I think they have them stationed on all the bridges on the route between bristol airport and the hotel in Newport too

Aye, there are a pair of armed police stationed on each side of one of the road, it would appear, protecting the Avonmouth motorway bridge on the road insot Shirehampton (not sure if there is similar on the A4 as well, but that’s a bit busier). Been there since at least Wednesday. Man, they look bored! ;-)

Another ‘nothing through the summer, full finger in winter’ kinda guy here.

Lovely place and you can’t go wrong just trundling around and turning up places

What he said, esp this +lots. Had 4 weeks there several years ago and ‘The Itinerary’ went out the window after day three and was (mostly) all the better for it!

<bookmarks for future use>

Your cardio fitness will help to hurt you. You might feel you can keep up and run about ok, but your body is not going to be used to the stop/start/direction changes. So take it easy the first time, and be prepared for a bit of achyness the next day

This – defo this!!! I also play very occasionally and the day after can be a world of pain…..

Almondsbury Forge did ours. Not the cheapest I expect, but the fitters were a good bunch and the after service has been good.

DO NOT GO TO THE SHOW ROOM – YOU WILL SPEND TOO MUCH MONEY (a colleague went to buy a fire-side brush set and signed up for a wood-burning range and installation…..)

EDIT: Ours is a Euroheat Harmony 13 – 5kW, contemporary style, smokeless rated (remote/thermostatic air control available if you’re into that kinda thing ;-) )

I built one, effectively copying the two bay design here http://www.devonlogstores.co.uk/index.php/products/list/category/log_stores/, adjusting the dimensions to a) fit the space and b) trying to use standard sawn timber lengths wherever possible. Came in at ~1/2 the price shown for something that holds ~50% more volume and took 1/2 day to assemble from a pile of timber. (Have decided the feather edge boards on the roof look a bit naff and will replace these with cedar shingles at some point….)

Have also used the space under some elevate decking (effectively screwing a single pitch roof UNDER the decking and then adding walls)….. next project is to add a lean-too type wood store to the side of an existing large shed where the pitch of the woodstore follows the roof line. All very aesthetic ;-)

Open pros are narrow, would definitely go with a modern wide rim like an a23/arcytype/stans etc for a better tyre profile especially with bigger tyres

Fair point – I’m only running 25c which are fine on my Open Pro’s and Aerotraks. If you’re going to run anything much bigger then a wider rim would be better.

I’m hankering after some Velocity A23 rims (already got some on a rim-brake bike) with the non-machined sidewall. Anyone got any other rim recommendations in the under-£50 and 450g or under bracket that I’ve overlooked? Open Pro CD perhaps?

Work colleague has just had some non-machined Open Pro built for a disc commuter and very nice they look too. Having investigated this quite a bit for a new set of wheels myself recently, I think the only way you are going to go lighter than an Open Pro is a Velocity Aerotrac (cheap, non-eyeletted, but I have clocked up ~5000 miles on a set on the road and they’ve been fine) or Stans Alpha (a bit more spendy).

In terms of bang-for-your-buck, for all round use, it’s difficult to see past 32 hole Open Pro’s on XT hubs – acceptably light, bombproof and with a bit of shopping around for bits and building yourself, can be had for (relative) peanuts.

Have been dropping not-too-subtle hints about the crane for the last few b’days and Xmas’s….. this thread may be the final straw…..

I (unhappily) imagined Angry from Manchester writing to complain about all the repeats on Tv

And by 5 O’clock everything’s dead, and every third car is a cab. And ignorant people vote for crap sheds like the doped white mice in a college lab.

Damn you two – damn you to hell! That’s me earwormed as well, and it’s so early on a Friday…. :x I have nothing of use to add with regards to “shed-gate”….

If I had either of those I sure as hell wouldn’t ride them in the rain…

He does an occasional single-digit mileage commute on his current dandy-horse – a Super Record EPS equipped Dogma. He recons that will be his wet weather bike when the two new bikes arrive…..

I’m not bitter – to some extent I egg him on ;-) – it’s nice to see some of this top end bling in the flesh rather than just reading about it!

I saw an irregular work acquaintance of mine the other day, who is director of a large institution who (and I think he knows this in is heart-of-hearts) is you’re quintessential MAMIL, rather than the racing snake he likes to think he is, and already has a the Emonda/SRAM Red on order….. but, having seen the spec, is seriously considering getting a McLaren Tarmac as well.

Watch out any sportivists in the South West (but only if it’s dry mind, he doesn’t like riding in the rain…. ;-) ) – so, yes, there is defo a market for these kind of trinkets….

What Tim said:

Ecotricity = the cheapest and really nice tree hugging people to boot

I’ll go with the pads not being bedded in first (never had a problem with cable stretch – run a full length outer to the rear caliper on both my bikes that have BB7’s using standard SP41 casing…)

…and as the other have alluded to, they are much easier to set up if you don’t run them so that the cable goes completely slack when you release the brake lever – pre-wind the outer arm and then nip the cable clamp up (maybe 5mm of cables worth).

