Rockshox are doing the 2016 120mm Rebas in 1-1/8″ which is good news for older frame users. Alltricks (France) have them.

This. SIDs as well, if you want something lighter still. Plus you don’t need to get them from France as your LBS should be able to match the price.

180 front and 160 rear for me too, I’m 90kg, and have never thought I needed bigger rotors.

My question is, Can Puregym, use a direct debit mandate that was in place with LA fitness to take my money?

Evidently they can, as it’s what they’ve done. Whether they were entitled to do so is another matter and one you could argue.

Is this legal?

Don’t know, not a lawyer.

just wondered if I had any protection under the Direct Debit scheme.

Absolutely. Call your bank and they’ll reverse it, as they have to under the terms of the Direct Debit Guarantee. You may then be pursued by the company for the money, but I can’t imagine they’d get very far.

Just cancelling DDs can be a bad idea from a credit rating perspective.

Maybe in the case of a financial institution, but there’s no credit relationship in this case surely? I’d have thought there’d only be an issue if the new company took the OP to court, won, got a CCJ etc. That’s a long way off.

Mavic Zoya are nice, the 2016 ones have a new name. Any colour preference? What size? We have some Mavic stock on clearance pricing if they’re of interest.

http://www.mavic.co.uk/footwear-mtb-crossride-elite-w-shoe

(2015 version has some more colour options too).

Firstly, good on you for not milking it.

I’d let the insurance company know in no uncertain terms that you’re not impressed, and that if they persist in trying to take advantage then you’ll have no option but to involve legal representation and fight them all the way. Let them know that you have the evidence you have – but maybe don’t share the detail of it with them just yet – and suggest strongly that they reconsider their offer in light of that.

If “all” you’re after is repair costs for the bike (and their driver’s car?), they’re getting off very lightly and should jump at the chance to settle.

Sarma Hoboy on clearance at the moment, reduced from “How much!” to a bit less. QR or 15mm versions, 135 spacing, tapered, full carbon.

I’m trying to see if I can get it below trade anywhere. Not looking positive though.

So you want someone to make a loss on selling it to you?

Transition Transam would be worth considering, IMHO. Could have a nice custom build for £1500.

60ml in the little Stans bottles which they say does one wheel. We usually use a touch more than that in a high-volume tyre if you want to be confident of holes being sealed. You can use a bit less if you’re a weight-weenie.

I’ve been riding one myself for the last few years – absolutely love it, great do-everything hardtail for me. I ran 120mm forks, and a pretty nice build – XT wheels, Raceface/XT drivetrain with XTR shifters, XTR brakes, SIDs, carbon seatpost and bars etc, and it’s light.

It’s a 19″ and for sale if anyone’s interested!

Also ran them in our hire fleet, mostly sold now but we do have a 16″ and a 17.5″ left, for a bargain £695 reduced from the original £1500 RRP.

We’ve just done this (not for a holiday, sadly) and found Transferwise the best. You should save a fair bit if you have a chunk to pay.

Have an invite I can send you if you like, which will get you a free transfer up to £3000 (so you get the true mid-market exchange rate and pay no commission whatsoever) but I suspect yours will be more than that. Either way, you’ll get way better than 1.47.

Yep, my feet have never actually been dry in them for all that long as I always end up wading through thigh-deep bogs on winter rides in mid Wales anyway, but show me a shoe that could cope with that and I’ll have some!

There’s very little to choose between road bikes from any decent brand at this price point. Those all look like very good deals.

The Merlin has slightly nicer wheels than the other two, but it’s the most expensive / least-reduced of the three, so perhaps to be expected. I don’t think the difference is worthwhile.

I’d say buy the GT from Tweeks, because it’s a proper bike brand from a proper bike shop – but that’s probably me being biased. However it’s the cheapest so you can spend the extra £50 on something else, plus it’s the one you seem most drawn to anyway, which is as good a reason as any.

Yes. They’re good. I’ve had a pair for the last ~5 years. They’re knackered now but that’s not bad going. They are (were) waterproof, and pretty warm – especially if you wear a nice warm sock underneath.

The only shoes I’d have in preference to them for winter are 45NRTH but they’re way more expensive.

Some very good deals available on remaining sizes of MW81s at the moment, I think brought on by the lack or properly cold weather so far this winter probably hitting sales. Feel free to give us a shout if we can help or if you just want to pick my brains.

Your friendly LBS should be able to help you out if you have some online quotes you’d like matching…

Maybe assuming SLX is entry-level is a problem.

Indeed. What sort of spend would you have to be looking at before complete bikes would be kitted out with SLX brakes? I reckon £1200 plus for a hardtail or easily £2000 plus for full-sus. Very much in the luxury sector, rather than the only-just-able-to-afford-the-hobby sector.

