Nov 6th by Ian under Materials and Construction
Tags: doc control, oil and gas QA/QC, QA, SGP
Being used to the role of principal contractor,then being a sub-contractor needs a mindset change, that comes through the contract and the impositions necessarily put on you. The Shetlands Gas Plant (SGP) Laggan-Tormore had a bigger surprise waiting, lurking menacingly, unseen, unexpected in the Totality of it’s monstrous dimensions – documents for QA. The whole team have no experience of the level of documentation required, I guess we are somewhat spoiled in transportation where the client has the testing required tabulated and “bare” appendices for designers to complete, from this I in the past have complied many test and inspection …
Oct 8th by Ian under Materials and Construction, Travels, my Friends travels
Tags: shetland sunsets
First tour of 18 days on and 9 days off which includes two travel days. No time off in 18 days, except to watch some morning rugby, where we played well but lost to the old enemy. Surprisingly I got used to the work cycle, working weekends well what else was I to do? well could have taken some more pictures, these sunsets were from the same place on different nights, luckily I had transport so could chase the sun to the west when it looked promising. I have to say I have about 20 really good shots and was …
May 19th by Ian under Materials and Construction
Tags: how to fail, TIE and no trams, vote them out
http://www.tie.ltd.uk/tie_key.html
click on the above to see the key personnel, well minus Mr Jeffrey, who bailed out today. The city of Edinburgh council have gagged the successful contractor Bilfinger Berger, so we will all receive a one sided account, and furthermore TIE have spent 80% of the budgeted sum and are now considering whether to continue with the project or not.
WHAT A BLOOMING SCANDAL
The Burghers of Edinburgh should be more reactionary and bringing those councillors who voted for this obviously ill thought out scheme to account. At the very least all those who voted for approval of this …
Apr 1st by Ian under Bird Watching, Materials and Construction
Behind our offices is waste land. Not covered in waste, just not fully usable by humans. It has an old railway and a few paths through it, I should say it is flat and boggy, not peat boggy just very wet silty clay boggy. However like much, left alone to nature land, every spare square metre has nature, being a birder I have taken much delight in listening and watching whitethroats in this favourable, to them, habitat. Last week as I wandered to the snack van to buy bacon rolls I heard my first chiffchaff of 2011. A few days …
Mar 21st by Ian under Materials and Construction
contract not signed yet but hey, use the link
http://www.transportscotland.gov.uk/news/Forth-Replacement-Crossing-preferred-bidder-announced
well done to all the bidding team and thanks for the celebratory lunch today. The proper one will be a double hog roast near 24 Ravelston terrace !…
Jan 30th by Ian under Materials and Construction, Miscellaneous
http://trustart.org/projects/109-bamboo-bikes
This caught my attention during the week, this is entrepreneurial Americans at their best. I am no lover of America or Americans but this project is just superb. Now we need bamboo towers that when properly anchored can support a turbine.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/8257153.stm
see above link if you think I was dreaming.
Everything is possible
If the “system” allows…
Jan 2nd by Ian under Materials and Construction
http://www.highwaysmaintenance.com
I have been visiting this site for years and found it useful, it occurs to me belatedly that I should share it with you. That is those of you not erudite enough to have found it. Particularly you divots that continue to call blacktop /asphalt concrete, —-TAR. Click on the site and learn. If you have used the word TAR out of context in 2010 then I give you a resolution, stop your sloppy language and be precise. It can only help you go further professionally and stop me metaphorically belting the back of your heids.…
Well if it is I would like you to listen to the link below
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/console/p00c4pmk/The_Climate_Connection_The_Climate_Connection_2010_Debate_Whats_Stopping_Us…
Dec 3rd by Ian under Materials and Construction
What can you buy for 20p a kilo? well pine cones, with global 24/7 news you kinda feel you can grasp what’s going on. Well I never knew this and I never even thought about it.
What?
The hand collection of pine cones from Georgia whose seeds are the stock of the Nordman firs we buy as Christmas trees at about £40. This is pure exploitation of subsistence farmers who risk their lives 40 to 50 metres up trees collecting cones for a seed base. Their exploitation is made easier by their communist past, their former world was controlled by …
You would expect, if you lied on a post or your observations on a company or institution were way off the mark that said companies or institutions would take some legal action against you or at least robustly comment on the maligning words. Well given the recent reaction to one of my posts, some people are as sensitive as adolescent school girls.  It surely must be wrong to associate a personal post on a personal blog to the persons employer and apply pressure regarding one’s personal opinions. So here we are in Scottish / Burmese state where words must be constrained, not because they are wrong, …
Nov 4th by Ian under Materials and Construction
Tags: bilfinger berger, edinburgh city council, TIE, trams
Well I have been biting my tongue for months, not like me ! the resignation of TIEs chief executive David Mackay was too much for a balanced view to withstand. I am not a Edinburgh tax payer, if I was I would be driven to protest. Bilfinger Berger are a construction company, they did not make the overly complicated bespoke contract that they signed up to. If it is exploitable it’s the fault of the spec makers, TIE. To state on resignation that a company who cannot legally reply, due to the contract, are delinquents, and lets take that in …
Oct 6th by Ian under Materials and Construction
I can see the searches people put in to reach my site, and a recurring one is “density of type 1 subbase”. So in my humble option you should use 2.1 / 2.2 t/M3 for aggregate that has a relative density of 2.7 / 2.8 t /M3. Limestone will be less in proportion to it’s relative density as will granite, and some igneous rocks will be more, such as from Hillhouse Quarries in Ayrshire whose relative density from memory is 2.9 t/M3. the lack of facts is we don’t routinely measure subbase density as a criteria so there is not …
some more selected M 74 pics…
Jul 27th by Ian under Materials and Construction
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Jun 8th by Ian under Materials and Construction
I went to a presentation tonight on the concrete ambassador series of four talks throughout the UK, Professor Karen Scrivener gave the talk on “cementing the future of concrete – science & sustainability” She ably demonstrated that concrete was needed and demanded as a unique material worldwide and went on to get us to the nana technology that enables them, the scientists, to tell us, the users and practitioners how a better understanding of the material and its constituents can deliver concrete with less CO2 emissions. It is the constituents that hold the key to CO2 reduction along with techniques …