The one the BCF does is 10% of value per year. Very specific on where you keep them etc

Afan saturday with the uni MTB club, north downs sunday.. Probably sleep monday.

Avoid pedros allen keys! Found mis-sized ones and had them snap on me at work.. Was left with bleeding fingers.. gnot gnice.. Their other stuff is pretty good though Esp like the chain whip substitute that fits directly on to 11 and 12 tooth sprockets.
Park chain checkers with the dial on are shite.
Cyclo stuff is usually well made and solid.

Also the new ones are 5" not 4", and about 2 pounds lighter, muuuuch stiffer, and not likely to make you vomit each time you see it.

Jeez.. I only paid £25 more for a brand new one direct from Giant! With an RP3 too.
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But I guess it hadn't been "tuned" by a pro..

Knowing how good the SKF bottom brackets are I'd pick them. Just replace the ones that need it, and clean and grease the others.

It's ****. I fixed a half inch gash in a bonty tyre with some extra large tubeless repair plugs, but even that was pushing it. I still check it several times each ride…

5'10" with shortish legs

175 on the ss
172.5 on the road ss and the full sus
170 on the hardtail, but only coz they were uber cheap.
I find the 172s to be most comfy.

Half price XTR's at On-one.

I have an MTE one which had poor soldering on the switch. Check that it's not the driver by shorting the back of the battery to the case with the tail cap off. If it lights up fine and if you can change modes by momentarily breaking contact, then it's not the driver or LED at fault.
If you do fancy re-soldering the switch you'll probably have to make some pins to unscrew the back plates under the switch. Be very careful to solder QUICKLY as I managed to melt the switch! Still, 5 replacement switches from DX cost less than returning the light, and I've just shorted the switch connections until the switches arrive.

swap the pads for sintered ones!

Studs are the business.

Sailor Jerry for a tasty spiced rum, or Wray and Nephews for stupidly overproof, but still tasting good.

This was wishful thinking, of course. In the run up to Copenhagen, we will see more and more hysterical (and grotesquely exaggerated) stories such as this in the Mainstream Media.

He said it himself!

There will be people on here with 2x £20k cars but will spend £300 on a bike and people who will have a £3k car but £10k worth of bikes in the garage.

£700 Diesel Polo… £5k in 3 bikes!

I've never worried about branch impacts. If you do anything other than just lightly scrape it in a crash, you should replace it. If you hit it hard enough you'll make a perfect imprint of your head on the inside. I'd usually say a couple of years is a good lifespan if you use it every day however I usually manage a good crash more often than that!

Our shop (well, me as the mechanic) did the local police bike maintenance. The Smith and Weston bikes are horrific things. They were worth about £200 (They look like cheap giant's, prob made by them), possibly £300 with the add ons and the police were charged £600 each for them!
They were soooo not up to the job.. Mangled wheels, bent mechs, busted plastic pedals, scary brakes.. Some bureaucrat must have received a pretty back hander to award that contract.

I just got some bikefridge sintered ones. 4 sets for £22! Really good friction. I will be on here screaming and cursing if they fall to bits.

Deore hubs have crappy sealing anyway, and if they were loose for a while you'll probably need new cones for them too. If they're anything other than shiny and smooth then replace them. A good LBS should have a stock of spare shimango cones. Take the old ones in to get a match.

67% for not actually caring how many people under the age of 19 are in the UK.. Seriously, will that actually affect my day to day functioning as a citizen? Will I not be able to do my job if I don't know if it's the "Council of Europe" or the "Council of the European Union"??

I did learn something though: Why do Irish people get a vote here? My English parents don't get a vote there, even though they've lived there for 9 years.. WTF???

I had the same from a set of ebay forks.. You can usually safely chuck the top cap from the steerer, and run the stem directly on the conical washer (only works on sealed bearing headsets) and get a nice low road stem. Sorted!

I got a bust MTE one from fleabay. The problem was the switch. Have you tried shorting it with with the back off with a screwdriver? I had to make a couple of pins to unscrew the switch mount and resolder it. Decided it was much easier than waiting for a return.

muc off or fairy liquid does the trick

Got a pile of Fizik seats in the returns bin at work because muc off and Fenwicks cause the glue to let go!

