How to make Rhubarb wine...

Rhubarb wine has become one of our yearly wines, it's simple to make and is usually ready quite quickly, and as we grow our own rhubarb it's also a good way of using it up if you have loads, anyway here's a short video on how to make rhubarb wine, or at least how we do it, it's a simple recipe and works well, the resulting wine is very nice and has a good flavour.

Here's the video -

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Simple wooden christmas tree decorations...

Simple to make wooden christmas tree decorations, these are made from scrap wood and don't require any special tools, they're easy for kids to make as well, and cats seem to approve as well.

These are a good use for some scrap bits of wood, and there are numerous ways you could make something similar to these, they can be painted or left plain and decorated with lights as we have, if you wanted something a bit more natural looking you could use sticks or small branches.

Here's the video - 

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Cleaning up old door hinges...

A short how to on removing paint from door hinges, I use a blow torch because it's quick and I'm lazy, but you could just wire brush the hinges, or use a heat gun (the kind for stripping paint) solvents would work as well, like the liquid paint stripper you can buy, I just prefer this method.

Works on steel hinges, I'd be careful if the hinges are brass though as excess heat may warp the metal, easiest way to tell would be to use a magnet, a magnet won't stick to brass.

After the hinges are cleaned a small drop of oil, or spray of WD-40 will make them work like new and they'll be ready for use on another door, this would work on hinges used on windows as well, and the casement stays, basically any metal that is covered in paint could be cleaned using this method, but make sure you use a well ventilated area when doing this, and be aware that the metal will get hot, so wear good heat proof gloves, or hold the hinge in some grips.

Here's the video -

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Homemade copper slug rings...

A short slideshow on how we made some slug rings to protect our young sunflower plants,and other plants, these are easy to make using just hand tools, and all you need is some old plastic waste pipe (which is what I used) or some other type of pipe that has some flex to it, and some self adhesive copper tape, which a lot of garden centers and diy type shops sell.

You could also use larger sizes of pipe to make bigger rings, basically all you need to do is cut the pipe into sections that are the same width as the copper tape, and then cut them so you can open and close them, then all that's left is to wrap them in the copper tape, easy and they are reusable as well.

They worked well to protect our young sunflowers so we'll be using them again on other plants that slugs and snails like.

Here's the video -

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A video of a much needed repair to one of our sets of wood framed double glazed windows, the repair was carried out a while ago now and is holding up well, and I have since carried out a similar repair to one of the other windows on the house, which is the bonus of having wood frame windows, it's easy to carry out repairs like this, tends to be a bit harder on upvc windows.

You can see in the video that the bead that holds the glazed unit in has started to rot, so this is me carefully cutting out the rotten wood and replacing it with a new piece and making good.

The alternative to doing this kind of repair maybe to strip the paint off the wood and apply a wood plasticiser, there are products you can buy that essential soak into the wood and set hard, they also prevent further damage.

Here's the video -

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Replacing a failed sealed unit...

This is a job I've finally got round to fixing, basically one of the double glazed units (sealed units) in our wood framed double gazed windows failed a while ago, by that I mean condensation was building up between the 2 panes of glass and rather than replace the whole frame i decided to just replace the sealed unit.

I found a company near to us who can make sealed units to whatever spec you want so I ordered one, much cheaper than replacing the whole frame. The sealed units in upvc windows can also be replaced in a similar way and it's cheaper to replace them rather than the whole window frame, how to's can be found online and a few minutes searching will find companies near to you who can make replacement units, you will need measurements though.

Here's a video of the process, obviously this will be different for upvc windows -

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Allotment Update...

This is the first of many visits to the allotment, I had thought I was starting later than I usual do, turns out I'm a bit earlier this year than last year, and as it happens we have started most of our seeds off earlier than we have in previous years.

Doesn't look like much was done, but you have to start somewhere.

Here's the video -

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