You’ll also have to check the threads have the same pitch. Make sure before you screw them in the frame you put the new bolt and old bolts threads together and they link in. If they don’t the threads will be a different pitch and you’ll damage the drop-out (nut) threads.

I had one of the smaller park i-beams. I bought it for the old fox 36’s with the pinch bolts as i’d read people kept on snapping the drop-out (before the spacer mod).

It did what it was designed for well but I sold it. I thought as forks and carbon parts require such specific low settings it was a necessity but it wasn’t. If you’re worried about over tightening small bolts just use an allen key the wrong way round i.e. hold the short end with just two fingers and your thumb. You’d have to be a real numpty to over tighten something that way, or under tighten it.

The problems come from people who instead of just nipping a bolt up use 3/8, 1/2 ratchets or the long end of allen keys and really crank it up. Where they should have 7-10nm’s they are doing it up to 20nm plus. You’d be hard pushed to tell a difference of 3-5nm.

IMO torque wrenchs are a good idea if you haven’t much mechanical experience and need a guide as to what 10nm is or you’re doing something up really tight such as a car head. Torque wrenchs with springs should always be un-wound to zero after use as well otherwise you will damage them.

All the show seems to be about is them d***ing about. Look we’ve crashed, we are such rebals, we are going to get chucked out the country, utter rubbish!

I did hear/read of taking an old junk bike over with you and packing your new but ridden and dirty bike in the bike box and getting away with import duty. Perhaps someone else knows a bit more about it? You’d have to check if it’s still covered with warranty as well. Good saving if you can get away with it though, same price in $’s as £’s.

Jesus, $49!!! I converted mine myself, used a fsa lock ring and a local machine shop machined the top part out for me. Total cost £0.00, had the lock ring and the machine shop did it for free. Stopped the creaking on my 29er, can’t claim credit for the idea, stole it from somebody off MTBR iirc he was from Scotland.

Thanks. It’s a difficult one, stay in van and get gassed or get out and possibly get your head kicked in! Must be a scary thing to have gone through made even worse when you’ve got children.

Service stations in the uk aren’t any better. I wouldn’t have thought twice about sleeping overnight in one but my dad was a lorry driver for a bit and worked away in the uk/abroad, service stations aren’t nice places at night.

Sorry for the hi-jack. The gassing, know it’s quite common, they drill a hole in the van and pump it in. I was going to get one of the gas detectors but what happens if somebody does it to your van, the alarm goes off, what then? The gas is in your van and surely you’ll start to become drowsy and not be much good at putting up a fight, is there anything (other than a gas mask!) you can keep next to the bed to counter or stop the effects of the gas?

What coatesy and pinches said if your doing it yourself. For what it’s going to cost you by the time you have bought paint, sand paper, de-greaser, tack cloth and t-cut for final polish it’s not a lot more to have it profesionally sprayed. As pinches said it won’t be as durable as not 2-pack imo just not worth the time and effort to do it yourself.

Yes

What sort of riding do you want it for, budget? xc/trail I think the Pivot Mach429 is a good bike. Can be used with a 100mm fork or 120mm if you want a more relaxed HTA. If your after something for more AM then the Turner Sultan is a good bike. Both of those bikes come in at around £3000-£4000 depending on build, TBA never ridden either but they would be what i’d buy if I wanted an xc or trail bike. Specialized make some good 29ers which work out a bit cheaper.

I’m sure EBT are lovely dogs but it’s the only breed of dog which puts the fear of god in me. My landlord has one, it’s a monster of a thing, biggest one i’ve seen, scares the c**p out of me.

To late now, started painting it! Think i’ve got the washing sorted, rinse with water, wash with a wash mitt and non-alkaline/ph balanced
car wash then dry with a drying towel. That should leave it streak free then it’s just what final product to use. I’ve got a few to try and it’s just a case of which works best.

Got a feeling I might end up regretting the colour choice and re-painting like yourself but as I said to late now, just have to keep my fingers crossed 😀

Thanks, is that the stuff? Had a look on Tesco’s website the other day but couldn’t find it.

I’m about to paint my van matt black and i’ve been reading it’s hard to clean so looking for peoples suggestions. Once it’s done i’ll try the different polishs etc on the roof and see what works the best and if it’s not much work that’ll be a bonus!

