What made you happy today?

[exeterjeep]

EV's will be paying RFL from April 2025 and the £40k levy will also apply, according to the chancellor about a year ago. Unless they change their minds to encourage the sale of EV's

My gt430 goes down to £180  from May this year as it will be 6 years old.

[C8RKH]

Wow, your GT430 will be cheaper than my 410. A bargain!

[Escape]

On 01/02/2024 at 20:03, Mark Blanchard said:

 🤣 Yes school boy error.  
Car tax on the V8 is £700 so I thought I could do it on the cheap. 

To put that in perspective, and quite likely make you a bit more happy: in bhellgium, that same car would have an annual car tax of €3465.07 and a (one time) registration tax of €10577.8! 😲 Which explains why we hardly see any. The Lotus V6 models suffer the same problem, basically anything with an engine of 2.0l or greater gets hit hard.

Out of curiosity, have you tried a V8 manual Mustang? I appreciate Ford being one of the few manufacturers that still offer a V8 with a manual box.

[exeterjeep]

1 hour ago, C8RKH said:

Wow, your GT430 will be cheaper than my 410. A bargain!

mine was registered  after the change in the tax rules..... (so my previous S would be much more expensive.)

https://www.gov.uk/vehicle-tax-rate-tables

Cars registered on or after 1 April 2017

Rates for second tax payment onwards (and 5 years of the £390 over £40k penalty)

Fuel type	Single 12 month payment	Single 12 month payment by Direct Debit	Total of 12 monthly payments by Direct Debit	Single 6 month payment	Single 6 month payment by Direct Debit
Petrol or diesel	£180	£180	£189	£99	£94.50

 

[Mark Blanchard]

24 minutes ago, Escape said:

To put that in perspective, and quite likely make you a bit more happy: in bhellgium, that same car would have an annual car tax of €3465.07 and a (one time) registration tax of €10577.8! 😲 Which explains why we hardly see any. The Lotus V6 models suffer the same problem, basically anything with an engine of 2.0l or greater gets hit hard.

Out of curiosity, have you tried a V8 manual Mustang? I appreciate Ford being one of the few manufacturers that still offer a V8 with a manual box.

Wow that's a horrendous sum!  There I was feeling sorry for myself but not so bad now .  So over there the only Lotus you can drive without being clobbered is an Elise?

The Mustang manual is a truly horrendous thing.  The gear change is short and notchy, the yanks are much better at autos.  I haven't tried it in the V8 but the manual is enough to put you off driving the car.

[C8RKH]

42 minutes ago, exeterjeep said:

mine was registered  after the change in the tax rules..... (so my previous S would be much more expensive.)

https://www.gov.uk/vehicle-tax-rate-tables

Cars registered on or after 1 April 2017

Rates for second tax payment onwards (and 5 years of the £390 over £40k penalty)

Fuel type	Single 12 month payment	Single 12 month payment by Direct Debit	Total of 12 monthly payments by Direct Debit	Single 6 month payment	Single 6 month payment by Direct Debit
Petrol or diesel	£180	£180	£189	£99	£94.50

 

That's strange, mine was first registered in 2018!

[Escape]

On 01/02/2024 at 19:27, C8RKH said:

On a different note, finally, a vegan restaurant I would actually go to and eat in.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-manchester-68160162

So basically now it's just a restaurant. I can't see that strategy paying off, surely most vegans will no longer visit as they feel betrayed and the rest of the public will likely prefer a 'standard' restaurant without the emphasis on vegan.

I also have a feeling their lack of customers might have something to do with being to militant about the vegan thing. And now they're trying to turn that around in a poor way. We once tried a vegan restaurant in Leuven. The food was OK if a bit overpricy, but what really put us off was their mentality. Everything had to be 'special', no normal drinks, only fancy juices, infused water etc. So we never returned, far better places in town with vegetarian or vegan offers.

[Alfa2Evora]

On 07/02/2024 at 17:41, C8RKH said:

Got my car tax reminder through today for the Evora Sport 410 - it's now dropped to a very agreeable £212.50

You're lucky on that Andy.

