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As we rush headlong towards midwinter's day - the snow lies, deep and crisp and even (and bloomin cold to boot) - our snowy tales continue..
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Its not just the UK struggling. Much of the Italian motorway network was struggling on sat, some pics...
tinyurl.com/2aadfsp
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Drove from Llanberis to Denbigh an back - some hideous road conditions including numpty tailgaters and some knob walking in the road, in near darkness, in a grey track suit bottoms and a grey hoodie - he needs help he does.
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...he needs help he does...
Yeah, help to get home, but I bet you swept past, snug and warm in your shiny new example of the best motor engineering Bavaria has to offer.
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>> the best motor engineering Bavaria has to offer.
>>
What!!!! Groveling around the moderators, what have you been up to iffy?
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@iffy - judging at his looked he'd have probably nicked my wheels before they stopped turning...
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...judging at his looked he'd have probably nicked my wheels before they stopped turning...
I thought my attempt to make you feel guilty was likely to fail. :)
Don't suppose I'd have stopped, either.
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>>judging at his looked he'd have probably nicked my wheels before they stopped turning...
How could you tell he was scouse? ;>)
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>> Drove from Llanberis to Denbigh an back - some hideous road conditions including numpty tailgaters
>> and some knob walking in the road, in near darkness, in a grey track suit
>> bottoms and a grey hoodie - he needs help he does.
Yup saw one of those in the road in Lower Sunbury. Too dangerous to walk on the icy snowy pavement, so he walks in the snowy icy road in the dark where the cars are.
numbnut.
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Bad news. My brother in law drove over my erection while putting his car in the garage.
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>> while putting his car in the garage.
....that some kind of euphemism? Does he dress up as a cowboy too?
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Squeal like a pig, boy !
Ted
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>> Bad news. My brother in law drove over my erection while putting his car in
>> the garage.
>>
Do you allude to your snowperson?
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>> Bad news. My brother in law drove over my erection while putting his car in
>> the garage.
>>
You'll be OK. They can fix very small holes in tyres, no problem. ;-)
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It was covered in footprints too. I'll have to draw another when it snows again.
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Oh I remember now...I'd tried to put it out of my mind.
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Normally I'd say "you need to go out more" - perhaps staying indoors more would be more appropriate :-)
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Its was -6 in Kingston on Thames at 00:00 hours and we are promised -7 tonight
It looks like it will go lower than forcast. Clear skys but also some fog forming in patches.
Looks like Heathrow will have an even worse task tonight.
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Got my wife's car out of the garage half an hour ago. Pointed my laster thermometer at it - it read -2 deg C. Pointed it at the cars that had been out all night and it read -9 deg C. Tried a few other things and it was saying around -8 deg C. Unless the thermometer is really inaccurate then I'd say it's cold out there today!
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"Unless the thermometer is really inaccurate then I'd say it's cold out there today!"
You need a thermometer to tell you that??? :-)
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Minus 6.8 at 07:15 this morning, its now crept up to -5. Nicole back from a night shift, and not working till xmas day now. More snow forecast this evening.
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According to www.boilerjuice.com the price of heating oil has evened out a bit now, but it went up 67% since about the end of November.
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-5 here today, no snow since Friday - snow is very odd - powdery and very dry - dog still loves it. Must dig out some other bits of driveawy later - after some more tea ! South facing lounge is currently at 15 degrees (unheated) no doubt will warm a little saving precious oil. We had a power cut yesterday - dug out my LPG camping stove for my morning brew.
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"snow is very odd - powdery and very dry"
Very annoying isn't it, when you can't get a good snowball together. My wife thinks that it's because it snows when it's well below freezing. Crispy snowman snow happens at about 0 degrees. So she says.
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My wife says that this is perfect skiing snow - damn dangerous pastime.
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-8 at 8.30 thismorning, the frosted trees look lovely.
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>>-8 at 8.30 thismorning, the frosted trees look lovely.<<
If it gets any colder, you'll have to think about putting the heating on!
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>> If it gets any colder, you'll have to think about putting the heating on!
>>
Mods please edit D's post...if my missus sees it she might agree with him...bah humbug put an extra layer on..;)
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Chap on Radio Cornwall this morning saying no one can get in or out of his village - St. Pinnock near Liskeard, even 4X4's just slither n' slide, he wonders just what he gets for his poll tax, apart from the bins being emptied.
Ya gotta feel sorry for him but - what sort of place does he live in I wonder, if he pays £2500 council tax :)
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Minus 5 degrees in my car this morning in West Sussex...
Colleague trumped me a tale of minus 8 degrees registered in his car.
