Obv. very different, but I’m still amazed by chris akriggs effort on the ‘wrong’ bike setup on this cobble wobble:

“i don’t know if this is a bad thing or am i doing the right thing?”
I think really bad

If there was anything that came out of that ‘fox failures’ threada while back it seemed muc-off was a big reason for severe stantion wear. There was a folk a two from fork servcing companies saying when there was stantion wear on a fork, there was often a distinct smell off muc off from the oils in there, or at least thats my recolection of that thread

Having never used muc-off, mostly a garden hose, occasionally some soapy water, I’ve since found a worn bushing can have a big effect on stantions too. A corner of a bushing down to the metal doesn’t mate nicely with gold stantion coating ..
I thought the stantions were fading a bit, especially that one bit when I had serviced them not long before, but hadn’t detected any play in the bushings so didn’t link up the two until too late ..

I tried combining the hollinsclough/tenterhill end of that ride with stuff around 3 shire heads/coldwell clough. A bit of a hill and tarmac to link the two but I enjoyed it it all. Finishing coming down into the centre of hollinsclough was great:

Maybe take it one step at a time to keep the cost under control just for the moment?

If you follow the service instructions off the Rockshox website you will be able to remove the travel spacer out of the Reba to get it upto the full 120mm travel. Yes you need a bit of suspension oil and probably some circlip pliers amongst one or two other things, but you ought to service your fork anyway so its not money wasted
From friends and the singletrack mag review I was under the impression that a soul is probably best with a 120mm fork anyway
If you really want to stiffen up the fork a touch in the mean time you could get a DT Swiss RWS (££) or for eg Halo Hex skewers for £9/pair, and make sure your front wheel is tensioned up properly

If you like the reba at 120mm, you might decide you can stomach the price for the 20mm (or 15mm) lowers and sort the front hub/wheels from there

“Hard to see past a pro 2 for th efront”
A ZTR 20mm is the same price and lighter than a Pro II 20mm, and has cheaper 15mm/QR adapters (going by JustRidingAlong) anyway

“or check out a DMR revoler 3 pawl for around £50”
Shimano XT (36 point pick up) if you add more grease from new and keep on top of any play that could develop could be had for that sort of money. SLX (32 point pickkup) can be had for less though you loose the oversize axle of the XT
A friend of mine had problems with the DMR (30 point pickup) snapping the QR adapters on it
Hope Pro II have 24 point pickup for reference (as do the non 120point superstars I think)

Headset wise, on-one have FSA Orbit X (I think) for £15 from about £50. I think 95g weight

“you can fit convertors for all the current axle standards”
Not quite? maverick, specialized e150, cannondale lefty won’t fit will they?

“I thought all I’d needed was a shim to fit the skinny seat tube but as the cable routing is from above rather than below it’s a different pull. Damn! So if I understand correctly I need a top pull 28.6mm front mech – any reason not to go for an X9 one of these? As I ride double+bash and have no intention of ever returning to a triple, can I get a double specific front mech?”
You should be able to shim the front mech, if you can get hold of one, from experience at least SLX/XT front mechs (perhaps called multifit on CRC for eg) come with the shims
A bottom swing (one that clamps above the shifting cage) mech IME will catch less mud than a top swing (one where the shift cage is above the clamp band) and as such will develop play less quickly. Plus on a hardtail I think it helps to break up the length of the downtube
I don’t know about SRAM mechs, but SLX/XT mechs I’ve had will let you run the cable in either pull direction. For the top swing models at least there is only 3g between the SLX and XT models. The XT one has ‘XT’ cut out into it ..
As far as I remember you can use a double front mech with a triple front shifter, though unless you match the double front mech with a double specific front shifter are you really gaining anything over a triple mech/shifter and just winding in the high stop so it won’t go further than the middle ring?
Plus you ought to find better deals on triple mechs as shops will generally shift more of them

“Sektor 100-140 coil u-turn “
I thought they were 105-150mm, or perhaps 95-140mm. Either way coil U-turn rockshox have 45mm of travel adjust

“Magura Thor – don’t know much about them, advice please!”
100-140mm, but nowhere in between which could be an issue on a soul. 20mm axle
2010/2011 ones are supposed to be excellent, 2008/2009 supposed to be very divey
Can be had for £480 from the right place

“719 rims”
Though I’ve not dented by XM719s, they’re still not particularly wide either generally or when you compare them to the 460g weight, they’re not that cheap either
Though they will still run bigger tyres okay, I reckon a 2.35″ maxxis/2.2″ bontrager or so is about as big as they can take without rounding the tyre profile too much

A ZTR Arch has the same internal diameter but is 40g lighter for eg

“am I going to be killed to death if I ride the Boardman with the forks at 120mm?”
Probably not, run them with a bit more sag% and don’t go overboard on the jumps/drops perhaps. Obviously I could be completely wrong and you’ll be killed to death ..

