The new news 24 thread

[stuboy]

13 hours ago, beko1987 said:

Looks like she's practising for when the "patio needs relaying"... 

its only for the wheelie bins to sit on rather than landscaped.. 

[NorfolkNWeigh]

Never upset a woman that can use a spade and lay slabs , ask Mr Jordache 

[MarvinsMom]

today we gave up one of the garages where one of the broken smol cars has been kept.

i pushed one broke car out of the other garage on the same block that we still, well for now anyway, have.

then kerry pushed the evicted car out, and across, and into the now vacant garage.

the broken mini was then hooked up to the back of the Rover, and it was dragged back to Kerrys.

once there, we popped the plugsout,and gave them a clean, before kerry took the cap off the dizzy.

turning over the engine, well there is no spark at the plugs, though kerry says she did see a spark at the points.

so,i think i'm going to get another coil first, and then maybe a new rotor arm, cap and, ifi feel flush maybe even some plugs and leads.

then it was cover on, its FAR to big, hell it was big on Marvin the Metro  and away home.

but i am now sure, i want to get it running and then its going .

i know i won't ever be able to have another mini 1000, but, frankly this sums np what i think of it (and the other broken smol cars)

[SiC]

I wish Minis weren't so expensive. I'd really like one but not for the high four figures they go for. Especially as they're high liability in the rusty bodywork stakes. 

I remember looking over your black one when you took it to the Leyland day at Gaydon. Looked like a lovely little thing. 

[SiC]

Found a picture I took. 7th Jul 2019. Nearly two years ago now!

[HMC]

13 hours ago, Jenson Velcro said:

Seeing this picture of a pub in Tavistock, makes me want to ask if the Ordulph Arms is still going? I worked in Tavi for 3 years in the mid 90s and lunches were often spent in the Ordulph as it made the afternoons pass in somewhat of a blur. The landlord had a Lotus Elan and a Lotus Carlton which he seemed to use as his daily. I remember briefly ( for about 400 yds) following him across the moors. Bloody hell it was rapid.

It was still going until a couple of years ago, the landlord used to have a DB7 in the 00’s so possibly the same owner as was then.

[Parky]

Failed my first financial paper.  Reason?  I referred to a test case client as “wanting to invest money gifted to them from their late grandfather”

Failed because I didn’t say the word “inheritance”

Funny old system.  You have failed.  Unless you correct the thing you failed on.  In which case you have passed.  I wonder why they don’t just say “hey, alter that and resubmit and we’re good”

In the final stages now.  Another day or two and that should be it

 

[Tadhg Tiogar]

13 minutes ago, Parky said:

Failed my first financial paper.  Reason?  I referred to a test case client as “wanting to invest money gifted to them from their late grandfather”

Failed because I didn’t say the word “inheritance”...

 

What if it was a gift given before the late grandfather's death? That wouldn't be an inheritance, so much as a potentially exempt transfer (albeit NZ may not have the PET loophole)....

[Parky]

1 hour ago, Tadhg Tiogar said:

What if it was a gift given before the late grandfather's death? That wouldn't be an inheritance, so much as a potentially exempt transfer (albeit NZ may not have the PET loophole)....

Ha ha!  Could have pulled that but the text did state inheritance from grandfather, I just didn’t call it that.

Rather like referring to “Pension” instead of “New Zealand Superannuation”. It means the same.  Or claiming “WCPGW?” instead of “the value of investments can go down as well as up and you may not get back the amount invested”

[Austat]

Got chatting with a bloke at a local garage of mine who has this lovely Monza Red RS2000 which I last saw around two years ago. I forgot to get a photo of it last time I saw it and regretted it, so it was good to see it again.

He looks like he's in his late 50's, and said he's had it since he was 18, so perhaps a one owner car! He plans a restoration for it in the future.

[Parky]

I have a collection to do tomorrow....

[tommotech]

Over the weekend I helped my brother fit brake discs & pads to his Audi TT, he procured the parts through Autodoc and went for the RIDEX brand.

I was a little dubious as I had no experience of RIDEX and they always come out less expensive than any other brand there. I did try to find out who they are associated with but they appear to be independent, according to their website. That said I was pleasantly surprised, finish was good on the discs, the pads had the usual excessive paint / powder coat that needs filing to get them to fit nicely in the caliper but that's no worse than Eicher or Apex stuff that I've had from the local motor factor.

