Christmas Shopping

From a draft first written last Christmas:
I may have touched on this subject in a previous entry, so bear with me if you've heard it before, but Shopping drives me mad.

Granted, men generally don't do shopping, we don't enjoy it, we are not programmed for it. But just occasionally and to keep her indoors happy we have to show willing and go and get cheese and nibbles and a chicken or something, rather than the car mags beer and gadgets we really want to buy. This means going into unfamiliar parts of the supermarket, by which I mean all of it. The entire supermarket is unfamiliar, because seemingly once a week the displays are re-arranged to confuse and confound the unwary. There is no reason or logic in the layout. I tried to find bread sauce, you would think that would be under the heading of "Home Baking" NO NO NO. It is under sauces. Brandy sauce, however is not under Sauces at all, but with the custard and rice pudding. Or possibly with the Christmas Pudding. Why do we need to buy bread sauce anyway? Given that no one eats it? It is one of those traditional things put on the Christmas dinner plate to be left over at the end of the meal. And why buy a packet mix of the damn stuff, when it is basically a white sauce with some bread crumbs in it? Even I can make a simple white sauce and put some stale bread crumbs in it. Anyway I digress from the main point.

Our roads are proliferated with signs and speed bumps, chicanes and parking regulations to keep us where we should be, speed us up, slow us down, prevent us from stopping or divert us from where we want to be. Our supermarkets, by comparison, are entirely lawless.

Yet no-where but supermarkets are such regulations more urgently needed. There are customers, women mostly, well alright, women exclusively, who want to make shopping a social event. Not for them the idea of going in, selecting a purchase, paying for it and going home. No. They want to meet friends and have prolonged conversations about nothing in particular whilst they are there. Not a problem, you might think, most supermarkets now have a cafe or restaurant attached. These of course, miss the point completely. These women don't want to shop and then chat, they want to chat whilst they shop, or more accurately they want to chat in between shopping. That is why they can be seen blocking the aisle with their trolleys having a lengthy discussion about nothing in general whilst you struggle to get through with a trolley with a wonky wheel to reach the milk. They are totally oblivious to the havoc they cause. They stand belligerently in the way, as you try in vain to squeeze apologetically past them to reach the tinned raspberries, and look at you as if you are some reckless impatience git, just because you want to finish this hateful shopping mission today.

They should be paying congestion charges, they are there so long. No where in Britain are traffic police needed more than in the supermarket. There are more cases of careless driving, illegal parking and abandoned vehicles (trolleys) anywhere than inside a supermarket.

For supermarkets to be more attractive to men we now need, no, we demand the following;

1. A sensible layout, where the beer milk, potatoes and heavy items are at the front of the shop and not the back, so that they are in the bottom of the trolley and not squashing the fruit and veg you have to pick first on the way in as per the current layout.

2. Strictly enforced No Waiting policy in the aisles.

3. Abandoned trolleys to be removed immediately and impounded.

4. No socialising allowed within the shop floor area, this to be permitted only inside the Cafe.

5. Minimum speed limit of 5 mph, anyone loitering to be forcibly moved on by security.

6. Items to be displayed clearly and logically. Any seasonal display at Christmas should therefore include the aforementioned bread sauce, Christmas Pudding, Crackers (both novelty and cheese) Stuffing, beer, wine, whiskey, sherry etc etc. Likewise, during the Summer (the first Sunday in July I beleive) there should be raw meat, sausages, barbecues, garden chairs, lawnmowers, beer and a bottle of Pimms for the ladies, all available within one easy to reach display section.

7. A topless Page 3 girl operatimnga special till for men only. Some may say this is taking things to far, but we already have special tills for the disabled, the deaf, mothers, elderly folk, etc etc. So why not have one specially for men. What man doesn;t look for the most attractive girl on the till anyway, regardless of how long the queue may be, so he can indulge in a little innocent flirting? None of us pick out the minger with the facial hair and the squint.

8. SatNav on the trolleys. Men love gadgets, and it would save an awful lot of time if you could type "tinned peaches" into the trolley handset and it directed you straight to them. Because you can be damned sure they won't be in the same place they were in last week.

9. Express haggling checkouts. Men love to get a bargain - or at least the feeling that they have got a bargain. The current express checkouts where you serve yourself are good, but you have to remove everythign from the trolley, scan it and put it all back. Far better would be the automated haggling checkout, where you make a "best offer" like on Ebay, then the robot either accepts your offer or haggles until a fair price is reached. The trolley could have a scannr built in, so the store would have a rough idea of the value of goods you've thrown in there. This would speed up th process at the checkout no end.

10. A bar in the car park, wih valet loading - you go for a beer, whilst a uniformed manservant loads your purchases into the car for you, returning your keys once he's completed the task.

And if all that is too far fetched, then let us have online shopping that is interesting. We need to see visually and in true to life scale what we are buying, and how full it makes the trolley look, so gve us a 3D lifelike image of the store with a trolley we can guide around it, throwing virtual goods into it. The store would be empty of course except for Page 3 girls on the virtual chekout. And if anyvirtual granny or wailing toddler got in the way we could blast them with the trolley mounted laser cannon. Now that's what I call shopping!

Grand Day Out 3

For our December Walk we had settled on a two day challenge, intending taking on two of the three Yorkshire Peaks, Ingleboruogh and Pen-y-ghent, leaving Whernside for another day. Some of our usual suspects couldn't make it, and when Rachel dropped out due to work commitments, so did Dawn, lewaving just the stalwarts to go on, Dave Selby and PK along with myself. The plan of attack was an 0445 start, pick up at Driffield then to Horton In Ribbersdale where we would be staying the night after tackling one of the peaks, then doing the next on the Wednesday before returning home in plenty of time for work on Thursday. (Although I was hoping to be contacted by duties with an extra day off!)

