@drj have you looked at the vitus, kenesis, merlin, nukeproof bikes?
Maybe worth a look, if here and now is what you are looking for 😉

JeZ

Hey,

Just ordered a Nukeproof Digger Comp. I’ll let you know how I get on with it, when it arrives. Btw Chainreactioncycles.com have a sale of them on:

https://www.chainreactioncycles.com/nukeproof-digger-comp-alloy-bike-2022/rp-prod202649

A word on the sonder with GRX groupset. They are taking orders for delivery in December? Bit weird to be honest the Nukeproof looked better value and on sale, what’s not to like.

JeZ

Hey all,

Found that the Nukeproof Digger Comp was on sale at Chainreaction:

https://www.chainreactioncycles.com/nukeproof-digger-comp-alloy-bike-2022/rp-prod202649

For the money and spec nothing close and suits my riding style. The spec and write ups look good and I’m a cheapskate anyway.

Anyway posting this after I got my order in ;-)

BR
JeZ

Hiya,

Another to look at is this one:

https://www.wiggle.co.uk/nukeproof-digger-comp-alloy-bike-2022

BR
JeZ

Hiya,

Following this thread with interest. Been looking at Gravel bikes and this one seems to fit the spec well. The thing to note also is the fork on this one can mount luggage unlike quite a few others at similar spec. The Vitus Substance AL is interesting, but on this bike it is worth noting no fork mounts.

JeZ

Well I for one will miss the Queen I think she was amazing. Anyway one of my friends posted this:

When Saudi didn’t allow women to drive she personally drove the Saudi crown prince at speed round the Balmoral estate and when Trump expressed an opinion about meeting the younger royals she sent Charles, Trumps least favourite royal to greet trump.

and another just posted:

Message sending in both deed and clothing has been done since at least the first Elizabethan era; in the 1600 “Rainbow” portrait (in think its in Hatfield House if you ever go) you can see her mantle is embroidered with ears and eyes. She was known as the all seeing and all hearing virgin Queen.
I think Elizabeth II followed that idea from before she became Queen. Even down to making sure her wedding dress was made following the ration coupons rules. The fabric for the dress came out of her fabric rations which she saved for years.
Her choice to do service as a driver which encouraged other young women to become drivers and mechanics; it was an active choice to be seen in uniform.
The royal children serving in the military… a message to those who serve protect this country and their parents… we don’t ask of you what’s we aren’t prepared to do ourselves… (unlike our politicians)
She might not have been allowed to publicly comment on politics but she could
sure as heck send an unsubtle message.
Other stuff in trumps visit you might not have known was her choice of broaches. Over three days she chose a simple flower for day one when she would normally wear something in some way related to the visitors nation. On day two she wore one that was a gifting from Canada, which would have driven Trump mad if he was clever enough to realise and on day 3 she wore a broach that had only been worn in mourning periods before.
I think much of this stems from
Her genuinely caring about the UK and to be honest her choice to die in Scotland… and I believe that was a choice, was her final message. Quite which way you see said that message I don’t know but if Westminster has any sense then they will think about it… and it seems she will lay in state in Scotland and thats one hell of a snub to Westminster.

All the best
JeZ

trail_rat:

while this is true – i suggest that you read the rules around the permitted development.

you will find you require a large plot of land as the bottom of the turbine has to be X from the ground – the center of the turbine has to be X from the ground and the whole thing has to be +5m(iirc) – but its for sure X meters from a from any boundary if it were to fall over.

I was just looking at the figures and potential because of where I live. I looked into the issues and problems. Looks majorly scary in terms of vibration and then energy production doesn’t seem that good.
Bearing in mind that I’ve lost two wind speed anemometers in two years, the height required not keen on.

Maybe one year someone will fix the main issues with them but I guess it’s just Solar for me.
Shame really because here potentially they could generate a fair bit of power ;-)

JeZ

Hiya Guys,

I’m thinking of Solar as many seem to be one note I do have is have people also considered wind power?
In England wind turbines are allowed as permitted development and where I live, just 200 metres from the Bristol channel, I’d get a fair return on the investment and the new ones are quite efficient and reasonably good at generation of power.

Planning permission for wind turbines

BR
Jerry

Kelvin:

PMQs… Starmer going hard on “excess” oil and gas company profits… rightly.

He also asked about the payment, so to did Ian Blackford. It’s a joke these profits. I also heard that it was questioned why EDF advertise 100% renewable electricity generation and increasing prices when it has no relationship to Gas or such like…

JeZ

Kelvin:

Don’t mention gilts Jez! You’ll fire Rone up and we won’t hear the end of it…

Funny you should say that, I did think about mentioning them as I did study economics at University as a unit on strangely an engineering degree (don’t go there), but thought I’d better not as it always stirs up contention.

JeZ

Rone:

The national debt doesn’t get paid down like you think.

The national debt is just a record of government spending not yet taxed back (it includes private savings, NS&I as well as bonds.) Stuff that shouldn’t be returned back unless you want people to lose their savings?

