onetrack

It's O.K., Trump won't even know who Dutton is, even if he is elected as PM.

Did you see the story about the Australian tourist denied entry to the U.S. simply because of his "circuitous" travel path to the U.S.? The Aussie traveller took a circuitous route to the U.S., because he was taking advantage of good airfare deals on routes less travelled. The Americans deemed his travel route "highly suspicious", and deported him on the spot!! The bloke says he lost $15,000 for a cruise he was going to take from Florida, which he could no longer take, because he was denied entry to the U.S. - and the cruise company refused to refund his money! https://www.smh.com.au/traveller/travel-news/an-australian-was-denied-us-entry-for-bizarre-reasons-he-s-not-alone-20250403-p5lov8.html I'm so glad I did a lot of overseas touring in 2010 to 2014, because it was easier, less costly, and I was younger and fitter. Plus at my age now (76 next month), I'm going to have a real battle getting affordable travel insurance, and many car hire companies won't hire cars to people over 75.

It looks like the Animals and Cannabis are on a winner in this Legislative Council!

There's been an interesting development in the W.A. Election final results. The lower House results were determined within a few days of the March 8th election, with Labor retaining their massive majority, and the Conservatives struggling to have any major impact, despite a general swing against the Govt of a few percent. However, the Upper House (Legislative Council) results have only just been finalised (it must have been a torturous count and recount/s) - and the end result is a big surprise, with Labor losing its former total majority in the LC, and the balance of power handed to the Greens. What is even more surprising, out of 37 LC seats (there were 36 seats in the last election, but a re-jigging of boundaries saw an extra seat added), 16 are Labor, 10 are Liberal, 2 are Nationals , 4 are Greens, 2 are One Nation, and one seat each for Australian Christians, Legalise Cannabis, and Animal Justice parties. This loss of control of the Upper House is going to make life very difficult for Labor this time around when it comes to passing their legislation, and the Greens are gloating over their potential to install many of their main policies, such as climate crisis legislation, aiming for a strict "net zero" emissions basis by 2030 for W.A. The coming 4 years in W.A. politics, and political decision-making will be interesting. The makeup of the LC probably is a fairer representation of the States voters alignment, than the Lower House results. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2025-04-16/wa-upper-house-final-election-results-revealed/105185376 https://www.abc.net.au/news/elections/wa/2025/guide/lc-results

I would detest living in a country where destitute women were forced to prostitute themselves to feed their children. You obviously follow the MAGA line - if you're poor, you must be lazy. People become poor for hundreds of reasons and many of them not their own fault. I like living in a society which looks after its poor, jobless and destitute. The wealth our nation currently has, and has produced, is incredible - the only problem being, a vast amount of it ends up in millionaires and billionaires pockets, when in reality, they have no need of more money. It's simply untrammelled greed, and Clive Palmer is the face of continuing untrammelled personal greed. My best mates son was working for Roy Hill (mining company), as an IT manager. He got the "termite" treatment from another senior manager who came from BHP, and who then brought all his mates in from BHP to Roy Hill. When my mates son protested about the managers shonky moves, he was undermined, then sacked for "failing to meet performance levels". He was sacked one day before a large bonus was due, and it wasn't paid to him - so he's engaged a lawyer to fight for what is rightfully his. But I said to my mate - "But Gina Rinehart (owner of Roy Hill) is the type of person who will spend $10M on lawyers against your sons claim, just to ensure he doesn't get his $10,000 bonus!" You only have to see what Gina Rinehart spent on lawyers to stop any of her children from dismantling the Hancock Trust, and thereby getting huge money that is due to them, from that Trust. She is reported to have spent hundreds of millions on lawyers, fighting her childrens claims - and she always won. But she's only got $37B, she doesn't have enough to live on.

God Forbid anything like that happening here. That is Europe, pre-Schengen Agreement, and it was the biggest PIA out when travelling - and it lead to massive criminality, bribery and corruption, as passes and visas were so easily forged.

Australia is pretty much an Asian society today, and you can play the "Spot the Anglo-Saxon" game if you're looking to kill time, too.

Yeah, but how much did it cost to build the 3D printer?

If it was MY car, I wouldn't be happy, until I knew what the actual oil pressure reading was, checked with a proper analogue gauge.

If Clive became PM, he'd treat Australian Govt funds as his own, and make Trump look like an honest, upstanding President.

There's a valve called the IAC (Idle Air Control) valve that controls the idle speed according to engine temperature and load. 750RPM would be a normal idle speed when warm. If the A/C is turned on, the IAC increases the idle speed to take into account the increased engine load.

Chinas blocking of Australian exports was an own goal for a number of products. One, we found other markets for the products, and the price often went up - especially for rock lobster (crayfish), which the Chinese can't get enough of. The ban reduced overall sales initially, but the ban simply meant the lobster fishing industry found other countries willing to take our lobsters, and the industry is now more diversified and less reliant on China for income. Secondly, the Chinese stopped importing Australian coal, but that sent coal prices up, and China had to buyer poorer quality coal at higher prices from other countries. Australian coal producers had no trouble selling our coal to places such as India, which competes with China.

The Cerato may have a partially-blocked oil pump screen, which will result in low oil pressure, especially at idle. No guarantee bearings won't fail at 50,000kms, Kia have a bit of a history of early engine failures.

EGR systems work O.K. if kept maintained and regular oil changes carried out and good quality oil is used. You can buy Penrite "Foaming Intake Cleaner" in both petrol and diesel versions, this stuff works good to clean out sludged intakes and engines. The Ford Ranger 3.0L diesel is notorious for the EGR failing with coolant leaks. The welding on the EGR coolant section was poor and the weld splits, dumping coolant straight into the intake, it buggers engines very quickly, usually by overheating. I have one with that problem right now, it pisses me off, having to strip the engine right down to check the damage.

