Keith Miles 2

Many years ago, on passing a large Ford dealership, I saw, in large painted letters on the showroom windows “Fiesta’s, Sierra’s...” etc. It put me off buying a Ford! (I got over it). Has anybody spotted the numerous and regular spelling and grammatical errors in the rolling headlines on the BBC News channel? Yes, even the BBC! We’re doomed! R.O.F.L.

Posted by Graham Bowers on 12/10/2020 09:42:35: I'd encourage any men in the susceptible age range to get tested. Whilst I totally understand and empathise with such a view from those who feel that it had a positive outcome in their particular case, I’m not sure that “encourage” is universally applicable nor is it the position of the NHS. There are many factors to consider and with the current state of knowledge and limits and risks of intervention, it has to be an individual decision. What might be the right decision for some might not be the right decision for others. Currently there is no clear position that the benefits of medical investigations outweighs the risks in a sufficient number of cases for prostate cancer screening to be “encouraged” irrespective of its commonality. If it were otherwise, then the case for a national screening programme would be much stronger, even unarguable. In the meantime, we can only hope, as in many other areas of medical science, that knowledge, prevention and treatments evolve over time and we must also accept that sadly , in many cases, this might never be achieved.

I hate the word “plane” unless it refers to a carpentry tool. Even worse when it is spelt “plain”. And don’t get me started on misuse of apostrophes for plurals! Aaaaaargh! Yes, I’ll keep taking the tablets! 😊

I do have to again pose the question that if it was felt, and promoted, that all males, particularly those in the higher age group, should be routinely tested for prostate cancer, and we all followed that advice, would the NHS be able to cope, physically or financially, given the numerous other demands on its services? If there was a single simple, reliable and cost effective means of early possible diagnosis, as seems to be the case with, for example, bowel cancer, then that would certainly help to answer that question and would also certainly aid the decision making process for all of us. Prevention is better than intervention, of course, but there is much about the various forms of cancer and the causes that, unfortunately, remains unknown. I do agree that for those who are worried, or who may have cause to be worried, a test might be worthwhile. At this point in time, I’m more worried about Covid19 and doing as advised to avoid it! Whilst cancers may be generic, at least they are not contagious! And there is NO current cure for the former which is also potentially fatal.

Posted by John Lee on 09/10/2020 17:01:03: The BMFA's own AGM is via Zoom on 14 Nov, your Club Secretary should have been sent the details. Spoke to him recently about this. He hadn’t heard anything. That might have changed since. I was just curious, that’s all. That said, he sent out an e-mail to members recently inviting suggestions regarding our own AGM and last I heard, he had only had one response. Mine.

Anyone know what the BMFA are doing?

The harder that you work a battery, whether discharging or charging, the shorter it’s life will be. The same, I imagine, applies to regular unbalanced charging, especially at higher charge rates. The manufacturers, of course, will be more than happy to supply you with early replacements! Speed and convenience or value for money? Yer’ pays yer’ money, yer’ makes yer’ choice, I suppose!

In view of the eventual excellent response from the retailer, maybe some praise is now in order? No reason now, perhaps, not to name the retailer in question. There are many things that can go wrong even in the best of organisations and, when frustrated, it’s all too easy to jump to conclusions or to get angry prematurely. An initial phone call doesn’t hurt, followed up, if necessary, by e-mail. The important thing is to follow a structured process. Always be polite but firm. I tend to use PayPal/Credit Card as much as possible as this provides two levels of protection in addition to standard legal rights. I can personally attest to the fact that the PayPal complaints procedure, whilst it might take a week or two to obtain a resolution, seems to produce results when all else fails. In my case, the company concerned (a laptop battery supplier) subsequently disappeared from the web shortly thereafter! I got the impression that whilst they appeared to be a large warehouse, it was likely that they were, in fact, merely a couple of individuals operating from home as even their return address, on making initial enquiries to Royal Mail, turned out to be bogus! As for Kings Lynn Models, I have just received, this morning, yet another prompt delivery from them this morning, preceded by progress e-mails including advance final notification of a one hour delivery slot which, again, was spot on. I also note that they have a 72 hour delivery policy together with a request that they be contacted if this is not met. As they say, one should perhaps judge a business on the manner in which it deals with complaints, assuming of course that the complaint reaches the appropriate person. Putting “F.A.O. The Manager” in an e-mail heading might be appropriate in many cases, as in this one, perhaps? it might be fair to say that we should consider, equally, the manner in which we complain in order to avoid any unnecessary delay in obtaining a resolution! And that is a general comment and not aimed at anyone in particular, especially the OP! Edited By Keith Miles 2 on 09/10/2020 14:26:56