As ever plans went to ratshit the moment we left Driffield, with a snowfall hampering our progress through to Horton. Oh yes, and to make things worse we arrived in Horton, thanks to SatNav woman, who managed to steer us off the wrong junctions whenever we hit the A1 or M1, rather than the similarly named and fortunatley not to faraway Horton in Ribbersdale. Snow had settled, but ceased falling by the time we set off up Ingleborough at about 1120 hours.

Having gone only a short distance it started to snow again, but as it was on and off, and not a serious blizzard we decided to push on - there was perhaps 2 to 3 inches of snow by now, and it was probably hovering about -6 degrees, but hey, what the hell. We'd come a long way, we were dressed for the weather and determined to get some walking in right? Light weights we are not (particularly the fat lad!) Visibilty began to deteriorate sporadically, but it's a well waymarked track and confident in Daves map reading and falling over abilties we pressed onwards. A breif luncheon sojourn in a derelict shooting lodge provided welcome relief from the wind and snow, and the opportnity to enjoy a glass of red wine with my Duck and port wine pate sandwiches - well, one has to keep standards doesn't one? In the absence of any girls we enjoyed a Yorkie too.

We pushed on and by 1400 hours had reached a decision point. Visibilty was almost nil, further snowfall had left about 6 inches of snow now settled on the ground with progres becoming more difficult. Dave had fallen over/slipped about 5 times by now (his total was 8 by the time we got back) and although he is well padded and escaped serious injury there was a real risk on of us might break something. incredibly, despite the sub zero temperatures, I had a sweat on from the exersions of making progress against what had now turned into a blizzard, with stinging freezing rain and hail being propelled at us sideways.

We reckoned we were only maybe 20 minutes from the summit, but the last 20 minutes is a hard climb, requiring the use of hands in places, and in the conditions it would have been too risky to push on. Even by 2 p.m. with the falling snow and cloud cover the light was starting to fail, and if we had taken the risky decision to push on it would have meant making the latter part of the return journey in the dark. We made the wise decision to turn back and head for the pub, with a vow to return in better weather, with more daylight hours to play with. incredibly, and to our joint surprise, given the remotness of our location, it was at precisely thsi moment that my mobile phone rang and duties granted me Thursday as a rest day. Proof indeed that they can reach you anytime, anyplace, amywhere! Strangely, immediately I terminated the call I lost the signal, and only gained a strong signal once we returned to the pub. Bob works in mysterious ways.
Left: The snow got deeper than this in places, over black ice on the rocky bits - very slippery!

At the pub (I forget the name of it - was it the Globe?) we had booked bunks in the bunk room, which turned out to be colder than a badgers nose, and turning on the radiators did little to improve things. Still, things would improve after a nice hot shower and a meal, right?

The hot shower proved a little too much to ask. There where two showers, one had a broken control for the heat adjustment, and none of us had pliers, so it would only give cold showers. The other one worked fine for the Selby person, but then refused to give hot water for anyone else - not in any quantity anyway. It would either give a jetwash of cold water, or a trickle of superheated steam too hot to bear - but nothing in between.

The bar opened at 6 with the promise of a mixed grille. Unfortunately chef didn;t have the ingredients for a mixed grill, despite the hills being covered in "them big woolly dogs" (sheep) and cows he was short of eggs, lamb chops and something else. We settled on fillet steak but guess what - he didn't have that either, but he did have sirloin which was very tasty when it arrived. PK plumped for Fish and Chips which looked equally appertising. Sadly the Black Wooly Dog bitter had run out, as had my second choice. I had the distinct impression this place was running down for the winter. I ended up with Timothy Taylor biter which was palatable right up until i drank the barrel dry and had to switch to John Smiths - did I really get through 8 pints that night? PK and Dave meanwhile were drinking Guiness, which didn't bode well for the ambience in the bunkhouse later.

At least a tenner disappeared into the pool table and a very sociable evening was had by all, retiring to the bar until about midnight, when we ran out of money and our drinking trousers wore out, much to the reilief of the barmaid, who we had christened Ingrid, for no other reason than she had revealed herself to be a Student visiting from Austria. We never asked her real name.

The bunkhouse was Bloody freezing, and dispite the beer coat and thermal vest it was an uncomfortable night for me, although to be fair my sleeping bag is summer weight - PK had some sort of centrally heated NATO surplus sleeping bag with a built in DVD player, minibar, colour satelitte TV, with hot and cold running water and reports that he was quite comfortable. Mind you, he fell out of his third storey bunk at one point so he could have been suffering concussion whe he said this. The night was punctuated by the homely smell of Guiness farts and PK's tuneful snoring.

Breakfast couldn't come to soon. Incredibly noone had a hangover, and the concensus of opinion is that the beer must be watered down. Despite having ordered full English breakfast, surprise surprise there were no eggs. I don;t see why the Chef couldn't have nipped out overnight and got soem from the loal Tesco's, it was only about 50 miles away, and the snow hadn't got that much worse, only another couple of inches falling overnight.

More snow was forecast however, so despite the clear blue skies and the inviting slope of Pen-y-Ghent it was probably a wise decision to cut and run and head for home. Pk was suffering a knee injury he insists is from the walking rather than the drunken buffoonery of falling out of bed, and I was feeling the effects of too little sleep. Rather than risk getting cut off in the snow and unable to return home (which would have been a terrble shame - snowed in in a pub!) we set off reluctantly for home. No point being stuck in a pub with no beer, no eggs and surrounded by Woolly dogs you can't eat.

Pen-Y-Ghent (or that dark brooding bastard, as Dave would have it) looking terribly inviting under a cloudless blue sky.

We shall return and conquer.

The car doors were welded shut by the snow and ice, and it took considerable effort to defrost and release it. Temperature at that time (about 1015) had risen to -4, so the overmight low was probably -10 or less, and we reckon about -7 (plus the wind chill factor) when we tackled the climb up Ingleborough. Okay, it doesn't make us Chris Bonnington, but it certainly gives a feeling a achievement to have got as far as we did given the conditions.