+1 what Dudie said. All that news coverage a fews years back about the money plumbers could earn because of a shortage then all of a sudden everbodys training to be a plumber. Plus everybody thinks of boilers, what about the s**t end of the job, toilets! Sorry couldn’t resist that one.

Seam-Grip if the holes are small. For larger tears or rips, sow up with dental floss then seam-grip. It’s like a mixture of arradite and silicone, waterproof and flexible. Lasts well and you can still wash the jacket as normal.

£800, what a rip off. If your not to bad with the spanners, take the caliper off the suspension (with fluid hose still connected) and carefully extend the pistons. Then clean them up with wire wool and wd40 or such like, push back in and repeat a few times. If that doesn’t stop it then one of the seals has gone (might have cooked it) and you should be able to get a seal kit here. Clamp hose, take caliper off, rebuild in a clean environment (with clean brake fluid), put back on and bleed. Worse case £50 for seal kit and fluid. If things go totally t**s up then a new caliper can’t be more than 25% of that.

My vans calipers keep on seizing up because it’s stood for months on end, done it at least half a dozen times, once there freed off there fine.

Cheers, i’ll give that tesco’s stuff a go.

If it was damaged to the point of needing to be replaced i’m sure the garage would have been only to happy to point it out to you so they could sell you another one! I wouldn’t worry they are very well built and a lot stronger than you think, they have had the tyre off so would have checked the inside of the tyre as well as the outside.

If you really are unsure about it you could use it as a spare or if it’s on the front put it on the back as i’d rather have a rear blow out.

If the tyre has just been replaced it could have been a poor seal or the valve as they said. Nothing to worry about, they just take the tyre off the rim and replace the valve for a new one. My best guess would be they didn’t seal the tyre properly and blamed it on the valve or the valve core worked loose. They rarely become faulty.

Sorry for the hi-jack but could someone answer a quick question? I had two endowments with Equitable life (12 ish years ago) which i’m guessing were mis-sold as I was told only 5% of people get a repayment mortgage and if you get an endowment you’ll have loads left been that way for the last 10-15 years. When they got into trouble eight? years ago I was offered the choice to stay in or take back what i had invested. I took back what I had invested, would it be possible for me to claim?

I used to suffer really badly with itching, even after showers or baths. What stopped it for me was making sure your skins well hydrated (god I sound like an oil of olay ad), rinse really well and pat yourself dry with the towel rather than rubbing. I also found using Johnsons Moisturising 2 in 1 shower Gel helped. Bars of soap or strong smelling shower gels always made it a lot worse.

Get some strong grade, high temp loctite.

STR – In general I agree with you, you can’t say anything like you have without being called a racist or bigot by the PC brigade. If agreeing with you makes me a racist then so be it. GENERALLY speaking the most racist people I have come across are people of colour anyway.

I was talking to somebody in the street and I used the word black to describe an objects colour and a man of colour looked round at me as if i’d said the n word. It’s a colour ffs, am I never to use it around anyone of colour?

nah it will just be full of call centres where we will be providing tech support in urdu and mandarin to middle class asians who make fun of our accents

Too true. History shows nobody stays on top for ever, things go in circles, so it’s the most likely outcome.

I think there will be great progress in medical treatment but the vast majority of it will be financially out of reach for the average man/woman. Ironic when you think that we (mr & mrs average) have paid for large parts of it.

Quite a few have several additional properties mortgaged up on buy to lets so somone else pays the mortgage, that is so wrong IMHO, no rational reason for thinking so, it just seems wrong..

Why does it seem wrong?

Everyone gets what they want in this scenario – the landlord gets a property paid for over the years, but they take a risk on the price and on being paid. The tenant gets a serviced house they can get out of at short notice. OK, they pay a premium, but it suits them to not have a 25-year commitment hanging over them.

And so speaks a landlord! Ever thought that the tenant has no other choice and they would rather be paying towards a mortgage? Basically everybody I know who rents does so because they can’t get a mortgage.

I agree with Mintman. It’s not much of an effort to go and see her. Being told your going to die at such a young age must be very hard, made her think of what a short life she’s had and what she hasn’t done. She has probably just looked back at your relationship and thought I ruined a good thing there and wants to clear the air.