Beyond that, er…..

This isn’t helpful either, but I can’t resist…..

Karma?

Carma, shirley?

IGMC

<bookmarked> Usually use my DAB/MP3 player int he car, but this is cheap enough to leave in there….. ta.

NoTubes Alpha

Discs or standard 340’s? I was going looking at these, but the Disc version has a quoted weight higher than the standard rim braking 340’s and higher than Open Pro’s….

^^ would be my first guess as well

Have a Shimano dynohub/B+M setup on the ‘other’/winter commuter – the bike this wheel is for is the summer bike/training bike, hence I was hoping to shift a bit of lard from the current XT/Open Pro combo.

Given the way the hub cost/weight equation is stacking up, I think I’ll stick with XT and splurge the money on some Stan’s Alpha 340 disc rims instead. Current XT front hub is well past 10,000 miles (all road) and is just feeling rough, so I don;t really have any issues with it’s life.

Hmmmm – bit of googling over lunch says I can get XT for ~£30…… or save 15g and spend double and get DT350…… double again and save another 20g and get DT240…..

Based on this, still struggling to see past the XT’s.

Should have mentioned – these are going on my disced road commuter, so will be paired with a 700c rim…..

Good shout – would prefer if it was below £100, but that wasn’t in the OP ;-)

Genuine Q – how do think the bank transfer, from and by you to a third party, is not secure?

Roy?

Thanks!

Hijack – Epicyclo: Can you recall/link to where you got the wingnuts for the Alfine? I’d like to do the same to mine.

Two days’ll do it….. just the sound of the clock ticking on the outside of Smallworld brings me out in a cold sweat, nevermind ‘that tune’….

Neutral service will become impossible.

The pro teams are saying this about discs. At the moment it’s Shimano/Campag/10-spd/11-spd, which is tolerable….. chuck in which size disc rotor…. and then whether QR or through axle and you enter a world of compatibility issue pain.

Personally don’t see a convincing case of through axle on the road, even with discs, but I’m sure it’ll come and really make the trail road come alive…..

It’s worth noting that some machines have “sealed” plastic drums now, and the bearings cannot be repaired, in those cases, you must replace the entire drum assy, which is not really cost effective

This^^^

I know on our current machine, the drum assy is ~£200 on a machine that cost ~£350 so – as it’s ~4 years old – if the bearings go then, unfortunately, it’s scrap. Have successfully repaired stuff before, but increasingly find repair uneconomic through a combination of parts/my time/someone else’s labour rate.

Clutching at straws a bit now, but I’ve found with these cheaper rings, playing around with the radial clearance between the front mech cage and the outer ring (closer seems to be better) helps and I also set the mech up with the ‘tail’ of the cage plates pointing slightly inwards (towards the inner ring), rather than completely parallel to the ring, so it ‘flicks’ the chain coming onto the ring, er, off.

Also, have you replaced the chain and/or cassette at the same time?

Got my outer ring from the same place ;-)

There should be two small threaded holes in the face of the outer ring – in the cardboard packet is a small plastic bag that contain a small screw to put in one of these holes, so it fits behind the crank arm and stops the chain dropping between the arm/ring and jamming. I’m not sure which of the two holes to orientate with the crank arm (doesn’t seem to make much difference to the shifting), but this does give a guide to the angular orientation. You are right, the recessed holes indicate the outer face to accept the chain ring bolts.

So, that pretty much ties down the chain ring orientation….. if it doesn’t shift then, er, guess we’re looking elsewhere….

Can’t say I’ve ever had a problem – refreshed my 105 compact drivetrain this weekend with 50/38 Stronglight 5083 rings and all went together fine and worked as intended.

As Woody says – is it a track ring/does it have the shifting pins through the ring?

An oil change every 600 miles might be easy enough to do…

For Alfine-11, that’s the first service interval – thereafter it’s every 3500km IIRC (so a smidge over 2000 miles). As my hub is on my wet weather/winter commuter, that’s pretty much annual mileage for the bike, which I can live with.

I’ll not go over it again, as it pretty much echos the comments above – it’s all here though if anyone wants to waste a few mins…

http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/talk-to-me-about-hub-gears

Indeed – if I ever have call for someone to resist hedgehogs in future I’ll know where to go.

Book-marked.

Oooo – nice! I wonder how much the wife would kill me if I sacked off painting the house and went for a wander and a pint…. esp as she’s away with the kids….

<cough> http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/golden-eagle-and-girl-content </cough>

If you have to drill it out (I’ve been forced down this road before myself), then this set:

http://www.sjscycles.co.uk/modolo-morphos-down-tube-stops-set-prod20642/

is really good as a replacement – ditch the downtube cable stops and just drill the braze-on to fit the threaded bit through and secure with the nut on the bottom end (see second pic from link). Still gives cable adjustment and is plastic to boot so won’t seize in again. 3 years down the line, still all good.

Good news – watched the first race on my big all-in-one PC, which was ace in HD :-) Cheap option for watching in on’t Telly as well – top tip.