Run my old one with pikes at 140 mm and love it.

Wish I had the patience and number of cams to do that editing, mind you it must have been a tad cold standing filming

To be honest, these days many people have a decent compact that can do video to a fair resolution. This was shot on my Panasonic GF1 with 20mm + 14-45mm lenses, and GT’s Canon G10 + GoPro helmet cam. I also used a full-size tripod + one of those mini flexi things. Editing done using iMovie (excellent software) on a Macbook. My other clip on Vimeo was shot on 2 GF1’s and a Nikon D90 with a few different lenses, again using tripods.
While it was me doing the filming, I was moving around quite a lot, often running between 2 cameras to trigger them, and climbing a couple of trees too. I’d also done a bit of planning, having ridden the trail a few times, so I had an idea of what sort of shots I wanted to get, and the overall effect I wanted to achieve (not wanting to sound too arty-farty like!) which cut down on wasted time.
I admit it’s a fair old commitment to do it (we spent around 2.5hrs riding / filming, and probably the same again editing, to produce a 2.5min clip), it’s worth it to share with others and receive positive comments like those above, and have a more permanent reminder of your ride, but accept may not be everyone’s idea of time well-spent when you could be riding!
Gives you a good idea of the effort required to make some of these top-quality films too!

Mate James (JPCapel on here) was up around Leith Hill yesterday and looked to be having fun…..photos here…..

MTBR

And a video from Friday before the extra snow arrived….
Snowy Video

BMWs are pants in the snow……..until you put winter tyres on them. I have an Alpina B5 Touring – basically a 5 series estate with a 500bhp supercharged V8 in it with 19″ wheels and big fat tyres. Last year it didn’t go out of the garage in the snow, but I bought a second set of wheel with winter tyres back in April, and fitted them a couple of weeks ago.
It’s now perfectly drivable on icy and snowy roads, and with the traction control turned off it’s a real hoot!

Blow back + make sure the bite valve is fully empty.

looks like it was speeded up in the edit….

Nope, although there’s nothing I can do to prove it! Mr GT is a pretty rapid rider! Funnily enough when we were looking at the clips on the camera screens he was annoyed it looked too slow, but on a bigger screen it looks as fast as it did in the flesh.
One thing that helped was that he must have ridden each section 3-4 times, and a few bits 5-6 times. We were running 2 cameras and the head-cam, but on a few of the corners & sections either I missed with the camera or GT wasn’t happy with his riding, so we did it again (and again and again)! Oh – and we rode it once top to bottom to start with to see whether conditions were good enough to bother filming.

Here’s what it was like on Friday……
Surrey Hills

A mate and I rode around Peaslake on Friday through to about 3pm and it was good fun. Stuff like Barrys was riding really well. That said, we’ve probably had 2-3″ of snow since then so it will be touch and go. I’d also note that the roads around there are sheet ice in places, as the snow from late Thursday thawed then froze as water, with the snow then on top of it! Anything with a slight gradient will be “interesting” to say the least!

Currently set up as 160mm…
Mine also lives in the Surrey Hills…

Overbiked?

Undoubtedly, hence the appeal of also being able to run it at 140mm. However, to me it’s more about the geometry: despite the travel, the HD does not feel you are perched on it like some longer-travel bikes I’ve tried, and the slackish front end gives you confidence to attack some of the nice steep switchback trails that have “appeared” in certain locations.
I would also note that at 28lbs it’s no slouch uphill, and the weight plus how well the DW link allows the bike to get up to speed on singletrack makes me think I’m not really suffering too many downsides of the extra travel – aside from the accusations of being overbiked 😉
There’s also some decent jumps around which are good to include in regular rides – for sure a decent rider could hit most of them on a shorter-travel bike, but at the wrong side of 40 I’m happy accepting a skill-compensator too!
Like most bikes (and riders) that live in Surrey, they also see other parts of the country too. In the last couple of months, it’s seen use in Snowdonia, Dark Peaks, and at New Year I’m off to the Lakes, so it will cover a lot of bases.

HeiHei, what do you think of the Bos forks, we have some in the shop now and I’m about to fit them to my Blur LTC when it arrives, give me your opinion.

Nothing special in the car-park pumping stakes, or at slow speed, but once things get lively then the damping seems better able to cope than the Float 36’s they replaced (’09) – a bit like the Push tuning of Pikes / older Fox forks. At the margin they are slightly less stiff, but not really noticeable on the trail. On my scales about 1/2lb lighter, and now also cheaper than Float 36’s, so pretty pleased with them.
I would note that all the adjustments are of the “fine” variety!

What sizes have you gone for… how tall are you?

5’10” ish and on a medium with 50mm stem and lay-back post – fits very nicely. Interestingly my medium regular Mojo felt a bit too small.

Got me worried then!!

Yep my girlfriend (of the time) and I went thru half a dozen pairs before giving up on them!!

Snap…..almost! Currently set up as 160mm but limbo chips are on the way. Forks are now BOS Deville and pedals a bit more tasteful, as is the saddle!
I also had an original Mojo and would concur with everything you say.

Mine also lives in the Surrey Hills – would be very interesting to compare 140mm vs 160mm back-to-back!!

Strictly recorded as Scott referenced “dancing tonight”. Also, Brucie doesn’t do Sundays!!

Mine is less than 2 months old and does it in the cold so think normal. Having said that, an RP23 spent a week sitting outside a holiday home in the Lakes over New Year a few years back at sub-freezing and def needed a service after that!

Swinley was riding nicely last night and has had a lot less snow than Surrey Hills despite being only 15 miles away give or take.

Some nice cars owned by STWers – good to see. I particularly like the Alpina B5 Touring.

