chakaping
Free Member
Despite my reservations regarding French cars

Which would be unfounded. It’s not the 1980s and hasn’t been for a while.

My 2010 Renault Scenic with a catastrophic auto gearbox failure and notoriously unpredictable electrics would like a word.

Garage advised me to sell it when the electrics first started playing up, having dealt with many other shonky Renaults. How I wish I’d listened.

2010 Scenic? 14 year old shonky car in being shonky shocker!

I did it about 20 years ago with my ex wife. One of the best 2 weeks holiday (13 days walking) I’ve ever had! We did it St Bees to RHB, used Packhorse to move our bags and stayed in B&Bs. Mostly good weather (although I did have to get our ’emergency’ gloves out of our day pack on the day that ended at The Lion at Blakey Ridge, we had thick fog for the day and it was freezing in June. We couldn’t see the pub but could smell the chips!

As per above it was nice to bump into folk again and again on the route, meant there was always people you recognized in the pub on a night, was surprisingly social.

Would heartily recommend it. Loved the days in the Lakes AND the NY Moors for different reasons. One of the toughest climbs that surprised us was up from Ingleby Arncliffe to Osmotherley, looked like a pimple but it was a hard end to the day, we were staying in the Queen Catherine in the village that night. We stayed at some lovely little places at the time, still remember the little B&B we were in at Kirkby Stephen that had made a reservation for us at the The Forge restaurant in the town without asking us. We walked down and had an awesome meal there, it was a lovely end to a long day.

That’s a rubbish outcome – and a lesson to everyone. Someone bumped my Mrs’s car in a supermarket carpark a couple of years ago. Her ‘free’ courtesy car was supplied by Enterprise and I was on my guard straight away. They delivered it while I was at home to receive it and the lad dropping it off recommended just doing a quick phone video around the car as soon as we had the keys which is what I’ve done ever since.

Pre covid times I had to regularly hire cars for work trips, mostly to Belfast. I had an annual policy from these folk – Excess Cover , never had to use it but it was extra peace of mind knowing that I could just chuck the keys back to them and jump on the plane. Was only about £35 quid a year at the time.

and…… disappeared again!

Well boo. Would have been just the job at that price for my 17yo boy.

I thought I was a font of car related knowledge but have never heard of the iconic FSR Tarpen.

Wiki link

Looks gopping.

+1 on getting a free router. But if you want to buy one, we’ve been using one of these in our static caravan since Aug last year and it’s been spot on.

£100 4G router

Noooooooooo! :-)

@jate

chrispoffer: We are clearly (if accidentally) shadowing each other. I was also at Ben Folds last week and This Is The Kit last night at the Sage, sorry The Glasshouse…..

I would be really freaked out if you were also at the Fire Station in Sunderland to see Seth Lakeman last Wednesday :-) ….. or if you were off to the Steam Machine on Sunday to see Tom McConville & Michael Biggins ….. which were my last / next evenings out!

Turin Brakes ‘Ether Song’ is one of my favourite albums, pity I’m not closer to Manchester or I’d bite your hand off @IHN . They’re great live, I’ve seen them a couple of times.

Trail centre wise I absolutely love:

Poulty’s last Blast
K Line

Rinse and repeat those two as many times as you can stand, then drop into

Transmission
Accelerator
Nitrous

Then back to the car park.

All at Hamsterley. Local (ish) for me and great fun. It’s a big climb up to Poulty’s but so worth it, you can just keep going around K Line and back. Thoroughly recommended. Not singletrack but swoopy and lovely, doesn’t seem to matter whether its warm and sunny or cold, wet and miserable it’s fun regardless.

40km with a load? Batteries might struggle, especially in this cold weather.

Another happy Brother HL-3140CW Colour Laser Printer user here. Bought it back in Jan ’19 as I changed jobs and my previous home printer was going back to my previous company with the rest of my IT stuff.

Still going strong, doesn’t get loads of use, just ‘works’. I only paid £113 from Mr Bezos back in the day, like everything it’s doubled in price since. I’d still recommend it, pattern toner works and it’s a reliable old thing.

