I had a great outcome on a Cannondale road frame claim – the internal cable guides were badly aligned and the cables actually carved a groove in them.

Cannondale did not have any cosmetically identical frames but without any quibble gave me a replacement in a different colourway.  Frame was returned bare to them for inspection, the bike had replacement components and non-Cannondale servicing – yet they still sorted me out.

Weirdly on this the dealer I bought it from wouldn’t help at all (Evans Cycles post the Ashley takeover), but another Cannondale dealer I had never used before would.

Needless to say not only did I buy another Cannondale but I also used the alternative dealer, vowing never to use Evans again.

@The Beard – if you are local to Essex I’ve a stash of saddles you are welcome to try.

My workplace has a policy allowing people to work in any country we have an office for 3 weeks per year – in my case Spain.

This was thwarted by needing a visa to work in this way. Unless I was employed in Spain and had residencia (registration for tax and other things) it wasn’t permitted by Spanish authrorities. I did enquire about a short term visa with the Spanish consulate but they told me it would not be approved and to save my money/time.

On that basis my workplace confirmed I was not permitted to work. We never quite bottomed out if it would be permitted if I were a Spanish citizen – I think then I would be legally entitled to work but ‘residencia’ may still be an issue, namely they aren’t getting their slice of the pie.

They are working (in Spain at least but likely elesewhere in Europe) on a ‘Digital Nomad’ scheme which appears to require a declaration of what you earned whilst abroad then a 20% of gross ‘tax’ payment for the privilege. A crappy double tax situation if it comes in as proposed but at least it would enable these sorts of arrangements legally.

Needless to say when I go on holiday now I won’t answer calls, emails or do any sort of work. Some may say I am a mug for doing that before, but I get paid on outcomes and relatively well, so I’m happy doing a small amount of work to make my own life easier on return. Not any more though!

In short in the OPs situation I doubt what is being proposed is legal, depending on where you are going in Europe, without a specific visa to cover working.

I’m getting asked for cookies on every page, is this an unwanted side effect?

I’ve got a Clarke Pro 90, ok for 2mm or 3mm if you angle the parts to be joined. Only downside is lack of active cooling so longer welding sessions can result in overheating (which shows as the machine output dropping and unpleasant smells!)

Can’t believe it’s £300 these days new though, and not sure I would buy a used mig welder unless it had a Eurotorch (i.e. easier to replace) and/or I knew what usage it had.

Spares for the cheaper end of the market are hard to get, which can write off the whole unit.

Either way I wouldn’t bother with gasless, if you want anything like that a used Arc welder might be a better option – you get a lot more power and without the complexity of mig it is something I would consider buying used.

Depending on bike geo and stem, I like a 42cm wide bar with at least 6 degrees of flare on drops off road.

My gravel bike has I think 44 or 46mm on a short stem and every ride I want a tiny bit more reach and less bar width.

Absolutely personal though.

The bad news is the Amazon supplied Pixel was unsealed, opened and covered in finger prints.
Ordered another from them and it sat in limbo pending dispatch for days on end.

The good news is it is now £299 so have reordered again.

Germoloids Ointment – not the cream, that’s too liquid and doesn’t ‘persist’ as long as the ointment.

Slather on, and in, pre-ride and hope for the best.

Pixel ordered, thanks for the quick response – bitten the bullet, spent more than I wanted but can’t really be without a good working navigation solution with my commute.

For reference 02 and Vodafone operate a mast sharing arrangement, if you get reception with one network it would be similar on the other. I am not 100% sure but also believe Three are in on that sharing arrangement.

Then you have piggyback firms which may or may not offer benefits like wi-fi calling (if phone supports):
Pinched from Moneysavingexpert:

PROVIDER PIGGYBACKING FIRM
EE Major players: BT Mobile*, Plusnet Mobile*, Utility Warehouse. Smaller firms: 1pMobile*, The Phone Co-op*, Ecotalk, IQ Mobile*, Zevvle, RWG Mobile, To The Moon
O2 Major players: Giffgaff*, Tesco Mobile*, Sky Mobile*. Smaller firm: Lyca Mobile*
Three Major players: iD Mobile*, Smarty*. Smaller firm: FreedomPop*, Honest Mobile, Superdrug
Vodafone Major players: Voxi*, Virgin Mobile* (1). Smaller firms: Asda Mobile*, Lebara Mobile*, Talkmobile*

Chilli-Tech here but the mount supplied rattles horribly and I had some battery issues. It runs for ages and video quality is ok though – a few times I’ve struggle with making out a reg plate due to vibrations.

