Have a look at Barclays. I went just for the bike insurance and it was about £50 for unlimited number of unspecified bikes up to £5000 each. You just tell them the cost of the most expensive up to £5000. Main limitation I noticed was bikes aren’t covered if stolen from the back of a car, unless they are completely hidden in locked boot. They are fine if locked to a rack on the outside though! I called to check.

Who has been drinking my pint?

On the beach.

How does everyone search for programmes or simply browse to find something to watch without skipping through multiple apps? I have SkyQ and an ATV box but almost exclusively use the SkyQ as it’s easier to search including live and within iPlayer etc. We also often watch recorded (or paused) programmes while they are still on live so we can skip through the adverts and guff. Also, waiting for things to appear on catch-up is a pain and rather random – e.g. F1. Any tips for these aspects?

Try buying in Scotland, that’s much worse!

How come? I’ve bought and sold in Scotland and England and prefer the Scottish system. Seems to get rid of the gazumping and wasters pulling out or mucking you about.

You could park up on the eastern side of Ullswater and do the shore path and road south to Hartsop. Then up to The Knott (hike-a-bike for the last bit!) then north over Loadpot and down to the Cockpit, turn left heading SW back to the shore. It’s a fast descent from Loadpot and an awesome view from the High St range.

Hopefully they will stay available. At least for a few years until 28.75 x 3.142 becomes the new must have size! As you, I love them on my hardtail. For me they give the best compromise for everything (rocky Lakeland/Scotland downhill to bikepacking) other than thick mud. I even prefer them for certain riding on the full suss and tend to swap around with 29er depending on the ride. As someone above, I buy the odd one when I see a good offer (Stif had Recons the other month) so have a few to tide me over.

Yes it’s absolutely fine. Just check the load limit for the rack and make sure you don’t exceed that. Easily done with 4 big bikes and a 15kg rack! I’ve had numerous cars with removable tow bars and all worked perfectly with my Thule 4 bike carrier.

Yes there is. Core 125 half price on Black Friday, £57. You’ll not beat that, get it bought.

That’s a fantastic price. Wish it had been that cheap when I got mine! Great little machine.

Something like this?

You could easily make similar from some 4×2 offcuts. Position it a bit lower to clear mudguards.

Short term insurance such as Veygo requires the car to be insured fully by the owner (or someone else) too. It cannot be used as the sole insurance cover. I use Veygo for my son to drive my car occasionally.

Your mate could just take out the cheapest insurance through one of the comparison sites and then cancel within the 14 days. Most have a nominal fee (£30ish) for cancelling in this period and could charge pro-rata for any days they covered you so check the Ts&Cs. However, if you did have a claim and they could prove it was bought with the intent to cancel you may find it causes problems – slim, but a risk nonetheless. Having a different policyholder to ref keeper / owner is no issue at all.

I would suggest not swapping the name on the V5. Not only does it add an extra owner but could be a whole world of hurt if your mate ran off with it or it was stolen.

Overall I’d suggest just paying for your mate to hire a van or use a ‘man and a van’ service.

Edit – it looks as if Cuvaa doesn’t need an underlying policy so would be a good solution. Obviously you would need to tax the van though!

As mentioned above the main difference as cost increases will be sound quality, a few features and build. I’m not familiar with the really cheap (or expensive!) pre-amps but use a Pro-Ject Phono Box in my set-up. Pro-Ject make excellent turntables and their pre-amp has a very good reputation. It has no features – simply line in and out and a power lead. They are about £60-65 from the likes of Richer Sounds or can be found cheaper secondhand. Very happy with the sound quality from mine.

I had similar issues. Checked hanger, b-screw, swapped cable, checked chain all to no avail. Swapped mech from another bike and it worked fine. I noticed the jockey wheels were very loose and worn so tried new ones but it made no difference. After a couple of weekend trips away the replacement mech started playing up to. Tried it back on the original bike and still had problems. In the end I decided just to try a new mech so got a SLX 12 speed. It worked perfectly – so well I got another for the other bike. That was perfect to. So in the end it was just worn out GX Eagle mechs. No obvious damage but clearly beyond their useful life. I’d suggest getting a new mech if you’ve tried the obvious, simple solutions. If nothing else it will rule that out and you’ll have a spare!

