Isomatic UK Weblog

Peter Burton's daily log, covering Peter's personal interests, e.g. jazz, travel and general grumpiness plus (occasionally) the business of Isomatic and its associate companies.

Saturday, December 31, 2005

Model Engineer Exhibition; solar panels

The Sandown Park Exhibition has been rather slow for sales so far so we are hoping for better results today (Saturday). Interestingly the Solar Toys have led to enquiries for solar panels, for which all the samples and brochures have gone to the London Boat Show. I have referred the enquirers to the Ampair web site.

posted by Peter # 08:33

Friday, December 30, 2005

Vauxhall Vivaro from Apex car rental

For the Model Engineer exhibition we are using a Vauxhall Vivaro from Apex car rental. It looks exactly like its counterpart from Renault. It is much nicer to drive than the Ford Transit, less like a goods vehicle. However, the low roof is a limitation when standing inside to load.

posted by Peter # 08:50

Wednesday, December 28, 2005

3 phase converters at the Model Engineer Exhibition

Today we are setting up to exhibit our 3 phase converters at The Model Engineer Exhibition at Sandown Park 29-31 December 2005.
We will also be demonstrating a Mitsubishi variable frequency drive, used with a Newton-Tesla motor speed controller.

We also plan to sell some solar powered toys from the Ampair range.

posted by Peter # 07:47

Tuesday, December 27, 2005

Mozart at The Barbican

This evening, Tuesday 27 December (UK public holiday), we are going to the Barbican Concert Hall for the Mozart by candlelight concert. We have opted for cheaper seats this time as an experiment, 26 GBP each instead of 31 GBP. This is still expensive by our standards.

It will be interesting to see if the venue is better organised than last year, which suffered from chairs/tables on a separate floor from coffee/snacks plus staff not allowing the paying customers into the auditorium at the appointed time.

Labels: Concerts

posted by Peter # 14:02

Monday, December 26, 2005

Peaslake on Christmas day

On Christmas day we drove to Peaslake, a beautiful Surrey village. We had local beer and tea at the Hurtwood Inn.

It is a real village, not just a hamlet, with its own village stores.

posted by Peter # 14:11

Saturday, December 24, 2005

Vodafone problems; Barclaycard portable card terminal

We inherited a portable card terminal from Ampair so set out to reactivate it. Barclaycard said we should wait for the new Merchant ID to be issued before starting a new contract with Vodafone; bad advice ! We received the MID on Friday so called Vodafone, transferred to about 4 departments in succession, only to be told it will take a minimum of one week to become active. The Vodafone contact suggested going to the local Vodafone shop to do it instantly so we tried this. The girls in the shop knew nothing about such an application so telephoned their contact who said no it could not be done there.

It is the usual story regarding all large companies; incompetent and disorganised. Result of all this; time wasted and no card terminal for the Model Engineer Exhibition at Sandown Park.

posted by Peter # 11:23

Thursday, December 22, 2005

Mitsubishi variable speed drives

Today we are preparing our exhibits for The Model Engineer Exhibition at Sandown Park 29-31 December 2005. In addition to three phase converters and solar toys we will be exhibiting Mitsubishi variable speed drives. These can be used as three phase converters for single motor applications provided the motor can be configured for 230V phase-to-phase. European-market motors of 3kW and below can usually be switched from star to delta for this purpose.

posted by Peter # 10:12

Wednesday, December 21, 2005

Complaint to IEE Engineering Management

As one who was recently involved in the acquisition of another company, with the loss of most of its staff, I take exception to remarks attributed to Alan Fitzgerald in the article 'Cream in the Global Churn' in IEE Engineering Management Magazine December/January 2005/6. New regulations covering information and consultation of employees came into force in April 2005. Under the regulations, employees have a statutory right to information about and consultation on employment developments and substantial changes to the organisation of their work, such as a transfer of ownership. Failure to observe the regulations puts both the buyer and seller at risk of legal action from an employee. In our case, the seller had not informed his employees so we insisted on being indemnified against such an action.

The argument attributed to Fitzgerald is that employees won't work as hard if they know the company is to be sold. This suggests the answer to this problem is to 'tell them as you serve them their redundancy notices'? Does he think that employers have no responsibility to their workers ? Does he think employees work hardest for an employer who cannot be trusted to behave honourably ?

I have asked IEE Engineering Management to print an apology for these remarks as they could encourage IEE members to ignore statutory regulations.

posted by Peter # 09:48

Tuesday, December 20, 2005

Geoff Cole's Red Hot Five at the Epsom Jazz Club

On Monday evening we saw Geoff Cole's Red Hot Five at The Epsom Playhouse Myers Theatre jazz club. It was the hot four for half the evening because drummer Johnny Baker arrived late. His vocal rendering of Gershwin's 'Somebody Loves Me' was the high point of the evening. Other members of the band were Geoff Cole (trombone), Tony Pyke (alto sax and clarinet), Alan Dandy (piano) and Ray Wiseman (bass).

