I did dry July and I’m still going. I was drinking way too much and have never felt better!

Lupine all the way. Still got my Nightmare setup from the 90’s but I’ve been running a Betty for the last 6 years. Faultless with the exception of needing a new cable.

I’ve got a Sthil 110. Very good unit (after a gun fault that was replaced under warranty with an improved brass fitting) plenty of pressure, but what I notice is the flow rate – lots of high pressure water rather than just a dribble. Hose is plenty long enough and foam unit is great for the car. It does use a lot of power – cables and plugs get quite warm.

First year with a full 20kw of panels on the roof, Just coming out of winter here and we’ve only got through about 1 tonne of firewood. The reverse cycle air con has been set to 24 degrees and has kept the chill off the house nicely. Looks like payback on the additional solar and battery will be quicker than anticipated.

Strange bike, equally strange review!

I’m just hanging out for used EV9’s to pop up on the used market. It’s the only realistic alternative to our old Nissan Patrol which is now old enough to drink!

Australia- dig a hole and drop it in.
On a serious note though – 3 wheelie bins, 1 medium for general waste emptied weekly, 1 large for recycling (glass, cardboard, tin, aluminium, emptied every 2 weeks, and a large one for biodegradable waste, same as the recycling bin. Although landfill is really cheap, Australia has quite a focus on recycling that started out of the paper industry. This now extends to glass as well, but we behind on plastic with the exception of PET.

When we have to – seasoned red gum. It’s super dense and burns cleanly for hours. I mix this with anything else I get free. In reality thou – there is no natural gas where we are and the air pollution on still winter nights bits unbelievable. One of our kids has asthma so we’ve increased our solar and battery storage and run the heat pump flat out. Massive difference in her condition as a result.

I’m with Youi (Australia) my policy went up to $2800 which I thought was extortionate. After a bit of shopping I found nothing cheaper than $4000. Went back to Youi and increased the excess to $2000. This saved about $800 off the premium as we really only have it for bushfire, which will take the whole house if it gets us.

Tesla model 3 does the job. All goes in the boot with the front wheel off, and a Yakima rack on the roof for short trips when the bike is too muddy.

Big hp difference between those two will make new bike day twice as exciting!

I just checked – I hit 1.2 mw in July and that doesn’t include the ev or hot water.
Quite impressed!

Looking at mine, I’d say the cable spec between MSB and the charger should be thumb thick….

Off it tbh, and based on my latest blood results looks like it’s going to be permanent. I’ve just picked up 5 dozen bottles of McLaren Vale Cabernet from work and they are sat under the carport with no home to go to. So much for working in the booze industry. ?

Get well soon. Happened to me a few years ago – quite a long road to recovery I’m afraid and it was hell inside my head fora good  couple of years. Interesting that the scenario is almost identical both in terms of incident and then spending many hours stumbling around like a blind zombie. I went down hard and put a split in my carotid artery which caused the problem.

Really knocked me about from a mental health standpoint. You’re not alone though.

Hot tip – to make the filament more durable – soak it in water for a few days. Nylon is hydroscopic and becomes brittle when it’s dry. You won’t believe the difference

Should also flag that diesel over the same period would have cost $5600, so around $5033 fuel savings.
if I include the cost of the loan, that puts me slightly behind a ice vehicle….

Esims are easy – just buy and install – you just need to select the sim you want to use in your phone settings, as well as if you want the phone to decide which sim to use based on coverage.
You need to toggle both calls and data btw.

I used Arlo for international travel – but next time I’ll use my folks details to buy a local,eSIM from ee or whoever.

My ev charge plan is 8 cents per kWh at night and free from 11 am through till 2. As I only get to use the free at the weekend I didn’t count that.  They have elevated rates for the rest of the day to catch you out – put the powerwall takes care of that.

Could be the Russians stirring the pot? Wouldn’t put it past them in the slightest.

Silicone spray?

Wine professional here…. Don’t cook with it, you’ll only spoil the food. Unfortunately cheap red is the hardest to do anything with. Suggest mulled wine or sangria. What ever you do, don’t cellar it!

Damn, going to have to give that a spin now. Many a great night at the Garage in Glasgow!

I have but two:
An arborist just around the corner called Steve Slaughter. Unfortunately way he has sign written his van – reads Steve Tree Slaughter Services.

Another one I have seen around the place is Meh engineering. I guess they are not very good.

Three things from me:

Ride with the assumption you’re invisible or that all the other drivers are actually trying to kill you.
Don’t think you can ride like it’s a race track unless you’re actually on one (thoroughly recommend btw)Chicken Strips are perfectly ok on the road, if you’re running to the edge of your tyres then you’ve got nowhere to go.

