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Best skip digging find


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49 minutes ago, Raja Clavata said:

Shortened front garden wall to get more cars on the drive which needed back-filling with paving blocks - a guy round the corner was throwing a load out - impossible to tell the difference once laid and sanded. Small things can make you very happy.

its all about "timing"............i want.............someone else dosnt want

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Much to my missus’ consternation, I am something of a skip-rat.  The posher parts of Bristol (Clifton) will regularly throw almost brand-new stuff out.

It’s very easy to over-do the hoarding though.  I had amassed a collection of off-cuts and sheet materials for the ‘that’ll come in handy’ eventuality at my first house.  When Mrs Udderly and I bought a place together – a ‘fixer-upper’ – I thought brilliant, I’ll use all of these materials up, and save some cash in the process.

Nope.

At best I managed to use about 50%, and the rest were too small or too rough to use.  I still ended up purchasing lots of materials, and ending up with a lot of small offcuts.  I had to take the remaining 50% and the offcuts  to the tip (living in suburbia, bonfires will get you complaints).   The point is, there’s a ‘cost’ to storing these items, be it time, money or space.

That said, my best skip rescues came from a former employer – A Lista workbench and metal cabinet.  These are big money and were almost brand new.  Built like the proverbial brick outhouse.

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I always have a look in a skip, and have picked up some useful bits and pieces, there is some office furniture combined with some sets of filling cabinets that I store most of my fly tying gear in. Also a set of library card draws. Loads of wood offcuts and some plastic growing trugs that have my tomatoes growing in them now.

Cheers

Aled

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My garden tractor/ride on mower came sort of from a skip.  It is 42 years old now, but was rescued by a builder friend who was asked by the owner to put it in the skip.  It did have a few faults and problems, but all sorted quite easily, though new parts (when available are expensive) and second hand parts sometimes tricky to find when you need them.  However it does a very good job of keeping quite a large area of grass under control.

UNADJUSTEDNONRAW_thumb_512.jpg

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Many years ago I saw unopened boxes of Cuban cigars including Romeo y Julieta, Cohiba,  Montecristo etc, being chucked into a skip by contractors clearing the contents of a tobacconists shop after a fire!...........25 Cohiba Esplendidos are close to £1000 a box at today's prices...........

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42 minutes ago, panoma1 said:

Many years ago I saw unopened boxes of Cuban cigars including Romeo y Julieta, Cohiba,  Montecristo etc, being chucked into a skip by contractors clearing the contents of a tobacconists shop after a fire!...........25 Cohiba Esplendidos are close to £1000 a box at today's prices...........

 

How many boxes could you carry? 

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1 hour ago, panoma1 said:

Many years ago I saw unopened boxes of Cuban cigars including Romeo y Julieta, Cohiba,  Montecristo etc, being chucked into a skip by contractors clearing the contents of a tobacconists shop after a fire!...........25 Cohiba Esplendidos are close to £1000 a box at today's prices...........

Wouldn’t they be a bit smokey 😊

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2 minutes ago, ditchman said:

saw skip lorry today...............with a skip on it..........and do you know what ?...you would never believe....someone had thrown a skip away...it only just fitted....how stupid is that ...they must be worth a bob or two 

Red wine going in quite quickly tonight?

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1 minute ago, ditchman said:

saw skip lorry today...............with a skip on it..........and do you know what ?...you would never believe....someone had thrown a skip away...it only just fitted....how stupid is that ...they must be worth a bob or two 

Bit subtle Ditchie?😎

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When I used to work for my local council parks depot, our yard was next to the tradesmans stores, the skips out the back were a goldmine,  had all sorts out of them, highlights were dewalt tools, nothing wrong with them, they had just changed to lithium battery stuff,  old gear was flung.  It was easier to lob something out than to sign it back in,  I've still got loads of plumbing stuff In The shed, still in the bags.  There was also a frightening amount of wet wall thrown away,  most of the shelters in my pheasant pens are made from it! 

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Work were having all new white solid formica lab benches. They were throwing out into a skip solid 1.5" thick mahogany bench tops in good nick 50cm wide and various lenghs, just needed sanding down and refinishing. In the rush from my colleagues I still managed to liberate my very own 4ft length. My mate helped me load it into the back of the old rag top defender I had at the time. Obtained the signed chit off the boss to take it home. :) Got it home and managed to get it into the garage. Weeks later found time to sand it down and get it all clean. It was going to be our new coffee table top. My Ex knew this was my plan.                                                                                                                                                Due to various commitments I couldn't  get any more done on it for a few months. I came home from work one day to find it missing. My Ex had given it to one of his friends without consulting me first. :mad:

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Not quite a skip story but on the subject of stuff being cleared out. Many years ago a pal and myself were converting an old 28 foot clinker built ship's lifeboat to be used for fishing and were on the scrounge for timber for the decking and cabin etc. My pal's brother in law worked as a messenger for Barclays Bank in Oxford Street in London. He had the go ahead to help himself to anything being stripped out. He also had the key to the front doors of the bank and the strip out work was only being done during the week. So, one Sunday morning saw us parked outside the bank with a unmarked Transit van coming and going loading up the van. Best things that we got were the folding wooden seats used by the bank tellers that we fitted around the sides of the boat. Perfect.  Funny thing was, we were not questioned once by anyone.

Cannot see that happening today.

OB

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11 minutes ago, oldypigeonpopper said:

hello, i would like to know where all these skips are that people throw out what seems like valuable items or ones that can be fixed up,  

In your case, try the posher parts of Witney?  Needs to be a relatively affluent, but also relatively suburban, where folk feel they don't have room to keep stuff hanging around.

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