Mostly lemon based

Category: Creative

  • And it spirals upward

    So, the idea for what has become Kathryn’s anniversary present came to me a while ago. About a year, I think. I thought “Oh hey, that’s a cute idea”. I pitched myself some costs and decided it was a cute/fun idea that I could probably pull off in a few days.

    Maybe a week or so.

    A year later, and it’s likely to be her present this year. It’s nearly finished. I’ve amassed everything I need to make it (I think, although I’m actually now thinking that I’m still missing one small item. Gah…. *NOW* I have everything, having placed a very, very small order for a very, very small object).

    It’s spiralled out from being a cute idea to being a reasonably well executed, vastly over the top thing. I hope that she appreciates the humour in it, and doesn’t just look at it and go “Oh lord, Kate”…which would be a fair reaction. I also hope it doesn’t break in the first few moments of existence. I’d be upset.

    It’s spiralled a little in the sense that I assumed I’d be able to pick up all the stuff I wanted at charity shops, and it turns out, I couldn’t. Indeed, mostly it’s come from ebay. Which is sort of disappointing, but has allowed me to find things I didn’t entirely expect to find, that make the concept work better than my first collection of things for it did.

    I’m quite excited about it, now I’ve done the ‘difficult’ bit, and am into the ‘fun’ bit. Unfortunately, I’m given to understand that this year is ‘Flowers/Linens’ which is about the only thing not in it, in any sense. Never mind.

    It’s also fun to find that after months and months of my brain being committed to work that it still has the fun/playful element intact, and that I still enjoy doing ridiculous things with stuff :)

  • So, this present…

    So, ages ago I had this idea for a present. I was so pleased with myself, it was simple, funny, clever… Granted I may be biased.

    Only it’s not proven to be so simple. Apart from the many parts that make it up and my general bare adequacy in the [redacted] crafting department, it’s quite finicky. Well, by my standards.

    Still, I’m pleased with progress, although I’m slightly of the opinion that it may need [redacted] in the [redacted]s. Am not sure whether to just go ahead and do that, incase it [redacted]s, or whether to test it out. Feh.

    Anyhow, despite swearing that I’d go out on my bike, I spent some time waiting for friends to get back to me about meeting up, and then decided to shave my legs, and then got confirmation of something we’re up to this evening, so… decided instead to spend time on Kathryn’s present, and finally getting around to putting Rebecca on a trickle charge. The battery may be nearly dead, but it’s not fully dead and so I’ll quietly leave it quietly charging…

    Oooh, and I have GPS tracker on the way for my bike, so I may actually feel like I can ride it and park it places. I’ve been feeling more wary since a friend’s bike was stolen. Granted it was recovered the same day, but still.

  • Part 2 – edited

    Comments / Typos welcome.

    Kathryn’s been very sweet and advised me that my suspected tendancy to over-write comes out quite strongly, uh, when I write. I’m attempting to turn it down a little. I’ve trimmed this a bit, and I’ll try to trim and edit it based on people’s comments…

    ——
    The room was bathed in the neon glow of the alarm clock. The blinds kept out what little early morning sun was around, leaving the blinking digits to illuminate the cluttered interior and, under the duvet, the lurking figure of a boy.

    The radio crackled into life (it was cheap, and crackled into most things), bringing news of a traffic jam on the Westway, again. Not that it mattered; he lived well outside London, but it made him feel part something bigger than his small suburban existence. Not that that mattered anyway; all of the events being earnestly reported were currently falling on the ears of someone deeply asleep. His head buried in the feathers of the pillow, his mind elusively detached.

    But slowly, The Clash being broadcast from the little white box dragged him into the land of the living. Well, in a limited way. The actual, perhaps unintended result was that he attempted to burrow deeper into the pillow, making himself one with the mattress. Perhaps, just perhaps, if he thought hard enough about it the day would go away and leave him in peace.

    The radio didn’t stop playing though, at least not by itself. After a few minutes a wiry hand crept out from under the duvet and felt it’s way across the bedside table. Hunting along the row of buttons it found ‘Snooze’ before making it’s way back under the duvet. Unfortunately for the boy, the ‘Snooze’ function failed to stop the sun continuing to rise, and the sunlight began to filter through the trees, then the blinds, and finally he could ignore it no more and as the radio crackled into life again bringing forth ‘I Believe’ he crawled from the bed.

