The grumpy thread

[Marina door handles]

Going back to the topic of MOTs today I experienced a surprise MOT test!

I had booked my car in to get some tyres fitted at the dealers that I work in. I gave the keys to service at the beginning of the day and got on with my day. At about 10 am, the work shop controller walked up to me looking slightly sheepish... "Hi Steve, we've MOT'ed your Freelander, errrr its a fail, nothing major just....." 

I was slightly taken aback at this point! The car is due its MOT on the 12th of December and has been booked in for the end of this month, definitely not toady. 

The down side of all this is that, the car has now got an MOT fail against it and you cannot simply delete the test result, its all officially logged.

Fortunately it just needs a track rod end and possibly a number plate lamp bulb (might be the lamp haven't checked yet).

So the Landrover is now back in my garage and the XK8 is back in service (oh no I will have to drive the Jag, what a hard ship! ).

I probably best not name and shame my own employers......

[Metal Guru]

When will climate change hypocrites be shamed into actually doing anything rather than “look at me!”?

Specifically Prince William and the Earthshot prize bollocks. How can the heir to the throne go on a jolly to Brazil when we have a Commonwealth  country on its knees due to climate change? I bet the planes sent in to pick up British nationals , went in empty rather than packed with supplies.

Can they  not see the irony of flying round the world contributing to the problem they then lecture the rest of us about?Ever heard of zoom etc?

The government is as bad , actively pursuing expansion at out major airports while wanting to cover the land with solar panels and wind farms. Meanwhile, everyone thinks, putting their baked bean tins in a different bin, entitles them to multiple guilt free long haul flights.

Either we get serious and call out these “seen to be green” wankers or we say, “forget it, carry on as before”. 

[hairnet]

18 hours ago, Marina door handles said:

Going back to the topic of MOTs today I experienced a surprise MOT test!

 

thats not funny id def be having a word upstairs

 

[Zelandeth]

Very minor grump in the grand scheme of things, but it's irking me nevertheless and seems symptomatic of the general enshittification of everything and the fact that attention to detail seems to be a concept that's completely lost these days.

The entirety of Doctor Who is currently available through iPlayer (well, aside from the episodes that are still currently AWOL from the archives anyway).  This isn't the grump.  The grump is in the video format.

As you would expect, all of the original 1963-1996 run is presented in a 4:3 aspect ratio as that was the norm for the time.  What is annoying however is that the stream isn't provided in that format - it's provided in a letterboxed 1280*720 stream with huge black borders on either side of the actual video content.  Which both seems wasteful in terms of bandwidth, and is a PITA if you were planning on actually displaying the content on a period appropriate display.  Nothing is going to automatically adjust the aspect ratio either as the BBC logo is positioned in the top right of the 16:9 window rather than relative to the actual content.

That continues with the more recent series where the actual content on the stream doesn't *quite* fill the screen vertically - there's a 30 or so pixel gap at the top and bottom of the screen, which means that the logo is hanging awkwardly half off the top edge of the video content...which just looks messy to me. 

Also means I can't just do a quick and dirty crop to fix it like i could on the earlier ones.

It's a really tiny detail in the grand scheme of things, but C'mon guys you're the BBC...You Can Do Better.  

Yes, I know it's utterly pedantic, but it has irrationally irritated me, and venting about that sort of nonsense is what this thread is for isn't it?

[barefoot]

2 minutes ago, Zelandeth said:

Yes, I know it's utterly pedantic, but it has irrationally irritated me, and venting about that sort of nonsense is what this thread is for isn't it?

No

[Yoss]

2 hours ago, barefoot said:

No

So do we have a pedantry thread? 

[High Jetter]

3 hours ago, barefoot said:

No

Y not?

[High Jetter]

33 minutes ago, Yoss said:

So do we have a pedantry thread? 

I think you mean a thread about pedantry 🤣

[New POD]

On 31/10/2025 at 21:47, sheffcortinacentre said:

Fair weather cyclists 

Car park at work is noticeably fuller this week. Its pissing down and dark when most people arrive for work now. 

[reb]

3 hours ago, Zelandeth said:

wasteful in terms of bandwidth

The current generation of video codecs are such that letterboxing and pillarboxing will make literally zero difference to the number of bytes used to transmit or store the video.

