If y’all don’t like it, cancel your subs.

I have…

I’ve got a (now very old) Lowe Alpine Airzone – it has a suspended harness, which I really like, particularly when climbing Wellington’s (many) hills, and is super-stable on my back. It is big enough for a 16″ Macbook (in a zipped sleeve), headphones, clothes and washbag with enough leeway to pack waterproofs for the capricious springtime weather.

It looks like it’s no longer made, but the Airzone Velo looks pretty similar…

Sorry, I’m very late to the party, having other things to do…

This quote caught my eye:

By your logic if we should allow any region of the UK that doesn’t have influence over Westminster to secede, right? How about Devon and Cornwall?

This is what this entire argument is about, right? Government in a democracy is *supposed* to be representative. That’s the point. If you don’t have influence over your government it’s not a democracy.

A pretty significant percentage of the Scots believe that the government they have is *not* representative, that they have no influence. Secession is a reasonable to thing to ask in that case. It would certainly also be for Devon and Cornwall (and maybe they’ll think about it if the Scots succeed!)…

We got a woodburner a few years ago and loved it. Then a very good friend – who works as an air quality consultant – pointed out the levels of PM2.5s that are produced by woodburners; even DEFRA-approved ones. Not used any more…

BMJ says that woodburners in the UK produce 2.4 times as much PM2.5 pollution as traffic; a study from Sheffield University found that woodburners release dangerous levels (compared to WHO limits) of PM2.5 and PM1 (that’s the really nasty sh!t that can cross cell walls) into the home.

May I enquire as to why she doesn’t like / enjoy this?

Hmmm – that’s a difficult one. I think part of it is drop bars (although she has a Ribble road bike that she loves); the cable-actuated disks (BB7s) are pretty uninspiring; the frame and fork are both pretty flexy, and I think a big part of what she dislikes is the liveliness of the ride – when loaded up for road touring, it can be a handful on descents.

She freely admits that she went for it because of the colour and the skinny tube profiles…

Thanks folks – lots to peruse there…

The OP doesn’t give a price point?!

No, no price point at this stage!

I’m going to second the Ortlieb Front Roller Classics.

That said, I’ve been using an Ortlieb Office Bag, which is basically a rectangular briefcase with clips for the pannier, for about 20 years – it’s bombproof and pretty easy to carry off the bike (as long as you don’t want to go far) plus it has loads of room. I might treat myself to one of their Commuter-bags if that one ever dies!

The thing about Ortlieb stuff is that the initial teeth-sucking expense is offset by the indestructibility – make sure you like whatever you buy because you’ll be leaving in your estate.

Isn’t there something about being able to see blue being evolutionary speaking a very recent thing for humans

No – the majority of primates (definitely all apes and most old-world monkeys) are trichromatic. So, being able to see blue wavelengths likely predates the split between apes and old-world monkeys and that was around 25Mya.

Interestingly, most other mammals are dichromatic, except marine mammals which are generally monochromats. Most fish, birds and reptiles are tetrachromats.

may be an explanation for why there are (were) no separate words for blue and green in Welsh (and some other languages I think)?

Not unless Welsh (and come other languages) predate our simian ancestors…

our brains usually perceive colours that our eyes don’t have actual receptors for (i.e. colours other than red, green and blue).

Technically, and this is a quite interesting fact, most humans actually see blue, green and yellow. Our “long” cone receptors generally pick up light in the 565-580nm range, which is definitely yellow. They’re also the most numerous – and this is partly why “hi-viz” is so often yellow.

My view is that it’s difficult to overtension spokes without making the wheel impossible to true (it will start “pringling”) or damaging the rim or nipples. It might be controversial, but I think that if you’ve got a round rim that is flat in the plane perdendicular to the axle, centred and there is no damage to nipples or nipple-beds, you *cannot* have too much tension.

Normally, spokes snapping is the result of too *little* tension – as the wheel loads up during rotation, the transient loads on spokes increase too much. A wheel with even, high (as possible) tensions will load all of the spokes pretty much evenly, and so will last for ages.

As @branes points out, though, spokes rarely snap in the middle unless there is something else going on.

Threaded the chain on the rear mech correctly?

Yes, definitely the right side of the tab – I’ve made that mistake before!

You’ve got enough clearance between the upper jockey wheel & cassette ?

Yes – and adjusting the b-tension made no difference to the noise.

Miss-matched wear?

All unused parts.

At the moment my best guess is that it’s the chain. It does still make noise under load, although it seems much better after its first fettling ride.

Thanks all for the ideas…!

Sorry, OT rant deleted.