Cheers Surf-Mat! It’s a great car – pretty subtle and understated, but then can do 0-60 in under 5 seconds, and supposed to be good for 180mph! It’s also very rare – only 5 B5 Tourings in the country, and often attracts an approving nod from those in the know!
It makes a brilliant grand-tourer – it often does the family holiday with 2 bikes on the roof + a roof-box, kids in the back. You can cruise along the motorways then when you hit the country roads, it’s ability to overtake caravans etc. is unreal!

Stayed here a few years back -cracking place…….

Sorry mate, but heihei beats you on both power and torque with his/her Alpina B5 Touring.

Technically his, but the wife spends more time driving it than I do! Usually sporting bike racks on the roof but when clean, looks like this……

There must be someone on here with an M5 estate? They would win.

Not quite, but have an Alpina B5 Touring which has the same power but coniderably more torque…. a supercharged V8 kicking out over 500bhp and 500lb ft through 19″ bonkers-wide rear wheels.

Last winter we didn’t go near it in the snow as we had the use of a neighbour’s Landy Disco, but back in April I picked up a second set of wheels complete with winter tyres. With these in place, it’s been very very good and perfectly usable even on the slippery hills we have to navigate to get out of the village.

Did a walking holiday there a few years back and thought at the time it would make a great biking destination. We walked up and down this, and spent most of the way down wishing I was on the bike!!!

The Palmer thing at Bedford Autodrome is awesome. It’s an expensive day, but the quality of cars and instruction is just amazing.

I’ll answer my own question having spoken to Skyline Cycles….

Hardly any snow we haven’t had any snow since Friday, there is some icy
compacted snow about still, but otherwise it’s all OK! the bike wash is out
of action though.

Steve

Nope – tried pretty hard a year or so ago and gave up, so the Speedball sits knackered in the parts bin!

I have to admit I wasn’t overwhelmed with the Push rockers with a Pike up front, and went back to the stock rockers. However, for a laugh I stuck a set of Z1 Light 150mm forks on the front with the Push rockers and liked it a lot. Sure the frame isn’t warranted for that length of forks, but I figured Turner frames are pretty bombproof.

BOS Devilles are good, and a step up from the ’10 36 Floats I was using.

I reckon they’d be mint on the 5-Spot coupled with the ccdb. It does feel like the damping is getting close to a coil set-up on the BOS which I guess is the nirvana. Will be interesting to see if they can pull the same trick with their rear air-can if they ever get it launched.

Devilles fitted and ridden today. First off I should say that the Surrey Hills are not the sternest test of a set of forks, especially in Winter. However, after a 3hr ride I got a good sense of their character. First off they feel pretty plush out of the box, but then these days so do most forks. Out on the trail, at slow speed there is nothing special to comment on – its not coil-plush, but nothing to complain about. Once the speed picks up however, I started to feel the damping was providing just that bit more control than the Fox Float 36’s these replaced. Difficult to be precise on what it was, but over downhill sections of roots I seemed to focus less on the roots but more on picking the turn-in points on the corners, leaving the fork to cope with the roots and me to focus on the lines.
Stiffness-wise, they look slimmer than the 36’s, but out on the trail I didn’t notice any lack of stiffness.
Weight-wise, with steerer at same lengths, the BOS is 150g lighter than the 36’s (2010 model).
I didn’t tinker with any settings today, with the factory ones seeming to do the job. I would note though that the rebound adjust is very fine, with not a huge difference end-to-end of the adjuster knob.

All-in-all, taking into account slightly lower weight, the new pricing point, and the better control, I reckon these forks are better than the Fox Floats – not by a massive amount but noticeable, and deserve to sell well.

Gortex walking boots reshod with 5-10 stelth ruber and sealskin socks works for me

Tracey – this sounds a great idea. Where did you get it done, and for how much?

Mine arrived last night from R53. Found Roger there really helpful. Worth noting you can get them in either 160mm or 140mm flavour but to get to 140mm they shorten some of the internals so unlike Fox 36 Floats, it’s not reversible.

Hopefully fit this weekend and get some feedback up.

Driving towards Glasgow from Loch Lomond a few years’ ago, I pointed out of the car to the famous rock climbing crag and said “Dumbarton Rocks.” She obviously didn’t see me point, as her response was: “Does it?”

Differences between the 2010 version (real-world riding rather than on paper)?

she’s a pretty good pilot

Only pretty good?? Note to self – cancel BA card!! 😉

gt – he’d never ride the sx trail hard enough to break it 😉

Tim – looking forward to trying it head-to-head with this…

PS Pedals and saddle changed!

Hows the new Spot toons??

the moon watch is very nice. Watching the moon landing in 1969 is one of my first memories

At the expense of sounding a watch whore, I have one of the 40th anniversary special edition ones, but that is the extent of my watch collection! My wife bought me one for my 40th, as I was born on the day they landed on the moon!

Here’s the 40th anniversary version….

Yep – funnily enough work colleague of mine was bought a Spitfire as a morning present – v nice.

Big fan of IWC as they fit the simple and classy. Have one of these…..

I found that an old ODI lock-on grip + 5mm stem spacer did the trick – lighter than an old hub too.

If you want proper rear suspension in an estate car, you have to lose space to suspension struts.

This and the rear-wheel drive.

I love my 5-Series touring (have the Alpina version that goes like the proverbial of a shovel), but I didn’t buy it for boot space. It’s ok, but as others have said, there are bigger load areas for that size of car. For day-to-day use I run a Thule roof-rack, but occasionally have put bikes in the boot, either seats down (faff coz I have to remove the kids seats too), or both wheels off and seatpost out.

glynp – which shop is this?

Am about to pull the trigger on a set for my Mojo HD so would be interested in any opinions. My understanding was that the importers would supply direct to customers rather than distribute through shops?