EDIT: I typed some of that before reading everyones posts beforehand, so there may well be some overlap

My brother broke a 2003 East Peak in late 2008
broke here:

I’m still suprised he had a tie-wrap/zipitie that big with him, came in handy to get back though

Anyway, they offered him a new (same shape) front triangle for free, or for £180 extra to cover a new different length (fox float r) shock with a 2008 (2007-2010 shape*) mount vision frame
He went for the 2008 frame as he didn’t like the X fusion shock the east peak had

*The geometry varys wildy between model years IIRC, so just watch what they offer you
The 2007 one is very steeply angled for a 120mm bike, IIRC they had it in the magazine (singletrack) in issue 32ish and slated it. 2008 has sensible angles (but still a high BB height, it still won a 5 or 6 120mm FS test in What Mountain Bike I think though (with trek/specialized/giant etc)
2010 at least went quite slack angled (for a 120mm bike)
I’m not sure about 2009

“More than a weeks worth of riding to be done”
Maybe if you include a load of natural stuff as well

“its a bitch to climb if your not well fit”
Even if you omit the ‘well’ its not really, with a sensibly setup bike for trail centre riding (up and down)
There aren’t any difficult climbs if I remember rightly except for one out on the black that feels about 45 degrees straight up the hill. A fair few hills do feel like they go on a bit though

“Innerliethan is nice as well – maybe more technical maybe less groomed. Less variety”
Just the one XC trail, but even so I thought inners xc (including the black option) had more variety than glentress red/black

Last June I went upto the 7 stanes for 4 days (having previously ridden all* but glentrool of the stanes at least once)
*okay so I didn’t tecnically ride very much of mabies kona dark side (I was somewhat less skilled back then) and I had to bail out half way round dalbeattie due to a mechanical)
Anyhow with 4 days planned I picked what I think are probably the best 4 of the stanes, I and 3 others:
Day 1:
Drove up from North nottinghamshire to Dumfrieshire, setup camp just south of dalbeattie forest (sandyhills) and rode into (and round) dalbaettie late afternoon/early evening
Day 2:
Drove to Kirroughtree, rode red/black trails, McMoab is excellent, especially as my freehub didn’t snap this time round ..
Day 3:
Packed up tent, drove to Peebles (next to Glentress), pitched tent, rode glentress red*, played on the freeride park
*although I probably prefer the black overall, kirroughtree was enough for some of the group, and many I know rate red more so i thought I’d best show them the red
Day 4:
Packed up tent, rode innerliethen by late lunch, drove back home

Excellent fun, worth all the driving, here are some pics to whet your appetite:

there was a giant one for giant mph brakes for IS mount down to 160mm – so same size rotor
It has to fit around the caliper, though giant MPH-3 calipers are pretty fat, I’d guess most should also fit

Jejames (rotherham) had them in stock when I asked about them in I think 2007?

Not aware of any others, not that I’ve looked

980 has a carrier over 3 biggest sprockets (like SLX), 990 has a spider over more (like XT has over 5 biggest)
990 is a bit lighter than 980

Seatpost length will be irrelevant if you use a shim

“XT must be due a redesign sometime soon”
should be due middle of this year for 2012 XT? (Given 2011 was XTR)

I’m tempted to get some Elixir R’s atm
Going by the claims of shimano and shimano, elixir R’s are 67g (per end) lighter than SLX

“I have spent ages playing about with + and – air and can get it so that the sag is right (about25%) and the action feels fine riding up and down the curbs outside my house”
That reads as if you’re trying to use the +ve and -ve pressures to sag the fork 25% before getting on the bike?

“unless you’re a big lad, or hit stuff very hard”
yes, and err yes, that’ll be me then ..

“that’s the one I’m thinking of coming down, unless you know of another”
I don’t think you are, are you?
I thought you were going down here,(down the first inlet on derwent reservior)
My pic is the top of a fireroad not found on OS mapping on streetmap, only bing OS 1:25k and aerial photography I think (I’ve not worked out how to link in the right place on those yet)

“Boys please leave your egos at home, ‘cos I’ll be walking down ‘The Beast’ and am not ashamed to do so”
My mum can bike ride down ‘the beast’, well maybe 90-95% of it ..

