What makes you grin? Antidote to grumpy thread

[Station]

I have a large spare room on my house I never use - I might do this! How much is it for loads of second hand track bits?

[inconsistant]

Depends. I wouldn't bother with the old 'classic' track, unless it's in really good condition or has interesting track bits like the skid chicane/hump back bridge etc, instead go for the new 'sport' track.

Sport track is compatible with the older system and can be joined with a connector piece. Sport track is easier to put together and take apart, it doesn't tend to warp or bend as much if abused, the slot is deeper and there's always loads of unwanted sets on ebay, so you can buy 3 or 4 sets and get enough for a big track, but it will tend to be standard curves and straights. Our track has all 4 raduises (radii?) which go from hairpin to wide fast curves. Try to get sets that are close to home so you can collect, as postage can be a bit steep.

 

The cars are the main expense, until you want to go 'Digital' and race more than 1 car on each lane like we do, then you can spend as much as you like on lane change tracks for overtaking, pits for in-race refuelling, a pc & connection cable for ghost cars and Race Management Software, a projector to show in race stats on the wall, etc etc until you end up in a church hall in Windsor once a month doing mad tracks like this

 

I've got some spare stuff in good condition which makes up a good set. Mix of classic & sport track and some shite cars from the 80s & 90s. Pm me if interested and/or I'll put up an advert thread. There's Vectras, XR3i, MG Metro and Sierras in the set if I recall.

[richardmorris]

Cheers, I think Halfords can fill my tubes with martian spunk for £5.99 per tyre or something, I should really invest in the tubes or the filling. Do you notice any difference to the ride with them? The road bike has Continental Gatorskins as they have that Kevlar (or whatever it is) lining, but you can't seem to get them for mountain bikes.

 

 

I just replaced my bontrager race-lite hardcases with them as I couldn't find those anywhere. Scwalbes are certainly noisier but calming down a bit now. The inner tubes took a while to spread the gunk around evenly - on the stand the bike was bucking all over the place for a while. I did have those continentals, but mine split after a while. Got mine from wiggle.

[fordperv]

Love the scalextric, i have 3 sets and some extra track that mrs fordperv purchased from a model shop, 2 of the sets were given to me it was pretty much being at the right place at the right time and we're very useful for the extra track, the only downside is I havent got enough space to lay all the track out together

[eddyramrod]

I'm in the same boat, I have 3 sets in this very room and another (bigger) in my lockup, and exactly nowhere to put them out.  Not to mention a load of cars, mostly shite; including some self-builds.  Airfix kits come in the same scale...

[Cavcraft]

I just replaced my bontrager race-lite hardcases with them as I couldn't find those anywhere. Scwalbes are certainly noisier but calming down a bit now. The inner tubes took a while to spread the gunk around evenly - on the stand the bike was bucking all over the place for a while. I did have those continentals, but mine split after a while. Got mine from wiggle.

 

 

Thanks, Richard. After yet another puncture yesterday (4th in three rides, I think!) I ordered two slime filled tubes from an internet auction site today. You can get slime tyre protectors too, but doing some internet research suggests it's not worth the aggro, as the liners split and cause the tubes to shred themselves!

 

In fairness, I think a lot of my recent puncture problems are due to the type of riding I've been doing, i.e across fields and bridleways. It's been a lot of fun though so worth the 'hazards' I suppose! I'm running with Bontrager tyres on my mountain bike (front is the original) as I've found them great for wear and grip and they don't have those piss thin sidewalls some mountain bike tyres have.

Anyhow, all this mountain bike riding is working, I went to work on my road bike today and carded my best time yet, and I'd have shaved a couple of minutes off that had the traffic lights been green!

[Richard]

Do you have Continental tyres? You could ride on the moon on Continentals and they would still find a thorn. Every bike I buy seems to have them and every one of them gets a puncture on the first outing. I won't even eat a continental breakfast now.

[Cavcraft]

I got given a pair and they were awful, might just as well have used damp bog roll for sidewalls. The road bike tyres are the opposite though in my experience, brilliant things that last for ages and never seem to get punctures. So that's that jinxed then.

[cobblers]

At work we repair/rebuilt electronics for buses/PSV/plant and we've got a few local sparkies who recommend us to people, anyway this farmer turns up today with a random small electronic thing that needed a resistor soldering back on it as it had rattled off due to wank lead free solder. We soldered it back on for him and since it would have taken longer to charge him for the job than to actually do it, we said he could have it for nowt.

 

Anyway he comes trotting back from his car to us with a bucket full of beetroot for me and my pal.

 

What the fuck are we going to do with a bucket full of beetroot?

[Cavcraft]

Pretend it's Kerry Katona and fuck it?

[Tayne]

 

Anyway he comes trotting back from his car to us with a bucket full of beetroot for me and my pal.

 

What the fuck are we going to do with a bucket full of beetroot?

Sell it to your local burger van, they serve beetroot with stovies.

 

Well they do up here.

[DS20]

Pickle it. Omnomnomnom!