It is irritating, though. I made a Hanbrake preset that automatically generates a 4:3 image by first removing black bars then adding them back in as appropriate, then downscales to 480p. Took about 14 bloody hours to run on my library.

[Marina door handles]

22 hours ago, Marina door handles said:

Going back to the topic of MOTs today I experienced a surprise MOT test!

I had booked my car in to get some tyres fitted at the dealers that I work in. I gave the keys to service at the beginning of the day and got on with my day. At about 10 am, the work shop controller walked up to me looking slightly sheepish... "Hi Steve, we've MOT'ed your Freelander, errrr its a fail, nothing major just....." 

I was slightly taken aback at this point! The car is due its MOT on the 12th of December and has been booked in for the end of this month, definitely not toady. 

The down side of all this is that, the car has now got an MOT fail against it and you cannot simply delete the test result, its all officially logged.

Fortunately it just needs a track rod end and possibly a number plate lamp bulb (might be the lamp haven't checked yet).

So the Landrover is now back in my garage and the XK8 is back in service (oh no I will have to drive the Jag, what a hard ship! ).

I probably best not name and shame my own employers......

Right update time...

Things have gone from the ridiculous to the even more ridiculous.....

This morning I jumped in the XK8 fired it up, slotted it into D and the engine died and a check engine warning lit? I Put it back in park and tried to start it again and it just turned over... Fuck sake! I had to borrow Mrs MDHs car to get to work.

This evening I cracked on with the Freelander repairs. got the track rod end off after a bit of a fight, went to fit the new one and found it was cross threaded..... Nothing wrong with the tie rod it still runs onto the old track rod with ease....  brilliant just what I needed....

At least the number plate lamp has come back to life so that's 50% of the Re test sorted, shame about the steering issue......

What has rather irked me is that I was trying to Sort out the Rover to act as cover for the Freelander, just in case I had issues at the MOT (booked for 2 weeks time). Unfortunately the Rover's front suspension is also currently in bits!

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Markeh]

Figured I'd work late getting a load of stuff sorted out tonight.

Didn't count on a random power cut at this time in the morning. Not interrupted my work (only out for a couple of seconds here I believe - enough time that the only side effect was the router rebooting), but it seems others aren't so lucky judging by ALL OF THE ALARMS going off around as I was hoping to get to sleep.

[Zelandeth]

20 hours ago, Markeh said:

Figured I'd work late getting a load of stuff sorted out tonight.

Didn't count on a random power cut at this time in the morning. Not interrupted my work (only out for a couple of seconds here I believe - enough time that the only side effect was the router rebooting), but it seems others aren't so lucky judging by ALL OF THE ALARMS going off around as I was hoping to get to sleep.

One of the reasons I ripped out the power supply and battery to our one.  Though power outages weren't the issue - it throwing a massive strop whenever BT were doing any work that momentarily interrupted the phone line very much was.  It interpreted that essentially as a tamper condition and would go into full on meltdown.  I had a major falling out with it the tenth or so time it did that - almost invariably at 2 or 3AM.  3/4 of the system didn't work anyway (no surprise in this house) so no real loss.  Two large dogs are more likely to be a proper burglar deterrent than an early 00s alarm system anyway.

[comfortablynumb]

13 hours ago, Yoss said:

So do we have a pedantry thread? 

I thought that was the whole site ??🤣

[EyesWeldedShut]

11 hours ago, Marina door handles said:

This evening I cracked on with the Freelander repairs. got the track rod end off after a bit of a fight, went to fit the new one and found it was cross threaded..... Nothing wrong with the tie rod it still runs onto the old track rod with ease....  brilliant just what I needed....

I've now done both sides on sprog's 2005 FreeLoader - LH was rusted solid and ate the clamp bolts - decided to fit a complete unit then found  getting to the steering rack bolts was a really fun* bit of contortion. RH, like yours, just span off (after tons of heat and some snake oil and a lot of swearing)

11 hours ago, Marina door handles said:

Fuck sake! I had to borrow Mrs MDHs car to get to work.

This time last year we had three cars and the van. Only the van was operational. Rocking up to places in a horsebox is such fun.

Cars are all bastards and plot these shenanigans months in advance. Even parking them out of sight of each other does not stop the plotting. I'd blame secret CANBUS meetings but none of them have one........

[Remspoor]

On 04/11/2025 at 00:10, Metal Guru said:

When will climate change hypocrites be shamed into actually doing anything rather than “look at me!”?