I’m not an economist but I do know we have to pay interest on this debt and the debt isn’t just the BoE. So it does effect us in the future and the interest payments takes money away from the public purse that could be invested in services. Again I still don’t think this is wise and again we are still being played by the energy markets and paying more based on speculation.

In all of this the government still hasn’t a longer term plan but maybe because some of the government revenues are based on fuel prices they are in their own conflict. Personally I see the best option in this is to be more self reliant as a household and I’m in a good position to do this.

JeZ

How about the fact that this bail out is on national debt that has gone from 500billion to 2.3 trillion, since the Conservatives have come to power. OK the sums may not be correct but still, this looks like bail now, pay later.

JeZ

My wife was diagnosed with Cancer 2 years ago. Pretty tough at the time. The NHS were simply amazing she’s now in remission our son graduated from Uni and things are good again.
Hang in there you did the right thing just pinging it out lots of support out there any advice or such like give me a ping, never a problem.

JeZ

the Muffin man:

…or they simply can’t afford to upgrade their properties!

I could whack solar panels on my south facing roof. Not quite got the £8k stuffed down the back of my sofa to do it though.

I don’t till next year either. Since the last disaster in 2008 I just speeded up paying my mortgage off earlier. Next year I do it! Then I have the money to pay for it.
Onto the issue of not being able to this goes back to my other comment about the green deal and what Cameron did…

JeZ

Molgrips

Ooh my Nan and Gramps used to have a back boiler on their coal fire. They had to come down and light it in the morning to get the house warmed and get hot water. I can still remember them doing that, as clear as day.

Our plan is to use gas in the morning to warm up the house, then use the back boiler thereafter. The energy companies making huge profits over the speculation are going to have a rude awakening, when they discover people are going to adapt and switch to self supply heating. I don’t even want to mention the Green deal that the Tory’s abolished because the house builders complained it cost them too much…

BR
JeZ

Hiya Guys,

For many with wood burners, look to see if you can fit a back boiler to yours. It then potentially heat the whole house whilst your wood burner is running. See my wood burner back boiler add on below as an example:

https://www.aradastovesandspares.com/product_detail.php?brand=SPA&brandname=Stove%20spares%20and%20accessories&stovetype=A&category=BO&subcategory=&code=AIB8&description=Add%20In%20Boiler%20-%202.0kw

This is my plan anyway. I also plan Solar and wind power because in 2011 they changed the rules for wind power for domestic use i.e. it come under permissive development providing you have one. Some of them are able to produce a fair bit of power i.e. 5Kw. Just note the permissive development only applies to England and not Scotland for some reason.

BR
JeZ

Why not invest the money on making the UK housing stock more efficient? Oh hang on Germany, Italy and France is doing this we’d rather throw money at private companies..

JeZ

I personally find it incredible that anyone is interested in the media frenzy of a candidate selection, that we have no choice of. I’m not giving any of it the time of day or oxygen. I’ll only be interested unless we have an election to show what we think of this shower.

JeZ

Hey,

The suming up for me was how Truss and her political team managed to get the discussion around her earrings as if to appeal to the poor and going to Claire to buy them, as if it was by accident and wasn’t staged to undermine RichTea and the fact that he doesn’t know how to use contactless payments ;-) It’s all grollocks and manipulation and it’s not like we are the 0.2% of the population/grey rinsers, that will be voting for either.
Loved the way trussless even dressed up as milk snatcher with shoulder pads and blue dress to appeal. Shallow and pathetic to be honest and worst still they will be governing us for the next 2 years ;-(

JeZ

All I know is that is delays all the stuff from work I’m trying to send, even if it is declared customs objects. The stuff that used to take two days now takes 7 at least and I’m paying increased customs charges filling in more forms and I can see no Bre5h1t benefits yet…

JeZ

Screaming trees. I completely forgot about them but on the revisit, absolutely awesome.

screaming trees

BR
JeZ

Hey there,

In Summary:

No one we voted for and even worse probably than blotus, as if that was possible ;-)

My hope:
Nobody that mad Nad or haunted pencil endorses….

JeZ

Morning,

Have we done packaging that isn’t recyclable or reusable in anyway ;-(

JeZ

Hiya,

Did it rain last night where you live? Did you have your window open unusually?
Sounds like rusty disks from weather and window open simply, else sticking pads.
I’d take it for a drive then retry the same maneuver. The other option is you ran over your neighbors cat ;-)

JeZ

Hey,

I worked abroad for 15 years, where they aren’t hung up with old measurements. I’m an engineer so SI units. I was never taught imperial and although it’s easy to convert, I don’t see the point.
OS maps are metric, so why the heck would you want to use imperial? The only place that it’s used is the roads and pints of beer/568ml, and only because they can’t be bothered to swap out from what I see.
So in summary for me and no offense intended, I see no point using miles it’s a pointless measurement.