I’ve used Fenwicks Windowize and Meguiars PlastRX in the past. They clear the haze nicely. Use some car wax afterwards to keep the lenses protected. You could also use toothpaste as it is a mild abrasive. The lenses will smell nice afterwards too!!

7 degrees is the recommended crossover point. For me in N Yorks that was generally early Nov until late March. I did get caught out once having put the summers back on and waking up the next morning to find 6” of snow! Made for an interesting drive to north Wales! I think the benefits of winter tyres depend on what car you have, where you live and what type of driving you do. A few years back I was weekly commuting from Bristol to Harrogate in a BMW so having winter tyres was a no-brainer. It made the difference between getting home for the weekend or getting stuck in Bristol or somewhere in between. The difference in cold, wet, slush, snow or ice over summer tyres was night and day. Even more so when compared to crappy run flats. Much safer all round. My commute is now simpler and in a FWD so I’ve gone for Cross Climates all year. A good compromise. I sold my old BMW alloys (bought secondhand for £100) and 2 season old winter tyres at a profit meaning I’d done nearly 30k miles for free!

In my opinion it’s massively overpriced for the spec but guess that’s the market at the moment plus SC premium. Shame there’s no frame only option too as many spending anything like that on a hardtail would likely want a more custom build. Thankfully I bought a secondhand Chameleon aluminium frame off here a couple of years ago and built one up with a mix of new and spare parts for under £600. It’s a much, much better spec than the new ones! It’s a great bike to ride and very adaptable. Very happy.

I also got a heavily reduced new Tallboy C from Stif a couple of years ago. I lucked in as it was before the component specs were reduced and because it was the previous year’s colour and a 650b+ the discount was huge. It cost me little more than my previous Whyte G150 and allowed me to afford a bike I could not justify otherwise. Shame there are no deals like that at the moment!!

Since there are no mud guard holes which out of the RRP or mudhugger guards fits the pikes best?

I’ve just fitted a RRP Proguard Standard and it fits well. Not tried the Mudhugger.

IMO locking up a wheel is a bit of a red herring unless it is done under controlled lab conditions. There are just too many variables: surface, tyre grip, tyre pressure, brake temperature, disc size, pad type, rider/bike weight, gradient, environmental conditions…..etc.

Over the years I’ve had Shimano, Avid/Sram, Formula, Hayes, Magura, Giant and Hope disc brakes. The early ones were poor in comparison to newer models. I found Avid/SRAM a pain to bleed and I’ve had numerous piston swelling issues (including newish Levels). The lever reach adjust spring on Guide Rs also locked the front lever open whilst in the Alps – not fun. They had a nice feel but suffered from fade. I’ve had enough of SRAM brakes!

The last set of reliable Shimano brakes I had were some old XT M765. All the others since have suffered from calliper leaks. When working they are fine but grabby. Not an issue at speed but I prefer more modulation at slower speeds, particularly in techy/loose terrain. I’ve given up with Shimano brakes due to the leaks and throw away culture.

Having serviced a set of very old and neglected Hopes for a chap and ending up with brakes essentially as good as new I decided to drop the cash and get a set of Tech3/E4s a few years ago. I like them. Good, consistent, fade free power with great modulation and quiet operation. Easy and effective bleeding and a bite point adjust that actually does something. They also seem less prone to being effected by contamination, such as muck from being on the back of the car. Above all, despite being hammered they have been faultless and required nothing more than new pads and a precautionary bleed every year or so. If they do have an issue I can get the spares. And they are UK made! It would be nice if they were mineral oil though. Mine are black by the way! Having got on well with the E4s I recently got a set of Tech3/X2s and have been impressed by their power (loaded bikepacking trip and Lakes) and simplicity.

I understand people will have preferences over feel and looks but in my experience neither of my Hopes lack ultimate power. Those that say they have no power must surely have an mechanical or setup issue with their brakes? Anyhow, those new levers look good. Will be interesting to see what the real world difference is over the Tech3.

Barclays do contents and/or bike only. For the bikes you state the value of the most expensive up to £5k and all others are covered to that value. No need to lock if in a building.

Barclays do bike only. Specify the most expensive up to £5k and all bikes are covered up to that. Covers outbuildings or locked on a car rack but annoyingly not in the back of a car unless in the boot.

