The grumpy thread

[steve_earwig]

Well, despite the billions of acres of glass we have around the planet, all the roadkill and so on, they were thriving very healthily until Homo Sapiens decided that the best way of making money from food growing was to kill or make insects poorly. And the UK has recently decided that some of the worst chemicals for bees should be exempted from an EU ban. Now, I see the EU for all its evils, but trying to preserve the insects which billions upon billions of plants and trees rely on for reproduction does seem to make sense.

Somehow the EU is getting it right for once but I can see what that idiot Camoron is doing, it's the usual big bizniz "have now, who gives a fuck about later?" mentality that's destroying just about everything. If they don't spray everything liberally with insecticides then crop yields will drop so subsidies will increase and the price of everything will go up within a year. Trouble is these insecticides don't care whether it's a good bug or a bad bug, so the "later" here includes bees and other pollinating insects dying out, crops remaining unfertilised, no food on the shelves and starvation. But I don't suppose Camoron cares 'cos by then he'll have retired to Planet Stupid.

[Station]

Tyre 2, Michelin. Perished sidewall and shoulder. 

 

Tyre 3. Scrubbed shoulder. 

 

They didn't need to be amazing, just legal, as the seller stated. They were going to be used as placeholders while I sorted a set of tyres out through work. Never mind. 

 

I think the only description the seller could've honestly used is "The tyres are f*cked".

[Heidel_Kakao]

Isn't buying second hand tyres as bad as, if not worse than buying second hand brake discs or pads?

[Brooklands]

Isn't buying second hand tyres as bad as, if not worse than buying second hand brake discs or pads?

Surely it's no more than you do when you buy a second hand car - as don't they automatically come with used tyres? ??

[M'coli]

Na, that's just non-commonsensical moronic nonsense perpetuated by scaremongering twats - every second-hand car that I buy, I buy second-hand tyres, brake discs and pads, dampers, snot, skinflakes, the lot.  Just because they're on the car when you buy them, doesn't make them any less second hand.

[Heidel_Kakao]

Yeah that makes sense, otherwise when you bought a car you would have to replace every component to avoid having any second hand parts on it.

[daveb47]

I always thought that moths are the stupidest insects,always looking for the light,but only come out at night...

 

Big grump,just paid out £126.50 for 6 months tax on ovlov 940 which i cant afford.

[Lacquer Peel]

Yeah that makes sense, otherwise when you bought a car you would have to replace every component to avoid having any second hand parts on it.

 

I think that's what Dug Ong's suggested doing in the past.

[purplebargeken]

Have been lucky so far with tyres and ebay. All have been nearly new and totally as described. 

[Heidel_Kakao]

I think that's what Dug Ong's suggested doing in the past.

Yeah I remember that which is why I was a bit confused by the buying of second hand tyres, but I guess every rule has to have an exception.

[Spiny Norman]

Buying secondhand tyres is fine so long as A) You're driving an old shitter sensibly and not an M3 at silly speeds on the autobahn, and B ) You inspect them carefully inside and out before you pay for them, something you can't do without a lot of aggro and cost when you buy a secondhand car.

For pottering about town where you're far more likely to destroy a tyre on potholes and punctures than wear it out, to me it makes far more sense to buy a couple of carefully inspected old Dunlops with 5mm on them for £50 fitted than cheapo YingTong ditchfinders with all the wet grip of a soaped up hamster for twice as much.

[dollywobbler]

The tyres on the Rover aren't the best. Seem a bit hard and some minor cracking in places. I won't replace them yet though. Might change my mind when I drive it in the wet! My hope is to wait a while, see if I still like the car and if I do, hunt down a set of winter tyres. Then sell it in October knowing me.

[chaseracer]

I'm fussy about two things, automotively speaking; the mechanism by which a tonne or two of chod is brought to a halt, and those four hand-sized patches of rubber which are its only contact with the road.  Hence the Dyane & the Blingo always wearing Michelins, the 300E getting a set of BOGOF Avons soon after purchase and the 205 moving onto 14" Barums, because the tiddlywink-sized Ditchfinders made it feel like it was falling over.

 

Or, as the Owd Giffer put it, when I were but a callow youth: "never prat about with brakes or tyres..."

[dugong]

Yeah I remember that which is why I was a bit confused by the buying of second hand tyres, but I guess every rule has to have an exception.

 

My god, is it the heat? So replacing second hand parts with other, even less known second hand parts that may have spent months exposed to the weather is better? Right. You replace second hand parts as soon as possible with new or completely reconditioned ones. Not with shit from a scrapyard to save £4.89. Two wrongs don't make a right. I think it's the 'oh, I've saved some pennies, aren't I clever' mentality that's the most irritating. 

 

I was going to be driving the van on those tyres for no longer than a week before the new boots I was receiving through work came through. They were a placeholder, nothing more. Probably something to drive the van on to the tyre bay without grinding metal off the body. I'm not exactly driving the thing every day, either. 

Slate me all you want Len, you're pointlessly tight and seem proud of it.

[loserone]

I've just been through the Ebay Tat thread's most recent few pages, and every car I've opened in a new tab is a Vauxhall.

