Now that’s an interesting one. We are on the hunt for a camper, but what has always stopped us is the ‘space’ issue (we are pretty much sold on a Transporter due to various issues). With 2 kids and all the outdoor ‘stuff’, unless it has a Rib or similar type bed, there was no way we were safely packing all the stuff we need unless going very light. And that’s not even considering things like bikes etc. Your kombi style camper lite version has me very intrigued indeed…

Its ace. Few pics…

Before:

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After:

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Chuck a 10cm Vango self inflating mattress on this and you have a bed thats far comfier than the old RnR bed + mattress topper.

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Still have the ability for this with the big awning:

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Or this with the smaller awning:

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Innocent Civilian

with Citeh to win. Again.

Some things in life are inevitable. Yawn…

OK, buckle up for this as it might be long winded…

Right, many questions but I’ll skip the 1.9 engine thing as they’re pretty much bombproof. Cockroaches will be driving around in 1.9PD equipped vehicles in the nuclear apocalypse.

How many will be sleeping in it and what ages? Does it have a pop top? We bought a T5(.1 if you’re being picky) conversion from a company who used it as their demo vehicle. That was nearly 10 years ago and its one of the best things we ever did. But………. space inside a T5 is pretty cramped. For 2 it’d be bearable with a pop top. For 2 without a pop top or in our case, with 2 growing kids and a cockapoo, space was just too compromised. Even space to take stuff away with you, unless you travelled MEGA light and barely took anything, was compromised. You were restricted to the small cupboards, some space behind the back bed or packing the floor between the front seats and the back seats (assuming its a “conventional” T5 layout).

Cooking and washing. The sinks are useless. The hobs are ok for making a brew.

A couple of years ago I tore out the interior of ours so its now a kombi setup that seats 6 people and is able to actually carry stuff in the back (no more of the “oh you own a van but can only carry 4 people and B&Q trips are a pain in the neck” type conversations. Regularly have 3 or 4 bikes in the back and 3 or 4 people in it. But…. we’ve still got the pop top and have an Amdro kombi bed so it still sleeps 4 as it did before but theres more space inside as all the cupboards and crap have gone. Cooking is done on a Cadac stove outside/in a Vango air awning that doubles the amount of space you have in 10 minutes or if we’re travelling light, a simple Stitches & Steel sun-shade type awning.

Worth considering how the van will work for you. A T5 sized van will always be a compromise in terms of living space but with the benefit of being able to park in normal parking spaces but if I wanted a “proper” camper again, I’d be going for a motorhome with some space to live in vs a T5 sized van which is effectively a posh metal tent in my opinion.

Almost tempted by an X9 frame at that price to build into a bike I never ride and then sell a few months later.

Bagpipes = a grown up version of the recorder and penny whistle.

OP says it was awesome. STW massive roundly naysay it without much information.

Bagpipes are never acceptable. Thats all the information thats needed.

At least being on the edge of the forest there are plenty of places to drag their body along with offending bagpipes to find a shallow grave.

I would happily admit to being accused of being ‘woke’, I’ve spent my life doing my best not to be an asshole to other people, especially people who work in the service and retail industries, and getting a smile in return seems to indicate my ‘wokeness’ is appreciated.

I’m not sure thats being woke, thats just being a decent human being.

disappointed at there being no references to the Manchester riot thread yet as far as I can see

Not racing but thinking I might head up with the kids and the dog on Saturday afternoon to meet some mates who are racing, grab some food, look at the expo area and go and heckle in the woods for a bit…

Echo the above – I’ve done a fair few PMBAs at Gisburn, Grizedale and that massive one they did for a few years that covered Havok, Lee Quarry and Facit (that was ace!) but I’ve just grown out of racing really… Thanks for the good times Kev & the team at PMBA.

Find the good stuff Jason and I’ll pick your brain for next time I’m passing by ByC… I was going to have an explore last time I passed by that way…

FWIW, I attended a careers fair at a school in Harehills last year and the kids and (almost) all the parents were absolutely delightful to chat with.

Regarding the riot itself, there is no way it should have escalated to that point. If only we’d not had massive cuts to our police force and we could have mustered more than a handful of coppers in a panda car to go and face hundreds of rioters and then be chased away… Any civilised or even non-civilised country would have been able to send a hundred policemen in there, properly equipped to disperse that crowd and make arrests. The police need to become a respected and yes, in cases like that, feared, entity again.

Romanian fella been arrested for torching the bus. Guess where he was arrested??? Yep, waiting for a bus…

I asked a similar question a few months back – suggestions were that Hopes were a good buy so thats the way I went. My Hope BB on my other bike is only just starting to make some creaking noises now after nearly 7 years…

Impressive as always, looks like the weight of the ebike makes some of that stuff harder

That was my thought as well. Compare it to the Mongoose days where everything seemed to flow, this felt a lot more wheels on ground type stuff but I guess thats to be expected when you’ve got 60lb of motor and battery sucking you to the floor…

One of my mates does it – did it for a few years and then moved into a training (no pun intended) role which is more office based but still includes some driving. He loves it. The shift work when he was 100% driving sounded pretty rough, not one for me but the job itself sounds ace (although I say that as a bit of a train geek).

To compound matters, there was actually an issue in US Central Azure region this morning too which meant storage became unlinked from VMs. Nice…

Might be from a Scott Octane like this (you can see the headtube is kinda held in place by “mesh”): (4) Scott high octane frame help. | Retrobike

Looks like a headset reducer thing. Or some frames back in the day had removable head tube inserts to allow you to switch between 1.125″ and 1.5″ (think Scott did for a while maybe).

