As others have said, try and demo one. I wondered if I had made the right decision when I bought mine because the suspension worked very differently to what I’d had before (VPP). Mine is the 140, would love to try it at 160 but wouldn’t need that for a lot of the riding I do.

The GoPro is the only one I’d consider for biking due to it working best with a chest mount.
I can see the ones with the rotating lenses being good when mounting in awkward places though.

The group I was with was of very mixed abilities. The weather had been terrible over here beforehand too, meaning most folk had hardly been out for a couple months. Everyone managed though. The van would also meet us roughly halfway into our rides with our lunch, there was the option to hop onboard at these times but no one did. There was a short day mid-week too, those feeling it could rest up but most of us went and did a ride in the afternoon.

mtbtomo – If you’re fine riding 1×10 here then you’ll be alright I guess…there was one day where it was nearly all uphill though and some hellish steep ones on some of the other days. I’d prefer more gears but that’s me. (Don’t want to get into that debate on here!).
I know Simon was checking out more routes so there’s no guarantee you’ll be doing the same one I did. Remember that the mountains are bigger over there too!

mtbtomo – I’d been on one of their Spanish trips before going to Morocco with them too. The riding is similar but everything is just more epic! I’ll definitely be going back at some point. 😀

Check out Freeride Morocco[/url]. I can’t recommend them enough. It depends what you’re wanting though…we spent five days riding across the Atlas Mountains, with a van carrying all our gear to each nights accommodation. This meant we had to ride a variety of terrain to link each place up…I thought it just added to the adventure of it all.
I’ve written what I thought of it in another post (on the Bear Bones Bikepacking site).

I’d already typed the above before seeing the fresh posts…I would say the trip I did was nearly half the price of those mentioned, I very much doubt that they’d be twice as good! 😉

EDIT: Here’s another link with some info on trips to Morocco (here on STW).

Keep off the tops whatever you do…there has been an avalanche warning issued this evening! 😯

The other to watch out for is that you want someone who works with Ti all the time. I’ve seen some custom Ti work before where the welds were shocking. If I was paying $$$$’s and the welds were shit I’d be ashamed to own it…it’s not like you can send custom work back (without losing lots of money). Sure if a weld’s cocked up it can be re-done, but not without introducing more heat and making the material more brittle. And that’s without going into distortion, etc.

(I used to be a welder/fabricator)

Life has however taught me to not mention if I think a woman is pregnant.

Me too! 😳 To answer the original question though, I would see if anyone was OK.

I think you would just disconnect the mech and brake caliper. You wouldn’t want them left on the outside of the frame anyway.

The only thing that would be straight forward would be a bike with a interupted rear mech cable and rim brakes…then you could use quick-release cable connectors.

Either a non-slip hallway runner or an off-cut of lino.

This doesn’t really solve any issues or provide any advice!

? The rear un-bolts.

Depending on how much faff you want…all full-sus frames can have the rear removed. Failing that, so can an Ibis Tranny or the soft-tail frame I’m selling. I don’t think I’d ever pay the premimum for S&S couplers unless I was in the market for a custom steel frame already.

EDIT: Tranny already mentioned.

I take it you’re going to be wanting it for more than just biking? If not, get a bike mounted one, it will have a bigger screen and will be in a better position for following a route whilst moving.
If I did have a watch GPS, I would still mount it on the bars/stem when biking.

EDIT: If you’re not wanting to follow routes with it and are just wanting to receive/record information, ignore what I’ve already said.

As above, you’ll be fine. If you’re going to be sticking to a waymarked route I think Whinlatter will be the best bet….it’s a lot more enjoyable than the North Face route IMHO.

D45yth I don’t think there are ant dramas with captaintomo saying ‘loughrigg fell loop’

The reason why I mentioned it is that I live close to Keswick and hear a lot of folk calling Lonscale Fell, ‘Loughrigg fell’…I think it maybe came about from Latrigg being close. I understand where you’re coming from as there probably is no confusion over the name of Loughrigg fell/terrace.

As others have said, don’t dismiss Grizedale…there’s better trails in and around there than anywhere else near Coniston. It’s such a shame that many folk go there, do the North Face trail and think that’s all the forest has to offer. I only use the start of it on my way up to Parkamoor.
There’s some good bits on the Walna Scar ride too, especially with the one or two cheeky bits added on. Stephenson Ground has been a bog for a long time but maybe it’s firmed up in these freezing conditions.

