The "I'm Such a Fecking Div" Thread

[ElyDave]

I had a comedy bridge moment of my own today.  A somewhat ambitious sharp left onto a humpback bridge that I've only walked with a recumbent previuously from the other side (rideable on upwrong).  I geared down, turned sharp left, accelerated, hit the bottom of the bridge and bounced.

I bounced right out of the seat and ended up sprawled RHS down.  No damage to me or bike, but I proved my point, you need to get off and walk that section. 

Just the other side of the bridge is about 300m of comedy moonscape potholing.  Just about rideable on recumbent if you can avoid the deepest craters, I hit one today and almost pinged myself off the bike again into the ditch.   

[mrcharly-YHT]

After an utterly non-restful weekend, I decided I couldn't get my normal Monday train to work because there was a new starter on my team, and my other team member was back from holiday and we had shuffled desks.

So cue very early start after row with the missus over something stupid, sod all sleep.

Get to work and find; A) New starter is at the other office, won't be with me until tomorrow. B) other team member isn't in until Wed, C) I have hospital appointment outside of Cambridge

Feck, I could have stayed in bed an extra hour, probably not rowed with MrsC and work would have been fine.

[Nick H.]

I built my frame on Dave Yates' course about 13 years ago. https://yacf.co.uk/forum/index.php?topic=39924.25Started When I specced it I decided to build it up with 8 speed Dura Ace. Prior to that I had been a user of 6 speed Dura Ace. 6 speed Dura Ace had down tube shift levers and non-aero brake levers. No other options. So I brazed on the fittings for down tube levers.  I could have gone for bar end levers but I didn't want that Dawes look. (Not cool. The pros never had levers there. Those levers were meant for TT clip-ons.) Through the '80s Dura Ace went to 7 and 8 speed and those fancypants aero brake levers arrived. (Huh, as if a tortuous cable routing could ever justify the infinitesimal drag reduction of hiding your brake cables inside the bars!) In '91 Shimano threw out the old designs and introduced 9 speed Dura Ace with brifters! (More idiocy, forcing you to compromise your aero tuck in order to change gear.) They paired it with the new Hyperglide sprockets, which have half the tooth area worn away from new so you can run the chain on two cogs at the same time and replace the cassette twice as often.  It's all just marketing gone mad, to convince you that your bike is disposable.

Today I finally discovered that the first Shimano brifters were actually for 8 speed Dura Ace. They came out in 1990. How did I go all this time believing that brifters were only for the modern age? All these years of combing ebay for 8 speed bits and studying velobase and I completely missed the arrival of the world's first brifters. The prototypes were first seen in the '89 Tour on Phil Anderson's bike - the first time that pro racers didn't use down tube shifters. http://www.cyclingweekly.com/news/latest-news/icons-of-cycling-the-first-shimano-sti-gear-shift-system-178099 I devoured all that detail at the time, so I must have known all the details. I was a big fan of indexing and the other Dura Ace innovations in the '80s. I specced a new 753 with a 7400 group set in 1986, an unheard of decision. I felt like I was the country's biggest Shimano fan. It's inconceivable that I didn't know all about the dramatic switch to brifters. But I completely forgot. And I've somehow been blind to them for the last decade and a half. What has happened to my brain? I've regressed. I'm a missing link to cave-dwelling simpletons.

http://velobase.com/ViewComponent.aspx?ID=C6C9B8F3-5C94-4E2E-BB45-B67E77E36B3A&Enum=125&AbsPos=0

[rogerzilla]

I remember reading in (I think) Bicycling magazine about these new-fangled road STI levers and Aheadsets, which came out at the same time.  The latter was a Dia-Compe invention although they later sold the trademark to Cane Creek, and the concept was licensed to anyone who wanted it (Shimano and Chris King wouldn't pay).

[Mrs Pingu]

We came on a bike touring holiday and forgot to bring our stash of jelly babies 

[SoreTween]

I'm tempted to re-black it by heating it up and dropping it in oil but this will probably anneal it and make it soft.

It was an awfully long time ago but my memory is slow cool to anneal, fast quench to temper.  It could well be hardened though and that has to be the last process, you would make it soft by undoing (to some extent) the hardening.

Sitting ready to be corrected.

[Beardy]

Slow cool to Anneal
Fast quench to harden
Low tempurature heat cycle to temper.

[fuzzy]

Been reading a LOT of Pratchett recently.

Yesterday, whilst completing some official type forms, I dated one Sunday 10th Grune 2018

[Guy]

Been reading a LOT of Pratchett recently.

Yesterday, whilst completing some official type forms, I dated one Sunday 10th Grune 2018

 

I'm quite surprised you put 2018. What with all that's going on "The Century of the Fruit-Loop" might have been appropriate

[matthew]

I've come into work today without any of my painkillers.* starting to get rather sore, but fortunately I have to travel to site in a couple of hours which means driving past home so I can call in and pick them up.


* As I typed this I remembered the emergency stash in my office bag. Only one tablet so a half dose but hopefully it will take the edge of the discomfort.

[barakta]

Ouch. Hope half dose will do till you can get to the full stash...

[barakta]

I didn't realise I didn't have a hearing aid in till I was at the bus stop yesterday - had to go home and get it because there's no point in trying to socialise with non signers without it... DOH

[Paul]

I've taken up the rotten floorboards up in the en suite (terminal shower leak) to replace them.

I had a bit of plumbing to do too so before replacing them I used some small cuts of the removed floorboards to bridge the joists and give me a stable platform.

Yes, you heard right: I decided to stand on cuts of the rotten boards that I was replacing.

One of them gave way beneath me on Friday night. Luckily, only my right leg went through, resulting in cuts and bruises and the odd sensation of being in two places at the same time...

