Clunkclick
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Posts posted by Clunkclick
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Clearly, there is a demand for this sort of thing.
With Trinity House adopting this sort of liberal approach, its worth considering investing in a few discarded 44 foot ISO containers, welding them together "Amazing spaces" style and then sticking the structure on some lashed together discarded domestic hot water cylinders(Corks in fitment holes of course) and towing the whole lot around using a Kensington Gardens row boat, with a view too running a continuous car boot sale on board - that would be about the UK's level now.
There's no two ways about it, the population over here with the appropriate disposable income for this endeavour are as thick as mince.
Nick
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On 12/06/2017 at 11:29, VWD said:
Been going on for years, Nick .
Have a look at this one --http://www.shipsofcalmac.co.uk/ships.asp?vessel=loch_arkaig
Looks OK,but in a side wind she'd heel over like a Spanish Galleon in a breeze. calmac bought it as an ex Admirality minesweeper ( from what I remember) and added the top superstructure . Great size for the small isles, but I was happier on board one of the local ( far smaller ) fishing boats in a bad sea .
Same deal with Jacques Cousteau's "Calypso" - saw it undergoing major refurb in Concarneau France - was originally a British Yard Minesweeper (Clues in the word "Yard"), wooden hull + lots of add-on superstructure, yet allowed to sail the oceans.
Nick
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21 minutes ago, eyegr said:
This story reminded me of an old film, The Towering Inferno.
Very sad, considering this one was a residential building and many people are now homeless.
. . . And dead and injured, I suspect.
N.
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Localish to me. Worked in that area for 12 years.
Reported that its a local authority 24 storey tower block, built in 1974 (As replacement accommodation, as North Kensington was cleared of WW2 bomb damage + slums). Apparently, recently refurbished at a cost of £10m which included the external fitment of decorative cladding - it appears that the cladding caught fire after a fridge exploded in one of the flats. Block managed for council by private concern.
Residents report no fire alarm heard, no sprinkler system installed, that emergency service access was impeded by unmodernised estate roads and that the building operators advice to tenants in the event of fire was to return to their flat, close the front door and sposition a wet towel against the gaps in the door surround - it appears that those that could took no notice of that and just got out. Looks like Lloyds are in for a big one. Residents reported that "One-hour" resistant internal fire doors fitted but these were ineffective against a fire that propagated through the external cladding.
Residents reported that some of the tenants were old people and that fire took less than an hour to seize the whole building - according to the Fire Officer, every thing above floor 2
Whilst the Fire Officer stated that the first fire engine got to the scene in 6 minutes (A similar arse-covering PR statistic has been used somewhere else recently), residents reported that there weren't enough fire units to deal with the blaze, they couldn't deal with anything above floor 4 (From the outside) and BBC say that fire equipment has had to be brought in from Surrey
Video clips that the BBC have been broadcasting show the fire racing up the outside of the building.
Nick
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I have been impressed recently when using the public transport in London. Particularly with the improved service reliability and reduced running times of trains and buses compared with 15 years ago when I last used LT services on a regular basis. Even the public address systems at some stations are improved.
But there seems to be one glaring (!) error that seems to be overlooked in the new system.
Train Indicator boards. Thesehave all been replaced by a new design and seem to be much smaller than those of yesteryear with the consequence that I cannot read them when only half way down the average platform . . and, yes, I had my eyes tested in February and there OK - in fact I'm longsighted. Not only are they indicator boards smaller but they seem to have standardised (For design continuity purposes) on the same sort of illuminated dot-matrix design (Orange LEDS on black) as is used in buses. Whilst they may be sufficiently bright to work in reduced illumination of the underground and buses, they just can't be seen in overground stations even when positioned under the platform roof. The indicator boards of old were 4 times the size.
Obviously, design continuity is a secondary issue here, but doesn't anybody do test installations and walk-thru's anymore ? Why wasn't this spotted before the type was adopted all over the system ?
Here they are talking about installing Wi-Fi for the tunnels and you can't read the indicator boards at any distance . . . shades of BREXIT.
Nick
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"But keeper Jeremy thinks that the merger of the two troupes won't work, as one of them is too diseased and psychotic to be stable" - Monkey Business.
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1 minute ago, camelspyyder said:
But what I want to know is, how can a country waste 7 weeks on an election and not have a winner?
All we have are Conservatives as 1st loser
Labour have gained but are still 2nd loser
SNP 3rd loser
etc etc.
What, if anything has been achieved?
Lots of political consultancy and lobbying firms have trousered some nice cheques ?
