Cougar – Member
Use as a ‘runner’ to cover the motorway bit of carpet through your room?

+1 for this, even a really good quality carpet will show signes of wear quite quickly in the high impact areas, our smallish living room always has a “pathway” from the door to the hallway to the door leading to the kitchen area, so using these offcuts as a runner might be good, unless it is a room like a bedroom that isn’t likely to develop an obvious wear strip.
Other than that cut it to shape for the car boot. I personally wouldn’t put it in my shed as the local rodents would have a field day stripping it and making nests of the stuff.

Just don’t tell them why you want one. Nothing more suspiscious than entering into a long tale of why you want to purchase something potentially dodgy.

BTW medicine (oral)syringes etc don’t have the right type of fitting for needles, so a chemist is unlikely to raise an eyebrow at selling you one unless you look particularly dodgy.
The tip re child nurofen is useful, I’d forgotten that they had those little 5 ml tube type syringes included.

Whatever you end up with, clean it out thoroughly after use as the lubes & oils we use in suspension forks don’t agree with the rubber used on the end of the syringe plungers & will cause the rubber to swell & jam in the syringe barrel.

Does Hewitt in Leyland do Mtb frames, or only road kit?

+1 for kwik fit, had an old Terrano air con serviced a few years back and the ACused to run so cool that rear seat passengers would complain it was too cold behind the tinted windows.

I’d always choose to use a top cap, just in case I end up landing on the stem in an off. The bloody allen bolts hurt enough in that situation without the top of the steerer tube coring a hole through my gut.

Congrats for your actions. Better to introduce him to a knife as a useful tool than wait for some muppet to introduce them as a weapon.

Thanks RM, I’ve applied pre-emptively, got a meeting with HR & the union tommorrow so might be able to withdraw my application yet, which would be good, I have some great friends where I currently work and if my employer could just make a few reasonable adjustments I’m fairly sure I can get back to the level I was at before the big C attacked my brain.
Just that when HR are talking of up to 3 months to redploy me, and if it doesn’t work terminating my contract, then at least applying for a safety net seems like a safety net.

The 28kg refers to what is called noseweight in towing terms, in law the max “downforce” that the towball should be subject to. Can’t see it would be a problem unless you have a bike rack made like the Forth Bridge & bikes to match. In theory the police could stop you & weigh everything but that is highly unlikely unless you load looked or was unsafe. It shouldn’t be exceeded as the Type Approval will only be up to 28kg, and if you had an accident your insurers might look at the overloaded towball as a contributing factor.
Bikes on towbars only become a problem where a person expects to carry bikes & tow a heavy caravan too, and the cumulative weight of caravan hitch & bikes exceeds the towball weight.

How old is the NIP?? Doesn’t it need to have been issued within 14 days of offense? Maybe find
a local solicitor specializing in traffic law if plod say it is genuine NIP.

Cable creak, either end caps in cable stops or where the cable outer enters the routing through the swing arm. Bit of lube/furniture polish might help.

2-3 spin sessions during the week, and then a longish road ride at weekends worked for me before ill health took over my life – hopefully going to get out more during the autum and rejolin the gym for spin classes.
I prefer spin to turbo as I get more from a spin session with the instructor shouting at me than I do using the turbo.

Last frame I posted was via Parcelforce, booked online, only cockup was that they attended to collect on the same day as I’d booked, not the next day as requested. £££ was reasonable and they got the item to a slightly more complicated destination than usual, the guy was a medic living on site in a hospital.

Outstanding news. Put a smile on my face anyway, especially as i was contemplating the possible outcomes of my next brain scan next week earlier today, and your PMA really cheered me up.

Surrounded By Zulus – Member
… will tomorrow be a race for the GC rather than a procession?

Unlikely, seems to be an unwritten rule that the last day is ceremonial, even with a small time gap. I think the last time recently the race was decided on the final day was when they ran a TT into Paris (Le Mond & Laurent Fignon, 1989). Lemond won by 8 seconds, closest gap ever in tour history. I doubt that even if Schlek or Evans is leading by a second or two at the end of today anyone will take them on, besides Trek & BMC would just control things.

A watch, wedding ring, and piece of medicalert jewellery. I also have a small St Christopher on a gold chain that my then GF (now wife) bought me for my 21st.

Had my wedding ring cut off this week as it had become too tight due to meds I’ve been on over the last couple of years – now negotiating with wife whether I go ringless, buy a new one*, or get old one repaired or melted and made into new ring.