David, I don’t doubt, for one moment, the statistics that you quote. As for the comment regarding reducing the costs to the NHS, however, it seems to me that if there was a strong argument to support that, then there would be little or no reason not to have a national screening programme and, indeed, every reason to perhaps introduce one. That said, NHS resources will always have limits which, of course, is the key factor behind attempts to minimise the transmission of Covid19 where, again, those likely to be most vulnerable are in the higher age group. And, as we are seeing, that issue is already having a negative impact on those needing other treatment. I am in no way being critical and for background, my Mother suffered most of her life from health issues including bronchitis, pneumonia, neuralgia, arthritis and Parkinson’s disease. She died of cancer. My younger sister was born with a heart defect and died of a brain aneurism, at age 44, just one week after collapsing at her daughter’s wedding. My other sister currently suffers from rheumatoid arthritis which she developed in her late twenties. In my youth, I had four hospital stays as result of an eventually diagnosed kidney issue which, I learnt later in life, could have killed me! Hopefully, I will take after my Dad who lived until he was 84 (despite having been a smoker for about 30 years) with no serious prior health issues until a heart defect in his final year prompted open heart surgery from which he did not recover, passing away in the ITU. Taking the emotion out of it both I and my sister whilst grateful to the NHS did both later question whether such a traumatic invasive and expensive procedure was cost effective in such a case. It is, of course, the classic moral dilemma and one that no doubt occurs regularly. So, as for any test for prostate cancer, specifically, given the uncertainties and other factors, it has to be a personal decision and, it would seem, not one to be taken lightly without a good deal of thought about our personal expectations until such time as a more reliable test comes along.

Posted by Tosh McCaber on 08/10/2020 15:06:21: Thx Keith, You're right, it does take a long while to charge upthe factory 2000mah battery with the Spektrum charger. So far though, I haven't been too bothered with the charging aspect of the battery- just switch it on after a flying session, and leavce it to simmer. But if I do need a spare, 4-Max is the way to go! Still leaves me withthe question as to how long it would take, beforeI would lose control of my glider ?? There's a story behind my pen-name, I'll let you have the details when I get a bit of time (I'm a slow typist!) Suffice to say I'm Scottish!! Thx for the reply! First thing to note, is that the DX9 charger is inside the Tx (hence the low current/slow charge). The plug in thingy is merely a transformer/DC power supply. That one confused me at first as my brain was stuck in the old days! That said, the old plug-in NiCd charger I had was also slow by modern standards! As for wanting to know when your glider will crash, I would suggest that the question is academic and not something that you would want to ascertain! And pushing things to the limits is always risky, too! Safest procedure is to stay at or above nominal working voltage for any RC battery and charge as soon as you drop below it! Scottish? Well, slap my kilt!

