The new news 24 thread

[High Jetter]

1 hour ago, Rust Collector said:

A summary of today:

• I oversaw the launch of a new software system at work, which I’ve been responsible for overseeing from concept and has taken forever to get to implementation. I’ve had huge anxiety in the run up to this day, and feared failure. It actually went fairly smoothly despite my apprehensions, and I only messaged a bug report to @rob88h by accident once. I’m calling that a result.
• I came home to find that my mrs has reversed the disco into the Proton, smashing the indicator on the proton and damaging the bodywork of both vehicles. Not ideal, but nobody hurt so not worth worrying about.
• My Labrador, who at 12 should be old enough to know better, for some reason rammed his head in the hole of his feeding table. In panic he then ran amok with the table still attached, damaging the house and breaking his feeding table in the process. It was a bastard to pull him back out of it and wasn’t enjoyable for him.
• My father in law and his wife put our kids to bed, cooked us a fantastic dinner and are now filling me with beer and gin.

It’s been a bit all over the place today.

At least the cock-ups aren't of your making! Plenty of mileage there, with Mrs and the Lab.

[Wibble]

1 hour ago, loserone said:

Who remembers these leaf glasses?

 

 

Were these the BP token ones? You wouldn’t believe the amount of this people claim as crystal.

[Split_Pin]

8 hours ago, vulgalour said:

Arcoroc

My parents replaced their Siesta glasses with a full set of those. I seem to recall they got the tumblers from a petrol station but they also had wine glasses and champagne flutes. I'm sure some of the latter survive at my mums house, I'll need to check!

[PicantoJon]

Didn't think I'd be driving home in a different car than I set off in... 

[Dyslexic Viking]

The Vivaro didn't pass the Mot, there were some small defects and the biggest was that the winter tires it was on had the wrong load rating, but the most frightening thing was that one of the brake hoses I changed 2 years ago has started to bulge under pressure now.

So it wasn't too bad, a new set of summer tires and fix the other and it's road legal again for 2 new years. And since it is not road legal, I left it at the garage so they can fix it when they have time in the next few weeks.

[Cavcraft]

Turns out an elderly ML320 petrol does exactly 16mpg round the doors, that's running on E5. It does seem to run better on that (and people say it'll be more economical) but I'll try it on E10 to see how the numbers stack up, as the latter is shit loads cheaper.

[andyberg]

6 minutes ago, Cavcraft said:

Turns out an elderly ML320 petrol does exactly 16mpg round the doors, that's running on E5. It does seem to run better on that (and people say it'll be more economical) but I'll try it on E10 to see how the numbers stack up, as the latter is shit loads cheaper.

Despite this, I miss this car.

[MorrisItalSLX]

The glassware of my childhood would have to be Anchor Hocking Fire King Peach Lustre mugs.

My grandparents had a set and I always enjoyed watching the tea slosh around through the shiny transparent mugs, so much better than these boring non-see-through mugs everyone else had.

I have the one remaining mug from the set.

[Cavcraft]

1 hour ago, andyberg said:

Despite this, I miss this car.

Honestly not surprised, plus it drives a thousand times nicer than the outside suggests. Still haven't had the starting 'thing' looked at, but it's not got any worse. 

[Cavcraft]

14 hours ago, Dick Longbridge said:

I remember those! Weren't they free* if you saved up 50,000 Texaco fuel vouchers or something? 

Edit:

Apparently you could buy tall versions of the same.

 

My parents had several of the smaller ones like yours- I'll have to see if any have survived the last 40  years. 

Edit again:

Turns out it was Esso Tiger Tokens. Seems like yesterday...

There was a 'competition' at the tyre place I worked as to who could get the most Tiger Tokens. One lad was the absolute king, he got thousands of the things somehow.  Often wonder if the Transits we had are still about somewhere, most of them hardly ever saw top gear as we ragged the arse out of them and tried to avoid 5th to burn more fuel.

[grogee]

On 27/04/2024 at 23:17, catsinthewelder said:

That looks ace, please bring it if we have wet weather!

Car park recovery vehicle, £20/tow

[purplebargeken]

Ha, my parents had the tall Siesta glasses when I was a kid.  Ace.

[stuboy]

Highlight of my day was charging the hired renfault ambulances that we waiting too use , the battery's don't seem to want too stay charged for more than couple days...

[Dyslexic Viking]

A couple here today woke up to a Skoda entering the living room.

[Tayne]

22 hours ago, vulgalour said:

 

T

 

 

 

The glasses of my childhood.

My father was a mobile plant glazier so managed to get 1000s of tiger tokens driving a VW Lt with a luton body workshop on the back, in additon to all the glasses he got the power tools and the garden strimmer and almost the whole catalogue. 

[andy18s]

7 hours ago, Cavcraft said:

There was a 'competition' at the tyre place I worked as to who could get the most Tiger Tokens. One lad was the absolute king, he got thousands of the things somehow.  Often wonder if the Transits we had are still about somewhere, most of them hardly ever saw top gear as we ragged the arse out of them and tried to avoid 5th to burn more fuel.

I worked nights at a Shell station when they first started the sticker for 5 litres, fill a card or 2 for a mini Maisto car.