Specifically Prince William and the Earthshot prize bollocks. How can the heir to the throne go on a jolly to Brazil when we have a Commonwealth  country on its knees due to climate change? I bet the planes sent in to pick up British nationals , went in empty rather than packed with supplies.

Can they  not see the irony of flying round the world contributing to the problem they then lecture the rest of us about?Ever heard of zoom etc?

The government is as bad , actively pursuing expansion at out major airports while wanting to cover the land with solar panels and wind farms. Meanwhile, everyone thinks, putting their baked bean tins in a different bin, entitles them to multiple guilt free long haul flights.

Either we get serious and call out these “seen to be green” wankers or we say, “forget it, carry on as before”. 

You foot all the others that cling-on to the higher echelons of society. I have read the Mayor of West Yorkshire. Charles and William (both will need their own jets) The mayor of London, Obviously some of The government, maybe some of the Tories too.

 

 

[Metal Guru]

2 hours ago, Remspoor said:

You foot all the others that cling-on to the higher echelons of society. I have read the Mayor of West Yorkshire. Charles and William (both will need their own jets) The mayor of London, Obviously some of The government, maybe some of the Tories too.

 

 

I think I know what you mean.

[Bren]

Ordered 10 L of torotec oil from ebay. It should have arrived last weekend but according to yodel there was a delay. Yesterday I flagged up that it hadn't arrived. Today I got my money back. I doubt it was even dispatched. I have had this before with engine oil from a different seller.

[hairnet]

pointless bollocks

fucker failed

whats the point

[Wibble]

Box of beer in Asda Basingstoke, £13.65. Same box in Asda Linwood, £21.45! I know there’s a minimum price per unit in Scotland now, just didn’t realise how much difference it makes! Was just looking BTW, not buying, not at that price, only went in for toothpaste.

[High Jetter]

25 minutes ago, Wibble said:

Box of beer in Asda Basingstoke, £13.65. Same box in Asda Linwood, £21.45! I know there’s a minimum price per unit in Scotland now, just didn’t realise how much difference it makes! Was just looking BTW, not buying, not at that price, only went in for toothpaste.

Alcohol free, then? 😃

[Wibble]

4 minutes ago, High Jetter said:

Alcohol free, then? 😃

Don’t be so ridiculous 🍻

[iainrcz]

We have a pair of matching large terracotta plant pots for the front of the house.

Guess which fuckwit has just dropped one.

[comfortablynumb]

16 hours ago, Wibble said:

Box of beer in Asda Basingstoke, £13.65. Same box in Asda Linwood, £21.45! I know there’s a minimum price per unit in Scotland now, just didn’t realise how much difference it makes! Was just looking BTW, not buying, not at that price, only went in for toothpaste.

Tesco's try that with dogfood round here, have to be selective which stores you use 😕

Edit- not eight quid different tho

[comfortablynumb]

Itv series n discussion to sell stuff to sky😕

There goes the only TV I actually watch, the BTCC.

Robbing bastards sky are, it'll definitely be pay-per-view

Of course, they don't want the love island shit

[Remspoor]

On 06/11/2025 at 15:56, iainrcz said:

We have a pair of matching large terracotta plant pots for the front of the house.

Guess which fuckwit has just dropped one.

Drop the other one and they will be matching again.

[PhilA]

Needed bring the wife's daily for oil change. Thursday they were fully booked up so they said "Saturday is first come first serve starting at 7:30". Sure thing. So I head out early.

Slightly foggy today. Arrive at the dealership at 7:40 and there's 5 cars parked up already. 

Apparently "first come first serve" applies to dropping your car off the night before. That, right there, is an example of not how that works.

Irritating 

[grogee]

FFS 

[motorpunk]

3 hours ago, grogee said:

FFS 

I hate this. I really, really hate it. 

[EyesWeldedShut]

On 05/11/2025 at 20:47, Bren said:

Ordered 10 L of torotec oil from ebay. It should have arrived last weekend but according to yodel there was a delay. Yesterday I flagged up that it hadn't arrived. Today I got my money back. I doubt it was even dispatched. I have had this before with engine oil from a different seller.

Try https://www.pyemotoroil.co.uk

They also sell on eBay (but they don't do TotroTec brand)

FedEx, next day - even to here