So how do shop AND internet shop staff afford to get by?

Someone’s making money.

And it’s not the shop owners, I can tell you that. We earn less than ANY of our staff at the moment (which is fine, it’s our choice to try to build a business, and I don’t regret it at all). I don’t think we’re unusual in this respect. When you work out the hourly rate, we don’t get even vaguely close to minimum wage – but then we’re doing something we (mostly) enjoy a great deal so it beats working for a living.

Seriously, hora, if you think it’s that easy and there’s loads of money to be made, why don’t you open a shop?

Yeah, 10%-20% deposit seems to be normal and it’s pretty negotiable. The shop doesn’t pay anything until delivery but understandably would want some commitment from the customer as they’re committed to the frame once it’s delivered.

Are they generally out of stock then? Hoping to get a Patrol in a couple of weeks – didn’t want to start pestering shops until I’ve got the cash

Depending on what size/colour you have in mind, I’d certainly recommend pre-ordering. No shop is going to object to you giving them a heads-up on what you want.

Some shops will have a few frames in stock of course – other than that there are very limited Patrol complete bikes, and virtually no frames, with the distributor until the next drop comes – and they’ll go out to customers who have pre-ordered pretty much straight away.

Towards the end of this month (which might mean early in the new year realistically).

Are you waiting for something in particular?

Some excellent points made by Ben and Scotroutes amongst others.

I drive a delivery van around London now..and earn far more than a Cytech 2 mechanic was apparently worth to the local bike trade.

Do you not see that it’s not how much the mechanic is worth to the trade per se (I’d guarantee you that more or less any LBS owner values a good mechanic very highly indeed) but how much they can afford to pay, based on how much the public are willing to pay for their services?

Eh?
A good workshop should pay for itself surely? Why would buying stuff elsewhere affect a bike mechs wages?

Absolutely – and they do. Labour charges, plus margin on parts fitted, is the way they do this. If that margin is eroded – either by people buying online, and bringing their own parts in, by having to lower prices so that people don’t feel you’re “ripping them off” – then it gets harder – and either mechanic’s wages go down, or labour charges have to go up.

I think it would be a shame if those on a low income were priced out of the sport. An entry-level second-hand bike can be picked up for relatively little and is more than good enough to enjoy riding. I think the issues we’re predominantly seeing in the trade are more to do with people thinking they should get XT for SLX money – or Deore money – rather than those who can barely afford to partake.

Yeah I wonder how many of those on this thread saying “that’s an appalling wage” or “I couldn’t live on that” are also those who think CRC is the greatest thing ever and that any LBS charging more than 2p to fix their bike is ripping them off….

The truth is, shops can only afford to pay what they can afford to pay… and wages won’t improve until people are willing to pay fair prices for both service and product.

Realistically there need to be fewer shops and a more level playing field against the big online box-shifters for this to happen.

What size are you? We have a medium 27.5″ Transam from last year which needs a home – unused but has been hanging on the wall on display.

As PeterPoddy says, plenty of options out there. Don’t expect bargain basement though as they’re unlikely to be stock items. Speak to a decent shop and they’ll be able to sort you out something from a range of brands.

Yep, he needs to return it to you (at your cost, if you accept that it wasn’t as described) or you can arrange collection – but it belongs to you, not him. He’s obliged to keep it safe for a reasonable period of time while you arrange collection.

If he refuses, you’re within your rights to pursue him for damages.

Yes, very good kit – would recommend.

Sorry for the delay in replying! Maybe best to email for for more info but to answer your queries above….

How much is the cost of delivery of the bike ?

£20 to anywhere our courier classes as “Mainland UK”.

Am interested in something a little cheaper. Are these bikes discounted?

Yes, the Merida (it’s this one here – http://www.merida-bikes.com/en_int/bikes/hardtails/29-xc-race-marathon/2014/big-nine-xt-edition-184.html) originally retailed for £1000 I think. We’d be looking for £450 for this one. With some upgraded wheels, it’d be impressively light (Merida quote 11.90kg as is).

If you’re after something better quality than Endura/Altura then the Mavic ones are good, but my favourite are the Royal ones.

Yes 2016 worth having due to the re design of a few internal parts

LoCo – can you clarify for us (being a bit cheeky and picking your brains here, hope you don’t mind!) what the changes are? Fisher have said “graphics and seals”. I know there’s a new SKF seal in there. Is there more to it than that?

Do 650b pikes come in 140mm?

Yes, as above they can be adjusted, but they also come as an aftermarket option in that travel option too. The advantage then is that the markings on the stanchions line up properly!

I’d also heard that SRAM would adjust the price for dealers so that can remain competitive on fork prices

Yes, any Rockshox dealer should be able to match pricing of up to 30% off retail from anywhere online in UK or Europe.

What you guys think of the yari fork?

