Alderstead Heath Caravan Club Site – First Impressions

Access to the campsite was somewhat tough because of a very narrow country lane. Apparently they advise you to access from the other direction but you might want to ask them when you make a booking. Once at reception I was asked to go and look for a pitch I liked and return with the pitch number. This is a different way of pitch allocation, most of the other campsites tell you what pitches they have available, show you those numbers on a map and you can then decide where you want to go. I decided to plump for a pitch near one of the shower blocks and returned to the reception to make my payment. At this time I received some really good news, the campsite operated a midweek discount, a 50% reduction on the pitch fee! Since I am usually on my own the pitch fee represents the greatest part of my costs. It was beginning to look like Alderstead Heath might become my new regular campsite!

Alderstead Heath Caravan Club Site – The Facilities and Local Area

After my initial positive reaction to the campsite I encountered what could have been a large problem. I could not get a decent signal on my 3 mobile broadband Mifi! I briefly walked around the campsite with the Mifi to see if the signal was better elsewhere and it did seem that a stronger signal could be achieved further away from the reception. After going back to reception to change pitch they confirmed that other visitors had reported issues with mobile broadband signals. Regulars to the site apparently request a pitch in the area that I was now being relocated to. I should point out that I never use the Caravan Club’s own wireless internet, mainly because the time limits are too small for what I need.

Once I could access the internet I was able to enjoy the campsite and its facilities. The grounds are well landscaped and it feels very rural. It has a total of 150 pitches, many of which are hardstanding and their website states that they can accept vehicles up to 10.4 metres in length. I certainly saw some very long fifth wheel trailers during my visit. Like other Caravan Club sites you will find a good heated shower and toilet block, washing up sinks, laundry and chemical disposal points. Lighting on the site was also good should you arrive back late at night.

Alderstead Heath Caravan Club Site

Some who choose the campsite would do so because of its close proximity to London. The bus that stops outside the campsite does so only every 2 hours from Monday to Friday and then only goes to places like Merstham, Redhill, Caterham and Oxted, none of which are in travelcard zones 1-6, so you would be looking at an expensive train to London! A better solution for London is to request a taxi from the campsite to take you to Coulsdon South train station, something that at the time of writing would cost you £7.00. If you are travelling as a family this £7.00 is really no expense at all. Once at Coulsdon South there are regular quick trains to London Bridge and best of all Coulsdon South is in Travelcard Zone 6 so buying a zone 1-6 travelcard will be all you need for exploring London.

The campsite has a number of footpaths on the doorstep with North Downs scenery awaiting you. Dog owners will love the walking opportunities from this site. One drawback is that being quite remote you don’t have a little local shop to buy supplies. There is a decent sized Tesco in Caterham which is listed as 3 miles away but if you are walking across fields on footpaths it should take you no longer than 45 minutes. In good weather I don’t mind the walk but to be honest it’s the sort of campsite where it’s better to stock up on supplies before you arrive.

Overall I really enjoyed my short stay at Alderstead Heath Caravan Club Site and I hope to visit it again soon, especially if their midweek discount continues!

London Low Emission Zone – Does it apply to you?

The zone has affected many people including small businesses and the motorhome community. Exemptions were given to some specific groups of vehicles for example:

• Agricultural vehicles that spend the majority of their time off-road but may also use roads.
• Historic vehicles built before 1 January 1973.
• Vehicles operated by the Minitery of Defence.

There are also a group of vehicles that are eligible for a 100% discount in the charge including:

• Showman’s vehicles (for example Circus and fairground vehicles).

The feeling amongst the motorhome community is that those who represent them, for example the Caravan Club and The Camping and Caravanning Club, did not do enough to try and get exemptions from the zone for their members.

The London Low Emission Zone

London Low Emission Zone – Fitting A Diesel Particulate Filter

If you have a vehicle that no longer complies with the Low Emission Zone you have a few options. You could decide to simply stay outside the zone and only use campsites outside the zone. You could also sell your vehicle and buy a newer one that complies with the new zone rules or you could fit a diesel particulate filter to your existing vehicle so that it complies. If you happen to live inside the zone and own a motorhome you will have most likely sold it or you may have to store it outside the zone! If you are paying storage for the motorhome when you have room on your driveway for it I can imagine you are not very happy.

