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1

General Discussion Area / Re: Trump has gone to the top .

« on: 23 June 2025, 10:24:31 »

Some (well at least one) of us were at Prestwick on Tuesday.
Some (well at least one) of us were at Lakenheath on Wednesday.

It's been obvious since last Monday that a decision had been made, and everything else since then was smoke and mirrors. The US don't deploy 40+ tankers, 12 F-22's, 12 F-35's, 12 F16's to the area unless something is imminent. More asset's over the pond as I type, although these appear to be defensive rather than offensive.

There are suggestions that the Yanks effectively hit empty facilities as the Iranians had already moved everything out to 'secret' sites. 

That's as maybee, but things required for nuclear enricment (like centrifuges) can't easilly be moved or replaced, and were known to be at the 3 sites that were attacked. Even if the partially enriched Uranium has/had been moved, hopefully they now don't have the faclities to enrich it further. I've seen reports (IAEA i think) that they had got to 60% enrichment, whereas 90%+ is required for a 'clean' nuclear bomb. Civilian nuclear power reactors typically run on 10%, so there is no legitimate civilian use for 60%+ enriched uranium.

2

General Discussion Area / Re: Trump has gone to the top .

« on: 22 June 2025, 19:32:37 »

Some (well at least one) of us were at Prestwick on Tuesday.
Some (well at least one) of us were at Lakenheath on Wednesday.

It's been obvious since last Monday that a decision had been made, and everything else since then was smoke and mirrors. The US don't deploy 40+ tankers, 12 F-22's, 12 F-35's, 12 F16's to the area unless something is imminent. More asset's over the pond as I type, although these appear to be defensive rather than offensive.

3

Omega General Help / Re: Centre tie rod availability

« on: 09 June 2025, 20:06:33 »

I also have one that is headed for the skip in a few days if anyone want's it.

4

General Discussion Area / Re: Any internet or phone deals?

« on: 02 June 2025, 23:06:20 »

I have one of these...

https://www.johnlewis.com/tp-link-m7350-4g-lte-mobile-wi-fi-router/p3129652?s_ppc=2dx_mixed_technology_BAU&tmad=c&tmcampid=2&gad_source=1

Works OK in the UK, Europe and Australia. Does NOT work in the USA (different frequency band plan). You need to put a SIM Card in it and it works as a WIFI hotspot that your computer can connect to. Has an internal battery which lasts a few hours, and is recharged via a USB connection.

I've also got one of these...
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/196837829679

It's basically a USB dongle that you can plug into a USB socket on your PC to make it 4G data capable. Again, works OK in UK, Europe and Australia, but NOT in the USA.

As for SIMs, no idea. I just buy £10 3 Sims which last a month and give you 10GB of data more or less worldwide.

5

General Discussion Area / Re: EU UK reset

« on: 19 May 2025, 15:05:03 »

The queuing issue is normally at European airports that serve package holiday flights. Geneva and Chambery can be chaos at the wrong time.

Basically, the tour operators fault because they have several flights all arriving at roughly the same time, so the PAX can be distributed around the various destination resorts. For ski flights (the ones I use) there is often a Manchester, Gatwick, Birmingham, Bristol, Leeds, Newcastle, Edinburgh all scheduled to land between 9 and 10am, and each will have 150-200 holiday makers on it. So there can be well over 1000 PAX trying to get through immigration between 9am and 11am on a Saturday morning. Then absolutely nothing from noon Saturday till 9am the following Saturday.

Places like Geneva and Zurich 'should' be able to cope - these are bigger airports but they also have scheduled flights from all over the world. You don't want to land at Geneva just after an Emirates/Qatar A330 or B-777 (don't think A-380s operate into GVA thank god).

Regional airports like Chambery basically have terminals not much bigger than a portacabin with 2 or 3 immigration officials on duty for the Saturday morning rush. If it takes 30 seconds per person to do the passport checking, then handling the Saturday morning surge (1000 pax, 3 officers, 0.5 minute per pax) takes 160 minutes - basically almost 3 hours. If your flight is last to land then you're in for a long wait. Just hope it isn't raining/snowing coz the airline crew want you off the plane so they can take returning holiday makers home again, meaning you'll be stood out on the tarmac queuing to get into the terminal. 

