Got Guide RSCs and the X0 Trail before it (same caliper roughly), and no problems in the alps and similar with big long descents.

One thing with SRAM stuff is they are best for modulation but they’re not a grab and drag brake. Learnt quick in the alps to just feather the brakes to scrub speed and hard brake before a corner as needed or not.

Still though, if they’re pulling to the bars something is up. Any pad left? (the RSCs and above have nice bite adjust to help when pads wear thin). Or otherwise a bleed issue. Were they perfect before hitting the trails?

Also, yeah, big rotors for the alps if you haven’t already got them.

The lithium ion ones are good but generally you’re not supposed to leave them 100% charged all the time.

Same as batteries for bike lights. Many get knackered because they’re not conditioned right for storage over the summer. Need to be around two thirds charge and top up every couple months but still store at two thirds, not 100%. Though when you come to start a car with one of these, will it need full capacity?

iMessage is likely just another messaging service like FB Messenger, WhatsApp etc. Just it integrates into the messaging stuff in iPhone. Send to a number it recognises (anther iPhone) and it will use iMessage, otherwise SMS. No data but a signal, I guess just SMS.

Android phone will just send SMS. Doesn’t have a clue about Apple stuff.

Though you could both use FB Messenger and this can be set to integrate with SMS so it will do something similar.

I think some Android manufacturers also have their own chat solutions that enhance with data but integrate SMS.

Charge Spoon has done me fine for years and I’m clocking 60 mile biggest rides off road. No fitting & measurements, just bought, rode and seemed to work so stuck with it.

Noting also Endura padded liner shorts. Don’t know if the brand makes a difference.

Don’t know why but SRAM parts just aren’t available in the UK aside from complete service kits or otherwise going through dealers. German stores seem to offer the actual parts on their parts list, but no guarantee they can get them.

There has to be a period to adjust the overpayment system to ensure you’re still overpaying. It’ll settle down and then reflect the true amount you’re overpaying.

Or you could get an independent energy monitor or just read the meter and see how much you are truly using.

[/end_cynic_mode]

Plenty of swanky restaurants and bars, they’re paying 😁. They don’t mind, they’re rich.

Market is terrible at the moment. So many offers falling through, chains failing. Local sellers near me have had their houses on the market for years. Can make offers but can’t sell. Bridging loan for that duration is just not possible.

That’s the problem I have. I can make offers but it’s a nightmare to sell.

Though people are waiting for the result of Brexit but that could still be a long wait.

From more of a customer point of view, I can see one problem being with groups of friends who decide to sign up to a particular ride and they ride the same trails back home okay, so they sign up to the same level holiday. Then while someone may have concerns others might convince them saying they’ll be fine. Get there and it can be a fine line where some may be out of their depth.

It’s why I’m cautious about booking with a group as I know I’d be out of my depth on some things other friends would have no problem with, but I’ve had the “you’ll be fine”. I’m okay if we all have a really good understanding of our abilities and the trip offers options. I’d prefer a trip where the whole group can do some things together and then split on more technical bits, rather than split right at the beginning and not end up doing anything together other than booze and food in the evening. If the gap is too wide though then understandable but would hope that’s filtered out before even booking.

All said though, a trip where you feel a bit out of your comfort zone at times can push you a lot in experience. Just doing what you’re happy with all the time doesn’t encourage improvement.

Main one I had was with flight changes where the airline changes. Change in Chicago to Salt Lake City. Can’t remember for sure but it may have been BA on the long haul but was Delta internal.

The luggage went awol more likely due to airport staff confusion at Chicago with different airlines. Though was worrying when advised to just dump bags in this random corridor and it’ll be sorted. They stayed there for half a week.

Return, I’ve had quite a few occasions of luggage not turning up on the belt at Heathrow and have to be delivered days later by taxi. BA and Delta. Almost certainly it’s Heathrow that’s the problem. Though BA and T5 seems to be generally smooth.

Anyway, with bikes, if at all possible and not too epic a journey, I’d prefer to drive (door to door to Alps factoring in airport transfers, parking and faff, it’s not much more time, more relaxing and can take bucket loads of stuff).

Flying and a short trip, I’d think twice about taking a bike for fear of the bike not turning up as that writes off the trip. At least renting for a couple of days on a long trip is not so bad.

Stick pedals in your jacket pockets. Wonder what security would think of them though. DMR Vaults especially are deadly weapons 😁

@Cougar – I don’t have any Apple things. Still got the spam. As said, just straight into my Google account.

