The Night Mail

[Winslow Boy]

1 hour ago, Oldddudders said:

As it happens, my surviving brother is a genetic engineer by background.....

Well what can one say but yet another reason to be grateful for genetics.

[pH]

3 hours ago, AndyID said:

 

Interesting, because Arizona "dis'nae gee its ginger" and most of it is stuck on MST all year.

 

Most of the province of Saskatchewan stays on central standard time all year. The provinces immediately east and west of it do change to daylight saving time.  That means that for part of the year, Saskatchewan is on the same time as Alberta and for the rest of the year, it’s on the same time as Manitoba.

[polybear]

8 hours ago, SM42 said:

Mrs SM42 has got an idea that it is time to replace her ride. 

 

The big problem is that she wants a simple car, without all the tech, not something that is very common nowadays.

 

Andy

 
Trabant

[NHY 581]

13 minutes ago, polybear said:

 
Trabant

 

 

Bless you. 

 

 

[Northmoor]

8 hours ago, AndyID said:

 

If you do not already have one, get a multimeter, preferably one that can measure DC current up to 10 amps but a 1 amp max would probably be enough for this. When the car is supposed to be "off", disconnect one terminal on the battery and put the meter in series with the connection to measure the current.

It shouldn't be more than 100 milliamps. If it is, something is draining the battery. To find  out what, remove and replace the fuses one at a time while you watch the meter.

What he said. 

The first quick experiment @SM42 is to check the main interior lights are switching off correctly when you lock the car.  Then ask Mrs SM42 to get in the boot and see if the interior light goes off when it's closed.  Taking the opportunity to pretend you can't hear her asking to be let out, is optional, obviously.  Either of these small lights left on can easily flatten a battery in a week. 

[SM42]

1 minute ago, Northmoor said:

What he said. 

The first quick experiment @SM42 is to check the main interior lights are switching off correctly when you lock the car.  Then ask Mrs SM42 to get in the boot and see if the interior light goes off when it's closed.  Taking the opportunity to pretend you can't hear her asking to be let out, is optional, obviously.  Either of these small lights left on can easily flatten a battery in a week. 

 

But in eight hours?

 

Boot light is easy to check by removing the parcel shelf. (Also lets her out easily to as access to seat latches quite easy as well 😕)

 

Definitely something is not right as it been fine since its last wobble. 

 

Of course the in built battery health indicator may not be reliable. 

 

I have a multimeter somewhere but what capacity it is or indeed how to use the thing properly are beyond me.  ( one if those skills I've put off learning till I really need it)

 

The issue seems intermittent which doesn't help for fault finding.

 

Andy

[Happy Hippo]

9 hours ago, Northmoor said:

 

 

Last year one toilet started leaking which could only be repaired by taking it out,

When Northmoor takes out his toilet.....

 

 

[Northmoor]

3 minutes ago, SM42 said:

 

But in eight hours?

 

If any rechargeable lead-acid battery is allowed to get below about 20% (too low to crank the engine) it will never recover.  There are treatments which help clean the plate cells but they tend to involve putting something more than a steady trickle charge through the battery, which isn't normally a good thing.  Basically if your battery has previously been flat it is more liable to become so again.

[Happy Hippo]

19 hours ago, jamie92208 said:

I've got the terrible job of eating a rather large carrot cake that a friend gave me for doing a little job..  I need some now as I've just finished a railway themed jigsaw and it featured green kettles with copper caps. 

 

Jamie

Does your friend need any big jobs doing?

[Northmoor]

5 minutes ago, Happy Hippo said:

When Northmoor takes out his toilet.....

 

 

I love that the recommended videos at the end include, "Don't put Sodium down the toilet" and "I'm going to put a hand grenade in a porta potty".  Without watching, we can assume both are from the land where such people are allowed to own automatic weapons. 

[petethemole]

2 hours ago, iL Dottore said:

What I found interesting about the Jamison Irish whiskey is that they make no reference to which brand of stout cask was used. I would’ve thought they would have been Guinness stout casks, but then I would imagine there would be all kinds of fees to be paid to Guinness by Jameson in order to use the Guinness name.

Barrels from Cork's Franciscan Well brewery, brewers of Shandon Stout.

https://www.thewhiskyexchange.com/p/31012/jameson-caskmates-stout-edition

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franciscan_Well

[Happy Hippo]

9 hours ago, SM42 said:

Mrs SM42 has got an idea that it is time to replace her ride. 

 

The reason being it not starting twice in the last 3 months, requiring a bit of a battery boost. 

 

The first time it had been idle for 3 weeks while we were in the motherland.  

 

Yesterday it had only been idle for 8 hours. 

 

The battery claims it is fine and indeed it lasted 3 months between failures. 

 

There may be something else going on. 

