Nice colour-coordination. You don't see green "highlights" much but I actually quite like it 🙂

Are your bars rotated slightly forward? What is the thinking behind that?

FSA Orbit XL II:

http://www.highonbikes.com/fsa-orbit-xl-ii-a-headset-aluminium-black.html

£22 posted.

Loads of bike shops have bikes you can demo for the day for nowt. Just phone around/look online

E.g. Summit Cycles in Aberystwyth seem to have a Santa Cruz Nomad demo bike in medium. OK it might be a bit small but it will give you an idea.

http://www.santacruzbicycles.co.uk/bicycles/demos/#

Other brands will get a bike to you to demo. For example I know Roger at Bionicon will get a bike to you to demo (they have quite a few demo bikes including a Large Golden Willow last time I asked).

Phone: + 44 (0) 7966 102963
:: roger.seal@bionicon.com

I have test ridden the GW and Edison a few times and I think they are great. Adjusting the travel/angles becomes second nature in no time and the suspension felt perfectly well dampened to me, but I am mainly a hardtail ridder. I didn't buy one because I really wanted a Blur 4X, which I bought instead. If I were in the market for an all-round bike, one of these would definitely be on the short list. If you are even slightly interested in one I would suggest getting a demo ride.

FENIX TK11 (which takes an 18650 battery). Great as a helmet light (in conjunction with a P7 on the bars)

6'3" (but long body/short legs), Large, 70mm stem, in-line post. I wouldn't want to put a layback on it for the reason your menionted. You need your weight forward a bit for climbing, especially if you don't want to bother winding your forks down for the steep climbs

Duckcm18 – email me at jfeball AT gmail.com

As long as you don't want pockets or vents it is great (I miss vents on mine tbh)

I can do 28th so lets do it then.

Ton – Have you used this company before? I have always wanted to find a good quality but reasonably-priced made-to-measure outdoor clothes company. Being skinny and lanky finding stuff that fits well is a challenge/impossible. Their website looks and reads well.

I have a Gill ProSpeed which was the precursor to the DHB Event jacket (above). Cheap(ish), breathable, basic design. Kept out torrential rain well. I prefer a (more breathable) softshell in all but the worst conditions though (I use a Gore Oxygen OS).

I am up for 28/29 Nov. Lets pick a day though, otherwise it won't happen. Sunday is probably better for me so how do you guys feel about 29th (Duckcm18, ddmonkey + anyone else interested)?

Sounds like it. To be honest, I am pretty unreliable anyway so don't base it on my availability. I will have to make the next one 🙂

I'd be happy with Swinley.

Don't base this around me – who am I kidding 😉 – but I can't do 22nd. I could do 15 Nov or 28/29 Nov FWIW.

I'm in Berkhamsted, Herts.

Why is Amersham "crime central", ddmonkey?

I've never been to Chicksands but I am up for a trip. Blur 4X group ride – very niche 😉

£23.50 for an LBS to do it?

You need to change LBS!

"that method is not ideal if you have a decent headset"

Not sure why not. I can imagine knocking out a fancy-pants headset cup might mark the cups slightly. Knocking them back in again with a mallet+wood should be fine. I can't believe a CK / Hope etc is softer or more delicate than the common or garden FSA etc headsets I have fitted.

But as an alternative, your LBS should be able to remove and refit for a nominal sum (free up to a tenner).

Any prices yet Sam?

Cup remover = large screwdriver and hammer (I use an old seatpost as it doesn't have the sharp edges of a screwdriver)

Headset press = mallet and block of wood.

I've done ti, alu and carbon frames with the above method. All worked fine.

(I took my time and was careful!)

I run mine as a double + bash ring and try to stay in the larger chain ring whenever possible to mitigate pedal feedback. I also find myself using Propedal on anything flat or undulating (setting 1 on the RP23), saving the Propedal off for the downhill stuff only.

Also, FWIW, I run the my air Pikes at about 125mm for 90% of the time too, winding them out for just steeper downhill sections (which there aren't much of in Swinley Forest and the Chilterns).

6'3" on a Large and it already feels like a toy bike to me (which is what I want, to be fair), although the top tube feels longer than it measures due to the steep seat tube angle, if that makes sense (front-centre measurement)

ddmonkey – Swinley is my local play area too so I'll keep an eye out for another Blur 4X there.

