The Grumble Thread - No energy for a full on rant.

[Mr Larrington]

I know not whence emerged this myth that Leftpondians don't do anbaric kettles.  I've been in a Target in El Paso with a greater variety of 'em than you'd find in the average BRITONS horriblemarket and I've encountered them in hotel rooms in Canuckistan.

Yeah, but they're still limited to about 1500W, unless you do something unsporting like wire a euro-kettle into a 220V cooker/dryer/etc outlet (for the full Photonicinduction effect, do this with a leftpondian kettle).

At which point the gas option (or indeed heating pans of water to boil things in from cold on the hob, which my USAnian correspondents inform me is a perfectly normal thing to do) seems like a reasonable alternative speed-wise.  And avoids the shoddier side of kettle engineering, which can't possibly be improved by the addition of those crappy little shaver plugs and an optional approach to grounding.

There will obviously be exceptions where there isn't a gas hob available, like hotel rooms and workplace kitchens.  No idea if USAnian landlords routinely do the all-electric thing to avoid having to have gas installations inspected, but that must happen too.

In-room kettles in Canuckistan appeared to be capable of coming to the boil an order of magnitude faster than my dual-vole travel kettle, to the extent that I was tempted to steal one.  This notion amused the man at reception in the Hotel Cranktheheatinguptoeleven in Whitehorse.

[Cudzoziemiec]

And now a grumble, just to restore this thread to its allotted grumpiness quotient. I've lost the pump that mounted in a bracket next to the bottle cage on one of my bikes. It could have fallen off while I was riding (but I think I'd have noticed – probably felt and/or seen it fall, as it was on the downtube, and heard the clunk), it could be hiding somewhere at home (but I don't remember removing it and I've looked in all the places), it could have got knocked off while parked in town (boo!), or it could have been stolen (grrrrrrrrrrrr!). Either of the last two seems the most likely. Still, I'd had it ten years and IIRC it came free with a bike (that I no longer have), so okay. But now I need a new one. Probably go for one that I can put in a pannier, as I pretty much always have a pannier on this bike. Except then it's bound to end up in the wrong pannier...

The answer, of course, is to have one pump for each pannier, left and right. And one for each small pannier as well, just in case I use those instead. Oh, and one for the rack pack. Hmm....£$£

[Cudzoziemiec]

I know not whence emerged this myth that Leftpondians don't do anbaric kettles.  I've been in a Target in El Paso with a greater variety of 'em than you'd find in the average BRITONS horriblemarket and I've encountered them in hotel rooms in Canuckistan.

Yeah, but they're still limited to about 1500W, unless you do something unsporting like wire a euro-kettle into a 220V cooker/dryer/etc outlet (for the full Photonicinduction effect, do this with a leftpondian kettle).

At which point the gas option (or indeed heating pans of water to boil things in from cold on the hob, which my USAnian correspondents inform me is a perfectly normal thing to do) seems like a reasonable alternative speed-wise.  And avoids the shoddier side of kettle engineering, which can't possibly be improved by the addition of those crappy little shaver plugs and an optional approach to grounding.

There will obviously be exceptions where there isn't a gas hob available, like hotel rooms and workplace kitchens.  No idea if USAnian landlords routinely do the all-electric thing to avoid having to have gas installations inspected, but that must happen too.

In-room kettles in Canuckistan appeared to be capable of coming to the boil an order of magnitude faster than my dual-vole travel kettle, to the extent that I was tempted to steal one.  This notion amused the man at reception in the Hotel Cranktheheatinguptoeleven in Whitehorse.

Is Canuckistani anbarism different to Usanian then? I always assumed they were unified, so to speak.

[Kim]

And now a grumble, just to restore this thread to its allotted grumpiness quotient. I've lost the pump that mounted in a bracket next to the bottle cage on one of my bikes.

Topeak Mini-Morph?  It's being guarded by the dragons on the COR section by Low Swainby Farm.  But don't bother with any St George tactics, the business end has snapped off. 

