Which is why all the Pros use them.

The rolling resistance is lower, but the aero resistance is higher. Makes more of a difference at pro tour speeds than your average bimble.

A cx bike with 28mm slicks on won’t be any slower on the road than a real roadie, and fine for dry weather off-road fun.
28s are supposed to have lower rolling resistance than 23s.. Offset this with a slightly less aero tyre and higher position and you won’t be much worse off, but more comfortable!
I am getting some cx tyres for mine, but not got to using them yet, as I’m enjoying hooning around on slicks!

I saw something very interesting on another stand… Belt drive from a big yellow German company!

Oh noes! I only sent my postcard in on Thursday, and by 2nd class post too… That’ll teach me for being cheap with stamps!

I saw something bonkers on the Leonardi stand at Bespoked Bristol today.. Adjustable sort of elliptical chainrings. Wish I took a picture to show, but basically, they were half round split rings, that you could adjust outward to give you a greater degree of oblongness, in one tooth steps. The more you adjusted them out, the longer the flat section without any teeth. Couldn’t see any real world purpose for them, but was impressed with their bonkersness anyway!

well he’s got 99.9% feedback.. so that means only 0.1% death rate?

Mavic 618s – Double-eyeletted, wide and indestructible!
Clear crudguards – Still got one, but each time I squeeze it into the car, another bit falls off.

Autechre – Tri Repetae… Still fresh!

whats to say he doesn’t just buy and sell bikes.

Well he certainly doesn’t buy any on that account!

I reckon hes a Halfords employee of some sort .

Half of those (Canondales, Specializeds etc) aren’t Halfords stocked, and a few are clearly well used with wheels or tyres worn or worn out. There’s no cheapies in there either.

Plus, he won’t do collection… Why doesn’t he want his face known?
It may all be legit, but I don’t see how.

Pedro’s milk bottle levers – I got a free pair from mbuk in the 90’s (?) and they are my longest serving lever they flex before they snap and are therefore most excellent!

I used mine yesterday! They must be pretty much the longest serving tool I have.

If it’s a cartridge rebound like my 2007 ones, then you can’t take the rebound assembly apart to fix it anyway.

Might be worth taking the rebound knob off (might need pliers for this) sticking the long end of an allen key in to replace the knob and gripping the short end with some big pliers to try and shift it anticlockwise. You only did it up by hand with a short lever, so take a bigger lever to it!
This may of course destroy the cartridge, so don’t blame me!

They are ludicrously simple to service yourself anyway.. Worth a go, even just to keep the lowers clean inside.

That feedback profile is shocking.. It’s like a who’s who of cycle-to-work scheme bikes, freshly nicked from unsuspecting clueless punters.

Bike thieves are scum, etc etc, but some people make their job too easy. Locking things up by the one wheel, only buying a pissant lock coz they spent all their allowance on the bike, leaving them in open back gardens or sheds tied up with bits of string, or locked to a railing in front of their house in a suburban side street by the seatpost….

Forgot to say.. and then leave them to dry overnight

Take them off and wash them out inside with hot soapy water. Then be liberal inside with spraymount and tie-wire them on. Job done.

OK.. If I must..

I once actually weed in someone’s shoes.
What can I say? She was annoying, I was hopelessly drunk, and they were some damn ugly shoes. They were new too.. Which brings a smile to my face even to this day! 😀

As long as you chuck some oil in the freehub every 6 months or so, and take up any bearing slack, they’re a goodun. Proper tubeless too, so less faff.

but so much white on a bike..?

look under service/oil volumes here

Might be 10wt

Andrewh.. 🙄
Lowers he said, not in the damper..
Yep, I use 10wt in the lowers on RS and Maguras, and Fox Float Fluid on the foam rings, although when I run out of that I’m getting some 80wt gear oil.

Have you tried Rockshox seals on the Maguras? Stops them weeping so much.. I took the lowers off mine at the weekend, and was surprised to find that they were clean inside for the first time ever! The two part seals with the separate oil seal won’t fit, but the one part ones are fine with the old foam rings, or the new ones cut down.

Bikewhisperer, mine was beyond that trick, rather beyond the additional 2mph. Mine had been factory chipped using the one and only laptop able to do it. Which was nice.

Bwarrp!

I can see a niche in the market here… Old grannies on Giant Twists doing burnouts at the lights..

Fair enough on the seat! Another plan is to spend it on some decent racey shoes.. Huge weight savings to be had there, and they’ll feel much nicer than cheaper ones.

Hope pro3 sp wheels are good for the money, and come with light rotors, although I found my 24 hole front one to be a little flexy on landings and I broke it too easy in a crash.. Maybe the 32 hole ones if you’re looking for sturdiness. Decent tubeless tyres will make it feel 110% better for sure.

980 cassettes I’ve found to be not so long lasting. XT are cheap from Rose though, along with the brakes!

With some top swing front mechs, the limit screws snag if you screw them in as far as you need to for 2x. Screw the high one in while you yank on the cable to see how far it’s able to go before binding, then back it off a bit. Make sure the cage outer plate is parallel to the chainrings too.

The frame is probably decent and light enough. Nowt wrong with Marins, apart their middle aged image!

I’d get the forks serviced and Pushed.. Or maybe replaced with some SIDs if you can get some Black Box ones cheap enough. New wheels, tubeless tyres, a new XT (not XTR!) cassette and some decent brakes should see your grand spent. And maybe a lighter perch to sit on if there’s any cash left.

EDIT: and loose the mudguards and wheel reflectors for flips sake!