I'm going to get some mtb training to get somewhere near its potential.

Someone else on here (I forget who, sorry) once said that you need to ride these bikes at ten tenths for them to make sense and that they punish you if you are "off your game". At the time I didn't know what he meant but now it completely makes sense. Somehow mine feels bloody hard work if I am not nailing it, flat out. The good thing is that the need to nail it flat out has definitely made me push my riding further and harder, and at ten tenths it is such great fun.

Chasing a young lad on a pink Stiffee, who was a much better rider than me, down Whytes Level was the most fun I've had on a bike 🙂

Good news 🙂

Hora – Your brown Spoon would look much better on my bike. Not interested in selling it are you (or swapping for my Flite)?

Nobby Nik on my front wheel that folded over during hard cornering. Deposited me on to the ground and embedded the chain rings in to my calf. 3 days before skiing but fortunately didn't impact my holiday 🙂

Hora – lovin' your bike…apart from the layback seatpost. What's that all about!?! Doesn't it make the bike climb like a pig. The only time I am in the saddle of mine is when I am spinning up a hill and it is great to take advantage of the steep seat angle and get your weight forwards. Plus layback Thomson seatposts look just wrong 😉

Anyway, here's mine. No action photos unfortunately.

Hora – Congratulations! What a great price… you b@stard 😉 Glad you managed to get back in the club without you having to steal mine.

You find very steep, very rocky downhills difficult on an RC36 and v-brake-equiped Klein. What a surprise! "Modern" bikes with a bit more suspension, better geometry and more effective brakes aren't skills compensators, they are simply more suitable for the job.

Your set up is approaching a decade old – you need to get with the times man!

😉

Just checked. Mine was £1,152 (hearing-aid-beige paint + RP23)

Hora – Mine cost me over £1200 with an RP23 shock from memory 14 months ago, if that makes the cost of one second hand any more palatable 🙂

Given they are now hard to get hold of, I reckon the newest 2nd hand ones ie 2008 might be worth more than 50% of their new cost. But then I am biased. £550 certainly wouldn't be enough to get mine off me and mine is barely used (damn those family commitments)

Damn. Wouldn't it have been worth buying as a bike and just selling the parts? They were asking for less for the whole bike than I paid for my frame. Oh well. Too late now. Bummer.

Is it a Medium you are after?

By the way, the one I linked to is 1 yr old apart from wheels which are brand new. 3 month warranty. (I asked the LBS about it about a month ago). Seems like a bloody bargain to me.

Can I claim my reward 😉

Here

It is a Medium.

Been for sale for a few months so probably ripe for a deal too!

oddjob – what happened to the On-One wheels? I am in the process of replacing the bearings in the freehub of my On-One rear wheel which I am hoping will sort out the issues I have been having with mine

PeterPoddy – sorry to dredge up an old thread. I am trying to replace (or at least regrease) the bearings in my On-One rear hub. I have managed to get both the spacers and the freehub off but can't get the cartridge bearings out. I gather I am meant to tap the axle out from the freehub side which will push out one of the cartridges but I have hit the axle harder than I really feel comfortable without any sign of budging the bearings. Is it really just a case of knocking the axle out? I am damaging my mallet I am hitting the axle so hard!

29er and pretty standard…

Great bike although the hubs on the standard On-One wheels need attention much sooner that I expected (play in them front & rear and I haven't yet worked out how to crack them open!)

If you want a cheap, light, fast and reasonable comfortable hard tail then look no further 🙂

They re-routed the trails when I was at Afan this time last year on Rally weekend.

Actually it was cool to see 10 mins of the rally!

I've only ridden Penhydd and Whites but thought they were both great. Nothing too technical – the sort of trail that relative beginners can do slowly and be fine with or more experienced riders can hoon along and have a great time. I had been somewhat put off by reports of how "technical" it was but I guess it all depends on what you are used to. Technical compared to riding round the edge of a field, yes, but otherwise no.

Anything round and rubbery will be fine at Afan (as gwaelod's daughter has proved – top marks for her, by the way). Nice grippy, well-drained surface for 95% of the trails at Afan. Take whatever happens to be on your bike so long as it isn't dual-ply.