Labels: Jazz

posted by Peter # 08:21

Sunday, December 18, 2005

Wind, water and solar power at the London Boat Show

Next week we start preparations for exhibiting the Ampair renewable energy products at The London Boat Show. These products comprise wind turbines, water turbines and solar panels.

posted by Peter # 10:47

Thursday, December 15, 2005

Variable speed drives

Yesterday we prepared to promote a range of small variable speed drives, often misnamed inverters. These take single phase 230 V input and provide three phase output but only 230 V phase to phase. Customers reconnect their small 3 phase motors from star to delta to accommodate this.

posted by Peter # 08:43

Wednesday, December 14, 2005

London transport; same problems

On Tuesday we were obliged to use London buses again. One reader of this blog suggested we buy a travel card to avoid using coins in machines but this proved to be uneconomic for a single bus trip in each direction. As usual we failed to find a bus back outside the rush hour and had to take a taxi.

posted by Peter # 10:37

Tuesday, December 13, 2005

Phil Brown Swingtet at The Cricketers

On Monday night we saw the Phil Brown Swingtet at the Cricketers in Horsell Birch, Woking. Nobody was missing so it was really was the full swingtet. Special features included guests Colin on piano and Roy (Stokes) on trombone. A good mix of jazz and blues covering the 1920s through to the 1960s. We cannot understand why some people want a narrower range of jazz; this is how we like it !
The picture below showing the pub is from the CD recorded live there this summer.

posted by Peter # 09:22

Sunday, December 11, 2005

VOX pop re. metrication & decimalisation

On Saturday I suffered a surprising outburst from the woman behind the counter at the dry cleaners. She is not only against metrication but is still arguing against the decimalisation of our currency in 1971 ! She agreed to being a dinosaur.

I find this love of the past quite amazing. The complexity and illogicality of archaic systems seem to be quite acceptable to those who resist every change.

posted by Peter # 13:50

Saturday, December 10, 2005

Companies House Web Filing

For the first time I filed the Isomatic UK annual return using the Companies House web site. The security measures are rather extreme; two passwords - one by e-mail and one by post - but once past that hurdle filing and paying is quite painless. I don't usually recommend using the UK governments electronic methods but this one seems OK.

posted by Peter # 16:51

Thursday, December 08, 2005

E-mail hosting problems; fax for Madrid hotel, Opodo

Yet again we have one of our domains blocked due to late payment of charges. The last one we were told not to worry when there was a need to do just that. This time we are told a request for payment was sent but I cannot find it. The difficulty is we are swamped with paper via the post and spam/scam/porn e-mail so we just cannot cope 100% with either method of communication.

Perhaps we should return to fax ? It worked with a hotel booking in Madrid when E-mail had failed. We have booked a week in the Foxa 25 Suites, where I once stayed on business.

Excellent value for a suite, particularly Friday-Sunday when the business customers are absent. Be warned, direct booking is essential, internet 'agencies' are useless in this case. Conversely, we use such agencies for all our flights. Our current favourite is Opodo, which we used for Cape Town and Madrid. Prices are very competitive and the web site is faster than many, with no annoying tricks (e.g. Iberia).

posted by Peter # 10:30

Wednesday, December 07, 2005

Dealing with sales calls from sick bed

Third day sick. The sales calls keep coming. I try not to cough during the conversation but I do not always succeed.

posted by Peter # 15:28

Tuesday, December 06, 2005

Forced to cancel Martin Litton Sextet

Due to illness we had to cancel seeing the Martin Litton Sextet at the Epsom Jazz Club on Monday. It was fully booked, with a waiting list for returns, so somebody had a pleasant surprise.

posted by Peter # 14:01

Sunday, December 04, 2005

Harp and Cello at the Dorking Halls

On Saturday evening we went to the Dorking Halls for a concert by Harriet Adie (Harp) and Jessica Burroughs (cello). We learnt a lot about the harp and the music written for this unusual combination of instruments; French, Cuban, Brazilian, Italian, Spanish and an Adie original. Hard to choose a favourite; perhaps a draw between Faure and Villa-Lobos. Below is a picture of Harriet. I could not find one of Jessica.

posted by Peter # 10:11

Saturday, December 03, 2005

Skype Internet telephony with headphones

On Friday we experimented again with Skype internet telephony. The inbuilt microphone and loudspeakers on the iMac G5 are too close together, producing reverberation, so we bought a pair of Sennheiser PMX60 backband headphones from Cancom. Problem solved !

posted by Peter # 09:59

Friday, December 02, 2005

Brian White band with Dave Hewett and John China

On Thursday evening we went to the Berrylands Hotel in Surbiton, where Brian White's Magna jazz band perform every week. Brian White (clarinet), Pete Towndrow (cornet & trumpet), Richard Lyons (string bass), Rex Bennett (drums) were joined by Dave Hewett (slide and valve trombones) and John China (piano and vocals). Highlights were John's vocals; what a great jazz voice he has ! The valve trombone, played superbly by Dave Hewett, was an interesting variation. It reminded me of the John Wain novel 'Strike the Father Dead' where the superiority of valves over 'slush-pump' was stressed. I still think the slide trombone is the better instrument for blues numbers.