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"Truly grasshopper, each man has his own route back to the 14th Century" - standby your beds for a reprise of "Explode your neighbour out-of-doors".
Lucky the GFA set-up at Stormont had already fallen apart, eh readers ?
Nick
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5 hours ago, gadgetman said:
Seeing a lot of EDL, Britain First etc posts wanting extremists locked up and deported.
Clearly the irony is lost on some
Monied vested interest having created the equivalent of Afghanistans' Mujar Hadeen, what other options are there - even if its just repeated short-term detention to disrupt the plans of local cells, So the "Threat level graph" is turned into a saw-tooth pattern rather than a straight line "Always critical". You're more likely to catch and prevent if the security state is varying periodically than when its always the same.
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19 hours ago, Awayoffski said:
Are they lining Michael Gove up for the Home Secretary position if he gets re-elected.
That is all the UK needs, a total prat / Rupert Murdoch Employee Journalist in charge of the UK's security.
A possible entry for Private-Eye's "Spot the Difference" gallery ?:-
Some irony here too.
Nick
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3 hours ago, Awayoffski said:
Theresa May as the Home Secretary was probably more successful at having UK Police stopping football hooligans leaving the UK to cause trouble than she ever was with stopping people going to train or fight in various wars around the world when not members of the Armed Forces or the 'Civilian Operatives' that the UK lets Companies send around the world.
Very good Police Departments involved tracking those online involved in Football violence by monitoring the Social Media etc.
Theresa May and now Amber Rudd might just be the wrong people to be Home Secretaries, maybe more like those in the past that were Involved in the Security Business while being paid as Elected Members.
Maybe a MP with a background in Law & Order or Security / Armed Forces would be just the ticket.
Unlikely, unless Mafair, parts of Islington or St George's Hill /Ascot are hit ? - but there's probably too many concealed "Blackwater" type security guards operating on private land to make it viable even for the lone wolves.
Nick
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If UK were southern California and we were all well-to-do middle class families who had the apple of their eye kidnapped and brainwashed by a cult, we'd engage a re-snatch and de-programming team to restore our beloved to the bosom of the family. . . . no chance in the UK of either of the two later propositions being fulfilled.
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35 minutes ago, gadgetman said:
The problem is giving them a hug like Corbyn wants isn't a solution.
Neither is going all 1984.
These people don't play by established Terrorist ways. They're indiscriminate, and will use any means necessary with little planning or traceable footprint.
How do you stop small groups or lone wolf attacks?
Just employ standard military force depletion strategy.
Being exceptionally, tolerant and politically correct (Like we all are on Briskoda) You arrest, imprison/deport/lose the 5,000 who are the greatest threat, wait till the level builds again and then do the same to the next 5,000 who fill the vacuum and so on.
Meanwhile, I'll start whistling a once popular Gene Pitney theme, in the hope that this post sees the light of day, publication wise.
Nick
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32 minutes ago, gadgetman said:
Just to add you can't want extremists stopped, yet ignore non Muslim extremists like Britain First etc.
If the initilal problem was addressed effectively in the first place, the second wouldn't arise, or at least not to the same extent.
UK is already part of a coalition who are AT WAR with Daesh and whose armed forces have already been committed in another part of the World to fight and eliminate this Muslim extremist faction.
But we're not practising the same at home, or to the same extent . Why is that ?
How can you maintain an "Algernon" in town, "Algie" in the country defence policy (In fact the reverse !) and be credible to this country's adversary's ?
This is running the country with "The bow doors open".
Nick
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Same here, not in the income bracket or interest group that would find two weeks under voluntary lock-down in a floating upmarket council estate shopping mall interesting.
But surely, on H & S grounds, this and similar vessels are a "Bow doors open" event waiting to happen.
Way too much "Top hamper". No rolling-resistance. Hulls designed with no real kiel, relying completely on the suction generated by barge type flat bottom to keep them anchored upright on the water. They daren't get broadside on to a heavy sea and wind.
I'm not saying it keeps me awake nights, but how the hell do they get these things certificated ?
Nick
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A "Funny-old-World" comparison in the realm of "Big-Numbers":-
5000 x £383,000 = £1,915,000000.
Versus 892,000 Euros for a fully finished cruise liner.
So it would be cheaper for Southwark Council to purchase, off-the-stocks, the latest maritime output from La Belle France, rather than build a housing estate for its tenants - and there would be entertainment and sports facilities and a shopping mall stuffed full of business premises chucked in.
