Head west if you can – you’ve (we’ve) got arguably the best sailing in the world right there on the doorstep! Years ago I got certified by the people at Cumbrae – they joined us on a boat we’d borrowed.
I can’t see a problem with doing the theory yourself – but there’s no better way than to apply what you are learning. My one (very minor) worry would be picking up poor habits – hence the value of a practical course to follow it up.
Dunno about mtb and sailing, but check out this[/url]

I spoke to Alex at bike rehab on the phone recently, he seemed like a nice chap. I don’t live in Sheffield (any more) but he has a decent reputation with friends of mine who do.

mines clad in cedar, and is 40 years old at least.
not rotten yet.
YMMV

brooess – good luck and enjoy the adventure.

I kept using my own phone, because that was the number people had. In theory I guess I could move the contract across to the company, but I can’t be bothered. A new laptop was needed though, so that is owned by the Ltd. Co. Like others have said, there’s some advantage to buying it out of gross (and more if you are VAT registered…)

Yeah, i did the same sort of thing recently with an SLX lever (generously donated by Vorlich, of this parish, to whom I still owe a bottle of wine). I dodn’t take photos, but it works really well. Ergonomics are spot on!

Basically, you (carefully) take the shifter to bits, and when the springs all come pinging out you’re done cos you don’t want them anyway. vtje – I think the other side of the lever might have some allen screws that will be the next stage, there might be a cap to prise off the central one, at the other end of where that flat spring is held.

I took out the downshift lever, to leave just the cable pull mechanism and return springs (which are a pig to get back in). The central bolt through the mechanism seemed to have a tapered thread to hold it all together – a bit of aggro and a vice solved that, but I threadlocked it when it went back together.

In short, if you’ve got or can get an old shifter, there’s nothing to lose by trying!

Saracen from about 1992.

bonfire night’s not far away…

Hi,
There’s a mech hanger attached to your mech already – with forward facing dropouts (i.e. actual dropouts, not track ends like you’ve got) this would be held by the rear skewer and probably a screw/bolt/funny shaped washer through the hole that’s in the top of it. You can probably do the same with this one – just trap the mech hanger in with the skewer.
The fork looks a bit like it could be a Carlton, but the seat stays don’t – are there frame numbers on it (bottom of bb, rear dropout, and/or fork steerer)?
Are the wheels newer than the frame – I think those mavics are 700c but the frame looks like it might fit 27″. What hubs?

Oh, and your drive needs the moss doing, etc, etc

IANAL (or a tax accountant); this is not advice:

I believe that the IR35 regs are set out to capture those in ‘disguised employment’, i.e. using a Ltd ‘service company’ for receipt of payment – thereby incurring corporation tax rather than e.g. PAYE. Think footballers and executives.

If you operate (as many do) as a one man Ltd, my suggestion would be to operate as much as if you were a larger company as you can. While the product is essentially you, any contracts should include reference to the right of substitution, severance clauses etc, to formalise the arrangement that a commodity is being bought (the service you provide), not the employment of an individual. Likewise, operating as a business might be expected to, e.g. bidding for work in several places, invoicing clients, chasing payments, having a letterhead and biz cards, serving multiple clients, etc all helps.

When you attend a client’s premises, do things like sign in as a visitor, make sure you aren’t in the tea club or lottery syndicate and the like (cos that’s what employees do – you’re not one!). Don’t go to the Christmas party (even if that one from accounts is eyeing you up).

HMRC have guidance here which includes a confidential advice line. I’ve not used this one, but their other departments, have actually been very helpful.

All that said, I suspect that even the best contract will not help if you should be caught by IR35. However, if you are outside IR35 then paying for a contract might give you peace of mind (or someone to blame…). The cost of that peace of mind might be well worth sleeping soundly – you’ve got enough else to worry about!

Something near you on nerdydaytrips[/url]?

yes, good idea – just spend a bit of time – take it steady, etc. Once you’ve got the lacing pattern right, you are ‘only’ doing up 32 nuts onto very long bolts.

+1 chromoplastics, but sometimes a little help from a heat gun to get them really snugged in. Worth spending a bit of time to get them ‘just so’.

two fat ladies…

Can’t speak for the 3 dr, but two bikes go into the Mk4 golf 5 dr with the front wheels off no problem. Seats down, fling em in. I can’t see the newer models being hugely different, and the opening is a bit more of a normal shape than the c30.

that’s known as ‘the game with no name’ in our house, and the kids love it.

My experience of setting up a Ltd was that is was all pretty straightforward. I can’t quite see the advantage of paying an umbrella (sort of defeats the purpose really). Find an accountant that you can work with, there’s lots to choose from. In true STW fashion, I’d happily recommend mine!

As INH says, it will pay to do your reading on IR35 – is the contract effectively your current employer becoming your first client?

Also, it might be worth looking at whatever the equivalent to IR35 is in Benelux, or if you can set up your Ltd there. Amazon, etc seem to benefit from it!

@sandwicheater
one’s weasel-ey identifiable. The other is stoat-ally different

Brooess, Like you I was with FD, but I phoned to ask and they don’t do company accounts. I opted for Clydesdale cos they were the nearest branch to me. I’m not desperately impressed, everything seems to be about filling in forms, and then taking ages. Free banking for 2 years though.

RealMan,
Just want to say thanks for these updates. I had originally thought that the big GC boys packing up [spoiler? ;-)] would make for a slow year, but I reckon this will prove to be one of the best tours for a while. It’s not in the bag yet by a long way.

what size is the soul?