    Pausing only for a somewhat theatrical switching off of the radio he went, cursing en-route, to find his dressing gown.

    “How do you get from London Calling to bloody I Believe in 10 minutes?” he muttered to the room.

    Staring at the disorganised clutter he awaited some kind of response.

    “No, bloody thought not” he mumbled.

    “Kim! Are you up yet?”
    “I’m getting there.” he shouted back.
    “Getting there? Are you actually out of the bed?”
    “Of course I am mum!”

    He could here the mutterings about the inappropriateness of the ‘of course’, but decided that discretion was probably the better part of valour and made his way into the bathroom. One brief shower later he was fishing in his battered wardrobe for a school uniform. ‘One more year’ he thought to himself. Then he’d be able to wear whatever he wanted; well, sort of, to school.

    And then she crept into his consciousness. Would she be there today? Sometimes she was there, at school, and sometimes not. No one ever seemed to comment on it. At least, not where he’d overheard them. Not being Mr Popular meant he kind of lacked on the gossip front, only catching what was said loudly enough for him to overhear. Being almost invisible, at school at least, helped on that front. Not that he normally cared for such conversations, but since her occasional appearances – and the slightly odd fact that her name was only ever called at register when she was there, he’d become more interested conversations to which he’d normally not be a part.

    “Bye Kim. Have a good day at scho..” he heard his mum disappearing out the front door.

    By the time he grabbed his coat he heard his mum’s fiat pulling away. He cursed again – he’d missed his lift to school, again.

    “Ah well, better late than never”

    He chanted his teacher’s favoured comment on his late arrival – then he considered other clichés he could use for his arrival, grabbed his Walkman, and stomped down stairs. At least he’d get breakfast. He’d probably get some kind of warning at school, but so long as he made his first class they’d not care. Mind you, he thought, one of these days if he was early he might see her arrive. He looked at his watch.

    Not today though. Today he’d be lucky to make registration, and he’d only make that if he didn’t eat. He perched on the stool and poured out Cornflakes. Breakfast first, then school.

  • Pretentious? Moi?

    I know I’m not the greatest writer in the world, but I’m debating carrying on with this. Sort of. In a way.

    —-

    Outside the stars glint appealingly, calling her to come out again. She’s done it before many times, and she slips quietly from under the covers. Her family are well used to her nocturnal nature but even years on don’t know what she does when they’ve gone to sleep. She dresses quietly, picking her clothing in the half light of the moon, it doesn’t matter anyhow, at this hour there’ll be no one there. No one but her; exploring alone.

    She knew what clothes she was going to wear anyway. Stuffed down at the back, behind everything else, she selects her favourites. Carefully stepping over the crease in the carpet marking the fractured floorboard that hits some pipe or other waking the house, she descends the stairs. Counting each one quietly, stepping with care, and listening for the breathing of her parents. Any change and she pauses. Waiting for it to settle again before placing her foot gently on the next stair.

    She’s been here so many times, she skips the steps that creak and stands, quietly, in the darkness of the hall. Her next challenge is one of the harder ones. Extracting her bunch of keys, the ones that will allow her to reenter this world, from the pile of keys on the shelf. Her family aren’t the neatest, and her keys occupy the lowest space in a pile of discarded metalwork. Fingers carefully working she moves each bunch; her Mum’s car keys, her Dad’s office keys, her Mum’s locker key. Finally the light catches the edge of the lettering on her door key, she slips them into her hand, listens once again, before stealing for the kitchen door.

    She wonders who thought that sliding doors were a good idea, and she attempts to hold the door mid point between the scraping bottom guide and the squealing top casters; moving it slowly and carefully she is able to peer through the kitchen window. The street is jaundiced by the glow of sodium vapour, but no houses glow anaemically from the opposite side of the street. She slips out, her key holding the lock open until the door is quietly shut, and as she finally releases the key she feels the release of the outside world.