The rest of the album was pretty solid – and you’ll now know all the songs having listened to them in Manchester ;-)

@tomparkin – if you listen to Ben Folds new Album – ‘What Matters Most’ – you’ll be able to relive the concert, most of the tracks on it were played last week at the Sage in Gateshead so I’d assume the same at Manchester. Like you I enjoyed the band, the guitarist and cello player’s project is called Tall Heights, they did an unplugged song at the front of the stage by themselves halfway through his set which was beautiful. Showed how good the acoustics are at the Sage too.

This is the Kit last night for me at the Sage (again). Always a good time with Kate Stables, was interesting to be sat down for a change :-)

I’ll have a look at Xert, thanks for the recommendation.

OK, I have the beginnings of a plan, thank you.

I’m going to do some reading up on hr zones.

I’ve uploaded the last years data from Strava to intervals ICU – the fitness tab shows the same sort of info as Strava, my ‘fitness’ score hit a high of 43 in June, currently languishing at a lowly 16. The June high also coincided with the last time my ‘form’ was in green. So if I’m reading it all right I need to create stress by keeping the purple line above the blue line which it hasn’t been since the summer. So work harder!

I fitted a Tado wireless thermostat kit to the combi boiler in our holiday static caravan a few weeks ago. Slightly different situation as it has a combi boiler and didn’t have a thermostat fitted previously. Just got the basic kit – no TRVs – but I’m really pleased with it. Nice clear, easy instructions to fit which I did myself and I’m certainly not any kind of heating engineer. Instantly made a difference to the place having a wireless thermostat – of course the very best feature for a static caravan is being able to turn the heating on from your phone so it’s warm and toasty before you get there. Which might be handy for you if your schedule changes on the fly too.

Decent phone app, easy to program, neat wireless thermostat, easy installation, has worked perfectly for us so far. And the starter kit (boiler control unit, wireless bridge to plug into your router and wireless thermostat) was only £99 from Screwfix.

If it’s a crop sensor camera then the equivalent of an old ‘nifty fifty’ is actually the 35mm suggested above.

If it’s a full frame then a 50mm is nice to have.

Crop sensor Nikon user here, used to have film cameras back in the day. Didn’t think about it and bought a 50mm lens then sold it quickly after. As mentioned, too long for a crop sensor. Got a 35mm instead but don’t use it that much to be honest – I’ve built up loadsa lenses over the years, so probably use my 18-300 more, then my 10-20 then my 150-600 Sigma. Horses for courses obviously.

So my suggestion would be mid range used consumer body from Nikon / Canon / Pentax? And then a couple of used lenses, see how they get on.

@kayak23 – prepare for some jumping around and flying beer if you’re anywhere near the front! Haven’t booked up for this round of the Streets but have seen him a couple of times before :-)

Ben Folds tonight for me at the Sage in Gateshead – now called the Glasshouse.

This is the Kit next Wednesday.

And Seth Lakeman the Wednesday after!

Cultural Wednesdays :-)

As above, we’ve had one of these at our static ‘van since August and it’s been fine, just works:

£100 4G router

You just need to check which mobile network works well where it’s going to be and sign up for the cheapest SIM only data deal possible.

I tend to charge at work but I have a ‘Granny lead’ to charge at home occasionally and a 3 pin plug at the end of my garage. They’re really slow though, think it charges at 2kw an hour. I was empty on Saturday morning (4% remaining, 60kw battery) and wasn’t using the Megane over the weekend so plugged it – was fully charged by lunchtime on Sunday. So just the 27 hours! Usually use it to just top up if I’ve got a big journey the next day so I’m generally charging from 70 or 80%.

Looks somewhat similar to this one but is Renault badged, more expensive and came from the dealer.