Also remember that Schengen is a stamp you in, stamp you out zone, so for every passenger arriving there is likely to be one leaving too. That means if you've got 1000 pax arriving on a Saturday between 9am and 10am, you're very likely to have 1000 pax departing home again at roughly the same time. So you're going to need another 3 immigration officers handling departures. So the airport needs 6 officers on duty from 9am to noon on a Saturday, but probably only needs a single officer to handle everything for the rest of the week.     

6

General Car Chat / Re: Who owns a milk float on here?

« on: 16 May 2025, 12:58:27 »

I've just discovered the car comes with a heat pump (something I hear doesn't work very well even in our home homes, yet the government, and mad Ed Milliband in particular, wants us all to install one) How does this work in the context of a car.

A heat pump is just an inside out fridge.

If you look at the back of your fridge/freezer, you'll see a black radiator. That black radiator gets hot. The inside of the fridge/freezer gets cold. The whole thing runs on electricity. 

So in thermodynamic terms what happens is you put in (say) 1 watt of energy to the fridge motor. That 1W of motor energy ultimatley ends up as heat somewhere. However, the motor is pumping a gas around the system, which extracts energy from the inside of the fridge (it gets colder) and dumps that energy into the back radiator (it gets hotter). So say it extracts one watt of energy from the inside of the fridge, and dumps that 1w into the radiator.

We now have a system where putting 1W of electrical energy in results in 1W of cooling, and 2W of heat (1W in the motor, 1W in the radiator). So we are 'making' more heat that the energy we are putting in. We are 'pumping heat' out of the fridge into the atmosphere.  The figure of merit is called COP (Coefficient of Performance) An electric heater has a COP of 1. You put 1W of electricity in, you'll get (almost) 1W of heat out. With a heat pump you can get COPs of 3 or more. Put in 1W of electrical energy and you can get 3W (or more) of heat out.

So now mount the fridge in your wall, with the door open to the outside world, and the radiator part inside your house. Turn it on. You will be pumping heat from the outside world into your home. You won't be able to cool the outside world, so the 'inside' of the fridge won't get noticibly colder.

There are also semi-conductor based heat pump devices - called Peltiers. Here is a datasheet for one https://tark-solutions.com/products/thermoelectric-cooler-modules/peltier-cp-series/CP2-127-06-L1-W4.5 . These don't need a pump, plumbing and gas. They are totally solid state with no moving parts, and you can get COP's in the 3-4 region. What happens is when you apply power, one side of the device gets cold, and the other side gets hot. The hot side gets hotter than the cold side gets cold, because you're 'pumping' energy (heat) from one side to the other.

Peltiers are reversible. If you swap the power the other way round, then the 'hot side' gets cold, and the 'cold side' gets hot. You can therefore put one side of peltier inside the heater (HVAC box), and use it to either heat or cool the air entering the cabin.

7

General Discussion Area / Re: Iberia Blackout

« on: 28 April 2025, 20:59:34 »

There have been numerous power outages worldwide over the years caused by solar storms. IIRC there was one in Canada and parts of New York State back in 1989.

Occams Razor and all that.

8

General Discussion Area / Re: What has P*ssed you off today?

« on: 12 April 2025, 11:49:50 »

Bald men in the barbers shop. How the AF can it take 45 minutes to run the razor over their scalp once or twice. I swear my hair grew at least a cm longer by the time I got into the chair.

9

General Discussion Area / Re: What has P*ssed you off today?

« on: 10 April 2025, 11:01:59 »

It's actually better than my maths, because you won't get the whole £12K/£9.6K on day one to put in the bank for a year. You'll get 12 monthly payments of £800. The first £800 will earn 4% interest for 12 months, the second £800 for 11 months, the third £800 for 10 months etc, etc and the final £800 for one month. Therefore, whilst the headline APR interest rate on your saved pension monies might be 4%, the actual interest earned will only be half that - averaging out at about 2%, so the 'lump sum' will only have about £192 interest added to it at the end of the first year, making a total of £9792.

The payback is then (9792/696), or 14.07 years.

Whilst Stemo might like a bird in the hand, it's no good if you pluck, stuff, and roast for an hour to make a meal. Give a man a fish and he eats for a day. Teach a man to fish and he becomes alcoholic. Or something like that.