Agree with everything said above. It was a great event (thanks Si, Paul and Ginny) with fantastic and varied trails. Hard work at times but very rewarding and great to meet so many likeminded people on the trails and over a beer/pizza. @stanley I chatted to you and your mate on the climb up to the railway line on Saturday morning. I was on the green Chameleon. See you next year?? Glad I didn’t take a gravel bike too!!

I’ve recently got the Ring alarm system plus some cameras and have been very happy with it. Keep an eye out for offers on Amazon or Ring. They were doing the 10 piece system with free indoor cam for £199 a couple of months ago.

I’ve been pretty impressed with my Camino. It’s been used for road, gravel, light off-road, commute and for bikepacking with a swap of wheels/tyres. It definitely takes 2x – I have 2 x GRX. Depending on the frame size, chainset size and what band you are using you may find the bottle mount gets in the way of the front derailleur band. I had to file a little bit out of the band (large frame, 48/31 chainset, GRX FD with Shimano band). It’s a really versatile bike and if you already have the parts the frame is great value. Just a shame about the wait!

@RickDraper you were spot on! The ‘smalley’ ring at the bottom of the air piston had indeed come out for some reason. Popped back in and now all working fine. Thanks

Ah, good call guys. Hopefully it’s as simple as that and the circlip has done no damage. Job for the weekend! 👍

Went through this a few years ago and tried numerous cars. The VW Up was by far the best bet. We just got the 60bhp Move. Nicer to drive than the i10, Aygo etc and as it’s not a common youngsters car like a Corsa the insurance was much cheaper. It’s been our second car for a few years and is great around town but I’ve also done a few long journeys in it (some with bikes on the roof or in the back) and it’s perfectly acceptable. Does slow down on big hills a bit though! Will keep it for a few more years as the daughter will start driving in just over a year. We used Marmalade for the sons first year of insurance after passing his test. It has a black box and he earned NCD but it is limited usage and is done in addition to our insurance. Cost about £800 plus the £120 we pay.

Yes, I’ve got 29er and 650b+ that I swap between my full sus and hardtail with no adjustments. Same discs and cassette but different hubs. Sram on the 29er and Santa Cruz (Novatech) on the 650b+ so bit of luck it all aligns. I also swap wheels on my gravel/road bike where matching Hope hubs swap perfectly. However, one front wheel has a Bitex hub and I need to do a quick realign of the disc calliper. I guess some shims for the disc would sort that. Overall it’s a bit of a lottery but using the same hubs, discs and cassette will give it the best chance of working.

If you like riding it and have an emotional attachment then definitely keep it. There is absolutely nothing wrong with 26” wheels and older geo. You mentioned a new seatpost – carbon will help absorb some vibration or a dropper will help in the more technical stuff and on the downs. Otherwise the best ‘upgrade’ in my opinion would be a clutch mech. This will make the ride much quieter and make the chain more secure. Depending on what setup you have at the mo this may require a groupset upgrade to 10/11/12 speed. Personally for the riding you describe I’d stick with 2x to keep the steps between gears smaller and give that bulk shift you get when swapping the front ring. 1x is absolutely awesome for the rough, big ups/downs and simplifying the bike but for more old-school XC I think 2x is slightly better. You can still get good tubeless 26” rims (Stans, WTB) so you could either get you wheels rebuilt if the hubs are OK or have some lovely new ones with say hope hubs and d-light spokes. Wider bars and shorter stem are certainly an option but I’d borrow some to try out first to make sure it doesn’t adversely affect the handling or your comfort. There are still some ok deals on unfashionable long stems and narrow bars that will be shorter and wider than your current ones!

Having said all that, if you have no attachment to the bike then now is a good time to maximise what you will get for it. You will however pay a premium for a new one and may struggle to source one or get to test one as the market is screwed. New frames are heavier due to modern crash standards so even a pricey and trick steel frame will be heavier than your Rocky Mountain.

