patches

Very nice! The MT-07 engine is supposed to be majestical! I'm guessing if you go for an MT-07 after getting your full license, it'll be the high-output version (689cc) as the other one is LAMS approved (655cc) and where's the fun in that!

Auckland has been in lockdown for the past 3 weeks, and with my building work done, and hardware stores only operating on contactless click-and-collect, I found myself with free time this past weekend so decided to try build a basic postbox (yes, like a Grade 8 high school woodwork type project )with some scraps of 12mm ply I had lying around. Now I'm no master craftsman. Just a desk-jockey with a few tools and some curiosity. Here's the journey so far... First I whipped up a quick 3D design in AutoCAD. Then the actual work started With no table saw, it was down o the track saw to do all the cutting. Takes a bit longer, but the results were pretty decent. It was also a challenge to get all the pieces I needed out of the off shaped scraps I had. Decided to try a little back bevel on the edges for aesthetics. Forgive the burn marks, my feeding of the track saw was a little slow in spots. Assembled and ready for varnishing. Now that we're finally out of lockdown, I can go source a piano hinge for the door at the back. Maybe some numbers for the front.

I don't think you can go wrong with an MT-03. Yamaha have set a market standard with the MT range. I've been on my restricted for a little over 2yrs now I should probably get round to doing my full. Apparently it's slightly easier than the restricted in that it's shorter. From what I understand the main thing they "test" you on is that you are comfortable and competent to ride at 100kph (whereas the Restricted test they only take you to 80kph). Are you going to go on a Ride Forever Silver course just before you do the test? Let me know, I may join. I've been meaning to do another Ride Forever.

I got to the bottom of my mysterious escalation in insurance premiums. ...so when I purchased the 2nd Husky I requested a quote for insurance from Insurer A (insurer of the 1st Husky). I never received a reply. I then went ahead and got other quotes and took up insurance with Insurer B. Insurer A took it upon themselves to add the new bike onto my policy, without even so much as an email to say they had done so, let alone the expected a policy update. The result, I have paid $300 more than I should have. I have reverted back instructing a cancellation of that 2nd policy with immediate effect, as well as a refund of the $300 which was never agreed to. The ball is in their court now, and I'm keeping the Ombudsman up my sleeve should they resist restitution. Damn skellums!

Haha, nice! I got about $50 back from Tower for the car The irony was that the car got used MORE during Level 4 (as I was considered "essential" and I usually bus to work, but staff parking became free, and with traffic massively reduced, I took it as a good time to drive in each day)

Yup, no wonder Douw Steyn is so loaded. Even Hippo his "independent" insurance comparison tool, mostly compares his various brands of insurance.

I think you may be right. I'd be surprised if we go full L2. Surely there will be some caveat.

@All the Aucklanders, what's your guess for today's announcement? Level 3 for X more weeks? Level 2? Level 2.5 (whatever that may be?

I run Tubliss on both my Huskies and am a big fan... except when changing tyres. It's a fair bit more effort than tubes, but still way easier than mousses. On the 650GS you may only be able to get Tubliss for the front wheel. As far as I know they only make 21", 19", and 18". If you're running the stock 17" rear wheel on the GS you may be out of luck. https://tublissreview.com/tubliss-17-inch/ As for ghetto tubeless conversions. I have done these on MTB's. Not sure how keen I would be to do them on a vehicle that can go in excess of 100kph Even Tubliss is technically not legal or designed for the roads.

I contacted the broker and asked why the premiums had escalated over the last year. He was surprised (or at least acted as such) and said that they prided themselves on no premium increases for the past 5yrs, and he would have to check with Vero as to why the increase. Still waiting to hear back.

This particular insurer is underwritten by Vero. Neither have been in contact with me regarding any of the above. My other bike was insured with Youi (which then got taken over by Tower). So good to note that they may be troublesome. I did look into AA as I am a member, but even with member discounts they were a lot more expensive. In fact when it comes to insuring an Austrian enduro bike for road use, most insurers treat your like you're trying to insure a homemade nuclear powered jetpack with anthrax crop-dusting capabilities. The premiums were astronomical, ranging from around $60pm to $150pm (all for comprehensive). So I chose the $60pm option (Youi)

The bad... Insurance companies and their universal scum-baggery! (apologies in advance to any ethically sound insurance brokers who may be reading this). I have a road legal Husqvarna enduro bike insured with a a motorcycle specific insurer (underwritten by one of the big guns of course). I went with them 4yrs ago because they had the best deal. I have noticed that my premiums have increased threefold in the past 12 months. This is likely due to the fact that the bike's WOF and Rego have expired (as it has not been ridden in nearly 18 months). Fair enough that the insurer's liability increases if the bike is no longer road legal, however I have 2 issues with this: Surely if the bike is no longer road legal and an accident occurs on the road the insurer can refuse to support any claims, therefore an increase in premium is negated. (and what bugs me the most) is that there was not 1 single imail/text/call form them to advise me of the increase in premium or why they were doing so. Had they simply informed me I would have adjusted/cancelled my cover.So yeah, having had similar insurance experiences in SA, this has illustrated to me that the underhandedness is universal.

