Third to last pic = here

Okay, so I think all these have been up here at one time or another, but having a gander through my flickr ought to turn out some okay photos

Almost snapped downtube ..

Maybe a few too many then ..

For which crank arms?

I know at least SLX chainrings don’t fit onto 2004-2007 XT HTII cranks arms without minor modification

How about mavic?

If you aren’t going to jump or you don’t want to run really quite fat tyres theres little point in the extra weight (And expense) of the DT EX5.1. Same goes for XM719s, EN321s or EN521s (or any of the DH mavic rims)

If you’re not overly heavy and don’t crash your way through things than a DT 4.2 or lighter (but cheaper?) Mavic XC717 disc would be what I’d get if it were me

A Mavic XM317 disc is about 440g, so slightly heavier than a DT 4.2, but cheaper and wider/stronger than XC717s

Ramped forward will be faster rolling and give better braking

I wouldn’t personally run 2.35″ Maxxis front, 2.25″ Maxxis rear as the rear will be bigger than the front (yes I know that implies 2.35″ is smaller than 2.25″, but thats how it is with new and old maxxis treads/carcasses). I wouldn’t want that forward tipping of the bike

If I was going to run high roller front with a 2.25″ Advantage, I’d put a 2.5″ High Roller up front to get the volume/size about the same. I’ve not seen single ply wire 60A high rollers on sale for a while (they’re not on the maxxis site) so they may have pulled them from the line up?

From face value (and what I remember of the UCAS system)

You need an A, and 2 B’s (but not in General Studies)

You need maths A level

You need 1 of DT or Physics A level

The other A level can be anything else (but not general studies)

Bontrager Race X-lite?
As cotic have as an option when you buy the frame

The steal route?!

Are you suggesting he go pinching a bike?

Pretty much any hardtail sounds like it will suit what you are wanting it to do tbh.
Longer travel, shorter length, beefier ones will make pedalling more difficult and generally harsher as far as ride comfort goes (especially on longer rides)
As a sweeping generalisation most hardtails (80/100mm) for that money from the big manufacturers are generally designed for XC racing and can be quite harsh for riding comfort, long in length, steep and forward making descents that bit harder

Something with adjustable travel may give you a bit more to play with at trail centres but of course isn’t essential

For the money you could build up (or have built up) loads of frame only frames

Alternatively you don’t have to spend that much and still have something really quite nice

“then get the lightest and most comfortable full-face you can afford”

The specialized one has some pretty big vents all over the back

Though if it were me, I’d feel a bit of a tool riding a full-face helmet on XC stuff (and most trail centres, and the peaks/lakes and ..) It maybe just that I’ve never used one though

Why won’t it?

Hope calipers and avid calipers will both fit direct onto post mount forks for 160mm rotors, so the adaptors will (I can’t think why they wouldn’t be) both makes of caliper?

You’d be better with hope 183mm adaptors with the avids and 183 rotors than with 183mm rotors and 185mm adaptors. You’d more pad in contact with the rotor

The classifieds could do with more classifications, so that stuff stays around for longer.
The bike and non-bike topics have enough classification IMO

Agree, Its fine as it is. Despite my initial dislike of most recent post sorting, rather than the old most recent thread order I’m quite used to it now.
Letting threads run and run is better too I think. It seems to get better responses, instead of having to keep restarting a popular thread to stop it falling off the end of the page and people being able to search for old threads, post something and for it to become fresh once more for all to see works quite well I think

It would more likely be 44 – 32 = 12T ~ 6 pair of links anyway

Yes, but 2″ Mud X’s are tiny

I can touch the rim with one on the rear of my hardtail at 40psi on sets of steps

Compared to 2.25″ folding Advantages (which are a fair bit bigger volume) they’re pretty heavy though (2.35″ folding high rollers that is)

Old Maxxis (Larsen TT, Ignitor, High Roller, Minion and so on) are small. Continental/Panaracer sort of small (not quite sure how they compare with one another)

New Maxxis (Crossmark, Advantage, Ardent and some (XC) others) are pretty big. Perhaps bigger than a proper 2.1″. The 2.25″ advantages are 2.5″ High Roller/Minion size (but 660g). The 2.4″ is ridiculous (even on the front of a nomad when I saw one. I’d love to see just how insane the 2.6″ Ardent is for size

“Panaracer cinder & they are on sale at crc too”
700g looks pretty good for a 2.35″ (Nevegal look a like) tyre
2.35″ Kenda Nevgals are a bit over 700g

