I’ve got a set of Panracer Ribmo’s on one of my bikes.

The cons are:
1 – a bit pricey and
2 – you need steel tipped fingers to get them on and off the rims.

The pros are:

1 – nice fast rolling tyres
2 – they can take a decent amount of pressure
3 – they seem virtually indestructable (which is just as well given how tough they are to work with). In over two years of hard use I’ve had no problems with them and I haven’t had a single puncture yet.

There have been a few threads to discuss these things. From what I can gather they are rubber bands for idiots with a handy built in shiny bit so that us normal people can spot the idiots from a distance and thereby avoid having to speak to them or make eye contact. It is a little kinder than having the word MORON branded on their foreheads.

No frustrations. My 29er does exactly what I expect it to do. Its just a bike after all.

Opps, double post.

forum post, not gate post that is :wink:

Rule 83:
Stuff The Rules

I agree. If I know that the saddle bag on my road bike contains everything I need for a ride (spare tube, tyre levers, multitool) then I know I can just get on and ride it without having to stuff loads of stuff into my jersey pockets. I have a pump on the frame and my pockets just contain a phone and wallet along with my keys and a bit of loose change.

This is how I have mine (yes I know the steerer tube still needs to be trimmed). The photo probably doesn’t really show the angle all that well but I have them set up so that the top of the bar and brake lever hoods is relatively flat. I think it is a bit more comfortable for going up hill.

I found that the bars needed a little bit of experimenting to get the angle right but now I love them.

+1 for the cafe at Cartgate picnic area. The cafe is a bit rough and ready in appearance but they do pretty decent food and it isn’t stupidly overpriced. Nice sausage sarnies.

I fitted a cheap FSA headset to my Cross Check without having the headtube faced or reamed out. Admittedly its a different headset but I would expect the problem lies with the cup rather than the headtube. Surly frames in my experience are simple in design but pretty well made and seem to accept a range of headset cups from different manufacturers.

When I saw the title of this thread I initially thought it was about a girl I used to know.

Anything with zombies in it.

Or big explosions.

Or perhaps a film with zombies AND big explosions. :D

My bike would be called The Wallet Botherer.

One of the best names of all time has to be the Karate Monkey purely because it is a totally meaningless and silly name. I have one and saying I’m just off for a ride on the Monkey always gets weird looks.

I tried one of these and it made my hand go blue. Am I doing something wrong?

I don’t get it. Are people actually buying these things?

I thought it was an April fools joke until I realised we’re fast approaching the middle of October.

Sounds like its time I dusted off my Power Fall Beer Bucket (TM) idea. The demo in the shop would involve drinking a bucket of beer from my patented hologram encrusted beer bucket (also available in neoprene for no apparent reason) and then showing potential customers how easy it is to fall over after completing the simple beer downing exercise. There are some proven health benefits that I haven’t quite finished making up yet but I’m sure I could make millions.

But when you get there, the car that towed the caravan will overtake you back

Fail to hitch the caravan properly and it will overtake the car. :lol:

I think the question we would all really like an answer to is; what tyres for an Afghan cave assault?

Any of you keyboard warriors have any idea of what you are talking about?

I know plenty of people who have served in the armed forces. Based on what they’ve told me about the yanks I think the best thing to do when around US armed forces is to make sure you are a very very long way away from them when the shooting starts as they tend to make a bit of a mess.

I think the fact that they may well have killed the very person they were meant to have been rescuing says it all…

you don’t know what you are missing

…the chance to become an organ donor perhaps?

Too many people I know who have had bikes have found themselves bouncing down the road at some point. Never felt the need to join in with the ‘fun’.

The latest on the story is that it is thought a grenade lobbed by one of the American rescuers is what actually killed the poor woman. I’m no military expert but surely trying to rescue somebody by chucking a grenade in their general direction is a stupid idea?

I think the ‘Special’ in American Special Forces is possibly short for special needs.

Dangerous question on this forum. Its right up there with asking why people ride singlespeeds or 29ers :D

I’ve built up three bikes over the years. Two I haven’t had faced and have had no problems with bearings wearing out prematurely and one I have had faced (again no problems). I think its luck of the draw. A lot of frames are made to pretty decent tolerances and a lot of the time you may be able to get away with not having the frame faced and some of the time you may not.

