Prop Nut

Posted by Tim Mackey on 08/04/2015 09:44:07: No. Amazon and the rest of them need to get some ethics. To suggest that domeone should give up online shopping altogether if they are not savvy enough to avoid tricksters is just rude. Why is it rude? Any form of purchase is subject to 'Caveat Emptor'. When you pay by credit card in a shop or restaurant, most people know not to let it out of their sight. If you pay by cheque, you know not to leave it blank and to draw a line after the amount in words to avoid it being falsified. If you buy online, you need to be aware of the boxes you are ticking and read the small print. If you are prepared to go to a shop that sells exactly what you want and pay in cash, fair enough, but be prepared for the shop to check the notes for forgery for their own protection. Don't we live in enough of a nanny state as it is?

I'd like to endorse that. Mike's service is superb.

Wow! Great service from Horizon Hobby.

So sorry to hear this awful news. Pete's column was always one of the first I turned to and I had the greatest respect for his gentle humour and skill as a modeller; the sort I always wanted to be but know I never will. Heartfelt condolences to Janet and all his loved ones.

We had a Dyson that was forever breaking cables at the outlet (£40 a time to get fixed) and was very heavy to carry upstairs. The repairer said he loved Dyson because he made his living from them, and recommended we get a different make. As soon as I see the Dyson name it turns me off whatever he's pushing.

I've used Wickes Non-Methylene Chloride Paint and Varnish Stripper to good effect on thick, hardened paint over various plastics. It's very benign, so you can use it safely and it doesn't harm the surface of the plastic.

Posted by Dave Hopkin on 21/02/2015 15:37:12: - so perhaps the old adage about Northerners being more friendly holds some truth... Not in my experience. I went to buy an expensive kit from a model shop in a North Yorkshire town that shall remain nameless, and the proprietor managed to complete the whole transaction without saying a single word. It made a visit to B&Q seem like model customer service. He seemed more concerned that every one who entered was a potential shoplifter and followed them around like a... well, Yorkshire terrier. But, like a mug, having driven 80 miles there, I still bought the kit and handed over my hard-earned, albeit reluctantly.

Posted by Keiran Arnold on 21/02/2015 18:21:28: Given the issues of F22 OBOGS I'll settle for another 6 Sqns of Typhoons please. The Typhoon is at least equal to the F-22 and, probably, marginally better. But the real contest is with the current generation of Russian fighters and the proposed Sukhoi T-50.

Posted by Andy48 on 16/02/2015 10:17:45: Posted by Prop Nut on 16/02/2015 08:36:25: Of course, the educational establishment will trot out the usual excuse for their failure to teach correctly by saying that English is a living language. Yawn. Education starts and stops with school does it? Poor English on the part of parents and the community has absolutely no effect on a child's command of English? Whatever happened to the concept of lifelong learning? Learning should be lifelong, but basic grammar is a building block to literacy in the same way as mental arithmetic is to numeracy, to be taught in the early days of education by teachers and parents. Many avid readers in adult life are still poor spellers because they do not look at the words they are reading with an intention to educate themselves better. I must admit I always thought of schools as maintaining educational standards but, from what you say, it seems that they play only an incidental part and it's really down to parents and wider society to do so.

Posted by Tony K on 16/02/2015 14:34:14: Posted by Prop Nut on 16/02/2015 08:36:25: Of course, the educational establishment will trot out the usual excuse for their failure to teach correctly by saying that English is a living language. PN, can you point to a particular moment in time when the English in use was correct and any deviation before or after that date was not? For example, until the eighteenth century it was correct to say "you was" as the singular verb and "you were" only as the plural (and the future subjunctive). Anyone using "you was" today would be considered uneducated. Who decided that the current illogical construction was correct and must be taught? The fact that language changes over long periods of time is no excuse for what is generally considered to be poor grammar at a given time, otherwise it would be unteachable. The whole point of language for communication is that it is standardised, or you end up with dozens of different dialects, each incomprehensible to all but a few, as in some third-world countries. My grandfather, born in 1884, considered 'you was' to be incorrect; 130 years later, it is still considered incorrect. That's a long time-frame.