I seriously considered getting a filter fitted and even received a quote from a company for £2000.00. In the end I decided against it for the following reasons:

• The vehicle needs to be tested each year resulting in another annual cost like the MOT.
• The filters are relatively new and the jury is out about how long the filter will last.
• The Low Emission Zone rules will be changed / strengthened again in the future and can you be sure your new filter will apply with any new rules?

In the end I decided that I would stay outside the zone and I spent the money that the filter would have cost on a Kia Sedona instead which I can use inside the zone and which comes in handy for journeys within the UK when I’m using alternative accommodation to the motorhome. It does mean that I can no longer use some campsites I have used in the past like Crystal Palace and Abbey Wood and it also means I cannot use some of my regular ‘wild camping’ locations like Wimbledon Common and Ealing Common.

If you are a motorhome owner and were faced with a similar problem I would be interested to know what you decided to do. To find out more about and find out if your vehicle is affected visit the Transport for London Low Emission Zone website.

Truma Water Heater Problems

I first noticed the problem when the carpet near the boiler door seemed to be wet. On taking a closer look I noticed that water was dripping from the hot water outlet connection. A call to Truma UK revealed that the part had changed in the late 90′s and I would need to give them the boiler serial number. Naturally, mine was the older boiler and the part number I needed was 34000-55600 which had been phased out. The newer part number for the newer boiler was 34150-01.

Truma Part 34000-55600

I asked Truma what I was supposed to do as it seemed totally unfair to have to buy a new boiler costing hundreds of pounds just because a small piece of plastic had failed! The advice given was pathetic, apparently I should visit a plumbers merchants and get them to try and make something up. Shocked at the poor customer service offered by Truma UK I decided to email Truma Germany but their reply, whilst apologetic was equally unhelpful.

Taking the old part to a plumbers merchant they tried to replicate the fittings in metal and whilst it did fit, neither they or I truly understood the significance of the thinner pipe that points up which I now know to be the breather tube. If you blow into this Truma Water Heater part you will discover that most air rushes down the larger pipe and the thinner pipe has some valve built inside that only opens in the event that pressure builds up too much inside the boiler, a safety feature.  The plumbers merchant did not know this and failed to replicate this valve meaning that when I activated a tap water would simply head up and out of the overflow through the pipe that exited the vehicle underneath.

Truma Water Heater

After this initial failure I decided to buy the newer part to see up close how they differed. Whilst the older part is a screw type the newer is considered to be a push type. However if you discard some of the parts from the new part you effectively have something that looks quite similar to the old part. At least the thread that connects to the boiler is the same and the existing hoses would also fit the hot water and overflow pipes. With the new part fitted however the pipes barely cleared the boiler casing so I could not connect hot water outlet or overflow pipes. A further trip to a plumbers merchant and after buying a 1/2 inch BSP male to female extender and applying some plumbers paste and tape the new part was fitted. As luck would have it once it was screwed tight the pipes lined up perfectly.

This repair seemed to have worked but some weeks later water began to leak again. This time I purchased two parts for the Truma water heater and set about trying again. Until now it seemed to have worked but today again it began leaking. I could try and fit the final spare part I ordered in the hope I will get a few more months from it but I think I will speak to a relative who is a plumber to see if there is any other solution. I certainly don’t see why I should buy a new Truma water heater when the actual boiler works fine. Shame on you Truma for not supporting your water heaters for longer!

In Ealing Broadway itself there were youths openly laughing whilst police formed a line to block the road but did nothing to act. The level of destruction in the centre of Ealing was worse than when the IRA bomb hit almost exactly 10 years previously. For the next few hours I sat parked up somewhere quiet with LBC radio on as listeners called in to relay their horrific experiences of the London riots. Police vans sped past throughout the night, initially regular vans but by 3am these were the amoured vans like the ones you used to see in Northern Ireland.

London Riots – The Morning After

As night turned to day I returned to Ealing Common and went to look at the damage. Many shop windows were smashed, especially those of estate agents and jewellers. As I progressed along Ealing Broadway the damage was even worse. A traffic cone was still lodged in the window of The Arcadia Shopping Centre. The damage caused by these London riots became even more graphic as I reached the area close to Ealing Film Studios. Shop fronts were burnt out as were cars, I counted at least 5!