Not that ‘cheap’, or steel but heavily discounted and fulfils your other criteria (courtesy of the PSA thread):

https://www.lyonequipment.com/bikes/bikes-frames/salsa-stormchaser-frameset__3194

Or just get a secondhand Dawes Galaxy frame off eBay / marketplace. It’ll probably outlast you.

Looks awesome but about 7x more than I wanted to pay and far too posh to leave at the station :D

I went through Geneva last week – from getting off the plane to walking outside including collecting bags and bikes was literally 15 minutes or so… no huge queues etc.

Immediate family – wife and kids, I love to the end of the world. They come with the challenges you’d expect from a disabled wife and 11 and 14 year old boys but never for a second would I not want to spend every second of every day with them.

Outside of that its a whole different kettle of fish. I love my parents but they’re the polar opposite to us and I find it hard sometimes to get along with them and have had fallings out with them over the years. One brother is a bit of a recluse and I rarely see him but still more often than my youngest brother who I simply don’t really like. Nothing in common, I think he takes the piss from my parents and they bend over backwards to baby him (he’s well into his 30s) – stuff like phoning builders for him because he’s too stupid enough to handle that kind of stuff himself.

Family on my parents side couldn’t be more different to my own. Get on with my BiL’s brilliantly and their families and my in-laws are ace, as are my wife’s extended family – aunts and uncles, cousins etc.

I’ve been using the Banana Industries ones for a few months now and not had a single issue with them moving. Cheap, multiple lenses etc. I do have a massive swede though…

^ I’ll take the bottom one please

People are arseholes

I generally dislike the look of ebikes but that new Patriot looks like quite a weapon. Seems like they’ve now managed to find the balance between their usual boxy downtubes and the ability to fit a battery in one without making them significantly bigger. I actually like them both.

New Stage 6 – wow its got a storage compartment. Just save money and weight and build one without one.

Satsuma – they’ll sell millions of kids bikes that cost I assume at least £3000. Yeh…

Disappointed with the pinkbike article that mentions this new £1000 jump frame but has no pics. Hope its a new-age MsIsle… Thought it sounded spendy but a SC Jackal is £900…

Heard nothing about it so I’d guess not. Besides, I think they’ve got bigger issues to focus on resolving first…

Theres someone knocking out 3D printed tat on one of the VW facebook pages I’m on who goes by the name ASS Designs.

Anyone mentioned BPW?

Went back for the first time post-Covid the other week with my kids (14 and 11) and we had an absolute blast. Did nothing but the blues all day but stuff like Sixtapod I simply can’t get enough of and doing trail centres, I’m usually headed straight for the black stuff. Great way to introduce yourself to uplift riding. Tip for BPW though – take food… the range from the cafe seems to have gone down and the prices up.

Just read that – heartbreaking…

Ace bike. Reading about it made my head hurt.

My wife went to see Foo Fighters on Saturday night.

Get the impression she wasn’t blown away by them – just got a ‘yeah, it was good’ response when she got home and not much more! (other than lots of moans about **** in the crowd).

She felt the 3hr set was an hour too long too, which is one reason I gave it a miss. There’s only so much shouting I can be doing with.

Sounds standard for modern Foo Fighters. Seen them a fair few times and each time just got more and more “meh”.

Just booked to see Bad Nerves in Leeds in December. Can’t wait for that!

I’m not trendy enough to hate a beer company and I frequent their bar in York where I’ll enjoy a pizza, some very nice beers, chat to their very pleasant staff etc. But… I’ve found that buying their stuff from the supermarket in cans has become absolute filth. Got a pack of Punk the other day and its really, REALLY nasty – nothing like what it used to be.

That is VERY similar to a Bird…..

Which is also very similar to a Giant ATX990 and every bike that has a similar outline in the 25 years since.

Told someone to “fk off”. And they did.

I live a 10 minute walk away so went to have a look – the retrobike part was the best bit, some stunning bikes. The pristine white Kona Kilauea, the slightly more modern Pace (RC200?) of the various Paces (Paceii?) and the stunning Yeti FRO or whatever it was were my pics. I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t been on retrobike this morning having a look for something pretty to hang on my wall/stand in the corner of my living room.

Full Sunday roast (on whatever day you finish your starvation)

Draw a 2 mile circle around Huddersfield town centre and avoid anything in it would be my suggestion. Treat it like a war zone.

As others have said, the villages out from Honley towards Holmfirth are dead nice. Think Meltham is decent too and then some of the places in the valley toward Marsden although you can kiss goodbye to sunlight for 6 months of the year if you’re in the bottom of the valley. Out the other side, Flockton/Emley are nice as are the villages down around Denby Dale although I don’t think the riding is quite as good around there (done bits and its mostly BW type stuff).

If it were me I’d be looking at the villages between the Calder valley and M62 – Stainland (nicer than it sounds), Barkisland, Sowood, Holywell Green etc. Outlane is kinda ok but its not really got a centre – just a loooong row of houses along a road parallel to the M62. Southern fringes of Halifax aren’t bad either around Skircoat Green and Copley – my old neck of the woods… All the above has incredible riding on the doorstep. You can smile as you see the endless cars with bikes on the roofs passing by on the way to Hebden when they’re missing all the best stuff in the valley… Avoid Ainley Top roundabout at rush hour though and the 629 down into Huddersfield. If you’re in the villages mentioned above then there are options to get around it by going under the M62 and down through Lindley etc.

Loads of decent options.

I use damping grease on all my bikes. Its brilliant stuff. So is the stripey paint I’ve just done my living room with.