I did a lot of looking at all the various systems over the past couple of years and went for Tado at the start of October. DIY fit – took just over 1 hr and most of that is making a note of which wires go where and registering the devices on-line. They simply fit on the back plates of my existing thermostat and programmer/timer. No drilling, fixing, wiring required. Take old one off, put new one on. Done.

Remote control, and also when out of the house. Uses weather forecast to put less energy in if it expected to be warm/sunny soon. And it claims to learn the thermal characteristics of your house so will put more or less time in to getting up to temp.

Has been very useful so far, usually when cold we crank the heat up, but then it overshoots and gets too hot even after turning off. With Tado we can set it to ‘boost’ for 30 mins to just take the edge off when we get home.

Comparing on-line usage for October (first full month) we were 12% down on last year, and Oct 2015 was reportedly milder than this Oct. So it should pay for itself fairly soon.

Got it! MapInstall didn’t work on either the Mac or Windows PC with the Garmin device. Turns out the USB trick works a treat and I now have the TT maps installed on the 520.

Added bonus, when browsing the Garmin folder on the 520 I found a file: “startup.txt” You can edit this directly on the device. Open it and edit away – to add a delay to the start up screen, I put in 5 secs, and then add your name and e.g. phone number or house number/post code. Could be useful one day should it go missing…

<!– Edit this file to display a message while your unit is powering on –>
<!– Allow one full power cycle after editing for your message to be updated –>

<!– Set the display number to the minimum number of seconds your message is displayed –>
<display = 5>

<!– Type your message on the next line –>
Ronnie Pickering
+441234567890

Beano68 – the file downloaded from TalkyToaster is 618MB. So I was expecting to be able to load it into BaseCamp and then select the areas I want.

I’m stuck.

Have the shiny new 520. Have the maps from TalkyToaster (the British Isles Contours NON Routable TT50 GMAPSUPP map). I’ve downloaded it, extracted it from the .zip and it is a .img file, 618MB.

I’ve also installed BaseCamp – which recognises the 520.

And then at step 3 – getting the map file to BaseCamp… nothing happens. No obvious way of loading, importing, drag and dropping the .img file into BaseCamp. It just doesn’t want to know

On Mac OS X.

Ideas?

I do like the basic and rudimentary look of that. Does appear to be a 26er though, happy to be proved wrong.

If you are doing it to complete the whole stage then park up anywhere around the city centre and off you go, with the option of getting the train back from Harrogate to Leeds (not Headingley).

Personally I wouldn’t bother with the train and would add the Harrogate to Leeds ride to the end of the stage. It’s easy riding, and has that ‘downhill’ feel to it as you ride back to Leeds.

If you only want to do the ‘scenic’ parts of the rides then miss out the Leeds exit and start at Harewood as suggested above, and complete the loop with a Harrogate to Harewood ride. You would be missing out on perhaps 7-8 miles of getting out of Leeds on a section that doesn’t have many redeeming features, and make the miles up with the Harrogate to Harewood ride.

As for the ride out of Leeds up the A61. It’s fine. Urban dual carriageway with a few roundabouts. Just the usual traffic to be aware of – no really high speed motoring or HGVs of note to worry about.

The Colne Valley Mountain Boat Challenge. I’ll be back next year with my kayak 🙂

Lived in Meltham for 10 years and never saw that stream impassable and having to use the stones to cross.

Thanks to Andy @ Wheelspincycles for getting my front derailleur tension just right before the off.

I’ll be there. Rain or rain, or more rain. Or rain. Just so long as the wind isn’t blowing you back up the hills then it will be fine, and wet (must remember to fit mud guard).

Another great day out. I missed last year so was eager to get back on it this year. Also have been getting fitter doing lots of (non cycling) training and expecting to get a big new PB. Well, I got the PB, but only by a few mins. I guess I need to go out and ride some more 🙂

Elvis was a masterstroke. Really was surreal, and the piper ‘borrowed’ from the Kielder 100 was a nice touch too.

Bloody cold at the top of the Pennine Way climb, can’t ever remember having numb fingers on the CVMBC before. Brrrr… And the Kirklees bridleway ‘refurb’ team have been out too. How long ago was Meltham cop smoothed over? It’s 18 months since I moved from there and haven’t been back since, but a great mud fest has been totally taken out.