Makes sense. Although as Im planning to work for four years after pensionable age,  through years 2,3,4 the figures will tip the balance to a degree in the other direction as the money accumulates ?
The state pension and probably tax thresholds will also change through that period too.

According to this calculator ....https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/savings/regular-savings-calculator/ ... if you save £800 per month for 4 years at a 4% APR interest rate, you'd end up with a pot of £41644 (including £3244 interest). This assumes you don't have to pay tax on the interest - you're only allowed £1K interest per year tax free.

If you defer for 4 years, your £12K pension would be increased to £15036 per year. (£12K * (5.8% ^ 4))

So the choices would be £41644 lump sum plus £12K p/a pension for life, or no lump sum and £15036 p/a pension for life. The payoff period is (41644 / (15036-12000)) = 13.71 years, so you'd be 83.7 years old when you broke even.

Impossible to predict future tax thresholds, allowances and rates, but you should note that while the (scam of!) the pension triple lock exists, it's basically guaranteed the SP will increase faster than inflation and savings interest rates. Sooner or later the triple lock will have to be changed, modified or scrapped, but for the time being it's still in place.

10

General Discussion Area / Re: What has P*ssed you off today?

« on: 10 April 2025, 09:31:48 »

It's actually better than my maths, because you won't get the whole £12K/£9.6K on day one to put in the bank for a year. You'll get 12 monthly payments of £800. The first £800 will earn 4% interest for 12 months, the second £800 for 11 months, the third £800 for 10 months etc, etc and the final £800 for one month. Therefore, whilst the headline APR interest rate on your saved pension monies might be 4%, the actual interest earned will only be half that - averaging out at about 2%, so the 'lump sum' will only have about £192 interest added to it at the end of the first year, making a total of £9792.

The payback is then (9792/696), or 14.07 years.

Whilst Stemo might like a bird in the hand, it's no good if you pluck, stuff, and roast for an hour to make a meal. Give a man a fish and he eats for a day. Teach a man to fish and he becomes alcoholic. Or something like that.

11

General Discussion Area / Re: What has P*ssed you off today?

« on: 09 April 2025, 23:22:49 »

My state pension age is 66, which is 28th October this year.
That aside, Im a bit lost now. State pension is currently £12000 pa (within a few quid). If I pay 20% tax on it, I make that approx. £9500.
I dont understand where the £7600 figure comes from.

Full state pension is £12K ish. I have no idea if you're getting the full amount, or some lesser amount. Plus I misread your example as meaning your predicted SP would be £9500, not the full £12K.

However, the maths still holds - the payback for a single years deferral is still about 14 years. Example...

You take SP of £12K at 66, pay 20% tax on it (so you actually receive £9600), stick it in the bank at 4%, and at 67 you have a SP of £12K p/a, plus a "lump sum" in the bank of £9984.

Defer for a year, then at 67 you have a SP of £12696 p/a, and no "lump sum" - a gain of £696 p/a for life.

The payback is therefore (£9984/£696) 14.34 years, so you have to live to 80.34 years old to 'win'.

12

General Discussion Area / Re: What has P*ssed you off today?

« on: 09 April 2025, 22:48:16 »

Your state pension, from November, is almost £12,000. That will be taxable if you carry on working, of course. But, still, it's a nice bonus.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but if you carry on working whilst in receipt of the state pension, then surely it's your employment pay (and any private / work pension / income over the tax free allowance) that is taxed, not your state pension?

Yes - sort of. What happens is your personal allowance is reduced by the amount of your state pension. Your employer will receive a new tax code for you to reflect this, and you'll end up paying tax on £12K (or whatever your SP is) more of your salary.

Whenever I had two jobs, the second one was always taxed/NI paid on the full amount keeping the allowances on the primary job. HMRC are actually pretty good in this regard as they will allocate the allowances as you request.

Not sure if this would apply to a state pension though as you would be presumed to be at least semi retired so being retired would be your primary income.

Yes, that's how it works with the SP. The SP is effectively treated as your 'primary job' and gets first crack at your personal allowance.  If you are still working then your first 'real job' only gets whatever the difference between your state pension and your personal allowance is. Any second, third or fourth 'real job' would basically get zero personal allowance.