Burnt out cars - London Riots (Ealing)

As I turned another corner I saw a bus that was being towed away. The front had clearly been damaged and according to one local man the bus driver had deliberately driven the bus into parked cars belonging to the looters. As I left to head for work a group were beginning to gather to help with the clean up. It’s a shame that something like this has to happen before you see evidence of ‘community’ in cities these days.

London Riots – What Now?

So what do you think will happen once the London riots end? Personally I’d like to take a positive outlook on this. The British public are slow to anger generally. Sure we like to grumble in the post office queue but how often do we actually act on injustice? You only really see the true British spirit when the country is at war. I would argue that following these London riots we are at war now. Normal working people are sickened by the actions of those at the top of society, like bankers and News International but they are also equally sickened by those who bleed the benefits system dry. Initial reactions by politicians make me think they they have not really guaged the level of anger among the majority of the general public. This majority, usually the silent majority now wants to be listened to and they are finally prepared to act to protect their homes, businesses and their way of life. Maybe, just maybe some good will come from these London riots.

The Banking Crisis a few years on

It’s clear that little has changed since the banking crisis. Taxpayers money helped bail them out and in return they have just spat in our faces. The huge bonus culture continues. Despite all time low Bank of England interest rates, borrowing rates have shot up meaning even larger profit margins. Small businesses who have always made a profit cannot get a bank loan for new projects and may fail as a result. At the time the banking crisis hit we were told by our politicians that they would seek to split the banks up into safe retail banks and risky investment banks. Has it happened? No of course not! If you’ve not already seen it, watch the movie called ‘Inside Job’ to see just how little has changed since the banking crisis.

Before Margaret Thatcher privatised everything we already owned and sold it back to us, most of us did not own shares. For many our mortgages and savings were held in a building society…….remember them? What was wrong with building societies exactly? They seemed to work really well in my opinion. Sure the bosses of these building societies did not have the same fat salaries that the banking bosses did, and maybe this collective greed resulted in their demise. The building society bosses wanted to become banks and award themselves fat bonuses but they needed us to agree so they bribed us and of course we voted for short term gain as we always seem to do!

The people I feel most sorry for in this banking crisis are those pensioners who retired just after the crash when their pension value was slashed. How is it fair that someone who has worked hard all their life is affected so much by bad luck and timing? I have no objection to people gambling with their own money but how do those of us who want no part of it untangle ourselves from these bastard institutions? There are things we can do and should be doing.

The Banking Crisis – What can we do?

I’m no financial expert and would welcome suggestions and comments on what ordinary people can do to fight back against this banking crisis. I do feel we should take action though and not rely on our politicians to do it. The British are not good at taking action, we like to complain about things but don’t actually get off our collective arses and do something about it. One of the things I did after the banking crisis was change banks. I used to be with Lloyds TSB who treated me badly after the crash. Banks like these don’t care about the customer, they only care about the shareholders. I don’t own shares in Lloyds TSB so I decided to vote with my feet and instead opened an account with The Co-operative Bank. You have no idea what a difference I’ve noticed! I rarely need to call my bank but when I do I speak to someone in the UK and not in an Indian call centre. How is it that The Co-operative Bank can afford UK call centre staff but Lloyds TSB can’t? How much did we the taxpayer have to spend to bail out The Co-operative Bank? See where I’m coming from? If more of us voted with our feet these evil banks would have to either change their ways or go out of business.

Another thing I would like to see is teaching of the financial markets in every school in the country. My own education was pretty standard. I took academic options and actually enjoyed mathematics but I cannot remember the last time I needed to know about quadratic equations. Since our futures are so dependent on the state of the markets does it not make sense that we should at least have some idea how they work and perhaps then take greater control over our own destiny? Could it be perhaps that the current curriculum is devised to churn out the next generation of cannon fodder for soulless, dead end office jobs? Perhaps those in power don’t want to arm the plebs with too much knowledge!

I’m not saying my way of opting out of the current system is right for everyone. The banking crisis has happened and is still with us. If we want change we will have to make it happen. Changing goverments won’t do it. By taking more responsibility ourselves we might just be able to protect ourselves better the next time a banking crisis hits.