@peekay that sounds like it – the text is grey purple and although bolder than before I can’t read it well. At first I thought my eyes had gone funny and was going to book an eye test.

Thanks very much – it could indeed be that although I’ve been on Android 12 for some time and only the last update triggered this issue.

I’ve set the colours to warm and it is slightly better, although still not good.

This has been the most disappointing Moto phone I’ve had out of the three, shame as the first two were great until I ruined them.

A work colleague has just spent many thousands getting their dog pretty much rebuilt after an accident. They were insured but went over double that limit. From what they tell me the dog is alive but is severely impacted, absolutely life changing to the extent it can’t go on walks, sits in one place all day, has to be encouraged to eat and drink.

That choice, from the outside at least, appears for their benefit not the dogs, and it isn’t one I could have made. I’ll qualify that by saying if I am ever in a position where my life has massively changed to the extent I take even even basic pleasures I’d rather be allowed to die.

https://floorplancreator.net/

I used this one to confirm I have **** all skill at designing a workable space.

It’s fiddly but ok for simple stuff, just note on the free version you only get one project and can’t easily export / print.

Thank heavens it isn’t just me!

Up one size and one width.

From 2020 only my wellies still fit, every other pair of shoes has been outgrown and found a new home.

I am struggling with running shoes feeling ok when put on to uncomfortably tight after a couple of miles.

Personally I get on with the Planet X bibs and am yet to wear any of my pairs out.

https://www.planetx.co.uk/i/q/CLPXP3BS/planet-x-pro-line-365x-bib-shorts

The pro is marginally tighter cut than the clubman, but both are generous.

When I was less fat it was Castelli Free Aero race, when I was a little fatter Endura RideLondon specials, and now I am a bloater it’s Planet X all the way.

From experience and on the basis of eye specialist advice I would never go to A&E with an eye issue.

The above mentioned retinal detachment was diagnosed as a cornea scratch at A&E and only it remaining visible for a few days led me to go and see an optician – who sent me straight to an eye hospital. The consultant there said I was fortunate the partial detachment had held and simply that doctors who do not specialise in eyes spend so little time on them and have such relatively small experience that things like that can easily be missed – he simply said any eye issue go straight to an eye hospital or an optician (who can refer you on).

In my late teens I was hit in the eye, resulting in a partially detached retina (and very mild loss of sight from the reattachment) and seemingly a large number of floaters.

Most of the time I don’t notice them but bright days make them far more apparent and they seem worse when I am tired. Offices don’t tend to be good places for me, white walls and bright lights.

I tend to wear sunglasses a lot, not just summer, and if you have glasses a ‘transitions’ lense can help. Computer screens seem easier if set slightly less bright and on the blue side of spectrum.

Do get checked and good luck with it.

There is a nice chap from Kent who has his email regularly mistyped (one letter missed) and I gave had job interview details, university communications and even a tenancy agreement sent to me.

My father used to gets regular comms from a credit card provider about a card limit being breached (.com versus .co.uk).

The oddest one was me being mistaken for a US Real Estate agent and the party who mailed me not accepting I was an unconnected chap in the UK.

Basically it happens, plenty.

Cookie killer not worked, this behaviour is why I cancelled my sub a while back (which is still running). Cue someone saying shut the door behind you but it’s frankly shit for a paying forum.

Great luck there OP, I had opposite experience here autofilling with short version of my name. Ended up booking a new flight as it was cheaper than the change.

After Garmin broke my heart at Christmas I bought a Vivoactive 4 instead.

That’s now been returned as the HRM and SP02 were amazingly inaccurate. Under exercise the HRM was under-reading, showing about half the expected count. The SP02 was showing as sub 90 at times (I had a chest infection) and I had to verify again with another device that I didn’t need to go to hospital.

I did try all the suggestions like shaving arm hair, moving further up arm, but nothing seemed to make a difference.