*She wants renewal of wedding vows if I go for a new ring, but not sure if I want the fuss & expense that I know she & her family will want with this – @rsed if I’m paying for another family party for her extended family like our first wedding reception became.

We’ve used a TomTom system (one of the better models but surely mapping etc is the same???) and on my PDA we used a mapping system called Mapopolis for several years. Mapopolis wasn’t that good, identifying little service roads on the autoroutes as junctions, but the TomTom was great. Cannot tell you which model as wife has it in the car with her currently, got either 400 or 700 in my mind. Includes a bluetooth handsfree function if that helps and wasn’t cheap, we bought it from Amazon as a package with hard case etc and was cheaper than high street (Halfords) retailers.

Took us to Paris & surrounding areas last year which must be a decent test of a sat nav. Not had it long enough to do a decent north to south and back trip, but wouldn’t have any concerns doing so with it.

organic355 – Member
has anyone tried that tire tyre dressing stuff (for car tires tyres) on the bike tires tyres? Was cleaning the car yesterday, then cleaned the bikes, they look like new with the tire tyre dressing and a bit of bike spray!!

Fixed that for you.

Life is too short to spend time dressing tyres, just get out & ride. Even if selling the bike I wouldn’t bother, as a prospective buyer I’d wonder what the seller was trying to distract me from. About the only advantage might be keeping the tyre rubber conditioned and less likely to become brittle due to UV light exposure.

Second hand might be your way to go, my old Cove Handjob was equipped with brake mounts.

As mentioned, it is the pack size that is probably the biggest issue with these quick pitch tents.

I’ve used a Khyam tent before and they’re not bad, bit weighty but do the job and pack size it a bit more normal. Currently have a small Gelert tunnel type two man tent, pitches in a few minutes, needs a little more thought than the quick pitch types but relatively cheap (£40ish from ebay). Isn’t a 4 season tent, but then neither are the quick pitch type tent.

Vanish stick stuff, and then a suitable stain remover that won’t bleach your too dark shirts.

Think of all the starving in Kenya…..

When we used to take MFL Jr around the local forest, we never used the pram, we used a carrier.
We also changed quite quickly from an oldish Ford Fiesta to something bigger as the Fiesta couldn’t accomodate a pram & anything else – it wasn’t possible to put shopping in the boot with the prame for example.

If my dog bites anyone, then it will go for the needle, end of. I don’t own a dog as a status symbol, or to torment people, or to protect my property, although I have a feeling it would be a better detterent than a house alarm. I like dogs, my dog is well trained (not by me, it was a rescue), and when I have been on long term sick leave it has been good company.

I’ve usually thrown the old part in the bottom of my toolbox, unless it is completely trashed, in which case it goes in the appropriate bin at the front of the house, rubbish or recycling.

And how much does Biketreks charge for their evening rides in the Lakes? Another example of north/south divide, haves/have nots etc? :lol:

allthepies – Member
Was watching my seven year old nephew play football at the weekend and noticed lots of non-traditional kids names being used these days. No Kevins though, I’m pleased to report.

I had this conversation with a couple of people at work this week, where the IT dept couldn’t get patient details in order to bill the appropriate PCT/GP etc. Biggest problem was around “none-traditional” and particularly around spelling of none traditional names.
Harper 7 or VII sounds like a bloody twitter tag doesn’t it.

Have heard of an Armani playing in the local juniors football league though.

Might be better to consider joining the Manchester-Blackpool night ride, thinking along the lines of broom wagon support & feed stops, plus got a feeling the Manchester-Blackpool has 3rd party liability insurance & transport back to Manchester the following morning?

randomjeremy – Member
At the risk of playing devil’s advocate, why do people ride on the road (with their kids)?

Because we’re allowed to. If cyclists grovel and allow motorised vehicles to think they have primacy on the roads, then cycling might as well die.
I was pleased when my son’s school class were offered the opportunity of an after school bike ride by their bikeability instructor, was funny to pick him up afterwards as he stood in the small gang of kids, camelbak on, like any of us would do just talking and having a laugh after a ride they’d enjoyed.

Good luck for your ride, I was in Paris the weekend one of the rides finished there, my wife spotted a group of Mamils near the Eiffel tower the day after the scheduled finish having a photo opportunity for Action for Children. I’d signed up to do the ride but due to a complete lack of training I had to pull out, but have plans to complete the ride next year in the spring.

Joe Blow. Had a couple of cheap Zefal ones from Decathlon but they were truly useless in comparison.

Are the proposals that a student will achieve QTS before completing their course? If so, how, as they won’t have achieved the requirements?

