Just do it.

You'll never regret it.

Unless you get hurt.

And then you might.

But even then you probably won't.

Cause there is no other feeling like it…

juan – Member
(now waiting for all the owner of a jap inline 4 to come on here and tell about how nice and stable their bike is at 180 mph on the motorway…)

Never been that fast on mine, but it is a very stable bike. Anyone heard of Gyroscopic effect – that is what makes it stable at highspeed. Juan if I have missed your point I am sorry.

I wouldn't ever suggest an R1 as a first bike, but if he has got it then there isn't a lot more to say about which is the best bike for a newb…

Get him to sit on the bike and play with the throttle until he can choose a particular rev spot from idle at will (obviously don't spend to long doing this as you'll really p155 off the neighbours!!)

Once he can do that he'll probably have half decent throttle control, it's then just a case of knowing when to trust the tyres and knowing when you have warmed them up, absolutely nothing other than experience will enable him to do this.

Get him on a schooled track day, that'll teach him more about how his bike handles than anything else… Roads are not as grippy as a track though.

As for all litre owners being scared of the power and failing to corner properly… Gross exaggeration there me thinks, I quite often go out with guys on smaller bikes, and I never lead because they can't keep up (Yes due to straight-line speed and acceleration) but I also never have a problem keeping up with them in the twisties (When I have got my tyre pressures right that is!)

You can learn to corner on any bike, if you force yourself. If he doesn't TRY and hold corner speed, the bike will be irrelevant, he will never corner quickly, all a small bike does is introduce you to how important holding corner speed is to keep up with more powerful bikes.

Cornering "properly" on the road has nothing to do with the power or speed, but about placing yourself in the corner properly to see as far ahead as possible and avoid dying! Obviously the better you get at this the faster you can go safely, however that may just mean he reaches the limit of a 400 faster if he is a quick learner.

That's all for now.

I wonder if CRC (Where I bought it from) will replace it under warranty?! Only problem with that is I'll only have a 3 speed whilst they make up there mind.

Stupid bl00dy interweb! – repost!

Hmmm, I will take them apart when I get a chance, I don't think it will be frayed cables as they are almost brand new…. well 6 months old.

I will do it well away from the fridge!

+1 imp999

Rubbish :( Just watched the footage… Pretty horrendous!

After a crash like that anything other than a spine board would probably have finished him off if the crash itself hadn't already.

R.I.P.

Am I silly for now questioning whether I should be saving for an Ibis Mojo or just getting a cyclo cross bike!!!!

I could defo get the cyclo cross bike a lot quicker and easier!

Cheers, looks like an email to the shop in question and a trip to me local wheel builder to see what they say about them.

The wheel looks true, the spokes feel even but there is a lot of lateral flex in them, much more than my previous wheels, but I did put this down to them being double butted so would have more flex in them at that point under the same tension anyway,

I don't think Moors Valley is the cheapest place to park, and the roads local don't really lend themselves to random parking (although as I live close I don't drive there so may be wrong!)

But that said, if you are using their facilities………

You definitely can, although it will probably start off with a bit of a road ride…. At the moment I can't mentally work out how you'd get to Morrs Valley Country Park without doing some road miles… but there must be a route!

There is good riding there, I live just down the road from 3x in West Moors and ride in and around there a lot in the evenings.

You could ride the Castleman Trailway into Poole. It's between an hour and 15 an hour and 45 mins ride depending on the exact route, (about 15 miles from Ringwood to Poole). It's mostly flat, fast fire road type riding which could easily be done on a road bike with chunky tyres.

Having got there, have an ice cream, wonder around the quay and appreciate the motorised 2 wheelers if you go on a Tuesday evening. Then turn around and go back.

If you are out for a short ride then Moors Valley Country Park[/url] are putting in some nice singletrack at the moment and it is really close to Ringwood, you can either go in the main entrance or come up the back alley as it were off the Castleman Trailway (They have some quite cool technical bits in one area including some half finished 'North Shore' and a pump track, or there are just miles and miles of forest roads with intersecting singletrack. But still very flat.

If you want long and fast with some good lung burning then the above will provide you with the opportunity, but as I have said it is all flat.

Loads and loads of riding if you head out over to the purbecks, although for some reason I haven't actually done more than a 2 hr ride myself yet! But there is loads to do here and the riding is apparently epic! Although still one for the short travel bikes to keep it interesting.

If your that kinda a guy the local club Dorset Rough Riders[/url] do a lot of rides in the local vicinity – check out the calendar for details.

If you go further afield to west Dorset/east Devon border there are some proper epic distance rides you can do, but there is between an hour and an hour half's driving to get you there from Ringwood.

This book by Colin Dennis is pretty good, I have it and have done a few of the rides, but I would very much advise sitting down with an appropriate OS Map or GPS and working through the route first, some of it is a bit confusing if you miss a junction (I found it hard to use whilst cycling so would strongly suggest using a GPS and setting his co-ords as waypoints.)

I hope this helps.

Dom

Without wishing to hijack the thread, where else is good to stay in the Afan area?

The lodge is all booked up the weekend I want to go with 6 mates.

I was looking at the log cabins, but they will only sleep up to 5, any other recommendations?

Dom

Well,

I went to start taking the bike to bits (One piece at a time) to super lube it all up, and before I got any where I noticed that I had been pushing down on the saddle to make it creak… turns out the saddle is really quite creaky. The rest of the bike is fine.

Happy days :D

+1 juan.

I meant a 2005 model, sorry I should have been a bit clearer, it's a 2005 ASR.

Looks like I'll be taking it apart and giving it a clean after the next ride.