Time will tell but I would be interested to hear of any other experiences with RIDEX, if there are any.

[brownnova]

Doing some clearing of a corner in my garden... what’s that big metal thing in the undergrowth...

 

Road sign.... 

Standard. 

[Floatylight]

1 hour ago, tommotech said:

Over the weekend I helped my brother fit brake discs & pads to his Audi TT, he procured the parts through Autodoc and went for the RIDEX brand.

I was a little dubious as I had no experience of RIDEX and they always come out less expensive than any other brand there. I did try to find out who they are associated with but they appear to be independent, according to their website. That said I was pleasantly surprised, finish was good on the discs, the pads had the usual excessive paint / powder coat that needs filing to get them to fit nicely in the caliper but that's no worse than Eicher or Apex stuff that I've had from the local motor factor.

Time will tell but I would be interested to hear of any other experiences with RIDEX, if there are any.

Thank you, just ordered springs, shock, bump stops and full rear subframe bush kit for under £100...

[Cord Fourteener]

I somehow managed to open a Wikipedia  article on Eliliana Torrini in Scots.

And it turns out she is Italian-Icelandic, just for more linguistic fun. 

[Cord Fourteener]

Probably old news now but Sabine Schmitz died of cancer earlier this month. I believe she went down fighting, there's a heart-warming video of her last public message, in German but she seemed strong to the last. 

She is responsible for one of the best pieces of Top Gear footage and one of the best pieces of driving catptured on film in general, in my opinion:

 

[brownnova]

Very first person to knock on my new front door (fitted today) was a <gentleman with an Irish accent> trying to buy my Saab 900... “I’ll do you a favour and give you £100 for it today and take it off your hands”

Funnily enough I don’t find that much of a favour.... 

 

[Tadhg Tiogar]

Just now, brownnova said:

Very first person to knock on my new front door (fitted today) was a pikey trying to buy my Saab 900... “I’ll do you a favour and give you £100 for it today and take it off your hands”.... 

In a way, you're lucky the fella offered £100. Half the time, they just take without paying.

[richardmorris]

Strange glowing orb in sky.

[Floatylight]

1 hour ago, brownnova said:

Very first person to knock on my new front door (fitted today) was a pikey trying to buy my Saab 900... “I’ll do you a favour and give you £100 for it today and take it off your hands”

Funnily enough I don’t find that much of a favour.... 

 

£200 and half a packet of Hobnobs

[Zelandeth]

4 hours ago, Tim_E said:

I somehow managed to open a Wikipedia  article on Eliliana Torrini in Scots.

And it turns out she is Italian-Icelandic, just for more linguistic fun. 

Stop making me even more homesick than I already am...

That basically sounds in my head like any of the regulars in any of the pubs I grew up frequenting (with my parents obviously - well aside from one, which admittedly we did live next door to and I was friends with the kids of the landlord, so different rules applied there!) just chatting about anything...

[MikeR]

hopefully the focus is alright for another year , put it into the garage for a check over today , slight knock on the offside front which I thought was the track rod end ,

and its come back ok , on the car cam its had a good ragging around and  a trip on the ramps and they think its ok ..

so hopefully its a pass in April for it , fingers crossed .......

 

edit

tre bollocks , just check my dates and I am a month out , its June its mot is due ......

 

[richardmorris]

Brooklands museum on tv tomorrow. Info from the local 2cv club.....

High everybody

 

Just a quick note  to let you know starting tomorrow night (Tuesday 30th March) at 20 00hrson the Yesterday channel (Freeveiw channell 26)  ' Secrets of the Transport Museum',  a series of one hour documenteries filmed at Brooklands Museum, Weybridge. I am not sure how many episodes there are but it does feature all areas of the museum. The trailer looks very good.

 thats all for now, enjoy

Bill

[Tadhg Tiogar]

3 minutes ago, richardmorris said:

Brooklands museum on tv tomorrow. Info from the local 2cv club.....

High everybody...

He must be on drugs

[richardmorris]

1 minute ago, Tadhg Tiogar said:

He must be on drugs

You’ve met Bill then!

[MarvinsMom]

mini fiddling continues - 

have put another coil on, still no spark.

so, tried another rotor arm. nope, still nothing.....

so, tired another king lead onto the dizzy. yes you guessed it, still nothing.

bastard thing!

any one know how easy it is to set fire to a car and make it look like "an electric thing" and not arson?

