njee20

Definitely not falling out, and not really "bantering" either (I really hate that term!), just trying to understand the rationale. Verstappen certainly seems to perform better in people's imagination than on paper! Some bad luck has definitely beset him, but better than Vettel? Nah, much as it pains me! Agree on Brazil though, fingers crossed for another wet one, maybe they'll add 20% to the race distance so Max can win it this time

Right... And Verstappen is in the top 6 in every single one of those where he retired. My point was that Andrew suggested Max would "definitely" have more points than Vettel were it not for his retirements, I'm just not seeing that. If he would have won two of the (say the 6th and one 5th) he'd have an extra 102 points, and would still be 12 points behind Bottas and 27 behind Vettel. And again, that's giving him the generosity of seven additional points finishes without also assuming anyone else finished some more races. Surely you need to give Vettel another 50 or so points at least?

A glorious irony given the near-propaganda like tone of some of the Verstappen articles ;-) We still don't know about 2018 though. I know we're not seeing major rule changes, but even so, I want to know how people know which are the best cars next year?!

I know, but that's harder, as you have to factor in things like where the other drivers were in the pit stop cycle. It's a huge leap of faith to say "he was in x when he had the problem, therefore he would have finished there". Grid position is a proxy, but shows he was still a long way off winning (or even beating Vettel), and if you're extending the courtesy of speculative point giving then like I say you surely need to do that for the other drivers?

Is it? If you take Max's grid positions, then he has retired from: - 2nd (Singapore) - 5th (Belgium) - 5th (Austria) - 5th (Baku) - 5th (Canada) - 5th (Spain) - 6th (Bahrain) So he'd have 76 more points if he'd finished in his grid position each time. I CBA to calculate how that would have affected everyone else. That would mean he would have 224 points, leaving him 4th, 38 points behind Bottas and 53 points behind Vettel, who should probably be 'awarded' some notional extra points for his non-self-inflicted DNFs. He'd also only be 30 points ahead of Ricciardo, who has himself had 5 retirements this year, as well as numerous penalties. I like Max, I don't like Vettel (although I applaud his humble congratulations of Hamilton yesterday), but lets be honest a Dutch publication is hardly the most impartial of publications, what may happen next year is total speculation, and to suggest anything else is just daft. There's a huge amount of 'what-abboutery' surrounding Verstappen, more so than any driver I can think of, he's undeniably had some reliability issues, but he's hardly been robbed of the world championship this time around IMO.

Felt for Max last night, put together a stunning lap, only for the Vettel to steal it from under his nose, again! Glad no action taken against him on Bottas, don’t deny he did impede Bottas, but he had nothing else he could do, except perhaps running super wide at 12 and picking up all the marbles.

Had a hired VW Transporter I drove to the Alps last month. The engine management light came on a little north of Lyon on the way south. Obviously as it was a hire car, Google suggested that if it felt ok it was unlikely to be catastrophic, and I wasn't overly fussed by the potential demise of the vehicle we carried on regardless. It stayed on the rest of the way there, plus the journey back, about 800 miles all in. No ill effects, Budget apologised when I returned it. Bit disconcerting though I must say!

How often do you just tell people you drive a Maserati?!

Obviously I don’t know what Phil drives, but I’d be astounded if any car in the last 20 years has had a ‘manual choke warning light’! Not defending gesticulating, but it’s an understandable response, he’s within his right to swerve, common sense dictates he looks over his shoulder first, but much like you checking your mirror whilst taking evasive action, sometimes self preservation kicks in first. Given how few people use their horn for anything other than angry ‘notification of presence’!

Correct, so you wait, as you would with any vehicle, it’s rarely that far. I don’t understand the horse thing, surely that’s infinitely more inconvenient? Totally agree on lights though, very annoying. Cars at the moment with badly adjusted lights too, come spring it’s better, people have got them sorted over winter!

A) yes B) yes C) not sure, but I’d sign up anyway, they do pretty frequent offers which are worth having.