Mervin goes on line

Okay, so I've been runnign the van (Mervin) on a mix of between 60 and 70% veg oil to 40 to 30% diesel for the last month. I finally ot round to fitting the Veg Oil heater, as with the winter months coming a little heat assistance will be needed to combust the fuel properly. This should allow me to run at about 85% Veg to a mix of 15% diesel over the winter.
Also completed today was the additional of the Hydrogen Booster, to mix HHO (Browns Gas) with the fuel mix, which should yeild an additional 15% increase in MPG. Watch this space for the results. My initial estimate of 50 MPG was over enthusiatic. It's actually about 42 MPG I've been getting - it helps to know how big the fuel tank is (42 litres as it happens) as I don;t have any reliable method of measuring how much Veg Oil I am pumping in. With that as a baseline to work from we'll have to see how much the Hydrogen fuel helps. At a 15% increase we ought to be seeing 48 MPG over the next tankful, although it may take a while to settle in.
I have also invested in some other fuel saving devices, a magnetic fuel saver which proports to rearrange the fuel particles for less coagulation and better combustion, plus an electronic engine management system which basically turns off the engine when stationary in traffic, and automatically starts it again when you move off - rather like the new VW Polo and Golf apparently, although this is a 1990's ZEMCO system. Full report to follow in due course, once it's all fitted up and running.

Grand Day Out Too

Friday saw the C Releif walking club tackling the Hole of Horcum near Goathland (TV's Aidensfield from Heartbeat)


The weather was kind with only a momentary mizzle towards the end of the walk which cooled us off nicely. No hassle from the sheep this time, instead AJ got chased by a bull. This was a Aberdeen Angus highland, so quite what it was doing in North Yorkshire is anybodys' guess - perhaps it was on holiday? Normally a benign and harmless creature this one took exception to AJ and chased him for no immediately apparent reason. It was most amusing for the rest of us, not quite so funny for AJ. As he commented afterwards, 2 tonne of beef with pointy bits running into him is not his idea of fun.
We managed to get lost, in what is now an accepted tradition of these walks, but that was probably because we took a short cut to avoid further harrassment from the bulls.
The last part of this walk involves a steep climb, which certainly lets you know you've finished, as it gets all the leg muscles complaining nicely. From there it was only natural to point the car towards Goathland for a pint of brown and sticky in the Aidensfield Arms (sorry, Goathland Hotel) As we left we spotted one of the Heartbeat Panda cars parked up at Scripps Garage. Another was parked outside the post office, causing us to speculate whetehr we had missed some of the filming that day - they tend to film in the late Autumn and Winter months as there are less tourists about.
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Mervin update

Mervin is now looking better with his new seats and a clean up, the lettering removed and a few repairs done - like the back door now opens with the handle, and a high security lock has been fitted ot the back doors. Wednesday should see the start of the bodywork tidy up - the worse dents have been bashed out, and the filling and spraying started but not finished. For a £200 banger he's looking good.
Mervin has amazed me with his reliability so far, he drives like a dream and despite a tired sounding battery he never fails to start. Even better he is averaging over 50 mpg, which is more than I expected from a cube van.
Last week I used him for my park and ride scheme. This basically means I chuck my bike in the back of the van and drive the first 10 miles to work, then park up in Preston village before doing the last 6 1/2 miles by bike. 13 miles a day is about my limit until I build up my knee and calf muscles - a long term injury has left the cartlidge in my left knee totally knackered and the muscles have to work so much harder. This has lead to some comedy collapsing moments over the years where my leg has given way as I've been walking. It's more embarassing than it is painful - I sort of stagger suddenly as if drunk. My GP said I would just have to live with it as there was nothing to be done, but regular exercise seems to be helping in my opinion. I bought a stepper which I could only manage a minute or so on before my knee joint was on fire, but now I can go 12 or 15 minutes, I also got a stationary bike which has helped. With Mervins help I hope to use the cycle for work maybe once or twice a week for work (shifts permitting) and build it up so that eventually I might do the full 17 miles on the push iron.
In the meantime Mervin is proving very useful taking thngs to the tip, shopping and generally running about.
I discovered he has a very powerful alarm, and also a satelite tracking system (now defunct although the transmitter/reciever is still in place in the roof) I found the wiring for the amber beacons too, and it's still wired up to the switch. Guess what I've got sitting on a shelf in the garage? Yes, an amber beacon. That'll be another job to do then. I just need some ply to line out the load area and tidy that up and he'll be a very useful engine!

Mervins' motoring!

Since the Ax died I have had to invest some more cash in a new hack to run to work in. The usual specifications needed to be met; it had to bediesel so it would convert to veg oil, it had to be seriously cheap (A budget of £400 was set) and it had to be practical. Two seats is enough, as I use it mainly to run to and from work, and taking Emma to Brownies, Dance class that sort of thing. The Zafira is used when it's a longer run, a bit of luxuryis needed or there are more than two of us to go somewhere (although between three and five we can use the Astra)


The Zafira also tended to get used for towing the trailer or since the trailer got punctured, for tip runs simply due to the carrying capacity. That was getting it all dirty.


So with those ingredients in mind the logical solution isn't a car at all, it's a van!


As ever Ebay came to the rescue, and a bid of £201.25 secured a Ford Courier Van Mot tested until July, battered and bent but otherwise all there. Graeme kindly agreed to run me through to Lincoln to collect thesad looking specimen, who has now been chistened Mervin ( because it's my van innit? - okay that might not translate well elsewhere, it's a Hull accent thing)


Mervin has yet to be converted to Veg Oil s he needed a little TL to make him look respectable first, but he has ben pressed straight into service.


Mervin lead a sheltered life as a British Arways World Cargo courier van for many years of his life. I am guessing he ung around the airpots a lot, as his mileage is only just 65000. He has a secure bulkhead, a burgkar alarm including an extremely loud panic alarm, working lights in the rear, and extra switches for orange beacons which are missng now, but might get replaced. Holes in the dashboard show where radio and phones were fitted, although he doesn't seem to have ever had a stero, something which we will be rectifying very quickly.