Good speed down the hill into Marsden past the cricket ground. The Strava speed trap reckoned I was on 49mph – not bad for knobbly tyres 🙂

And good to see some familiar faces – mintimperial, we’ll have to get some dates in the diary for a catch up ride around those parts again 🙂

Why? Because I wanted a purpose built SS frame and Cotice Simple fits the bill. Then cobbled together with bits left over from other bikes in the shed and minimal eBay / new spend.

Thomson stem, and post. Renthal 34. Acros Headset, Formula brakes, SLX crank, Lapierre bar – cannibalised from other bikes.

Recon Gold TK – eBay

Hope hubs, Fatties Flatties – new.

Simply brilliant, in Pantone 1655 orange too.

Aye, ‘appen he’s alright. Did the Stop Crashing course at Gisburn about 18 mths ago and booked for another one in June time.

The Wheel and Tyre Bible.

(Almost) everything you’ll need to know on the subject:

http://www.carbibles.com/tyre_bible_pg4.html

The 17″ ‘equivalent’ tyre table down at the foot of the page is illuminating in showing how the various combinations can be the ‘same’.

Ooo.. that looks interesting. What is the date in October?

A great find as I’ll be moving to that part of the world soon and will miss my regular CVMBC circuit that I do on the southern side of the M62.

Wow. Incredible effort from all participants. I bailed this year’s race – and in retrospect am pleased I did, it would have been very mentally tough to do all the prep only to be destroyed by the weather. Last year was tough enough and that was in the dry :S

Do the midges keep away when it rains? Perhaps the blessing is that you aren’t being eaten to death on the circuit when it is wet. 🙂

Next year…

Well, for the conspiracy theorists why have none of them explained the propagation delay in the signals.

Easy for NASA to put a delay in the send/receive cycle, but amateur (and Russian) radio could have tuned in and targeted the signal and done some funky stuff to prove that the signals were coming from where they were.

Or maybe the Russians and radio hams were all in on the ruse.

/rolls eyes.

PlusNet = BT
Virgin = BT backbone
Others* = BT backbone (*well, most)

So, it all comes down to customer service.

If you have a poor connection and nothing gets done then your ISP (incl. BT) is the worst thing since the worst thing ever.

Otherwise everything else is much the same.

BT Business from work @ home = 4MB/s Never had a problem.
Virgin cable for personal use = up to 30MB/s Never had a problem.

Both the above with 10 yrs experience.

Pays money, takes choice. Fingers crossed you don’t have problems.

seosamh77

“25 years ago people held doors open and were polite, now you get doors in your face and grunts”

It’s annoys me when people come out with this nonsense…Plenty ignorant people about 25 years ago. and there are plenty polite people about these days.

Exactly. Hence the Kes piece. Written 43 years ago (blimey, that long ago!) and bemoaning the fact that … 25 years earlier everything was so much better.

