The grumpy thread

[Low Horatio gearbox]

The ballache that is buying or trying to by a house during  our current interesting*times.

5 hours ago, TheDoctor said:

Step dad died this morning. Covid-related, but heart attack actually did the job. 

Only 63, that's no age. 

I wasn't close to him, but it's still shitty 

Ouch and sympathies.  

[ruffgeezer]

4 hours ago, beko1987 said:

Sad's do that... 

(got the correct and matched ram fitted? Did you do a clean install to the ssd or clone your old drive?) 

2 different pairs of ram, but still was cunty on one piar or t'other. It'd previously had 2 pairs mismatched 4gb sticks. 

Reinstalled windows again today and it's been better touch wood (now I've sent for a replacement sdd) 

Time will tell I guess! 

[strangeangel]

RIP Colin Bell

 

 

 

[vulgalour]

Telecommunications.  Rain.

[louiepj]

Off because of covid restrictions
Jobs to do on cars
Have the parts
Nearly chop the top of your index finger off while sorting recycle
Bloody tin cans !!!
Bonus photo of dogs head with bald spot.

[Zelandeth]

Oh hello check engine light...

[timolloyd]

2 hours ago, Zelandeth said:

Oh hello check engine light...

Invacar?

[Pieman]

Scraping noise from under front end of car at low speed tonight.  Disappeared as the car runs and it's driving fine, but every time I drop to very low speed it returns.  Hopefully just something stuck in the brakes or similar.

[Zelandeth]

2 hours ago, timolloyd said:

Invacar?

Uh...No.  Xantia.  Which thinking about it is actually the only car I own just now which even HAS a check engine light.

Went off next time I started...Normally I'd just run over to a friend's place and have them interrogate it with Diagbox/Lexia...however that's obviously not an option just now!

I'm used to seeing the light for a couple of seconds once every few months when it throws an overboost error - but only flat out at high revs.  This came on randomly just while cruising and stayed there.  I know the battery is a bit low from lack of use, so I'm not worrying too much about it until I've fully charged the battery.  If it comes back then I'll investigate further.

[Parky]

On 1/5/2021 at 8:17 PM, taranaki said:

Meanwhile in New Zealand......

 

We had a big get together yesterday, three families and many bottles of wine.  It’s brilliant although coming from the UK I can see how everyone here has relaxed a lot thinking it’s all over and done with.  I think Kiwis do need to be a bit more vigilant than they are being as complacency is creeping in and it only takes some fake negative tests from a visitor to trigger the whole thing again.  

[Tamworthbay]

On 04/01/2021 at 22:25, Mr_Bo11ox said:

Can you be semi-vegan?

Know what you mean though, I like to try to go meat-free for over half the week

Same here, we have been gradually reducing meat intake over recent years. It’s never been easier and some stuff is proper nice. My favourites are Linda McCartney burgers - proper dirty food but not, and Aldi goats cheese and red onion bakes that I could eat as a snack.

[Aston Martin]

Not sure I'll upload the video.

 

But I'm in 3rd Lane of M1, doing 56 but struggling. Some wank in a van, licks my tail-lights and pulls into Lane 4. He cuts off a grey 3 series estate.... Which lights up like a Christmas tree, which lights? Ah, big blue fuckers.

 

Here's the issue, van gets infront of me no problems here.... The mother fucking wank coppers, give him a bollocking from the passenger seat. He slams on, they slam on.... They then leave him alone... I'm braking/hazard lighting still going uphill and now fucked doing 40.

[Soundwave]

Major and sudden tooth ouchie, leading to emergency dental appointment. Major and sudden wallet ouchie followed soon after.

[PhilA]

Just.. everything. Ugh.

[Bren]

Only just managed to get the vectra started. Battery is less than 12 months old. Lack of use won't help but I suspect it's the starter - trying to start a locked engine wont have done it any good. It can wait.

[Ghosty]

£4k isnt even a good price. 😒

[brownnova]

You know when you’re about to sell a car but the car gets wind of this so it develops a little fault which is bad enough to be noticeable, but not so bad you’d do it straight away if you were keeping it... and you don’t want to spend any more money on it, but you also don’t feel you could sell it as is without dropping the price a bit... 

 

Yeah... that... 

[Mr Laurence]

18 minutes ago, brownnova said:

You know when you’re about to sell a car but the car gets wind of this so it develops a little fault which is bad enough to be noticeable, but not so bad you’d do it straight away if you were keeping it... and you don’t want to spend any more money on it, but you also don’t feel you could sell it as is without dropping the price a bit... 

 

Yeah... that... 

They seem to know exactly when to it! it's as though they're sentient.

What's the fault?

[Parky]

Bored with the Mitsubishi and yes, I am thinking of selling it.  Just as an odd whining noise appears at speed...