Will admit Sensodyne does make a difference when the tooth is properly sensitive, though it may depend on the reason for the sensitivity. In my case my tooth was cracked (unbeknownst to dentist). The stuff clearly helped fill the crack where normal toothpaste wasn’t doing much there.

Then it cracked, tooth pulled, so end of problem. Back to normal toothpaste now but the annoyance is I shop in the small local supermarkets mostly and so the only option is Colgate Total.

Am interested in a viable eco option for toothpaste or at least something that isn’t feeding the global mega corp vultures (and Colgate-Palmolive are associated with evil Palm Oil stuff and all that).

Gold fillings

Oddly, I’ve just now got one of these spam! Forget Mac etc (I don’t have a Mac), it’s spam direct into the Google account. Went direct to my Google calendar telling me I’ve won an iPhone. Noting my Google account isn’t my primary account and my calendar on devices is via Outlook.

So Google have a hole in their security. I know they’ve tightened up their GMail API for developers to do audits on third party apps now, but I guess this is through some other hole.

Easy enough to get access to Google Calendar API (I have done work on this stuff), but it shouldn’t give me access to spam a private calendar. Though anyone can send someone an invite to an event but I’d expect that to appear in the mailbox also and some calendar systems will put a tentative entry in the calendar).

That said, there’s an option ‘Automatically add events from Gmail to my calendar’ so I’ve turned that off just in case.

i also noticed on ba web site that they say you should ring in advance to tell them your taking a bike

I’ve had a few flights in recent years via Expedia and they default to budget no bag ticket meaning paying for the bag on check-in. I can’t remember if BA was one of them, but check-in online to pay and ticked ‘special item’ for sports equipment and it just says checked-in but have to pay at the desk. Turn up and they had no clue about the check-in and insisted I had to pay full price at the desk, not online price. Twice happened to me. The second time the guy at the desk said just check in as a normal bag online, only use the special item thing for really weird stuff. Bikes, skis etc are the normal bag price so long as not over the weight / size limits.

Oral-B is what you need. The dentist on telly said so.

I didn’t even know Oral-B made a toothpaste!

Checked in with BA at Heathrow T5 with bag, pushing the limit, but the guy at the desk insisted it was actually 32kg for bikes, regardless of what it said on the web site. Also it’s a faff to weigh them anyway due to the size so they didn’t bother.

32kg is the absolute limit for a single bag though for all airlines as that’s the max weight baggage carriers are allowed to carry. Anything over must go cargo.

Anyway, with BA you get two carry ons and at 23kg each. One has to fit under the seat though, but I find it’s generous room. I fill all my clothes and gadgets in the carry ons. I also take a helmet just in a loose bag or no bag as third carry item. Done that with both bike and skiing loads of times and never been questioned (even with EasyJet and RyanAir).

p.s. economy with BA is one checked bag including sports bag. Except certain destinations.

To be fair, they might dump it on Amazon or Netflix for the UK. That’s at lest been an advantage being in UK, e.g. ST Picard on Amazon and Discovery on Netflix, both CBS All Access shows in US.

Though Disney own Hulu also and that’s never stepped outside the US. Apparently they have said they want to launch in as many markets as possible though. So that could mean a long wait rather than see it soon on Amazon/Netflix.

Always wet, even in a drought.

To be honest, I’ve used tube patches on tyres, just the peel and stick kind with glue. Plenty of sealant, job done.

Depends on the hole though.

I’ve also used a Velox tubeless repair kit which has patches and glue. They didn’t seem any different to tube patches really, just a tube kit might not always have the larger sizes.

Just in case, keep it to PMs, please don’t post locations on a public forum. The area is sensitive. Just my 2p.

What’s the content of the calendar events and/or emails?

I don’t know Mac stuff and not that familiar with Google Calendar, but is ‘dismiss’ actually doing a decline for a meeting invite? That sends an email on some calendar systems to send the decline.

Sporty health type being interviewed a while back by BBC I think, claimed he got diabetes from energy drinks, gels etc.

Anecdote over.

Screw it if it needs a subscription to yet another service.

While Sky / Virgin is stupidly overpriced, the problem with replacing with streaming services is you need so many of them. It’s a fragmented market, and a monthly cost for each adds up.

Though I’m sad to admit that I’ve lost interest in Star Wars yet was such a big fan of the originals. Only watched the first of the new Disney stuff and really haven’t had the enthusiasm since then, even to rewatch the originals (all the more complicated by having to source the proper originals and then there are numerous versions so have to decide which to watch, then someone does another version, etc).

Also, is this more of a kids show being on Disney channel thing?