The same thing happens with personal/occupational pensions. The state pension gets first dibbs on your personal allowance, then typically one other pension gets the remainder of your personal allowance, and any second/third/fourth personal/occupational pensions get zero allowance.

13

General Discussion Area / Re: What has P*ssed you off today?

« on: 09 April 2025, 22:33:23 »

Your state pension, from November, is almost £12,000. That will be taxable if you carry on working, of course. But, still, it's a nice bonus.

I will be taxed on mine as Im still working, but yes a nice bonus to build up reserves with.
Swmbo is currently 12 years short of NIC,s for her state pension, but we are in the process of buying them , so she will also get full state pension untaxed from June 2028.

You don't have to take your State Pension at 67. You can defer it. If you continue to work past your normal State Pension Age then this can be very good value.

https://www.gov.uk/deferring-state-pension/what-you-get

The amount that is then paid out when you do take it will have increased by 5.8% per year of deferral. I haven't done the sums recently, but if you are in good health (you expect to live for > 10 years) the conventional wisdom was that it's best to defer by between 3 and 5 years, which would result in about a 33% increase in your state pension - about £15900 p/a.

Of course, you could die before you break even - but them's the breaks.

Im not sure it would be wise to defer it. Even though I will effectively pay 20% tax on it.
Lets say I save £9500 of it p.a.( after tax figure)  and get say 4% interest p.a. That has to be better than deferring it and getting the 5.8 % interest but not putting £9500 in the bank for the four years Im planning on working after I start claiming it ? *
I should add, I will still be below the 40% threshold when everything is added up.

Also, I will stop having to pay NIC once I reach state retirement age, in either scenario which will be nice.

Edit * Actually, having thought about it, that will depend on how long I live. At some point there will be a crossover, where I would have been better off deferring.
Maybe stick with my plan and get swmbo to defer hers, so covering both bases ?

If you take your SP at 67 but continue to work, then due to tax (at 20%) you'll not receive an 'extra' £9500 - it'll effectively only be an extra £7600. Stick that in the bank at 4% for a year (and resist the temptation to pi55 it up the wall) and at 68 you'll have a cash lump sum of £7904, and an annual state pension of £9500.

If you defer for 1 year, then at 68 your annual state pension would be £10051 - so £551 more per year, but no lump sum.

The break even point is a further 14 years (£7904/£551) - so you would need to live to 82 for the gamble to pay off. Die the day after you claim your SP (at 68 and one day) then you're £7900 down. Live to 100 and you'd be quids in.

Not saying it's right for everyone, but it's an option to consider if you intend to continue working past state pension age.

14

General Discussion Area / Re: What has P*ssed you off today?

« on: 09 April 2025, 20:42:06 »

Your state pension, from November, is almost £12,000. That will be taxable if you carry on working, of course. But, still, it's a nice bonus.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but if you carry on working whilst in receipt of the state pension, then surely it's your employment pay (and any private / work pension / income over the tax free allowance) that is taxed, not your state pension?

Yes - sort of. What happens is your personal allowance is reduced by the amount of your state pension. Your employer will receive a new tax code for you to reflect this, and you'll end up paying tax on £12K (or whatever your SP is) more of your salary.

15

General Discussion Area / Re: What has P*ssed you off today?

« on: 09 April 2025, 20:38:29 »

Your state pension, from November, is almost £12,000. That will be taxable if you carry on working, of course. But, still, it's a nice bonus.

I will be taxed on mine as Im still working, but yes a nice bonus to build up reserves with.
Swmbo is currently 12 years short of NIC,s for her state pension, but we are in the process of buying them , so she will also get full state pension untaxed from June 2028.

You don't have to take your State Pension at 67. You can defer it. If you continue to work past your normal State Pension Age then this can be very good value.

https://www.gov.uk/deferring-state-pension/what-you-get

The amount that is then paid out when you do take it will have increased by 5.8% per year of deferral. I haven't done the sums recently, but if you are in good health (you expect to live for > 10 years) the conventional wisdom was that it's best to defer by between 3 and 5 years, which would result in about a 33% increase in your state pension - about £15900 p/a.

Of course, you could die before you break even - but them's the breaks.