 

The other reason is the boot lid catch keeps sticking. An issue that has developed since it was repaired after its little argument with a Fiat Tipo.

 

Many Deltics are therefore at risk at SM42 Towers. 

 

The big problem is that she wants a simple car, without all the tech, not something that is very common nowadays.

 

Andy

Check the Beta lead that attaches to the Alternator.  We had a Fiat Tipo that exhibited identical symptoms.  Fiat couldn't fix it, but a local auto electrician did!

 

'It's this little wire here that has come adrift'  said he....

 

Alternatively, for nipping into Poland, this a sturdy, and quite simple little number: 

 

 

[Northmoor]

2 hours ago, iL Dottore said:

I had to leave my Hermit Abode™ yesterday and go into town to a Verein meeting. On the way back I stopped at Paul Ullrich - one of Switzerland’s finest wine and spirits merchants - to see if they had anything that caught my eye. I ended up buying a bottle of Glendronach Port Wood finish single malt and a bottle of Jameson Caskmates Stout Edition Irish Whiskey. I was also tempted by a bottle of Dalmore Cigar Malt Reserve Highland Single Malt - but I thought that those extra £120 on top of what I had already purchased would have incurred The Wroth of SMBO. So in this case discretion was the better part of valour.
 

What I found interesting about the Jamison Irish whiskey is that they make no reference to which brand of stout cask was used. I would’ve thought they would have been Guinness stout casks, but then I would imagine there would be all kinds of fees to be paid to Guinness by Jameson in order to use the Guinness name.

 

A visit to Ullrich is always bad for my wallet, although I have yet to succumb to the temptations of the Dalmore Constellation Collection Cask No 594 33 Years 1979 Highland Single Malt (£10,544) or even the Talisker Xpedition Oak 43 Years Single Malt  (£3,700). As I charge by the hour for consultancy work, I set the limit of my discretionary (self indulgent) spending at “1.5 Boring Teleconferences” 🤣😳. But even without going for the big ticket rarities, it would still be too easy to drop 5 grand at Ullrich in one go (and the whisky shops in London and Edinburgh are even more dangerous to my financial wellbeing!). Fortunately I am made of sterner stuff!

 

I think that the next time I’m in The Big City I’ll swing by Ullrich and get a bottle of the Dalmore Cigar Malt Reserve Highland Single Malt; then head to Davidoff for one or two Alec Bradley Black Market Filthy Hooligan Barber Pole cigars - then back home to grab a good book, a wee dram of the Dalmore and a Filthy Hooligan and then decamp to the patio for a good read, a good drink and a good smoke!

 

Living well is the best revenge…

 

The Glendronach 15 y.o (Sherry Cask) is widely considered to be one of the very best single malt Scotches you can buy and I will certainly endorse that view.  It sounds like your price range is a little higher than mine but what you have to ask yourself about the oldest whiskys/whiskeys is, what if I don't actually like it?  Once you've opened the bottle the value is largely wiped out (which is why most are bought by collectors who never open them) and as the woman in my local whisky shop put it, it must be disappointing to spend three grand on something to find it just tastes of barrel.

[jamie92208]

57 minutes ago, Happy Hippo said:

When Northmoor takes out his toilet.....

 

 

Bri gs to mind the story of Count Fritz von Krappehauser in Spike Milligan Puckoon. The family motto was Abort in Luxus. 

 

Jamie

[NHY 581]

Discuss. 

 

[Happy Hippo]

11 minutes ago, NHY 581 said:

Discuss. 

 

Stunning!

 

Did you buy it for me as a Christmas present?

[45156]

Readers of ERs will already know that I spent 10 weeks in hospital with a chest infection (actually pheumonia), was discharged after a week before it was fully cleared, and then readmitted for 9 weeks with pus on my left lung, the antibiotics they used were so strong that they left me vulnerable in other parts, resulting in two bouts of c diff, but also encephalitis, sepis, and a stroke - now recovering at home.  I am mainly posting this to let the ex ERs who are only active here know how I'm getting on.

Stewart

[GMKAT7]

Good afternoon Rob G,

 

Is that the call for a WTF button/icon?

 

Is it discuss or discus?

 

Cheers, Nigel.

[rockershovel]

20 hours ago, Happy Hippo said:

Oh Dear, the Jockenese lost this afternoon's 6 Nations Rugby match......

 

To the Italians!

 

Wales had better pull their socks up if they don't want to remain at the bottom of the results table.

Springjocks / S Africa A, you mean....

[rockershovel]

2 hours ago, Northmoor said:

I love that the recommended videos at the end include, "Don't put Sodium down the toilet" and "I'm going to put a hand grenade in a porta potty".  Without watching, we can assume both are from the land where such people are allowed to own automatic weapons. 