(old) Mono minis (140mm caliper) are what I’d hope to use .. Hmm

ir bandito, care to link me the add (I can’t find it in the classifieds)

Scandal, well it would be ~1.5lbs (and £15) lighter
though still alu. 100mm fork max, matt black (are they still mud absorbing?), SS looks untidy ..
I’ll still consider one

Jacobs loop took 7 hours? I managed within 5?
I was with the pootle, or so I thought, I mean I took pics and put them up on here afterward?

Half of it was iced up snowdrift

re: route, just butting in unneccessrily now, what is hagg side like in winter nowadays, since they relaid (rather laid on top of) it with some limestoney stuff a year or two back?
The other fireroad (starts just above the fairholmes dam, goes up near lockerbrook fm), which only appears on 1:25k on multimap/bing (not streetmap 1:25k) or aerial I know stands up to wetness pretty well
ie the one that finishes here:

Merely a thought, feel free to ignore ..

I don’t get the chopping and changing either
As far as I can see you have:
the start, in the middle
the start of ranger proper, near the end
the start of the end (telegraph valley), near the start
the end, in the middle
and everything else here there and everywhere?

“I kept coming unclipped in spds”
Sounds like the cleat and/or pedal is worn. Winding up the tension (if your pedal has the option) will help a bit

As mentioned above it depends what you are used to
If you haven’t got used to SPDs properly where unclipping doesn’t worry you, then you’ll probably be more comfortable and ride faster/harder stuff on flats
If you’ve learnt all/most of your offroading on SPDs then keeping your feet on flats won’t be as easy, especially if you SPD-bunny-hop (okay so thats technically terrible technique)

I quite like my shins personally, and I can only just ride comfortably with lycra leg warmers if its really cold or rainy. I just wouldn’t get on with leg armour (I don’t with knee)

How wider tyres do want to run on them? (min, max and normally would be helpful)

Something along the lines of:
Mavic XM719Disc, EN521Disc
DT Swiss EX500/530
Stans Crest (not sure on strength for abuse), Arch, Flow

Personally I’d not use pro IIs. A ZTR front is slightly lighter, the same price from JustRidingAlong and the adapters are cheaper. For the rear, I hate the noise, pickup is only 24point/revolution, the bearings are pretty minimal in size, I’ve seen one too many cracked hub bodies, I don’t feel the price is worth it given those issues I have with them. All IMO of course

wet and windy today

A few randoms

I assume a 456 has a 27.2mm seatpost?
That leaves you with a gravity dropper of some spec. or a KindShock i7. Leisure lakes should give you a better price for Kindshock than superstar will

I used some suspension grease I got off of wiggle. Can’t remember the brand name but I think they called it ‘super-slick’ or some such name
I can’t remember the manual being specific about greases though I’m not 100% sure I have all of it

The base can be a pain if the nut on the base is done up tight to the base. You’ll need some long nose pliers that will fit into the holes well. A vice is useful to put the pliers into. I can’t remember at what stage they are but I used that sort of setup to get it undone anyhow

Pretty simple. Open, clean, grease, close back up again

Shame after regular servicing mine has loads of play side-to-side and bit fore-aft

Spinning contact adjusters don’t sound good, I imagine a good chunk of riding in the peak on a fork in need of a service won’t help it out

R’s still being lighter than CR carbons is complicating things

“Cable oilers do nothing perpetuate their own need”
But without them I found full outers would be blocked in 3 months (with sealed ends)

Granted I didn’t fork out for avid flak jacket or gore ride on but they seem mighty pricey

Anyone?

the cheapest outer and (open) ends you can find and then add in middleburn cable oilers. Flush out and (slightly) lube the cable in one with WD40/GT85/etc
Plus if you cut the outer in the right place you can use them as bump stops to sit against the frame (Eg next the headtube)
(4mm for gear cables, 5mm for brake)

The permissive is more sloppy/slimey than boggy so shouldn’t result in axle deep over the bars stuff. Plus you get Hagg Farm
Both climbs are all rideable too

Only a suggestion anyway

“that is a massive brown trousers moment when you think what would happen if the brakes were to stop working.”
Its more of a brown trousers moment when your brakes do actually go. Pulling on the brakes, slowing down a touch only to speed back up again isn’t fun, neither was dodging the walkers, speeding across the crossroads or just making the corner afterward. Luckily the brakes were still biting a bit, enough to slow enough to ditch once it flattens a bit after the corner
Rotors were completely black afterward
Since then I don’t drag my poorly bled small rotored brakes all the down a road doing 30mph+

