🙂 excellent conversion.

Some of the chatter within the thread, some possible answers.

It’s an ex emergency unit, so it’s been maintained to a high standard, it’s cheaper to drop in a new engine/gearbox than replace the vehicle, but high mileage is not uncommon, it might even be second time round the clock for a 10 year old unit on original engine, or second engine.

Anything with FERNO on it is spendy. The basic manual pump up stretcher is around £10K so direct bolt on floor mounts have second hand value.

Emergency units have in house cleaners so UV light sweep should come up negative. Light soiling is easily delt with, heavy soiling is sorted with deep steam cleaning, the saloon is designed to be easy to clean quickly. They are almost a rolling theater so high standard of daily cleaning during active shift and in downtime before next shift.
Non emergency PTS ambulances have a lesser cleaning regime and are deep steam cleaned every few weeks (depending on Trust or Contract)and daily cleaned by crews using them, or pulled from service and deep cleaned if heavy soiled.

Blue lights and sirens.
Lets just say……. if you happen to reactivate them, if they are in a state to be activated.
You really don’t want to get caught having a cheeky blues and 2’s moment to get through traffic.

The Pug Boxxer/FIAT/Merc sprinter type van units (more a converted white van) come in around the 3 ton mark equipped so if you have a restricted driving licence they are a better bet.
PTS units tend to be restricted to 68mph, no blues&2’s
PTS High Dependency units are not restricted and have bigger turbos 🙂

Was tempted by click and collect with Halfords, but wait was around a week before i could collect.

Tried CRC about 2 weeks ago, haven’t used them for years, paid whatever it was for next day service (£5 ?)

From point of ordering to actually getting the stuff in my hands was around 22 hours, will use them again.

I am from Minehead.
To relive boredom i have tried rigid 29er down fort william and raced down Glencoe.
You will be fine on a full susser. If you have some ability in your riding, rigid, HT, short travel susser will ramp up some excitement.
The Knights of Klunk used the area for a reason……….

There is no right or wrong bike, just the bike you have on that day, from epic xc to technical DH it’s all there (and the Quantocks too)

Nearest bikeshop is Pompeys in Minehead (say hello to Tim the mechanic)

Maybe don’t try to ride through the harbour, the mud is deep and smelly 🙂
Enjoy.

What sort of “cat”

Big **** off Exmoor beast type black panthers or cougars/mountain lions like the canadians and yanks get.
The big cats would eat the dogs and slower riders so win win 🙂

Seen some times, seen some post quali chat vids.
If she stays upright, and can trim 20 seconds off the time (or more) then she will be in the top 15 and worrying the top 10 bracket 🙂

I expect they will air her race run, failing that i expect it to crop up soon afterwards.

Seems to be enjoying the new bike geo and 650b was a culture shock but the Missle reckons she was holding back and the race run will be “exciting”

Not a fan, but enjoying the PR circus and hope she can worry the top ten. Appears to be legally tied to New York state until 2016, a good result tomorrow and i could see a big brand signing her up for a season.

YT have done a deal for this race so that should put them in good standing if she has a future.

I guess at the moment the american companys are a bit wary of having an ex-con represent there products.

From watching the quali video (which was slow and jerky on my PC) she only had to make 20th to race, so hitting 17th is a bonus. Would have to compare against other riders but she appeared to be coasting a lot. Could be playing safe for the race run then go nuts.
If she tops 15th then good go, if she makes topten or gets a close time just outside topten then i expect a post race flurry of offers.
If she makes 5th, then possibly open chequebooks before she gets off the podium.
YT gain a load of media PR either way so kinda win-win.

Rad girl gone bad girl now reformed good girl, the americans love an underdog and if she breaks top ten then a right feeding frenzy to come.

Just need ACC to have another go for old timesake 🙂

Cougar, your thinking along the right lines.

Roof top tents are far from a new idea and very popular with overland tours of Africa, there a large portion of the small wildlife can be unpleasant and quite toxic to your health, then you have the wildlife that views you as an English takeaway, although if a lion/tiger/panther/meateater with big teeth really wants to eat you it will investigate a top tent.
Then we have the big heavy weights, cattle/elephants/rinho/hippos a stampede through a camp or just a hippo coming to have a wander through late at night…..tent on the ground is no protection.