Hi guys,

meant to say it's 2k5 version so I doubt the dealer would be overly impressed on me trying to get anything on warranty!!! It came from the classifieds on here, go STW!

The missus is really happy with it, the creaking is just starting to interfere with the convo's during the ride!!! The trouble is she gets louder to compensate ;)

I've put a deore disc groupset on it for the moment to get going and will upgrade as we go, but this is all less than a month old with only about 10 – 15 hrs riding on it.

We went out today for a short <1hr30m x-country ride with no big hits in it and I didn't notice the creaking at all, the other rides we've done have been a 3 hr ride at llandegla which resulted in some creaking and some 2 – 3 hr x-country rides which were mostly xc oriented, but it was on these I noticed it the most.

I'm wondering whether the bearings might heat up and swell or something over the longer rides…

Cheers for the suggestions though.

All 125's are cool!!!!

They're soooo much fun, but in a completely different way to proper bikes… What ever you get, forget about what you look like on it and just concentrate on having fun! Much like on a mountain bike!

In my opinion the chain cleaner gadgets are definitely worth it! No questions asked.

I use one with some white spirit/similar stuff to clean the chain after every ride, it takes about 5 mins per bike once you have got the hang of it, then leave it, then before the next ride lube up with some wet lube…. Although I'll be trying some dry lube when the wet stuff runs out, unless it's winter in which case I'll stick with wet.

As for forks, I look at them and wipe them and try and decide if the seals are looking cruddy. Otherwise I leave the bike to do it's own thing!

Dom

Hmmmmm… I just bought the missus some Mountain Kings for her new bikes… Not entirely sure I'm happy with that now in the face of all the comments!!!!

She didn't have any problems at Llandagallollouw on Sunday though… as far as I am aware!

I've just, literally about ten minutes ago, bought the 175mm XT's from Merlin…. I should probably have read this first though, I'm 5' 11" with a 32" in seem, I have no idea what my current crank length is.

Oh well, I am sure it will all be fine!

Ok… It would be interesting to completely dismantle the full range side by side to see where the differences lie. I'm thinking XT(R) at the moment… I would like a bit of Shimano bling…

The dreamliner is – I believe – the first non military aircraft which uses composites for serious structural elements… ie all of them.

It's worth paying the extra for the XTR one then? Will they be compatible with all cranks or would I have to go XTR – Not sure why I think there would be compatibility issues but I have a niggling feeling I've read about it somewhere.

3 MONTHS!!!!

Is that between fettling or between replacement!?

Loving the airfix comments!!! I am worried they're going to turn out a bit like James May's life size airfix spitfire…!!!

I don't think the stealth aircraft use the same level of composite as the dreamliner does, or even the same construction method, nor does it carry 240+ (I think) passengers. I also don't think it has poorly trained ground crews driving food trolleys into the door frames regularly – although I have noticed that they are armoured.

Sounds like I'm scare mongoring (Spelling?), possibley I am, but personally I think these materials have come in a bit quick, although I am sure the FEA will prove me wrong. Still at least the process of producing CF is environmentally friendly…

Hmmmm… Are we saying then that the Shimano ones are not servicable, and when they are gone they are gone, whereas the more expensive ones require bearing replacements every so often…

Next question, are the bearings cheap ie £ not ££££'s?

As far as I am aware, there are efforts to develop recycling processes, most of which are quite successful, but hugely energy intensive. Although things are improving.

Fair enough then… Clearly I was wrong about STWer's worrying about carbon bikes!

My favourite quote from the Boeing man at Farnborough was that CF's don't corrode like metals and therefore are better – or something like that. Hmmmm… There are other issues though unique to composites that I am fairly sure there isn't a good solution to yet.

Apparently a lot of people on this forum… Not me though. I do however worry about carbon fibre aeroplanes.

I wouldn't drill it as although it will reduce the stress concentration at the crack tip you are just opening up more opportunities for cracks to propogate through the weave and for fraying to start at the edges of the hole – remember Carbon is NOT black metal.

You could do what the airlines do and bolt a wapping great big alu sleeve over it?!

But I wouldn't do that. not sure what I would do to be honest, you could maybe use some resin to fill the gap and then monitor it closely. However cutting down would be a suitable idea if you'll only lose 1cm.

Just shows there is a whole lot about this mountain biking malarky that I know nothing about!!!!!!!!!!!

fair enough… I stand corrected.

MkI Renault Scenic for <£1k.

Then keep the rest for repairs.

Had mine about 2 years now and spent about £500 more than I paid getting stuff sorted. But she has always started :D

15ish miles more or less all off road, takes me between an hour and an hour and 15mins depending on how fit I am feeling.

I know he's a cyclist… but I found this really quite funny!

I love riding with my dog, it's a Hungarian Viszla, very temperamental when out on 'walks' but is as good as gold when I am on the bike, he seems to need the speed to keep him entertained.

As with the others, We'll probably do between an hour and 2 at the moment, hoping to up that to a half day or more at some point, but plenty of regular rests and make sure we stop at every watering hole for a couple of minutes to make sure he gets something to drink.

Not sure how a rescue dog would work, unless it was very young.

Dom

Cheers Dafy. I have to admit I'm not to worried about colour matching things, as long as they aren't garish!!!! I'm more interested in ease of maintenance and smoothness when it comes to hubs.

From your last comment then I am guessing you believe the Hope II are every bit as good as the CK's?

Dom

Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm Mojo.

Just awaiting a test ride, not on the HD though as super sexy as they are I think 160mm travel may be just a little too much. SL for me.

Good luck though!!!!

Here's an idea, stick the money in a high interest account and sit on it until November…. You never know you might get enough interest on it to but a chain stay protector for it!