looks to me that he got a job lot from Bumblebee auction site and can’t be bothered to deal with them…

Hard to see any worth picking out even if he’d let you!

really? Would that include the Nike store in Ox Circus then? Didn;t think Nike still did cycling shoes.

oooh, I wonder if my Pikes + wheel + xtr front brake will turn up at the same auction site! I wonder if the police ever think to check off the stolen stuff they collect against stuff that’s bee registered stolen with them. When my gear was stolen I got a letter dated the very next day telling me they’d closed the case. So guessing nothing more will be done.

I say congrats ZC on getting a bargain. ANd I shall be monitoring it to see if any of my gear shows up!

Good to hear Walleater. I have to say I was kind of surprised people would not want someone for free if they could vet them etc.

And o96192082, you’re right it does have its problems from a management perspective but if handled correctly volunteers won’t refuse to do work they’ve been briefed to do. In my experience volunteers tend to be more likely to do the ‘toilet washing’ than the paid staff! You just need to be sure they buy in to the company vision and values so they feel they are contributing.

There you go, used a bit of marketing speak for you Poly. Couldn’t resist.

Thanks Rogg, I will. Hopefully people won’t be quite as suspicious and cynical as some of the folk on STW. Although I guess cynicism is all part of the fun on here! Gotta suck it up!

My interest is getting some general bike industry knowledge. Getting a better idea of what makes the customer buy, what frustrations face the bike shop owner, where the industry is going next. I’m on the process of setting up a bike related company (of absolutely no threat to a bike shop) and think that it would be helpful (and sensible) to have some more general knowledge of how they operate.

I wouldn’t want to do anything that wouldn’t be useful. I could probably offer some advice on marketing (although given I’m looking to gain knowledge of the market it would be pretty theoretical) and could probably help sell a few bikes if trusted to do that. But to be honest I’d be happy to make tea, sweep the floor and generally graft. Despite what people might think about marketing folk I’m happy to do what I’m told!

Anyways, it looks like I might have missed the point so drawing board!

Point taken about stealing other people’s jobs. In some respects I’m not sure why volunteering (or interning) for a company is actually that much different to volunteering at a charity. Charities generally also pay their staff and paid staff at charities can often feel threatened by volunteers but I take your various points. And agree it is traditionally more accepted that charities will take on volunteers.

But if you knew someone was trying to get experience in your industry (whether it be biking or whatever) how would you suggest they do it, short of offering to do it for free? I’m guessing you wouldn’t want to pay someone…

around 12% of the value of your bikes every year. Not bad and much cheaper than the quote I received, but maybe that’s because of where i live…

Question came up because a mate of mine doesn’t insure anything he doesn’t have to (i.e only car and buildings ins) but has the good sense to put cash he would have spent into a savings account that he will use if anything stolen. To date he’s been lucky and has a large pot saved.

hmmm, maybe it’s just me then…Yes, wearing ‘proper’ shorts. I did notice that the top of them don;’t have the grippy stuff on them where the bottoms do. WHich seemed odd…

Thanks – just bought the BB5s of the bloke :)

Here’s to many happy days of non bleeding touring and commuting…but not stopping very quickly

depends what you’re after? Not really found much for mountain bikes but plenty of roadie stuff and crappy singlespeeds…

I did this one last weekend http://singletrackworld.com/trailguide/uk/south-east/the-north-downs/
Did the ‘grizzly lungbuster’. It was a pretty decent ride – had a few problems map reading but only because we tried to make do with print out!

It didn’t take quite as long as it make out either. We spent about 7 hours I reckon. With a fair bit of faffing about…

I wanted to do this same and got a Titus X. It’s 100mm front and back and has done the job admirably. As with clobber I might be looking to sell it if you’re interested. Only because I’m now thinking I might like something with a little bit more bounce. And because I’m a flighty consumerist who likes to have a new toy every now and again…

Hi Tricky Disco – No it was totally lacking any ‘nose’. Somehow looked even weirder than the one you posted up…

I followed a car through a toll gate barrier (the one is Dulwich) only for it to land on me as I was cycling through. Slight scratch to paint work, some painful bruising and £800 bill for a new barrier as it snapped off!

