and today i have mostly been...

[Doggy]

Voltage does sound on the low side, as Peter says.
I would measure the voltage at the alternator itself and see if you're 'losing' anything between it and the battery.
You should get around 14.5V even at idle without lots of electrical load - if it's less than that or erratic your alternator is suspect.

[steve_earwig]

I managed to download some bumpf, it's for the 2AZ-FE (2.4 i.e. Yank) version but it should be close. WTF is a current sensor when it's at home? It's on the negative terminal.

BATTERY
Open voltage∗ at 20_C (68_F):
12.6—12.8 V Fully charged
12.2—12.4 V Half charged
11.8—12.0 V Discharged
∗:
Voltage that is checked 20 minutes af-
ter the key is removed with all the lights
turned off

Now that's, erm, bizzare

Measured the new battery before I took it out, 12.7 volts

It's fully charged? I'm smelling some sort of high-tech rat

[Welly]

I don't know sorry I know my Honda had one, like.

Alternator for a Japanese car?

Ker_Ching £££

[steve_earwig]

I don't know, the voltage seems low but it's correct. I think I need to do some more digging. Alternator faulty, nasty, but if that wasn't what caused all the beeping what was?

This morning I took it to the bodywork guy to have the front bumper glued back on. Darko, the bodywork guy, looked at it, suckedzzzzzzz7ut66u u8888888vbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbb v (new kitten alert) sucked his teeth and said the hangers are too far gone. Toyota only, Roni ordered them. While he was at it I got him to order the 8 clips that hold the grille on, all but one have been "replaced" with any old clip and it was quite interesting to have the bodywork guy identify them - "Mercedes, yes, and those 2 are Renault."

[steve_earwig]

(new kitten alert)

It's another case of "didn't run away quickly enough". This kitten turned up (allegedly) at a friend's house, the daughters wanted to keep it but the dad said no. I was asked first (Nah, we already have 5) but then they asked t'wife Male, about 6 weeks, complete with some sort of eye infection To the vet's! Antibiotics and eye drops, a week later he was starting to look ok but then a suspiciously familiar bald patch appeared on his neck - ringworm:the return Back to the vet's you go.

One thing though, I'm always worried t'wife will name them something awful, like the black cat she decided to call Obama or naming one of our "twins" Charlie, without any thought of what to call the other (she's Camilla btw) and the cat I had to immediately think up a name for before she named him David (Cameron) But I just couldn't think up a name for him, I thought maybe Oswald or Michael (Wittmann) but I just wasn't happy.

So we're back at the vet's and this time Mirela, our tame vet, is back from her hols, and she keeps calling him "she". In Croatian cats are always female so I let it go, I know he's a boy, it's a hard job when they're that small so I checked with the other vet. However it was bugging me "It's "he"" I finally pointed out. Mirela checks under the tail "no it's not."

An hour later I named her Bobbie. Just because.

[highlander]

Awww, check out Twinkle Toes having a stretch!

Has this little character got a name yet? How did he/she come to be with you guys?

[steve_earwig]

Sorry, I finally added some words but it took a while because I was too busy sodding around resizing pictures. and i 'm umder attack!9i8o90

[Welly]

*ring* *ring*

"Hello? steve_earwig residence"

"err hello we have a cat here and not sure what to do with it?"

"just bring is round ffs"

[Captain Jack]

I am in Dubrovnik at the moment and there are certainly a lot of cats here....

[Doggy]

I'm at work at the moment, we don't have any cats to my knowledge, but we do have an epidemic of seagulls.

Concerned employees are bombarding H+S with complaints about the noise, poop on their cars and the aggressive nature of these creatures.....
Apparently they're protected since they have nests / young, so were not allowed to 'encourage' the seagulls to relocate.

Only in Britain.

[steve_earwig]

An old old mate of mine used to have the same problem where he worked, they took to catching the seagull, painting them and then releasing them. I gather the RSPCA eventually took an interest...

So, today I have been... getting rid of the tomatoes. I have so many I don't know what to do with them, I can't give them away to the neighbours as they're mostly the same, so today I took this lot

To Miloš's wife to make passatta. I've already frozen 2.5Kg of chopped toms but t'wife reminded me Renata likes doing that, so off they went. Saves me a job

I guess there's not much idea of scale there but the bigest weighed 600 grammes. 600 grammes? What's that in old money? 21,2oz, or rather 1lb, 5oz. Soddin' 'eck

Also

[PeterN]

We've got a conservatory full of tomatoes at the moment, we have had a couple of hot spells and they are all ripening at once.

Lovely cat.

Peter

[steve_earwig]

Bobbie Bobbie Bobbie! She looks great in that pic, sadly she's still got a bald patch in the back of her neck from ringworm plus some sort of skin infection, it's all tufts now and it'll take a while, sadly. The other cats don't really seem to mind her now, and Teatime is playing uncle again. My brother reckons maybe he's a feline paedo but he's no longer equipped, maybe he just thinking "is this one of mine?"

So tomatoes, in t'garden I have 30 apples, 30 ox hearts and 22 cuttings - because I can. The ox hearts have been in hyper production for a couple of weeks now. The apples have toms and there's a lot of red too but they're too firm to be properly ripe. I've tried a couple and they're like the insipid rubbish you get from the supermarket, plus they've had loads of blossom end rot too, I guess they're not enjoying the weather. Me neither

The idea with the cuttings (tom cuttings are easy, just pop your bigger pinch-outs in a jar of water and they'll pop roots out in no time) is to try to over-winter a few plants. I've wondered if it's possible for a couple of years now but my father actually managed it last winter. So I gotta give it a go

[PeterN]

Good idea but I think it's a bit to cold to do that here. We only get tomatoes here at this time because I plant the seeds in January and bring them on indoors, once its warm enough to put them in the conservatory they take off, it gets to 40C+ in there sometimes - then I open the windows, keeps the house nice and warm too!

Peter

[steve_earwig]

Me dad's in Herfordshire, the weather's probably a bit better where you are! He has a conservatory too but I gather he overwintered his toms on the window ledge in his front room


Btw speaking of conservatories, I hear from my bro, also in Herts., they had a hailstorm there last week that smashed the roof of his conservatory and made Swiss cheese out of his carport It also slightly devalued my nephew's Suzuki My pa's 2 miles down the road, no damage whatsoever.