Craig, First and foremost, may I wish you continued health for the future. Further to my earlier point, it is interesting to note your GP’s comments about “assurance and peace of mind” whilst also pointing out that the PSA test can be unreliable. Those comments would seem to echo the NHS guidance. I would not, therefore, regard the lack of a national screening programme as “shocking” but perfectly understandable, given the apparent uncertainties and, as I said, the apparent lack of consensus regarding risk versus benefit. As the guidance clearly infers, a false positive is not necessarily going to provide either assurance or peace of mind and it further infers that, in such cases, there is, in fact, a risk of subsequent unnecessary intervention that might itself create unnecessary trauma or negative effects. I can well understand the view of those who were eventually positively diagnosed and for whom the decision turned out to be the correct one, however, I am wondering just how many have made the personal decision, or been professionally advised, to take a test and for whom the outcome was quite the reverse? If I felt that the decision to take a test was a simple one, I would not hesitate nor, I suspect, would the medical profession seem hesitant to advise patients accordingly or similarly hesitant to introduce a national screening programme. If things were clearer, I wouldn’t need a coin! Edited By Keith Miles 2 on 08/10/2020 17:21:36

An interesting thread and hats off to all contributors. Prompted by this thread, I took a look at the NHS guidance on this issue and it seems to be a difficult area in terms of the risks and benefits of tests/examinations. It seems that the lack of clear consensus in this regard is the reason why there is no national screening programme. So, for someone like me who is fairly healthy with no symptoms of Prostate Cancer, it would seem to come down to the flip of a coin in deciding whether or not to be tested and/or undergo an examination. The coin, for the time being, is still in my pocket.

Posted by Tosh McCaber on 07/10/2020 19:38:44: Just wondered how long it takes for the DX9 battery to go down to what seems to be the critical 7.2- 7.3v. I haven't used my one on the slope yet, but flights there can be quite long, over a day out. Edited By Tosh McCaber on 07/10/2020 20:10:14 Depends what the capacity of your Tx battery is! Also, leaving it switched on in “idle” mode to test it would not be a very trustworthy experiment! I did find that that my DX6i, with 4 x 2300 NiMh cells, required much less frequent charging than my DX9 on the latter’s original 2000mah Li-Ion. The main issue, for me, with the original “intelligent” Spektrum 2000 battery, given the relatively high power drain, is that it can only be charged in the Tx, with the supplied power adapter, at a fixed SLOW rate of charge whereas the 4-Max 4000 LiPo option can be fully charged in an hour or less on an external charger. The only negative is the need to unplug and plug (slightly fiddly, and a little care needed) the LiPo each time as the battery leads are necessarily too short and it’s probably better to remove it for charging anyway. The other issue with the original battery is the price of a spare.....OUCH! So, can’t answer your question but can only suggest that if you’re worried, and assuming that you have a suitable charger, buy a couple of the 4-Max LiPo packs! Love the name by the way! (You couldn’t make it up...or maybe...?) Edited By Keith Miles 2 on 08/10/2020 13:55:50

Posted by fly boy3 on 28/09/2020 22:17:33: Thanks Keith, decorating !!! At my age my daughters have banned me from all step ladders, triple extension ladders, even stools lol As they are so busy I have to pay people to do jobs I have done for over sixty years maintaining my home. The only decorating I do now is covering my models which I love. Keep safe My house needs a lot of work. I keep putting it off, to my great shame! I, too, might be palming much it off! Good luck with the I-pad. It costs nothing to try a few things before replacing it and you could learn something in the process! On which subject, my OS52 FS has suddenly lost all compression, valves look fine and no obvious leaks, so I've just been watching a YouTube video in case I have to take it apart! Not done a four stroke before.That said it looks easy enough and my brother-in-law is also a retired engineer with 50 years of model flying experience. Very handy! Hopefully it's nothing serious, or expensive, and I can get any needed parts! I'll stop there in order to avoid any "off topic" complaints! May your lock down be over soon and may your shops not run out of toilet roll!

Fly Boy 3. OOOPS! I should have gone to Specsavers. Oh, and it seems that I was also wrong about 2Mb. Seems it is still fairly common and supposedly adequate for most purposes, most of the time, depending on how many are connected to a given hub, and how many are using it at a given time! As I said, though, when mine went down to that level, Safari was taking so long to load a page, I could have gone and made a cup of tea and a sandwich! Apparently the service providers sometimes switch things to meet demand, presumably hoping that the “losers” don’t notice! Sorry that you’re in lockdown but, as you say, it might be an opportunity to sort a few things out, or maybe do some decorating? Aaaargh!