In reality for UK, if it’s very wet, possible minor flooding or you pitch up in a field full of curious cows then they will be of use.

Another factor is freeing up vehicle space, you can carry lots of weight on the roof and sleep inside the vehicle, this makes a top heavy vehicle and prone to falling over when serious offroading.

Carrying all the water and spare fuel low down is more stable and secure when in remote locations.

Look for the Pinzgauer and Steyr overlanders 🙂

Watching with interest as a route i would like to do.

Sourlies to Inverie path. What 13thfloor monk said, i have seen chatter that the wire/slatted footbridge has been repaired, this takes you off the marsh and up to the pass (cluster of ruins there as well) when i used it a couple of years ago it was bad but useable.

The pass is a zig zag slog upwards, depends on skill/fitness and bike weight you might ride some sections then walk most.

However, once at the top you have a good path and miles of downhill coasting 🙂

The B&B cafe at Kinlochourn is a bit quirky, think more farmhouse sideline than a dedicated cafe 🙂 nice home made cakes.

🙂
Heard many a tale of 50+mph descents on some of the hills.

More from the canti/v-brake era of mountain bikes….. but the smell of melting brake pads was a hint to leave a big gap to the smelly rider so if/when the heat transfer through the rim popped the inner tube you could stop in time yourself, happy days 🙂

A bloke in 2 photos up there, for some strange reason a character from spaced comes to mind “wheels” 🙂

Is the giant rider this years underdog hero 🙂

Mark90, that’s the bridge heading north, other slogan is other side heading south 🙂

Si of cannock, thats pure gold will check out the link, thanks.

Fast Haggis, yes the camels are still there, the Wicker man at Bridgwater is being urbanised with a new estate going up around it, i won’t be surprised if it gets torched again 🙁

Peas and Pies, millitant foodies on a rampage.

Maybe (with Moses name link) it’s a local legend.

Tended to clean them of the factory packing grease/lube and re-lube with something thinner when i was racing. Chains got cleaned lots, if it was a muddy race then they got cleaned before race runs and re-lubed.

Varying choices of cleaning agent….. jam jar of unleaded or thinners or proper degreaser/solvent…..of course do so at your own risk 🙂

Been singlespeed for the last few years so not really bothered.
The old logic was the factory stuff made for a sticky chain, so a full degrease and relube was a small performance gain and better shifting.
Most likely in practice with Time trailers and road racers, i expect there is a chart somewhere showing wattage variation of sticky lubed and cleaned light lubed chains.

For DH racing yes but don’t expect a long life span.

For xc, it will be draggy but don’t expect a long life span, although as the tread blocks go they do speed up a bit.

Tarmac will give your legs a real good work out, bit like riding into a headwind 🙂

Ta, i know where you are now and parking is easy.

I was quietly thinking to myself that there hasn’t been a sale for ages and it’s post xmas so people might be having a turf out.

Be looking for some roadie bits, drops,posts, wheels maybe calipers, more of the older steel frame fitting gear.
Never been to a bike jumble before.

🙂 won’t be testing any kayaks, too cold to get a wet bum

Yep…….keep missing the Bristol one 🙁

From memory, your on the open plaza next to the canoe/kayak shop ? i can vist two things at once 🙂

Try a specialized concept store, they do custom builds, several shops around the UK and more direct link than local shops.

In the past Spesh have been picky about what they sold in the UK and frame only options or colourways available in other countries had to be a long wait custom order via a LBS or a direct import from a USA or Euro shop that would ship to UK.

Test rode a Sir 9 with matching steel fork, while it was comfy and a joy to ride for xc, when pushed i found the fork a bit flappy, brake judder and toe overlap.

I went KM, they have a rep for a harsh fork. If only doing xc maybe change the fork. For me when i gave it some stick it had direct steering and stable, only broke the lower headset bearing.
If ridden hard or a heavyweight rider or the bike will be loaded up then a good workhorse.
From ragging one in DH races it was immense fun, like a roided up bmx with a nice comfy ride. The more it was pushed the nicer it was, apart from bursting a headset bearing 🙂
I got a 2011, the facelifted frame design but the last year of the v-canti brake mounts, the frame is a keeper.