Needless to say I ended up with a full collection,all the way up to a 1/12 Jaguar Xj220.

Then it switched to the Ferrari Collection and again I had the full set,even the Panini/Top Trumps cards..

[Split_Pin]

1 hour ago, Dyslexic Viking said:

A couple here today woke up to a Skoda entering the living room.

Couple OK I hope? 

[Dyslexic Viking]

3 minutes ago, Split_Pin said:

Couple OK I hope? 

Yes, they were in the bedroom sleeping when this happened. The driver was also uninjured.

Not surprisingly, the driver is suspected of driving under the influence.

[Split_Pin]

37 minutes ago, Dyslexic Viking said:

Yes, they were in the bedroom sleeping when this happened

Glad to hear it. Very traumatic nonetheless 😞

[Dyslexic Viking]

3 minutes ago, Split_Pin said:

Glad to hear it. Very traumatic nonetheless 😞

The couple took it in rather good spirits and invited the driver for morning coffee.

[stuboy]

5 hours ago, Dyslexic Viking said:

least they missed the Stradivari on the wall

[Dyslexic Viking]

6 hours ago, stuboy said:

least they missed the Stradivari on the wall

Yes, that was nice of the driver.

[andy18s]

7 hours ago, stuboy said:

least they missed the Stradivari on the wall

But they did flatten the Mona Lisa that's just out of view.....

[Yoss]

6 minutes ago, andy18s said:

But they did flatten the Mona Lisa that's just out of view.....

But that was flat already so that's fine.

 

[Split_Pin]

MOT at 10am today for this.

Other than it starting and driving, I have done zero preparation for this one. Maybe I'll drive down the road to the test peeping the horn and checking the brakes like an absolute madman 😂

[MorrisItalSLX]

*insert punchline here*

[Split_Pin]

A pass for the Saab 😀

[Fat_Pirate]

In 1997 I kept a diary (rare for me), it logs all the trauma I had with this X1/9 I bought for £1500 - replacing the brake master cylinder (twice) being the worst job.  Had I not bought this, and spent the money instead on Apple shares (~$0.13 at the time), I'd have roughly $3m now and no PTSD.

[Barry Cade]

2 hours ago, Fat_Pirate said:

In 1997 I kept a diary (rare for me), it logs all the trauma I had with this X1/9 I bought for £1500 - replacing the brake master cylinder (twice) being the worst job.  Had I not bought this, and spent the money instead on Apple shares (~$0.13 at the time), I'd have roughly $3m now and no PTSD.

You are one of life's winners and that decision has made you the man  you are. You are posting on here instead of being on your yacht in Monaco. If id invested the money ive spent on X1/9s over the years Jeff Bezos would havee been working for me...I take it you removed the entire steering column to replace the cylinder ( 4 or 5 bolts) ? Its a piece of piss !

[Marina door handles]

On 28/04/2024 at 22:51, Marina door handles said:

Well this evening didn't really go to plan...... I will just take the Honda for a test drive after replacing the front brake pads........

About 2 miles from home the Accord suffered some kind of electrical failure (the brakes were fine!).  Initially I was going to fit a spare battery but each time I tried to connect it sparked! And yes the terminals were the right way around, I think the alternator has developed an internal short.  I gave up on any idea of re electrifying the car and ended up getting my better half to tow me back home using my Forester.

Being towed was rather terrifying as my tow rope is rather shorter than I realised (possibly shorter than a cars length)  and unassisted Honda Brakes are heavy and useless .....  It felt like I was just about to rear end my spare/winter/tip run car with my main car for the entire journey!  😬

Hats off to Mrs Marina Door Handles for remaining cool calm and collected and putting up with my panicky riding of the brakes! 

The timing of this is actually not too bad as I am starting a new job tomorrow and breaking down on the way there would have been really unfortunate, its always best to break down in your own time! 

 

Slight update to the saga, I disconnected the alternator and fitted the battery off the Rover. The car burst back into life - so the culprit is definitely the alternator - a new one is on its way, just hasn't arrived yet.....

Which is an issue as my car luck hasn't got any better..... The Subaru is not behaving itself, the power steering pump (which is a second hand unit I picked up because the original was borked) started to only provide PAS intermittently - not ideal but I could live with it...  Well on the way to work this morning I realised that I had made a wrong turn and pulled to halt at this point my faithful Steed cut out....  oh.... Turns out the PAS pump had seized... Panic!

I ended up hacking the fan belt off with my pen knife, like some kind of Automotive Ray Mears! I then limped the car to work. 

Nobody seems to sell the emergency fan belts any more so that wasn't an option, you cannot fit a short normal belt as the pas belt only runs the alternator, which is fixed. None of the girls or guys were willing to lend me a pair of tights so that was option 2 out of the window. One of the lads charged up a couple of old batterys for me which was kind! 

On the way home, I fitted the one of the 2 batterys that actual fitted - just abouts. Tried to start the car.....Nah. Ref fitted the original battery and it fired. Oh well, here goes nothing... I then attempted to nurse the car the 20 or so miles back home, no lights (good job it was daylight hours!), no radio, no heater blower. Survived Stoke traffic and made it back home. Which is great but it means I have got 5 none working cars, brilliant! Thankfully my better half is lending me her car for tomorrow.