Ridiculously oversized inflatables far too big for the garden with annoying pump/fan seem to be a trend at the moment.

Kids party, yeah, bouncy castle the size of the entire garden more suited for an event in a big field, and very loud blower on at crack of dawn all day into evening. Gets used for about 10% of the time.

I’m hoping it was just rented and they’ve realised it was a shit / expensive idea so won’t be using it for the next party.

USB might not be that quick, depending on connection type plus might faff about trying to install drivers.

WiFi hot spot is simple. Just go into settings on laptop for that WiFi connection and make sure it’s marked as metered and then it won’t download huge amounts.

Or get a decent amount of data.

Careful with some mobile plans which might treat tethered data as non inclusive.

If playing to use it a lot it might be worth getting a 4G dongle for the laptop or a 4G access point.

Monty Python Italian Lesson – http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x6qgle1

Ticket cost – what is it? I’ve not seen any figures? Which makes it difficult slagging it off for being “overpriced” especially when you consider that a return from Manchester to London on Virgin can be over £300.

Return on train can cost that much, depending on time/day, and you can get flights cheaper (BA comes out cheaper for a start), with 1hr journey time.

Point is though, whatever the current price is, an HS2 ticket is guaranteed to be higher. I can’t see any way it could be cheaper especially given how much the project is costing and then it’ll be run commercially for profit aimed at business people.

lots of people commute home from London on a Thursday and Friday – they aren’t high powered execs amd the trains are compeltely rammed

Cross country trains are run at capacity with just enough carriages for the typical use. They’ll always be full.

HS2 speeds doesn’t help congested stopping services as it doesn’t stop at those places, same as some current long distance trains.

What we need is less trains!

More trains and infrastructure that are of benefit to 90% of commuters, just not high speed vanity projects that benefit 10% (or less).

There are a few YHAs that are pretty much ride out the door. Not so much trail centre places, but they’re right on popular trail locations or routes.

YHA at Holmbury St Mary in Surrey Hills for example, and the one at Danywenallt / Talybont-on-Usk is right on the Gap ride in the Brecons.

Very little about the regional markets it unlocks

I’ve never understood how it should unlock a regional market, or boost the “northern powerhouse”.

It doesn’t solve capacity issues. Yes it provides an expensive ticket option for execs to get between London and the North slightly quicker instead of using the cross country trains on the rickety old lines (which aren’t that slow), but the real congestion still exists and more so in the local areas, and worse those lines are not being improved because the money is being spent on HS2 instead.

And the world has moved on and far more people realise they don’t need to physically be at a meeting a long distance away when it can be done remotely. Price of an HS2 ticket costing as much as a flight, or a couple of quid or less on a conference call and not having wasted half the day getting there and back (despite being “a bit quicker”).

Sure, some people need to be there in person, but the time saving is not amazing and with the ticket price it’s hardly going to encourage investment in the north. Far bigger things affect that.

HS2 may be costing a fortune, but if you want people so stop traveling by air this is needed.

I hardly think the relatively tiny amount of people who fly London to Manchester is worth building HS2 for, and if the ticket price is more than flying, people are still going to fly anyway.

It’s not like this solves a problem for millions of people and businesses. It’s a tiny fraction of that.

According to my childhood joke book, the punchline is supposed to be…….

Because their heads are so far from their bodies!

Badoom-tish.

You’re having a giraffe.

Oh, and another option is WSL, Windows Subsystem for Linux, if you’ve got 64bit Windows. Integrated into Windows and can execute Linux binaries within Windows or from shell windows.

It doesn’t have the GUI technically, but you can install an X Server on Windows and X GUI apps will work.

It’s not full-on kernel level Linux either… yet. Though that’s coming with later releases of Windows.

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/wsl/install-win10

Also worth a look is the new Windows Terminal which includes support for WSL (and with some fiddling with the config file, can set up tabs to SSH into a Linux box, instead of using Putty).

https://github.com/microsoft/terminal

Though maybe not quite an easy start for a 12yo, but once set up you’ve got linux stuff to play with within Windows.

Timber bell now being sold by STW

Discount for members or STW branding perhaps? ;)

Not sold on them yet though. I can appreciate out with hill walkers and horse riders where the cowbell sound is pleasant and they tend to be less hostile to riders anyway.

The miserable gits on the canal though are deaf, selectively deaf, headphones in, or otherwise looking for a reason to kick off. The approaching gentle cowbell sound might not get their attention. I find it difficult enough to get attention with a loud bell I’m ringing constantly.