Granny charger

Oh, and getting the license at Spa? Have you got a driving sim mad 16 year old son? If so, give your controller to him for a bit, worked for me :-)

Haven’t played it for months! Might give it a spin at the weekend :-)

I’ve got a Zwift Hub (the original one with a cassette) and Play controllers, I’ve been on hols for a couple of weeks and arrived back yesterday in time for my usual Thursday TTT. Did the updates on the hub and controller – and lo and behold virtual shifting had come to pass! Put my bike in a suitable gear for a nice straight chainline and worked out which buttons do the shifting (the black pads on the side of the shifters, outboard of the orange steerers/brakes) and I have to admit that I’m quite impressed with it.

There does seem to be a tiny lag between calling for the next gear and feeling it – but I guess no different to ‘real’ shifting for that. Did kinda forget which pad to press at one point and braked instead of shifting up but I’m sure I’ll get used to it. Feels good to get additional functionality for nothing. Well, I know I’ve already paid for the Play controllers but, y’know what I mean. I’ve only got one bike that I use on the trainer so the cog would be useful but I can see how it would be good to swap over to a mountain bike etc.

https://www.autotrader.co.uk/car-details/202309182112618

Amazing photos, didn’t know you could use a wide angle potatoe as a camera lens!

Worth a phone call and a viewing I’d reckon if they’re close to you – they might not have done any research into the selling price. And like @chakaping suggests, you’d want a private sale to be substantially cheaper than a dealer sale, might be worth having that conversation with the seller.

I honestly wouldn’t worry about traffic if ‘your friend’ is on a motorbike – in all my times up in the NW of Scotland it hasn’t been an issue, folk are usually great about using the passing places if they see bikes coming. The weather’s the thing that makes or breaks a trip and I’ve had it all – particularly because we always like to book the accommodation in advance. Chances are you will get wet but will also see sunshine. May / June’s usually my preference.

I’ve also been up that way with my son in our MX5 for the August Bank Holiday weekend. Lots of midges, stunning weather and actually not too much traffic surprisingly. Scotland’s a big place with not too many folk in it away from the cities so I think you notice congestion more if you’re in something like a massive motorhome rather than on a bike or a small car.

Yes, they had 30% off back in May which also worked with c2w. Like Benos, I traded in a qualifying kids bike (£40 off marketplace) to get an extra “£250” off a Boardman 8.6 gravel bike. I only started messing about because I’d ordered my voucher, it took 3 weeks to come through and by the time it had the bike I was going to get had gone up by £150 – and on our scheme you’re not allowed to add money to the voucher.

A guy I work with used to do this for a living, great money but very boring when he wasn’t actually moving stuff – which seemed to be a lot of the time. Used to take his iPad up with him and watch stuff on Netflix etc. Only gave it up because of the time away from home, the crane company would just send him off to Sizewell from the North East mon to fri, he prefers to earn less but see his Mrs more.

If it’s a nice clear day then I think I’d be OK taking a confident 7yo along Striding Edge and it sounds like you’ve done plenty of hill walking.

I think I’d come down via the Dollywagon zigzags and Grisedale Tarn and down the valley. I’ve only climbed Swirral Edge once and that was in crappy weather, was very scrambly and and not much fun in the murk. Don’t think I’d be confident coming down that way.

molgrips
Full Member
Based on anything specific?

Posted 3 minutes ago
REPLY | REPORT

The spoog on the back seat! Based on that!! :-D

I don’t know, if it’s really cheap I might still be interested. Borrow Dr P’s plug in tool – I guess the state of the battery is the most important thing on a Leaf so check that and don’t accept what it says on the screen.

Assume the mileage is made up, assume it’s never been serviced, assume that it’s shagged and rattly, assume the battery’s about as much use as that old Samsung in your draw. Then if you’re happy with all of that then buy it :-).

Cougar
Free Member
But when I don’t want to carry a phone or a wallet or any cash I use this:

How’s that working for you? Does it link to a bank account in a sensible manner or is it a stupid top-up system like BPay was?

I mentioned wearables earlier. I think it’s the way forward, but if I spent £100 on a ring I wouldn’t be able to buy anything with it.

