These are great tyres in the dry.
Bontrager Jones XR tyres for £22 each

Clean out the grease and use engine oil instead. Honestly this works.

Is it chilly in your part of the world at the mo. Your missus is wearing a lot of gear for racing.

I hope that it’s either A: cheap, B: rides amazingly, or, C: both A and B as it’s no looker.

It’s the 1:1 actuation ratio of SRAM that makes it shift better than Shimano that still uses 2:1. In lamens terms what that means is that for each mm of cable movement on a SRAM equipped bike the rear mech will move an equal amount of mm’s, where as a Shimano equipped bikes rear mech will move 2mm for every mm of cable movement.

The 2:1 cable actuation ratio was developed in the dark midst of time for road bikes with down tube shifters. It was done so the rider could shift through all the gears on the down tube shifter without the shifter having to move more than 90 degrees from the lowest to the highest gear.

All though I use SRAM on my bikes the technology (apart from 1:1) and build quality is superior within Shimano groupsets when compared to SRAM. It’s just that 1:1 makes such a difference in shifting quality, especially in the muck, that SRAM gets the nod from me.

If your the sort of person who likes to buy local then ironically the Lapierre may be made closer to home than the Pace.

If you take two identical forks bar the travel, say for example a 80mm and a 100mm Reba, then the real difference in ride height is about 14mm not 20mm. This is because a 100mm fork will need to be set up with more sag than an 80mm fork.

I’m not sure if you realise it but your post is quite ironic as Shimano scrapped Biopace as it made knees somewhat fekked.

I’m sure Shimano cited similar studies with Biopace, but in reality it just led to tendinitis.

To be fair though the majority of Biopace nay-sayers were roadies who tend to pedal for longer durations at higher revs so it might work for mtb’s. It could just be that Shimano got the angles and amount of eclipticalness (that can’t be a word) wrong.

Are you talking about the Salsa Moto Rapido frame? If you are that was designed ideally for an 80mm fork and XC racing. If you fitted a 130mm travel fork it would put the head angle at about 66-67 degrees and significantly raise the BB height.

Whether that’s a good or a bad thing is down to you and how you like your bikes to handle. My personal opinion though would be if you are going to ride down lots of really steep and rocky terrain on it then it might be OK, if you are just going to use it for ‘general’ riding around though it’ll be pants.

Yep, the place has changed a lot. Apparently since you last went there is a great big hole just after a small drop off where some fat bloke stacked.

The tyres I use as an ‘all round’ set up here in the Clwydians are Bonty Jones ACX, 2.3 front with a 2.2 out back.

They’ve got small evenly placed studs so they avoid that intermediate slip you get on Maxxis tyres as you move from the large central knobs to the outside cornering knobs.

They’re also pretty light for the size, tubeless compatible, clear mud easily, roll well and have a softer compound of rubber on the outside edges to help cornering.

I can honestly say that I’ve tried tyres from most manufacturers and these are by far and away the best tyres for my riding here in N.Wales. I counted my tyres last week as I’m going to have to try and flog them soon as they are getting in the way. I’ve got 32 tyres at my place and another 20 odd at my Mum and Dads. Anybody interested in a load of tyres from WTB, Michelin, Bontrager, Maxxis, Geax, Continental, Schwalbe, Onza, Panaracer and probably a couple of other makes that I’ve forgot about?

Hmmm, those cable guides should look quite neat and with the first guide being on the side of the top-tube should stop any excessive cable rub.

It reminds me of one of your earlier creations, I think it was called Compo.

A couple of points if I may.

The rear mech cable looks like it will be a bit flappy, maybe another guide hole needed by the seat tube?

Lynskey must be confident in their construction methods as the way that seat stays join the drop-outs looks like one hell of a stress raiser.

There are no zip ties on that down tube at all, never mind a zip tie strapping a front mech to the down tube.

I propose that you DrRSwank are in fact the mong in question.

