Shed 2 (The Gazebo)

Now that's REAL class!

I'll have an RIP please, Bob.

Jim Garten wrote: This will mean nothing to anyone outside of the UK, so here's probably the best place to remember the man: Bob Holness... RIP Another of the great faces from my youth - I used to watch Blockbusters every night, waiting (usually in vain, but it got there occasionally) for the immortal line: "I'll have a P please, Bob" +++cue guffaws & a 'knowing look' from Bob+++ Another part of my youth gone RIP, Bob. [edit] And, no - he didn't play the sax solo on Baker Street, neither was he the first James Bond (he was actually the second... Barry Nelson first played Bond on radio, followed by BH, after which the franchise moved to the silver screen)

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Sobering words, Dean, but a post I think all here can relate to in one way or another...

Back in the day when Vicky was the proud owner of a Morris Minor, the usual garage we frequented together was in Hitchin, a place called Studman & Morgan. This garage was run by 2 geriatric mechanics (and I am talking way beyond retirement age, here), but what they did not know about car electrics was not worth knowing... their benches were strewn with yellowing, much thumbed conversion tables & I swear to the gods they still had an old money/decimal conversion table up by the till.

We'd take Wilson (Vicky's name for the MM) into them, knowing full well if they were not too busy, they'd look into the problem there & then & if possible, would remove a component and (wait for it...) fix it! No, not order a new one, but actually take said component apart & fix the problem . Alas, such garages are few & far between & messrs Studman & Morgan both failed their last MOTs many years ago.

Vicky and I now both have modern cars - when these were under warranty, they were serviced & fixed where necessary by considerably younger men whose first action is not to ask what the problem appears to be, take it for a run to see for themselves, then do the 'sharp intake of breath', but to plug it into a computer... then do the 'sharp intake of breath' (nice to know some traditions never change). And their overalls were always disturbingly clean. I'm sure they have all the requisite knowledge, but call me old fashioned, I prefer my car mechanics to be older than the last headlight bulb I replaced.

Luckily, now both cars are out of warranty, we no longer have to use a Ford main dealer, so we found a backstreet garage (K&K Autos), run by a comfortingly older chap who really knows cars, wears ancient once-blue overalls, smokes a rollie & is not adverse to doing the odd quick job if he has the time in exchange for a tenner in cash. Sure, he still has to plug the car into a computer, but at least he knows not only what the screen is telling him, but why.

Then he does the 'sharp intake of breath'.

^ sounds all too real

Isn't this just great?

Welcome back Jared, good to see you again True, The Shed has seen better days, but so long as we all stick around & keep the door barred to young'uns, it should survive in the wilderness for a good while yet.

Jared wrote: I really do fear for the prospects of this generation of school leavers...

When they eventually leave school that is... it seems the general trend now is for everyone to go to university, whereas in-my-day it really was only the top level of pupils who could even aspire to a degree. So what happens now? They eventually leave education in their early 20's with a degree in sociology and/or media studies + a huge debt to start their adult lives.

I think one of the problems is, the UK is no longer a manufacturing hub - when it was, there were any number of small firms willing to take on & train apprentices, but now...

Glad Vicky & I have no children...

Today I've been working on my car. Of course I say that like I understand auto-mechanics, and for a while I think I did. What I should say is I have this ticking noise from the engine - I'm pretty sure it's the tappets, or at least one of them - so I lifted the bonnet and looked at it for a bit, and I started the engine and listened to it for a bit with a facial expression that indicted to anyone who was watching that I knew all about engines and I knew what I was doing and in a hopefully knowledgeable manner I determined the sound was indeed metallic and at a repetition-rate that could be the valves, or at least something; so I then took off the engine cover (some strange piece of plastic shaped like the top of an engine that fits over the real engine - amusingly it reminded me of the toy plastic lawn mower that we bought for Alex when she was 3 or 4) and looked at it a bit more, and I started the engine again and listened to it a bit more and thought the noise may be coming from the cam pulley (cheap) rather than the valve tappets (expensive) so I thought I'd remove the plastic cam-pulley cover and have look; and that required removing the plastic cover that covered the driver's side inner-wing where the washer bottle and power-steering reservoir lives so I could get a spanner to the bolts that hold the plastic cam-cover - so I did that and looked at it for a bit, it seemed superfluous to listen to the engine again, so I skipped that bit and proceeded to remove the two bolts that held what I thought was the rear cam-pulley cover, except it wasn't  - the two covers are really one and to remove those means taking off the timing belt (not good) and the power-steering pulley (not good); then I realised that even if I did that then I still wouldn't know where the noise was coming from, and to remove the cam cover itself would require removing the power-steering pump and the fuel injection system and the inlet manifold, so this probably isn't something I can do myself, on my drive, in the rain, with a socket set I bought from Woolworth's thirty years ago. So I put back everything I'd taken off and closed the bonnet, probably for the last time, and called my friendly auto-mechanic, who carefully explained to me that it would cost more than the car was worth to repair it, and just to make sure I did a search myself and sadly he's right. Damn. The car is only 11 years old, in good nick it's worth maybe £1500 at a push, webuyanycar.com have just offered me £625, which they'll undoubtedly knock down to half that once they've seen (and heard) it. I guess I'll have to buy another one.  

..not an option for me - noise is damage, the louder the noise the more damage is being done and this is really loud. I could drive it very, very sedately and perhaps get a few more miles out of it, except I don't own "performance" car (yeah, right, it's a hyundai, but it's a 140mph hyundai that'll go from 0-60 in 8 seconds) to drive it like a granny.

He most certainly did Jim.