GON, check your oil pressure with an accurate oil pressure gauge plumbed into an engine oil gallery or lube supply point. Once you have an accurate reading (engine hot, and pressure checked at idle and at speed), you can then check the readings against the recommended pressures. Some engines have low pressure at idle normally, but a light on at idle is generally an indicator of excessive big end bearing wear.

Here's an interesting article from Politico, showing how the Chinese are not total fools, they're targeting MAGA homelands with total blockages of U.S. imports, thanks to clever manipulation of health and food safety rulings. These people are shrewd traders and they have 5000 years of trading experience, Trump and his MAGA idiots have only a few dozen decades of global trading experience, and the Chinese aren't about to let their economy suffer by the actions of one U.S. Presidents chaotic decision-making. https://www.politico.com/news/2025/04/12/china-trade-war-exports-00287123

Yes, I second that, a great musician with some great hits. "Girls on the Avenue" is a favourite of mine.

The greatest bearings I've ever encountered were in the rear axle of a German Magirus-Deutz truck I owned from 1967 to 1975. Magirus-Deutz was a fire-engine manufacturer from 1899, and they went on to produce a long line of road trucks. The company was absorbed into Iveco Trucks when Iveco was formed by Fiat. They built the cab and chassis, and used air-cooled Deutz engines with ZF gearboxes and rear axles. The ZF rear axle in my truck was only single drive, but it was rated at 12 tonnes load capacity, unlike the normal 8-9 tonnes of most truck axles. This axle contained barrel roller bearings, and these bearings are a heavy duty bearing that can cope with major deflection in load angles and high shock loadings. Thus, the axle was designed to cope with bending of the axle housing under severe overload conditions. The rollers in barrel roller bearings are essentially an oval shape.

Oh, how appropriate! "Snouts in the trough"?

That's a good article, but in my personal opinion, there are at least three things that have led to America's problems. The problems, as Trump sees them (and he's largely correct there), are that; 1. America is carrying a huge level of debt. 2. American manufacturing has been in decline for many years. 3. China is becoming the worlds most threatening power economically, and posing a real threat to American global dominance. Problem No 1, can initially be sheeted home to Ronnie Reagan. He promised Americans he'd make them rich (same as Trump is doing). What Ronnie Reagan did was make an exclusive cabal of already wealthy Americans a lot richer, at the expense of ordinary Americans. He reduced taxes on the rich, and tore down barriers that stopped the wealthy from becoming unbelievably rich. He spent Govt money like water and trebled the size of the American economy - and all on borrowed money. Those borrowings have never been effectively repaid, the standard U.S. economic theory is, it's O.K. to just keep paying interest on debts, without paying down the capital, has ruled for decades in the U.S. The debt continues to keep climbing, and no-one is addressing it. Problem No 2, is American businesses flocked to purchase goods from low-cost countries, and even set up manufacturing facilities in those countries. It was much more profitable to do that, than set up manufacturing in America or to buy American-made goods. The countrys laws and economic incentives made it easy to do that. The rich got richer, once again, because the greatest way to acquire huge amounts of wealth is to buy low and sell high. The rich "shared" their wealth by offering cheaper products to consumers. It was a pretty poor deal, as most of the imported goods were lower quality. Trade deficits soared as a result of this policy. Trade deficits have to be funded by borrowings, thus American indebtness increased. Problem No 3 is simply due to the American rush to buy cheap goods, or make lots of money selling goods at good prices, that were bought for very low prices. It's a global problem, and one that is not going to go away with increased tariffs. Then there's the problem that over several years in the late "twenty-teens", America Govt printed vast amounts of paper money with no asset backing - the so-called "quantative easing". It is a fallacy that you can do this without eventually seriously devaluing your currency. The chickens have yet to come home to roost, but I can see them coming. Trump is effectively trying to make people from other countries pay down the U.S. Govt debt with his tariffs scheme. It won't work, because the people who will be paying the bulk of the tariffs, are the ordinary American people, but it will take quite some time for ordinary Americans to realise that.

Spacey is right to be cautious on these solar scammers. Unsolicited Solar System telemarketing is the bane of our country today. I would get at least 4 or 5 calls a week from Victorian and NSW numbers, and I immediately become suspicious, as I have little to do with Eastern States businesses today. Every one of the calls I bothered to answer was a Solar System telemarketer, and the ones my phone bounced were marked as "Spam". Looking up the numbers on Reverse Australia nearly always sees people saying, "This number is telemarketers". The number of calls I've received has increased since both Federal and State Labor have announced schemes for batteries (and the potential for an increased number of solar panels). Nothing like free Govt money on offer to see the scammers, and get-rich-quick merchants, appear out of nowhere. The ACCC is looking into banning solar telemarketing. https://www.solarquotes.com.au/blog/unsolicited-solar-sales-complaint-mb3157/

Hold on! Doesn't the U.S. Constitution GUARANTEE the right to bear arms to EVERY adult person born in America!? What are they doing, trampling on his GUN RIGHTS, by refusing him access to firearms?? 🙄

I was talking to a former farmer client some years ago after not seeing him for quite a while. I asked how many kids he had now. He replied, "Four". I said, "Gee, you're breeding like rabbits out there!" He shot back, "It's O.K. We found out after a while, what was causing it, and stopped it straightaway!" 😄

If the screw is surrounded by plastic, then an impact driver should work O.K. Monitors are pretty durable.