Nick
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23 hours and response still not posted - touch of arthritis ?
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What is certain is that another Tory Government will finish the NHS - with my recent experience (MI in 2011, Lymphoma 2015) I can attest to a system under progressively increasing strain over this period.
At least, at the moment, all those Ex-pats in Provence, have access to a greater variety of health care treatments via use of their EHIC cards and minimal waiting when compared to over here. Bearing in mind most of them left the UK in the early 1990s to early 2000's, they're going to have a real culture shock when they attempt to use the facilities of the contemporary NHS.
Government of the time (1980s-1990s) were to blame in no small part for what's happened on Health care and social care fronts.
They were more than well aware of the oncoming consequences of the 1950s population bulge. In fact, that was used as the justification for the "Big-Bang" "Liberalisation" of private pension arrangements in the late 1980s i.e. the change from Final Salary to Money Purchase schemes. But of course, most of the savings from that went straight into the pockets of Corporations and were paid out as increased dividends and loan repayments to City financiers and shareholders.
Equally, the take-up of money purchase schemes wasn't in direct proportion to the loss of final salary scheme members - some members of the population decided to divert disposable income that previously went into pension contributions into larger houses, cars, holidays and the government legislation to correct this deficit and enforce private pension contributions at a minimum level was 20 years in the coming. Houses are the only residue with an asset value that is now left.
If early action had been taken, at the end of the '80's to mitigate the financial effects of the demographic bulge, i.e. by a combination of increased NI contributions, perhaps a special tax, plus a certain amount of deficit financing by government and a scheme for increased personal contributions this "Crisis" could have been avoided. After all,in economic effect, isn't the demographic bulge, the same as an economic slump and what do we do there ? Fill-in the slumps with deficit financing - witness, most recently, Quantative Easing 2008 -2015
The 40 year con -
UK average long-term rate of economic growth 1945 -1979, 2% per annum.
UK average long-term rate of economic growth 1979 to date, 2% per annum.
In equality of wealth and Income, off the scale since 1979.
End of.
N.
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1 hour ago, Awayoffski said:
Those that jumped ship & took their pension or benefits income and proceeds from sale or let of their homes off to Continental Europe
while still getting Winter Fuel Payment , Xmas £10 Bonus etc and free bus travel when back visiting are now all worried about having to return to BREXIT UK that they never paid taxes to in some cases for many years now.
Worried the NHS will not be able to cope because migrant workers that came to work, earn and pay taxes in the UK will be leaving and the NHS will not cope.
Nothing as queer or as contrary as folk.
Ex Pats or as i call them Immigrants that left the UK and settled in the bright new life.
Come back here for your NHS treatment . . . . . I should coco. I'd stay in France/Germany/Spain and pay . At least you be guaranteed treatment fitted to your needs rather than something tailored to the various economic agendas (Undisclosed of course) of HM Treasury.
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What would the apron crew be doing manoevering the GPU under the trailling edge of the port wing between the engine nacelle and the wing root, or even further aft, when the electrical connection point is on the Starboard side front fuselage - see film. Good practice, surely, is for the GPU to be in visual sight of the cockpit, so flight deck crew can see it and don't initiate depart with the thing still attached by cables ?
Furthermore, it would be impossible for the GPU to clump the flap, even if the GPU was wrongly positioned and the flap was left fully deployed i.e. vertically down from the trailling edge because the GPU is not tall enough - see film.
Inter-city/regional flights lasting 1-1.5 hours, virtually no catering required. With the fuselage that low slung, in the absence of a built-in, electro/hydraulically operated ramp (Like the buses), they probably use ally light weight portable ramp (Like car tow trucks have) to push the catering trollies on.
The MO for these sort of operations is that you transit from a central hub to radial destinations - usually the major services, fuel, catering, sullage are only available at the hub. The outlier stations only provide the GPU., fire truck, air traffic and . . pax. The economics and logistics of this sort of cut-price fare transport is founded on these assumptions. It doesn't work otherwise.
Some people on here have very delicate egos, but thanks for the insults anyway.
And the original question . . . . . ?
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Logically, that is a possibility. But whilst the system is working (Allbeit with minor errors reported on OS exit), I'm going to be brave and leave it alone. Otherwise, it will be money, money, money (At least a new Processor, possibly a second-hand Phenom, with all the risks that entails) and I'd rather use the dosh to save for the AMD4 replacement for this system
Like the motor, happy to run it in sub-optimal configuration i.e. like giving the two extracted fuses a stiff ignoring.