If she takes it the wrong way or things get a bit weird just be polite and leave, at least you’ll know you done the decent thing.

Nice one. More or less the same thing happened to me a short while ago. Had to chase the little smack head waster round his house threatening to give him a hiding to get it back. Thought I would stay really angry but even though it was slightly damged it was strangely satisfying.

Bloody annoying, countries got no money but they manage to ruin a good trail! When I was in the lakes there was a lot of trail ‘repairs’ just like that. They ruined the Garbun Pass, there was some really good technical sections troutbeck side and they just covered it in small loose stone.

unplug it first.

If you have to be told that don’t take the top off 😀

How good are you with mechanics? I’d take the top off and have a look inside to see if there’s anything obvious like a wire arced out on the body if it’s an older machine a wire could have worked loose with all the vibration and touched the drum.

I bought one when they first came out just because you could re-grease the bearings. The grease gun didn’t come out until a lot later so I have just popped the bearing cover off, washed them out with wd40 and re-greased. I haven’t bothered with the gun because the job is so easy. You have to take the crank off anyway so a couple of extra minutes is no trouble and at least you know you have removed all the dust, water etc.

I live in a shared house and the level of cleanliness of the house and housemates leave a lot to be desired. For me it came down to this, you won’t change people they are what they are so you have three choices,

1) Put up with it the way it is
2) Move out
3) Clean it up yourself

Pick the one which will annoy you the least! It’s a good job you don’t live in my house as one of my housemates is a physcofrenic. druggie, prostitute. She hasn’t lived here long but has left the gas on, unlit at least twice to my knowledge.

I’ve got a ditworker, great bit of kit. The only criticism i’ve got is the attachment for the hose on the machine sticks out a bit and its easily hit and a bit fragile. Mines an early one though so don’t know if the newer ones have changed.

EDIT : Oh and the return on the gun trigger stopped returning after not a lot of use but overall i’d still recommend it.

Make a note of the categories before you send it back as they have a habit of ‘loosing’ a few like your 7.5t or trailer category on the replacement license. If that happens you have to take the relevant test to get it back.

TJ – Cases like this would be delt with by the Magistrate court, and if the CPS present a case like this you would be very lucky to get away with it. It is well known that in grey areas such as this Magistrates side with the police/CPS as they have to be seen to uphold the law. As you said the police can’t know every part of the law the same applies to Magistrates. The test cases would have been held at Crown court which is a completely different story.

It’s pointless arguing about it because we are both wrong but both right. You just have to look at the case of your mum and the case of the gentleman who came into the shop where I worked. Both the same circumstances but different outcomes, this law is not clear and a lot of it is luck of the draw.

Reading through this thread it would be quite easy to think you can carry a blade under 3 inches and be fine but that is wrong. I’ve had a friend warned for carrying a stanley knife while buying his lunch in a chip shop during the week while in work clothes (carpet fitter). The police are very tight on this and if you get the wrong policeman on the wrong day you will get prosecuted for it.

There is another law which covers blades and sharp pointed objects under 3 inches and makes it illegal to carry them without good reason. I was told by a solicitor that under that law technically you could be prosecuted for carrying a biro as it has a sharp pointed end!

I worked in a shop a while ago which sold swiss army knifes and I had a guy come in for a replacement knife. He had gone camping abroad (before the heightened air security) and while going through customs/security had his backpack searched and they found with all his camping gear a swiss army knife with a blade under 3 inches. They prosecuted him for it. Fair enough I can see them taking it off him and giving him a warning but prosecuting a 60+ year old guy in those circumstances is imo wrong but it does show how tight they can be.

The jacket you can wash with the relevant nikwax product. A lot of people dry them with a tennis ball to help seperate the down (better if you can find one without the yellow fluff). The sleeping bag should be washed proffesionally as your washing machine and tumble dryer at home won’t be big enough.

agentdagnamit – cheers, looks similar. Just curious to know if anybody had cleaned it. I’m sure it’s been done but not by me and after many attempts!

Jedi, is that the descent towards Grisdale Tarn from Dollywagen pike?