Category: Uncategorized

A very very long time ago (2013?) I had Be broadband. They understood how it worked, they were great. Then Sky bought them and I was not going to go there, so I changed to id.net who were my company ADSL supplier. To reduce cost a little I had the option of buying the line from the PostOffice.

So far so good.

Then the PostOffice sold their phone line and internet business to Shell Energy and one day the line went dark.

I called id.net and they picked up the phone after a few rings and looked. Looked again. And reported that there was no ADSL circuit on my line anymore. My best bet was to call the line supplier.

I called Shell Energy. And waited. And waited. And waited. About 30-45 minutes (I was not counting) I threw the phone down (metaphorically – modern phones are not nearly as satisfying as the old clunky landline phones). I called id.net (two rings, and an answer) and instructed them to just set up a new line, get it sorted.

On 2 November 2022 I wrote to Shell Energy that I request that they cancel my service (what service) immediately as they had clearly breached their contract with me, and furthermore were not available to speak to. I also suggested we close this off with “closed wallets” and I never wanted to hear from them again.

Much to my surprise I got another bill. I responded with another letter on the 23rd of November demanding an apology, a proposed settlement and an end to demands of payment.

In the mean time I had had a twitter conversation with “Matty” from Shell Energy who assured me it was all good and the account was closed.

Just in case you think I sat on my laurels, I did finally speak to a Shell Energy representative who was incoherent, mumbling and sounded like she was at the business end of a bottle or two of sherry or a few good spliffs. She did pass me on to a lady who listened and with a matron like manner, which I did welcome very much, said “this is not right” and actually sorted it (almost) all out.

I did receive another bill, but for a much lower amount and my final letter basically repeated my previous: apologise, offer me a settlement, never contact me again. I heard nothing after this which suits me fine.

In retrospect, this bothers me greatly. A company the size of Shell taking over a relatively simple Broadband or Energy business should go in guns blazing, with absolutely no problem whatsoever, yet they manage to turn it into a bumbling mess with callcenter staff who are clearly on drugs, non-response to letters and not understanding the technology they are selling. Someone who has to make ends meet and is less assertive would have yielded under the tyranny of this type of corporate indifference and Shell should be ashamed of themselves.

As a shareholder I know this project is but a drop in the ocean, but it still begs the question: Why go there?

I’d love the apology I asked for but will never get, but more so I would really want to know what the strategy behind this has been and hopefully is no more.

Early in March we decided that hatching some chicks would be a fun project for springtime.  We got eggs from Mary at http://www.fosterpoultry.co.uk/  Two Light Sussex hybrid eggs and four Cream Legbars.  The Cream Legbars are great since you can sex them shortly after they come out of the egg.  Males often have a white spot on the head and girls are more stripy.

Incubator construction

Ingredients:

• A foam box (glued together from a larger foam box)
• A 25W light bulb and holder (inserted in the right hand side of the box)
• A heat mat (left over from reptile cage – I believe it is not really necessary)
• Some wire mesh to suspend the eggs (about 1 inch above the heat mat) and to stop the chicks burning themselves on the light.
• A bowl for the humidifier/kitchen rag
• A IV line for inserting water into the humidifier
• A small Halogen bulb (10W)
• A 1-wire humidity/temperature sensor.
• 1x USB controlled relay + PSU to drive the halogen heater

So we construct the box with some contact adhesive and covered any cracks with packing tape.  We make two inspection holes in the top and taped them inside and outside to create “double glazing”.

We use a dimmer to set the temperature in the box to ~35°C and rig the computer to control the gap to about 37-38°C by switching on and off the halogen bulb.

 
Fig. 1: The complete setup.

The humidifier is created from Lego Mindstorms.  A single motor runs for 0.1s every 15-120 depending on requirement and pushes the plunger of a 50ml syringe attached to the IV line.  NQC source code on github: https://github.com/gbusker/rcx-dose-pump

Fig. 2: The Lego Mindstorms humidifier

 

The wait

Once the eggs are placed we still spend quite some time controlling temperature and humidity.  The temperature is easy – except that after a few days we realise the Raspberry Pi is not stable enough and we switch to the kitchen laptop.

Humidity control is hard at first and only becomes stable once we place a kitchen rag in the humidifier bowl.  By dosing water into this we can control humidity to within a few percent.  Note that we don’t actively control humidity – we just set the water injection rate by selecting an RCX program that does a small dose every 15,30,60 or 120 seconds.

Below you can see the temperature and humidity profiles.  We didn’t so so well with humidity because we controlled it manually in the 10 days and then had some issues with reprogramming the RCX (via crappy IrDA link).  The humidity profile in the last week is as it should be – increase humidity before hatching.

Fig. 3-4: Temperature and Humidity profiles over the incubation.

Hatching!

And then … just before Emma’s 10th birthday party a small pip appears ….

After dinner chirping and pip turns into hole ….

During “Jurassic Park” a hole turns into a crack …

And finally a tired chick falls out

 

24 hours later he/she seems quite happy in the brooder.

 

Quite amazingly I’ve only now started a blog after seeing how useful it can be as a way to post information onto your site 🙂 Not a lot to tell right now.