Some months prior to the contract expiring my Huawei DT100 wireless router had broken meaning I could no longer share my broadband connection. The DT100 was no longer being sold but they had a new ‘toy’ I was really interested in……….the Huawei E585 mifi wireless modem. They retail from £70.00 upwards so I haggled with them and got the modem for free by committing to a new 18 month contract with a £2.00 per month increase in my bill.

The Huawei E585 ‘mifi’ wireless modem

I’d read about the mifi for some time and it looked really promising. Basically it’s not much bigger than a normal USB modem and could be powered via USB in much the same way but it is so much more! Whilst it looks more like your traditional USB modem in size, it behaves more like a wireless modem you might have at home. Just like the home wireless modem the mifi transmits a signal which can be detected by other computers, smartphones etc.

Huawei E585 'mifi' wireless modem

One drawback compared to your home modem is that only 5 devices can be connected to the mifi at any one time but for most of us that’s more than enough! You would not want to be sharing the connection with too many people in case you go over your bandwidth allowance!

What really sets the mifi apart though is that it has its own rechargeable  battery inside meaning you do not need to power it via USB. The quoted battery life is 4 hours which is pretty generous. It means you don’t have to be tethered to your laptop via the USB connection and you can place the mifi anywhere in your home, vehicle etc where you get the best signal. Being so small it also means you can put it in your pocket and take it wherever you go. So imagine you are down the pub, your mobile phone data connection is slow so you decide to switch the mifi on, let your phone’s wifi detect it and connect to check on your emails, download those app updates etc. Your friend might have his iPad or Android tablet with him and he too can do some quick surfing at the same time. Or you are taking a road trip and 5 hours in the car seems like such a waste of time. Now your passengers can do some work on their laptop! I also use mine with my wireless printer so I can click print on my laptop and the signal is sent via the mifi to the printer in another room or another part of the motorhome.

Huawei E585 ‘mifi’ – Specifications

So what do you get in the box? Well besides the modem itself you get the battery and USB connection cable which allows you to charge it from your laptop. You also get a UK 3 pin plug with a USB slot and all the instructions you would expect. If you are a new customer you will also get your SIM card but I used my existing one. Generally the device will be locked to your network but it is possible to unlock these and use them with SIM cards from other mobile companies. The mifi only weighs 90 grams and seems really well made and tactile. It has an LED display that relays information like signal strength, battery life, number of devices currently connected and badwidth used and time connected during current session. The mifi also has a Micro SD slot that accepts cards up to 32GB so you can store additional data.

In summary I think the mifi is a great device and worth the asking price. If you are already a mobile broadband customer with a contract about to come up for renewal you might want to haggle to see if you can the mifi included in your next contract. I would happily recommend this product and my review rating for the mifi would be 9/10!