Ah plan has emerged… Stupid of me to buy 25.4 on assumption, but 0.3mm per wrap will save me mwhaa haaa haaaa haaaa haaaaaaaaaa

Because the hosepipe is green Harry Too, because!

Cool! Shitfers passes the swearometer..

dual release.. mmmmm!mmm… although they don't have the adjustable length clamps that the XT do. TBH unless they're a real PITA then fit your brake levers first and then your shitfers around them.

If c~*t was a colour I'd choose that.

Shimanos have been mostly hassle free for me, as have hopes. I prefer the shimango lever feel though, and am happy as larry with some new SLX's, although I don't know how they compare with the newer hopes.
I've spent more time fixing Hayes brakes at work than anything else ever made by man. They do not like the British winter. Road salt + magnesium does not mix.
Just got new bike for GF and the reach adjuster on her Avid Elixirs is made of plastic and seized. Aint the first I've seen either. Bit unimpressed.

and there's material.. Softer steel makes for a better brake afaik. That's part of the reason why Hayes brakes actually work (that's work in the "just out of the box and not seen a winter yet" kind of way..) Their rotors are the fastest wearing I've ever come across.
I think half the time there's too many holes in rotors just to save weight. Look at any ashima rotors to see this. When the hole is half the width of the pad it's bound to offer uneven loading and excessive scraping

TJ, to further confound your theories how do you think the "holiness" of the rotor affects pad life? And I'm not talking about having them blessed..
More holes should clean out the gritty paste, but then could hold it on the edges of the holes to get mixed back in. Fewer holes would dry slower, but would offer a cleaner braking surface when dry. On the other hand more holes would equal less braking surface and higher pressure on the pad surface effectively shaving the top off the pad.
****.. I'm getting OCD about this now..

I've had hope sintered pads last fookin years. They wail like crazy in the wet so I went to organic ones and they are lasting pretty well. Will see what winter does to those. Hopes do have bigger clearance than shimangos though.

I used shimano mineral oil today in lieu of superglide. Would be the obvious choice..
I'm sure the volatiles in WD are bound to mess it up in some way or other.

what he said ^

Cheap sintered should still be hard enough…. Mind you, I lent that bike to my girlfriend for the first few months after I'd replaced the callipers (one m465 and one 9 year old deore lever, with LX callipers that cost me £9.99 each with pads! bargain upgrade!). I don't think she's heavy enough to properly bed in the pads..
If the pistons keep getting out of shape and sticky I'd get a can of Stendec Superglide. It's a silicon spray that dries on thin. It's good for making fork seals uber slippery too. Pump the pistons out some, get them really clean with disc brake cleaner, and then squirt some stendec on and let it dry. Then work each piston in turn by holding the other one back with a screwdriver and a cloth. Repeat until they don't feel like they're "popping" out and move smoothly and then reset them and wipe off any excess gunk. You may have to do this every few months or so until they settle down.

I've just finished sorting out my rear LX calliper which had exactly the same problem. Slightly sticky piston one side and it chewed right through one side after a couple of wet Swinley Forest rides. Have to borrow some pads from another bike so I can ride tomorrow.
I think the Shimango resin pads are relatively soft, and the pistons do tend to be a little sticky until the seals have aged a bit.
Got 4 sets of cheap sintered pads for £23 on ebay this eve. Problem hopefully solved..

crank bros 17. Had one for 5 years, still good as new.

What do you call a man with no shins? Tony.

I found 44:16 good with 1.5" slicks on a 26" wheel. I changed it from a 48:16 as I don't mind spinning, and was a trafficy route with lots of lights and hills.

Fraid braided hoses have different end fittings. That's the expensive bit in the packs. They screw in to the inner hose and an outer compression fitting at the same time.
I've wondered if you could bodge it with olives and inserts if the external diameter of the braided bit (under the plastic coating) was the same as the standard hose, but I get the feeling it would leak regardless.