Reproducing a pencil sketch is a bit pointless so I inked up the preliminary Alvis body idea.

Phone camera's always have a bit of distortion built-in. Anyway, I drew this up at 1/5th scale,

.... couldn't get the hang of the front in 2D so,

.... had a go at the back with a similar lack of success and ordered a piece of blue (now grey) foam to make a 1/5th scale model. I think that's the only way I'm going to make any serious progress on the design front. That opens up options to do a 3D laser scan, pop the data into Solidworks, slice it up and get each rib cut out on a CNC router. At that point, the buck will probably have cost as much as the Hillman!

This is a 1982 Migatronic that was about to be scrapped - fully working but missing the torch. I rescued it, popped the outer panels in with the funnels at the powder-coaters and now all it needs is a quick blow-over with some black and it'll be as good as new. I aim to use this for S/S welding when quantities of pig's troughs have to be turned out. A generous engineering chum has lent me a gun and half a reel of S/S wire to play with.

And a small Christmas present to myself, an electric rotary welding table. I do quite a lot of flanges in 3 and 4mm S/S so I'm going to experiment with S/S rods for arc welding - something I really enjoy even though I'm not much good at it.

A tank for mixing up various forms of medication for livestock caused me a few headaches over the last week. The sump and the body of the tank were each in two bits - lots of fun and games. Then dopey thought he could TIG a 4mm wall socket onto the 1.5mm lid and get away with it - I didn't, so I'm making the lid in 2mm and hinging a portion of it. Why didn't I think of that before? The lid has also to support a motor attached to ...

... the mixing fandango. Attaching this to a hollow shaft and then the shaft to a 3mm motor shaft drove me nuts so I binned the plan and went for something a bit bigger and easier to deal with. A geared motor with an 8mm shaft and man enough to whizz the lot up to speed - I only need around 100rpm as the liquid has the consistency of consommé - is on its way.

And by way of relaxation, I completed the frame of the English Wheel which now takes up a lot more room in the workshop than I had at first envisaged. And it was hardly relaxing man-handling the thing in order to weld the legs on. It weighs an absolute ton so I'm confident that it'll be plenty stable enough. I've yet to reach a decision on doing the body in steel or aluminium - everyone I ask contradicts the last advice I had.

And as it's that time of year again, many thanks for your continued indulgence, without which it would be difficult to keep to the discipline of writing up the diary. I'll try to squeeze in a bit more Alvis stuff in the coming months. Happy holidays and all the best for your plans for 2019.