zetecspit

There are settings in Invision, and if not set up may not be easy to find? But it is in members/content moderation. We have a few rules set up, but now tweaked so it takes a few people to report an issue before it is hidden. That scenario is usually a spammer, or something that needs to be looked at ASAP. As to not being able to post links, John posted one and he isn't a member, so no idea what is causing the issue. I just C+P. There is a list of moderators on the forum (not website) homepage. https://www.clubtriumph.co.uk/forums/ And of course, you know I have that millstone around my neck.

Ta Now "fixed" and a big fuss caused by auto moderation. A lot of time/energy/grief could have been saved by asking the right questions of the moderators rather than jumping to conclusions. Bit of a life lesson for all of us.

It certainly isn't the CT way And I am struggling to find out who carried out the "moderation". I am not going to intervene with that post until I hear from whoever that was. But demanding stuff doesn't help, a reasoned request (and response) achieves far more. I have asked John to reconsider his respose on the CT forum and edit it. But I now realise that just like this and other forums, he won't be able to edit his post as he is not a CT member. But I am still waiting for him to reply to my contact as I can edit it for him. So please all, do not jump to conclusions just yet.

Tony Lindsey Dean has had some uprated chain tensioners made because of the issues with the ones being sold everywhere else. A local vitesse owner had a tensioner fail in a few hundred miles, he was not happy. He found the old one and reused that.

So have I. Mine went to junk mail, which was odd. Or so I thought. (I wasn't asked for anything, except if I was free atm)

Sons should learn to dig well.... I would be looking at flexy pipework connectors, a bed of hardcore/MOT type1 or similar, and plastic chamber. Should allow a bit of movement. But that looks like it could have been broken many years, and would have just got worse and worse. But who knows.

If that is the case I wouldn't worry, it is the expected 40-60psi range so all good.

Time to invite the sons over.....

I bought a "High quality" recon rack from the dolomite club. The reconditioner (apparently) rejected most of the core stock on the basis the racks themselves were too worn. So I hoped I was buying quality. And indeed, it felp lovely when it arrived. Sadly that didn't last. Turns out the barstwards had used a bit of nylon? tube to replace the tube bush, which wore and caused slop. But that was 2 years, but only 3k down the line. I pulled it apart, everything else was very good. A £10 bush and sorted, lovely again. TDC now use another supplier (apparently) no idea if my chat with the spares chap had any part in that.

What is the oil pressure (hot) at idle and 3000rpm? If 45psi (15psi/1000) at 3000, that is acceptable And I would hazard a guess that a set of crank bearings would significantly improve things. But if the car is not thrashed, probably not necessary. The other easier option is to use some Millers CSS 20-60 which will give better hot oil pressure. But with the very limited miles covered may be excessive if it gets an annual oil change. (Re the CSS, I managed to forget to change the oil in my Toledo, it ended up being in there nearly 4 years including 2xRBRR and probably 15k. The oil was still good when I did change it)

The seperate return spring are the earlier type. And I think the change was because these pull the spindle, and that can wear the carb body/spindle. With later type the spring rotates the spindle, and they never seem to get seriously worn. I have never looked at if the early type can be converted, but if they are in decent shape, and you don't use too strong a return spring, they will last many thousands of miles.

I am a fan of spray "chain lube" for all sorts of stuff, including storge of metal stuff.

Evapo-rust is currently on offer from toolstation, £37 for 5L I think. Sounds interesting stuff....

I had an Avenger for my own first car. 1300 M plate. I saw the advert, rocked up to the place and it was owned by the father of a lad in the year below me at 6th form. Whining rear axle, fuel tank rusted so you could only put a fiver in at a time. Axle was replaced by a one from a 1500, and fuel tank was sorted while I had an interview ay Southampton uni. My Dad came with me, went off for the day and found a scrappy who swapped the tank. Had that car for a few years, sadly front drum brakes that I soon discovered didn't like being heavily used, Bit disconcerting... But went all over the place in it. Eventualluy sold on, and was replaced with a Cavalier Sportshatch, which was rather quicker. But happy memories!

That must equate to a 20% vacancy rate (assuming half the population are of working age etc) What industries are those vacancies in? Is it mainly hospitality or a wide selection.