Rating: ★★★★★★★★★☆ 

My Top 10 Android Apps

My Top 10 Android Apps

1. MM Tracker. Hiking is one of my main hobbies and I also have a keen interest in gadgets. Just as many car drivers moved from paper maps to GPS devices, the hiking community has to some extent done the same. There is still a place for a paper map and compass skills but once you have used electronic versions of Ordnance Survey maps it’s hard not to be impressed. Now before the ‘luddites’ slag off technology I acknowledge that battery life on smartphones is an issue when using the GPS, as is weather proofing. Both these issues will be addressed though with external battery packs and special cases. One of the first companies to produce electronic OS maps for the UK was Memory Map. Other companies have since followed but each company uses it’s own format. Viewranger was one such company who responded to the huge increase in smartphone ownership, whilst Memory Map was slow. With so many people owning Memory Map maps, unwilling to buy the same thing again in another format, it was only natural there would be a demand for apps that would allow us to use these maps. The app that did this for Android owners is MM Tracker which works perfectly and only costs £4.99. Finally Memory Map produced an app for iPhone users at a price of £19.99. Finally lots of smartphone owners can use their Memory Map maps! For a keen hiker like me this has to be one of my top 10 android apps.
2. Gmail. When compiling a list of your Top 10 android apps it’s hard to ignore the Gmail app. Since Android is a Google operating system you would expect it to integrate well with other Google services….and it does! I probably use my phone more for checking and replying to emails than I do for making calls and sending text messages. Like all the best apps they have been designed to work well on the reduced size of a phone screen. The Gmail app is a good example, it does not look exactly the same as Gmail on a laptop but the app is intuitive and retains all the important features including labels. I have 3 email addresses in total, my Gmail address, and 2 domain email addresses I own including motorhomevagabond.com. All three are setup to be read in Gmail and using this app I can reply from any one of these 3 email addresses. It’s great to be able to answer emails on the go when on public transport or in a queue etc. I love this app!
3. CalenGoo. Now the android phone does come with a pretty decent calendar app but I deleted mine by accident when rooting the phone. Until recently I did not really use calendars much but I now prefer them to using a paper filofax or relying on memory! I’d read good things about CalenGoo and I liked the design on it. There are various views including Day, Week, Month and my personal favourite, Agenda. It syncs with my Google Calendar perfectly and after installing the Google Calendar Sync on my work PC, my outlook calendar is also now visible on the CalenGoo app. The app costs about £4.00 but I think it’s worth it and better than the free app.
4. Dolphin Browser. A recently installed app but it makes it into my top 10 Android apps. I’d been fairly happy with the default browser and I also download Opera. I have a huge interest in search engine optimisation and I like to check on websites’ pagerank and alexa ranking. On the PC I use Firefox with the search status plugin to do this. The Dolphin Browser for mobile phones, like Firefox offers lots of plugins. Now I use Dolphin almost exclusively and can check on pagerank and alexa rank on the go.
5. Dropbox. Dropbox is like an external hard drive where you can store your important files. The free service initially comes with 2GB which is plenty as long you as you don’t want to use it to store videos or your entire music mp3 collection. By having versions of dropbox on my PC and my phone I can look at and edit excel files or word docs on either device which has proved helpful more than once. You can share access to some of your folders too. Easily makes it into my top 10 android apps.
6. Paypal. I use the internet all the time and like most who do I have a Paypal account. Like all the best apps that have a desktop equivalent what you see on the phone app has been designed differently to make best use of the screen size of the phone.  All the important options are available and I’ve found it really useful to be able to quickly logon and transfer funds from my Paypal balance to my bank account while I’m on the move. One of the apps I use the most and therefore had to make it into my top 10 android apps.
7. PowerAMP. One of the few criticisms I have of the Orange San Francisco (ZTE Blade) phone is that the volume when listening to music files is not loud enough. The answer for me has been the PowerAMP app which is a music player with an attractive interface and graphic equaliser. By changing some settings on the graphic equaliser I’m able to get a sound acceptable to me that allows me to use the phone as my mp3 player too. There is a free limited version of the app but I bought the full version which costs £3.21
8. WordPress. For the last couple of years I’ve been converted to WordPress which represents everything that’s great about the internet. Open source software that is free to use, you can find attractive themes for free and have a really good website up in no time. What really makes WordPress one of the most popular platforms for web design though is the plugins that extend the functionality of the website without having to do lots of coding yourself. The Android app means I can now do a quick post on the move! Definately one of my top 10 android apps.
9. Pubtran London. Apps like these are invaluable when travelling in a large city like London. When you need to get somewhere they can tell you how to do it, what forms of transport to use and where you need to change. The app also seems to know about closures and engineering works and as such will often advise of replacement bus services. Technology really is clever and this had to be in my top 10 android apps.
10. Out of Milk. A simple app but it makes it into my top 10 andoid apps nonetheless. When you launch the app you are presented with three icons, Shopping List, To Do list and Pantry. I use the shopping list the most as I hate paper lists and I was forever going food shopping and fogetting at least one item I was supposed to get. When creating your shopping list you can either type in the items of scan the barcode of the packaging of an item you are about finish. Being single this does not apply to me but the Pro version has another clever feature where you and your partner can sync shopping lists so you don’t both end up buying the same items on the way home from work.

My Top 10 Android Apps

I settled on the above apps because they make my life easier and allow me to be more productive on the move. It was hard to decide on which 10 apps to pick from and I may do another top 10 android apps list in the future to tell you about other really clever or useful apps.

I hope you have enjoyed reading about my top 10 android apps and I welcome your comments about the apps that you love!

When mobile broadband first became popular in the UK it was not really suitable as your only connection if you, like me are a relatively high bandwidth user. Many contracts limited you to just 1GB per month and the charges for going over your limit were excessive.