Fly Boy 3. With reference to your recent post regarding switching on/ off and closing apps. Yes, there is an on/off push button on mine, it is on the edge of the I-pad diagonally opposite the “Home” button on the face of the I-pad. This switch will switch off the I-pad but it will not close any apps left open. I fitted mine, however, with a cover which switches the I-pad on and off when it is opened or closed, so I never use the button. To close apps on mine, with the “Home” screen showing, I “double-click” the “Home” button on the front face. This changes the display to show opened apps. I can then place a finger on each opened app displayed and “swipe” each off the screen to close them. If all apps are closed before you switch off, switching back on should then bring up the “Home” screen immediately and, hopefully, no warning about your phone being infected! If not the “intruder” probably is in the operating system (IOS). So, to summarise... Close all apps before switching off, then switch back on to see if the “infected phone” problem has gone. If so, the problem is in an app (probably Safari or another browser if you have one) and not IOS. That said, provided you have your wanted files backed up and you’ve made a note of the apps that you have, I would do a “soft” reset first, and if necessary a “hard” reset before then trying an update of IOS. There is much info on line about how to perform resets or any other task that you wish to perform. Brother-in-law says it IS possible that your I-pad may be too old to fully update but agrees, as MattyB has said, that this may be no big deal if you only use your device for basic stuff. If, of course, IOS is infected and you can’t cure it with a reset or update, then you may have to spend some cash! As for Windows, all I know is that when I shut down my PC, without closing a program, unlike my I-pad, it always boots back into “Home” screen, although it may, if I remember correctly, give an alert if a program has been left running. Ignoring the alert, however, doesn’t prevent shut down or affect reboot. As MattyB suggests, it might cause a program to run in the background but it certainly doesn’t affect what comes up on the screen as an I-pad does. Finally, you said your Internet speed was 2Mbs? Are you sure? By modern standards, that seems extremely slow to me! In an earlier post, I mentioned a very noticeable recent slowing down of my I-pad and Android phone over Wi-Fi. I ran “Speedtest” and it reported 2.81Mbs Download/20.9 Upload. Rebooting the router fixed the issue. If your figure is correct, it would certainly explain your reported slow downs! I just ran another test on the I-pad, over Wi-Fi, and it just reported 128Mbs Download/15.7Mbs Upload. Looking at past results, I’ve had it as high as 147Mbs Download with an average “low” performance above 70! That 2.81 was VERY noticeable!       Edited By Keith Miles 2 on 28/09/2020 19:49:53

Fly Boy 3, Just before I head off to the field, and at the risk of asking you a silly question..... I take it that you always close your apps, especially your internet browser (e.g. Safari) before switching off your I-pad?

Fly Boy 3. One of the reasons, of course, for keeping operating systems updated is to combat viruses and malware! Does seem that, for some reason, your IOS is waaay out of date if the number of my version is anything to go by! After a full reset, if you don’t receive an automatic alert to update, you should be able to update manually in “Settings”. As you have a laptop in reserve to use, don’t give up just yet! Oh, and I forgot to mention that “Speedtest” for checking your Wi-Fi speed, is a FREE download and safe to use! Worth putting it on both your laptop and (eventually) your I-pad. I’m going flying with my brother-in-law in the morning. He knows his stuff on these issues, so I’ll see what he thinks about your problem and get back to you. Keep the faith! By the way, did you try “Googling” your problem?  Just had a quick look, lots of ideas on the Internet which might help, also confirming that infections of IOS are very rare.     Edited By Keith Miles 2 on 28/09/2020 00:19:33

My apologies, Fun Boy 3, I just noted that you have apparently already backed up your data, so ignore that bit of my post!