I can’t speak about the Diverge but can about using a gravel bike for road duties. I built up a Sonder Camino last year and thought long and hard about the setup. IMO 1x simply does not have the range for road riding or the ratio jumps are far too large if you try to get the range by using something like an Eagle cassette. On the other hand 2x with a clutch RD gives little away off-road. A fraction more weight and maintenance I guess, but that’s all. After looking at a lot of gear inch calcs (sad!) I went with GRX 800 with a 48/31 crankset and 11-34 cassette. Allowing for the slightly larger diameter of the bigger tyres (32-40mm) over say 25mm on a ‘normal’ road bike this setup gives an almost identical high gear as a compact 50/11 setup, but also gives a much lower gear for the hills or off-road. This setup is easy to tweak with either a closer range cassette or an 11-36 (not officially but works fine). The same could be done with a compact 50/34 crankset for someone fitter than me or if you want to move the whole range higher. Changing a 1x to 2x is not a cheap undertaking as you will need cranks, FD, left shifter/brake, cassette and rear mech – if you can even source them at present. Having 2 sets of wheels is great so you can have a road orientated set and a gravel set for an easy swap. Since building the Camino I’ve not ridden my road bike. With 30mm slicks it rides/rolls very well, much like an road endurance bike but a couple of Kg heavier. I am very much the limiting factor rather than the bike, but if it was 1x the bike would definitely be the limiting factor. A quick swap of tyres and/or wheels and it becomes a very good gravel/bikepacking/winter/commuting bike.

But at least it puts Red Bull under pressure to perform and ace everything. They’d already fluffed one pit stop for Perez, not at all saying they would do the same again, but even if they had a 99.9% chance of acing it, that’s still better odds than the 100% chance of not getting anything else from it if they don’t force them to stop at all. Red Bull won at Ricard because they were aggressive, Mercedes have won before being aggressive, hence why I was confused they didn’t even attempt to force the issue and apply a bit of pressure. Sitting back and letting Max streak away just felt like they’d given up, which is not how you win championships…

Lewis didn’t have any new medium tyres available whereas Max did so he was always going to be at a tyre disadvantage to a clearly faster car. If Lewis had pitted earlier it would have given Max the chance to pit as well. Not only would Max still have won but he would also have got a chance at (and almost certainly got) fastest lap. By pitting Lewis with only 2 laps to go Max couldn’t counter it so Lewis was pretty much guaranteed the extra point. It also meant Lewis was in a position to capitalise if Max had any issues until the last moment.

Ouch. I broke mine into 4 pieces in Morzine a couple of years ago. The doctor in the UK wanted to leave it to heal but the French doctors were pretty insistent it needed an operation. I went for the op and I’m very glad I did when I read threads like this. I was on the operating table 20 hours after the crash. I was back on a bike in 3 weeks (rather gingerly!) and riding properly again in 5 weeks for a cross-Iceland MTB expedition. I have had zero problems with the shoulder. My ribs took months to stop hurting though!! The impression I got is that there is a reluctance to operate in the UK and the norm is to let it heal naturally. That may be fine in many cases but as shown by some of the comments above it sometimes doesn’t work or takes much, much longer than it needs to. Maybe give it a little bit longer as 6 weeks is still a fairly short time, but don’t keep getting fobbed off if it’s not healing and don’t discount an op if it’s needed. Good luck.

I had the HDD fail on my mid-2011 iMac a few years ago and replaced it with a much bigger HDD and a smaller SSD setup as a fusion drive. The easiest way I found of installing the os was to make a bootable USB drive. There are instructions readily available on how to do that and where to get a copy of the os from. The issue with drive compatibility is to do with the temperature sensor on the drive. If not done properly the os will run the fan at full speed because it is not getting a temperature input. I used a stick on sensor that gets around this problem if using a standard drive (HDD or SSD) or you have to use a specific Apple drive with the correct temperature sensor setup. IFixit.com has some really good guides on how this works. Good luck.

Done.

I had 5G the other day for the first time in my home area (on Three) so ran a speed test. Got 691Mbps download and 57.3 upload. So pretty quick!! If that is important to you then it’s awesome, but makes very little difference to normal browsing and none to phone calls (does anyone do those these days?!).

Recording stuff os weird its a total non requirement.

Why’s that? Many programs take a few hours to appear on catch-up or are only available for 30 days. I record stuff so I can watch it whenever I like and skip through all the ads.

I left Sky a few years back when we moved house and went to Virgin for the fast broadband. The Virgin TV box is awful so when the contract ran out we tried a few other options (Fire Stick, ATV etc) but they are all compromised or awkward to use. In the end we went back to Sky on a very good return deal for TV only (still with Virgin for BB) and have negotiated a good discount on each renewal. Definitely speak to them. Our cost has pretty much remained at the rejoin price for the sake of an annual phone call. Wish I had never left to be honest as I lost the free F1 that I had on my old package! Sky Q just works so well compared to the other options and has all the main streaming services built in. Just hate the thought of paying Murdock (if he is even still involved)!