[catsinthewelder]

Wor lass grates it and raw carrot up and puts it in salads. It's much nicer than all the green leafy things that go in too.

[Inspector Morose]

Works well in chocolate brownies too. (Yup, honest! It adds moisture to the mix. Grated courgettes work too btw)

[Pillock]

Wrap it in sausagemeat and deep fry. Scotch Beetroot ftw.

[Honey Badger]

Chips!

 

It is rather messy peeling the stuff though, another vote for salad to.

[DSdriver]

And now for something totally different that made me grin:

 

The Egyptian postal service has issued a set of "Suez Canal" stamps but there is a slight error - one of the pics is of the Panama Canal.

The giveaway is that there are no locks on Suez.

 

 

[Skizzer]

+1 on the brownies, but if you've got a whole bucketful then you want to be getting into some beetroot wine:

 

http://www.lowcostliving.co.uk/home-brewing/recipe-beetroot-recipe.php

[Mr_Bo11ox]

I fucking hate beetroot, its proper bowk.

[The Moog]

Options 

1. Run an Autoshite Paint Ball day - instead of guns we stroll around lobbing beetroot at each other. Then go down the pub
2. Sellotape a Corsa badge to it and offer it to Cavcraft
3. Sell to Vulgalour as a paint base for his car. He can rub it all over and save paint. Beetroot stops rot.
4. Sell them to Prince fans as Limited Edition Prince Chocolates
5. Stick a banger in the middle of each one and then play pass the bomb
6. Hide them in a pile of scrap and they will be gone by morning
7. Handwrite an Escort Mexico Vin, apply sellotape, cover in cobwebs and stick on ebay. Sit back and count £££
8. Sell to Vulgalour as organic furry dice
9. Superglue a borked alternator on a beetroot and flog to Scooters
10. Stick small wigs on them and flog to American Tourists as English Haggis
11. Eat them
12. Build mini Voodoo beet people and then stab them with pins imagining they are all you hate
13. Photograph in a white room and write a long spiel about who they are a limited edition beetroot with only 2 miles on the clock, lovingly cared for by previous owner. Charge Millionity pounds
14. Carve them into exact replicas of famous locomotives, video it, stick it on Youtube and become a hero to lots of men in dodgy coats
15. Turn up down your bowls club and offer the best bowler a game. Careful remove your beets and prepare by rubbing them on your whites. Walk quickly to escape the mob
16. Velcro them to your testicles and go to A & E. It will make their day. They dont half love a larf
17. Create a small stop motion animation childrens cartoon about environmental issues, called And the Beet Goes On... sell it round the world and win Japanese Citizenship
18. Dip in chocolate and give out to the fattest kids that come round on Halloween night. They need their veg
19. Crochet a Volvo badge and pin it to them. Put up for sale and await the migration south of the SVM coming to collect.
20. Give them away but keep the free bucket

[andy18s]

Don't forget "BARN FIND" for no.7. ...

[dave21478]

The front door on my house opens outwards.

 

 

I spotted some shady looking prick going round the village obviously selling something door to door. 

He knocked on my door. I ignored it.

He started banging like fuck on the door so I ran down the stairs and threw it open.

 

Oh, your toes got all fucked up? well, flip-flops dont really match your charity-shop suit anyway. Kindly piss off.

[cms206]

An SVM EGM has occurred...

[DVee8]

HaHa this turned up on my faceache

 

 

 

[Spiny Norman]

Or the US version.

 

[Tayne]

And autos don't use less fuel, manuals do.

Autos have an unfair advantage in the european tests.

[skattrd]

What? Autos use more fuel than manuals in my experience.

[Mr Lobster]

Thought I'd lost a key. It should have been in the airing cupboard but wasn't. So I had a good look around and deduced it must have dropped through the floorboards into the space between the downstairs ceiling and floorboards I was stood on. 

 

Didn't find the key but I did find the previous owner of the houses 'secret porn location'

 

So now I have a late '70's / early '80s copy of 'Playbirds' magazine (verdict = not erotic at all) and a mysterious adult video. S'pose I'll have to find the video player just to see what it looks like then...

 

(also, before I bin it - I don't suppose thirty odd year old gentlemans magazines have any value do they...)

[fordperv]

Quality I think it would be hilarious* if someone with a 70s vintage motor had the gash mag and put it on their passenger seat at car shows, that would get the bearded bunch hot under the collar when they spot it

[HillmanImp]

What? Autos use more fuel than manuals in my experience.

 

I have not had a manual of the same car I had an auto of to offer a proper scientific answer unfortunately. 

 

However Mrs Imp drives a manual and never changes gear, instead screaming along the road at 6,000 rpm in 2nd for 3/4 of a mile until she thinks its a good time to change up to 3rd. I am currently trying to convince her to get an Auto as I suspect she will be considerably better off with one one. She has driven the Jaguar okay. 

 

Like I have always said, an auto is better 95% of the time but when you get that bendy country road, its got to be a manual.