For the last year or so Mevin as worked for a builder, who aused him terribly, although for a builder that s probably ormal behaviour towards your van. Consequently I have removed several loose shovelfuls of snd and cement from the back and the cab area. He needed a thorouh clean and vacuum inside, and a pair of new seats. The carpet has seen btter days but will do for now, some mats will tidy the looks up later. The steering wheel had chunks mig out of it, presumably where the builder has sunk his teeth in frustration in traffic jams. A cover has tidied that for now. Mervin also has a shiny new silver bonnet to replace the badly dented and faded grey one, and I have knocked out may of he worse dents, to be filled and flatted later before he gets a new coat of paint sometime. For now a real good clean and removal of the residue from the stickers has improved his looks 100%.


The faulty drivers door lock has been remedied, although the rear doors stil only open from inside with a Heath Robinson brand length ofroe pulled from the drivers seat! Part of the lock mechanism sees to be missing, so it's not an easy fix.


Watch this space for further adventures of Mervin.


1. Someone has clog danced on the bonnet. 2 Stickers have left nasty residue which leaves the original use undisguised. 3. Bulders eat car interiors apparently - they nibble steering wheels, and feast on the soft fabrics and carpets. About four shovels of cement dust and sand have been removed along with fag packets, sweet wrappers old newspaper and £1.41 pence in cash. (I suppose tht brings my purchase cost down under the £200 ceiling)


4. Steering wheel damage. Now covered with a sporty looking steering wheel cover. 5. Bend and scrape to nearside needs fettling. 6. The unique method of opening the rear door - the rope pulls the interior release and the door pops open. I'm thinkng about having the other doors modified the same way (with apologies to VW) - the four sprung door technique!

AX Dead

The Citroen is officially dead. Head gasket failure was diagnosed last month and despite emergency surgery, a new gasket and glow plugs, it seems that the diesel pump has also failed, meaning that she is beyond economical repair. Even if the faults could be rectified, the MOT is due end of October, and she needs at least a new driveshaft on the nearside, and I've never been happy with the handling and the alarming knocking noise from the suspension over bumps, nor the way the front offside wheel doesn't appear quite right in the wheel arch. So it is RIP (Rust in Pieces) from tommorow, and hopefully she'll proved useful parts for other AX's to soldier on. Meanwhile, I'm looking for a new project.

A Grand Day Out

Wednesday 18th September 2008........

......0500 hours. It's may day off. What the hell am I doing getting up this early?

......0600 hours. Convene at Bransholme Police Station to collect one of five colleagues who'll be joining me for a hike around Ladybower Reservoir and district in the Derbyshire Peaks.

...... 0605 hours. AJ delivers the news that 2 of our number have bottled it. Rachel can;t be bothered or some lame excuse, and PK has a lame excuse, literally. He has damaged ligaments in his foot playing football the day before. That leaves four of us. That's okay room to stretch out in the car.

...... 0620 hours. Hessle foreshore. Can't locate our other team members. Turns out they can;t tell the difference between Hessle foreshore and the Humber Bridge Car park. They have no idea whee Hessle foreshore is or how to get there. They are from Driffield and Walkington and don't get out much. We mee them at the Humber Bridge car park.

...... 0630 hours. On the road and only a hlaf hour behind schedule. Dave has brought TomTom Sat Nav which is good, but it has a woman with PMT giving the instructions which is not. She is able to give directions whilst we are on the well signposted motorways which I know well anyway, but gets us lost passing through Sheffield. We forgive her at first, as half of Sheffield appears to be closed off for roadworks, but eventually we realise that she is wanting to visit every shoe shop in the city and giving us directions to get us there. Once we realise she has now directed us back to the fiurst shoe shop we passed we give up and rely on roadsigns, instinct and pot luck.

.......0800 hours. We have survived Sheffield City Centre and despite the attempts of several people in Audis and Mercedees trying to kill us we esape the city and find the A57. One man in a 08 plated Audi, quite obviously a company car waves to thank us after almost sideswiping us, carving across our bumper, causing me a near coronary. I'm begining to wish I'd brought the old Citroen banger and not my decent Zafira. Hull may have some mad drivers, but Sheffiled must be the only city that lets registered blind people drive.

....... 0810 hours. My three passengers are sulking because I missed the left turn into Morrisions where they were hoping to get a cooked breakfast. If I'd been giving more than 3 millimetres/half a nano second notice I might have made the turn. Dave reluctantly admits that there is a cabin at the car park where we might get a bacon sandwhich.

....... 0830 hours. We arrive at the reservoir car park. There is a cafe/snack bar! It is closed. Bugger. We all dib int our packed lunches early as none of us have had breakfast.

........ 0835 hours Best foot forward. The reservoir looks stunning as we set off. The water is flat as a pancake and reflecting the trees beautifully, a shining natural mirror which the photgraphs just don't do justice to.

Promotion!!!!

At last we have a promotion in the family - sadly it is not me making Sergeant but my daughter Emma being promoted to "sixer" at Brownies. Still, it's a step in the right direction suppose.

Summer Holiday

The emphasis being on day. This year I couldn;t get any leave, so my family went to Ostend without me, and I stayed at home and went to work. I couldn;t get leave for the usual reasons; management were trying to organise a piss up in a brewery, so couldn;t do anything else as they were too busy. they all got their leave of course, but put a blockade on anyone else trying to get time off, because Hull Coty have ben promoted, and they can't decide if we are having traffic department or not, and because grass is green or some other flimsy excuse. The upshot being it is now September and I have about 3 weeks worth of leae to take, but no chance of taking it.

Anyhow, I digress. Because the purpose of this post is to say that despite all the odds I did manage a day with my children before they went back to school.