Needless to say I didn’t pay it!

Hi Phil,

Could be great – thanks. Don’t suppose you’ve got any pics? And do you have levers etc to go with?

unforuntately saddle got destroyed in previous attempts and it’s an ibeam so no spare old ones hanging about. And I am NEVER ever buying another ibeam saddle.

Will see if I can find something else that might slot in though and hammer that

Titus X

I didn’t grease it but the git who sold it to me did.

When I emailed him to say the seatpost is seized he said ‘it shouldn’t be I just greased it’. When I emailed him back to tell him that was the problem, I surprisingly had no response.

$%£*

I would do that Zippy, but it’s a horrible iBeam saddle (part of the reason I’m trying to shift the thing) so that won’t work…

So far I’ve emptied a can of WD40 in through the bottle cage mounts and left for a week to no avail. Can’t find anywhere local that sells plus gas so trying coke this evening…

Really IanB? That would make me very happy. Was yours also a carbon seatpost? I had imagined it would then splinter

Dear PleaseCycle,

I put it to you that HR managers in large corporates are also human beings capable of understanding plain english.

I’m sure you’ve done your research and been told that people like to be spoken to in that way but in the 8 years I’ve been marketing to folk like that I’ve always tried to make language as easy as possible for them to understand – because otherwise they switch off…

Also my lady friend is an HR manager who works for a large corporate and has worked for many big banks and she HATES that kind of speak!

Maybe you could try having two websites with different copy and see which does better. If you do, please let me know as I’d love to know the outcome.

Best of luck with it though – I do think the idea is a good one

Stupid question I’m sure…does greasing the post make it stick then?

I like the hairdryer idea – thanks. Finally I get to find a use for the hairdryer my girlfriend left in my flat…

Will a carbon seatpost survive a vice? Always assuming I had a vice that is?!

I’ve tried that for a day ride but it killed my knees…so, probably not that nealry fine!

Don’t know much about the Titus Carbon frames but I ride a Titus X with carbon seat stays and love it. Kind of feels a bit like you’re riding a hard tail and then when you screw up on a rocky descent you realise you’ve got a full sus after all and all is rosy…

Second Clobber. Don’t use it – they’re rubbish nd swing about all over the place. Even with a relatively low load, as soon as you’re out of the saddle they make you feel really off balance too. Better off going for something that attaches to the seat rails. The xlarge ortlieb saddle bag is good. Combine that with handlebar bag and you can get most stuff you need for lightweight road touring.

keep the nobby nics on

Cheers guys, it’s a Colnago Arte. Currently got Schwalbe Ultremos on it…did look at the marathons. Can you run those at fairly low pressure?

Brilliant piece of kit. I use it for all day MTB rides and Enduro Races and it works a treat.

oh and spares for 26inch wheels seem to be easier to find

I’m with RUSHER4. Just use a nice comfy MTB and stick some decent hard wearing slicks on it. I’ve spent a year touring on an old Lava Dome and it was perfect in every way. It also meant when things got a bit tricky (we were in South America) you could stick on some nobblies and you were laughing

I met a guy touring who swore by never cleaning his chain and just adding more and more oil so it was one nastly black gloopy bit of string and he reckons it more than doubled the life of his chain. I like shiny metal and non oily calves too much to do it but it’s worth chucking in…

Come on, who here can honestly own up to not be infantile and attention seeking? If you’re not give it a try. It’ll make you smile.

I feel a ‘best bodge’ thread coming up…

Surely a big part of riding bikes is about building something out of whatever’s left in the shed.

Sorry mugboo – decided to have a go at rebuilding an old hope hub instead that fortunately had a suitable rim built on to it. I shouldn’t imagine that’ll work much better though…

So that’s a no then…just trying to recycle (and be a cheapskate…)

never drop mine because no QR but wish I could after an incident a few weeks back…don’t think I’ll be having kids any time soon ;)

Titus X – lovely and light. Looks pretty too.