Still at Poole. New boiler being fitted today. Bye bye £2.5k!!! It will have a 10 year warranty. Yeah. Not looking forward to 2033. Boo!!!
Bluey - my sympathies, but unless the bloody thing has literally blown off the wall, all boilers are repairable. The property we stay in Brockenhurst had a Baxi that wouldn't fire up one year we were down there. Called the owner and he sent a great guy from Lymington about 8 miles away who came straight out. All the kit and loads of knowledge to go with it. The igniter spark was clicking away merrily but no cigar on the gas front. Went through everything both electronic and mechanical and deduced a faulty O ring on main gas valve was leaking and wouldn't allow it to open the pilot jet when prompted. He phoned a local supplier of Baxi parts and got one sent straight direct to him the next morning. He called around and sorted it. No idea what that cost the owner cos it wasn't my problem, but I bet it wasn't £2.5K..........
Trouble was the problem couldn't be identified. It had been serviced every year. Only a pocket sized boiler for a small flat so little room to work on it. Changed the pcb, £175, no go. Changed the visual display, £100, no go. Next stop was the fan, £200, but no guarantee that would solve it. We could have continued throwing money at individual bits but no certainty of resolving it and no long term warranty. We chose not to go for the fan, returned the vdu (saying it was faulty )so only paid for the pcb and a bit of labour. Instead we have a brand new boiler with a 10 year parts and labour warranty. Large cost yes, but have spent little on the place in the 11 years we have had it so not an unreasonable investment.
See if you can get a taxpayer handout for repairs like the MP’s do for their second homes? Can’t believe rich people complaining about paying for things like the rest of us ( no offence )
You do realise we live in a society where its them and us and we must not question them having a free ride while we get fleeced........even **** andrew the Prince of England is brushed under the carpet.
Was listening to a piece by the great Welsh king(or should be) Michael sheen and he brought up a bit of a shocker to me......anyone heard of Brofiscin Quarry.
Here's the memorial piece written by the King of Wales........Worth listening to all of it but bit I'm talking about is around 1hr25mins......goes on after then talking about the waste that will get dumped in Cardiff Bay........politics fkd us over for money AGAIN......same old same old
Hey Remote, you ever thought of broadcasting your farming adventures? Just saw this chap on the local new... https://youtube.com/@FarmerP Apparently he now earns more from his social media exploits than his prize cattle (and they brought in around £15k last year)... Reckon you'd have at least a dozen subscribers on here for starters!!
A nice idea, but our dabbling won't create a lot of content. I did start the tractor up yesterday and one of the chickens laid an egg (since bird flu lock down they've had a moult and stopped laying). Once in a while we get some excitement, but not often. There are quite a few farming bloggers out there now. The problem is, they've become so focussed on the revenue they chase outside the actual farming, the novelty of their story is diluted. Quite a few TV programmes causing the same problem. My Yorkshire Farm and This Farming Life spring to mind. A couple good stories out there, but the 'fame' seems to have overtaken the graft. The more they're on, the less the appeal. Don't blame them for trying to turn a buck though. My daughter followed a few for a while and my wife flags stuff from time to time. There was a story about a retired barrister (legal, not coffee - always get the spelling wrong) whose wife had MS. They left London and moved to a scottish island for the lifestyle. He used to sell hoggets (lambs are under 1, mutton is over 2, hoggets are the animals between 1 and 2 - bigger animals and a better depth of flavour than lamb, but not as tough as mutton). It was a niche market that made him a profit. My daughter followed The Red Sheppardess for a while, but again her story got lost in commercialism. The same with that Yorkshire woman with the hoard of kids. Its all about the books now. There are also some big farmers who have good stories, or fight the corners of British farming. Gareth Wyn Jones is a generational farmer who comes across very well. Not keen on the Country file farmers though. They seem to have had it handed it to them on a plate. Gentleman farmers who get others to do the work rather than get their hands dirty day to day. Just gives them something to base their TV careers on. TV personalities that farm rather than farmers who have media coverage. To be fair, and I don't like him generally, but Jeremy Clarkson has probably done more for the profile of farming than country file. a big learning curve for him and portrayed, warts and all. Showing how much graft goes in and how little cash is made. And there are plenty real life characters like Caleb. I meddle with the 9 acres we own and another 25 we rent. Clarkson does it with about 2000 acres. He's got a bigger tractor than me as well. I quite enjoy speaking to farmers around me. Most are well established, generational. They will have forgotten more about farming than I will ever know. The stories of some of the young farmers we know through our daughter can be good, especially those not born to it or those who have branched out into support services. I was talking to the guy who cuts our hedges yesterday. Great skills with a machine, but you don't often appreciate the challenges. Can't get on many fields as its so wet at the moment, but all hedge cutting has to be done by the end of February to protect nesting birds. Stuff you don't think about. I'll keep posting snippets on here. You can have it for free. In fact, I should be paying you to put up with it.
Excellent read this remote. Gives a complete perspective of the media, including social influences on farming today. I must admit I wouldn’t want to be farmer these days but you seem to have just enough on your plate. My family included quite a few uncles who farmed in Co Tyrone and I loved staying with them as a kid. I think all their farms are gone now. Happy memories.
I think I've said before that I got into it accidentally. More my daughter and her then boyfriend who started it, then I mucked in to help and found I quite enjoyed it as its so different from the 30 years I spent in offices. Never been afraid to get my hands dirty having spent a lot of time on building sites with my dad as a kid and laboured on building sites during school hoildays from 15 to 19. I also like just being outside, whatever the weather. More from my fishing than anything else I also like learning new things, and there's been plenty of that over the last 7 or 8 years. Wouldn't want to try to make a living from farming, especially if starting from scratch. Its difficult for youngsters to get into as well. All the small farms round us get bought up by big farming families so you're getting fewer and fewer, but bigger and bigger farms. I'll just stick to dabbling. its a nice environment and community to be involved in though.
If I hadn't come home close to death ill (bad chest infection) last week, I'd have popped over to have a look at it for you . I know bugger all about boilers but I could have stood there scratching my chin and tutting like the plumbers I get.
I have a Vaillant boiler here at home and every Christmas it would pack up and the family would be wearing coats all day... I would get a plumber friend or my plumber cousin round and they would service it one changed a fan, another changed the motor another time but every December it would pack in again. about 5 years ago I bit the bullet and phoned Vaillant themselves based in Stinky town (£100 gone already - call out charge {jack bastards}) They turned up and were there for 20 mins after replacing a sticking float valve (I think or maybe similar) total cost including parts, labour and call out was £220 with a new 2 year warranty and not had a problem since
Cheers Blueturk. Hope you're feeling better now. The weather was absolute dogshite for our 2 weeks. Only 3 decent days. We didn't even make it to the Quay. We're down again Monday for 7 days, granddaughter's second birthday Thursday and her party Saturday. If you're back in the area and fancy a pint let me know.
I rent my old house out in the dark side of turktown and recently replaced a cheap combi with another cheap combi and my service engineer is there more than my residents .... Vaillant or another famous name all the way from now on
Antibiotics finish on Wednesday so I'm hoping to get the will to drive down, I'll let you know,,,, picking my T5 up from the menders later too so at least I'll have a vehicle that can get me there (my car is at the caravan park ....or Pikey site as we lovingly refer to it)
well, you did have the offer to watch some footy, but as the game was sh1te, you probably made the right decision to stay in Poole