    The girl steps out onto the street, still carefully checking, but at this time no-one arrives, and she is free to slip through the world unnoticed. She wanders suburbia, quietly taking in all that surrounds her. Her runners crunch across the gravel, the silence briefly broken but returning and washing over her. This, she thinks is freedom. But it is, as always, short lived. After an hour or two the cold of the night eats through her clothing and she slips back home.

    A repeat performance takes her quietly up the dark stairs, praying internally that no-one will awake – there would be too much to explain. Eventually she wraps herself in her duvet, the warmth seeping through her and drifts to sleep.

  • People are lovely, at least, the ones I know.

    So, this was going to be a whiny depressed post. A fed up rant at all things DAF shaped, at myself for my desire to run classic cars as daily drivers, at the world for frustrating me every time I think I’m wining. That kind of tedious thing.

    Why is this? Well, because this weekend an awesome band of wonderful people descended on Slough to aid and abet me in my classic car and MZ fetish. Enablers, one might call them. They rock. Nikki and Kate and John I’ve known for many years and they are known lovely people. Kate has overlooked my initial poor first impression (If I’d’ve written to Points of View I’d’ve been ‘angry of Colerne’), and is incredibly patient for someone with no interest whatsoever in classic cars with her partner’s interest and my obsession and came to Slough for a day which would be both long and involve very little of interest to her (she was also awesome because she helped Kathryn out).

    Nikki has been mentioned many times, respected EV advocate she may be, but there lurks deep in her soul a dark secret. She still likes classic cars, even if they’ve got an Internal Combustion Engine. And while she’s not quite into the quirky bizarritude of classics that I am (Is it Communist? Is it Obscure and impossible to get new bits for? I’m in!) – she gathered her cadre and brought forth a person who I’d only met once before who possibly wins in the awesome stakes, because he injured himself in the call of getting someone he barely knows mobile in a non-ev.

    John, for long time journal readers is a known fine gent. I recall him ferrying me back home after I had my wisdom teeth removed and while I was still under the effects of a general anesthetic. Despite me living 45 minutes from Bristol by that time and the fact it was snowing, he took me home and looked after me for the afternoon. He came, he soldered, and he went. He rocks too.

    But Adam, Adam perhaps wins for helpfulness beyond the call of duty. I met him once, and between him, Nikki, Kate and John I felt a pining for Bristol. They are all part of what makes Bristol such a good place to live, and his generosity is proof that good human nature is extant. He came and helped out for an entire day to assist in rebuilding someone’s car who he’d barely met.

    Between them they bring ‘rocking’ to a whole new level.

    So why the rant?

    Well, while disassembling and reassembling the engine I discovered this:

    cracked cylinder head

    And the general response from the owner’s club was “you’d’ve noticed if it was a problem by now” – but let’s be honest, that relied on me actually doing my research properly, and I was slack. With the engine very hot it more or less runs on both cylinders, not well, but it does. Pulling the plug from either cylinder produced an engine that ran attrociously. I should, however, have done it when cold. Or looked at the plugs from both cylinders. When I stripped the engine I wasn’t certain how so much oil had ended up in the cylinder bore. I should have thought more about it.

    We needed to move the Minor to extract the DAF from the drive. The minor wouldn’t start. I suspect that the fuel pump needs priming – two weeks of baking heat have presumably evaporated the fuel. That has never happened before, though, and was frustrating.

    On reassembly of the DAF, on Saturday night, at around ten PM, the engine limped and dragged the car around at the speed of a sloath. It actually required people pushing the car to get it back up on the pavement. After the very unfortunate and expensive discovery that I was on an early shift yesterday, not, as I’d thought, a late (requiring in the end 2 taxis), I came back from work and looked at the car. John, from the club, suggested that the uneven running might be that it was still firing on one cylinder. It was.

    Because the side with the cracked head? It’s full of oil. I can make the car run beautifully for about 30 seconds by cleaning the plug, after which the oil fouls it completely and that cylinder becomes a display only one. The car is not immobile, but not driveable. As I contemplated the rust that needs repairing, the miriad of problems it’s had (70k miles is not a huge amount, but I think the maintenance has left something to be desired) and my (perceived) manifold failures in decision making, I was feeling deeply frustrated.