Whilst waiting in M&S, at the weekend, while my wife tried on some clothes, I noticed that the sign outside the changing rooms said 'Maximum amount of items allowed is four per customer'. I asked my eighteen year-old grand-daughter (A Grade English Language GCSE) who was with me, to tell me what was wrong with it, but she couldn't. I pointed out that it should read 'maximum number of items...' and had to explain the difference as she did not understand it. This particular grammatical error is made by people at all levels of education; I heard it most recently a few days ago, used by a university professor on the TV programme 'The Secret Life of Four Year Olds'. The most commonly repeated example is 'the amount of people', when it should be 'the number of people'. Of course, the educational establishment will trot out the usual excuse for their failure to teach correctly by saying that English is a living language.

Posted by trebor on 11/02/2015 15:17:28: Came across this which has a strap to secure the back end. Halfway down the page Great Mate Table. **LINK** I don't think Great Mate is made anymore, but you may find a used one. It's the single best accessory I ever bought.

Swearing is very rarely heard in my club, but it's strange how it can become part of the culture of some groups - female as well as male. I started to watch '10,000 BC' on Channel 5, but one foul-mouthed individual was enough for me to turn it off for good. Sometimes swearing can be in context, but this uneducated man used it gratuitously and spoiled what could otherwise have been something worth watching.

My club has a free training scheme, which I was glad to make use of some years ago. However, I found it difficult to progress when the duty instructor changed every week, and when each one had his own way of doing things. So, I paid for a couple of intensive consecutive Saturdays at ATS (as it then existed), having the same instructor throughout, and made very rapid progress - albeit at quite a financial cost. In my opinion, effective instructors need to be taught the techniques and methodology of instruction, especially when imparting skills, and I count myself lucky to have been trained in such by the armed forces. I am hopeful that if a BMFA 'academy' comes off, instructors can themselves be taught to a consistent national standard.

Posted by Andy48 on 01/02/2015 20:54:55: Posted by Prop Nut on 01/02/2015 20:38:40: Children haven't always learned multiplication tables at school. In 2003 there was a Channel 4 programme called 'That'll Teach 'em', where a group of teenage boys and girls were taken back to education in the 'fifties. One of the girls was predicted to get an A grade at mathematics in her real school, but struggled with the maths syllabus of the 'fifties. She was astounded when a teacher explained the four times table to her, as she had never been taught it, or any other, at school or at home. She was delighted and went round exclaiming 'It really helps to do maths when you know the tables'. In the same series, the group were given an 11 Plus paper to do, without being told that's what it was. Afterwards, when asked what they thought they had taken, they mostly said it was an O Level exam! They were devastated to find that most of them couldn't pass an exam at sixteen that pupils of the 'fifties and 'sixties took at ten or eleven. Yes they have always been taught the tables, the National Curriculum is a legal obligation on schools. This is purely anecdotal from one pupil, probably designed to make good TV. Maybe she had forgotten her tables. As I pointed out above, I defy anyone to actually define in measurable terms what knowing ones tables means. Maths, as a subject has changed in the way it is taught and what is taught. It is little wonder that pupils could not do a 50s paper or an 11 plus, though not necessarily any easier. Incidentally, in the 50s, the GCE pass rate was just over 10%. One thing I learned at school was that the teacher is always right - even when he's wrong, he's right! However, when my grand-daughter took the 11 Plus in 2010 it was almost identical to the one I took in 1959, in the form and content of questions. It is mainly a test of verbal reasoning, so results or degree of difficulty should not differ markedly from one generation to another. One of the exam boards states that some of the questions test logical deduction skills or ability to decipher codes, but most require a good vocabulary and strong basic maths skills. The question of comparative GCE pass rates is a vexed one. There is widespread belief, even amongst teachers, that grade inflation has distorted them for decades and, from a practical viewpoint, why has it been necessary for many employers to provide additional tuition in maths and English to supposedly highly-educated graduates? Anyone who has recruited newly-qualified staff in the last twenty years will know the difficulty of finding any who can write a letter that makes sense and is spelt and punctuated correctly. As I have no desire for detention or lines, this is the end of my contribution on the subject. No doubt to the relief of many!

That's as I was taught it Martin, along with many other things that have stayed with me throughout my life. My CofE primary headmaster taught two classes in one long room; one group were about to do the Eleven Plus, the other were in the year before. He would do some lessons with both classes, then set work for one whilst he taught the other, then reverse the process. He had a very high pass rate and must have worked his socks off whilst making it all look very easy. It took me twenty years to realise just how much I owed him.