All fair enough until you see a set of 2.35″ Rampages. They’re tiny. A 2.2″ I reckon. Smaller than 2.35″ High Rollers I reckon and they’re already small
Still bigger than 2.1″ Kenda Nevegals though, but not by much

“High Roller 2.35″ folding – too heavy for cross country/long days out”
What?!
Maxxis Say they are 695g. JRA say they are 646g. On picking mine up (when fitting) they feel pretty light

“646g for which tyre? Maxxis website have 2.3″ folding Rollers at 695g”
Just Riding Along has them at 646g (on their we weighed these maxxis tyres type page)[/url]

You can fit new style post mount (74mm) brake calipers (most are like this now) onto old style IS mount (52mm) fork mounts.
Need a post mount to IS mount adaptor. Most brakes come supplied with them

The washing out sounds like tyres, carrying too much speed into corners, forgetting how to corner as well as you used to and braking while cornering?

Kenda Nevegal 2.1″ DTC (dual tread compound) folding (the size of 2.3″ continental/panaracer)
Maxxis Advantage 2.1″ 62a eXception folding (again quite big)
Bontrager ACX 2.2″ folding (520/565g) – a tad hard though
Maxxis High Roller 2.35″ (more like a 2.25″) 60a folding (646/695g)

Stuff I’ve been most recently (for a while actually) and happy with most for riding as you describe. All handle mud well enough, big enough to take a bit of a battering and corner well enough mostly

Tighten it up more. Using a ‘proper’ allen key, not a multitool. Ie something like this with plenty of leverage:

“no matter how much i play with it and make sure the tyre is not rubbing i cant seem to solve it!”

When you land, the wheel and frame will flex as they (and the suspension) take the impact. You need more than a small visual space between the frame and tyre when off the bike and stationary

Have you swapped the tyres (to bigger ones?)

I’d be checking
– all the suspension bolts are tight
– all the suspension bearings/bushings don’t have any play in them
– your wheel hub doesn’t have any play in it
– your wheel is true through its rotation and isn’t bent/kinked at nay point
– your spokes aren’t really loose

Work it out yourself!

Take the chain off
Wrap it round the two biggest chainrings/sprockets (ie the 2 32T rings), but NOT through the rear mech. Make sure its on all the teeth properly. Shorten so when pulled tight there is an overlap of one pair of links.

Basically as you would when you shorten a chain from new

(Going from 44T biggest to 34T biggest (running a 32T casette) I removed 3 pairs of links)

“so my money says he’s pukka.”

“it doesnt come with the code
so if you wana put a cd player in your car or van here you are”

Mine doesn’t

My i900r has been great so far. No play whatsoever and works like I wanted it to

5″ of drop gives me about the right amount of drop I was after (and find I set at hieghts right through its range

4″ of frop (or 3″) wouldn’t give it the same potential. Though I got one because my stumpjumper fsr frame only had 3″ of conventional seatpost drop and wanted some more as it limited it a fair bit when trying steep/jumpy stuff I’d not ridden/cleaned before

EDIT: I’m perfectly happy with the remote lever. I don’t think I’d like a poploc lever. With the supplied remote it’d be easier to still hold on in (semi-rough) stuff and push the lever. A poploc would require more hand moving. I wouldn’t want to have to that. For me it would limit the dropper posts potential to drop in more situations/rougher terrain

No, and you know its not really

Well maybe down the shops it’ll be strong enough, but if you want to push it a bit then I wouldn’t ride it If I were you (or me)

Does the ute not have a rear (cable) disc brake? What about just the mounts?

I find myself strangely wanting a ute/big dummy/mungo .. I really don’t know why

Is your 36T ring from a double setup? As in designed/sold/etc to run with a little ring as well (and/or a big ring as well)

If so its designed to derail to chain easily (side-ramped teeth for shifting) and the front mech holds it

If you got a unramped chainring (which also has much deeper teeth (deeper than the chain) It will help keep the chain on no end
I’ve switched to one of these recently from a bash, home made jumpstop and ramped chainring setup and it works better. I’ve not took it to properly rough terrain yet (like the peak/lakes/etc..) (being my second bike) but its not dropped it once so far

The Kindshock/Pure Race i900/i900r has a fair bit of layback. Not sure if its the same as a thomson, though I didn’t think thomson laybacks had loads of layback due to the inline clamp?

Which ever comes in an XL frame size?