OP – If you do go to the Sierra Espuna NP (I think it’s more than an hour away to be honest), check the ‘La Perdiz’ restaurant in the forest (not far from the visitors centre)…I went there for three days in a row once I’d found it. A proper Spanish hunting kind of place, all the meat they serve once roamed in your surroundings. Giant venison and wild boar kebabs, served with fried potatos, bread and a glass of red for about 7 euros! 😀

As mentioned above, Wikiloc is your friend. I would have been lost without it as I was downloading routes onto my phone and luckily the memory card fitted my GPS. If you haven’t a GPS, buy one over a bike bag as the best trails aren’t waymarked.

Sorry if I’ve caused any confusion…I was just saying that I chose the Doblo as it was the only vehicle that could take the Evoc bag without hassle. Any normal car would struggle, especially if you need the rear seats.

How many passengers OP?

You could struggle…I had a choice of all kinds of hire cars when I was last in Spain, I chose a Fiat Doblo though as that was the only one that I could get my stuff in with the minimum of hassle (Evoc bag and suitcase).

I take it you haven’t already got the Evoc bag? I have a BMW 3 Series estate and still have a fight with that and my other bag/s, let alone anybody elses…I guess the Passat would be similar.

It’s known as vaginoplasty isn’t it? Any cosmetic surgeon should be able to sort it out.

EDIT: Oh sorry, I hadn’t read the rest of the post! 😛

Must just have been while he got the camera out? 😯 if not!

You don’t need the grease tool, that just makes things easier…you can just pop the seal off the bearing.

Caldbeck Fells

I’d maybe give that a wide berth…I saw some pics the other day where a delivery van and two gritters had to be dug out by a JCB on the Caldbeck road!

loughrigg fell

Do you mean Loughrigg Terrace or Lonscale Fell? Whichever, neither is anywhere near the best ride in either locality.

Borrowdale Bash is doable though. Not sure what else to suggest, like you say, you want nothing going high.

I use the CK ones and if I had to use something else would probably choose Hope (what I used to use)…most other BB’s are more or less disposable. I always regrease mine when doing any other maintainence.

EDIT: I’ve one here in my spares box that has 1000’s of miles on it…I only changed because there was a noise coming from my bike that I thought was it. After changinging it though, turned out to be something else!

Have a look on the MTBR Nicolai forum…then it’ll be like being in a sweetshop!

I wish they’d called it earlier to give folk a chance to cancel hotels and not spend a fortune on fuel

Too true. I was supposed to be doing something at Whinlatter last friday but it was cancelled…that decision had more to do with the high winds rather than any snow. Anyone who rides the trails up there (or in any forest) will realise the danger trees of coming down on the trail.

but it does stike me me as H&S going over the top again

??? Have you seen the road up to Whinlatter? There’s always accidents at events, probably a lot more in these conditions…would you be happy for someone to get injured and then them not be able to be rescued or taken to hospital as easily as normal? 🙄
How many people out of the 650+ that had entered would normally ride in these conditions? Don’t think too many people would have been happy standing about in it all day either.

I’m sure we could all park in Keswick

Really? A few hundred cars at the very least? Where at? And then bike up to Whinlatter, all organised at a moments notice…get real.

Most of these one man operations struggle to keep up with demand or keep a constant stock of the best materials to make the bags with. Like pastcaring said, maybe he doesn’t need the extra business yet. There’s nothing worse than loads of phonecalls or emails when you’re too busy to do the work.

pingu66 – the only others I had seen were in the US.

You’ve haven’t been looking in the right places then. There are quite a few folk making them here in the UK and across Europe.

gasyz – Member

Good call
+1, I think those who think it should still go ahead should stopping thinking about what they would do and consider everyone else.

I’ve come to the conclusion that the kind of people who do this are those who only do things or go to places so that they can tell others. Probably the same morons that post Facebook updates of where they’re at whenever they get the chance. 🙄

Internal width and 19mm is narrow by todays standards.

I thought someone with more experience of bothies than me might have chipped in by now. Some are better than others and you should always carry other means of shelter in case the bothy is full…you’d be unlucky if it was but a lot could depend on the time of year, how popular the route it’s on is, etc.

??? 10 speed is compatible with any modern bike as long you’re using a 10sp drivetrain and shifters.

I’ve always used Sportscoverdirect…it’s that cheap I’ve always gone for the 12 months option. I’ve never had to make a claim though so don’t know what they’re like in that regard.

Have you looked to see if anyone’s done anything over on Bear Bones Bikepacking?

As well as Alpkit there’s a few other reasonably priced ones.
Bikepack.eu
Buggybags
I’ve seen some posts about a Russian business selling them on eBay but I can find the link. They were very cheap but could take a while to get here I think.

If you are able to blag the education thing with Adobe, you can get the creative cloud for £15.88 month for 12 months…that allows the use of every program they make (I think).

Link

Have you thought about Lightroom? A few folk I know now use that instead of photoshop now and do any HDR in Photomatix.