WildCard

Hi, everyone. This morning I just received news sent to my wife via SMS from the aunt. At around 3:00am in the morning, a brain scan by the doctor & hospital revealed that the brain is no longer receiving blood flow. The doctor has certified Raiyan to be effectively brain-dead. The family has made the very sad decision to take him off life-support as of 6am this morning. Original SMS from the aunt. Apologies for the misspells as she tends to keep her messages brief: Funeral wake is at the address above (651b Jurong West St 61 #05-360). Those who remembered this charity drive and the boy it was for, do go if you can.

I am considering a 2nd hand car. Its sort of a 'trial' to see if I have means to look after a car (not financial-wise but savvy-wise).

Noted. Its mostly due to my son and, at times, my elderly parents.

Wow. Thanks bro. Didn't realize that someone posted before. Diff is, I'm not planning on an Class 2 bike but rather down to a small basic transport bike for work and commute. Might mod it some but not like I had done with my big cows previously. I thought as much and have the same thinking about fighting the temptation to "don't think, just drive everyday" with an OPC car. But I wanted some opinions from those who have done it before. Thanks for your input. Will love to listen to some more.

Heyos, bro. Thanks for the reply. Maybe my intention didn't get through. Getting a full-plate car might lead to temptation to drive everyday, especially on rainy days, to work. An OPC car kinda 'forces' me to keep it to weekends only, especially when there is the hassle of getting and buying a day-use coupon. So its a major reduction in mileage in comparison. Maybe I should phrase my query this way: In comparison to using a full-plate car daily and using an OPC strictly on weekends (and certain off-peak days) with a small bike for daily use, would there be any significant differences in operating costs? That means, maintenance, petrol and similar variables. Insurance, road tax and parking are relatively fixed.

Need some input from owners of an OPC car and small bike. Situation is like this: I'm thinking of getting a small family car for weekend use recently. At present, I'm using my Africa Twin to send my wife to work in the East before I head off to work in Central. We stay in the West. On weekends, we usually spend most of Saturday at my parent's place and might head out for some minor shopping after that. Sunday is rest day or some light outing with my family. Now, my wife might be transferred to a new site office in the West as well with transportation provided to send her within 10 minutes of our house. So its now just me and my bike to work. I'm thinking of downgrading to a smaller bike (say a used $2K-$3K Phantom 200) and get an used OPC car for weekend family outings and trips with my wife & son and sometimes my parents along. The bike will be used only by me on weekdays to work and weekends for quick trips to the grocers and such. I saw some ads in SGCarMart for a 1.2-1.3 Suzuki Swift auto OPC for like 200++ a month. Have driven one for the weekend after passing my Class 3 last week and it seemed perfect for my needs. My questions would be: 1. Most importantly, for my situation and usage plan, would it be worth it to get a OPC for weekend family use and a cheap bike for weekday work commute? 2. Any significant difference in maintenance and petrol costs between a normal-plate car and an OPC? Expenses like road-tax and season HDB parking are fixed so I'm aware of that but would like to know more on the variables like above.

Yes, if they are parking wardens assigned for illegal parking enforcement duties. I suppose no if they are those on escort duties.

Try not to use WD40. WD40 tends to wash off any form of lubrication in the keyhole and dry off itself, leaving the ignition keyhole dry of any grease and making the 'tightness' worse or even encourage rust to set in. Try using a dry-film lubricant. GT85 comes to mind as it leaves a film of Teflon behind. Alternatively, use chain-lube. Singer Oil is useful but it washes off easily at the first signs of rain or bike wash.

1. Clam chowder pasta (ok, I cheated with Campbell's canned clam chowder soup) 2. Fried pasta (as opposed to using tomato, we use local flavorings like biryani spices, fried rice spices, etc) 3. Basic American breakfast and lunch set 4. Basic garden salad 5. General-purpose beef / chicken patties (handmade and frozen overnight) 5. My specialty: anything with tom yam (tom yam soup, tom yam noodle, tom yam macaroni, tom yam spaghetti, etc) All self-learnt since my son was born and I didn't have the heart anymore to make my wife wake up earlier than me to prepare our breakfast and my lunchbox....

Sounds cheap. I remembered GMax the distributor advertised at $695. I doubt with installation.

Brand new or used?

Just get more HDD space? You could spend a bit on a cheap SATA RAID card and do a RAID 1 on 2 1TB HDD. Will never lose your movies that way.

Last I heard, 16GBs are out. 32GBs might be too. Enough to load an OS to use as a flash-boot disk.