Lidl
 

Popped in Lidl today and saw one of those small oil suction pumps for changing oil etc. £12.99 if I remember correctly.

They're advertising Parkside 50L compressors for £119 this weekend, quite a selection of air tools too.

Those look interesting. Now what excuse do I need to buy them? I wonder if we even get those offers over here.

EDIT: Just checked their website and turns out the Lidl stores in NI started selling this stuff yesterday, so chances are slim anything will be left by tomorrow.

You can get a 50L compressor from SGS for less than that:
https://www.sgs-engineering.com/air-...air-compressor

I have their 6L compressor, which I use for inflating tyres, blowing out the dust in PCs, etc. Had it several years now. It's been a great little compressor.

Not so good for us in NI. £43 extra to post the compressor. Will have to go see if I can pick up a compressor and the sand blasting kit at least.

Wow. Why is delivery so expensive and difficult to NI? You're still part of the UK, right?

That is a very contentious issue with people living here. We've always been treated like we're some far off country and delivery arrives on the back of a pony.

I have noticed in the last year or so that a lot of eBay sellers won't even deliver to NI, or for that matter to outlying islands and Northern Scotland. Something to do with their being too many types of courier available, and I suppose they probably get some sort of discount by staying with one courier. What's really worse is that some will offer international delivery to Southern Ireland but won't even deliver within the UK. It's cheaper for them to post something half way around the world than to post within the UK. :-(

FWIW, the sand “blaster” will probably be useless! They need a lot of air!

I agree about sandblaster, I had one included along with several other tools when I bought compressor and it's not that powerful, creates a lot of dust and does not want to work with regular sand so you need to buy expensive special sand.

That's a pity. I have two cast iron fireplaces in the bedrooms which have been painted numerous times over the past 90+ years. I was thinking I could sandblast them back to bare metal and then get some proper black paint for them.