We were both beaten by our lady colleague who has a farm near Gatwick who registered minus 10 at home . Their drive is quite a long one, uphill and sheet ice.
She apologised for being late because she had to fit the snow chains to her own and husbands car to get up to the main road and then take them off again.
Her husband had tried to get his Galaxy out yesterday without chains and had got half way up the hill and stopped so he came back for the chains....Panic ensued when, with husband one side, wife the other busily fitting the chains ,the car started sliding slowly back downhill of its own volition..... luckily they managed to stop it before it did any damage .
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A certain Police Officer of my acquaintance used to take the fuse out of the central heating when he was on nights to stop his wife using it. He also gave her a fixer for double yellow line offence - surprisingly she's still with him 20 years on.
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...He also gave her a fixer for double yellow line offence...
Police in Sunderland raided their own club for after-hours drinking a few years ago.
I suppose no one else was going to do it.
Back to snow, two or three inches of powdery stuff in County Durham, temperature around -6.
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>
>> gave her a fixer for double yellow line offence - surprisingly she's still with him
>> 20 years on.
I bet she's made him suffer in many ingenious and mysterious ways.
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Minus 13 in Cambridge overnight, apparently. Certainly this morning I thought I wasn't going anywhere not because the car wouldn't start, but because the metal latch on the gate had frozen solid.
Kettle faffing sorted that one.
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All our snow (5cm ish) fell in a couple of hours on Saturday morning, but the biggest problem is the bitter cold since. -8°C according to the car when I finally ventured out to it at 8:00 this morning, and had to pour warm water round the door seals to get the drivers door open. I was then confronted with a thin layer of ice on the INSIDE of the windscreen. Never seen this before. I reckon we must have got well down into minus double figures.
It's also the longest I've ever seen the glowplugs stay on for on a VW PD. 7 seconds! Father in law reckons this is easily the worst winter so far since 62/63
Last edited by: DP on Mon 20 Dec 10 at 10:32
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81 was a bad one, mind you I experienced that full on, riding a motorbike more or less right through it !
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...Father in law reckons this is easily the worst winter so far since 62/63...
Pedantry/serious point: Winter doesn't start until tomorrow.
The pedantry point is obvious, but the serious one is we could be in for a long period of cold weather.
I reckon the coldest time of the year is often February/early March, so it could easily be two months or more before we see the last of freezing temperatures.
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At least the days get longer.....daylight is a real blessing in this weather...
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I checked the weather forecast for our area and the warmest it is going to get this side of Christmas is minus 3 apparently, with Christmas Day itself being a cold one, with day temps down to minus 6.
This snow and ice ain't going away anytime soon, my wee pup has never seen grass I don't think! He thinks the world is full of white, and yellow, snow!
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...He thinks the world is full of white, and yellow, snow!...
Bit like our Queen who could be forgiven for thinking the whole of her country is litter-free and freshly painted.
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Bobby - my spaniel loves this weather - will he walk on the roads when he can bound through the snows ?? The silly dog even had an exploratory look at going in the unfrozen lake ! Why is it when you see this stories in the Daily Mail how an owner died/miraculously saved from an ice covered lake it's almost always a Spaniel or a Labrador ?
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>> almost always a Spaniel or a Labrador ?
>>
Or a half wit Golden Retriever who enjoyed nothing more than running flat out and leaping as far as possible into water (preferably stagnant) causing a huge tidal wave regardless of the temperature, she had a grin from floppy ear to floppy ear, mind you the water helped to wash some of the cow/sheep/anything with four legs dung she rolled in at every opportunity.
Last edited by: gordonbennet on Mon 20 Dec 10 at 10:54
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>> at going in the unfrozen lake ! Why is it when you see this stories
>> in the Daily Mail how an owner died/miraculously saved from an ice covered lake it's
>> almost always a Spaniel or a Labrador ?
Yup, Fifi is drawn to water like BBD to a yummy mummy. Its funny however, the stories you always hear are the owner drowning to save the lab, and the lab always survives.
You can not underestimate how good some dogs are at swimming. The lab has two coats, with very buoyant air between them, and very waxy waterproofing.
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That's why I'm resistant to "clipping" a Spaniel - although I had to give this one a Number 1 last summer !
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62/63 was very bad. Snowed on boxing day in London and sub zero temperatures until beginning of March. Worrying thing is that it only started on Boxing day then and we've still got a week till we get there!.
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Helping build the temperature map....... -12 in South Northants at 0600 this morning. Subaru 4 wheel drive technology got me as far as the station, having abandoned my bike for a day. Clarkson - right make, wrong model.
