Steve_M

I once bought a car with HP. Put it in my wife’s name. We separated six months later, leaving me with, effectively, negative equity in that car and unable to sell it because I was skint and couldn’t afford to pay the outstanding balance. Since then I’ve either bought cash or had a personal loan from my bank. I feel more in control of my situation this way.

Drift ? More like a dinghy in a storm… The whole “will my bike run on E10?” has been done to death elsewhere… it’s the new tyre and choice of oil topic! Back on topic.. It may not affect lacquer protected pain, but unprotected plastic… my screen from my recent mishap in Scotland. It may be a general petrol effect, and maybe E10 is coincidental…

Did we lose the point of the original post somewhere? Nothing to do with whether your bike / lawnmower* / whatever is capable of running using the damned stuff, but the potential damage to unprotected surfaces. Having had to replace the screen on my bike at great expense, I think it’s a valid point. * I do need to check my lawnmowers (yes, I have four - I used to be a gardener, and we have a lot of grass to cut here ).

I did post of the effect it had on Perspex a few weeks ago after it splashed my windshield. Lesson learnt the hard way.

I’m a 100% tarmac rider (though I did ride down Kielder Drive. Once). For that reason I have Michelin Road Pilot 5 Trails. £lots but I find them to work well on the GS.

Indeed, but I can hear the anti-EU rhetoric if it had originated from there…

You mean the rules that were scrapped in 2008? You might choose to look at the current U.K. rules… this for apples, for example. U.K. marketing standards.

True. oh, and my bike had new tyres. My apologies for not posting and asking advice on which tyres would be best.

That was due to a strike by delivery drivers - even the Express acknowledges that - the last paragraphs. ” However, many others pointed out that the empty shelves across Brussels is due to a strike in a distribution centre. One person, @Banned_Reunion, tweeted: "But this is a Carrefour store. "Who have a strike in their distribution centre.”

I was looking at Versys parked up in Carlisle. I was considering if it would be an option when I eventually change bike… but those panniers Form over function? And only 28l each.

Many a grand night spent on the town in Walsall in my yoof (well, I didn’t know better). I served my apprenticeship in a foundry (long since gone) at Bescot, learnt about rock music in the “Beir Keller” under the Dirty Duck (now Flan O’Briens), saw Slade at the George Hotel (the building remains… ) and had many a fine evening talking b*ll*cks with mates at the Watering Trough on Ablewell Street. My mum lives in a nearby town and tells me it’s gone to the dogs. Shame.

I zip my trousers and jacket together less for the draft problem, more to prevent the jacket riding up in the event of a slide down the road. I attended a talk by Dr Roderick Woods where he talked about riding kit… this was one of the many areas of motorcycle clothing design that he discussed that stuck with me.

I think that’s the one we bought recently for my other half. We got caught in rain during our recent trip to bonnie (wet) Scotland and it repelled water as advertised. Most impressed.

Must go to more apple fairs…

Good morning. Today we will mostly be going to an apple fair.

Not quite that far back… but there’s a thought.

Good evening. Back from a short trip to Glasgow where we’ve been working on my step-daughter’s flat, readying it for sale (and so she can pay back the money we’ve lent her to buy it). Yea gods, what atrocious weather for driving in, and what the actual feck is it with middle lane road hogs? Now chilling, slowly emptying a glass of Old Speckled Hen, and about to watch a old episode of Dr Who.

It doesn’t help that the public read the headlines and fail to read beyond them, nor understand the context.

A measured assessment… “John Milbank, Consumer Editor of BikeSocial: “From a purely personal point of view, I’ve found the past few days to be a sickening reflection on the state of British media, and the general public’s inability to read past a click-bait headline. “When I read the first news story discussing the ‘handful of filling stations’ that were struggling to get fuel I was extremely disappointed with the language used in the headline (‘fuel shortage’), and the photo of a closed forecourt. The story made it clear – if the reader got that far – that other stations down the road had no such problems and it was obvious that there wasn’t a national crisis. But that’s not what gets the clicks that every media outlet is so desperately hungry for now. “As queues started to form through panic-buying, the reporting continued, with clumsily-written headlines of ‘Ministers discuss petrol driver shortages’ being used to shock. Ministers were discussing HGV driver shortages, some of whom drive fuel tankers. But that’s not as exciting. “Even as I vent this, there continues to be ‘news’ of huge queues and struggling motorists; the stories that feed the panic. Some like to see a global conspiracy in this – some quote ‘Project Fear’ – but it’s far more simple than that; every media outlet wants to be number one, and while you can rightly blame mainstream media for this ‘crisis’, the mainstream public’s rabid desire for those click-bait headlines – and the resulting unfounded panic – is why this weekend saw many of us choosing to stay at home rather than take the family out for the day and risk getting caught up in a totally unnecessary fight for fuel. That click-bait hunger dictates the way stories are presented… it’s a vicious circle. “The fuel ‘crisis’ will – I’m sure – soon be over, and blame is already being aimed at the Road Hauliers association (though the media refuses to acknowledge its part). Was this a cunning ploy to accelerate temporary visas for more HGV drivers? In a world where PR companies can offer to sell you space in news outlets for whatever message you want to push (we’ve been approached in the past), it doesn’t seem beyond the realms of imagination to wonder if some shouts of impending shortages are a new marketing tool; ‘We’re going to run out of trainers or pop or drumsticks… quick buy them now!’ “There is a problem with distribution and it’s hitting us all, but panic-buying isn’t helping. Nor is incitement to panic.” My italics

The media is an easy target. The fact that the Road Hauliers Association issued a misleading statement, and the readers of said media probably reacted to a headline without reading the whole article compounded the response. Add in Social Media and a tendency towards dramatics in some people…

Needing new tyres after our little jaunt up to Scotland last week, I’ve just had a price on new Michelin Road Pilot 5 Trails for the GS. The price was a little higher than when I replaced them two years’ ago, but not significantly, and we’ll within what I anticipated paying for fitting by a Motorrad dealer. The interesting thing being that they don’t keep stock - and I’ve just bought the last front tyre of this type from their supplier’s stock. It might be worth checking on availability if your tyres are nearing the end of their life.

How about the guy who rode down to Glen Etive last Saturday. Once there he found he had a slow puncture in his rear tyre. Managed to get back to the A82 and tried to phone his breakdown insurer to find he hadn’t renewed his cover last year. I am that biker. Many thanks to the two bikers who helped me out.

Getting the tank full on the GS is a trial of patience. A trait I lack… Oh, and today I had to get a puncture repaired … this short break hasn’t really gone well.

I sprayed (E10) fuel all over the bike. The screen is now opaque and needs replacing.

That’s a fun journey <sarcasm alert>. I lived in Norwich until 2 yrs ago, and my mum lives just outside Walsall (my daughter lives near Lichfield) so it was a fairly frequent trip for me. Look on the bright side, you don’t have to get stuck in the traffic queue at Elvedon nowadays (the A11 was all single carriageway and the A14 didn’t exist when I used to commute weekly from Solihull to Norwich!).