    I was feeling a little better today, having at least organised supply of a replacement head for not very much, but it wasn’t going to arrive for at least a week. I resigned myself to at least another week of hire cars, and prepared to go and collect the rental – and then couldn’t find my debit card. I swore and stomped around and cursed the world. Kathryn very sweetly put up with me, for reasons I can’t quite work out, rather than telling me to grow up, which is what I really should have done.

    Having found it I went and collected the card, and came back to find an incredibly nice e-mail from another star of incredible proportions. A fine gent in Ireland offered to send me a spare 44 cylinder head, potentially such that it would arrive this week. Potentially enabling me to get the car back on the road at the end of the week. If I catch the colleague from work, the welding might be done, and lo, the DAF shall rise again. Hopefully I&A will ring soon with a “the car’s ready” message and all shall be right in the world. Ish.

  • Kathryn & I found this…

    Kathryn and I found this stove:

    abandoned aga
    abandoned aga-oid

    kicking around on the street near where I live. Sadly there was no-one in and it looks like they damaged it a little during it’s removal. But it’s almost certainly repairable, all there, and appears to have been left out for scrap.

    If anyone wants it, give me a shout and see if I can sort it :) It’s a terrible shame for it to go to waste – it’d be ideal if someone’s doing a green/eco house project :)

  • Maths, lies, thrills and unthrills.

    1) Kathryn drives much more economically than me.
    2) It took me much longer than it should to work out the DAF’s MPG. Given that I think she’s still not running quite right (mixture wise), and am pondering whether there’s some clutch slippage going on, we should be able to get better fuel economy from ’em.

    The result of the pondering is that a 1974 DAF 44 returns, with an economical driver, 38mpg (which equates to approximately a CO2 rating of 194g/km (or, adjusting for how optimistic auto manufacturers are, about 155g/km). That latter ‘adjusted’ value is disconcertingly close to a Mini One.

    But the government in their pseudo-green drive are scrapping cars that are just as green as the modern ones, discounting the energy required to build cars, and essentially are propping up companies that failed to adapt to changing market conditions with more environmental destruction. Thanks Labour. Don’t think you’ll be having my vote. You’ve actually driven me to voting for the Greens. Seriously. I never thought I’d do that.

    Sadly, incidentally, there’ve been some classics which were casualties of the destructiveness of this government… Anyone who said Classics wouldn’t be affected want to reconsider that answer.

    Anyhow.

    In other news, I’ve been continuing to ponder the construction of an EV-DAF. Slightly prompted by Mr Clarkson’s annoying take on the (probably awful, but his whining about all EVs and his belief that climate change is all in everyone-elses heads make me want to recommend it anyhow) Honda Insight Mk II*. I knew it’d been done before, albeit somewhat badly – Nikki B, of the a minor journey EV blog & appearances on EV cast waved it at me a while ago – essentially, this conversion consisted of a Milkfloat motor dropped into a DAF with some scaffold board to support it. That the owner claimed it moved at all was no mean feat.

    What I didn’t realise is that it’d been done somewhat more thoroughly somewhat earlier; twice. Shell used the cute little DAF to build a Fuel Cell Hybrid (yes, seriously) in the 60s.

    I wonder if the technology of producing an extremely poor energy carrier for nothing is close to maturation yet ;)

    Apparently it wasn’t great – but what do you expect from 60’s fuel cell and electric motor technology? The colour choice was good though :)

    What was more interesting still (although the photo was very cool) was that there were two independent companies that built DAF 44 EVs in the states (in the 70s). CHW, in Athol, MA. (who later became ‘ElectriCar’ – and seem to have disappeared) and a company called EV Propulsion. Although the DCA chap has figures for CHW’s cars (around 60 produced) he didn’t mention how many EV Propulsion converted… But that, lack of money, time, space, and plans to do it in a vague and hazy future haven’t stopped me mailing them.

