50+ and proud of it.

Well, after about 3 months of waiting, Dacia UK have finally got back to me about the roof rails on my Mark 2 Duster. I asked a simple question - "Are the ' holes ' at the front and back of the roof rails load-bearing?". Reason being is that the roof bars supplied with my Mark 1 (top pic) don't fit around the thicker rails of the Mark 2 (bottom pic):    (photo from DaciaForum.co.uk) The old bars do fit through the holes , so you are tempted to fit them at that position. However, the reply from Dacia is as follows: Initially, we thought that the holes at either end of the roof bars were load bearing, should you want to fit a roof rack to the bars, however, after having contacted the Product manager from Dacia, I have now been informed that they are not load bearing for you r Duster MK2. So, no, you can't safely use the holes. HTH 

We went to the Lake District from Kent last weekend towing a 1300kgs caravan. On cruise control at 60 mph it returned 25.6 mpg. At 55 mph it returned just short of 30mpg - and that figure was rising. A significant difference. Ok, it's only done 600 miles yet so the engine is still tight and I had to keep it under 2,500 rpm - interesting to do with an auto up some hills. "Towing with a new engine?!" I hear you cry? I confirmed with The Dacia Helpdesk that "keeping below 2,500 rpm and not racing a cold engine will be OK" They then followed that up with "...should be OK". "Should be"?  Thanks.

Just got off the virtual phone with an agent at Dacia who confirmed that the towing weight of a post-2013 (MkII/Facelift?) Dacia Duster DCi 110 Diesel Automatic 4x2 is 1500Kgs with a nose weight of 75Kgs. This is in conflict with a lot of info on the "net" that says it's only 50Kgs - not true. Posting this in the hope that it helps someone.  Update: I found that towing with a nose weight of about 80-85kgs towed better than 75-80kgs.

New Year's Eve 2015 was a lovely day, so I thought I'd go for a bike ride. Sad to say, a lorry, a speed camera and a wet kerb brought it swiftly to an end: It's OK, it's only my wrist How to ruin Lycra The Demelza 101 Sittingbourne To Amsterdam is at the end of April - I should be out of plaster by then...

I guess I should "close the loop" so to speak regarding Mom. Sad to report that she passed away peacefully on 23rd June 2015, aged 99¾. She never got the telegram from the Queen she so wanted.

OK, so I was asked to review my recent holiday at Le Bois Du Chillou, Marcay, by the infamous "TripAdvisor". Great! Except that you through all the hoops entering stuff in and only then do they ask you to register - b*st*rds. I don't think so. Good job I "copied-n-pasted" beforehand! Anyhow, here goes, this is what I was going to say:   " First of all, this was a superb holiday, but with two downsides - one is that the advertising implies that you stay in the Chateau, you don't, you stay in the excellent outbuildings that look over to the Chateau. This should be made more clear when you book. It's there when you check the advert with hindsight, but not obvious. The directions from the owners to find the place are lacking I'm afraid, but a quick  "Google Earth" for "Le Bois Du Chillou, Marcay" gets it spot on. The second is that the pump for the swimming pool seems to be bolted to the bedroom wall and as such there was a c...

In a fit of "I-know-what-I'm-doing" the other night, I signed up for the next Demelza House 101 challenge - Sittingbourne to Amsterdam, about 340 miles. It was only after I'd paid the deposit when I found out that the 340 miles is over 4 days, and not the 5, I had previous thought. The realty of it dawned when the "There-are-no-Hills" Kenny from the Organisers remarked "Day 3: 105 miles, and, I manged to find some hills in Holland!". Great. On the plus side, I found a 5p piece on the floor and went to hand it in - "No, you keep it, that's a 5p start towards your sponsorship!" OK, only another £1,999.95 to go then.

If you get the above error with Outlook 2013 (and with Windows 7) then try this first:- I got the answer from this link:- Outlook 2013 Send Error "Got the answer. First create a new shortcut to Outlook 2013. Right click/Run As Administrator. Send/receive. If it works, it tells that it is the permissions. Then Right click /Compatibility/ Privilege Level/ Run This Program As Administrator. Send/Receive. If it works, it tells that it is the permissions. You could just leave it, OR, do this: got to C drive/ Program Files/ Microsoft Office/ Office 15 Folder/ Right Click/ Properties/ Security/ Administrators and Users All Checked Full Control . This should fix it permanently. Send/receive. Paul" Thanks Paul, whoever you are. Note, I didn't create a shortcut to run it as suggested, I simply went to the entry in the start menu and right-click, Run-As:- I changed the security on the "Office 15" folder as Paul suggested to fix permanently. Why ...

Ha. Fixed it. For any one who has problems losing their sound with "Code 39" after messing around with an EasyCap device then this link fixed it for me in about 10 seconds:- Fix error Code 39 with sound card. Basically, find this key and delete the upper & lower filters entries:- HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Class\{4D36E96C-E325-11CE-BFC1-08002BE10318} Enjoy.