3 Mobile Broadband

I was finally convinced to enter into a contract when 3 mobile broadband introduced a contract where for £15.00 per month they would give you 15GB. I’d never been a customer of 3 mobile broadband for any of my previous mobile phones and indeed some people said they were not the best provider for mobile phones 2G services. They had however invested heavily in 3G and their mobile broadband coverage was generally considered to be the best in the UK. The contract was for 24 months and I was supplied with a free Huawei 156G dongle which plugs into your laptop via a USB port. This dongle proved itself very reliable, I still own it and managed to easily unlock it after which I was able to use it with SIM cards from other networks in Europe during my tour in 2010. Another good feature of the Huawei 156G was the fact that it has a CRC9 connection for an antenna as can be seen in the image below. This connection was a little loose but I was still able to buy an antenna that boosted my signal, very useful!

3 Mobile Broadband Dongle - Huawei 156G

At the time of taking the contract I also bought a DT100 wireless router which I would connect the dongle to and then the DT100 would plug into the mains. I should perhaps explain that at the time I entered into the contract I had not yet purchased a motorhome and was still living a traditional lifestyle. The DT100 proved a clever gadget, allowing me to place the dongle wherever the signal strength was best in the house. It also came in handy when I wanted to share my 3 mobile broadband connection as others could ‘see’ the connection and use it if I gave them my password. This router was especially useful during my tour when it allowed both Joy and I to use the internet at the same time, though when wild camping it did mean powering it from a 12v-240v converter. Wireless routers like these are also very useful if you own a wireless printer, as I do.

3 Mobile Broadband

So what is the signal and coverage like on 3 mobile broadband? Well there are very few places in the UK where I’ve not been able to get a signal, and I travel extensively! In populated areas like cities you can expect to get a good connection. The speed of this connection often matches that of fixed line broadband. On my travels I’ve also found good signals in remote places like the Scottish Highlands. There have been a couple of times when getting a signal was difficult, for example remote places in the Lake District and parts of Cornwall spring to mind.

If you also own a USB dongle with a CRC9 type connection and you are interested in boosting your signal why not look at the following magnetic aerial. Magnetic and clip on antennas are omni directional, ideal if you don’t know where your nearest 3G mast is. If you know the location of the mast and prefer a directional antenna look at patch antennas, which can either be desk mounted or external units.

3G antenna 9dBi Huawei Connector

If your modem does not have a connection point for an antenna you can still buy the following product which fits over the outside of a USB dongle and has a SMA type socket the other end.

Clip on 3G to Antenna Adapter SMA Socket

You will then need to look at antennas suitable for SMA connections such as this:

3G antenna 13dBi SMA Plug Connector

When my first contract recently expired I decided to renew again as I still believe that in terms of coverage, bandwidth and cost, the service is still the best in the UK. If you want to find out more about their service visit the 3 Mobile Broadband website. My personal rating for 3 Mobile Broadband would be 8/10.

Rating: ★★★★★★★★☆☆ 

A motorhome is a small space to keep clean and using a normal domestic vacuum cleaner seems like overkill. Motorhome owners are always aware of space and weight, the maximum allowed payload can be easily exceeded if you are not careful! As a result a portable handheld vacuum cleaner seemed the best option.

The rechargeable handheld cleaners of the past were next to useless, the suction just was not good enough. When Dyson entered this market it all changed and finally it was possible to buy a product that actually did a proper job. Now Dyson products are not cheap but I’d rather spend a little more on something that actually works, rather than curse and spend longer on domestic chores!

Dyson DC30

At the time I bought my Dyson there were 2 main models to choose from, the Dyson DC30 and the Dyson DC31, the latter costing an additional £20.00 or so. In the end I opted for the cheaper Dyson DC30 which has a Dyson digital motor, 2 year guarantee and a 0.35 litre capacity bin. It weighs 1.2kg, has 40 Air Watts of suction power and can operate for 6 minutes before needing another charge. Like all Dyson cleaners the Dyson DC30 is bagless. The DC31 offers a few extra features, the main one is 2 power settings 38 Air Watts gives a 10 minute battery life or 65 Air Watts which gives 6 minutes battery life.

The Dyson DC30

The fact the Dyson DC30 is rechargeable suits me as I wild camp regularly and do not have access to 240v hookup. The battery life of 6 minutes does not sound much but I’ve found due to the good suction it’s enough for small spaces like motorhomes, caravans and car interiors. To recharge the Dyson DC30 battery takes about 3 hours and I always take the opportunity to recharge the battery when I have hookup.

