the South East will probably grow

Apparently London, if it were looked at apart from the rest of the UK, hasn't entered recession proper at all during the credit crunch.

Back in the day, Intel chips tended to run cooler than their AMD counterparts. If this is still the case, it makes the maker's life easier.

Businesses don't want 50 machines all sounding like Dysons, so the manufacturers try and build low noise machines, which is easier when you've got less heat to dump.

North Norfolk.

Not a fan of Whitby and surrounds. Too bloody cold.

I think there's some slack in the system – firms are trying to make their staff work harder rather than take on new people.

And of course slight economic growth doesn't cancel out shrinkage. If the economy shrank by 5% say, it needs to grow by around 5 and 1/4% in order to be back where it started.

If you're properly scared, you won't learn. You shut down to the reptilian brain. It's a case of pushing yourself, or being pushed, gradually.

Get Brian Lopes' book. It's awesome. It clearly explains all the techniques and physics that get repeated and chinese whispered here and in the magazines.

If single, I'd think about it. If you don't like it and come back after a month, you'll still have a load of cash in the bank. I assume it's around triple your current earning potential?

Why not just go the whole hog and infect him with Ebola or Marburg virus? It'll be hilarious when he shits his intestines out on the bus!

One of the papers tested out different types of bike for commuting. Road bike was considerably quicker, but a hybrid wasn't that far behind, and the guy riding the hybrid wasn't so sweaty and minging. I certainly find that being on the road bike encourages me to go all out.

Don't do it on a Raleigh Banana "racer" from 1988, on a Sunday where you need to spend the afternoon working on your undergrad dissertation. Instead, you might end up in Northern General Casualty Department, along with the town centre pugilists and beaten wives from Saturday night.

I hear vegetarians are particularly susceptible to it 😉

I've got a Raleigh in the shed with near enough the same frame and forks. Your bike's definitely bent.

Might be worth whipping the suicide levers off and getting them on ebay?

I had one in my old Pug estate – it was a rigid plastic OE pug one. Worked fine, did a good job of keeping the boot clean and dry (was transporting a lot of wet and mucky stuff for work at the time). My only question would be if they're a fag to fit – the common seat covers certainly are.

SyncToy and any external device run into problems for most people with stuff that "really" needs to be backed up. In the event of a fire or similar, my PC and external storage, be it USB or hard drive, would almost certainly be in the same place.

I'm not using public folders, I'm using private ones which are presumably accessible only to me.

Unless there's some kind of Flickr "All your base are belong to us" clause in the EULA?

Genius, loads of hassle saved there!

Tell me more! The reason I'm after a USB stick is to do backups with Synctoy, but it's a bit clunky, and I'm a terror for losing things…

There's a good idea in Brian Lopes' technique book, from a Fox tech guy.

You start at the extreme settings, then try one just over half way from the setting that felt best, and iterate from that.

Nope.

It issn't normal. Get Halfords to swap it back. The positions of brake levers are covered by regulations for new bikes – same as reflectors etc.

Kinhell. PCP or something?

I'd always go for a nice san-serif for the body. Comic Sans is my first choice.

Bats can find their way pretty well. They swap roosts pretty regularly and travel fair distances happily enough.

They usually follow linear features – hedgerows, watercourses, paths etc. so it would most likely know exactly where it was.

As for catching and getting rid of bats, if you stick them in a box or whatever for transport, remember that they can get through a 15mm gap 😆

The only time a bat will bite you is if you're handling it. They don't randomly attack people. If you do get bit, it's time to go to hospital and ask for a rabies jab, no ifs, no buts.

It's actually 69p as of last year, and doesn't include the cost of security. Which I'd imagine is a good few quid. Convenient that they left that bit off, eh? And the rest…

Nevermind the royals, what about President Tony? He spends a few years comprehensively winding up a large portion of the country, on the basis of what Bush / God / Whoever's paying him consultancy fees said, and now we're paying for his security, bulletproof cars etc.

The Royals spend a good portion of their time gladhanding foreign dignitaries and citizens at least…

By standing up and keeping the pedals level, you move the bike under you, staying up on the pedals and leaning the bike keeps it planted but is far, far quicker

You can see Steve Peat doing this in seasons – the bike follows the trail, but his bodyweight (and therefore momentum) near enough goes in a straight line.

I'm pretty much with Zulu Eleven's first post on Halal & Kosher meat. Often the lines between culture, race and religion become very blurred.

What concerns me is that when fast food places etc. offer Halal meat, they often offer it exclusively. I can see why they would, for simple economic & practicality reasons. But I would prefer to eat something that's been slaughtered by the methods that have been codified specifically to minimise suffering to the animal. Most likely codified by a committee who knew an enormous amount about it.

As for only eating certain bits, there's very little waste really – I know a butcher, and there's a reason the mince and shin beef is a lot cheaper – it needs shifting! And of course, if we didn't eat meat, most livestock would exist only in zoos.

I'd probably get down the steps, and carry straight on at the corner at the bottom. Or OTB.

I wouldn't worry about the EGR. They're the devil's own job to get on and off, and if it's failing, the car will show a fault. Even when they are failing, they don't cause drastic power loss.

Which HDi are we talking? The early 2.1s and late 2.0s are more complex than the 2.0 HDi fitted to the 406.

The tool designed for the job – easy outs.

And almost universally regarded as the absolute last resort, because they're made of hard, and therefore brittle steel. And they break. And then you can't drill them out.

Irwin Bolt Grippers are also designed for the job, and won't cause that kind of uglyness. But they also don't work for recessed bolts.

Money saving expert has an article on this.

An electric screwdriver set to a low torque will often move stuff that's stuck too. On big nuts and bolts, an air impact gun works wonders but it might be overkill on a bike 😆

What he said.

Hot & Cold helps – kettle full of water, freeze spray, penetrating oil. The hammering in of a torx key will probably shock it loose though.

Muller rice is vomalicious!

SKS mudguards.

The battery life of smartphones is an absolute pain in the neck. Think less than a day if you use it heavily.

Hang on. "Footballer has economic relationship with woman he's boffing" – surely that's just the standard state of affairs? If WAGs had degrees they'd be chasing hedgies instead…

OTOH the Syncro is a good basis for the sillier conversions you might consider – the Haldex diff from an R32 can be fitted, giving electronically controllable front/rear power splits.

A 1.8T Syncro would be a laugh, but for ultimate cornering speed, a quaife or Peloquin diff in a well set up FWD MK2 is better. The 4WD cars lose the rear wheel steering which was built into the FWD Golf's suspension.

Thread from the dead!

I'd sidestep or at least very carefully look over any high mileage VR6 Rado / MK3. The bores can go oval at high mileages.

The 2L 150bhp MK3 (ABF engine) is pretty good, lasts well and was supposedly designed with one of the VAG rally teams in mind (SEAT?), so will run to 170bhp with pretty minimal modification.

Look at it like the old Golf Driver.

Exactly. VW UK badged them as GTIs as the name sells well here. Rest of the world had it as a 1.8 Golf.

I suspect a VR6 Corrado is about 170 brake in 1.1-1.2 tonnes? You'll want a 180bhp 1.8T or chip a 150bhp 1.8T GTI. Seat did a nice line in GTIalikes…

My DMF and Clutch was fine too. Then one day it started slipping. It's a big pain in the neck to get fixed, and it's easily avoided by making sure you buy a car that's had the thing done already.