JetSet

B I spend about £40 a month. 2 large bags of sunflower hearts, 1 medium sized bag of peanuts and a couple of small bags of niger seed. Sometimes I replace the sunflower hearts with black sunflower seeds. We get the odd pheasant too, cats seem to ignore them but one day several years ago we found a dead fully grown male one in our kitchen. Back door was closed so a cat must have dragged it in through the cat flap Pete

Sunflower Hearts are what attract Goldfinches and Bullfinches. Although I've been feeding the birds since I moved in here years ago I'd never seen a Goldfinch or Bullfinch at the feeders, I'd seen them in the lane so knew they were about. I had tried Sunflower Hearts to attract them before but it didn't work probably because I put them on top of a bird table. The very day we filled our feeders up with Sunflower Hearts they arrived...hard to believe but true. We have loads of Goldcrests but they don't come to the feeders, preferring to feed in the conifers and Long Tailed Tits only visit us now and again, usually a flock of about 20 arrive and leave after 10 minutes. Pete

Yeah, we used to have that problem. We installed a squirrel baffle on one of the feeders and smeared vaseline on the other one. The baffle worked but the vaseline was only a partial success. Next we trimmed back the bushes so they couldn't leap onto the feeders and more importantly leap off to escape the cats . Now we just get the odd squirrel and they eat what the birds have dropped (which is quite a lot). I also stopped putting bread and other scraps in the garden as the cats were catching a few birds mainly Blackbirds and Thrushes, instead I put it an open space about 50 yards away, this also keeps The Crows, Magpies, Jays and Jackdaws out of the garden. Pete

Birds actually. One of the great things about living in the country is the great variety of birds we get in our garden. Here are a few I took this morning. A Goldfinch, Siskin and Greenfinch. A Nuthatch, fairly common around here. Another view of the Siskin and its mate. A pair of Bullfinches, another Goldfinch and what I believe to be a Redpoll Another view of the Redpoll A Chaffinch. They don't usually go to the feeders as they normally feed off the ground. And finally no garden is complete without one of these. There are many other birds we see at our feeders or elsewhere in the garden, this is just photos I took over 10 minutes. Pete

I bought a Yamaha tuner amp off a mate of mine, 60w per channel and state of the art in 1980. Paid him £200 for it and I know he paid £350 just a few months before. Used it every day until 2006 when it developed a dry joint. Didn't have £200 at the time as I was at British Steel who were on strike and even though I worked through most of the strike on safety work I didn't get paid for 4 months . Simple solution, sold the wife's Mini for £200 and she used my Datsun Cherry until we could afford another car . Pete

Silver or possibly GM in an underground car park. Looked like one of the detectives was about to get in it Pete

Has anyone on here ever used the pair of tights trick when their fanbelt broke? I haven't BTW . Pete

Kinda nice isn't it . Pete

Going back to the days when I had my scooter I managed a rather strange and probably quite dangerous fix to get me home. Lambrettas had a nasty habit of snapping the throttle cable and it always occurred at the handlebar end. So I pulled the broken cable through the outer cable from the engine end and wrapped the broken end around my hand . Of course, it meant that it was either full throttle or off, not for the faint hearted. Pete

Yeah, could have been a lot worse. Providing there's no serious under the bonnet damage It'll just need a new front bumper and probably some fixings. The reflectors look to be O.K which is more than can be said about the nearside headlight washer cover which you'll also need. Keep in mind that you'll need a facelift washer cover, earlier ones are different and won't fit. Pete

If any car is advertised at a price lower than you'd get from WeBuyAnyCar then there's something dodgy about it. Pete

I remember putting the bonnet stripes on my XR3i to make it look like an RS 1600i . Around that time there was a guy around here who converted his standard 1300 Escort to look like an RS Turbo.I only realized what he'd done when I spotted that it was on a Q reg plate. Pete

Does have the frost seats though. Pete I think you will find, as per the advert, that they are in fact beige No such thing as beige seats for the zed but I guess we'll never know as the ad has been removed Pete

Gear stick snapped on my Lotus Europa while I was in Chester, 10 miles from home. Took the top off the transmission tunnel, shoved my hand in there and changed gear by twisting, pulling and pushing the connecting rod . Pete

Does have the frost seats though. Pete

No MOT between 2010 and 2014, yet 28.000 miles added. Pete

Excellent condition ones fetch £60-70k. Considering they were 20k when bought new in 1987 they have more than kept up with inflation. There's not that many cars that actually beat inflation, especially Fords Pete

Indeed, I'm going to look up how on earth it manages to re-enter the atmosphere without burning up. Pete Heat-shielding?... Just read up on it, nothing new really (other than the pinpoint landing) . Basically, only the first stage is recoverable and that doesn't need heat shielding as it never leaves the Earth's atmosphere, The Space Shuttle's twin boosters were also recoverable and reusable but they landed in the sea using parachutes. There were plans to recover Stage 2 but that would require heat shielding which is much too heavy. Pete

I would imagine the Cosworth came with a factory alarm/ immobiliser, my 1989 Escort RS Turbo did but yeah they were fairly easy to get into. There were a number of tricks, some of which are probably still used today but I think the days of using a coat hanger are over . I remember years ago when "Car" magazine had two Cosworths that they were testing/reviewing and following the RAC Rally. They were parked up right outside a well known hotel in Newcastle and were blocked in by parking a couple of vehicles right in front and behind them. Next morning they'd gone, thieves must have used a fork lift truck to put them on a low loader..............that's how desirable they were. Pete

Indeed, I'm going to look up how on earth it manages to re-enter the atmosphere without burning up. Pete

They had over 200 bhp, that add says 150 bhp the same as the XR4i. Doesn't show up on DVLA search either. I considered one of these back in the 80's but the insurance was something like 4x what I was paying for my Capri 2.8i. Pete

I've no idea how much money the exchequer looses through tax avoidance and tax evasion but the thing is it's you and I that have to make up the difference. It's like honest people having to pay more for their goods because of shoplifting or paying more for your car insurance because of cash for crash scams. I'm not saying Cameron is a liar but like most politicians he's fairly devious. He also inherited 300k (the maximum tax free allowance) when his father died, no problem with that but when his mother dies he'll inherit part of her fortune, estimated to be 20 Million, I'm sure he'll have his accountants looking for ways to avoid paying tax on it. Pete

You can get a Vodaphone Smart First PAYG from ASDA for £19.97 comes with Android 4.4. Pete

yeah, the system used in the last few years seems to work quite well. The system before that involved thrashing around for 4 practice sessions, best time in any session counted for your grid place......a bit boring but at least there were very few times when the track was empty. Pete

Identical. Pete