BR
JeZ

Hey there,

Good thread I have a multitude of bikes from 3×9 to 1×12. To be honest I like them all, sometimes I like the range of the 3×9 but like the simplicity of the 1x setups. For sure the 3x setups or even the 2×10 are cheaper to maintain. All I can say is thank god I can buy SunRace cassettes because they are a damn site cheaper than the Shimano or SRAM ones ;-)

JeZ

Are seriously suggesting that not supporting a policy which restricts free & uncontrolled immigration to people from European countries is racist? Or am I misunderstanding?

Have you guys seen the new trade deals being signed at the moment? There is one that request s access to the employment market. So people coming over and stealing our jobs is always going to happen. Myself, my family were refugees, so my opinions on this are rather clear ;-)

JeZ

It’s funny how anyone you don’t agree with at any particular moment becomes the enemy.

I was wondering that too ;-)

I can only assume he’s plant to keep people voting anyone but conservatives and split the vote for Boris, lol. I think you have a choice here keep someone who can’t keep an ethics advisor or at least someone I at least you can probably agree with on some issues.

JeZ

FWIW – I think Starmer would be an excellent Prime Minister. He’s serious, intelligent and has integrity.
Unfortunately, it seems you need to be a “character” to get elected. At least in the eyes of the Tory biased press.

Yes I think in general you need to be that annoying loud kid in a school classroom, that gets all the attention, just because they are loud an obnoxious.
Personally we all seem to suffer if we keep it the way it is at the moment…

JeZ

The reason I’m critical of Starmer is because I’m convinced that he’s leading labour to defeat at the next election, not because I want to keep the tories in power. Funny how the same people who spent years slagging off Corbyn now accuse those of us who are critical of Starmer of helping the tories. Grow up FFS.

I voted Corbyn too I honestly didn’t mean to offend I was saying if you slag off either it generally plays into the hands of the Tory’s.

JeZ

Starmer represents everything people hate about modern politics. We’ve had decades of politicians on all sides telling voters that anything that would help or benefit them isn’t possible. Johnson (and Corbyn before him in 2017) did the opposite, and unsurprisingly people voted for him. It’s astonishing that labour think they can win an election by going back to telling voters that they can’t have what they want.

Well then have the torys then make an extraordinary habit of lying about everything.
Personally I’d do anything to get rid of them if you’re a fan then of course be happy with them.

JeZ

Of course carry on slagging off the opposition, it’s cool…Just remember this passes the next election to the conservatives. All because they have a charismatic liar in charge that sprouts grollocks without any oversight. Just a comment. I personally prefer boring to lies.

JeZ

<Sarcastic mode on>
How does 100% unsuccessful in shipping immigrants out of the UK to Rwanda destroy the business model of the people traffickers?
<mode off>
BTW my father was a refugee so personally I hope it all fails anyway ;-)
On another note the trade deals being negotiated, I do hope people realize in some cases has clauses to access to the UK employment market. So I’m guessing anyone thinking from the perspective of little island protection, better consider that there will be immigration regardless and they will be taking our jobs and such like.

JeZ

Hey there,

It occurred to me that the only people I want on this flight are Conservative MP’s.
The only way I can handle this completely ignorant malaise of a government is by humor.

BR
JeZ

AI and intelligence and self aware. Cool can it take over our government? ;-) It seems to be devoid of any intelligence.

JeZ

It’s now at 342 pages of telling me what I already knew. Blotus is crap along with his self serving scum party. If I may say, saying Keir is worse or not as mouthy as Blotus is a reason if any to vote for him. I’d rather see an intelligent measured person than a slogan based populist that has failed to deliver anything. Personally I’d vote anyone to get these liars out…

JeZ

Get one of these they are awesome. Very useful to have the chisel too

https://www.screwfix.com/p/titan-ttb278sds-6-3kg-electric-sds-plus-drill-9-piece-accessory-kit-230-240v/97533

JeZ

Hey there,

I have a Renault trafic campervan. I took it in to change its brake discs and pads. When I told them what van it was and what needed doing, they said thank god, we hate working on VWs. My brother in law had one traded it in, such was it’s reliability issues. I don’t want to tempt fate but happy with my choice 6 years ago. OK it doesn’t have a VW badge but I’m not a brand monkey type person anyway.

JeZ

Hiya,

My only comment is from bitter experience attempting to buy a pre-1960’s one, without realizing till the survey. It is important to note Mortgage lenders will not lend on pre-1960’s timber built houses they state the buildings are not standard construction and will reject the mortgage application. This cost us a fortune in wasted solicitor fees and delayed our move. In hindsight it did us a favor in that we found an awesome house in Portishead the the house in Yatton now is going to be in the middle of housing estate instead of overlooking an idyllic set of fields ;-(

JeZ

Hiya,

Whilst we are on Watches. Absolute bargain for last years Garmin Fenix:

https://www.runningxpert.com/en/garmin-fenix-6x-pro-194547.html?gclid=EAIaIQobChMIs77cgd3F9gIV84BQBh0r7QA-EAYYASABEgIGYvD_BwE

I don’t need the touchscreen but mapping and music would be cool and NFC payments.
My Fenix 3 is being retired to sproggit to use.

BR
JeZ