If i had Sir9 money to drop i would consider a custom frame as well.

At the time i did consider a Swift, but the KM had more options, Swifts are nice though….

Shock Shuttles, what it says on SX trail ones.
(High BB) HT=67.5o
(Low BB) HT=66.5o

As with others, run a long full outer.
There is a cable tie on the downtube, and one on the chain stay, the bikes had a coupler (clip on tie) that ran between the frame above the BB, this allowed both cables (front+rear mech cables) to be loosely tied and not flap about.
Spare shock shuttles are like rocking horse poo 🙂

Spxxky, they tend to do better if you drop them while reading on the bog, unless you have a waterproof tablet or smart phone 🙂

Not a roadie but i do pick up cycling weekly from time to time, mostly if it has cx stuff on the cover, as with leggyblonde pretty much matches what you want.
Had a thumb through one last night, thursday is the new edition day and i think it was £3

Edit.
No good for ride routes, partial to the american Road Bike Action (sister mag of mountain bike action) the november issue tends to be cx focused as start of season, and the big bike show, vegas-Eurobike photo specials are nice for shiny thing dreaming. But it’s more focused on home american market/races

Yep i was posting so your link showed after my question 🙂

Real deal then, causal $10 several choices up to Elite spec at $20 how many of the diy’ers on here will be busy copying them 🙂

I see lemonysams piccy, early april fool or real gadget?

I thought this was going to be about the TOGs, or those new micro barends that actually sit on the inward end of grips, bar-in-ends thumb over grips.

5 caps and canal jobs.

Last one i opted for a goldie as it was only several quid more than a white one, think that was around £80 all in.

Maybe twenty years ago or longer, it was costly at the time 🙂 no dramas since, only thing thats stays with me was the nerve removal, i remember joking about the movie Marathon Man with my dentist….. anyway once the nerve was “removed” from the root, didn’t feel a thing after that.

Wham bars and quality street toffes, proper filling rippers 🙂

I remember the mozo pro adverts, did Palmer ride for RST for a bit ?

Still got an alu LTS and a Thermoplastic one knocking around the trials locally, well we did have, last time i saw either was only like a year or so ago.

Atom Lab are still going and dosen’t that Danny Mac fella use them 🙂

Mike scaled things back, a big product line cull as they where doing stems/bars/rims/hubs/forks/pedals/ hardtail and suspension frames/cranks and a few other bits. It was only a few blokes working from a lock up kinda set up, and Mike also had other brands on the go so it went back to basics, always loved the red-white frame colour ways.

Hora old chap, i don’t know your timescale, but if not in a mad rush i would advise a trip to Bristol for the Bespoked Bike show.

You get multiple choices to empty your wallet and chat to the builders.

You can also quiz the tubing companies as they attened the show too, the man from Reynolds is very very helpfull.

Ahh the iron horse scandal.

From memory, fella at the top was selling stock out the backdoor for cash, these bikes found there way into discount stores priced for retail way below what the actual bike shops paid trade for.
This devalued the brand in america as they got viewed as cheapo bikes, proper bike shops dropped them over it, and all sort of happened just as they hit the big time with world cup wins. Really good bikes, fella at the top really scored a massive own goal……. 🙂

On Slingshot bikes (the ones with a steel cable for a downtube) on-one where selling those maybe 4 years ago.

Hard to compare old tracks against current tracks 🙂

Jesse did the multilap dh enduro on a rigid raider, so was around 12mins, i think his best on hardtail was 5.50mins i know steve larkin did around 6.38 on a dialled alpine in the sds a few years back, think my best was around 8.13mins in the dh enduro but i am old and unfit 🙂 i did try it on a big bike and with actually trying to slow the damn tank down i hit 7mins without trying (spesh sx trail)

I have nearly…….become king of the knights clunker, which involves a pootle down a big hill in somersetshire on very crap bikes with brake systems being more for show than actually working, my clunker racer might convert to a “lets try cx, what could go wrong…” as the brakes might be good for that until they clog with mud and jam the wheels anyway 🙂

Just an after thought, having had a chop at and racing a wc dh track.