Do you have any past experience on what suspension designs you like the ride characteristics of?
The prophet being a single pivot, the pitch being an FSR/proper four bar

Nowhere near as wide as DT EX5.1s

They’ll still take a 2.5″ High Roller or 2.25″ Advantage without any rolling over problem though. Arguably bigger rubber sits a bit round when seated on them, but it depends if you want square tyres or round ones ..

My 15.5st hasn’t bent (merlin built) ones on up to 3-4′ drops (yes I know thats not particularly ‘core). I like them. 460g seems pretty good for the disc ones. DT EX5.1s are about 500g, EN521s about 540g and EN321s about 570ishg. Stans (tubeless) rims will be a lot lighter though for a similar width

Once you are used to them, no. heel dropping and other maintaining pedal grip means you don’t. But once used to being clipped in, its easier to stay that way? (and vice versa)

“I did Stainburn red route for the first time yesterday with flat pedals for the first time in ages. No way would I have even attempted it clipped in.”

Why? Its not like its hard (As in what is there that you should feel uncomfortable clipped in, IF you’ve given them the chance to get used to them (properly) as with most riding?)

Have you never used SPDs or just not properly used to them
As I haven’t used flats in a good while I wouldn’t consider anything but SPDs for the double black warren boulder trail. I want to think about riding instead whether my feet are going to fall off. I as good as always manage to unclip in time if things get nasty, if they do its often better to try to ride it out anyway

“SPDs make you lazy; many people rely on them too much.”
Yes they make you lazy
But
Why does that matter? They keep you feet on(/in) your pedals and if you’ve gotten used to them enough that you are comfortable enough to use them anywhere (and trying to push things a bit) and unclip as you please, whats the problem?

“Riding flats gives you the skills riding SPD made you think you had.”
I’d just rather ride my bike. I know I’m never going to be a pro, so why not just take one less thing out of the equation and help me along. Its not like its taking that much away from riding? (when I rode flats I was used to them and didn’t have to think about dropping heels etc.. just as I don’t have to think about unclipping now with SPDs)

Negative air chamber (The bottom one) leaking slowly pver time?

The imbalance of pressure (more psi in top than bottom) would create a setup like this

Having the pressures equal gives the best balance of suppleness but doesn’t dive under braking/steep stuff too much for me

Haing more psi in the negative preloads the positve so it goes into the travel a little, making it very supple on small stuff, but dives a lot under braking/on steep stuff/harsh bumps etc ..

If you playing with the pressures, make sure you set the top (positive) chamber first. The negative (bottom) chamber is a lot smaller so setting this first, then putting loads in the top cuases the pressure in the small negative one to ramp up far too much

” rarely get more then 85mm of the 135mm it’s set to”

Its a 130mm fork btw

Oversize bars are only oversize on at the stem clamp area. 31.8mm and 25.4mm bars both narrow at the grip/brake/gear lever area (maybe to 22.2mm? (BMX bar size))

So its not that

“welding. is it difficult?”

Maybe not with thick metal

The steel used in higher end bike frames tends to be very thin. You’d easily cmelt holes all around where you were hoping to attach the disc mount

That aside, how do you plan on getting the mounts (from where?) on the frame 52mm apart, parallel with one another and at the right angle so the disc caliper is exactly in-line with the disc? When the frame is built they’ll use a jig to weld all the bits in exaclty the right place

Drilling out a frame is just madness

If you’ve internal cable and hose routing, to put the rear brake on you’ll need to diconnect the hose to take in on/off, which can be a pain

All in all, get a custom frame builder to make you a ‘clean’ looking bike with internal cable/hose routing and the ‘custom’ brake mount

“A light XC full-sus makes little sense, as it will not do majorly bigger stuff than my hardtail can handle”

I found when changing to a 5″ (ok so not that light, but not exactly heavy at 27/28lbs) full suss frame (from a 4″ HT frame, but had ‘upgraded’ to a 5″ fork (which is now on the full suss) It brought my riding on no end, so my full suss does do majorly bigger stuff than I could handle on my hardtail

Just a thought. Not questioning the SS purchase. If you wanted to go full suss, you could SS the genesis. Or just SS the genesis now (its not difficult to regear it and see how you get on with it. You could then go about building up another bike to put your SS bits on (ie the SS chainring/chain/rear sproket/tensioner)

I thought with 130mm Revelations the summer season was already about 66(.5?) degrees? 160mm forks have more than 30mm arch-to-crown difference than 130mm revelations, so you may have more like a 64/65 degree head angle with 160mm forks?