It looks good, could be a cheaper option with 90% of the performance of the Pike. The challenge will be that the RRP is around the same as the online prices for the Pike – so what will the actual achievable sale price for the Yari be?

We have 150mm Pikes and 140mm Yari in stock and happy to do deals on either!

That is a cracking price for those forks from a UK company with a good reputation.

Buy them. Or buy them from LoCo if they can do them for that.

(UK RRP is £820 so they’re over 30% off, and we’re not even into the “year” they’re supposed to belong to yet… Crazy world.)

Can’t help with the not-driving too far bit as we’re based in mid-Wales (though we can deliver) but we are selling our ex-rental Genesis High Latitudes for £750. That’s half the original RRP of £1499. Full SLX, Deore brakes, and Rockshox air forks so decent spec for the money, wheels aren’t bad, and we’ve fitted decent tyres recently. It’s a good frame too.

We have two 19″ left I believe.

They’ve been used – obviously – but we replace components as they wear and before sale, so other than the fact that the frames have a few signs of wear, they’re mechanically very sound indeed. Give us a shout if you’re interested in seeing more detail.

(We also have a p-ex Merida 29er in their XT-level spec if you’re looking for something a little cheaper and more XC-oriented).

We’ve just finished building up a Transam 27.5 and I must say, it looks fantastic. Very tempted to get one myself but I’ve just ordered a new Salsa frame. Can I justify a 27.5 and a 29er hardtail?

If anyone has any queries about the Transam I’d be happy to try to help.

Plus any that I forgot

Lots of good bikes on that list, lots more already mentioned – only one I’d add in to the mix is the Pyga OneTen.

If you’d like to try the Smuggler or the Pyga, give us a shout! Also have ex-demo frames/builds of both for sale (though not sure I can bring myself to sell the Smuggler yet…)

Some useful advice above – especially Loco’s guides – but surely the shop you bought the bike from should be helping you with this stuff. Did they not offer any help/advice?

We’ve been selling them for a couple of years and one of our team has just bought himself a Dune carbon – so would be able to give more detailed insight into bearing life etc in a year or so!

From what we’ve seen, ability to withstand mud and crap is certainly no worse than other overseas brands. UK brands like Orange are probably unbeatable in this respect, but it’d certainly not put me off having a Mondraker.

Support and spares availability is excellent. In this, having stable distribution really helps – Silverfish have been doing them for years, and I expect will be doing them for a long time to come. I’d not be in the least worried about getting hold of bits. Silverfish are good to deal with and reasonable, too.

Of course, it really comes down to how efficient your dealer is, but having said that, you can always get spares direct or from any shop with a Silverfish account, or at least any Mondraker dealer – of which there are plenty.

We’re using Randonneur Pros on our hire fleet as they’re cheaper than our other go-to option, the Schwalbe Marathon (or Marathon Plus if you really dislike punctures). The Vittorias are a bit lighter and more supple, too, in my experience.

What price are you seeing the Randonneur Pros at? They shouldn’t be expensive, to be honest.

Don’t know if anyone is still looking, but there’s an ex-display Ripcord available at 30% off RRP if anyone’s interested.

You won’t have any problems finding accommodation, mid-Wales is full of B&Bs.

We offer it as a self-guided holiday over 8 days – this makes for quite short distances and plenty of time for sightseeing. It’s perfectly doable in 5 days if you’re happy to push on.

As others have said, it’s very hilly and doesn’t take the path of least resistance by any means. Often you’re up and down on the sides of valleys when there’s a much faster (and not all that busy) A-road down in the bottom. It’s very scenic and takes you through some lovely scenery, though. Most feedback we get about the route is very positive, as long as people haven’t over-estimated the distance they can cover in a day.

– Make do with circa 7Mb/sec and endure endless video buffering (I don’t really want to)

As others have said, not too bad, we’d love to have that speed. Having said that for the applications you describe I can see why you’d want more.

– Get some form of data line bonding service and use two BT broadband lines in parallel (anyone done this here?)

This is what we have at the shop. Supplier is called Sharedband – about £20 per month on top of two broadband (and line) rentals – so not cheap, but not obscene either. Fibre, when it eventually arrives here, will be much cheaper for us.

Sharedband works pretty well, and although we probably don’t get quite double the speed, it’s not far off at all. It’s the best solution for us at the moment.

– Use Satellite Broadband (does this work ok?)

Looked into this for home, where we get under 1Mbps. My understanding is that the latency of satellite makes it unsuitable for streaming video, although it’s good for transferring lots of data quickly. So may not be suitable for what you mostly want to do?

This, with loads left over for uplifts or whatever?

Or if you want something niche, Transition TR500. If you want carbon (the Saracen has a carbon rear but alloy front) then the Mondraker is a good shout and looks stunning too.