Good luck with trying to get the difference in 6 years worth of premiums with different insurers refunded…

Worth noting that many specialist/classic policies assume that you have use of another car. They tend to require you to keep the car locked up in a garage, and mostly will stimulate a mileage limit. I’d avoid Adrian Flux like the plague. Footman James weren’t bad, but a bit pricey. Peter Best Insurance Services worth a look…

These any good?
http://www.merlincycles.com/easton-haven-alloy-riser-bars-special-offer-58497.html

1996 Fire Mountain was available in blue with light blue decals and grey Project 2’s or grey with grey decals and grey Project 2’s. Other spec highlights include canti brakes, threaded forks and headset with quill stem (ahead/threadless from 1997 onwards) and gripshift. I believe 1996 was the last year of the serif font for the decals, before they went over to the “jungle-y” font.

Mine, owned from new, is now a long way from the original spec with 3×9 LX transmission, V brakes, upgraded wheelset, threadless Project 2’s and riser bars – upgraded various bits and pieces as they wore out and/or broke. The only remaining original component is the frame. Sadly, it doesn’t get used as much as it used to, but it does still see the light of day from time to time…

Have you had a look directly at Commencal to see if they still have 2013 stock remaining?

http://www.commencal-store.co.uk/PBSCProduct.asp?ItmID=12501276

yes, it’s weird. everyone knows the formula for bikes is n+1. you seem to have got a bit confused, and are using n+2

Damn you and your common sense Swavis

sugdenr
…I would happily go back again…

Surely that would that say something about the (in)effectiveness of the course…? :wink:

One thing that experience has taught me is that if you’re out in the Middle East during Ramadan, the half hour or so before sunset is *not* a nice time to go out for a drive

In terms of “sensible daily drivers”, it’s 5:
1986 VW Polo Ranger
1991 VW Golf Driver
1999 Seat Ibiza GTI Cupra Sport
2005 Renault Clio 182 Cup
2009 Honda Civic CDTi

In addition to the above, I’d also like to mention a small supporting cast which were all fun in their own little way, but I was glad I never had to rely on any of them as regular everyday transport:
1983 VW Golf GTI
1989 VW Scirocco Scala
1976 Alfa Romeo GT 1600 Junior
1988 Peugeot 205 GTI (1.6 flavour)

AM41’s?

the chain is pulled up past the chainstay which seems impossible since the only way to get it back down is to pull the chainset out

I’m guessing it may appear impossible when the bike is unloaded and rear suspension is at rest – like it normally would be when you’re trying to fix it. When the rear suspension is compressed – even just at normal riding sag levels – you may find that it’s a perfectly possible place for the chain to end up.

Personally, I’ve started using this -> http://www.screwfix.com/p/self-amalgamating-rubber-tape-black-19mm-x-10m/87717

One roll has done a couple of regular tubular chainstays on hardtails so far with roughly half width overlap and there’s quite a bit left on the roll. Certainly enough to do at least one more chainstay, probably enough to do another two. Obviously you wouldn’t get so many beefy swingarms out of a roll though…

I have a Boss DSD-2 and a Boss DD-3. Don’t use them both at the same time – it gets confusing…

5. It says so here :oops:

I am confused. According to the BBC article:
Gary McCourt, 49, from Edinburgh, was found guilty last month of killing Audrey Fyfe, 75, in August 2011
McCourt had previously been found guilty in 1986 of causing another cyclist’s death by reckless driving
He was jailed for two years after cyclist George Dalgity, 22, a student from Edinburgh, was killed while he cycled along the city’s Regent Road on 18 October 1995
It’s possible that my maths is worse than I thought, but I make that three…

IGMC… :oops:

how have we got this far into the thread without a mention of Sandbach on the M6?

Advertised quite clearly as being 5 years old and being sold due to the age, 99p start with no reserve.

But… did the listing mention that you’d puked in it? :D

lol @ Rorschlach

EDIT – btw, I like Marin just as it is and think it’s generally underrated. Yeah, it’s a bit old skool, but therein lies the charm – it’s *not* your typical identikit trail centre

evillittlegoat, isn’t that before tax though ?
If you’d been paid that £999.96, wouldn’t you then have paid £250 or so in tax and NIC, so you’ve actually got a £1000 bike for paid your employer ~£750 for the priviledge of using a bike which they now own ?
Isn’t that how it works ?

FTFY. If you just make the monthly payments and don’t make the fair market value payment at the end of the term, you own precisely nothing. Your employer will have a bike on their balance sheet though.
(Edit to make changes clearer…)

its in the saddle guidelines too

Really? It looks to me like the leading edge of the clamp is clamped onto the bend at the front of the rails.

Sorry – didn’t read previous post properly. Had assumed it was a cambelt tensioner changed rather than an alternator belt tensioner. May just be bad luck.

Why did you have the tensioner changed? I’m struggling to think of any scenario that would require a new tensioner that wouldn’t normally require a new belt, apart from a precautionary tensioner replacement when fitting a new belt. And even then, if the belt had to be interferred with and was due to be changed within next 20k why would you put the old belt back on rather than replacing with new one?

Don’t know about VAG diesels, but with older VAG petrols it is commonly quoted that the cambelt change interval is every 60k, reducing to a 40k interval if it’s been tampered with (e.g. because someone changed a pulley or tensioner).