Had a similar but not as bad incident coming into nenthead on the C2C on some really badly bled brakes of mine, on smaller rotors, didn’t have the out of control thing quite going on though

Back on topic, 49mph on an MTB (crossmarks pumped up to probably 60-65psi) on the road down a dual carriageway, but of an aerotuc and some spinny pedalling going on

“I know that Halo do some white rims, but who else?”
Many Stans
DT Swiss EX5.1D (at least a year or two back they were available)

There’ll be many more

Are white rims (As per many white things) heavier not being anodised, but coated?

I might be able to make this, perhaps with one or a few others. I’ll see

When you say “Ladybower Pub descent”
Do you mean cutthroat bridge or the ‘other’ one (which can be rather good, not sure in slop though) as they both come out behind the pub onto the road in front?

How long will it be before somebody sanitises the bottom of WLT-cutthraot – I’d bet they sanitise all the way to the road (at cutthroat) though, which would be a shame

Normally in winter after gores fm descent I head up the fireroad next the dam just above fairholmes (could drop down to fairholmes cafe via the stepped path and back up the road) back upto near lockerbrook farm and back down hagg, then up and down the permissive b.way (with the extra bit at the end) back to ladybower dam if not parkd in the A57 layby below 2 thorn fields farm. That’d bring it upto 4 hills (last one not being full size and easily ridden parallel next to the resevior)

“Would a Mavic EN521 not be a much better choice for the riding your intending? Yes its 100g heavier”
A DT Swiss E530/E540 would be cheaper, lighter(or the same) and wider internally(IIRC) though

“Does 2mm make that much difference?”
When its the difference between 17 and 19, yes it does (as per what I said above)

“I love my ‘mountain’ bike….”
You rode up/down the mountain behind you then?

Stanfree, that saddle angle looks mighty uncomfortable

“Plus they are 100g lighter than than a Maxxis High Roller”
than the wire ones yes. But not the 2.35″ folding (60a) ones (spesh are folding)
Maxxis claim the 2.35″ folding 60a are 695g (eskar controls are 700g)
JustRidingAlong claim after weighing them they’re more like 645g

Treadwise eskars are closer to advantages? High Rollers being closer to spesh chunders (I believe no longer available in the UK, are in the US though, inc. a 2.2″ trail version)

“Kenda blue groove 2.1 rear and Nevegal 2.1 front”
Interesting to see someone riding them the opposite way around to how (I thought) Kenda designed them
I’ve ditched kenda (at least on the rear) until they sort out the premature (as in tread still almost perfect) sidewall giving out problem I and other I know have had

“Frankly, your £300 budget isn’t really going to stretch to something worthy of the frame”

The frame isn’t exactly brimming with the latest technologies though is it? Its £260 through a distributer (okay if you buy through CRC they are one and the same). Its a 5.5lbs frame so while okay for 130-150mm steel its 1/4lb heavier than an ibis mojo sl, so fork weight ought not to be a must to keep really low.
Sector 20mm (or 15mm?) shouldn’t be lacking in tracking (20mm being pike lowers IIRC?), the coil U-turn spring is the same as was used in coil pikes/revelations IIRC (and solo air is active enough), motion control and standard rebound are useable. They may not be upto to standards of RS Blackbox or Fox damping, but IMHO/IMHE you’ll have enough harshness from the rear end to be worrying about the fork damping

I’d reckon sectors/pikes/non-silly-bells-and-whistles revelations would suit the bike pretty well

I’m tempted (once things dry up a bit) to try a rubber queen 2.2″ up front (or 2.25″ Albert) with a 2.15″ Michelin Dry2 after using a 2.25″ advantage up front with the michelin on the rear last summer. Okay there was a bit of loss in uphill pedalling traction on quite hard ups, but not enough to bother me and I was running it the wrong way round for pedalling anyway.

atm, high roller 2.35″ 60a front, bontrager ACX 2.2″ GumBi rear for a bit less drag when not in slop (which they cope alright with)
that’ll be the road then ..

Does the calculator with the burgtec hub let you read the dimensions of the burgetc hub or let you insert dimensions for the crest?
Similarly any with crests, can you read the crest info? or insert the info for the burgtecs?
Else try to find the info on their websites?

what he said

Why does the ‘dalwhinnie – twinned with las vegas’ sign face away from the road?

Am liking the Bez signage