Tag: crack

April 25th – A recovery day, mainly resting and pottering around attending to mechanical issues with the bikes. Long-term readers will remember my bizarre crank failure last spring, and at the time I suggested I’d never see it again: well, I was wrong. 

This is an identical Lasco crank from my other bike. There are clear cracks growing either side of the pedal mount bore. Thankfully, I had a spare so changed it over on discovery, hopefully forestalling an unexpected failure.

I‘m not sure if this is a poor design, manufacturing failure or a sign that I should lose some weight…

October 30th – I spotted this yesterday, but it’s surprisingly hard to photograph. Growing from the thinnest of fissures in a capstone 20ft above Park Street in Birmingham, a small shrub. I’m not sure what it is, but it’s bearing the most beautiful red berries. It’s way out of reach beyond the platform fence of Moor Street Station, where the line crosses the street below. Here, the parapets and abutments of the bridge ramble and cross, and this small plant is clearly thriving, unseen, unchecked and unappreciated, presumably seeded by the local birdlife.

Give nature half a chance and it’s in like Flynn. Wonderful.

October 20th – Also up on Chasewater Dam, I spotted the crack in the render of the back wall of the dam cottage. It’s obviously been there a while, and someone is monitoring it – that white plate, glued across the fracture with resin, was put there to gauge if the crack was growing. The plate has indeed fractured, and a portion is now missing.

I guess it’s a remnant of the dam works here. I never noticed it before.

January 29th – On the kissing gate at the entrance to the new pond at Clayhanger, I spotted this notice. Thought I’d feature it here, as anyone making such an effort to get the community together in any activity deserves a little support. I wish Garry and Jackie all the best in their venture.

I noticed also that the kissing gate had recently been expertly rebuilt by (I assume) the countryside and estates guys at Walsall Council. I also observed that the common itself was again spotless, and it appears that some coppicing is in progress. People have been working hard on the greenspace locally for a while now – there are refurbished boardwalks over on Brownhills Common and some brush cutting and thinning there, too. 

Thanks, folks, your work is much appreciated.