I’m loving that a guy in a birch bark canoe has a name like that!

I think you might be able to get a new socket at an electrical supplier (or even screwfix/B&Q come to that). Wire it in as described here and see what happens?

ring ring

There was a site somewhere that tells you what voltage things should be, but I can’t find it now. Trial and error might not be the best bet – as per spooky_b239’s comments.

Oh, and get the proper tool for putting the wire’s in, even just a cheap plastic one will do.

Done – interesting, especially the uncertainty element. Good luck with the project.

Oh dear, nothing positive to report I’m afraid, I got humped for a bit of a scratch* no way they were backing down. I think they try to cover their loss form the vehicle bing in for repair too, so it may be worth a visit to your local bodyshop before taking it in.

*well, a bit of a dent if I’m honest, wasn’t as bad as they made out though

have a look at Irfanview – the batch options seemed to be pretty useful, but its a while since I’ve used them.

ere, are you looking at my pint?

This guy [/url]seems to have taken a few of these to bits. It looks like there are some places wher grease is needed and some oil (the article suggests that oil alone would come out the seals).

The question that springs to mind is whether a ‘preventative’ service would actually do more harm than good? Obviously if you are having problems there’s a benefit, but otherwise I might be tempted to leave it be.

I’m only just wearing mine in (a few hundred miles tops) but do rather like it – what sort of life has yours had?

Wot nemesis said ^

Also, if you get a race number, tape the edges so it doesn’t act like a sail.
An odd one, but if you take a bottle, put the cage on the seat tube, not the down tube – it deflects air round the rear wheel apparently. Saying that, you shouldn’t have time for a drink on a 10.

After a few goes, you will probably get a better idea of pacing. Again, I’m not sure there’s time for that on a 10, just empty the tanks and hope the clock is kind to you.

I really like the combination of thinking about being faster and going out and doing it. As others have said there’s some impressive times there, and they are moving in the right direction. Just enjoy yourself!

Nicolai Tesla

Linky

I think the trick is in how you start off.

It’ll be a pain if you want the folk’s names in there (edit: yeah, Geoffj types faster than me!), but if you just want dots on the page, start by highlighting only the numbers in your two columns, then insert/scatter.

If you include the labels it starts to get upset and think your series are different to what they are.

I might be tempted to consider the MEDIAN function here. I believe it ignores blanks too, but my main reason would be that it deals better with outliers in your data, e.g. John M gave you a ‘2’ for staff training, but you got better scores from the others.

Being picky, ‘average personal score’ is the sum of scores per person isn’t it?

Have you mown the grass yet?

Good on you mate. Don’t listen to this rabble – or if you do only after you’ve compared times for a 25.

Bailie Nicol Jarvie / The BNJ might work for you. Blended, but that isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Supermarket ‘highland’ malts i.e. own label might work for you too – I’m pretty sure they are just younger/unlabelled versions of what you’d pay more for in a smart bottle.

Can we play a guessing game?

Is it looking north to Carnoustie from somewhere like Kingsbarns?

ninfan raises a good point. That’s not a new bike, its a prop for your next photoshoot…

More seriously; just keep a record of it. If you sell ten of them then HMRC might be interested (or indeed if the first of the four figures is a nine!), but as it stands I think that you’ve paid your tax at source. I have a good accountant I can ask if you want me to double check for you?

Oh and well done! Thought you’d not long sold the Leica?

Good luck with it – I did something similar and went through all that IR35 heartache. Essentially the rules are there to catch ‘disguised employment’ so if you operating on a freelance/Ltd Co basis is simply a way of avoiding PAYE, then you fall under IR35. I don’t think your status affects this, it’s to do with the relationship between you and your client, and making sure that isn’t an employment-like relationship.

The way round it is to behave as an independent business would – bid for work from other clients, get a letterhead, biz cards, other clients, incur business expenses, ensure that any contracts between you and a former employer deal with things like right of substitution and mutuality of obligation. Use your own timesheets, and expenses forms (on that lovely new letterheaded paper you sorted out). Sign in as if you were a visitor. Get out of the office lottery syndicate and don’t do the milk rota. Once you have two or three contracts under your belt it will stop worrying you!

In my view there were some advantages to operating a LtdCo – you gain the protection of limited liability, i.e. the company’s money or debts are the company’s, not yours. So if the company gets sued, you can keep your house! There’s some benefit from distribution of profit at corporation tax rates, not personal tax rates. On the whole I am not sure the extra paperwork is particularly burdensome, but in either case try to get your head around the difference between ‘you’ and ‘the business’.

I strongly recommend that you find an accountant that you can work with, they’ll save you far more than their fees in time and worry.

One thing to watch though is that if you designate part of your home as ‘work space’ you may become liable for business rates on that portion. I think the sums in my case worked out at about £4 – it’s really not worth the hassle.

What line of work are you in/where are you based?

IR35 contract guide[/url]

I have a chunky monkey (the sticky one) on the front and love it, seems to be wearing pretty well too.
The Smorgasbord on the back a bit less so, I find its a bit sensitive to pressure, and not desperately grippy on grass – locks up on the way down grassy slopes easily.

yep, like the others I’d never have heard of these if it wasn’t for you lot. Ordered one on the strength of this thread last week and am very impressed.

Got the ipod plugged in to a Locic3 dock, line level into the back, sounds great!

Thanks stw.

Is there any potential for a Trombe Wall?

I helped make one in an eco-demonstrator house once, and they seemed like a pretty effective approach (with the added bonus of summer cooling), but a lot will depend on whether you can successfully incorporate it into the existing house.