Postscript
Yesterday, I re-installed the MSI graphics Radeon Graphics card + latest software. And the effect on the Motherboard voltages occasioned by the increased current draw - none, in fact the BIOS software was showing that the voltages went very slightly up in the direction of the standard reference voltages.
Only mildly deleterious effect of installing the graphics card was that the corruption that was previously experienced in the BIOS software display (And only on exiting the in-built ROM update utility) -oddly only effects the display and not function of the utility. I may try disabling the on-board graphics in the BIOS to see if that goes away (Manual says on-board graphics + plug-in graphics card can be run together).
Nick
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Isn't this way of paying for Social Care just deferred deficit financing in private individual form ?
Politicians of today have virtually no choice in what they are offering.
Current price £900 a week for residential care in a care home and probably at least £450 a week for care in your own home.
What were they to do, to even make it look as if they were half-addressing the problem ?
These are the solutions you get, when the mass of the electorate are too disinterested or dim to look ahead.
You wouldn't have paid the increased National Insurance contribution or Income Tax starting 40 years ago which would have enabled the Exchequer to build an actuarially sound sinking fund from which Social Care today could have been funded. The Tories didn't want a saving scheme because that would have reduced the amount of money coming out of the national pot that they creamed off for their own essential indulgences i.e. Rolls-Royce Celestials, country piles and multiple mansion, the plastic boats in the Aeagan - hence the anti-taxation rhetoric there has been since the 1980s - from recollection, the argument put forward at the time was that larger N.I. contributions would have made our industry uncompetitive - a complete lie, as we now know, its lack of investment in UK industry and running the economy as a low-wage sweatshop that has done for the UK.
You spend large portions of your uncommitted disposable incomes on ultra expensive, carriageway blocking, depreciating 4 - wheel identity bracelets and foreign holidays. You can't get a quart out of a pint GNP !
The Donald would like it, he'd say its "Beautiful", and I'd have to agree with him . . . a beautiful, long-term con, exquisitely executed.
Nick
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John - noted.
Be a shame if it was the PSU, as its only 18 months old.
I swapped - out the pair of double rank DIMMS yesterday, for single rank, so the set-up is all single rank now and, again, it appears to be fine.
As it seems stable now, with memory pairs planted in A1+B1 and A2+B2 (No matter whether they are single or double rank) and as the motherboard voltages reported in CMOS are within limits, I'm inclined to leave the memory alone, hope it will keep going- if only to prevent further wear and tear on the DIMM connectors, ultimately with a view to upgrading to AMD4 socket MB and Ryzen processor, when the prices come down.
I will be re-installing the MSI radeon graphics board. That is a big power draw, the board has its own 6 point power connector - voltages will drop slightly, even if the PSU is OK. If the PSU, or one of its rails is faulty, a problem will probably show up when I re-install that, especially when I run the furry bouncing ball stress test.
Also,there is another persistent problem, which may or may not be related. When closing down W10 on this machine, I'm getting a "Cannot write to this memory as its 'Read Only'. This problem persists, no matter which of the three pairs of DIMM memory I install in the 2 bank pairs on the MB. So, perhaps there's a failing component on the MB. Something to do with the "No-Execute bit" facility on x64 processors ?:-
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X86-64
Postscript
The other thing I've noticed is that the AM3(938) processor is reported by the CPU-ID program as being from the Propus family of Athlon II 630 4 core processors (Family F, model 5, stepping 2, Ext. family 10, Ext.model 5, revision Bl-C2), with 4 x level 2 cache of 512Kb, 16 way, whereas the following document records the Propus as a 3 core Athlon II, with 3 x level 2 cache of 512KB and with the fourth core disabled:-
http://www.cpu-world.com/info/AMD/Unlocking_cores_and_L3.html
I'm just wondering whether the final seller (OC UK) or their supplier tweaked the processor as it was sold as 4 - core in conjunction with the overclocking Asus M4A88 board and that this may be causing the issues.
Nick
Loopy knife edged NHS Treatment Model ?
in The Roadside Hotel
Posted
Today, a couple of weekly outpatient appointments later at Mount Vernon, things seem to be getting back on track treatment wise. The finger seems to be healing and physiotherapy (Both clinic based and me doing some at home) seems to be having an effect in ensuring that most of the finger tendons on the damaged finger don't become locked-up with adhesions.
Downside, I left yesterdays clinic session and went to the clinic reception to book the next appointment only to be told that I couldn't as the computers were down - apparently they are still having problems with software re-installations following the recent hacking ??????
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