A decent bike shop should do it reasonably cheaply so if you are worried about bearings getting knackered go for it.

Cross Check.

Cheap, versatile and handles nicely. Not as heavy would have you believe.

apparently you spend one whole year of your life working/surfing the web/posting on here than I do

Yep, but we’ll also live longer and so will have more time to do more productive things. We will also usually have more money to enjoy our retirement with as we won’t have wasted it all on fags.

But seriously, why does anybody still smoke in this day and age? It costs you money, makes you stink and kills you. I honestly don’t get why somebody would want to even contemplate smoking.

"We all play synth"

Pure class.

To be fair to Pastor Jones he is only proposing to do the same thing that happens in any Islamic state; namley the burning of literature, national flags and efigies of hated people. I do think what he is planning is wrong but couldn't help but chuckle at the hyprocrisy of the protestors in Afghanistan who were burning the stars and stripes and efigies of Obama in protest.

More recently they've been dumping plasterboard in the more overgrown areas as it's going to get cleared anyhow.

Report them to your local Environmental Health team at the council and the Environment Agency as soon as you can. Fly tipping can carry a heavy fine and possibly a prison sentence in more extreme cases. You can't even landfill plasterboard anymore so I'm sure they will get less than polite treatment from the EA.

he sad truth is we need some very stringent cuts to be made and sooner rather than later; there is a huge public sector employment bubble in the UK right now and it simply isn't sustainable. We need to trim the public sector back so that it only provides essential services and tighter limits on efficiency and spending need to be put in place.

Why? Justify that statement.

Look at the accounts of any local authority and you will see evidence of massive overspending and debt. For example Somerset County Council is over £300m in debt. For an organisation that should only be delivering essential local services and taking a risk averse approach to it's activities that seems pretty scandalous to me.

In the last few years I have worked for companies serving local authorities, in councils and, more recently, for a quango. I have also worked alongside a range of publicly funded support bodies. Maybe its because I work to support private sector companies that are struggling to survive, maybe I'm just being cycnical, but I see very little in the public sector (outside of education, health and defence) that should be spared from severe cuts. Personally I'm looking forward to getting back to the private sector.

The current government is trying to do what should have been done a long time ago which is to establish a new baseline for the economy. It won't be easy or pretty but it needs to be done.

Anyway, I shall leave you old women to bitch and moan. I still, for the moment, have a job to be getting on with.

I've followed this thread for a while and not bothered to post anything up until now.

I work in a public sector job that in all probability won't be there in a few months time. The strange thing is, after working in the public sector for a few years, I can't wait to get out of it. The level of inefficiency and mindless overspending I've witnessed over the last 6 years has shocked me. The sad truth is we need some very stringent cuts to be made and sooner rather than later; there is a huge public sector employment bubble in the UK right now and it simply isn't sustainable. We need to trim the public sector back so that it only provides essential services and tighter limits on efficiency and spending need to be put in place.

Whilst it all seems very dramatic at the moment I honestly believe that the coalition government is doing the right thing. And I say that as somebody who will probably be looking for a new job very soon.

no way the cyclus headset press is awesome

+1

I've had one for just over a year and used it three times. Does the job perfectly and will probably last for years.

For removal I've got an Xtools headset cup remover from CRC. It wasn't that expensive and it takes seconds to remove a headset cup.

I thought they had stopped filming Last of the Summer Wine :D

Lovely part of the world though, I'm hoping to get back up there next April (usually no midges at that time of year).

Just fit mudguards and get on with riding, thats what I do. Have done for years.

If you buy one just make you check the chain ring bolts for the inner ring regularly. If they come undone the inner ring tends to tear itself apart around the bolts that are still in place. They are pretty good quality however and fairly light.

I could be in this position in a few months time. I was TUPE'd across to a new company in April which it turns out is in a pretty perilous state financially and as the area of work I'm involved in is government funded I'm fairly certain that I'll be out of work in the next 3-5 months. As I work in the business support sector its fairly ironic that the bodies set up to help businesses are disappearing one by one.