Children haven't always learned multiplication tables at school. In 2003 there was a Channel 4 programme called 'That'll Teach 'em', where a group of teenage boys and girls were taken back to education in the 'fifties. One of the girls was predicted to get an A grade at mathematics in her real school, but struggled with the maths syllabus of the 'fifties. She was astounded when a teacher explained the four times table to her, as she had never been taught it, or any other, at school or at home. She was delighted and went round exclaiming 'It really helps to do maths when you know the tables'. In the same series, the group were given an 11 Plus paper to do, without being told that's what it was. Afterwards, when asked what they thought they had taken, they mostly said it was an O Level exam! They were devastated to find that most of them couldn't pass an exam at sixteen that pupils of the 'fifties and 'sixties took at ten or eleven.

'The HMS' is one to make me grind my teeth, along with 'moped'. Every police officer, TV reporter and journalist seems to refer to scooters as mopeds. As with HMS, they don't think about what they're saying. A moped is totally different from a scooter and gets its name because it is propelled by both a small motor (mo) and pedals, as a bicycle, (ped) - a scooter has only an engine. And why do so many supposedly educated people use the grammatical nonsense, 'one of the only'? Either something is 'the only', or one of several.

For LMS to survive, they need to adapt to changing market conditions. I know that's more easily said than done, but it applies to all areas of business. Our major supermarkets have had things their own way for decades and have thrived on it. Now, in a changing market where many customers prefer to shop every day, as we did sixty years ago, and with the arrival of discounters like Aldi and Lidl, the likes of Tesco, Asda, Sainsbury etc have to respond to those new conditions, too. They won't just roll over, they are already fighting back, and so are many LMS. I use a handful who are characterised by selling from retail premises and online, have very competitive prices and P&P, and an extremely efficient service. For me, it beats the cost of driving to a shop and finding parking, and I really don't miss the so-called personal contact, which has always been greatly over-rated, in my opinion. Change or die!

As Ken says, it's off topic, but his point about pubs closing in the North East is the opposite of the South and Midlands. Marston's Brewery are opening a new pub every two weeks, and the new-build rate is accelerating. Obviously, they're not like the old-style pubs, but they must be doing something right to attract such a big customer base. I never missed Sandown, because it was the first major show of the year and I thought it was well-organised and seemed well-attended by both trade and visitors. I had no idea numbers had fallen off so badly, nor do I have a clue as to why. The Much Marcle show seemed well-attended, last September, but maybe the economics work better for the LMA.

I'm sure many of us have experienced similar problems with carriers. I recently purchased some items online, but the carrier (not UKMail, in this case) failed to deliver three times, despite their website scheduling it. Emails went unanswered and they don't provide a customer service telephone number. When they eventually did deliver (unscheduled, so lucky I was in), one parcel was so damaged I rejected the whole lot. The driver deliberately tried to foist them off on me by covering the damage, then blustered about the depot having told him something was damaged, but not exactly what. RM and Parcel Force can be bad but, overall, I find them marginally less incompetent than most others.

The January mag says the February issue is due on 16 January, but you're right - I would normally have received it on Monday of this week. I did, however, receive the opposition's bumper issue today! Shouldn't we subscribers get a month's freebie added for the fact that the newsagents got it first? Edited By Prop Nut on 15/01/2015 18:00:18

It's stretching a point to say the Bf109 could have won 'easily'. The cannon had a much greater destructive power than machine guns alone, but it was slow firing by comparison and a great deal of BoB air combat involved snap shooting at a fleeting target, where mgs had the advantage. I don't exactly understand the point about height; the fact that the German fighters came over with a height advantage was tactical, not an inferiority on the part of the Spitfire. The Bf109E had a service ceiling of 30,100 ft, but the Spitfire Mk 1A could reach 31,900 ft (37,600 ft with the Rotol Constant Speed airscrew). Lack of fuel injection was not a decisive disadvantage and the Spitfire's superior turning circle more than balanced it out in defensive fighting. Perhaps the best comparison is when the RAF started flying offensive sweeps over France, where the Spitfire had the range disadvantage. RAF losses were significant, but proportionately less than for the Luftwaffe in the BoB though, by then, the Spitfire IIB was carrying cannon, as well as mgs.

Mine has all standard JR 591s. Never had a problem and it flies like a dream on them.

Many US sellers seem to charge only domestic shipping rates for Canada (Tower Hobbies are one, I think), but I've found that some US sites quote silly money for shipping to the UK. On several occasions I've asked them if they can ship more cheaply and they have come back with much more reasonable quotes, so maybe UK sellers can be persuaded to do the same for Canada.