[Kim]

In-room kettles in Canuckistan appeared to be capable of coming to the boil an order of magnitude faster than my dual-vole travel kettle, to the extent that I was tempted to steal one.  This notion amused the man at reception in the Hotel Cranktheheatinguptoeleven in Whitehorse.

Is Canuckistani anbarism different to Usanian then? I always assumed they were unified, so to speak.

Probably just that the dual-vole kettle is under-rated.  I assume the Canuckistanis have a slightly better understanding of tea than the USAnians, and put a bit of effort into kettle selection.

[Kim]

The wonderful but not at all surprising thing is that Kim just knows this.

A jet engine enthusiast mentioned it once.  For the reason rogerzilla cites, I didn't believe them, so looked it up on googlepedia.  I suppose gas is a *lot* cheaper than electricity when you're the gas company.

Slightly disappointed that it's an industrial engine turning a compressor, rather than a high-bypass turbofan breathing natural gas, with oxygen injected where the fuel would normally go, thobut.

[Cudzoziemiec]

And now a grumble, just to restore this thread to its allotted grumpiness quotient. I've lost the pump that mounted in a bracket next to the bottle cage on one of my bikes.

Topeak Mini-Morph?  It's being guarded by the dragons on the COR section by Low Swainby Farm.  But don't bother with any St George tactics, the business end has snapped off. 

I think it came from Decathlon originally. But you've reminded me that I did see what I recognized as the snapped-off handle of a Blackburn pump lying on the road a few days ago, and that in turn reminds me that I have such a pump. I think. I might have given it away and it didn't work very well anyway due to lack of valve lock thingy.

[ElyDave]

The wonderful but not at all surprising thing is that Kim just knows this.

THis is my line of business as well, gas turbines are used in the offshroe industry directly for power generation adn also as compression engines to move the gas onshore.

I'm currently engaged in another round of "how much gas have you burnt lately" with a load of operators in Aberdeen

[ElyDave]

The wonderful but not at all surprising thing is that Kim just knows this.

A jet engine enthusiast mentioned it once.  For the reason rogerzilla cites, I didn't believe them, so looked it up on googlepedia.  I suppose gas is a *lot* cheaper than electricity when you're the gas company.

Slightly disappointed that it's an industrial engine turning a compressor, rather than a high-bypass turbofan breathing natural gas, with oxygen injected where the fuel would normally go, thobut.

There are also some electrickery driven turbines out there.  Put in a massive variable speed drive and it's a lot more efficient in terms of response to demand.  GTs are only really efficient at high load and fall off very rapidly. On compression turbines offshroe, if the throughput falls below the design point they generally have a recycle loop which wastes energy sending the compressed gas around in a circle

[hellymedic]

It's cheaper to boil a kettle on a gas hob anyway.  It's not as effiicient at the point of use, but gas is about 1/4 the cost of electricity per kWh.

I wonder how the efficiency compares if you look at the whole system? As most electricity in the UK is now produced by burning gas... but then you've got scale in a power station. And presumably electricity is used to pump the gas to your house. But then you've got kettle lifetime and manufacturing too.

Separate from all that, a kettle on the hob seems to "boil hotter". I guess many electric kettles have thermostats that are either inaccurate or set fractionally low for safety reasons.

Our Sainsbury's jug kettle does not cut out until it's rocking with bubbles so I can't imagine it boils any cooler at the ambient atmospheric pressure than a stove top gas kettle unless its whistle is a VERY tight fit...

[ian]

Aboard the mothership, boiling water emits from a magic tap (you have to know the secret location of the child-lock). Seems adequate for cups of tea. You can also get it from the coffee machine, which isn't very good, so I'm thinking of making my own coffee or taking in a thermos of coffee from my home coffeebot.

[rafletcher]

We also have a Billi-tap for hot (and cold) water. There seem to be several Aeropress's on the drainer.