Any other job with a natioanlly recognised qualification (nursing as an example) couldn’t function in this manner, besides what happens when those north of the border get £10K for their last year in university and then get a job working south of the border, would their pay still be halved or would they earn £30k in two years, one of which was while they completed their training.

Ok, so possibly an AT&T phone might be the way to go. I’ve found this website Here[/url] but I’m uncertain whether this is genuine or not. Any ideas?

Terminate contract, get onto agent and tell them to do one too, as they’ve obviously not been black & white enough to potential customers, how many times might this have happened in the past without your knowledge?

Harm to kids isn’t just the obvious of physical, sexual or neglect, there is also a very difficult to prove category of abuse of emotional abuse/neglect, but her behaviour towards her children could certainly be contstrued as emotional abuse.

Just for transport & storing stuff, I’d go with a trailer, caravans are too prone to damp ingress over time. A purpose made “U-Haul” type trailer might be better. Storage of caravans in remote/rural locations also runs a risk of rodent infestation
We limit what we store in our 2010 Swift caravan to reduce risk of damp & attraction to rodents.
I suppose a compromise may be a caravan shell but with all of the unneccessary kit removed – don’t know what an insurer would make of that though.

I’d ask the same question on a caravan forum and be prepared for a very long thread. There are several weight measurements that need to be considered when towing – the kerbweight of the car (not the max tow, that is different), the max loading of the caravan, the max weight that can be applied to the towball of the car, and the max load that can be applied to the rear axle of the car, and maximum train weight for the vehicle, that is towcar & trailer weights together.
Common guidance is that for caravans, due to their high sided nature, a caravan should not weigh more than 85% of the towcar kerbweight for a novice tower, but up to 100% of vehicle kerbweight still remains legal but increasingly less stable. Exceeding 100% is possible, but usually this will be with a none caravan type trailer (think car transporter) which are greatly less effected by cross winds and overtaking traffic than a caravan. I’d think a 206 with a 700kg caravan will be overtaken a lot too!
Noseweight on the hitch should be approx 5-7% of the caravan max load, but cannot exceed the manufacturers stated max hitchweight (noseweight) or the actual max loading stated for the hitch itself (usually Alko, which is in the region of 100kg). That means the 700kg caravan will sit with a noseweight around 35kg (5%).
Rear axle weight of the car cannot be exceeded but is nearly impossible to weigh without taking the loaded car & caravan to a weighbridge. Noseweight can be measured using bathroom scales and a piece of wood equivalent in length to the height of the vehicles towball. Max train weight is again best measured on a public weighbridge and cannot legally be exceeded.
When a vehicle has a max tow of say 3500kg, like a lot of bigger 4×4’s do, this is based upon engine & gearbox being able to cope with the description that Spooky gives, being able to pull away from a stop on a given gradient in the region of 10-12%. A very small number of cars might have a max tow lower than their kerbweight, but the 206 doesn’t stand out as being one of them. Some small cars don’t even have Type Approval for towing due to too low kerbweight etc.
There are also a couple of obscure laws regarding length & width of the caravan that mean some big continental caravans need “commercial” vehicles greater than 3.5tonnes to tow – hence why travellers often use Transits to to tow their big Hobby or Tabbert caravans.
So long as the maths adds up there is nothing to stop the OP’s proposal, I’d want to make sure that car & caravan are both mechanically sound and up to the job.

If the kids have witnessed any of her behaviour towards you, then contact social services – children shouldn’t be exposed to domestic violence issues. If the police get involved and are worried about her capacity to safeguard her own children, then as a matter of course the police would be obliged to involve the social services.
Under Child in Need a Common Assessment Framework would be completed, and this would possibly lead into a series of Child in Need meetings.
A phone call to health visitor might not go amiss either.
Doesn’t sound like the kids would progress to a Child Protection Plan (the old register doesn’t really exist any more) as CAF & CIN is meant to manage lots of lower level problems and keep the SS free for dealing with clear cut cases of harm.

It’s a complicated situation you are in, but for your own sake & the sake of her children there needs to be some action taken.
Best of luck.

I think schools only get concerned over those who have an existing poor attendence record, if a child is otherwise attending then they’ll pay little attention.

ADH’s choice gets my vote.

Get some practical vouchers. We asked for some vouchers, Argos, Ikea, B&Q, and had people handing us M&S ones because “they were posher”. Might be, can’t buy bloody powertools in M&S though can you? Has taken me 16 years of marriage to get around to buying a decent cordless drill.