chodweaver

Do the front wheels often make a bid to escape and join the back wheels on these?

@JJ0063 I think you already know that this would be a bad move. It sounds a hard, sometimes dangerous and poorly paid job with a shit work/life balance. If you want the experience and are prepared to move on in a short time, fine. 'Cos from the sounds of it, it's not a job that many people settle into for the long haul.

I recall Clarkson praising the Berlingo for the best ride he'd ever experienced! I don't remember ever travelling in one though, so cannot comment. To this day, I still get nauseous if reading/looking at a screen while a passenger on A or B roads, doesn't seem to matter what the vehicle is. Personal chunder history: Vauxhall Victor estate Ford Popular 105E Several ADO16s and minis Marina (many, many times) School trip coaches (usually into a plastic bag. I'd got plenty of practice in by that age) Citroen GS (driven by a lunatic uncle, around Barrow's roads)

Fine effort! I'll be on some of the same roads the next two days but our itineraries are unlikely to match, so have a virtual wave and three Hail Marys to speed* you on your way.

I think you've answered your own question there, wuv

Those vids do suggest there's a problem either with too little current/voltage going into the arc, or the wire feed stuttering and causing burn back. 3VOM and i had a more severe case of that, due to the wire spool hub running dry and putting up too much resistance for the feed rollers to overcome. A generous application of vaseline helped. Check how smoothly the wire feeds both off the spool and through the torch liner. With the feed rollers and the spool tensioner released, there should be little resistance to the wire coming through - pull some through with pliers and see what the feed rollers have to overcome. Also, have you replaced the torch tip recently? If not, compare the hole with a new one - the wire needs to be quite snug as it exits the tip as this is where the wire gets its current from. A sloppy, worn hole in the tip* will cause intermittent current feed and disrupt the arc. * OOOH ERRR, Matron!

Just caught up with this. Bastards.

Wouldn't it! Alas, no. I just mentioned the Titan cos it changed my mind about cordless battery tools.

Some great suggestions there. +1 for mirrors on sticks. I also have a broken rear view mirror that lives in the portable* toolbox. Both are useful for locating things I dropped down the back of an engine, checking inboard brake pads for wear, looking for the access grommet on the backplate of shitty drum brakes (easier than getting my head stuck in the wheel arch or being under the hub when the car is only on a jack), inspecting the inboard side of a suspect sill without actually lying on the ground. You get the idea. Also +1 for picks. Spring hooks was what my first set were supposed to be, but they got used to dig paint out of posidriv screw heads before applying a driver in an attempt to not round them out, unclog naughty washer nozzles, hook moss out of crevices in bodywork and trim, scratch legends on material to be cut, bent etc and of course, retrieve non magnetic things dropped in to inaccessible places. I've avoided the rabbit hole of cordless tools for almost as long as they've been around, but a Titan cordless drill driver changed my mind, and this was reinforced by the ActivEnergy 20/40v battery gear that Aldi are doing. The cordless grinder skin of this range is my favourite new tool at the moment, and I've just spaffed more money than I'm prepared to let on to Mrs CW on: Another battery Another grinder skin (so that I can have one set up with flap sander wheel, the other with slitting disc) The Ferrex combi drill driver skin And I've finally tumbled to the pretend three drawer tool chest (in red!) that Aldi are flogging as a **Special Buy** for £30. Watch the grumpy thread to see if it turns out to be made of sharp edged foil, or has failed to survive the attentions of the couriers that Aldi use

So, why am I still up at this ungodly hour? Pink Corsa decided it didn't want to crank at about 9pm. Oddly, it had been starting fine every 5 mins or so since 5pm, as is the needs of a delivery shift. On bidding the recovery wallah a good night, I had my supper and decided now was as good a time as any to eliminate the Corsa's ignition switch from its FTP investigations. HBOL says you need to get the steering wheel off to get the shroud and stalks off. You don't. Getting the ignition barrel (which has been crying out for a regreasing) and the switch off is not difficult on a Corsa C, so I was soon able to check the switch operation, smear some grease around and put it back together. In checking the wiring diagram with Haynes, I noted there is a starter relay easily accessible in the main fuse box. Pulled that out and prised it apart and found a pair of slightly furry contacts that had a fair bit of resistance when closed. Cleaned them up and put it back together. I'll test it in the morning, but if that's not fixed it, I'll know I'm not wasting my time getting the Corsa on ramps and taking the solenoid and starter motor off, as it can't* really be anything else now... * Famous last words

Took AutoAid's cover a couple of months ago when I CBA arguing with RAC about the cost of the full fat service. Cover for me and Mrs CW was about £65 iirc. Used them for the first time tonight, as it happens. The pink Corsa decided it wanted a rest from delivery duties, half way through a shift. Fortunately, it decided to throw in the towel outside the shop, so I was able to hop in the boss' (or perhaps it's the boss' wife's) 1 series BMW and finish the shift in that, before having a firtle then deciding to call for help. They told me I was looking at about an hour's wait, but in fact the recovery wagon turned up after about 25 mins, looked at the same things I did and drew the same conclusions: that at 11pm on a Thursday night, an automatic Corsa which had a healthy battery and no warning lights and had been starting without a hiccup since 5pm, suddenly refused to crank, should be taken home and left to think about what it has done: - fixing it could wait till tomorrow. Poor bloke - he'd been on since 8am this morning and his previous call had been to a right bunch of herberts at services on the M6 with a Citroen Relay tipper that he felt was clearly overweight, possibly by a ton. When they'd phoned it in, they said it was unladen. Added to this, they had it stacked very high so if he'd got it loaded, he'd have been well over 16'. They refused to sign a waiver that if the recovery rig with the Relay on got pulled for being overweight, they'd pay the recovery guy's fine (2 grand he estimated, based upon looking at their load), so with the backing of his boss, he left them to it. Their loss. My gain.

You are Anthony Quayle in Ice Cold in Alex AICMFP

They are an invention of the devil. Especially those where there is no hole in the backplate for tricking the auto* adjuster to move the shoes away from the drum, or where there IS a hole, but the adjuster is fiendishly designed to allow only outwards adjustment TOWARDS the drum through the access hole.

Tv and radio ads which... actually, ALL tv and radio advertising can get in the sea, but the ads that can get in first, to be trampled into the sharp shells and rocks, broken White Lightning bottles, half corroded oil cans and shopping trolleys that will cut them to ribbons, by all the other ads right behind them, are the ads with the 'catchy' little whistle embellishing them. Which is what I have been subjected to this morning by the neighbours' fencing contractors who, despite working in the great outdoors in glorious weather, with birdsong to entertain them, have brought their fucking Makita builder's radio with them, tuned to a commercial station with a playlist made exclusively of the worst 80s shit, but limited to 16 tracks, so Starship 'we built this fucking city' and Phil Collins' Sussudio will be back around in 3, 2, 1... Fuckers. So i remembered i had some pressure washing to do. That drowned it out.