[Pickled Onion]

&& the best temperature for an Aeropress is way below 100˚

[ian]

I don't think the Vietnamese stuff I'm on the moment cares about the precise temperature. You could resurface a road with it. It's like they mixed tar with amphetamine and then insulted its mum. I love it.

[Cudzoziemiec]

We are not leftpondians but we may be savages (not this sort of savage, although some of us have been know to paint). We've been using a kettle on the gas hob since 2 electric kettles failed in one year. This one hasn't failed us. It would be great if it whistled, but it doesn't.

And I've just discovered a bit more about those Savages! I knew where they meet and I have a vague feeling I might even have been to one of their exhibitions, but well, they sound a bit... distinctive...
https://www.bristol247.com/culture/art/an-exclusive-society-hidden-in-the-heart-of-bristol/

[Mr Larrington]

You know when the HD picture suddenly falls off the distascopic screen, and you break out the signal strength meter to check the string 'twixt antenna and distascope and the battery goes flat so you buy a new one and the signal from the aerial is fine and the signal from the amplifier is also fine and so is the signal at the other end of the long run of coax and likewise after it's been through the PVR and in fact there's nothing wrong at all and the picture is now fine again?

Yes, exactly like that.

[rogerzilla]

Firefox add-ons have stopped working due to a known fault.  The internet is horrible without a big-ass adblocker.

[Cudzoziemiec]

Firefox add-ons have stopped working due to a known fault.  The internet is horrible without a big-ass adblocker.

I agree. Muchly! I don't use Firefox but a different browser with built-in adblocker and when I see the same sites without, they're almost unreadable.

[mrcharly-YHT]

Triple grumble.

1)
Big race on Sunday. don't have access to car, so dependent on a lift to get me and boat to race. Club arranges lifts. I message my 'driver', asking if we should meet on Sat to load up. No, meet on Sunday morning, he says.

Great. I live 10 miles out of town, really don't want to have to cycle in to town yet again, I'm tired.
Sat morning he messages me "Are you around, I want to get the bars and boats on the car today?"

2)
It is bank holiday, I'm exhausted from work.
I'll be working all of today and most of Monday. Then Tues - Fri attending a conference that I didn't want to attend, but boss insisted I go. Seemed to think it was personally important for my development. You know what is important for my development? Those in-company courses that I haven't had time to do that I am supposed to complete by mid-May.

3)
My lovely landlady and catcare. The cat-litter tray doesn't just need the poop scooping and fresh litter adding, you have to completely empty it sometimes and wash it. I've done it once when you were away, was going to do it again today; but you've just filled it up with a huge pile of cat litter (on top of wet litter). It honks with a nasal-clearing cloud of ammonia.

[Torslanda]

10 past 1pm. On a Bank Holiday Monday.

No shit the shutter's down...

[Feanor]

I'm going to Trondheim soon, so I'm mooching around on Strava's Global Heatmap for some ideas where I might go for a run.

Only the map has **NO F*CKING SCALE** on it.

Is that one k, or 10k?
I can see a couple of loops which I assume are 400m running tracks, so I can guess from that.
WTF use is a map with no scale?

[Kim]

See also: Campus maps and similar which frequently lack a scale, and are often rendered with some direction other than north up without the benefit of an arrow...

[Mrs Pingu]

Isn't Trondheim the place with the bike lift?
Right up there then....

[ElyDave]

if it was Hammerfest I could help 

[andrewc]

I used a Visa card to draw cash out of 2 ATMs in Hamburg over the weekend.  Now told someone tried to use it to make a payment on £0.0 on Amazon early this morning.  Card now cancelled & I'm waiting for a replacement.  Luckily I only use that one abroad, so it's causing no inconvenience.


Edit.  I could have done without the 05:00 alarm call but  the transaction was timed at 04:59 so that's a pretty fast automated system.


I was careful to use ATM's _inside_ buildings, a bank & a post office.  I've just remembered that when I used the bank one the first machine I tried rejected the card.