I was clearing out my den the other day and came across a bunch of old VHS tapes that the children used to watch when they were little. One of them was marked "Home Video - 1993". I also found an old VHS recorder. I managed to get the player going and discovered that I had no means to actually view the output. I could of course just take it downstairs and plug it into the TV - but that would be too easy. The actual mission was to convert the tapes to DVD and then get rid of the tapes and player, thereby clearing some valuable space in my room. So, I ordered a Chinese knock-off "EasyCap" USB video capture-to-PC device off eBay (new) for a fiver. Now, this actually worked - well at least it played the video, the sound was lacking, but it worked sufficiently to see what was on each tape - which I religiously viewed "start / middle / end". Each one taking ages to forward wind etc. I previewed "Gone With The Wind", "Disney's Robin Hoo...

Right. So I win a bike bottom bracket on eBay and the normal stuff happens with the chap (or chap-ess) posting said item. A few days later, a "sorry we missed you card" drops on the mat. Normally, on none-delivery, the postie either takes the parcel to the main office in town or, takes it to the local Post Office - a five minute walk up the road. This time it was "Your parcel is four miles away in the next village" - WTF? I check online and find that the Post Office shuts on a Wednesday afternoon else I would have driven there and then in the smart. I read the note again. Yup, it's in the next village. And, rather lazily, the postie has only written my address on it, not my name as well. So, I cycle to work the next day as normal and afterwards cycle the four miles past my village to the post office. "Hello, have you got a parcel for me? It's a bottom bracket, so it'll only be about so big". I held my hands in front of me to give the la...

Well, I did it. I did the London To Brighton Cycle Ride last Sunday on behalf of Demelza House Children's Hospice, and to be honest, it was a bit, well, uninspiring. It was quite simply 4,000(ish) people cycling from London To Brighton - and not much else. There simply wasn't the comradery that I expected. Not many people took the time to pass the time, they just got on with it. "Nooo, look straight ahead, ignore the old chap trying to make conversation!" This had the result of half of the 4,000 simply getting in the way (and me getting in the way of the other half). It was fairly obvious that a lot of people had only bought a bike the week before and were probably regretting it. I have never known so many people walking their bikes on the flat. The slightest incline brought them all to a grinding halt. At some point after about 10 miles, my cycle computer stopped working, which was annoying to say the least. I didn't realise how much I used it. The firs...

In a couple of weeks I'm doing a London To Brighton bike ride in aid of Demelza House (again). We all signed up for this after Paris as we thought we needed something to focus on. Needless to say, no-one apart from me has done any training for it and I only have by default as I cycle for work. However, in a fit of enthusiasm sparked by Warped Woman getting a trike, I signed up for the Taff Trail Challenge the week after. I confess to spending more time researching this one than LTB. So much so that I even followed the entire route from Brecon to Cardiff on Google Street View using the organiser's instructions. I was amazed that Google even went off-road at some points. I even bought a new set of off(ish)-road tyres to replace the Gatorskins. Drive to Cardiff and back - £50 diesel New tyres - £40 Registration - £20 Sponsorship - £40 Evening in the pub the night before - £20 Why don't I just give the charity £50 and have done with it? Why? That would be too ...

I got a call earlier from the Assistant Warehouse Manager today. "My boss tells me that he's not getting any emails from the Heath & Safety System. He thinks he may be set-up as Michael.Surname , not Mike.Surname . Can you have a look please? He's not in today." I check the database. Nope, he's definitely Mike.Surname , so what's the problem? I check another older system just in case the mail is going via that route. That involves logging onto a remote server and waiting a bit for the logon. Nope, that's fine too. Bemused, I check the SQL that sends out the mails. I slice out the appropriate part and run it:- " To: mike.surname . Subject: An accident occurred " So, that's not the issue either. I write a long email showing my investigation, and basically, I have no idea. Is he receiving any email at all? *ring* *ring* "Hello, I'll just log onto his PC and check to see if he's getting any mail at all." ...

My wife and I went to France last week and had a very nice time thanks. Really relaxing, as this time, we didn't rush all over the place visiting everything within a 50 mile radius. No, we just put the bikes on the carrier and used them all the time once we got there. The days consisted mainly of cycle to town, get some bread, cycle back, have breakfast. Cycle to town have lunch, have a beer, cycle back. Cycle to town to the nearest bar, watch the footie and have a few more beers. Cycle back - carefully. One day we even ventured 10km to a small town inland by way of the cycle track which ran alongside the dykes and rivers. "Oh look, a brown beaver!" The large furry rodent sitting on the path gave us a withering look before gently gliding into the stream. Unfortunately, all the subsequent beaver jokes fell completely flat when we found out later it was Coypu. Such is life. On the last night however, we decided to have a "proper" French meal. Cycling to ...