Posted 2 days ago

@ Cougar – sorry missed your Q. They works really well, we bought 2. It is a ‘top up’ system so you ‘load’the amount on it that you want – you can set it to auto top up straight from your bank account too although neither of us have done that as yet. No fees though and very straight forward to top up on the app. They only work for 3 years so I suppose you’ve got to budget that into it. Very easy to use in practice, just like Google/Apple pay on your phone – just hover your hand over the card reader. Instant ping on your phone to notify you, although if you’ve got your phone with you, you might have missed the point of the ring – the useful thing about it is that you don’t have to have your phone or wallet anywhere close…..

This is my wallet – I’ve had it for the last couple of years.  Useful for carrying my work c/card, driving licence, etc – stuff that I can’t get away with a digital / phone version of.  ‘scuse the Amazon link.  It’s about as teeny tiny as a wallet can be, leather and entirely lovely despite the low price.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B01I7WAJEO/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1

But when I don’t want to carry a phone or a wallet or any cash I use this:

https://mclear.com/ringpay/?gclid=CjwKCAjww7KmBhAyEiwA5-PUSh8PyrboK5tH1z4tgMQKB6i19Y_QGaw0408aSlRDu_WPeDhEwPqZ-hoCWH4QAvD_BwE

What a time to be alive! :-D

Staffy cross is always the answer.  2nd hand, obvioulsy.  Incredibly tying (of course, all dogs are) and the rules regarding company etc apply but she’s worth all the effort.  She’s brilliant at shedding hair though so no good if  you ever want to wear black …..

I’d go for carefully without using 3rd.  But IANAM.  I have had previous experience with waiting for recovery and it tends to be sloooooow.

Whiplash?  I absolutely loved it.  Thought there were some outstanding acting performances and loved the music, incredible to listen to it turned up.  Just shows, we don’t all like the same stuff :-)

Surely this has got to be the answer?  Cheap enough that you could keep your Vitus too.

https://www.evanscycles.com/brand/muddyfox/electric-avenue-hybrid-bike-700516#colcode=70051611

Got one last year for my better half, it’s not a brilliant bike – but just the job for commuting.  Buy mudguards and a rack and you’re good to go.  And not the end of the world costwise if it gets nicked.

Used iPad is your best bet – lots of Android tablets won’t run it.  You can get a used Air 2 on eBay for less than a hundred quid which will run it fine for the time being, add something like this:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B07H9RT763/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1

And you’ve got everything you need.  I got one in November for exactly the same reason, just swapped it for a used iPad Pro to get a bigger screen but the Air 2 was great while I was using it, no issues at all.

Apple TV and a telly and stand is also a good choice but unless you’ve got a stand/wall bracket etc hanging around you’ll probably end up spending more.

“real” camera…. :-) I like it.  Like ‘bio’ bikes.

Digital only for me, either phone or Nikon.  I still have my old OM10 from my teens but don’t use it anymore.  I was reminded why on a trip to Bempton to see the puffins recently.

The ability to take loadsa pics and then have a squint at them on the back of the camera was awesome, it was a day when limiting yourself to 36 on a roll and not seeing the results until you’d developed the film would have been rubbish.

Film is probably fun for landscape photography but even so – if you’re using ND filters and long exposures it’s so much easier to take a few shots and see the results on a digi camera.  Progress is marvelous as far as I’m concerned!

Hmmmm interesting.  I try to have at least 3 rest days out of 7 usually.  I should clarify the hill I climbed on Sunday was an actual in real life hill.  That I walked up.  Stupidly steep though.  And although there was a handy NT cafe at the top they actually didn’t do beer!  Shocking.

Our scheme has the same smallprint about being up to £1,000 value. But that’s what it’s capped at in total, we’re unable to buy a £2k bike on it – something to do with the company owning it and leasing it to us, if they only own a proportion of it (if you get something for more than a grand) then it doesn’t work. So even if the bike I wanted was £1,050 I couldn’t put £50 to the voucher.