I was very proud of them both. They only learned to ride bikes last summer, and are still learning road sense and how to react to traffic etc. Yes I am old fashioned enough to make them ride on ROADS. Under supervision of course, but on your actual ROADS, not pavements. Cycle tracks are good, of course, and we have lots of old railway and bridleways to explore, but many miles of straight and safe country lanes too, as well as the vilage to practice on.

Hence we set off,with picnic lunch from our house, down the old disused railway line to the bridleway and out towards Halsham, the on into Halsham Village, on roads into Halsham proper, then out towards Winestead, back towards Ottringham and back down the old railway line (much overgrown and nettle infested - OUCH!) back towards Keyingham. The odometer on my cycle computer read 12 miles total - not bad for an 8 year old, a 5 year old and a man in his forties.

Thomas and Emma relax for a break at the Constable Mausoleum, Halsham.

The round journey took us about 3 hours including a break for lunch.

I do a truncated version of the same route as part of my keep fit regime, 6 1/2 miles in around 30 minutes (best of 27 mins 49 seconds to beat)

I'm thinking maybe I shoudl plan a few routes around the area and write a guide book? Holderness is great for cycling, lots of off road options and it's all fairly flat so good for beginners.

Sheds and tyres

I am exhausted! Allow me to explain. I am currently building a new shed to replace my old 8 x 12 which was on it;s last elbows. Building is perhaps an exaggeration, installing is probabky the right word, because I've bought one ready made whcih just requires final assembly. Just......HA!
It is a large shed, 20 x 10 which is almost twice the size of a modern sitting room. Not unreasonably, this needs some substantial foundations to sit on. The manufacturer recommends either 75mm of concrete sat on 75mm of hardcore, or 3 x 3 tanilised bearers on 75mm of hardcore, or paving slabs sat on yes, you;ve guessed it 75mm of hardcore.
Well I had none of the above but I did have some railway sleepers and a 1/2 tone of sand. Not enough railway sleepers as it turned out, so I set off to buy some blocks to make up the shortfall. I reckoned about 32 to 36 blocks would do, so I bought a full pallet load of 40 - better to have too many than not enough right?
Now my trailer holds about 22 blocks, so no worries, 2 runs should do it.
About 1/4 of a mile from the builders merchants disaster struck when a tyre blew out on the trailer. The tyres are about 16 years old and do deteriorate with age (about a 7 year life span) so it wasn't entirely unexpected. I rang home on the mobile to get the spare brought out only to find that that wouldn't hold pressure either.
What do you do in this situation? A trailer fully laden with blocks, with a shredded tyre at the roadside? Well of course, you go and steal a neighbours trailer to finsih the job you started.Yes I have sunk tot he levels of petty crime and taken a neighbours trailer without owners consent. Fortunatley he understood my predicament when he returned home and gave retrocpesctive consent, so I won't be sharing the showers with Bubba just yet.
Any hpw, having loaded a trailer with blocks, then unloaded it into another trailer, then unloaded it again, returned for a second (and then a third) load, then unloaded it three times at teh other end, then carried each block around the house to the site, then lifted them again into final position I am really feeling a little muscle stretch in my arms.
And I still have to build the shed - and sort out the trailer tyres.
I just read the instructions for the shed whch say - 2 man assembly, 3 to 4 hours. My arse!

The world is going mad

The world is going mad I swear it is. As I brushed my teeth this morning I noticed a little "V" symbol on the toothpaste tube. This apparently means it is suitable for vegetarians. Really?
I am not a toothpaste scientist, but I thought toothpaste was basically very finely ground chalk, flavoured with mint in a paste. Of course it's suitable for vegetarians, it's mint flavoured rock. But would it matter if it was made from whalemeat? We don;t eat the damn stuff, we rub it on our teeth then spit it out. It's hardly a foodstuff is it? Can you imagine the situation where you might say - mmmmm, I'm really hungry, I think I'll have an Aquafresh sandwich? Okay, perhaps on an Arctic Expedition when all other supplies have been exhausted you might resort to the toothpaste as asource of nutrients. But then would you really worry about the vegetarian alternative in that situation?
It got me thinking though. Is there toothapste out there that is NOT suitable for vegetarians? I thought they were all mint flavored, but it opens up some intriuging possibilties. Steak and Onion flavour toothpaste perhaps. My next trip to the supermarket will be a lot more interesting.

Hydrogen is looking good!

A rough estimate over the past week has shown my fuel consumption decrese from 57 miles per gallon to 68 miles per gallon using the Hydrogen booster I fited in the AX. That's a 44% improvement, or almost half price fuel. Okay, so I runon free used veg oil, mixed with a little diesel, up top 50% in winter, but almost nil now that it has warmed up to reasonable temperature. My running costs are now down to about 3 pence per mile, and falling. On the now rare occasions I use my Zafira it costs me 14 pence per mile. I expect my costs to stabilsie at about 2.5 pence per mile once my experimentation period is over.
I already save around £60 a month on fuel costs compare with havig to drive the Zafira, I can potentially save up to £120 - effectively free motoring - less the cost of insurance and road tax.
The future is ...........well it ain't orange that's for sure.

Just to add to my green green credentials you may like to know I am typing using power supplied by free sloar energy too. Using a solar panel that cost just £25 of ebay. Brilliant! I am an energy saving, money saving GOD!

Now that I have saved all this energy, what i really really want to do is blow it all! Anyone any ideas? How can I increase my carbon footprint at maximum FUN rating?

Hydrogen Injection Conversion

I guess most of you know by now, either because I told you, or because you smelt the chip shop like emissions from the Citroen, that I have been running it since November on Vegetable Oil. Asides from a period of bad running caused by a faulty filter the system works just fine, thanks to my earlier testing on the Frog. I’ve been running 50/50%, then 75/25% through the winter, so running costs have been about 4 pence per mile (against 15 pence per mile in the petrol Zafira) Now that the spring temperatures are finally approaching double figures I should be able to go over to almost 100% Waste Veg Oil and run for almost nothing. So my Yorkshire credentials are secure, and I am officially tighter than a ducks backside.