Given that the work situation in the area I live isn't great I'm already starting to look at alternative career choices and trying to get to as many industry events as possible to chat up potential future employers. I was unemployed a few years ago for a period of five months and it was totally depressing having to go into the job centre and prove to them I was applying for work. They stopped asking me to provide evidence after I dropped a lever arch file that was overflowing with application letters onto the desk. It made quite a noise!

but i've never bitten a dog

You probably shouldn't. The forum would be full of dog owners calling for you to be muzzled…

dogs are dangerous, they do attack people, all i'm suggesting is a muzzle.

People also attack people. Perhaps the police should hand out muzzles to chavs in town centres on Friday and Saturday nights by your reasoning?

muzzles are fair, cheap and easy to police.

No, my point is muzzles aren't fair and can inflict a certain amount of suffering on well behaved dogs which would lead to behaviour problems. It also wouldn't be easy to police as there are millions of dog owners in this country and the cost of policing such a policy effectively would run into millions. Besides, any council worked in a cheap uniform trying to force me to put a muzzle on my dog will end up with it shoved somewhere it wasn't intended to go.

i was 6, it was a very big dog, these are very deep scars.

Perhaps you should man up. You aren't six anymore. Unless you are some sort of dwarf I suspect you'll be bigger than any 'big' dogs you are likely to come across.

You've obviously never tried to muzzle a dog that doesn't want it. I think common sense is a far more powerful tool than a muzzle but them this country does seem to be short of it these days.

Besides, why should all dogs be targetted because of a few morons with dangerous dogs? It is a sad state to be in when a few law breakers lead to restrictive laws being put in place for the law abiding majority and peaceful dogs are made to suffer.

In a loose parallel for example; the government are now proposing higher alcohol prices to stop binge drinking. It won't work if it is put into law and will just penalise the rest of us who enjoy a drink and can do so responsibly. As with a lot of recently proposed laws and controls it would only deal with the symptoms and not the root causes, just as imposing a law to muzzle all dogs would.

easy, any dog without a muzzle gets shot

STW – the home of rational and measured debate.

As a dog owner of many years I can only say from my experience that the problem lies firmly with the owners of these so called status dogs. Properly cared for and trained even a 'dangerous' dog breed will be even tempered and well behaved.

Yes, the dog licence should probably be reintroduced along with compulsory chipping but it won't deal with the sort of lawless scrotes who are attracted to dangerous dog breeds. What is needed is firmer policing of the dangerous dog act but in a world where the police are underfunded and the streets are crawling with powerless PCSOs that probably ain't going to happen anytime soon.

If you have children, just teach them to be wary of any dogs they don't know and to ask the owners if they can stroke them. Common sense people, thats all that is really needed.

The spare parts are reasonably cheap. Unfortunately my Astra seems to need rather a lot of them!

The build quality just doesn't seem to be too good on modern Vauxhalls. My 2002 Astra felt bombproof. My 2006 model feels like it will struggle to reach 70,000 miles. I shan't be buying another.

See tonnes of astras/vectras about so regardless of what people say they cant be THAT bad!

They are cheap second hand and tough to kill. Apart from that I honestly don't think they have many redeeming features. But then it depends what you want from a car. I reckon if you want a cheap, well made, second hand car that will handle lots of long journeys and take a couple of bikes an old Saab 9-5 or even a Ford Mondeo is a better bet.

Personally I'd go for an Astra over the Vectra

I'm on my second Astra. The first was a 2002 and was a bit slow but well made. The latest is a 2006. Its faster and roomier but sadly much crappier. Its poorly made, unreliable, expensive to run and the most uncomfortable car on long journeys I've ever had. I'm only holding onto it as I can't afford to replace it at the moment. Rubbish drivetrain as well.

Tried a Vectra once. Never again.

For the last couple of winters I've done most of my road riding on a Thorn Sherpa touring bike. I've no idea how much it weighs but I suspect some fully sussers are lighter. I ride it because it is dependable and handles well in bad weather but I think it does make riding my lighter bikes a more pleasant experience when the weather improves.

I'd like to say it improves my fitness (big hills + heavy bike = greater strength) but I think I cancel out any benefits with beer…