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Home→Published 2019 → October 1 2 >>

Monthly Archives: October 2019

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Dell Lattitude cooling

Dell Lattitude E6520

Blasdale Home Posted on October 28, 2019 by SteveFebruary 4, 2020

My Dell Lattitude E6520 is seven years old. Still running fine. I did change the hard disk drive to an SSD a while ago. This happened after a failed upgrade of Windows 10. I had been running Windows 10 for a year. One day it decided to update, and there started a loop. Update, fail, backout, update, fail, backout ……… A search on the Internet suggested a failing drive. Diagnostics showed some possible issues. Read more ….. I bought an SSD 512G drive and installed from scratch. Best thing I ever did. So fast, boot-up time almost instantaneous.

Anyway, a couple of years later I started to get warnings about the fan. Ignored these for a while, then one day almost burnt my hand on the laptop after it had been working hard. Took the back off, and realised there was a heat pipe taking the energy from a couple of hot spots, moving it to the fan. All this had to come out to get to the fan. Found the product number on the fan, MagLev MF60120V1. A quick google, eBay order and next day had a replacement fan. Quickly reassembled and now no warnings from the BIOS at startup, and I can hear the fan when the PC gets working hard.

Next update maybe a new battery. They are still on sale. The battery in my laptop is now less than 50% of its original capacity.

Reckon that has saved me a lot of money, there are still years of life left in the laptop. It would be nice to have a lighter, High Definition replacement though.

Posted in Technology | Tagged Dell, E6520, Lattitude | 3 Replies
Southwold rainbow

Southwold for my Birthday

Blasdale Home Posted on October 24, 2019 by SteveFebruary 1, 2020

We headed off to Southwold on the eve of my birthday. The drive to Southwold is quite a long way, more than three hours. Google had us doing a shortcut on country lanes from the A14 to the A12. Disaster stuck behind a large sugarbeet lorry on its way back from Bury.

Arrived at the site, we had not booked as there was plenty of space on the website. We checked in, and there was the response, “sorry no space”. But the field was empty, though looking again we could seek the lakes across the grass. After some consultation, it was decided we could use a hard standing area for the two nights. If we had been staying longer, we would have been out of luck. As it was, the campsite staff were going to have to cancel many of the weekenders.

We parked and quickly headed over to the Harbour Inn for lunch, a light lunch because we were going to have supper later. Despite the sun being out, it was a tad chilly sitting outside, in the shade behind the pub. Would have been better at the front. Anyway, we ate inside.

A walk along the footpath across the fields, over the golf course to Southwold, was somewhat fraught. The far end of the field was flooded, and there was no way through without wading in water. We backtracked and walked along the road, then across the golf course. Arriving in Southwold we seemed to attract people who started to explain where the museums were.

We looked through several shops, even visited FatFace, but ended up not buying anything, other than some chocolate twists for breakfast. Walked back to the campervan along the coast road. We set up for the night. Then we dressed for dinner and headed out to the Sail Loft. The card behind the bar asked if we had booked, we said no, so he, looking at all the empty tables, said fully booked, in half an hour a huge crowd of people were arriving. Damn, what were we going to go, asked him if there was any way we could eat. He relented, only joking. I swore at him calling him a Ba****d. (He laughed!)

We sat down, me with a Ghost Ship and R with a G&T and we ordered out supper. Here we had a large meal, starter and main. R did not do justice to her mushroom risotto. I did struggle with my two-course meal but was not vanquished.

Back to the campsite for an early night.

Next day was my Birthday, opened my cards, ate our very nice Co-op chocolate twists and headed into Southwold. Today it was due to rain, so jackets were required. First on the day’s events was a tour of the Adnams Distillery. When we had booked we were the only two on the tour, today the tour appeared to be full.

Having some time to spare, R pounced upon a market stall and bought a couple of tops, I don’t know who was more surprised, me or her.

We were shown a film, then taken to the distillery. Immediately before entering the distillery, there is a room with several small stills where the distiller experiments with recipes and they also hold their gin making taster courses. There was one in progress when we arrived.

The reflux stills were shown to us and explained. In these, they make the Vodka required for the Gin making process. Apparently they make three Vodkas, one using barley grown and harvested only a few miles away. Their Vodka is not filtered and retains some of the flavours from the malt. This was especially noticeable with the Vodka made from rye. Apparently Adnams has twice won the best Vodka in the world prize, beating the Russians and Poles. There were two more stills to be seen, one still a more traditional whisky type one.