But if a road is wide enough to have a solid (or indeed any) white line it's also wide enough to give 1.5m of space. There will, of course, be country lanes where leaving 1.5m of space is difficult, but that's a very strained argument though, that's not what the police are policing. Why shouldn't you give a 1.5m gap regardless of speed limit? There's not necessarily an inherent link between road width and speed limit, and whilst being passed by a car 30cm away is more daunting if they're doing 50mph more than you it's still quite unpleasant at 20mph more. Are you just trying to justify to yourself why it's ok to squeeze past cyclists? Solid white lines are there for a reason, ie it's not safe to overtake. If someone is doing 10mph you can probably (in the eyes of the law at least) 'nip' past quickly without jeopardising an unseen oncoming vehicle. I don't think anyone's suggesting 10mph is a reasonable speed. If they're doing 20mph, all things being equal, it takes twice as long to perform the manoeuvre. It's a curious psychology around cycling, people see a cyclist and they have to get past. It's not uncommon to be overtaken by someone already braking for the line of traffic they're about to join. You do see stupid cyclists, you also see stupid pedestrians, motorcyclists, horse riders and drivers. All bar the latter are extremely vulnerable though. JDW's example is an interesting one, a (no doubt very unpleasant) incident with a cyclist, but it was "a few months ago", when I think about how many times whilst driving I've been put at risk or had to take evasive action to avoid other motor vehicles I certainly don't have to go back a few months!

Yep, like many offences, there’s vast amounts of subjectivity and judgement involved. I’d still happily see people fined, as with tailgating etc, although accept the limitations. We’re far too lenient when it comes to traffic offences IMO.

Apologies, amid 4500 posts it's hardly surprising, and it's (perhaps tenuously) related to driving at least! Getting back OT then, good to see other police forces trying to clamp down on close passes on cyclists, here, although a shame they're not being fined.

Wasn’t aimed at you, but that presumably means you have used public transport at some point in the last 40 years, which proves my point. It’s no wonder the roads are so full of angry people, the love affair with the car is so ingrained.

Curiouser and curiouser! Each to their own I guess.

I don't disagree, but those marginal costs add up. My last service/MOT was £500, nothing really out of the ordinary, 10,000 mile intervals, admittedly alternating major/minor, so say they average £400 a year, that's still 4p per mile, which on the hypothetical Norfolk - Edinburgh journey would be another £28. Then I reckon on about 10-12,000 miles out of a pair of front tyres, there's another £300, or 3p a mile. What about depreciation too? Hiring a car is a good option, but then one could do that at the other end, dealing with TheQ's issue of not having transport. I commute on Southern, they can certainly be pretty dire, last year was horrendous for sure, but by and large they're fine, and you think trying to drive into the City of London would be quicker, more pleasant and cheaper (or even any one of those) every day? Yeah... good luck with that! I don't think anyone is saying train always makes more sense, but I just can't quite comprehend having not used the train once for 40 years "because driving is cheaper". But then I live in the south east, and clearly have better connections than TheQ, so who knows. Presumably you've not visited London since 1976?

Whaaaaaaat? That’s nuts. Train travel isn’t always cheap admittedly, but sometimes it’s the cheaper option, and even if it’s not, it’s frequently far more pleasant than driving!

Yep, I didn’t know that about the viaduct.

Nice dilemma to have!

I think you’re passing your opinion off as fact, clearly you find the window frames such a catastrophic error that you’re rubbishing the model. I’m trying to show that others won’t, the Bachmann coaches are 50% more expensive (they’re not here yet, let’s not deal in box shifter prices), and both are a total unknown, yet here you are with all the vitriol about how atrocious the OR coaches are. Sorry you feel like that, you have options - get over it, buy the (IMO wildly inferior) Joeuf/Lima/Hornby offerings, or fix it. If I modelled OO I’d be snapping up rakes of the OR coaches and be pleased at the price (and that’s not about knowing the price of everything and the value of nothing, which is just mildly offensive). YMMV.

I’ll definitely come and see it again, and I’ll say hello!

Didn’t introduce myself as you looked somewhat pre-occupied, but I was impressed, as was my wife, who found it interesting to see a layout in a half finished stage. Your track and platforms look amazing, and nowt wrong with an FGW HST, even after 10 laps! My 9 month old son knew not to touch it either, some people are just morons

Still some sets running with 2. They’ll all end up green eventually, their current colour seems a bit moot.

3.4%, so £93.50, plus £275 to eBay. I've sold a couple of bikes for more than that over the years. Does smart a bit, but you're getting exposure to a global audience who otherwise wouldn't see your item. Still, bit irrelevant here I'm sure!