Could be exercise induced migraine? I get them frequently and it started after a mini stroke a few years ago. If it’s just suddenly started I’d recommend seeing your GP ASAP. You’ve only got one brain.

Serial EV charging tariff gamer here… $0.08 per kWh midnight to 6am, $0.00 from 11am to 2pm.

powerwall is set to 100% time based control and the heat pump (air source) runs 24/7. Come midnight, eveything flips over to grid and the EV and powerwall guzzle flat out. This stops at 6am and we revert to battery power. Same thing happens at 11am (if there is insufficient solar) which takes us all,the way through to midnight. Any excess solar is mopped up by the EV using a smart app (charge hq) and dumb Tesla charger. They work in conjunction with the powerwall to divert any excess from grid to the ev.

‘They do get me however on the electric hot water, but I have heat pump plans for that which should see a 4.2 year ROI.

Hi, Australian solar performance here. Most people have panels on their roofs. I’m running 4 strings facing north, east and 5 degrees south totalling 18kw, 2 x Fronius inverters totalling 13kw and 14.5kwh powerwall. On the demand side I’m running air source heating and cooling, as well as an ev. Savings on paper are $4k per annum on a total system cost of $20k. If I add in ev charging savings and firewood savings, that doubles to $8k per year. 

Mid 30’s here in the Barossa – an hours drive north of Adelaide in South Australia. No doubt we’ll get the Perth heat in the next day or so!

I tried to sell a Holden cruze (prob a Chevrolet something or other in the uk) a year ago. I gave up in the end due to all the time wasters as they did my absolute head in. It’s still sat on the drive…..

Yakima make the Tesla roof bars, so I’d suggest them as a first stop after the Tesla shop….

South Australia 80% renewables right now. I can only make apologies for our coal burning brethren in NSW,VIC and QLD

Hydrogen for transport is a really tricky area to navigate as it comes in a whole bunch of ‘colours’ depending on how the hydrogen is made. Grey is split from natural gas, green from water electrolysed from renewable electricity and a bunch of different shades in between those two. There are a number of things that need to be considered but the main one is The global market for hydrogen is already huge – its primary use is in the Heinz-Krebb process in fertiliser manufacturing. It’s also worth noting that hydrogen is never transported as for practical reasons it’s always made (from natural gas) at point of use as it’s a tricky molecule to contain. It also does nasty things to steel as it can work its way between the molecules of the container. So, if decarbonisation is the goal – fix the industrial processes first that can only use hydrogen by converting to green hydrogen.

There are also a heap of reasons why we shouldn’t consider hydrogen for transportation asides from the fact that engineering wise it’s crazy to have hydrogen hanging around for longer than absolutely necessary:

it’s energy inefficient- at least 3 times more power hungry than BEV in round trip efficiency (that means 4 times more solar panels, wind turbines and hydro installations)

it’s easily hijacked by the fossil fuel industry and grey substituted for green
it’s not energy dense

it’s already in high demand for industrial processes (as previous)

if you split it from gas it uses several times more gas to achieve the same energy (great if you’re in the gas selling business)

on the point that EV’s are impractical for Aussies – yes, there are some charging limitations at the moment, but containerised solar charging stations can and are being deployed off grid for remote areas and the major mining companies are converting their heavy and light fleets to electric simply because you can make it on site rather than truck it in from 1000’s of kms away. I also knock out over 40,000km a year commuting in my BEV, (70% self powered too) so it’s hard to make that point.

I guess hydrogen cars… well it’s a bit like saying we should be running coal fired steam engines. Yes, it can be done, but it’s not exactly a good use of resources…..

@fat-boy-flat do shimano last better thank crank bros? I seem to needed to replace cleats every 12 months or so with cranks bros…..

I’m just used to that connected feeling with the bike, especially on rough terrain. Also seems to help with keeping my feet consistently positioned on the pedals. I guess the big thing is that I’ve ridden clipless for pushin 30 years now and it’s hard for a old dog to learn new tricks!

Welcome to the forum Andy, never a dull moment here. We’re cheaper than a psychologist.

Henks Plain Jane beef jerky… ‘It’s not as salty as your Ex” 😘

Ditto the bleach- I lived in Haworth and it worked a treat on slimy flagstones. Jet washing also works, but it still leaves enough slime around and it comes back super quickly. Hydrochloric works super well, but it’s not the safest thing and I’m always nervous applying it or even having it in my house.

Keep your nylon strimmer filament in water – nylon is hydroscopic and keeping it wet reduces brittleness.