Down now into the stores, where we see the barrels. Their whisky is stored in fresh French oak barrels, so not flavoured from bourbon or sherry. They decided not to compete with Scotch whisky. Now the important bit, the tasting. We started with the different Vodkas, and then the gins. Different gins based upon the different Vodkas, plus some extra botanical differences. Each Gin was tasted neat, and then with tonic. Finally, there were whiskies to be tasted. As the tasting progressed, the conversation turned from almost silent, to chatter and then loud conversation.

Finally over, we headed to the Adnams outlet shop to buy some Vodka and Gin. Now it was into the Swan for the birthday lunch. We were seated in the Stillroom restaurant and ordered our drinks. I ordered a Hopped Negroni, and R a fizzy Rose. My Negroni came with a thin biscuit topped with Marmalade. The full ingredients were Adnams Copper House Gin, Campari, Adnams Port, Cherry, Beetroot, Adnams Dry Hopped Lager & Adnams Broadside Marmalade. Not like a normal Negroni, not bitter, sweeter.

Starters arrived. I ate Local Seared Pigeon Breast, Butternut Squash Parfait and Pickled Girolles. Very nice, though the breast was a little overcooked. R ate a Heritage Beetroot, apple and candied hazelnut salad.

A bottle of Viognier accompanied the starter and mains.

The main course arrived, Seared Halibut, scorched gem lettuce, blue meat radish, chilli, soy gel and mussel broth for S. Very good. R launched into her Suffolk roast pork tenderloin, breaded cheek, orzotto, parsley root puree, charred leek and truffle. While in Suffolk, the Suffolk pig is a must. So much free-range pork in Suffolk these days.

The rain was starting, and Rosemary seeing the market stalls closing, suddenly jumped up, rushed out and bought another top. The alcohol must have been loosening her inhibitions.

We finished with a double espresso and a one Apple & Wild Wave. As we were leaving the doorman suggested we have a drink in the bar, it was hammering it down outside. So another drink. Later we headed on out and back to the campervan for a relatively early night.

In the morning we packed up and headed off. I thought I would drop in on the G…s, friends of my parents from years back. So we headed over to East Green, and as we arrived a vehicle was leaving driven by Robert. Introduced myself and we had a short chat, he was off and could not stay around, but gave us directions to where Tony and Jeanette now lived. Not far away, so we visited them. They were very surprised to see R and me at their door. We chatted with them for over an hour. In their 90s and still very sharp.

It was then back home for us. The next day washed and cleaned the van before putting it away for the next few months.

Steves Birthday at Southwold, Suffolk
Steves Birthday at Southwold, Suffolk
Steves Birthday at Southwold, Suffolk
Steves Birthday at Southwold, Suffolk
Steves Birthday at Southwold, Suffolk
Steves Birthday at Southwold, Suffolk
Steves Birthday at Southwold, Suffolk
Steves Birthday at Southwold, Suffolk
Steves Birthday at Southwold, Suffolk
Steves Birthday at Southwold, Suffolk
Steves Birthday at Southwold, Suffolk
Steves Birthday at Southwold, Suffolk
Steves Birthday at Southwold, Suffolk
Steves Birthday at Southwold, Suffolk
Steves Birthday at Southwold, Suffolk
Steves Birthday at Southwold, Suffolk
Steves Birthday at Southwold, Suffolk
Steves Birthday at Southwold, Suffolk
Steves Birthday at Southwold, Suffolk
Posted in Suffolk | Tagged Adnams, Birthday, Southwold | Leave a reply

Camping and Motorhome Show

Blasdale Home Posted on October 15, 2019 by SteveJanuary 30, 2020

Checking my phone in bed, I see google reckons I am interested in camping and motorhomes, so Google is telling me this is the first day of the Camping, Caravan and Motorhome Show at the NEC. Quick decision, we decide to go. Good idea to see what is changing in this area.

The entry we walked into was the end with the camper vans. There were several companies who did conversions, mainly VW, but also Fords and other makes. Most of the conversions were similar to ours but different in small to large ways. There were oddities in many conversions, some blocking half of the sliding door entry with cabinets. Many cabinets were thinner than ours to get in a wider bed or leave a little more space around the bed, or even leaving horrendous metal tracking on the floor so the rear seat could move. So yes, we came away from there pretty pleased with our van’s conversion. R informed our convertor, CJ Vans.