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My unlucky neighbours had 5 weeks without any heat or hot water (Boiler Failure) luckily before this cold spell. They have had a new boiler fitted but it is, for some reason, installed in their garage and it has now frozen! -8 here - East Midlands.
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I would be kicking the plumber up and down the frozen road for not fitting, or setting up the frost protection..
I though most boilers came with it.
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I don't know. it is a box full of water, pipes and a gas burner. Can it be made to light if it senses that it is getting too cold? I know houses have froststats to light the boiler if the house gets too cold but what provision there is for a boiler in a garage? Mine is the kitchen so it is OK!
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Ours is in the garage and froststat protected. No problems in the 6 years we've been here. Touching a big piece of wood.
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The Worcester combi in the caravan has its own frost protection circuit.
It will fire itself up when it needs to, regardless of what setting the user has left.
What it does need is electricity and gas, which cannot always be guaranteed, particularly on a caravan site.
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It should have a built in froststat, and yes comes on when approaching freezing point.
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The condensate has probably frozen and stopped the boiler igniting. Happened a lot round here in January when we saw -19C overnight.. Happens even to vertical downpipes: insulation is needed if outside.
If the condensate pipe is not insulated, the plumber is a numpty.
Last edited by: madf on Mon 20 Dec 10 at 13:05
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-10 C outside my house in Beds.
Getting the car out from cul-de-sac was bit of struggle. Office car park is even worse!
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Our neighbour had their boiler stop working last winter during the cold spell due to the 'consensate' (is that what it's called?) pipe freezing. The neighbour further down had a burst pipe outside during the cold spell a few weeks back and this prompted him to tell me to make sure outside pipes were lagged. This is the first winter for us in this house.
So I did lag them and there's a very short pipe outside which I think comes from the boiler that I wrapped up well. Heating still working so far thank goodness.
Last edited by: rtj70 on Mon 20 Dec 10 at 13:29
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I'll just leave this here...
sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-ash1/hs739.ash1/163100_10150345411125613_727855612_16227965_4872837_n.jpg
Sorry if it's a pearoast, i just hoovered it off another forum but it had me in stitches :-)
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>> I'll just leave this here...
>>
A pretty average drivers level of knowledge. :-) I resisted the Bavarian driver bit !
Last edited by: Old Navy on Mon 20 Dec 10 at 13:44
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Shouldn't laugh at the afflicted:) Going back to RTJs post, I had fun thawing out the condensate drain yesterday. Initially noticed some water near the boiler, thought it was from drying boots. Then saw it was a bit more than that! Water dripping from base of boiler. No fault code. Switched off, saw the 50mm or so protruding plastic pipe was plugged by ice. Cleared that but still blocked somewhere so set hair dryer to blow via air brick. Seemed to sort it. Eventually had to have floor board up and lag pipe (1.5 m), or as much as I could get at, running from boiler down into floor void. Made up a little cap for the pipe outside the house. Why don't they run the drain to an internal foul drain? Answer: they can get away with it, 'cos like the deluded BMW driver, we weren't aware. In our case that the ice could cause boiler shut-down. Gas Safe? hah! Thinking of a trace-heater fix for water pipes in house in Buxton, if we ever get there. They froze this a.m. SIL panic stations. All OK now. Told her to put some heat on in the house - only heats 2 rooms!
Last edited by: NortonES2 on Mon 20 Dec 10 at 13:56
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The easiest and simplest thing to do with these ere frozen condensate pipes, is to run the thing into a receptacle *inside* the house next to the boiler while this extreme weather lasts, it's notta lotta water, after all.
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The plumber that came here to fix the showers was unconcerned about this problem, he said to lag it but in the case of this house it would be a very short run - house up the lane has a very long run (around 4 meters) I was passing a few nights ago and a neat cut in the pipe around 75mm in length seemed to have resolved their problem. Next door down had a new boiler this year and their pipe has a 100mm drop where it emerges from the wall - skill of plumbing is the art.
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We seem to have topped out at -10C! Been into town. Went past one house having a new front door fitted! Also went past a guy up a ladder putting up a satellite dish as well as various utility vans. Now the utilities guys probably need to be out there, but the other two could wait if it were down to me!
Visibility in the Merc 4wd behind me must have been impeded by the great big hood she had up. No heaters in them?
A first in the 14 years we've been here - the lane has been gritted. I also drove by a gritter and he was chucking out far less grit than they normally do but it looked like enough to me.
