on petrol.

So that's where Project Scythe is at the moment: Awaiting parts.

UPDATE: This is the next page of Project Scythe

Wednesday, 8 July 2009

Cucumber Forrest

The cucumbers have gone mad! Since my last post a few days ago, the biggest cucumber seems to have had a growth spurt and must now be be about 9 or so inches long. It's getting fatter too!
cucumber getting bigger
Cucumber getting bigger every day

And while I was distracted with that cucumber, the others seem to have come on in leaps and bounds too. Every leaf junction has got a fruit on, and I have three plants! They are taking over the whole greenhouse with tendrils and side shoots going everywhere, grabbing on to what ever they can, be it French Beans or tomato plants! I'm going to have to do some serious moving about in there whilst I can still get in.
cucumber plants
Cucumber plants are taking over the greenhouse

Sunday, 5 July 2009

Red Raspberry

I went out this early this evening to water a few things and this is what I found. A bright red raspberry, almost glowing in amongst the verdant green leaves of the canes. After calling the girls out (there will be a lot more competition for ripe raspberries as everyone likes them, as opposed to strawberries which Mrs Matt doesn't like - not even in Pimms!) and a lot of build up, the raspberry was not quite ripe so refused to budge! Patience is a virtue as they say.
first red raspberry
This is our first raspberry to turn red

French bean harvest
After the local school fete Emily helped me go round the French bean plants and gather our first harvest. They're sneaky things and hide themselves very well in the stalks of the parent plant.
emily and french beans
Emily (as a tiger) helped me harvest our first French Beans

Cucumber update
This is the latest picture of the most advanced cucumber - it's about 5 inches long. It seems to be quite wrinkly, as if it has all its skin and is slowly filling it up!
cucumber
First cucumber is about 5 inches long now

Charlotte potatoes
After the somewhat disappointing showing of the Red Duke of Yorks I had a quick look at the Charlotte potatoes that are growing in the patch at the end of the garden. I thought the foliage was dying back a bit so decided to get the fork and have a snoop under the ground. What I found reassured me that all is well! I found a few good sized tubers and once I'd found some I could not resist digging both the plants up! We have cold roast chicken, fresh new potatoes and salad with our own lettuces. Excellent. We have more than twice the amount shown in the picture but Mrs Matt had started cooking them before I could get my camera out!
charlotte potatoes
Some of the Charlottes from the potato patch