The easy, cheap option is to use remote desktop to log into one of the university machines. That’s what I do when I WFH, and it works surprisingly well. Fairly standard laptop at home and good internet, but not sure if the university will allow it.

Is he sure he wants a laptop? I’ve had a couple at work and they’re big, with rubbish battery life.

There may be smaller options available now, but it will never be as good as a desktop.

Suggest he looks out for a refurbished Dell, but £700 isn’t going to go far.

Yes, there are two overlapping disciplines, plumbing and electrical. The plumber we use is very upfront and says he doesn’t do the wiring side, but has a mate who does, and so far both have been fine. Part of the problem is me not understanding the system, so hard to know what’s a fault and what’s normal. Thanks to the answers above I understand a bit more.

Thanks. One of the valves has a small leak that we’re getting replaced later this week so I’ll ask the heating guy what everything is.

Swapping to a smart system is a possibility, but there are also 2 UFH systems! Electric in the kitchen and wet in the newish extension. (Not sure why it was done like this.)

OK, so it makes sense that the thermostats are wired to the appropriate valve to open as required. There’s a load of wires going between the valves and a couple of black boxes which must be doing something.

On the pump, it seems to run almost continuously, even when there is no demand from the thermostats, which doesn’t seem right to me.

Thanks for the replies.

I had something similar due to epilepsy last year, 1 year off. It makes a difference if the licence was voluntarily sent back, or was suspended by DVLC. There is also a rule that allows you to drive if you’re fit but waiting for DVLC. The problem with that is insurance. I was fit to drive but couldn’t get insurance because the insurance company can look at the DVLC database, and it had me down as suspended.
There wasn’t much of a backlog in June, but this was a fairly normal 1 year suspension, when they write to your consultation, rather than a letter received.

I’ve not done it, but if I was I’d find something to sell to businesses.

They will understand how much time is worth, so will know what the thing or service you offer is worth to them, compared to selling birthday cards to the general public who expect you to work for a few pence an hour.

How sensitive is your meter? It only takes a small current to flatten the battery if its flowing 24 hours a day.

You should see something if you have a leak.

(And I should have said before, with the meter in between the battery and earth, don’t try to start the engine!)

You need to measure the current flow, so one way to do it is with the meter between the negative battery terminal and an earth point on the chassis, and remove the lead from the battery negative to the chassis. Now all the current is going through the meter.

Sorry if you know all this, but you don’t really measure current drop, you measure either current flow or voltage drop. Can you explain where you’re putting the test leads and how they are connected to the meter.

Don’t forget to measure current the meter must be in the circuit so the current goes through it. Putting the test leads across a fuse will just measure voltage drop (which will be very small if the current is tiny).

Not in my opinion.

Once you start adding things it gets out of control. It’s hard to manage, it’s a pain when you want to search for a particular issue, and you don’t even know how many characters it is, or you leave space for, say, 6 characters in a form, and someones made a 10 character code!

And don’t get me started on part numbers!

I think it’s not a good idea to add letters to your revision text just to ‘fix’ a specific problem (and whatever system you have may not allow it anyway).

If your revision is letter,number keep it like that.

But what happens if there’s a change just to the French version?

Good question, and one I’ve asked for the same reason. My view is that it’s a new document so should have its own issue number, but when you up-issue the English version and get it re-translated that will also bump the french issue number.

You will need to keep a record of what issue number of the original was used for the translation somewhere, and the issues will get out of sync, but as I said, they are different documents.

I had to deal with about 5 different languages once!

But some do sound cancelling, so the must be some signal processing going on. I must take a pair apart and look inside. Another project for when I retire: cheap hearing aids!

As above, made several from milk bottles, they’re the right shape as well.

Yes, but someone is paying for them, NHS don’t get them for nothing (or maybe they get a reduced price?)

Ok, can someone explain why I can buy a pair of wireless earbuds for £10 but hearing aids are thousands.

I get that there must be a load of regulatory stuff to do, but isn’t the hardware much the same?

3M double sided tape.

In that application I’d use a locking nut, nylok or Aerotight, depending on how hot it will get.

It’s not just the cost, it’s the thousands of trees that have been cut down that I’m most annoyed about.

What percentage of the RAF’s aircraft are the Red Arrows? Compared to the display teams of the USAF?

Channel 4 are doing a program about the RAF on Mondays, last week was about a detachment of No 1 squadron to somewhere in eastern Europe. They had 2 Typoons! One went u/s so they had to plead to get another one fly out from the UK.

Not sure if we can justify the Reds anymore (and I love them).

Any writing on the ic’s?

When I will the lottery I’m going to buy a Curta:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curta

I still use RPN. I have, and use most days, EMU48 emulator on my phone (which emulates an HP48. After many years of using HP calculators is just find it easier and quicker. I also have a real HP48 but the phone is easier to carry.

As above, I’ve been looking at the Swiss Micros for a while, they look very impressive, but just can’t justify one when Excel or a phone does everything I need.

Got to be my HP41CV. Spent all summer working on a farm to be able to afford it. Was about £250 back around 1982, so not cheap!

I used to work for a company that now puts anyone that gets to 20 years on a four day week but pays them for five.

I think I remember getting 10 days extra holiday after 10 years. I should have stayed there.

Still get ”No access’ in Edge on my Android phone. Edge is set to full access to photos etc.

Members upload doesn’t work on my phone using Edge in Android. Keeps asking for permissions, which are all enabled for Edge. Ok ish on Windows desktop in Edge.

We’ve got a few around me at the moment. There’s a crossroad in the middle of the village. One Division sign points left, another points right.

Another Sad Cars user here. Picked up the most dented, worn out Subaru I’ve ever seen. No point checking it for damage when returned as nothing short of rolling it would be noticed.

But, it was fine. Great fun not having to worry about denting it, and was fun parking it next to all the smart, modern hire cars at the attractions. Also looked like a local.

I just use a cheap Amazon one. I use it to give a relative measure, and am lucky enough to have loads of well aged logs so not in a rush to use them.

You can always calibrate it by measuring the weight loss after drying a log in your oven, which will give you a dry reading.

Government website on UKCA, updated today.

https://www.gov.uk/guidance/using-the-ukca-marking

Interesting points:

UKCA ‘cannot be used in Northern Ireland’, but is just ‘not recognised’ in the EU, I guess this is to do with the Windsor Framework, and

The UKCA marking can be used now. However, to provide businesses with flexibility, the government will bring forward legislation that would continue to allow recognition of the CE marking and the reversed epsilon marking for most goods that are being placed on the market, or put into service before 11pm on 31 December 2024. You should check the sector specific set of regulations that apply to your product.

Yes, was going to post that. What a surprise. Not.

It would have a problem when the UK regs moved away from the EU ones, which was all about ‘taking back control’. And was a problem trying to find space on a small product for the CE mark and the UKCA one and getting labels printed. Also a load of extra admin to manage.

Unknown cost to companies over the last few years for exactly zero benefit.

Can’t help, but I’m still using my 30 year old Black and Decker WorkMate.

Does Owen have any children?