Is von Krapenhauser in Puckoon? I don't think so... my vote for the best "exploding toilet" joke anywhere is the extended farce involving Apthorpe's "Thunder Box" in Waugh's "Officers and Gentlemen", with its tragi-comic ending in the single word "Biffed!"

 

A Mention in Despatches for Rik Mayall as Von Richthofen, for his soliloquy beginning with "Cavaliers of the clouds" and ending with a discourse on English lavatory humour. I can't imagine any of that getting on the present BBC, least of all Flasheart's closing line. 

[Oldddudders]

Elsewhere in Milligan's Memoirs, ISTR a tale of North Africa, where orderlies used petrol as a disinfectant in the latrines. This could provide spectacular results for anyone smoking while completing his daily requirements.....

[Tony_S]

2 hours ago, jamie92208 said:

Abort in Luxus. 

The Aborts on the  Rűgen narrow gauge railway train are not at all Luxus, you get a lovely view of the ballast. 

[iL Dottore]

3 hours ago, Northmoor said:

The Glendronach 15 y.o (Sherry Cask) is widely considered to be one of the very best single malt Scotches you can buy and I will certainly endorse that view.  It sounds like your price range is a little higher than mine but what you have to ask yourself about the oldest whiskys/whiskeys is, what if I don't actually like it?  Once you've opened the bottle the value is largely wiped out (which is why most are bought by collectors who never open them) and as the woman in my local whisky shop put it, it must be disappointing to spend three grand on something to find it just tastes of barrel.

The following is a most fascinatingarticle: https://www.luxhabitat.ae/the-journal/top-10-most-expensive-whiskey-in-the-world/

 

What I find interesting is, apart from the 60 year old whiskies, the huge amounts of money that changes hands for these things is not so much for the whisky, but rather the packaging (decanters, wooden chests, rare labels). As to the drinkability, I think all of them would be drinkable - I can't see Macallan putting their name to a bottle of dodgy whisky - no matter how rare or old it may be. Of course, once bottled whisky stops aging and should remain drinkable no matter how old the bottle (unlike with buying - say - a pre phylloxera bottle of wine at a similar price)

 

But would those who can afford such expensive whiskies actually drink them? Possibly - although I suspect there might be a price level beyond which you no longer drink it you just collect it. If I were ever in the fortunate position of being able to buy one or two bottles of the Dalmore Constellation Collection Cask No 594 33 Years 1979 Highland Single Malt (at £10,544) without having to consider the cost, then yes, I would drink it. Preferably in the company of carefully selected, like minded, friends

 

My one real whisky indulgence was buying a bottle of 50 year single malt [i.e. bottled after being in the cask for 50 years, not the bottle being 50 years old] for my 50th birthday a decade or so ago. It wasn't that spectacularly expensive and the self-discipline of limiting myself to a wee dram to just twice a year [birthday and Christmas] means I still have a few years worth of wee drams from that bottle.

 

Edited March 10 by iL Dottore

[PhilJ W]

7 minutes ago, Oldddudders said:

Elsewhere in Milligan's Memoirs, ISTR a tale of North Africa, where orderlies used petrol as a disinfectant in the latrines. This could provide spectacular results for anyone smoking while completing his daily requirements.....

My dad told me of his cousins who in the 1930's lived in a tenement in South London where several families had to share an outside WC. One of their neighbours was the local bully who would occupy the privy every Sunday morning with his copy of the Sporting Life and a packet of five Capstan Full Strength which he would smoke while checking his bets on the horses. If anyone was occupying the privy he would throw them out irrespective of age or gender. So my dads cousins and a few of their mates decided to do something about it and someone suggested dropping a *carbide tablet into the pan before he entered the privy. Come Sunday morning instead of putting one tablet into the pan they put a handful and then hid and watched their victim enter the privy. after about ten minutes there was an explosion that almost demolished the privy. The bully was found laying face down in front of what was left of the privy with a scorched and blackened backside.

*Carbide tablets were used to produce acetylene gas used up until after the war for vehicle and bicycle lamps. When dropped into water they gave of the gas.

[Oldddudders]

2 hours ago, 45156 said:

Readers of ERs will already know that I spent 10 weeks in hospital with a chest infection (actually pheumonia), was discharged after a week before it was fully cleared, and then readmitted for 9 weeks with pus on my left lung, the antibiotics they used were so strong that they left me vulnerable in other parts, resulting in two bouts of c diff, but also encephalitis, sepis, and a stroke - now recovering at home.  I am mainly posting this to let the ex ERs who are only active here know how I'm getting on.

Stewart

Stewart that sounds hideous. 10 weeks in dock is a lifetime. I hope they have really got it right this time.

 

 

 

 

Edited March 10 by Oldddudders