Building ArcEm on Ubuntu 18.04

sudo apt install libx11-dev libxext-dev

Damp, mortar and indecision

I recently bought a house that needs a bit of care. Some slipped slates, in need of decortating - no problem get some quotes for the exterior work and get cracking. Then I started reading about lime mortar and the semingly contradictary approaches of "DPC and waterproof sand and cement internal render" and "let it breathe with lime". And then I fell down the internet rabbit hole and am still no closer to reaching a conclusion.

The house was built in 1880ish of rough cut gritstone

The house

Currently problems are there are some damp problems coming through the plaster and some rotting joist ends and parts of the wall plates. First task was to unblock the gutters which has stopped water running down the outside walls.

Back of house

Front of house

Clearly this isn't the first time the inside walls have got damp as the top coat of plaster is cracking off just above where the render changes from a soft cream colour to a hard grey colour. So it looks like the bottom 50 cm at the front and 1.5m at the back have been hacked of and rerendered previously. There are white crystal salts on the surface of the plaster in the corner and the horizontal line at the front of the house stays damp even after days of warm weather.

Outside there is a concrete path all around the house a couple of centimetres below the internal floor level. Mostly this is angled away from the house but in some places water pools during heavy rain. The air bricks also seem to have been partially hidden.

Concrete path

Rear air brick

Front air brick, broken and covered with wire mesh

The pointing on the exterior seems at least partly to blame. In places there are holes between the stones where the soft mortar has fallen out. Much of the house has previously been repointed by smearing cement over the old mortar. Some of the cement mortar is stuck on hard, some is falling and some appears to be damaging the stone.

Soft, crumbly (original?) mortar

Cement pointing

Cement falling off leaving soft mortar

Stone damage

What to do?

So what to do? Obviously the roof needs repairing and the gutters coudl probably do with enlarging. I have had various quotes/suggestions for what else needs doin:

1. Cream DPC, repoint in 6:1:1 sand:lime:cement, apply clear waterproofer up to the eaves, hack of render inside and redo with sand+cement
2. Repoint with natural hydralic lime (NHL) 3.5, apply "breathable" lime based render to the inside

Lowering the path has also been suggested.

So is 6:1:1 mix bad for stone walls? Is cement the devils work? How much of the lime based method is based on visuals and conservation? Is it wise to spend the extra on lime? Do I need to hack off the internal plaster and how high?

Suggestions gratefully received. Opinions seem to be strongly held with little scientific testing to back them up so the more I read the less I seem to know...

Ubuntu for arm in Qemu

sudo rootstock -d lucid --fqdn arm --login user --password pass --imagesize 1G --seed build-essential,openssh-server,ubuntu-minimal,nano --notarball

adding init was essential:
qemu-system-arm -M versatilepb -cpu cortex-a8 -kernel ./vmlinuz -hda qemu-armel-201104120842.img -m 256 -append "root=/dev/sda mem=256M devtmpfs.mount=0 rw init=/sbin/init"

then enable networking

sudoedit /etc/network/interfaces
add auto eth0
iface eth0 inet dhcp

MTB tyre size

Winter is over and it is time to remove the Bontrager Mud-X tyres for something a little less spiky. But what will fit?

Lots of love for 2.35 Highrollers on singletrackworld so thought I would give them a try. Everyone says that the Highrollers come up small and mtbtires.com confirms it.

It would be better if all the tyres were in a sortable searchable database rather than individual web pages by manufacturer but we manage to struggle on.

Easy access:

• Bontrager
  
• Kenda
  
• Maxxis
  
• Specialized
  

Ford focus central locking

It started with a temperamental key and ended with remote locking not working at all.

I took key apart (see user manual) and checked the battery - 3V no problems there.

Tried resetting remote key. That worked fine, the key made the car beep when I pressed a button. But still the locks did not respond to the key.

Then I found the turn it off and on again solution. Just unplug the Siemens box, wait an hour then plug it back in.

Look under the drivers side dashboard.
Under there attached on the right hand side right is a box which should say SIEMENS.
This is the remote control signal box.
Remove the cables attached to it and leave it for approx 1hr.
Go back to the car after an hour and put the cables back in.

Fixed!

The waiting seems important. First time I plugged it back in after five minutes and the key still didn't work.