However, not content with that, or the added bonus of carbon neutral GREEN motoring, I am now taking a bit of a step into the unknown and the darker side of electronics and chemistry. I have fitted a device which should boost my economy by a claim of up to 50% by running the car on WATER. Yes you read that right, and YES, I laughed too at first. Then I read up a few bits on websites and thought, who dares, wins! This time next year I could be a millionaire, Rodney. I was dubious about it but the science at least seems sound. Water is H20,which is basically 2 atoms of Hydrogen bound to one of Oxygen. If you can separate the Hydrogen from the Oxygen you have fuel. Hydrogen will burn in a petrol or diesel engine with little modification.

Hydrogen cars are set to take off (not literally, they’ll still stay on the road) in the very near future, but the problems are getting the infrastructure in place, refueling and storing the Hydrogen in high pressure tanks, and being held to ransom by the same people who sell us petrol being just a few of the problems.

The gadget I have fitted claims to produce “Browns Gas” which is HHO, in other words separating one of the Hydrogen atoms from the water, which can then burn in the engine, the waste product being H2O, as the emissions bind back with free Oxygen to produce water again. It all sounds quite charming. It’s not a true Hydrogen car, but a step closer, the “Browns Gas” supplementing the diesel (or Veg Oil in my case) thereby reducing the use of the base fuel.

I fitted the gadget today and I’ve only had chance for a short test drive, but I swear it is already more responsive to the throttle and smoother running. I track my fuel consumption with each tankfull against the odometer, so I should be able to give some comparison figures next time I fill up. I’ll keep you all posted on how I do, as with the cost of fuel set to soar again soon (and the threat of strikes at the refinery’s) I am sure you’d all like to get more MPG and cheaper fuel sources. As the AX only cost me £125 I have nothing to loose if this doesn’t work, and other than a hole in the air filter casing everything is entirely reversible if it fails.

Watch this space for updates.

The AX has avergaed 47 mpg since January. A 50% improvemt should see me gettign 70 MPG.
Official figures, running on diesel quote up to 70 MPG on a run, so I could get as many as 105 MPG. And that's running on Waste Veg Oil and water, both of which I can get for free.

Little holes are the worse

Little holes are the worse surely? I'm talking punctures here. in cycle tyres specifically. Now any puncture is bad, but at least if it's a big blow out you know you need a new tube and probably a new tyre too. No it's those little holes that are the problem. Big holes, tyres that exploded Worth a bang, (and with 50+ PSI in a mountain bike tyre they do go bang believe me!) are not a problem. You know that you have a long walk (Punctures never. ever happen at home) and a bill for a new tyre and tube.
Well actually they are not so much a problem, and to be honest I quite enjoyed fixing the puncture - it brought back memories of my youth, although in those days the Cycle was my primary transport, and essential to earn a living as a paperboy. Now the cycle is strictly for leisure, and fixing the puncture was also a leisurely activity, using the levers to tweak the tyre from the rim, pulling out the tube, swigging from the beer can, inflating the tube and dunking it in the bowl of water, swigging more beer, roughing up the tube, smearing the glue........ it was great.
Is there anything more satisfying than that sense of achievement when despite all probability mankind fixes something that was broken?

I'm almost looking forward to the next little hole appearing, just so that i can teach Thomas (5 years) how to fix it. A valuable life skill that is much underrated in my humble opinion.

Plastic bags

So our wonderful Government want to ban plastic bags, or at least tax them to reduce their use. They say this is for environmental reasons, because marine life, notably Dolphns are being killed by plastic bags. I find this difficult to comprehend.
You see, I buy stuff from the supermarket. If it's less than a handful I don;t bother with a bag - I'm usually in the car, so it's no hardship to carry a couple of items to the car and put them on the seat, in the boot, or just eat them as I walk to the car. If on the other hand I am doing a major shop, then I tend to use carriers to keep associated items totgether, even though it then all goes back in the trolley then into the car boot. It makes loading and unloading easier. Now I wold happily reuse these cariers, but they are so cheap and flimsy that a single use is all you can reasonably expect. So far as I can tell they are already biodegradeable, they begin to decompose as soon as something is inserted into them.
Having emptied the ripped and strecthed bag I then effectively recycle it as a bin liner and it is filled with the non recyclable waste and put in the wheelie bin.
Now, I always assummed that the men came round with a dustcart emptied the bins into the back of it, and took it to a big hole in the ground where it was buried. Or possibly set alight. Not so. It seems these people take the bags of rubbish and feed them to Dolphins. How else could these poor creatures get them ingested into their stomachs? You don;t often see Dolphins foraging around the tip; Gypsies yes, but not Dolphins.
Another thought that occurs is that perhaps its Dolhons that tip my wheelie bin over at night and rummage through it - I'd always assummed it was foxes. Or perhaps the foxes are in league with the Dolphins? What have the Dolphons got over them I wonder?
Anyhow, aren't Dolphns supposed to be intelligent? Fancy a nice fish Mr Dolphin? No thansk I'll just eat some more plastic bags. Perhaps the Dolphins are so short sighted they can;t tell the difference between a Jelly fish and a plastic bag? Could be, they always appear to be squinting don't they?
So what is the answer? Glasses for Dolphins. So come on Tesco, never mind Bio degradeable carrier backs, introduce a scheme whereby you sponsor a pair of Dolphin Spectacles for every customer who brings their own bags.

