July 2014
I nearly got caught with a Triumph Stag, the seller offered to deliver the car to me for inspection with E-bay's new delivery and inspection service, and to open a private dialogue within E-bay to put the money in a holding account within PayPal that would be released only when I had inspected the car and agreed. The misspelling and urgency for me to accept in the email put my suspicions at defcon1 and one call to e-bay confirmed my suspicions that this was fraud. I alerted the publication and they pulled the ad but it was back in the next week Read more
Our Rav 4 has sustained minor damage to the rear bumper including one small area though which you can just see daylight. The bumper is solid, thick, black plastic and is unpainted. We live in the Bournemouth area.
Any recommendations for products which work and are suitable for DIY repairs please?... Read more
Used a soldering iron with a spoon shaped tip, did a very good job on the small areas. Closed up the hole and got rid of the distortion. Installed a pair of Halford's black self-adhesive protective strips, one to cover the problem area, the other to match up. Finished off with some 'Back to Black'. I am very happy with the result: cost £9-95.
I have a VW Passat Estate, the passanger door will not open but all the others will the central locking seems to be bypassing this door any help to reduce a large garage bill will be appreciated :-) Read more
When I have problem with locks I always call my friend, he works in keys4u locksmith company. I don't like to play with that, proffesional help is much better :)
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Given that for every 10 kWh (units) of electricity made 'available for use' in our homes, the distant fossil fuel (coal or natural gas) powered powerstation in Castle Donington or similar has to generate 37kWh of 'heat energy' then surely it makes much more economic and ecological sense for us to generate our own electricity as close to home as possible? (This is beacause 27 units of the 'heat energy' generated at the 'distant' power station is 'lost' in the generation process and in its journey of hundreds of miles over 'lossy' overhead power lines from the 'furnace/boiler/generator' to the wall socket in your home). Similarly, if nuclear power is used to replace the fossil fuel 'furnace' the remaining stages of generation, transmission and distribution are subject to the same 'heat losses' as are involved in those process stages in the fossil fuel case.
The nominal efficiency of the process is further diminished in the use of mains electricicty in our homes to charge up the 400 volt 5/10/22/24 kWh 'battery' in an electric or hybrid electric car, motorcycle etc. Typically between 30 and 50% more electricity has to be used in the battery charging process than is actually stored as useable energy in the battery. Finally the conversion of stored electrical power in the battery to motive force in the car is no more than 85%. Thus 'doing the maths' we can see that the 'conversion efficiency' from power station to 'motive power on the road' is between 10/37 x 1/1.5 x 0.85 = 0.153 and 10/37 x 1/1.3 x 0.85 = 0.177 i.e. the conversion efficicency is between 15% and 18% with a typical value of 16.4% for coal fired generation. In contrast the converson efficiency between petroleum based fuels burnt in an internal combustion (IC) engine and 'motive power on the road' is typically greater than 20%. ... Read more
This same post is also in the Motoring section. We don't need it twice.
Stilhaus Kitchens in my mind are the best value kitchens by far.
... Read more
Mine was terrible.
First the Stop start did not work...
I was unfortunate enough to fall victim to this. I bought my Skoda from an official Skoda franchise too. The sales manager could not have cared less. It took me 3 months of stress and fight to get my money back. Read more
The worst offenders are often cars that have been used as minicabs and there the owners clock them back just before they go for an MOT so the excess mileage is not recorded on the MOT history.
Instead the vehicle only shows a modest increase year on year.
It would be so easy for the manufacturers to modify the software in such a way that if the mileage was not correct it would flash
hi to everyone.people pay out a large sum of money to enable them to drive into london on electric power, so the discussion on size of vehicle is immaterial as the health of the city is paramount.kind regards clint. Read more
The motoring press and government seem to be obsessed with the pursuit of more energy efficient cars and more energy efficient homes etc and are even encouraging us to buy an electric car, a 'plug in hybrid' car, or to install 16 huge solar panels on our roof tops, by offering huge financial subsidies and 'feed in tariffs' etc. Conversely ,we are 'warned' that huge future investment is required in such things as new nuclear power stations and 'renewable or eco energy' sources such as wind farms, solar farms and the like - all necessary to sustain our luxuries and 'energy rich' life styles.
There are alternatives to all this madness that require no new technological break throughs and probably only modest initial investment.... Read more
IMO madness is pretty much right,these break throughs to me are ok if they benefit my health and pocket,but this is all assuming global warming is caused by us,I dont think it is,I think its all natural occurances that would happen whether we are here or not.
transport I think should be improved rather than get away with what you can as our system seems to be,Hybrids I think will be improved, but I doubt all electric will take over untill electricity prices drop a lot, with lots of charging points all over country,and nuclear is our best bet ;-)
How well do communications, electronics, electrical, computer, software, automotive, mechanical. genetic, production, mass transport, aeronautical, civil and chemical engineering degrees (etc) equip today's graduates (2010 to 2014) for taking up a non-managerial, technical or design job in research and development (R&D) or Production Engineering in the manufacturing, pharma, petro-chemical, food processing, and construction industries?
When I was a 'student apprentice' with GEC-Marconi, we were put onto a four year, 2:1:1 'thick sandwich course' at Loughborough, Aston or Brunel Universities, but the whole of the third year (some 13 months in reality) was spent working and training in an R&D laboratory environment, and every available holiday period was spent back in training, initially and then latterly, actually working as a junior engineer, back in Essex in one of the many GEC-Marconi divisions. Thus, when we graduated with our Bachelor of Technology Honours Degrees, we already had the equivalent of nearly 18 months industrial training and working experience. Other graduates with say, just a 3 year Physics Degree were 'all at sea' and struggling technically for the first year or so of their post graduation employment and so we 'young technologists' were tasked with 'helping them get up to speed' as part of our initial deployment! ... Read more
It depends on the course they did (sandwich or non sandwich), the engineer themselves and their ability and receptiveness to asking for help and finally the company which employs them. No one can expect to leave a university with a degree in engineering and start designing space ships. Many multi nationals provide a strucutured training program to develop their engineer through to their chartership (4-5 years). I was like a sponge when I left college and wanted to know about everything. My first appointment was for a small engineering firm where I was the only Chemical Engineer. The other engineers took me under their wing and gave me a sound grounding in all the other engineering disciplines which has stood me in good stead ever since
I purchased a space saver for my b180 ctdi from M.BENZ becaues they only have a repair kit which I hate.(which is unused).
The same problem applies to asenta I am considering purchasing .Will it fit this vehicle. Read more
Most manufacturers have different bolt patterns, PCD's, centre bores, offsets etc. If any one is out it probably will not fit or the car will potentailly be unsafe.
A non homologated spare will also affect your insurance should you have an accident when using it....
Browse
I once delivered a car for a poor young woman in Glasgow fro Bradford, it was days after the delivery that I realised what had happened, I felt so guilty afterwards. To make matters worse some use car dealers employ this tactic, I have been in the car delivery business for a while and it is getting worse.
Yes this problem is real, people shouldn't buy a car without verifying the seller.