All on wife's 2008 Rockhopper:

Merlin built (and BARGAIN!) xc717 on XT hub
SRAM 970 cassette
SRAM 991 chain
New Deore HT2 chainset (it was octalink I think)
Stuck my old front wheel (DT Swiss/Spesh Stout) on the front
Sauserwinds front and back.

Rode it on my 13 miler this morning and it's really good – definitely lighter and much more slick shifting.

Thanks to Merlin for the parts and my friendly mobile bike mechanic for fitting it all! The old chainset needed angle grinding off!!

Mine's in for a few minor tweaks too.

Angle grinding!? Did he not have a crank removal tool!?

"Thank to Merlin for the parts"

eh? You did pay them for them didn't you?

Wheels don't match. Expect abuse.

SB – wheels will match soon…

njee – it was completely stuck due to overtightening when it was built in the factory.

Clubber – I did!

Huh? You can't overtighten them, the splines are only so deep, unless the threads in the crank arm got stripped that sounds very odd.

Well he showed me the angle grinded crank arm and it has been ground off. TBH I didn't really ask – he knows his stuff, he has SRAM backing him as a race mechanic so I just trust him.

Anyway, new bits are good.

All on wife's 2008 Rockhopper:

Rode it on my 13 miler this morning

"Why do you need another bike??"

"Well this ones for you.."

That old chestnut huh?

RealMan – she rides it a lot. In fact she was the 2nd female in a local tri last year 7 months after having our little boy. She's a really rapid downhiller and decent climber.

In fact she was the 2nd female in a local tri last year 7 months after having our little boy.

You tight sod, at least buy her a proper road bike, she'd have won! 😀

Tsk tsk! Was an offroad MTB ride. A road bike would have broken many times over!

Should've lent her the Stumpy then!

I've just remembered – she used my bike (the Stumpy HT) for that tri event!

We are almost the same height – rather handy/

We are almost the same height – rather handy

can also share clothes.

We are almost the same height – rather handy/

Hmmm, if my girlfriend wanted to use my bikes I'd be rather irritated, can see it's handy for her though 🙂

You are easily irritated Nick 😉

njee – 99% of the time, she used the Rockhopper but this was a race so we thought the Stumpy would be better – it was.

She's due (2nd baby) in Feb so the riding is on hold for a while now. Bike is ready for when she's back in action! Just thought I'd test it to make sure everything was working fine.

Thom – only underwear.

You are easily irritated Nick

This is an accurate fact!

It was a very tongue in cheek comment, my girlfriend has a Rockhopper too, if she entered a race and we were the same size I would very happily lend her my Fuel. As it is we're not, and she has no particular interest in racing!