The Dyson DC30 is very well made and easy to use. Emptying the bin is very easy as is taking the cleaner apart to clean, including removing the filter. It’s worth mentioning the filter, it’s a washable and reusable one, meaning you don’t have to buy spares and as a result surely better for the environment than disposable filters?

Dyson DC30 Summary

I’ve been very pleased with my purchase of the Dyson DC30. Some might argue that the 6 minute battery life is too short but for people with small spaces to clean like car interiors, motorhomes and caravans it’s certainly worth considering. The fact it takes up no valuable space and weight is a huge benefit and Dyson’s are the only handheld vacuums I would consider. My personal rating for this product would be 7/10. The Dyson DC30 would have scored higher if the price was slightly lower and the battery life longer.

Rating: ★★★★★★★☆☆☆ 

If you are interested in a Dyson DC30 or Dyson DC31 you can buy them online from Amazon:

Dyson DC30 Handheld Vacuum Cleaner (Latest Generation)

Dyson DC31 Handheld Vacuum with Dual Power Mode (Latest Generation)

I’ve always been interested in technology and gadgets but was relatively slow in adopting a smartphone, largely due to their huge cost. I’ve never been a particularly heavy user of text or minutes and as such many of the contracts available for such phones don’t represent good value. Buying something like the Apple iPhone outright to then use on a PAYG (pay as you go) basis also made little economic sense.

At the time I bought the Orange San Francisco mobile phone I was on a Tesco PAYG plan which was decent value in terms of texts and cost per call minutes but not great for data which is what I now use most of. What finally prompted me to purchase this phone was the fact that the phone was selling for less than £100.00 PAYG and also the emergence of the network giffgaff which offered free data on very reasonable PAYG deals.

When doing the research for smartphones I had pretty much settled on the idea to get one that was powered by the Android operating system. I had been intrigued by some of the apps I had used on the Symbian powered Nokia I had owned but it was clear that the 2 biggest markets in terms of number of apps were the iPhone and Android platforms. At first it looked like I would be buying a HTC Wildfire which was selling at £160.00 at the time. HTC Sense was a selling feature but the low resolution screen was regarded to be the main weakness of the device. For those that don’t know Sense is like an Android theme that HTC phones use which make the Android implementation much more user friendly than on some other Android phones. Futher Google research began to reveal that the Orange San Francisco mobile phone was very well regarded, especially by its users and after weighing up the pros and cons I decided this was the phone for me.

Orange San Francisco Mobile Phone

Orange San Francisco Mobile Phone

The Orange San Francisco mobile phone is made by a Chinese company called ZTE. Indeed in many countries the phone is known as the ZTE Blade. In terms of specification and performance it’s generally thought that nothing can touch it for the price. I won’t list the full specification of the phone here as you can get that from other websites. Generally it scores highly in terms of the screen, value for money and general feel and usability. If I had to find a weakness it would be the camera which is low quality but then I own a digital SLR so would never consider any mobile phones camera to be good enough! I also found that the when used as an MP3 player the phone was not as loud as I would like, something I fixed by downloading the Power Amp application which comes with graphic equalisers which allow you to modify the sound. Battery life is also not great but not really any worse than other mobile phones.

Orange San Francisco Mobile Phone

One important point I should mention is how upgradeable this phone is. It came shipped with Android 2.1 operating system and was locked to the Orange network. I hate the Orange network after a miserable time trying to deal with their customer services some years ago. Unlocking can be done for free and it’s easy. I also upgraded from Android 2.1 to 2.2 which in the process gets rid of all the Orange ‘crap’ that they put on the phone. Upgrading does invalidate your guarantee but the extra speed and functionality you get with newer operating systems makes it worthwhile.

Now that I’ve owned the phone some time I could not imagine life without it. The ease with which you can integrate it with your Gmail account and Google Calendar has made me more productive on the move. Many of the apps available are incredibly useful and there are too many of them to list them here. I will do another post soon though about my favourite Android apps.

So if you have been considering getting a smartphone but you have a limited budget, take a look at the Orange San Francisco mobile phone, it’s the best £100.00 I’ve spent in ages!