[phil_lihp]

Points and/or condenser maybe?

[Lord Sterling]

Boring car stuff.

Bit by bit I am returning or repairing stuff on the boring modern Peugeot 407.

Rear bumper has always looked like this:

So I bought a trim piece in the right colour. The cheapest one in the right colour had a bit of paint damage which I didn't really mind given the cheaper price. It arrived but had a clip holder missing and a holder tag. Ah well, whatever:

Now, the bumper has previously been damaged in the area which explains the missing trim piece, no biggie, but fitting the piece was easy, too easy that it'd easily fall off given a big jolt.

I need to find a way of keeping it on permanently and discouraging a fall off. There is really nothing behind the clip to keep the piece on apart from some flimsy plastic clips of which one has already departed.

Also, I found a matching alloy and was offered the alloy via eBay for lower than the asking. I didn't take the offer as I hadn't been yet paid. By the time I had, the offer had ended and I sent an offer explaining I'd just missed it but seller didn't reply and the listing ended, so back to the search. 

[High Jetter]

2 hours ago, richardmorris said:

Brooklands museum on tv tomorrow. Info from the local 2cv club.....

High everybody

 

Just a quick note  to let you know starting tomorrow night (Tuesday 30th March) at 20 00hrson the Yesterday channel (Freeveiw channell 26)  ' Secrets of the Transport Museum',  a series of one hour documenteries filmed at Brooklands Museum, Weybridge. I am not sure how many episodes there are but it does feature all areas of the museum. The trailer looks very good.

 thats all for now, enjoy

Bill

Yup,didn't series link for me on sky tho

[wuvvum]

I made a bit more progress with clearing out the garage over the weekend.  Most of the stuff has been slung in the back of the Iveco for now, but at least I've made a start on sorting stuff into "keep" and "sling" piles.  The Innocenti is also now much closer to being able to be extricated.  I refitted the nearside front wheel, now resplendent with a shiny new ditchfinder that I bought from Camskill and which I got the local garage to fit while they were putting a pair of part worns on the Mondeo.  I'd also taken the battery off to charge up, and once refitted the car fired up with a bit of cranking (always takes a while from cold as the auto choke is broken).  Dry storage obviously suits the car - all the electrics worked when tested, normally when I've left it standing a while I have to piss about wiggling connections to get things to work.  I did notice when putting the front wheel back on though that the brake pads are very low, so I've ordered a set of those.  Hopefully over the bank holiday I'll be able to get it out of the garage and give it a bit more of a going over.

The other job on the list was to swap the wheels front to rear on the Mondeo - I had the replacement tyres fitted on the back, as they were pretty much on the limit whereas the fronts were only worn on the inside edge, but I prefer to have the better tyres on the wheels that do most of the work.  That turned out to be a fairly easy job - I lifted one side of the car at a time, the front on the car's own scissor jack and the rear on the trolley jack - and the garage had done the wheelnuts up to the correct torque rather than going mad with the ugga dugga gun.

The petrol C2 is booked in for a test on Thursday so I went round it quickly checking all the lights etc. are still working as it hasn't been anywhere for a while.  The nearside front tyre had gone down, which was slightly worrying - it inflated again fine but I'll have to keep an eye on that.  Otherwise I haven't found any obvious fails other than the grot in the driver's side sill, but that doesn't mean MOT man won't find other bits wrong...

The diesel C2 disgraced itself this weekend as well - heading in to Norwich on Sunday the rear silencer fell off.  The tail pipe had rusted clean through, and the silencer was left dangling by one hanger, bouncing along the road.  Fortunately the hanger itself was rotten enough that I was able to wrench the silencer off and stash it in the boot.  So that's another bit of expenditure the car needs - if it carries on like this I will have spent more money fixing it than I've been saving on fuel.  It did manage 110 miles on the last tenner of diesel I stuck in though, which isn't bad going, and it isn't stupidly noisy with the back box missing - it's a bit more droney but it's only properly noticeable when I put my foot down.

Whilst I was in Norwich I swung by where I used to live (haven't been round there for over a year) and bumped into the only former neighbour I've kept in touch with - he was just arriving home from fettling his (formerly my) MGB which has been stashed in his mum's garage over the winter (his own garage being allocated to his 1969 Mini Cooper S, which for obvious reasons he wants to keep a close eye on).  So I joined him in his garden and had a good old chinwag, which was nice.