Interstingly I know some mid 20s couple who have bought locally. Probably average wages, both working. They seemed to have saved for a few years, and then bought. Their houses are currently worth 350k ish at a guess, they bought a few years ago, maybe 300K? so it is achievable, even in the rather expensive SE. But I am unsure if you want all social housing is sold off? (I have no idea what else to call it) Or what else is to be done? And what happens to the millions who currently live in such homes? Yes, housing is a huge issue, and as you point out second homes have decimated some communities. But the solution? govts investing in building, even if for a modest profit or more desperately needed rental accomodation. It must be enough to be self funding, I really do not understand why it doesn't happen. But would that make the "choice destinations" even more attractive and encourage people to move to where the well paid jobs are, leaving other areas with ageing populations and employers leaving to benefit from where workers want to live? My crystal ball is a bit murkey on that . House prices may well drop in a few years. There is a track record of an 18 year cycle. I think we have 6 years left before the next price crash is due. But it probably won't help much as the economy will also go belly up for a period, and job security will be an issue. Again, crystal ball not giving any form clues, but a cyclical crash does have some validity.

If the labour is free, it won't be too expensive apart from the armoured cable. But I would suggest a 40a D or C rated breaker in the house to feed the garage. Better still, an RCBO. I have searched for a reg that would allow a 100ma rcd in the house, but it has eluded me. Still, I do have one I will probably fit, with 30ma in the garage itself. Shhh.

Indeed, the housing charities and the govt always jump on the bandwagon of blaming private landlords, when time and again it is the housing association and corporate landlords. And concentrating on enforcement makes a lot more sense. A good friends daughter was living in an unregistered HMO. But because the house was owned by a relative of one of the people living there it was OK. On the other hand, air BnB is a nightmare. I stayed in one place for literally 8 hours. It was OK, but no way the electrics would have passed any inspection. That was with a cursary glance. Dread to think what would have been revealed if I started digging. And gas safety certs? It really is the wild west. It seems no requirements for any safety inspections etc despite them being a business.

What you are suggesting is that peoples free choice is removed altogether. In Utopia, everybody has a lovely house, everything is shared equally, and everybody is happy. But it doesn't work that way. Some people are clever, some work hard, some are lucky. Some none of those. Most countries work on the basis if you have a higher income for whatever reason, you can afford nicer/better stuff. In this country we are very fortunate to also have a free NHS, and a system to provide homes and enough money to survive to those who cannot work or provide for themselves. Not always perfect, but the vast majority of the time it works. But I am in favour of that support being on the basis of needs rather than "wants". So even though when I was in my 20's I wanted to live in a house with a garage etc etc I couldn't afford it. Things changed, I took some risks (that others were too afraid to take) and worked damn hard for 15 years before things started to really start looking up. We did benefit from some inheritance, enough for a deposit on a 60K house to rent. The sort of money that could easily have been spent on a new car. But we made the choice. There was a time up to 10 years or so ago when people on housing benefit could rock up to the benefit office having rented a place, and benefits would pay the rent. It was becoming obvious this was untenable, as some (say) 2 bed flats in Brighton rent for £1200/month, but if you want the city centre fab places, expect double that. And people were getting councils to pay for the expensive places. One suspects there were plenty of deals going on and money being pocketed. Which led to capos on housing benefit. And this leads on to social housing. Why is it offered at lower than market rents? If the tenants are on a low income or no income, HB will top up the payments. This would encourage those with high household incomes to either buy somewhere, or enter the private rental market. As to being forced to sell rented houses (and I presume you mean at a discount) that would result in landlords exiting the market and that causes increases in rents. Remember there are many that want to rent. My corner of the market is student lettings, it works perfectly, they move in, stay for 51 weeks and move out (in fact over half my places the people stay for a second or even third year) Those groups do not want to buy. Or reant from the "purpose built student accomodation" places that cost 50% more, Likewise we used to have "professional" (ie non students) in shared houses, they were quite fluid with individuals moving often after 6 months, sometimes a couple of years. Again, they don't want to buy at that point in their lives. And some people simply do not want to buy. I know a couple of people who retired at 50, and had VERY VERY well paid jobs. They rent a place in central London, and have done so for at least 10 years, and they plan to stay indefinitely. As to my politics, I call myself a socialist capitalist. Look after everybody according to needs, and allow people to benefit from their skills and become wealthy. Those that do that should pay a fair share. And that fair share is the issue. Too much money in the black economy, too many not paying what they should, including bit corporations. All that leads to squeezing the easy targets to make up the shortfall. Now time for me to go earn a crust.