140mm Revelations on my mk2 BFe. Not been out on it a huge amount as I only finished the build recently but I’m loving it so far. 70mm 0 deg stem with a 5mm spacer underneath and a set of low rise EA50’s. I had thought that I might shim the forks down to 130mm but never quite got around to it. It seems to climb well enough as it is, so I’ll probably just leave it as is for now.

Re: cornering with outside foot down – personally, I prefer pedals level with outside foot forward. This keeps your weight spread across the pedals rather than having all your weight on one leg, it helps with “steering from the hips, not the shoulders” (mentioned above) and looking to the exit (also mentioned above). Yes, it’s likely to feel a bit weird in one direction as most people tend to feel comfortable with one foot forward but having other foot forward is “just wrong”. But it works for me.

As for most helpful tips, I reckon it’s elbows in, wrists down, weight on the nose of the saddle when going uphill up.

geoffj – seriously? Your tenant had improvements made to your property at no cost to yourself and you rewarded her by increasing the rent? 8O

Personally, I nuke a small knob of butter in a bowl until it melts, then break eggs into the bowl, whisk and then in the microwave pausing regularly for a bit more mixage. As with scrambled eggs done in a pan, the trick is not to over-do them. The egg will continue to cook in its’ own heat.

…And if women pose a statistically significant lower risk for insurance then taking that into account isn’t nonsense, since insurance is all about the probability of a claim being made….

There’s the small matter of the cost of the claim too. I seem to recall reading somewhere that the statistics suggest that women actually have *more* accidents in their cars, but are usually lower value claims.

Also worth noting that no matter how skewed the statistics are, they’ll never be better than the raw data they were calculated from. Looking at the number of cars you see with damage to them, I would imagine that there’s an awful lot of incidents going unreported…

Anyway, much as I dislike insurance companies, removing a valid risk factor from their calculations is stupid.

Have been using a Flash & Flare since last autumn, my commute takes in some unlit rural roads and tbh I find the Flash adequate if set to steady mode (tho I’ve got a pretty good idea of where the potholes are). Noted that the spring on the Flash was considerably more springy than the spring on the Flare when new, and had worries about cross threading the lamp unit. Leave the unit assembled with a battery in for a few weeks tamed the spring enough, so few concerns about cross threading now. So that’ll be me cross threading next time I Need to charge batteries then…

Oh, and btw – have had several following riders complain about the brightness of the Flare. Esp. when set in flash mode…

As always – it’s the cost to change that matters. As salesman has taken £500 off his sale price and offered £500 more for your trade in, cost of change has dropped by £1k. So… my view would be that either they’re keen to get rid (possibly been in stock a while), the car was basically overpriced to start with or he was taking the wee with his initial trade in offer. Or some combination of the above.

Crossmarks are a good fast rolling option on sealed surfaces, but grippy enough off road. I’ve been running a 2.1 70a folding on the back on my bouncy bike for the last couple of months.

I’d also suggest you get another set of wheels – changing tyres is a ballache, doubly so if you’re running tubeless.

Not sure if it’s still the case but CRC had some good deals on the M087 in the now-discontinued silver finish a few weeks back. You’d need to be able to put up with having shiny silver shoes which may not be to everyone’s tastes. I’m liking mine so far.

My contract said much the same, so I did what the contract suggested and discussed with my employer. Their response was basically “You can either give it back to us, buy it from us for the FMV or if you’re happy to keep using it but don’t really care whether you own it or we own it, keep using it and we can discuss it again if/when circumstances change” – which is basically what I’m doing. I’ll decide whether to hand it back or pay the FMV when I leave the company.

However, this is the stance taken by my employer. Your employer may take a different stance. Suggest you either do as the contract suggests and speak to your employer. If you’re really not keen on doing that, you might first seek out others others at your place of work who have been in the same situation and speak to them.

Does that answer your question then?

The scheme as operated by my employer allows me to continue to use their bike at no additional cost as long as I remain employed by them. If I want to buy the bike from them, then the FMV payment becomes payable. As this reduces with age, I’m putting this off for as long as possible.

[edit – I’d suggest that in the first instance, you check the contract you signed at the start of the term to see what that says, though it’s unlikely to make anything more than passing mention to the possibility of transfer of ownership]

Dunno if it’s relevant but since the last firmware update, my Edge 500 has developed a rather annoying habit of autopausing and resuming as the mood takes it. It only seems to do this when fitted on my cyclocross bike and not when fitted on my mountain bikes. Potentially relevant is that cyclocross bike has speed/cadence sensor fitted, mountain bikes do not…

Based on recent experience, I’d think the ’70mph on the M62′ club probably has a much smaller membership…

Depends what happens at end of the term. It amazes me the number of people who think that having made all the monthly payments, they own the bike. To achieve the tax benefit, the scheme exploits a tax loophole that only applies to rental agreements. If you agree a final payment up front, then it’s a hire purchase agreement and you can’t have the tax benefit. From a philosophical point of view, it’s interesting that HMRC decided to publish a system to calculate a fair market value, as this allow people to calculate what the final payment. All of which seems a little contradictory to me, but there you go…

At the end of the rental term, the scheme run by my employer allows me to continue to use their bike after at no cost to me, or hand their bike back to them (goodness knows what they’d do with it…). So, I guess I’ll continue to use their bike until either I leave the company (at which point I can stump up the appropriate “fair market value” defined by HMRC or give them their bike back), or on a long enough timeline, there will come a time when they write off their asset.