Mice will take over the world

I have already written about the Educated rodents and their efforts to eat my caravan. This week I found they had attacked my car too.
The Citroen had been running well since the Brakes broke episode. Okay it let me down a couple of times on cold mornings when the veg Oil heater knocked the stuffing out of the battery before it started, but it was nothign a jump start couldn't cure - and long term the cure was a new 63 amp battery to replace the 40 amp hour that comes as standard.
I decided to treat the car to an oil and filter change, and a new fuel filter at the same time. Oil change completed in an inpressive seven minutes. Now for the fuel filter - to get at it you need to remove the air filter box - not a problem, 1 x 10mm bolt, pull it out of the location pin socket and hey presto sorted. Okay, I leaked diesel all down my arm and all over the engine, but next time I'll know about the bleed screw on the bottom. And the process to bleed the system so the engine starts again when yo have the new filter on.
So what has this got to do with mice I hear you ask?
Well, after this unparralled mechanical attention the Citroen became extraordinarily difficult to start. The battery was going flat again, and the car was just coughing and refusing to run smoothly. Had I upset it?
Realising that a full servive probably involved replacing the air filter as well i removed the filter box and swapped the filter for a new one. Well swapped suggests an exchange of items like for like, which is strecthing the truth a little. The air filter that went in had rubber ends, a steel core and a paper filter element around the core. The one that came out had ..... fragments of paper, most of which had blocked the outlet preventing the engine from breathing. I an only guess at mice, although how theygot into the air filter box to eat the filter is beyond me. Given their enginuity in getting into my caravan I wouldn't put anything past the little bastards. They probably had rope ladders, and training bythe Mouse equivalent of the SAS.
Any way witha new filter the car is starting and running fine again. i just don;t know if I shoud install a rodent alarm and protection system

Brakes Broke

I think I have spoken of my Veg Oil powered Citroen Ax Ebay special before, bought in November 2007 for the princely sum of £125, and intended for use as my commuter car/parts chaser/runabout/banger rally car.

Well it converted well to Veg oil and is running cleanly and cheaply on both SVO (new oil) and recycled waste oil acquired from 2 cafes I frequent.

It has however soiled it's copybook. It joins a BMW 320 and a Triumph FWD as one of only three cars in probabkly fifty I have owned in the last 22 years that have disgraced themselves by having to be recovered on a breakdown truck. Most breakdowns of my various bangers have been rectified at the roadside, although a Yugo I owned twice had to be towed home, once with an exploded coil (never seen before or since) and once with a sheered flywheel location pin.

Any I digress. The Citroen, yet to acquire a nickname, had been running well. For a £125 bargain buy, needing just a CV boot and a headlamp adjuster to pass MOT after a few years standing it was performing exceptionally. Hitting roadside debris holed the radiator last month and cost me £65 for a new one, but saved a few pounds in weight, as the old one was all steel, the new one is plastic and alloy.

It let me down badly however on Sunday morning. I was already late finishing my night shift, and as I left work the handbrake resisted a little as I released it and set off, just a minor niggle i thought. About a mile and a half down the road I stopped at red traffic lights and applied the handbrake. As the lights changed to green I released the handbrake let up the clutch and rose about 9 inches on the back haunches as the car refused to budge. The nearside rear wheel had locked up solid. Suspecting a sticking brake piston I tried to reverse with similar comic effect - the car appeared to be doing press ups as it rose again on the suspension. With much clutch slipping and high revs I coaxed it, wheel locked around the corner into a car park.

A call was placed to "international rescue" otherwise known as my sister Reb, who lived less than a half mile away, and who I knew would have some tools to hand. She duly arrive in her Ford Ranger with a siezed trolley jack and a selection of useful sockets and spanners, plus a much needed large hammer. Ffteen minutes saw the trolley jack working and the car raised off the ground and wheel removed. The brake dru however resisted all attempts to free it off.

despondent, dejected and knackered after a 12 hour nightshift I gave up and called out a friendly recovery agent, who we just happen to put a lot of business through at work. I didn't expect a freebie recovery, but got one anyway, as they were running my way on a Police Recovery, so they were passing anyway - thanks Robin at Bells Truck Services.

The AX arrived home and was shunted into a corner until I finished nights.

monday afternnon I started again trying to remove the drum. I tried coaxing it gently, then using heat, cooling it, whacking it with a ruddy great hammer - nothing worked. The only solution in the end was to take a grinder to it, and cut the brake drum in half as far as I could, then split it with a cold chisel. This did the trick and revealed the extent of the problem - the friction material from one shoe had parted, then worked it's way 180 degrees around the drum until it had become very firmly affixed with the shoe in that side, locking the drum very tightly. I've seem this happen before, but never to this degree where the drum is locked cmpletely. I think it was compunded by the overall wear on the shoes, making the handbrake adjuster go overcentre as well, locking the mechanism on that side. But no warning was given, the brakes worked just fine one minute, then jammed the next.

A new brake drum came in at £42 quid. Normally I would change both sides, but given the banger status of the Citroen (by virtue of age rather than condition) and it's low mileage I measured up the opposite drum and found it had hardly any wear at all. At the risk of a minor brale imbalance I have replaced just the one drum I damaged in removal, but fitted new shoes to both sides, giving them a genorous coat of copperslip grease to ensure smooth working.

Job done, the handbrake is now much better, the spring resistance can be felt through the lever, and the brakes are fine.

Bearign caps are £3 each, although they come for a Saxo rather than the AX, with a different size hub nut. I have reused the old hub nut against advice, as the straking point is different once refiited due to wear on the bearings, so it should be fine. The alternative is to find onother nut the same size fitted to something else, and as I can't see a failure being likely why bother?

The next major project for the Citroen is to see if Hydrogen Injection is feasibly as a fuel booster, using tap water to onert the H2O into oxygen and hydrogen on the fly, and running it in through the air intake to reduce the amount of Veg Oil burnt. An intersting hobby project for this bargain banger. I'll post my findings here, so watch this space.