John
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You should be slightly careful with what you do with the condensate as it is quite acidic - not the best idea to run it into cast iron drains! Ours has run OK this winter and last but then the outside length of small bore pipe is very short and insulated. I am highly amused by the icicle that is hanging off the boiler flue though - it has now reached a couple of feet in length, and must be 3" diameter at the top.
A mild -4 at our house this morning! Last Tuesday my weather station recorded -14.9 and the car was down as low as -17. My colleague saw -20 on his car, but it reads a couple of degrees lower than mine. It was above freezing last Saturday and Sunday, but otherwise has been below freezing almost continually since about Nov 25. Brrrrr! Some signs of a breakdown to warmer weather at the weekend, but I'll believe it when I see it - the forecasting models don't really seem to know what's going to happen!
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Minor 'moment' while reluctantly out and about today.
Guy pulls out of a side road in front of me to turn right.
He gets just enough traction to drive his S-Type across my path before its back wheels start spinning uselessly and it comes to rest.
I part-skidded to a halt with a couple of metres to spare, so no harm done.
Poor driving on his part.
Pulling into a reducing gap is not ideal in dry conditions, but is daft with snow on the ground.
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On the subject of air temp - it was claimed to be -19 on Saturday night at Pershore, close to where I was snowed in overnight at work.
It was a kind of dry cold I'm not used to which made my face numb while shovelling on Sunday morning.
There was a lot of snow too, five or six inches when I arrived at midday on saturday, but it was close to a foot by the time it stopped later on that day.
The drive home late last night wasn't too bad once off site, but it needed a snowplough earlier in the day to clear the site enough to get out onto public roads.
Shades of 1963 for me. Dad used to talk about 1947 in the north East.
The more recent ones haven't left quite the same impression even though there have been a few impressive ones.
Memory is odd.
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I got to the car park at work this morning after a struggle defrosting the car, a mates car thermometer showed -12 degrees. I don't trust mine - it was showing -30 degrees. The air was cold enough to feel it burning your throat.
I keep forgetting to spray the wiper arm frame with de-icer, I get the ice off the blades but because the frame is frozen stiff it leaves unwiped patches right in front of me. Came back to the car mid-morning to find the car alarm going off. Then I see that the passenger door is slightly ajar - the cause. This happened to me Friday, I tried to open the passenger door, it wouldn't budge, but the latch stays open, then it thaws and the door opens slightly. I found out when I turned right and the traffic got suddenly louder. I'll have to watch that one, and spray the seals with silicone. It starts superbly though, thanks to the Varta battery I installed two years ago.
Last edited by: corax on Mon 20 Dec 10 at 20:57
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Minus 16 in leafy south Warwickshire last night, my Mother tells me! Neighbour has an Audi TT with 4WD so is ferrying villagers to and from the shops for provisions. Never thought that Audi's 4wd system would be used in this way on a 2-seater sports car!
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Interesting sight on the Northbound M3 tonight as I was heading Southbound.
Three lane closure at junction 3, with all traffic being routed off the motorway at the exit slip, and then back on at the entry slip.
In lane 2 of the carriageway, a chap in a cherrypicker is breaking off and safely disposing of the metre or so long icicles dangling out of the expansion gaps in the concrete bridge overhead.
Never seen this before.
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DP, there are a couple of bridges at Charing Cross on the M8 that this is a regular occurrence.
They can be quite scary if you are sitting in stationary traffic underneath them!
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In a previous thread, BBD wrote: >>Dad of the Year.
>>Just been watching the news. Brainy dad has the bright idea of towing his ten year old
>>son on a sledge behind his car on main road. The sledge fishtails into the path of an
>>oncoming bus which does it's best to avoid hitting the kid by swerving into a tree. Kid
>>dead, bus has to be lifted back onto the road by a crane.
That's nothing.
www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newsvideo/weirdnewsvideo/8209120/Swedish-fighter-jet-pulls-toboggans.html
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But the fighter jet pulling the sledges isn't as dangerous looking at it. Now if it took off...
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Not much snow here in Paris though freezing fog at CDG when I landed, just hoping the return flight tomorrow evening, well, happens!!
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Do I recall that other nations soon get the snow scene sorted ?
www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-12090575
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Here we go again, and they still haven't sorted out last years mess!
trafficscotland.org/currentincidents/details.aspx?id=62956&type=ci
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...and New York were held up on R4 last week as an example of how some other countries cope better. In general, the programme made the point very convincingly that most of Europe does NOT cope particularly better than the UK, but the populace, being more familiar with snow and better equipped themselves to deal with it, were less likely to whinge about it and it's effects (their term not mine).