‘Please, Sir.’
‘Don’t interrupt, boy, when I’m speaking.’
He stepped back and filled the gap in the line.
‘I’m sick of you boys, you’ll be the death of me. Not a day goes by without me having to deal with a line of boys. I can’t remember a day, not one day, in all the years I’ve been in this school, and how long’s that? … ten years, and the school’s no better now than it was on the day that it opened. I can’t understand it. I can’t understand it at all.’
The boys couldn’t understand it either, and they dropped their eyes as he searched for an answer in their faces. Failing to find one there, he stared past them out of the window.
[…]
‘I’ve taught in this city for over thirty-five years now; many of your parents were pupils under me in the old city schools before this estate was built; and I’m certain that in all those years I’ve never encountered a generation as difficult to handle as this one. I thought I understood young people, I should be able to with all my experience, yet there’s something happening today that ‘s frightening, that makes me feel that it’s all been a waste of time… Like it’s a waste of time standing here talking to you boys, because you won’t take a blind bit of notice what I’m saying. I know what you’re thinking now, you’re thinking, why doesn’t he get on with it and let us go, instead of standing there babbling on? That’s what you’re thinking isn’t it? Isn’t it, MacDowall?’
‘No, Sir.’
‘O yes it is. I can see it in your eyes, lad, they’re glazed over. You’re not interested. Nobody can tell you anything, can they, MacDowall? You know it all, you young people, you think you’re so sophisticated with all your gear and your music. But the trouble is, it’s only superficial, just a sheen with nothing worthwhile or solid underneath. As far as I can see there’s been no advance at all in discipline, decency, manners or morals. And do you know how I know this? Well, I’ll tell you. Because I still have to use this every day.’
He brought the stick round from behind his back for the boys to have a look at.
‘It’s fantastic isn’t it, that in this day and age, in this super-scientific, all-things-bright-and-splendiferous age, that the only way of running this school efficiently is by the rule of the cane. But why? There should be no need for it now. You lot have got it on a plate.’
‘I can understand why we had to use it back in the ‘twenties and ‘thirties. Those were hard times; they bred hard people, and it needed hard measures to deal with them. But those times bred people with qualities totally lacking in you people today. They bred people with respect for a start. We knew where we stood in those days, and even today a man will often stop me in the street and say “Hello Mr Gryce, remember me?” And we’ll pass the time of day and chat, and he’ll laugh about the thrashings I gave him.’
‘But what do I get from you lot? A honk from a greasy youth behind the wheel of some big second-hand car. Or an obscene remark from a gang – after they’ve passed me.’
‘They took it then, but not now, not in this day of the common man, when every boy quotes his rights, and shoots off home for his father as soon as I look at him… No guts… No backbone… you’ve nothing to commend you whatsoever. You’re just fodder for the mass media!’

Kes. 1968.

Plus ça change…

The BIG TRAIN comment is spot on. It is how I described how much life will change to a colleague who was of the view that 2 weeks after the baby arrived she would be here there and everywhere carrying on as usual and just bringing the baby along. How we laughed.

As for hard… sleep deprivation is hard. You’ll get to find out soon enough 🙂

Hope it all goes OK.

Buy it. And then with all the old, yet servicable, bits you’ve replaced you will, over time, build a whole new bike!

/that’s my excuse anyway.

Shanghai is a great place for towers.

The BT tower is a great place to visit in London. Have been fortunate enough to go to the top quite a few times, and the revolving restaurant is great fun. It will re-open as a restaurant as part of the Olympics next year and from then onwards.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/food_and_drink/eating_out/article6898128.ece

Potato picking.

Hard, bent over, backbreaking work. 8am to 6pm. Earned cash in hand. A nice crisp £10 from the farmer at the end of the day. In the days before the minimum wage. I was underage and wanting extra money during the summer holidays. Rioting wasn’t an option in those days.

I recall that nearly every day one of the gang would turn up late. I was naive not to realise that they were signing on – and then coming to do cash in hand work. They also took turns to drive the tractor with the potato trailer behind it. I was too young and so wasn’t trusted, so no breaks for me. Bitter, after all these years? Nah 😉

Did do paper rounds though. It was a gold mine at my local newsagents. Started out on the crap, heavy, long rounds (Telegraph / Times), but over time took on the quick light rounds (Sun / Mirror) and made them my own. They all paid the same so the light rounds were best. Then I got the ‘spare’ role – which meant I had to take on extra rounds if someone didn’t turn up. I got paid the bonus regardless of whether I had to work or not, and I got the money for the extra rounds too. Made me late for school every now and then 🙂 Did the same on Sunday’s too. That was easy money.

Tried to get into the ‘deliver 500 papers to local houses for £5’ business, but that was hard work in the evenings. Binned it after a month or so.

@FunkyDunc point taken, and I absolutely support the principle of the NHS and it is one of those things that is absolutely fantastic and I really would not want to live somewhere where personal insurance is the only way you get treatment.

For the majority of people the NHS is apparently ‘free’, yet you never hear people saying ‘Fantastic NHS, well worth the £660 my family* pay each month in insurance’.

This isn’t intended as a political statement, just a fact. I was unaware of the huge NHS budget until I did some work there a few years ago and was exposed to the staggering amount that national healthcare costs. And as technology and drugs improve, and the nation ages, it can only become more expensive (of course, some will say that efficiencies can be made, but the trend IMHO, will be upwards).