So now I have some plastering to do when I've finished the shower.

[PhilO]

Bit of a drawn-out commute yesterday morning. Thank goodness for flexi-time! I heard a suspicious rattle just before reaching work and stopped. No keys in pocket. Looked behind. Nothing. Checked bag. Nothing. Phoned MrsO. No, keys not at home. So rode home slowly, looking for them. Checked all round house and garage. Grabbed spare key, and rode back in again, slowly, still looking for keys. And found them, ~2 metres from where I originally stopped! 

Hour and a half for s commute that normally takes 16 minutes...

[Kim]

That annual favourite: stopping the spinning wheel by hand when there's a studded tyre on it.  Been a while since I used the mountain bike...

[andrewc]

That annual favourite: stopping the spinning wheel by hand when there's a studded tyre on it.  Been a while since I used the mountain bike...

Some people pay others to inflict decorative scars , you just DIY....        Hope there was nothing other than bad swears as a result.

[T42]

That annual favourite: stopping the spinning wheel by hand when there's a studded tyre on it.  Been a while since I used the mountain bike...

Some people pay others to inflict decorative scars , you just DIY....        Hope there was nothing other than bad swears as a result.

Man been to Heidelberg.

[Ham]

Imagine if you will, being on holiday in a country such as Malta. Possibly renting a property through Airbnb with a BBQ area outside the front door, overlooking a bay. Nice, eh? Then consider preparing a meal, including putting some stuff on the cooker in a frying pan. Then consider what might happen if you step outside to see how your spouse and the BBQ are doing, closing the front door so it doesn't bang, as it's quite breezy. With the key inside.

You get permanent membership of the leaderboard of this thread, that's what

[Mrs Pingu]

Oops!

[Torslanda]

Awaiting a leather case for my new phone. Postie arrives with a suitably sized padded cell envelope. 'Goodie, goodie, gum drops!' methinks.

But wait. What's this? Marry! 'Tis a rubberised armour case in a fetching shade of orange with a screen protector and a lurid bronze anodised stylus.

Straight onto ebay, 'Item not as described'. <Fade down>

<Fade up> Mrs Torslanda - of the horned helmet and heavy metal breastplate - arrives.
'Has your son's new phone case turned up . . .'
'Is it orange?'
'Yes'
'FUCK!'

[T42]

Further proof that I shouldn't do anything requiring thought the day after a hard ride: my FDR has been rubbing a bit in the high trim position, so this morning I put the bike on the hooks and started twisting the downtube adjuster.  (a) very stiff, even on the smallest chainring and (b) twisting has no effect; but I managed a couple of turns.

Out to workshop again just now, after lunch. Noticed that moving the FDR shifter twitches the cable on the other side of the bike.

Fixed now.

[citoyen]

Cycled to parkrun this morning. Made a last minute decision to change which bike I used, which meant swapping stuff from one bag to another.

Got to parkrun, locked up bike, did run, went back to bike... and that’s when I realised I’d left the key for the lock in the other bag.

Wife poorly in bed so I can’t get her to come out and rescue me.

Bollocks.

ETA: finally got hold of my son after making my wife get out of bed to wake him up, the feckless layabout. He’s on his way with key. I’ve promised to take him for breakfast by way of thanks. Although it will be lunchtime before he gets here.

[andytheflyer]

Our ancient (for modern consumer electronics/white goods) 20 yo Hotpoint washer was being a bit picky about how the door was shut.  Sometimes it would wash, sometimes it would need an extra push on the door - and since we have Economy 7 and the washer goes on in the wee small hours (aka the small wee hours) we would often wake up to a machine that hadn't washed.

Diagnosed a faulty door interlock switch.  Looked up new one on the web and I thought it was £20.  Not being sure if the lock was the problem, found one on Fleabay for £8, delivered.  Just in case it wasn't the lock.

Fitted the new (old) lock, only took me 15 mins, having determined just how to get at it.  Works fine.  Result.

In browsing for motor brushes (it's bound to need some soon) I saw that the price of a new lock wasn't the £20 that I thought it was, but £7.65.  So 35p cheaper (but without p&p) than a used one that's only 2 years newer than the machine itself.  Doh……..

Oh well, at least I now know that the problem was a duff interlock, and I know how to swap it over for the inevitable new one.  Assuming that the next machine problem isn't terminal.  But even major parts such as the programmer and the motor, still available  new but >£100, are available used at around £25 - so maybe the machine has a few more years left in it yet.

[TheLurker]

A small collection of idiocies gathered over the last week or so.

Midday today sees me hurrying home with two copies of a glider* plan in my hot little hands eagerly looking forward to starting on it tomorrow morning....

... only to find that; yes I *can* build a 36" span wing easily on my board, *provided* it's a two part wing of 18" a-side.  What I can't build is a *one piece* 29" wing.  Cue the sound of an, extensive, forehead being slapped. Never mind measure twice, cut once; measure once would have been a good place to start. 

Wednesday last week saw me kicking my heels in the local minor injuries unit with a deep scalpel cut that would just not stop bleeding.  Top tip. When putting a straight edge on balsa sheet prior to cutting strip keep your fingers out of the way of the blade.

Monday last week saw me in a minor flap thinking we had a leaky pipe in the loft.  No.  A certain clot had left a not quite empty bidon in his study cupboard which he'd knocked over that morning and the drips of water were from that, but it took a good five minutes of frantic turning off of the mains and checking the ceiling for damp patches to discover this


*Walthew MK II, Roland Scott 1948.  This one has been on my build list since 1973.  For those of you interested in that sort of thing I uploaded a cleaned up copy to Outerzone last week.

[ElyDave]

That's where not having an upstairs comes in handy, any ceiling dripping is automatically SERIOUS