I could ride fort william all right on my km.
Trying to do a multi lap or single timed race run at full pace is a different matter, first thing to go would be vbrakes in favour of discs and more burly wheels 🙂

Mtbel, what track and when?

I had a chop at fort william from the white wallride through the lower woods to the motorway on a surly km with track wheels and vbrakes.
I didn’t race the dh enduro like that.
Jesse did race on a rigid spesh P2 alu frame on 8″ discs his lap times where around 11.30-14mins the same rider on the same bike with a suspension fork came 4th overall one year with around 6min lap times.

I have raced a macavalanche and some woodland riders dh races on the rigid vbrake monkey………. Discs would be much nicer 🙂 rock gardens are what one would call “exciting”

If serious about getting a podium then after skill, fittness and taking your current bike as far as you can, then it’s time to splash the cash for a dedicated race bike fit for purpose.
As i don’t worry about podiums i get to be weird and race a bike many wouldn’t 🙂

I think it was a quiet year of evolved products, over some years when loads of new stuff gets shown.

Still, my mate got all dippy over Palmer, got a signed piccy and posed for a photo so he was well chuffed, found his bike as well and had a good look over that.

Lot of Fat action, had a quick spin on an Ice cream Truck ( i think ) used the outside chess and draughts sets for nimble turning testing and trying to bottom out the tyres.

Eye catcher was an All city ” Macho King” i caught the 853 badge on the silver fade paint job with matching Whisky carbon fork, liked that, just looked up the price and still like it but can’t justify a £1100.00 cx frame and fork 🙂

Raceface beer sling was just made for SSUK 🙂
And quite liked the bikepacking gear from Apidura, frame and bar and saddle packs, haven’t looked at prices yet but looked very nice.

Also never been a fan of poles.

Borrowed a pair and decided worth a punt for some stuff.
Did notice less fatigue and strain on the body.

Only a few times a year useage expected. After a lot of looking about i gambled on Karrimor x-lite carbon poles, was £30 from field and trek few years back.
They are within a few grams of minimum claimed weight and took some abuse with no dramas, very handy when fording rocky river beds or trying to thread down rocky decents with 2 rucksacks on (bit of drama, hence carrying 2) lost a basket mid walk, did notice the differance in mud without it.
Although a tight fit, Leki baskets fit, so i could fit the larger snow baskets if i went snow walking.
Very happy with mine.

Mine don’t ride like a 70’s delivery bike 🙂

In fairness to Sov, back in 2008 you might have been murdered out for suggesting disc brakes on road race bike or CX bike on forums.
The older KM was well known for being picky with rear disc brakes and racks.

Years ago Streetfighters mag did a spoof tax disc with “tax in the pub” scrawled over it. Might still have it somewhere as i think it was illegal to display it 🙂

Did mine on sunday, used the new beta system on the dvla website, no dramas, will print off the receipt email though and leave that in the car as a reminder.

I concluded that people that live nearby and vist the shop get treated normally.

People that mail order and can’t get to the shop get treated like crap because the staff don’t have to worry about face to face contact with an irate ripped off punter who is bigger than the shop staff.

Still… only a week late to the thread, took 3-4 months to get my money back via credit card company.

Did you get the order ?

Any pics of Caroline Alexander ? she was lovely and fast and i think raced Klein’s

My old mental image might be a bit rose tinted 🙂

Missed a class, fairly new one, really cheap too.

Primitive. Self made bow. Arrows must be wooden with self cut nock’s no glue on plastic string nocks.

So knock up a dozen arrows for about £40, get a bow string about £10 then find a nice stick £free and off you go.

Found an account of a chap doing just this for the Primitive class at last years NFAS champs. He turns up with arrows and a string, signs in, wanders off into the woods, finds a nice lump of wood/stick/branch bit of whittling and he shot all weekend and had immense fun……did crap…..but enjoyed himself.

Might try that meself 🙂