 

This forum, &c. 

[Lacquer Peel]

Slate me all you want Len, you're pointlessly tight and seem proud of it.

 

Most of my modest income goes towards running a house at the moment, my work is sporadic and Ms._Peel works part time. I would never run a car in an unsafe state but I don't see the problem with good used parts either.

[drum]

That feckin tax disc website isn't working.

[EssDeeWon]

Why are 99.6584% of cars for sale in Essex all with bellend dealers who feel the need to clog the receiving end of my phone with verbal diarrea??
 
What happened to private sellers selling genuine cars? Seems to be less and less around these days, locally.

[EssDeeWon]

I always thought that moths are the stupidest insects,always looking for the light,but only come out at night...

 

Big grump,just paid out £126.50 for 6 months tax on ovlov 940 which i cant afford.

 

Look at it this way Dave...that is still cheaper than using public transport for the next 6 months!! Which in the South East is getting stupid.

[Mr Lobster]

Bakeries - when did a tasty Gingerbread Man become a Gingerbread Person exactly?

[ruffgeezer]

When it came out of the oven dickless and titless?

[rml2345]

^ Wouldn't that make it a gingerbread automaton? Rise of the gingerbread cybermen!

[daveb47]

Look at it this way Dave...that is still cheaper than using public transport for the next 6 months!! Which in the South East is getting stupid.

You are right,it is cheaper.

Hang on...I got a free bus pass.......

Bugger.

[Mr Lobster]

When it came out of the oven dickless and titless?

 

Alright then, why do bakeries now advertise them as 'Gingerbread Person' rather than Gingerbread Man. 

 

Has someone from trading standards been in, noted the absence of wedding tackle on said gingerbread man and decided that it therefore cannot be considered a man?

[HH-R]

I hate shite tyres. The garage are going to think I'm nuts when I go and ask them to put a Continental with 5mm and some other unbranded shite that's brand new in the bin in the next week or two. Never before have I driven on worse tyres. Feels grippy in the dry but it's Bambi on ice in the wet. Pulled out of a junction the other day gently after an earlier downpour and was stuck in the middle of the road with the front wheels just scrabbling for grip. I had to use the clutch on its own and it was still spinning!

[dollywobbler]

I haven't driven the Rover in the wet yet (incredible considering I live in Wales) but that might force my hand. I know it stops very well in the dry, but if it's crap in the wet, I'll have to buy some new rubber. Perhaps I'll hold off getting the wheels balanced until I know! Some big clouds around today. Might not have to wait long.

[SambaS]

This weekend I was gonna grind all the mating faces of the Jimp/ Jimp roof and prime and paint, then weld/ bolt the thing back together, except my electric ran out on Thursday. So I made best of a bad situation and washed the cars and tidied the flat instead. Its great. As soon as it gets dark I go to bed. I charge the phone 3 times a day in the Samba, the only thing I haven't figured out yet is where to shower so I'm just using the sink. Shame the bath isn't metal else I could heat it. All cooking done on camping stove.

[Cavcraft]

Don't forget that when it's been as sunny as it has and there's been no rain for ages, the day the wet stuff comes the roads are naturally more slippy than normal anyhow.

[dave21478]

I hate shite tyres. The garage are going to think I'm nuts when I go and ask them to put a Continental with 5mm and some other unbranded shite that's brand new in the bin in the next week or two. Never before have I driven on worse tyres. Feels grippy in the dry but it's Bambi on ice in the wet. Pulled out of a junction the other day gently after an earlier downpour and was stuck in the middle of the road with the front wheels just scrabbling for grip. I had to use the clutch on its own and it was still spinning!

 

Yeah.

I bought a C2 VTR because I like silly French hot hatches and have owned most others previously, so decided to try one of the more modern offerings. It was a massive let-down. In the dry it was mediocre and did not inspire confidence but in the wet it was bloody stupid...wheelspin everywhere and understeer that was just laughable. On the first few drives, I assumed that something was seriously wrong with the car as on a wet day I could turn onto a roundabout at even lower than normal speed and the front would just slide straight on with no intention of steering. I could not follow an average person tootling along in something like a Scenic as I would get massive understeer on corners they just drove normally round.

The tyres were all new-ish but a mixed bag. The two fronts were a pair of Chinese WeeWoos one rear was some other toss nobody has ever heard of and the other was a Nexen which I have heard of, but this one had a tread pattern like a commercial van tyre.

I sacked them all off and jizzed up for a set of Uniroyal Rainsports. Fucking transformation! The difference it made was frankly stunning. 

I cant help buy wonder why the old tyres are allowed on the roads. They were fully legal...recent tyres, plenty of tread, no uneven wear etc but they were genuinely a serious danger. Hitting a cm or two of standing water at 70mph would simply have been the end of me.

[Station]

I had new Kumho Ecsta tyres on my Impreza and the difference was massive, even in the rain. Properly restoring confidence in driving and not crawling around every corner in the wet.

I've got crap tyres on my CRX and it just understeers in the damp if you apply the throttle at any speed.