Fly Boy 3, One other consideration, I just remembered, regarding “slow downs” is your WiFi connection. I can recommend downloading the very popular “Speedtest” from Ookla. Both my phone and I-Pad seemed very slow recently. A test showed that my download speed had dropped to a mere 2Gb over WiFi instead of being in the three figures that I pay for! Switching off the router for a few seconds and then giving it a few minutes after switching back on to fully reset itself, and normal service was resumed! This is not an uncommon issue, apparently. Edited By Keith Miles 2 on 27/09/2020 18:29:09

Fly Boy 3, The “phone” reference is very odd. The Apple IOS system is renowned for being pretty robust compared to other systems, e.g. Android or Windows. I was just guessing that you might have a SIM card fitted, based on the “phone” reference. Yes, by updating, I assumed that you meant IOS not a new I-Pad! My IOS version is 12.4.8. A reset might be worthwhile but as MattyB points out, you will erase stuff unless you first back it up to another server, Cloud being possibly the easiest option although their are others including transferring to PC via I-Tunes. I’ve never backed up an I-pad so will not risk offering advice on that but imagine it would be easy to do. As for the apps, you could always make a note of each and get them again later from the Apple Store. Finally, it sounds like you have sufficient memory to rule that out as a reason for the slow down so, it could, indeed be an infection or a failing processor. If it refuses to update again, seems that a reset is your next option with the aforementioned caution in mind. Again, I’ve never done a reset but I believe that you use the little probe supplied, or something similar, to push the little button on the side of the case. Don’t spend several hundred quid just yet!

Fly Boy 3, Totally agree with all that MattyB has posted. I just checked my six year old (at least) I-Pad Mini and of its advertised 16GB capacity, 7GB is taken up by IOS (the operating system) leaving only 9GB for apps and files (photos, videos, etc.). Currently, I have 4.5GB spare. It is not uncommon for buyers, especially the less technically aware (me, for one!), to fail to realise this when deciding how much memory they require and such information is rarely, if ever, clearly displayed or advertised. On the matter of being unable to update, I would have thought that you would get a warning of low memory if that was the cause of a failure or inability to update IOS. I could be wrong, though. As MattyB suggests, you will find a list of all items under Settings/General/I-Pad Storage and the amount of memory being taken up by each item. If you don’t already know what your I-Pad memory is you will find that as well under Settings/General/About. Do get back to us if you need any further assistance. Edited By Keith Miles 2 on 27/09/2020 16:36:16

Fly Boy3, If the message was “I-phone” not “phone” as you stated originally, then that is puzzling because I would have thought that IOS would know the difference between an I-pad and an I-phone! So, there is no SIM card in your I-pad, then, and you only use your home Wi-Fi? Is that correct?

Some good advice from MattyB. The combination of “your phone is infected” and “you have won a prize”, especially the latter, should certainly ring the alarm bells. I’m definitely no expert, but I do have an I-pad albeit without a SIM card. First thing that I would do is remove the SIM card and see if the problem message went away. If it did, I would then try an update of IOS with the SIM card removed and, perhaps, even a reset. I might then put the SIM card back and see what happens and, unless intent on buying a new I-pad for other reasons, replace the SIM card if necessary. I assume that the “your I-pad is on its last legs” comment was not contained in a similar message or made by a retailer?     Edited By Keith Miles 2 on 27/09/2020 11:28:56

My final comments on the issue are, firstly, that we should all feel much safer flying models in accordance with the guidelines than taking part in, for example, a game of Rugby, the latter of which would also appear to be legal! Secondly, the only people likely to complain about the likes of us will be those whose social activities, or intended social activities, are not covered by an exemption and who would therefore, presumably, prefer a free-for-all with maximum health risk or a total lockdown with minimal health risk. Nobody, of course, would ever complain out of pure spite, would they? As for non-essential travel, whilst I believe that this is also covered by the exemption, if anyone feels uncomfortable about this or any other perceived anomalies or contradictions, the simple solution is to not go flying. Oh, and a group of six flyers at a field, hugging and kissing each other is probably not within the sprit and intention of the legislation!