I was interested in the electrics area and always wondered why with our conversion, we ended up with a lead-acid battery and not a lithium one. A lithium battery is long-lasting, lighter and you can discharge it down to less than 10%, making it far more powerful than the equivalent lead battery. You can also take more power out of it, and run an Inverter, running electric Induction hobs of over a kilowatt-hour. Using solar cells, a lithium battery and an Inverter you can go off-grid camping. Ha, the reason why is the cost. The battery is more than a thousand pounds, and when I had our van converted it was probably a whole lot more than that.

While we are on things to change, I still would like an external gas connector for a BBQ in the fender of the van. Saw one at Download a couple of years ago, and there seem to be people doing it on campers. I suppose using a gas BBQ will use up the gas, our small tank is still going strong after 3 years, more than 160 days of camping.

We took a look around the large vans, enquired about road permits for Switzerland, had a coffee at the Camping and Caravan Club. Decided not to buy the ACSI membership from the ACSI stand, it seemed a lot more expensive than getting it through the CCC.

We checked out the Eriba stand, the little vans are quite cute, though Eriba seems to be doing bigger vans these days. On another stand, there was a life-size Lego caravan. At first glance, I did not notice it was Lego, just thought one window was a rather odd plastic.

R and I studied the different awnings on show. We are not too happy with the ‘Shed’, rather large and difficult to get back into its bag, takes up a lot of space in the van when not being used. We might have been better off with one of the roll-out awnings, the trouble is we have a track in the place where we would have to attach the roll-out awning. Also looked at how similar awnings to the ‘Shed’ attach to campervans, took photos of the way the connecting tunnel connects to the van. Have I been doing that wrong? Not sure! Came away with a Thule catalogue as well as some lithium battery ones.

Mororhome Show
Mororhome Show
Mororhome Show
Mororhome Show
Mororhome Show
Mororhome Show
Mororhome Show
Mororhome Show
Mororhome Show
Posted in Birmingham, Fairs | Tagged Campervan | Leave a reply

A walk around Green Park, Reading

Blasdale Home Posted on October 12, 2019 by SteveFebruary 8, 2020

A tour to Reading with the Cambridge Society on a rather wet and unpromising day. We met near to Green Park, parking in the CostCo a short walk from the wind turbine. We then spent the next hour standing in the rain, listening to a talk about Wind Turbines. Interesting to hear the turbine paid for itself in 7 years and has a life span of at least 25 years. The most carbon polluting part of the turbine was the concrete foundation, which could be reused by a replacement turbine. When the wind speed gets up to 70mph, the blades are feathered and its stops generating. If left operating at higher wind speeds, the blades would bend back and start to impact the column as they rotated..

We then went for a walk around Green Park, and the local new housing. Green Park has some footpaths totally shielded away from the office buildings. So you are walking down a muddy tree and bush lined path, and through the leaves, you could see the high tech buildings. A lovely pond centres the park. All the buildings housed Tech companies, Cisco, Symantec, Huawei, Veritas to name a few.

After the walk, we headed by car for lunch at Cunning Man. Not far away, but seemingly miles by road. Very busy pub serving lunches. Not sure now what I ate, but it was fine.

Posted in Berkshire, Cambridge Society | Tagged Cambridge Society, Green Park, Reading | Leave a reply

Back Home

Blasdale Home Posted on October 9, 2019 by SteveJanuary 27, 2020

On Monday, we said goodbye to Camping des Playes and headed to Camping Champ d’ete in Pont-de-Vaux, a short distance off the Autoroute du Soleil. A large flat campsite near to the town. There is a small river which joins the nearby Saone. I say a small river, it was big enough to have boats and a marina in the village. It looks like it is easy to walk into the town, and the river must have some good walks along the banks. Alas, the weather was wet and not conducive to walking. The campsite was also about to close for the winter. I shall put this down as a possible place to stay in the future.

The Tuesday we headed off back to Chalons-en Champagne to stop in the same place as when we came out. Not sitting outside for supper this time, instead, there was rain and more rain. The grape pickers had all left as well. We did stop off at the large Carrefour.

Wednesday was an uneventful drive back to Calais and a trip across in the Euro Tunnel. We caught an earlier train and managed to miss most of the holdups crossing the Thames.

Posted in France | Tagged Camping des Playes, France, Pont-de-Vaux | Leave a reply

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