On second look, that is the next model up. More power (though my 180A will happily stick 6mm stuff, and with care 8mm) but yours has more power steps, mine has 6. Which is enough, but more seems a good idea. Pretty good on thin stuff too..

Good choice. I splashed out a few years ago and bought a Oxford, exactly the same machine except it is green. I find it flatters my welding abilities, it always seems to produce good welds no matter what. (excepty when I forget to turn the gas back on at the bottle)

Interestingly where I live ("Nice" area of Hove, lots of large detached places) plots are being bought, houses demolished and replaced by flats. Most recent is a pair of detached houses, now almost completed 2 bed flats, I think 12. Overlooking the park, they won't be cheap. But there is obviously demand for such places, I guess as people decide their current places are too large. We rattle around our place until we get the kids/husbands etc appear (they are due easter weekend for the 25th edition of the annual easter egg hunt, daughters 26 and 28) So in reality, and if we had to, we could downsize. But we have no desire to do so. But most of teh places around here are 4beds plus, mostly with older couples living in them. Scarily I guess we are one of those now

Of course I am biased, but the thing is that I have never had a serious issue with a tenant, or them with me (OK, the guy who started dealing cannabis, then heroin, was a problem, but we never had a personal beef) And by squeezing landlords and forcing them to sell up helps who? And how? The solution to affordable housing is to reduce property prices. Reducing the number of places to rent tends to push rents up (though I have not seen the apparent 20%+ increases over the past few years) My take is that social hopusing needs to be reformed. There are far too many older couples in family houses. Social housing should be allocated by need, not want. So when kids leave full time education, either they pay more rent and stay in the same property, or move to a smaller place freeing up the desperately needed 3 bed places for young families. Not a popular idea with some, but I reckon ask the young families living in overcrowded places and they will think it is a great idea. Trouble is it needs a large number of smaller places to be built.

Being a landlord was tricky up until the mid 1980s with regulated tenancies (where rents werer low and it was near impossible to evict a tenant) In fact when my parents passed, we "inherited" 2 such tenants, been in situ for approx 40 years. One recently passed away, all rather sad as I was the nearest thing he had to a friend when I phoned him when he was in hospital to see how he was doing. Anyway, in the mid 80s Assured shorthold tenancies became a thing, and caused a boom in BTL with many many individuals suddenly prepared to buy and rent stuff out. Before that it was seen as too risky, with rented properties changing hands at a fraction of market values. The new rent reform bill that seems likely to become law at somepoint will address the whole secure tenancy thing, but my market is student rentals, and has been for 30 years. This will become a nightmare as student properties will not be available until the previous tenants give notice. (Currently our places get reserved for Sept by Christmas) Of course, the big corporate landlords and councils/hopusing associations are exempt from the rules. There is a push to corporate landlords, but they are the ones with the worst reputation. The agency I use is excellent, treating tenants with respect. They reckon they have only refused to take on one, yes one, property in the last 15 years because it was so poor. Repairs get done in a timely manner (I know, I do a number of them) and all the mandatory stuff is done as required. Again, I do some of that too. Compare that with how corporate landlords behave. Nobody has ownership or it seems interest in getting repairs done. Things drag on, with nobody taking responsibility. Of course, there are some rogue landlords, often dealing with the most vulnerable. But their behaviour is what often influences legislation affevcting all the good landlords. In recent years, the financial incentives to become a landlord have been eroded. Again, companies still get perks. But I just don't see all the houses being "freed up" by landlords exiting the market being affordable to much of the population. To do that, it needs a price crash. Probably 50%. But the economic fallout from that would create a series of events that would be very bad for the entire UK population. And beyond. I fully intend to sell up, but the plan is to let the Rent reform Bill go through, then let everything settle down again. So about 5-10 years. At least that is the current idea. I reckon we get 4% return on the property value, and to get the equivelent after CGT we will need to achieve 5.5% plus growth equal to that of house prices. That is unlikely to happen, but then again I am getting weary of the whole thing. So retirement is a realistic proposition. In 5-10 years....

I saw that. So you pay 50% more than the hammer price. Ouch. And as usual wrong end of the country for me.