Slightly grumpy in that it is raining here, I need new wipers and they are currently sitting at my Mums as Royal Mail won’t send parcels overseas because Covid.  I didn’t want to buy them here as they are megacoin but might have to

[Jazoli]

My car has a whining noise at speed also, it disappears when the wife gets out..

Wipers can't be that expensive over there can they? Can you not get them from supercheapauto? They are around $70 a pair which is less than £40, not too expensive for a safety critical part.

[Cavcraft]

On 1/4/2021 at 9:59 PM, wuvvum said:

DVLA.  The feckers have tried to take a VED payment for the Granvia, which I sold last month.  I transferred the exact amount of money required to cover this month's legitimate VED payments into the specific bank account I used for that purpose, and the attempt to take the payment for the Toyota has resulted in the account going overdrawn - albeit only for a few hours as the bank refused the payment.  

The reason I had to set up a separate bank account was because I kept cancelling VED direct debits when I sold vehicles, which resulted in my main bank account being blacklisted as apparently you're not supposed to do that as the direct debit automatically gets cancelled when you sell the car.  Except it obviously doesn't.  

I'm going to have to make a snotty phone call to the DVLA tomorrow.  Assuming there's anyone actually in the office at Swansea obvs.

FFS.

You used to be able to get away with cancelling loads before they got onto it. Had exactly the same problem, probably still do. If you complain and give them the reg numbers and dates they should refund you. I think twice now they refunded the wrong person (previous owner) and then me when I highlighted they'd got it wrong, but they never chased the payment back they made to the wrong person.

 

I believe you can still cancel some payments before they black list your account, and the reason they've tried to stop people doing it is because it was a  free way to legally get an untaxed car home. Basically you just taxed it on the spot, got an email receipt and drove home, then cancelled it immediately upon getting back*. No money ever changed hands and it was all legit.

*Allegedly of course, would never have tried this personally.

[Parky]

2 hours ago, Jazoli said:

My car has a whining noise at speed also, it disappears when the wife gets out..

Wipers can't be that expensive over there can they? Can you not get them from supercheapauto? They are around $70 a pair which is less than £40, not too expensive for a safety critical part.

Indeed.   To replace the Suzuki fronts alone with Tridon parts here in NZ costs $96 - nigh on £50.  

Extrapolating that across both the Swift and the Mirage, front and rear Bosch Aerotwin wiper arms cost £42 in the UK for both cars.  Here the cost (for the cheapest lowest quality own brand options) is not far off that just for the Suzuki.  Plus Supacheap don’t sell arms for the Mitsi, only rubber refills at an extortionate $26 for a strip of rubber with a metal inner trim I have to cut and fit myself.  That’s not a massive problem, except the arms are slightly damaged so the rubber slops around and doesn’t wipe very cleanly - hence the need for new arms.

Repco can supply the parts for the Mitsi and Suzuki for standard quality parts for $170 or £85.  Basically twice the UK price before shipping for less good parts.  Shame I have to wait but luckily it is summer here (apparently) so wipers hopefully aren’t going to be as critical as they would be in the uk in January

 

[Aston Martin]

"If we use pattern parts, roughly £565 in total"

 

I think the 4x4 is coming up for sale lads.

[The Moog]

DVLA took payment for the pug that sold before Christmas as well - even though changed keeper back in December.

[loserone]

Presumably if you just leave the DD open, they put it back if it shouldn't have been taken?

[clayts450]

1 hour ago, loserone said:

Presumably if you just leave the DD open, they put it back if it shouldn't have been taken?

yes.

[omegod]

Remember kids, grinders ain’t no toy , luckily had 2 pairs of thick gloves on but finger burnt a bit 😢

[Datsuncog]

The Forester's slightly sticky and temperamental remote locking key finally gave up on Boxing Day morning, failing to unlock the car even after careful cleaning and installation of a new battery. Looks like the microswitch has gone in it.

Not the grump.

The car only came with one key, as per usual in Autoshite territory, but early plans to simply buy a new spare key fell through as this car (an ex-Subaru UK demo car with a few features I'm told are very unusual) has a strange single-button key shell that no-one seems able to supply as a replacement, including the main dealer.

Not the grump.

Because of the Subaru's alarm system, I can't use the emergency key I got cut and coded - previous experience has shown  that although this will open the mechanical door lock and work the ignition, it still needs the remote plipper to turn off the alarm and immobilizer. Failure to have the plipper working means that on opening the driver's door the alarm will go off - and it will then continue to sound every ten minutes until I disconnect the battery. I'm unwilling to disconnnect the battery for an extended period as I've known this to banjax immobilisers before.

Not the grump.

I should maybe also mention that there's a whole load of Christmas gifts, my sunglasses, my iPod, plus our welly boots, which have all been locked away for nearly two weeks now.

Still not the grump.