Oh, and as a disclaimer my parents and wider family have had so much NHS treatment that I expect any self respecting insurer would refuse to provide cover 😉

*2 adults, 2 children in the average nuclear family.

It is great, but it ain’t free…

From their own pages: “The 2008/9 budget roughly equates to a contribution of £1,980 for every man, woman and child in the UK.”

That was (in 08/09) about £165 from *everyone* every month. 😮

Tommy Zoom really is poor.

Little one loves Octanauts right now. I’m more Rastamouse and Nina with her Neurons.

I could happily take out the cast and crew of ‘Me Too’ and the whole population of Riverseafingle or whatever it is called.

From elsewhere…

The corporation pays £60 million a year for the rights to the 19 F1 races and the cost of covering F1 is believed to be more than the entire annual budget for BBC Four, which would be saved if the broadcaster goes ahead with the plan to drop the motor racing.

BUT! how much (if any) of that £60M does it recoup in selling on the BBC coverage to other broadcasters? They do tend to make a point in the programme at each race that it is going out across the globe.

I expect there is a cost, but £60M is the headline figure and it won’t be the the net result.

^
Pennine Way, Marsden.
v

Which leads to the Packhorse Trail down to Marsden

Huge massive pipes, the steps on the right give and idea of size 😮

From this.

And on the other side of the world, a night time lock transit on the 3 Gorges Dam. Much control of keeping the lock doors closed at the right time!

IceToolz kit for me. Served me well over the years. Then buy specific tools as and when required.

@mrmo does the Iraq war get 4 mentions there?

Also, where are Bono/U2 earnings 😉

Put it in perspective for me with pictures of starving children and then cutting to live footage of the shuttle launch / docking / landing.

I’m a huge supporter of exploration and NASA/ISS work, but it does make you wonder.

That’s my brother, Steve Phillips, with his 1594cc Lotus twin cam Escort in the paddock at Silverstone in April 1977.

I used to get taken to Silverstone, Brands Hatch, Mallory Park etc. at weekends as pit crew.

Cool.

I’m the other way around. Lotus Elise S2 with an engine conversion: Ford 2.3L Duratec :). Bags of power and torque. Use it on track days at Silverstone, Donington, Oulton, Cadwell, Rockingham, Bedford etc. Most recently Spa – oh my word, what an incredible circuit.

I have to defend the world of cyclists on the Lotus forums 🙂

Wifelet has an A5 Quattro 3.0D. More torque than you could ever need. I love it.

Looking for Jag XF as her next car when she decides to change up 🙂

(y)

ACN for four years and worked at others as consultant too.

Thing is, consultants are brought in to make the change, deliver, get out.. Companies can do that too, but why would they be employing their staff to do that? Surely the staff are 100% busy with doing their day jobs for the company.

Don’t like the perception of consultants preaching – but they have experience of seeing elsewhere (competitors) what works and what doesn’t. So don’t dismiss that, and they do generally listen and act on what the client staff know and do. They get measured on success – so it does help to keep people happy and not piss them off.

@teaboy – where, and with whom are you working now?

Targeted at women in order to get them to associate the drink with a slim ‘fit’ body with an ‘ideally’ proportioned waist and chest.

X-Control 510 here.

My first full sus so I don’t have anything to compare it against, but it is bloody amazing on local routes compared to my hardtails.

I got rather a good deal, almost £1k off original list price and quite a few £100s off the shop price at the time so was in the right place at the right time to buy it.

Inspirational stuff. I need to find the time to get it done before I die.

You are doing it the right way.

Should be doable in daylight in one day at this time of year.

Touring or MTB would be best, with semi slicks (or something a bit thin and knobbly if heavy rain ahead of and during the ride)

I was planning to do same weekend but have postponed until later.

Tell us how you get on.

Yup, hillly is hilly :). I might take a look at the barometric devices but they come with their own problems too.

So long as you have a consistent way of measuring then it is that what is most useful.

These days I make use of the MMR climb ratings and number of climbs as a good way of assessing a route for hilliyness.