Land Rover

Well, it's Thomas' 5th Birthday tommorow, and of course what every five year old boy needs is .......a Land Rover. Not a real one of course, that would be silly, he'd never reach the pedals. So I bought some paper plans to build a working model from scratch. Then I found out it was going to cost a small fortune to buy the wheels, axles etc.........or was it? I had a cunning and devious plan, as I figured that the wheels of one of those disabled peoples buggies that the elderly use would be about the right size. Hmmm! Rather than steal a pensioners buggy from under them, I browsed on EBAY and found a non runner for just £34. Some quick measurements and hey, the frame ws the right track, just too short. Angle grinder, welder, new box section - Hey Presto, new chassis. The old mobilty car had a steering tiller, rather than a steering wheel, so I begged an old Reliant Robin Steering wheel and column from BELL TRUCK SERVICES of WODDMANSY (many Thanks Robin!) and "Uncle" Graeme (see pictures below) assisted in maunufacturing new track control rods, whilst an old socket set provided a UJ for the modified steering rack. With the body temporarily fitted the brakes cleaned and tested and the lights transfered fom the old scooter, with new trailer lights for the rear it was time for a test run, Uncle Graeme taking the jockey seat.

Left, What we started with, and old 1980's BATRICAR invalid carriage/OAP scooter, a non runner bought off eBAY for £34.

Left, Thomas at the wheel. Whilst not a true Land Rover replica, it is instantly recognisable, and in any case just what is a "standard" Land Rover? They made so many variations, this would reasonaby pass as a factory product.

Now it just needs final painting, the grille fitting to the bonet, the windscreen and surround fitting and some minor fettling.

It has forward and reverse gears, but is rear wheel drive only, the original motor driving the rear axle by a chain and sprocket, hence the high seating position - the motor is huge and sits under the seat. Although not timed and tested I reckon top speed with the driver and adult supervisor on board to be around 12 mph, (A scale speed of about 60 mph!) and there is so much toruqe at start up that it wll pull wheelies! Braking is by a disc on the rear axle. The turn signals work as do the lights, although there are no brake lights yet, and there is a working horn too.

We have a disused railway line nearby where some of our tests have been completed off road where the "Crosslander" performed very well - right up to the mark 1 steering linkage breaking. The reinforced Mark 2 steering system is much stronger and also prevents going "over centre" which is what did for the first one - you could turn it roght through the arc of operation so that eventually you could turn roght but be steering leftand vice versa - not anymore, the redesigned system works just like the real thing.

Project cost is probably around £200 all in, this beng the cost of the plans, the timber and plywood, paint, lights (we reused the front lights from the BATRICAR but had to buy new for the rear), perspex for the windscreen, various steel stock and offcuts, aluminium frame and offcuts, aplsu the new Leisure battery and the BATRICAR itself. We started the build in June and have finished (almost) in January, although work has prevented regular time being spent on the car. It probably represents about 200 hours work, although this could be done a lot quicker, I took my time as I wanted to involve Young Thomas as much as I could in th build - what better than to be able to boast at 5 Years old that you helped your dad build a car!

So far as the value of the car goes, well it's not for sale and won;t be for a long time as Thomas and I are going to have fun in it for some time to come, but I guess if some body offerred £1000 I might be tempted, but then I know I'd just end up building another, bigger, better, stronger (four wheel drive?) version anyway.

Maurice and his Educated Rodents

....Was the title of a Terry Pratchett book, the story of Marice the cat and his team of magically influenced talking mice, who came to a partnership to effectively fake the whole pied piper thing to fleece unsuspecting townships of their fortune.

Thing is you see, these mice were educated, the could think and talk.

Well I thing the little bastards have been round my way. Allow me to explain. I own a caravan, kept in storage on a former farm near home. Siad farm now has high security CCTV, razor wire fences, secure electronic locks etc, to keep the theiving scum of our society out. Now I don;t expect these measures to deter mice, that would be expecting too much. There are however bait boxes to poison any visiting rodents one of which is fixed to the fence right alongside my caravan.

Caravans generally have one or more vents to prevent condensation build up and keep them aired. Mine are in the floor, but that's okay, as it is a foot off the ground. Except it's not okay, because some enterprising mouse has chewed through the plastic vent and got in, wrecking the soft upholstery inside, presumably because the little vandal couldn't find anything else to eat. But hold on, how does a single mouse reach over a foot from ground level to vent to chew trhoguh the grille inthe first place? Either he's a very tall mouse, he had a step ladder or he had help. I reckon four mice standing on each others shoulders would do it. Or perhaps 7 in a pyramid, for better stability whilst the to one chewed? Which then poses the question, did he chew the grille, or did he have a small motorised chainsaw. Was this a cunningly planned "mouse breaking"

I tell you, they really are incredibly intelligent pan dimensional beings (Douglas Adams, you have a lot to answer for)

Humber Bridge debt

It's just been on the news that the Humber Bridge tolls could be scrapped if the Government agree to wipe out the debt on the bridge - good, they should have done that years ago. Why are we still paying interest on such a big debt - it must have been astronomical interest, as the tolls are the highest in the country and we still owe more than the bridge cost to build. Someone obviously got their sums wrong.
So anyhow it occurs to me, if I don't pay my mortgage my house gets repossesed right? Why don't the Humber Bridge Board just stop paying the money, then the government will have to repossess it, and it becomes their problem? See what they do with a second hand bridge? I doubt they'll make a profit from it, they couldn;t make a profit selling apples.

AX Update

Well, it is a banger, so life would be dull if their hadn't been an event!
Following my first puncture in about 17 years I've now had my second debris strike within a year - Remember the road crap (I never did see what it was) that damaged the belt and pulled the wiring off the fuel cut of solenoid on the Ligier? That was my first. Now my second, a huge stone took out the radiator on the AX. In true banger bodger style I plugged it with exhaust putty to get me home (and to work and back for a few days - with regular top ups) until I could source a new radiator. Now I am £66 lighter and strangely the car is lighter too. The old radiator was steel and looked like it had seen better days anyway, the bottom looked about rusted out. And it was heavy with sludge and crap. The new one is plastic and aluminium and weoghs about half as much. So not only do I have efficient cooling and heating again, but I save fuel (as weight equals fuel) into the bargain.
More updates as they occur.