And this thread neatly sums up why humans are racing towards extinction…

I only just saw this today. Made a donation and there will be a postcard from sunny Wellington, NZ on its way to Ren tonight.

I think a lot of people will be surprised to learn that the 20mph limits ARE NOT ENFORCEABLE in most areas. Contact your local authority. I know LCC did not provide the local legislation to enforce the 20mph limit (might have changed more recently?) on a cost basis.

This is flat wrong – the The Road Traffic Regulation Act 1984 (Amendment) Order 1999 (so, not *that* recent) defines 20mph limits; these are enforceable by law and councils no longer need to seek approval from the appropriate Secretary of State.

Awesome! Thank you all so much – I’ll have to start digging to see what I can get over here.

@MoreCashThanDash – good call – up to 700c x 50 (although, clearly, it’s not going to be a ‘c’ tyre if it’s 50mm wide!)…

You can also add “+<whatever-you-want-here>” to a gmail account and it will still send to your email.

user@gmail.com
user+spamtrap@gmail.com
user+spareaddress@gmail.com
user+1@gmail.com

All these send to the same inbox.

Hmmm. I’m not certain that you can blame the voices of, what, 17.4m people solely on the internal machinations of the Tory party. We could blame their choice on the tabloids, but that’s a dangerous path to go down: the people can’t be trusted to make democratic decisions for themselves, or to work out what the truth is, so we should restrict the information that they receive and make those decisions for them?

I think it was a spectacularly stupid decision, but I thought that of the election of Cameron with a majority – which was what precipitated the whole referendum.

What’s really disappointing me at the moment is that the left of British politics seems to be mostly stuck in hand-wringing and complaining – rather than embracing what has been inevitable for at least three years now, and painting a picture of what a progressive, fair, environmentally sensitive UK could look like, freed from the more negative aspects of European Union: the corporatism and the neo-liberalism. For all the good that the EU represented, let’s not forget that the organisation essentially imposed an idealogical austerity on the Greek people in direct convention of *their* democratic voice (and not in a referendum, either) when they explicitly and overwhelmingly chose a government that had pledged to default on their debts (mostly to German banks).

Thanks all for the responses.

@Bunnyhop – avascular necrosis is the biggest risk at the moment: the fracture was very close to interrupting the blood supply. I’m being very good about observing my non-weight-bearing status and my guess is that the 6 weeks off the leg was all about minimising that risk.

I think the recovery is going well – even since writing this yesterday I’m up to around 80° of flexion in my knee, and the physio came today and got me climbing and descending stairs for the first time. I even made it out into that rarest of things – Wellington sunshine without a gale – for my first significant walk (well, hobble on crutches) outside. Unfortunately, this being Wellington, every route out from my front door involves a steep hill…!

Thanks again for all the sympathetic comments!

I’m not sure that I agree with beefy that you’ll save money (unless you buy blank spokes in bulk and a thread-cutter) but it is a hugely satisfying thing to learn and you will never fear an out-of-true wheel again. Plus, if you’re prepared to take the time, your hand-built wheels will last like no other – as others have pointed out, there’s no magic to it and the more time and care you’re prepared to put in, the stronger the wheel will be. I really enjoy spending a winter evening building a wheel…

Thanks for all the info, folks.

@twisty – yes, s71806 bearings and they are angular contact bearings (didn’t know that meant they had to be preloaded).

@abingham – thanks, I’ll keep that in mind when I reassemble.

I have two – my Banshee Spitfire and my custom WaltlyTi hardtail (“Slacker”). I think these will likely be the last two mountain bikes I’ll own and if I was forced to give up one of them it would, very regretfully, be the Spitty.

Slacker is long enough and slack enough to take on trails that are way beyond my skill level (or cajones), but it keeps making me want to try more; it’s also lively enough to take on Wellington’s twisty hillside trails; all that and comfy enough to deal with a long day in the saddle.

Of course, that is assuming I get to keep my drop-bar bikes, one of which is my Salsa Fargo, that takes on bike packing (and touring, and commuting) duties…

No, you won’t notice the difference due to the wheels. The tyre choice will make much more difference and, if they’re on different bikes, geometry will be next.

I would strongly recommend trying a Linux-on-a-USB-stick before you break the screwdrivers out. You should be able to have, for example, Ubuntu up and running in a few minutes, connect to your wifi and get the image files off.

There’s also a lesson here about anti-virus software…

@kelvin – sorry if my response came across as petulant; I genuinely appreciated the succinctness!

Yeah, I’m aware I can go up at the chainring and the largest sprocket, and that’s what I’m planning. I was just hoping I could do all of it!

Awesome – thanks, kelvin, for a super-succinct answer!