The vehicle tax system is a shambles with all the different sets of rules that apply depending on when the car was registered. My NA, because it's older than a 2017 registration year, is £395/year otherwise it would be just £180 if it had been stuck in storage and not registered until after 2017..

Do you know anybody looking for a nice 2.0 Turbo SAAB Estate? By pushing out 1g of CO2 per km over the limit that would have had it in the same tax band as the Evora, it's costing £675/year, . Now off the road and on SORN until I part company with it.

[exeterjeep]

I had been looking at a number of Jeep grand Cherokee SRT's,  so 1 registered 31 March 2017 is £695, and another registered 1 day later would be £180, makes the older ones very hard to sell. As you say it is a bit of a joke - typical government/civil service rules.

And keeping until they are 40 years old is a bit of a non starter as I will have gone by then - or probably taken off the road.

[Kimbers]

First Publisher we sent our Husband/Wife collaboration Childrens book to and KAPOW! Want to take it further!

I wrote them and Wendy Illustrated! More later!

[bogle]

1 hour ago, Kimbers said:

First Publisher we sent our Husband/Wife collaboration Childrens book to and KAPOW! Want to take it further!

I wrote them and Wendy Illustrated! More later!

Wow! That's awesome. Congrats!

[C8RKH]

That's brilliant news @Kimbers. Are these stories about a little penis that goes on holiday to Cyprus and the adventures it has?  🤣

[Kimbers]

15 hours ago, C8RKH said:

That's brilliant news @Kimbers. Are these stories about a little penis that goes on holiday to Cyprus and the adventures it has?  🤣

You can go right off someone you know!

[C8RKH]

You've lasted longer than most @Kimbers....

[Kimbers]

Wendy's Book Covers are now available as quality Poster prints with her Publisher GB Publishing!

https://www.gbpublishing.co.uk/product-page/wendy-kimberley-art-antecedent

[chipp]

Two all clears from the hospital on the same day, 💪

[bogle]

2 hours ago, Kimbers said:

Wendy's Book Covers are now available as quality Poster prints with her Publisher GB Publishing!

https://www.gbpublishing.co.uk/product-page/wendy-kimberley-art-antecedent

I like the Nova print.  Please tell Wendy for me.

[Kimbers]

1 hour ago, bogle said:

I like the Nova print.  Please tell Wendy for me.

Will do. And the book cover it is on was written by one "David Kimberley" my brother

[jep]

Just paid £48 for my The Lotus Forums subscription renewal.

Apparently if you pay £200 pa, it blocks all @C8RKH posts but my day wouldn't be the same without them 🙂

Justin 

[exeterjeep]

7 minutes ago, jep said:

Just paid £48 for my The Lotus Forums subscription renewal.

Apparently if you pay £200 pa, it blocks all @C8RKH posts but my day wouldn't be the same without them 🙂

Justin 

Thought that as a mod it would have been free....

Think you under quoted the other amount, its closer to £500.

[jep]

Bibs warned me the pay was not good as a mod.....quite the reverse 😁

[C8RKH]

Moderators are like politicians. Overpaid and just in it for themselves. It's the equivalent of being given a clipboard and a hi-viz jacket at work.

[Kimbers]

1 minute ago, C8RKH said:

Moderators are like politicians. Overpaid and just in it for themselves. It's the equivalent of being given a clipboard and a hi-viz jacket at work.

Wait now...... moderators get paid? 

[C8RKH]

Depends what you negotiated @Kimbers, but I believe they are well paid, in kindness.

[johnpwalsh]

On a happy note. LotusRescue have had another bit of expansion by having to take on another part of the building, now shed No3. This is to be used as a clean  assembly area and the 1st project, an early S1 Esprit already has her chassis in there on stands having just come back from strengthening, blast cleaning and painting with a further S2 and an Elan to follow. Once the projects are built up to rolling shell's, they now go into building No2 for assembly which includes the shells and fitting out. Area 1 now has a nice gantry crane which can travel the length of the building for lifting engines in and out as it can also travers the building. Handy or not, oh yes. Looks like the next 12 months is going to be heads up and ass down with little time for anything else.