Oddly I had a similar experience with a Fitbit years ago, wondering if skin tone or vein bulginess might have something to do with it.

Anyone else had similar?

Managed a partial tear of the tendon itself. Was lucky and after ~3 months was ok to get back cycling and begin running.

Fair amount of physio with a guy who previously worked at professional football clubs. He manually worked the tendon to break down the scar, each time I left battered and bruised, but it did the job.

Rehab program itself involved many hours on an elliptical trainer.

For comparison 5 months ago I ripped an ankle tendon and that’s been far far worse. A lot more pain, recovery has been a lot slower and I’ve ended up with lots of side effects (knee, hip, back pain). Saw a very good sports injury specialist and now a great physio but it is just not recovering how anyone would like.

Wish her luck.

Whatever you get make sure you can get replacement mech hangers.

We nabbed a very cheap but badly maintained Wild 20. The mech hanger was bent and ended up costing almost half what I paid for the bike to replace, and that needed a bit ground off to fit well.

On the roof I might put some sort of foam on the stanchions if was doing a motorway / a road drive. Otherwise absolutely no worries at all, worst case would rinse it off when home. Fix with reusable cables ties.

A friend was driving a VX220 (similar to an Elise for the non-car folk) and a stone flicked up, went through the open roof and shattered the rear screen – seeing chips on screens and the leading edge of roof/bonnet and knowing this suggests you could see damage if unlucky, and 30 seconds protection to avoid that seems sensible, especially on expensive forks.

Volvo by chance?

Genuinely thought this thread was going to be about cookie consent.

@saxabar I have to agree on abuse of legitimate interest. No easy way to deselect legitimate interest without going into a second tab and clicking hundreds of boxes is absolutely against the spirit behind the legislation. What compounds it is with the random re-asking it sometimes appears to opt every single one back in.

I do expect in the next cleanup of PECR and ICO refining DPA implementation (if they can get back on top of things) this will be cracked down on hard.

Even as it stands the cookie handling on this site is out of line with ICO guidance against GDPR.

Car theft with LV, near faultless claim, fast payout (initial £1k under market offer, one email back with photos of adverts got us a fair payout).

Comms from LV were not great, for example did not send us all the info they should have, resulting in us not throwing away spare keys and when the car turned up 3 months later it could be opened and driven (massive bonus for them). Not having that info however meant hassle trying to deal with police with a car that was no longer ours once found, and LV not being able to get us in contact with the right team there side to agree recovery and collection etc.

Howies bib tights – not as old as most of the kit on here but for something that had dealt with my arsehole and balls they have done fantastically well for many years. A perfect spring/summer leg coverer and although crap alone in wet / proper winter they go well under trousers if it’s bloody cold.

I regret not going bigger.

What you describe is very similar to a friend of mine just before New Year, only he didn’t have a covid booster. His was put down to respiratory virus.

More of the same here with Hunt (road wheels). Needed wheels fast they had stock, turned up damaged. Some back and forward and paid extra to upgrade to carbon and they turned up well out of true with significant moulding issues around.

On my MTB I had a set of Hunts too, never managed to bend them but they went out of true after the first ride (spoke tension was variable to say the least) and the bearings lasted a disappointingly short time before needing replacement.

Went back to DT Swiss factory wheels.

I think that may be the most disappointed I have ever been with a series.

I did end up buying a different watch when this looked to be going sour.

Arrived yesterday but wife asked why I didn’t bask for it for Christmas instead of saying ‘nothing’.

Thinking back I didn’t even want one then, allured by the false-bargain I convinced myself I had to have one, and ended up spending a lot more doing so.

Garmin won.

GRX rear mech has a clutch to assist with chain retention. Can be switched off for road use / servicing and back on for gravel if required.

Bar that you are good as said above.

Same here, new pending transaction on my credit card as of 6th, after the cancellation email on 5th, which was after being told the order was fine by customer service on 1st.

Well that blew up didn’t it?

I’m more hacked off at being told by webchat it was all fine shortly before the cancellation than anything else.

Disappointing from Garmin after confirming nothing wrong with order on webchat. The alternative I ordered when thought this might go tits up should arrive tomorrow though.