Though as I’ve often said, in the morning it’s a different matter. Happy friendly bunch. Seem to be fitter more active types out and they often spot me without even ringing a bell and greet me with a cheery hello before I’ve had a chance to say anything.

Anyway, how are Timber bells in a crash? My regular crappy cheap bell got smashed up other week in a crash, and that’s with it mounted under the bar. So I’m after a replacement. It’s mainly for the towpath though and as I say I’m not sure this type will keep them from ranting.

the done thing is to spend a bit of time and bed them in properly

Meh, just ride and brake heavy on a few descents or while riding off, but for all the variations I’ve done including not bothering at all, I’ve noticed no difference really once I’m properly riding the trails.

If you’re about to start a race though with new pads or discs then sure I can understand you want peak performance from the off. Nothing I do requires peak performance as I pedal out of the car park or house, but will be up and running by the time I hit proper trails or done that a few times (bearing in mind I myself won’t be up and running properly for a few trails anyway).

Noting also I’m just a social rider or pedal hound. In it for the smiles and miles but not Strava times.

Definitely the cup, not just the bearing or is it the race on the fork that’s got stuck up there and dropped out?

Very unusual for the cup to drop out as they’re tough to press in and need a lot of effort to get out.

Maybe there’s damage somewhere, frame or the cup. If it fell out I should imagine you can easily pop it back in but likely to come out again.

+1 Boot liner (Hatchbag.co.uk in my case).

Rags / brushes in car, wipe off the worst, chuck bike in car. Got no problem with bike in car and much prefer it to roof or towbar racks for a whole pile of faff and security reasons.

Home, wash when convenient or a lot of the time just dust off. Over last year and throughout winter I’ve not had to properly wash my bikes much. A bit of mud left on it is fine and probably dusts off or just ignore as it will get more mud anyway. Mainly just keep the drivetrain clean, and since using Squirt lube all the year I find the drivetrain only needs a wipe or at most a very brief rinse and relube.

Portable washers. I used to use hand pump garden sprayer types. They worked by kept breaking. Cheap though. Almost everyone I know who’ve had powered washers have had issues with things breaking or leaking.

A tip also is if wheels are caked in mud towards end of ride, find a nice puddle to ride through near the car park.

He should learn the hard way

The hard way is trying to learn from Linux forums. Really will drive you to suicide.

Effectively boils down to from “read the man page” to downright abuse if you ask a question, and if something is broken or feature/driver missing then don’t go asking for help, fix it yourself so long as it’s fed back to the community with no appreciation for your efforts. Any device that works on Windows but not Linux is the spawn of the devil, until someone reverse engineers the drivers and gets it working then it’s amazing (though to be fair the hate is because manufacturers won’t support Linux so it’s up to the community to work it out).

However, to echo everyone else… Raspberry Pi and Raspbian (it’s Debian basically).

😁

I’ve used the liners from Endura shorts for years (even if not using Endura shorts). I don’t clip them to the shorts though you can do. I find it’s better unclipped as they stay in place while the shorts can shift about. Clip them in and the shorts can drag the liner down your arse.

Bibs… faff, and I don’t have a need to keep everything pulled up (as I say, so long as not clipping liner in). Don’t have an issue with tops riding up and getting muddy back, as that doesn’t happen.

Anyway, I’m just used to padded shorts. A few times not worn them and it’s weird, especially for a bloke. “bits” get caught up in things, plus undies get wedged up.

p.s. don’t ride with undies and padded shorts. Commando only.

I get loads of spam that come from people I know, but it’s not directly from them, just from a spambot. Generally either they’ve had a virus at some point which has harvested their address book or more likely they’ve signed up to something which shares their address book and that has been hacked or was malware in the first place. Very common is on Facebook. Loads of advert posts which tempt you into clicking to see more detail or sign up for a game, then it asks for some permission which people don’t look at and just click away, then they’ve got your address book from FB.

Similar with options to log into various web sites using Facebook or Google accounts. It’s great because it saves tedious filling in a form and entering passwords, but you may also be granting access to your address book, and can you trust that site? Maybe they’re genuine, but they have rubbish security and get hacked.

Go through your Facebook, Google, etc security settings and check all the apps and third party sites that have access to your profile. Revoke everything you don’t recognise and don’t 100% trust and actually need.

There’s also another way which is just in how emails are sent through the internet. They’re not secure generally and can pass through many mail servers along the way and one could be intercepting mails and harvesting addresses, either deliberately or because they’ve been hacked.

To deal with a lot of this I use a personal domain and allocate an email address per every site I sign in to. I’m a lot more protective over my personal mail I use to communicate with friends and family and try not to give it out.