    Still, there’s plenty to keep me entertained on them as it is. Vixy’s off to an actual factual garage to have the brakes done, although I’m going to have a little go at mixture again tomorrow, having invested in a colortune. I’m also going to give her actual new spark-plugs. We’ll see how that whole thing goes. Her new door should arrive in a couple of days time too, just a case of spraying it to, uh, match and fitting it. I’m looking forward to her having a window winder that works :)

    Jejy’s new wheel bearing is sat in the lounge too, all ready to be fitted, and I’ve got a ‘source’ hopefully tracking down a silencer (or two), wheels and some clutch shoes to re-con. The new drum and inlet manifold have arrived, so that’s all shiny. Lots of work to do there…

    I’ve got a quote for fetching the ‘zed from my mum’s to here. I think I’ll go make it accessible, and then get the couriers to bring it over.

    Unrelated but very, very good: We were sat in the garden and one of the birds (?sparrow) decided it didn’t want to wait until we vacated the area – and hopped around a few feet from us (literally, 2-3 feet), fairly much disregarding us. It was really just incredible.

    Unrelated but very, very bad: Change we can’t believe in.

    * I always rather liked the look of the Mark I, although tbh I want an EV that looks all futuristic and modern, not a Hybrid. Basically I want an EV1. Yes, I’m still whining.

  • Today we went a wanderin’

    So, we’ve been meaning to go for a walk, and today, the weather was good enough that we could take the coats and go. A few days ago – well about a week ago – when I took Vixy out for a spin (I guess, almost literally given the state of the brakes) – I found that we’re actually about 20 minutes from really pretty countryside. Really pretty.

    So today, dans le minor, we headed out into the wilds of the environs of Slough, armed only with raincoats, my FF’s (and Kathryn’s walking boots) and a camera. We came back with some pretty pictures and some nice memories.

    It’s teh pretty out there.

    Set here.

    Be gentle, I’ve not been able to take the camera out for months, so this is the first time I’ve been out in the wild with new batteries :)

  • Another day in the dirt

    Not all car stuff today; to skip the car stuff just scroll down to where it proclaims that car stuff endeth. :)

    So, today I shuffled the cars to get the Minor on the drive, and whipped off the ill-fitting exhaust, separated the 45 degree segment at the base of the downpipe (which I spent about 40 minutes attacking last time with ‘penetrating oil’, this time I got the Plus-Gas on it, and the thing just came apart. Simple as that). Then, with Kathryn’s help, we reattached the exhaust.

    Only took from 11am to 3pm. I’m not very good at exhaust fitting, and having done it we drove into town and… it’s rattling against something at the back. Usually this is the exhaust hitting the fuel tank; not a soothing noise at the best of times; so that’s something to attack later.

    Then I spent about half an hour adjusting the mixture. She’s been running rich and idling too high. A bit of a tweak to that and she’s now idling at a much more sensible speed and lord knows what the mixture’s doing. I suck at setting carbs up, I keep meaning to buy a colortune to aid in my attrociousness. The DAFs have a much more ‘relaxed’ carb than the HiF44 in the Minor, which is slightly worn (not terribly so, she doesn’t hunt horribly at idle) and which has proper mixture adjustment.

    Still, she’s running okay, so I’m going to presume it’s alright for the minute.

    Next week will be more car stuff, hopefully, in so far as I’m hoping that the brake bits will arrive for Jejy and Vixy and we can get them assembled.

    Then comes the difficult decision, which of the cars to take on holiday with us. We’re looking at around 1000 miles plus whatever motoring we do while we’re there. The minor’s swivel pins are worn, but I don’t know how badly. Jejy’s a big no-no, without the new clutch drum she’s not going anywhere far (so that’s easy), but Vixy? Vixy’s kind of an unknown quantity. Unknown quantities aren’t good for holiday relaxing, I find, but on the other hand she’s been recently serviced by a garage, she’ll have new brakes, she’s got a spare pair of belts in the boot…

    …and only 21k on the clock.

    We’ll see.

    Anyway, hopefully we’ll have less car-posts for y’all once this is done. Then we can return to the ‘house posts’

    car stuff endeth here

    Mind you, I ought to do a garden post because the garden is *awesome*. Kathryn spent time today breaking up soil and prepping it, then planted some of our wild-flower seeds; she’s hacked down pruned the buddleia, out the front, which officially needs to be dug up and moved into the raised bed at the front, but since the builders haven’t quoted (or contacted me) then, uh, that’s not quite happening yet. The back garden is looking really very nice; when she takes the photos off her camera and flickr’s them I’ll linky.