New York had some good ideas - all dustcarts had fitments for ploughs, all drivers trained in their use, individuals responsible for clearing outside their house etc etc.
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I think the comparison with new york is unfair. The amount of snow they had makes ours seem like icing sugar.
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My parents are out in N Germany at the moment. Salt has run out more or less, so only 1 lane on the autobahn is getting salted. And none of the pavements have been cleared.
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I believe in NY they have streets where - in snow - parked/abandoned cars get towed to leave room for emergency vehicles.
We should adopt in UK especially for motorway hard shoulders in snow.
£150 retrieval fees I suggest - which is cheap..
PS: at least we are not in NI...
Last edited by: madf on Thu 30 Dec 10 at 16:06
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"PS: at least we are not in NI..."
Too right. Do we have a NI correspondent to give us the facts? Pictures on tv showed external pipes spurting mains pressure water - crackers. So are the leaks in the system or in houses?
John
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>>Pictures on tv showed external pipes spurting mains pressure water - crackers.
>> So are the leaks in the system or in houses?
www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-12093504
"....It said much of the extra 250m litres it has released into the system has already leaked out - some of it through its own own distribution system, but most because of damaged pipes on private property."
"The thaw followed the worst snow in Northern Ireland in 25 years and record cold temperatures.
As temperatures rose, burst pipes drained reservoirs, forcing NI Water to turn off the tap to the 80 locations."
The radio item I listened to said would all owners of property check for leaks as so much water is being lost they cannot pump any harder and the reservoirs cannot refill fast enough.
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>>Pictures on tv showed external pipes spurting mains pressure water
I saw that and thought it looked like a cast iron downpipe from a gutter. I also heard a report they're coming across wooden pipes over there!
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They were interviewing that McGuiness fellow the other night - he was out of his depth.....having to deal with "real" issues !
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Bet he knows someone who could shift a pile of snow pretty quick mind. Some of those guys used to be shoplifters you know. They famously lifted Marks and Spencers once...
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Its his fault, all those bombs must have loosened the pipes years ago. he should pay for it personally as He was the IRA chief of staff.
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Whilst we've had a thaw here in Central Scotland - the ground is still pretty frozen. My neighbours' water supply froze on Christmas day - it's not as deep as it should be, but it was still about 14" down at the 'highest' point. In order to excavate parts of it he had to go in with an SDS drill!!
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The roads around here were very dodgy this morning. Rain the previous day and overnight freezing plus bright sun gave you a false sense of security. I was OK going one way because the road was in the sun, but coming back along the same A road, the car was twitching sideways in the parts shaded by trees. I have honestly never felt the car feel so unstable and although this is a BMW I don't find it too bad in the snow. The back end was very unstable and this despite keeping the car dead straight along the road. The rear tyres were finding different cambers in the road which were covered in black ice, and it felt as though a rear location link in the suspension had come loose, it was that bad. The Volvo behind me was keeping a respectable distance, don't know if he could feel anything.
It fair put the wind up me and I turned down a country lane to check the tyres and suspension. No problem, and later the car was fine.
Last edited by: corax on Sun 9 Jan 11 at 19:50
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This week we have had a part of the M8 closed for 3 hours in morning due to black ice making it undriveable (Wed).
Last night we had sleet and a big freeze. Radio says this morning that M8 through Glasgow was closed for 2 hours due to black ice last night.
I am driving in this morning at 8.30, signs warning of black ice, all the overhead signs stating 30mph limit but still there were eejits racing down the outside lane, bumper to bumper at 70mph.
Was I wrong or was I being bad by wanting them to skid off??
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>> Was I wrong or was I being bad by wanting them to skid off??
Just try to keep away from them BG.
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I am in that general area, daytime thawing snow and hard overnight frosts make for entertaining mornings on the road. The ground is cold, so some of the meltwater freezes in strips across the road at any time of day.
Oh joy !
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We had that here on the last day of the "ice age" in all my many miles of meandering in the snow on foot it was the only day I fell base over apex - twice when walking the dog - it was spectacularly bad !
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What part of the country corax ?
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>> What part of the country corax ?
Essex, around the Maldon area.
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Couple of weeks back when we had a good settling of snow in N. London, I left work early and joined a very slow commute home.
One stretch of 30 limit in a built up area, completely flat, was stop/start in one big queue...and I had to keep knocking my car in neutral, because the slight drive when in gear was enough to propel it slightly forwards...and the road was so slippery I couldn't hold the car with the footbrake.
Just as well it was stop/start, otherwise someone was going to have a big moment.
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SNOW (Drift No 6) - PR