I was in my 2nd last year of high school when that came out. My friends and I lived on a diet of Dorritos, Mountain Dew, metal, Southpark and MTV (when it still had music and funny series like Jackass and Tom Green). So yeah, I absolutely watched Freddie got Fingered Baseketball was another classic from that era

Everything you need to know about investing explained in under 1 minute:

Yeah, I've been meaning to make a zero clearance fence and insert. I've been doing a lot of mitre and bevel cuts lately though so it would be a bit of a pain to put the fence on for 1 cut. So instead I used the extremely safe method of using a stick to stop the block from pushing back Once I'm done with all this skirting and cornicing I'll put a zero clearance fence on. They produce far neater cuts. EDIT: I see the fence in your pic is more like a crosscut sled for a table saw. Good idea. It means it can be put into place just for the cut required, and doesn't necessarily need to be fastened to the fence.

Yup! As Saag said, accounts here are WAY easier, and pretty much free. The annual/monthly fees get waived as long as you deposit something like $2000pm in them. So your salary pretty much waives the fee. And even then, the fee is $5. Plus in NZ one can have sub-accounts. The bank account numbers here are actually pretty clever. eg. 12-3456-7890123-456 where the first 2 are the bank code next 4 are the branch code (as far as I know) the following 7 are your actual account number and the final 3 (or 2 depending on who you bank with) are your sub-account number. So usually the last 2/3 digits are 00 or 000 meaning it is the main account. Then as Dave said, one can create sub-accounts for all your expenses/savings like: 01 - Rent 02 - Bills 03 - Groceries 04 - Bikes etc etc It's a pretty smart system and all that one needs to supply is that long number. No bank name branch code, account type etc. That said, I got my account number wrong at my first job here (wasn't used to the format and added an extra 0 in the middle bit. I didn't get paid that month, but the payroll bounced it back. I figured out the error, and it went through a few days later. One thong I must say though. NZ online banking (I can only speak for Westpac and ANZ) isn't as versatile as FNB. No PayPal linking (not that I have figured out), no share trading, no decent rewards schemes (Airpoints and Flybuys are lame compared to eBucks), etc etc. But it does what it's supposed to and it's free, so what more can one ask for.

They seem to be pretty decent in most places. Rimu floors with PU coating. Recently bought a dehumidifier though, as the ceiling and bath towels were almost never dry. Damn Auckland!

Not that I've noticed, although I have no floor tile in the house and both bathrooms have hardwood floors. That said I also cannot recall a step in any other house I have lived in in NZ or my partner's parents' houses in Sydney & Bundanoon. Maybe it's a Queensland thing As for the DB boards, mine was outside (1950's bungalow), but earlier this year I had a new DB installed and the electrician moved it inside and said that external ones were not up to current code, but fine if existing.

Not good, bad, ugly... but just different and a random small thing I noticed. Bathroom light switches. In SA they always seemed to be just outside the bathroom. In NZ they are nearly always inside the bathroom. I forgot about this until 10min ago when some old instinct kicked in and flicked on the hallway light switch, which just happens to be outside the bathroom But yeah, wonder if it's a building code thing in SA?! Small little differences in everyday life. Neither good or bad. Just different.

Awesome! Glenfield is my local. Yeah last time they used the drive up system. the backlog seemed to be on the part where they got orders ready. It took them about a week to gather the 5-or-so items in my order. Luckily this time I only need one.

I recall last time we went to level 3 and I did a few Bunnings click-and-collects they were super slow in getting orders ready. Which Bunnings did you order from? Glenfield? Constellation? Hopefully now that people haven't been in Level 4 for weeks on end (like last move to L3), the sudden demand on the click-and-collect system isn't overwhelmingly high. BTW, the boat is looking good and coming along nicely!

There's guys like this creating beautiful pieces with joinery by hand etc... ...then there's me who is either chuffed with his amateur attempts at coping a cornice or devising ways not to lose an eye of fingers with hacked substitutes for a table saw

I have the slightly smaller (450) and less pimped out Husky version, and I can highly recommend!

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Damn! I could have done you a package deal on a brand new AEG with 6Ah battery and charger. Unfortunately I have sold the charger, but the driver and battery are still available haha As for the 2mm drill bits, I wonder if it's a chuck manufacturer issue?! Jacobs vs Rohm vs whatever else?! EDIT: I was going to proposed a package deal for a driver, battery, and spare barely use charger I have, but the I looked up the Ryobi prices and damn one can get an entry level impact driver from them for a pretty decent price. So unless one needs the heavy hitting power of the AEG Fusion driver, then the Ryobi looks like a good bet. As I said, I use my little 12V more than anything else.