OP – can you give us a detailed account of how you live your life/house/holidays/leisure pursuits before […]

This sentiment neatly encapsulates why we’re doomed – so many people are unwilling to do anything, or even accept criticism of their choices, until everyone else in the world has made the changes they’re unwilling to contemplate.

However, the key thing is that we can’t change our trajectory towards extinction until we fundamentally change the way our societies work. Why would we expect people to avoid buying SUVs when they are effectively so heavily subsidised by our governments?

Cheers but I need boost, otherwise I would have snapped them up.

I thought all Pikes were boost these days?

I use Adidas Evil Eye half-rims with inserts – I’ve just given up contact lenses because of all the disposable plastic involved. Honestly, I really miss contacts and planar (Oakley) shades. The Adidas inserts are a faff – they need cleaning much more regularly, they fog up between the lens and the insert and once a bit of sweat or mud gets between lens and insert you have to stop, dismantle and clean. The Adidas sunglass lenses seem to be made of some sort of transparent cheese, although the inserts themselves seem to be resisting scratching a bit better. I can’t recommend them.

Folks – apologies for the delay in responding and thanks for your suggestions.

@joebristol – it’s my commuter/tourer, so it does quite a lot. Plus, I’m living in Wellington, so it does a *lot* of hills and I am getting through brake pads quickly.

@parksie – honestly, I didn’t even know there was a reach adjustment! I’ll have a check.

One of the things I was hoping someone might know (or might know where to point me) are the diameters of the pistons in the Rival road calipers versus the Guide RSC calipers. I’m about to start digging through the SRAM service catalogues…

@happybiker = the highlights are (built around a 150mm Pike 29er):
Head angle: 65 degrees
Seat angle: 74 degrees
Reach: 475mm
Chainstay: 430mm

Thanks @tomhoward – I thought that was what I was doing. Ho hum.

@big_scot_nanny: I did a compare and contrast of the raw figures with bikes I liked the look of or had ridden and knew I liked, searched for opinions on here, did a *lot* of reading and then used rattlecad to check that my figures produced a frame that at least *looked* OK. Then I bit the bullet and sent them to Sumi. We had several iterations of working through their drawings.

I’m blown away by the quality of what they’ve produced. The welds are beautiful. I’ve not done a lot of riding on it yet – but, so far, it feels awesome. Climbs incredibly well and feels like it’s dying to go down really steep stuff!

Aaah, bugger.
Slacker

Can’t get images working.

@mikeys – no, and I totally accept that the accuracy of the meter is likely questionable. Still, it would have to be reading *very* low, I think, and my secondary tensiometer (plucking and my ear) suggests that I’m on the low end of taut enough. I’ll try a tone-comparison against another 650B wheel.

The Spank FAQ suggests building the wheels on the looser side, though – I’ll try taking a half-turn off every spoke and see where that leaves me.

So, this is a pretty solid rim – I think it’s had the least response to small adjustments of any rim that I’ve ever worked with (it’s an i35 32H, so there is a lot of material between each spoke). That made it all the more surprising that it deflected so much.

I’ll try going through a few iterations of the process of tensioning, truing, stress relieving. I will try the “stand on it” method (I’ve always used my hands or an old crank, pushed into the crossings and twisted). I think I’ll give @joebristol’s method a try – even up all the tensions (probably on the low-tension, non-rotor side),

@dovebiker: interestingly, the Park Tools app defaults to 20%!

I should also say: thanks everyone for your thoughts!

@NewRetroTom:

I haven’t seen the stories about Mark Beaumont, but surely rolling threads onto a spoke is how they’re made in the first place; so, a spoke with a few new threads rolled on to it will be exactly as strong as one without? What am I missing?

I’ve seriously considered getting the tools to do it myself (that is, cut threads into blanks) but I don’t build wheels often enough to make it worthwhile…

The Roads Were Not Built For Cars

I’m not sure I understand where all the hate comes from, myself.

There are *loads* of e-bikes of all stripes here in Wellington – maybe not so surprising given the wind and the hills. I’m a fan, personally, even though I don’t want one for myself – at least partly because both of the last two commutes home along the Hutt Road, into the teeth of a northerly, I’ve been able to tuck in behind an e-bike and get pulled along at a much better pace than I’d have managed myself! It is mildly demoralising to have a granny on an sit-up-and-beg blast past you like you’re standing still on the hills, though.

Still, the more riders we have, the better; especially given how shit NZ drivers are.

Quick question: the legal limit for e-bikes in the UK is that the motor won’t provide any assist beyond 15mph, right? Anyone know what the power output (in W) is, generally?