    It is just amazing to look at the ground and go ‘my god, they’re beans. They are our beans, that we planted and they’re growing. I could get quite into gardening, I fear. It’s really lovely though, to go out there, in the nice weather we’ve been having and see plants we planted growing, and indeed growing well. It’s not like either of us is particularly ‘green fingered’, but we’ve got good soil, and my mum’s around to help and advise us (and Kathryn’s mom is available for advice too :) ) and it’s come together to be a really restful place, potentially.

    And the lie and deception which is the gravel-over-concrete path appears to be working.

    Anyhow, now it’s time to make dinner. So I shall scoot.

  • Another long day in mechanic mode

    So today was hard going. Started at 9:30, finished at 17:30 with only a break for lunch and a couple of quick trips to (a)Halfords and (b)Proper MotorFactor.

    At one point I was so demoralised I stood staring at Vixy wondering both how she’d actually managed to stay running so well, wondering if the fault I’d found had anything to do with the poor idle and failure to up-revs on braking, and contemplating whether she should return to the internet in search of a new home.

    However, thankfully (I think), I opted not to do that.

    Faults found and rectified today:
    – Idle / Braking: There’s an Electro-Magnetic doojit on the carb, it wasn’t actually screwed in. I’ve no idea if it was sucking in air around the barely attached doojit, but certainly, doing it up screwed with the mixture. Then I found that the pipe which covers the join between the inlet manifold and one of the inlet pipes (it’s got a flexible segment made by having a sleeve and a tube with a bit of rubber over it) was completely beyond saving. It was cracked and split and a mess. It’s been replaced. The idle’s now much better and the engine does it’s thing when you put your foot on the brakes.

    – Oil Leak: Turned out to be the oil-pressure warning sensor. It was leaking like a secret government meeting filled with double agents. Having spent an entertaining twenty minutes with my newly aquired ‘shop towel’ (like J-Cloths but less strength in tension and way more absorbent) cleaning gunky oil off bits of the engine I lay under the car waiting for the dripping to start. Sure enough, there was the leak, oozing it’s way out of the pressure switch. Amazingly my local autofactor had one in stock. Took them about 20 minutes to find it, but they had it.

    – Radio: Wired in and working, but I still need the bracket and an arial. Remarkably it can pick up Heart 106 (not that I like Heart 106, or it might be Star 106. It’s 106, anyway) despite not having an arial. The tape bit sort-of-works, and sound comes out of the really rather silly Goodmans Speakers plonked on the back shelf. I do need some means of attaching them as they don’t actually appear to have any means of attachment.

    Discoveries of a non-awful nature:
    – According to my wildly innacurate Autodata manual, the DAF has the pre-1972 wiring scheme. This is odd for a late ’73 car. However, the Autodata manual is noted for it’s similarity to the Haynes Book of Lies in the respect of ensuring things are accurate (like, for example, the non-existent Lockwasher I spent time angsting about).
    – The exhaust really is an astonishing piece of bodgery. It changes diameter twice and appears to have been made by someone going ‘hey, that’s a big ‘ol chunk of straight exhaust; that’ll do’.

    Things not fixed today:
    – The brakes.

    Discoverys of an unfortunate and upsetting nature:
    – Jejy’s brakes are dangerous. I took her to the store to get the oil pressure switch and had one of those ‘oh-dear-god-I’m-going-to-die’ moments when I put my foot on the brakes at a junction. The slightly weepy front cylinder has become the ‘pouring brake fluid out in a very generous and lubricous nature thus ensuring stopping is a gentle and largely terrifing experience’. I had a look on arriving home, having got Vixy fairly much as far sorted as I could, and basically, the brake cylinder is the fucked. I’ve asked my local autofactor if he can order 3 brake cylinders for me, if not then they’ll have to come urgent-first-class-next-day-as-soon-as from Holland, which’ll be pricey.

    Still, I consider myself to have rocked today. You may all praise me :)