With replacement seeming unlikely, I chose to get the switch repaired. I bought a replacement microswitch online, but after delivery (which took a week) I discovered my Maplins soldering iron, bought new and never used, didn't work. At all. Not a pick of heat. Bit late to go back to them, hey?

Still not the grump.

So I decided to bite the bullet and get it done professionally. An eBay listed automotive locksmith in Peterborough with 50k+ verified transactions, same day repair and return offered, plus a 99.8% customer satisfaction rating, seemed to be a reasonable bet.

I paid online for Royal Mail's Tracked 24 service, put the value of goods therein at £100, and printed it all off on my home printer just like I do with all my Tat Box parcels. Not cheap, but worth it for the peace of mind, hey?

Then I found out that I couldn't simply drop it off at the handy Post Office up the road llike I do with all my parcels - for some reason, Tracked 24 parcels need to be left at Royal Mail depots only. So I drove down over Monday lunchtime, to discover that the depot's opening hours have been reduced to three hours a day, from 8am-11am.

In other words, I'd have to wait nearly 24hrs before I could post my Tracked 24 parcel, which kinda makes no sense.

The only other option given to me by Royal Mail was to post it into their pre-paid parcels pillar box by the depot gates. Of course, this meant that I didn't get a printed receipt, or a date stamp on the dicky little 'Certificate of Posting' that comes with the address label. But, otherwise stumped, I did it (taking photos).

On Tuesday afternoon, just before 3pm, I received a text message from Royal Mail to say 'We've received your parcel'. I initially thought they were letting me know that my repaired key had been posted back to me, but on further investigation, it turned out that this was the outbound parcel only appearing on the Royal Mail tracking system now, a full 26 hours after I'd posted it.

Since then, there's been no updates to the tracking, and the key repair place has advised that they haven't received it.

Trying to get through to Royal Mail customer services has got nowhere, and the online helpbot asks for a load of information, and then rejects it all because the only avenue open to me is to pursue a loss claim after seven days has elapsed. To make a loss claim, I'll need to enclose proof of purchase showing the value for the goods lost, of course (how the hell would that work for a car key??), and also a scan of my proof of  posting (which I don't have, because they shut their depot offices early and direct customers to just put their parcels in the pillar boxes).

Now, I understand that the postal service is swamped at the minute, with many staff off sick and self-isolating, while at the same time there's been an enormous rise in e-commerce parcels due to the national lockdowns. I get it, I really do.

But with that being the case, I don't think that Royal Mail should still be selling 24hr/48hr/ guaranteed delivery by a certain time services. Explain what the problem is, that they're doing their best, and only offer customers 2nd Class standard or tracked for the foreseeable. That way, no-one has expectations that turn out to be unrealistic. And no-one's paying for a premium service which, it transpires, they're wholly unable to provide.

While certainly quite stressed about all this, I don't believe my key is actually lost - I'd like to think not anyway, since I put my name and postcode on the key itself, and slipped it into a cardboard sleeve also with my name and address on it, before putting it into a padded bag with the posting and return address clearly printed. But since this is the only key to the car that turns off the alarm and immobiliser, if it really is lost then I'm concerned the car's pretty much scrap.

And that's my grump for today.

[Talbot]

Grump of the day:  Speed Awareness Course.  I've heard people say good things about them in the past, both on here and elsewhere.

Had one this morning after taking a calculated risk by driving at +10%+7,  (speed awareness courses generally being offered up to +10%+9) and my luck ran out.  No surprise, it was going to happen some time, and I knew I was in SAC territory rather than points+fine.  I went into it with an open mind, expecting and hoping to have the same positive experience others have had.  And?

Utterly fucking useless.  It taught me absolutely nothing at all.  Complete and utter waste of 3hrs of my life.  I could have *run* the damn course.  Not only that, but the trainer was demonstrably wrong on a couple of points, which, when gently challenged on them, she basically said "I'm the trainer, you're not, I know what I'm talking about, you don't.  Shut up and listen".  No point arguing, so I just sat in basic silence for the rest of the course.  A couple of other people seemed to nod in agreement when I made my point, one even said so, but then also just remained silent for the rest of the course, presumably also just thinking "bollocks to it.  just be quiet and it'll be over soon", rather than risk being identified as someone who has not engaged with the course.

I even got accused of cheating, just because I knew the answers to several of her questions.  Seriously?  JFO.

Maybe it was just this trainer, but the entire course seemed to be full of detritus and waffle.  About as effective as a fart in a tornado.  I *almost* wish I'd taken the points and fine now.

/rant

[artdjones]

53 minutes ago, omegod said:

Remember kids, grinders ain’t no toy , luckily had 2 pairs of thick gloves on but finger burnt a bit 😢

This is the result of last week's grinder episode, done by the edge of a flap disc.