I used to make a lot of dumb moves like that as a kid.. Then I learned to drive and realised how much carnage and swearing must have been going on behind me. Now my dumb moves take a different form!

shooting it

Poor little feller.. He didn’t stand a chance!

Mine was chipped, so possibly not as “standard” as you might expect.

It’s as easy as holding down a button for a number of seconds while you switch it on.. Just turns it from being UK compliant to EU compliant and gives you an extra 2mph! I’m sure there’s more that can be eked out of them by someone in the know..

I worked somewhere that sold plenty of them. They’re very well made and sturdy, and hilarious fun.. As above though, folding them is a pain, and mudguards are expensive and wibbly. none of the accessories are cheap, even when comparing them to Brompton standards! The supplied lock is also woeful, and I’m not sure if there’s a really effective way of securing them with a D lock or suchlike. You could probably wrap a solid chain round the back of the main frame.

Train station is underneath the airport, then tram. Not sure if you still have to buy tickets *before* you travel on the tram though.
Or just hire a bike straight away from near Centraal station.

Damn.. Need to speed up my typing-fu!

Was talking about this the other day, not a Scandal though in my case.. I’d snapped a Hope clamp too, so went for a Nukeproof one. Still got creaking and slippage even with it done up tight.
I managed to fit half a redbull can as a shim round the seatpost with a little lip to hold it in place under the clamp. It seems to have stopped it creaking, but not ridden it yet to see about the slipping.

Spray it on the disc rotors. Helps clean ’em.

I was waiting in the carpark at Brechfa a while back and watched some guy give his whole bike a gentle misting of GT85, brakes included, then put on his helmet and ride off up the hill. All his mates on much more expensive bikes didn’t seem to bat an eyelid at it. I’m guessing that maybe there’s a joke on him that he didn’t get…

And what do I do with it? Don’t own any.. Can’t stand the smell.

That’s the same as my tensioner, although it didn’t come from Superstar.
I got mine to tension upwards using the other tension setting, but it’s not got as much throw that way as the spring binds on the outside. Seems to work fine with a zip tie round the stay, attached to another one around the bar that holds the jockey wheel. It gives it enough spring and looks ugly.. Ugly is important for singlespeeds!

EDIT: Yup, you need 3/32 with those bits.

The brake callipers were the same as the previous years LX, as the previous years XT were one piece. The front mechs were a different colour, and had SLX stamped on them. The chainrings were just as soft as the old LX ones, although they have made them better since. The hubs were the same internally too, with the same seals and cones.

I’m just saying that it wasn’t completely new. Some bits were redesigned, but much of it was just given a shiny new look.

There’s bits in the XT group that don’t trickle down, and do help with longevity.. Ceramic bushed jockey wheels and steel toothed middle chainrings for example. FWIW, unless you have to buy it all together I’d be mixing and matching anyway.

Calling it SLX rather than LX was just a re-branding exercise.. The old LX stuff wasn’t all that reliable when you chucked loads of sloppy mud all over it. Some things like the brake callipers just had their colours changed.
The cranks went from Octalink to HT2. Maybe that’s where the 50% stronger claim came from. SLX stuff certainly isn’t stronger though. The double cranks might be a bit tougher with the pedal inserts but that’s all.

SLX is designed for all mountain riding, 50% stronger than XT and XTR but with a wieght penelty.

You just made that up. Do you mean Saint, not SLX?

If you put the air adapter into the transfer port, and a rubber gloved thumb over the hose connector you can do either side. It does require 3-4 hands though.

Carnegies/Mary bars have made them redundant in my case.

XT bits are better for durability.. Slop in the mechs and having a steel toothed middle chainring for example, and the shifters do feel nicer.
I’d still rather get better wheels though. I’ve seen some shonky wheelbuilds from Superstar.

It’s very easy to snap the pad locator pins.
The only way I know without an air compressor is a track pump with a football or airbed connector, pushed through a couple of layers of an old latex glove to help get a seal. You might be able to do something dangerous with a CO2 inflator and an old presta valve too!

Deffo worth wrapping it up with a cloth, if only to catch some of the atomised DOT fluid!

Cheers guys.. That solves the question I had. Just got a racing ralph from the classifieds (cheers Scant!) for the front, and I reckon a CX comp on the rear will keep things speedy on the road.

Park CC-2s are a bit rubbish in my humble opinion. The solid plate chain checkers don’t have anything to go wrong, sloppy or bent like the cc-2 has.

I run cheap chains and will swap 3 or 4 over so they wear together. That way, if one gets mangled, then there’s still a couple of spares which will match to the cassette. When the chainrings start sucking it’s time to start thinking about replacing the whole lot together. Sometimes just switching to one chain and running it to death will stop the cahinsuck too..

It’s no drama to swish the chain in the sink, stick it on the radiator and chuck the next one on the bike when it’s dry. It’s a no-brainer when it comes to cost IMO. SRAM 951s can be had for about 6 or 7 quid each.. A 990 or xt cassette plus a couple of decent chainrings is going to be at least a ton.

This may be one of those myths, but I’ve heard there’s about a 5% efficiency difference between new and worn drivetrains, so doing this means you’re spending much more time on a newish chain.

I’ll be there, hustling for a job.. Sick and tired of my masters, and missing working in the bike trade!

Degreaser + TF2.. 😯 I bet your chains last forever!

If the bike needs hosing and brushing, then the chain gets that too, otherwise I’ll run it through a rag and use a special patented blend of used fork oil and shimano brake oil.. The geared bikes use Squirt, so I just swish the chain under hot water and chuck it on the radiator.