How much room have you got left on you HDD? OSX needs >10% otherwise it slows down massively and grinds to a halt if free space is really small. It could also be a sign of a failing HDD. Mine failed a few years ago so I replaced it with a much bigger one and put a SSD in at the same time and formed a Fusion Drive. The difference was sensational. However, the new HDD only lasted a couple of years and started to fail again – similar signed to you, very slow, lots of beach ball etc. I disabled the HDD and now run on just the SSD. Works great for a 10 year old machine. Make sure you have backups!

I am within permitted development and as it’s more than 2m from the boundary I have 3m height to play with so a warm roof is possible.

That’s great. General consensus seems to be go for a warm roof if you can as it removes the risk of condensation. It’s also easier to build than a cold roof. Wish I could have gone 2m from boundary or had applied for planning as I had to stay within 2.5m. I opted for a cold roof and had a few condensation problems in the snow as the new building was drying out. Seems to be sorted now and all dry even when it snows.

If you haven’t already, I suggest watching Ali Dymock and Oakwood Garden Rooms YouTube channels as they are full off useful info. Liam, who runs Oakwood GR, also runs a brilliant Facebook group that is great for getting advice like this. Search on FB for ‘self build garden rooms, offices and home bars’.

For your cladding I would definitely put a black UV proof breather membrane to protect the structure of the building. Tyvek do one specifically for Rainscreen cladding. Without this the structure will get wet and start to decay, seriously shortening the lifespan of the building. Also you will need battens behind the cladding and before the membrane so water can escape. It is uncommon to have vertical gaps in the cladding as rain will enter but it can be done.

Do a warm roof if possible with the height you have. Even if it means applying for planning permission to go above 2.5m. Cold roof and metal sheets is a recipe for condensation and damp. You don’t need a waterproof membrane as such as your outer roof layer is the waterproof bit (metal,EPDM, GRP etc). What you will need is a vapour barrier immediately on the warm side of the insulation to stop water vapour passing through the structure and condensing on a cold surface. Look at Steve Roofer on YouTube for info on roofing. Also, do not scrimp on the roof structure (joist sizes, vapour barrier etc) or you will have expensive issues later.

Make sure you have agreed with a sparky your planned approach in advance, as you will struggle to find one that will sign off work they have not seen and pre-agreed.

Rigid PIR boards are better insulators per mm than rockwool but can be a pain to fit. Many people do a mix in the walls with 50mm PIR and 50mm rockwool to get the best of both. The problem with just rockwool is it will sag over time and leave cold spots. You could maybe go with 50-70mm PIR for the walls which will be cheaper and easier to work with than 100mm and still give plenty of insulation for the walls. 80-100 is good for floor and roof. Note that if you are using 4×2 regularised timber that it is only 95x45mm so 100mm PIR will not fit.

Main tip is to do lots of research and planning and understand the details as mistakes will get expensive! Get planning, permitted development, building regs right too!!

Good luck and enjoy the build. I’m 90% through mine and it’s been very rewarding.

Don’t just put insulation between the rafters and cover over as you will get condensation problems in the roof unless you have a vented gap between the insulation and the roof deck. You would be best to put the insulation on the outside between the roof deck and the shingles/tiles/rubber (whatever covering you have). Ideally you should put a vapour barrier in too. Have a google of warm roofs and cold roofs – warm is the better of the 2 but makes the building higher so make sure you don’t breach any permitted development rules. Ali Dymock on YouTube has a good video explaining the 2 types of roofs.

As mentioned above, focus on roof and floor first. Then the walls and windows.

+1 for Zipp Service Course CX. I’ve put that on my Camino and am very pleased with it. Grippy and comfy. Seems to be lasting well. I’ve also used Tortec Super Comfort and my wife has that on her bike. Comfy and grippy too (though not as grippy as Zipp) but my wife wears through it in 12-18 months where her palm sits. It’s cheap though (£17) so no problem replacing when needed (unlike Lizard Skins DSP!).

Dumb question, can the latest version of the camino take a conventional compact double.

Absolutely. I’ve got GRX 2x on mine.