Most fork outer ‘seals’ aren’t actually seals as they are not sealing anything in, they are used more as ‘scrapers’ keeping the muck away from the proper seals.

If you want to be pedantic about it the best you can do is use a plastic tooth pick to slightly prise the seal away from the stanchion and move it around the seal while putting some thin teflon lube in the gap and then working the fork up and down. Make sure you wipe away any excess lube as it will only collect dirt.

To be fair that’s pretty awesome photo shop skills.

You’re rad x 10!

You can tell it’s an ugly bike when it’s got risers and bar ends and nobody mentions it.

I think Mr Nutt has been on the sherry again. Can you please explain what on the ‘track’ tandem made you think it’s a cyclo-cross bike?

gizzardman – sounds like the negative chamber is leaking into the positive chamber, I’d get them checked out where you bought them from as the internals on 09 Revs are identical to 08 ones.

I feel for the bloke as he has obviously been treated like dog-do.

Telling people though that their frame will definitely fail due to a manufacturing error after stating that there is no longer any warranty or back-up support is a bit shitty though. All that will happen in the UK is that when an Iron Horse frame fails a disgruntled customer will go back to the bike shop waiving a copy his post demanding a new frame whether the frame failed due to a manufacturing defect or not. In the UK all I can see coming out of his rant is angry customers and people slagging off their LBS and Jim Walker.

Yep. Normal washing powder blocks the pores in the jacket so limits breath-ability and they strip off the DWR coating that lets the water bead and run off your jacket.

Nikwax and Grangers make specific washing liquids for waterproof stuff. Soap Flakes work pretty well as well.

Oh and whatever soap product you use make sure you wash your jacket on its own or with just one other item to make sure it gets rinsed off properly.

I had a Raleigh (dont laugh) full susser made out of 853 for the front triangle and something else (probably 531) for the stays. It had a horst link and a rocker driven shock.

It was probably one of my favourite bikes of all time but as everyone else has already said it was heavier than its alu counterparts and the flex between the stays would wear out the horst link bushings in double quick time. When everything was working though it was lovely to ride.

‘And what if Lance’s push had backfired, he mis-judges it, looses balances and crashes into pelton and takes out 160 riders?’

Takes out 160 riders!?!?!?! Do you think pro-riders explode when they crash?

In American law what Lance did would be classed as ‘simple assault’ and thus would be treated as a misdemeanor. A slapped wrist for Lance then.

By the salad dodger wielding a home made trident an assh0le lawyer could easily argue that he had committed ‘aggravated assault’, a victim only needs to feel threatened by someone with a weapon for a charge a aggravated assault. That would put chubby away for 30-90 years!

Sorry sodafarls I should have made it clear that I meant ‘slightly left’ of the normal right wing politics that are exhibited in capitalist democracies.

GNARGNAR – Flaming hell you really hate Mr. Armstrong don’t you? Did he steal your girlfriend?

Anyhow, how else would Lance have been able to change American health care policies without meeting with Bush while he was president? Oh and before you claim that Lance is just jumping on the Obama/left wing band wagon he had been making anti-war comments before Obama had won the race for the Democratic nomination, never mind the Presidency.

sodafarls – Is this the same Lance Armstrong that has gone on the record with his support of Barrack Obama?

Oh and the same Lance Armstrong that after a meeting with Bush to discuss health care and cancer research stated that he may one day pursue a career in politics but that his views are much more left wing than George W?

The fat ****t that Lance slapped was wearing black and yellow, the corporate colours of the Livestrong Foundation, the chunky fellow also had Liveclean on his cape.

He was not trying to make a general statement about drug use in cycling but was instead having a personal pop at Lance and the charity that he formed.

So GNARGNAR still keen to stick up for a d1ckhead who thinks it’s OK to belittle the work of charity that is trying to stop the awful suffering that cancer inflicts on people? Or do you still think it’s wrong that a man that nearly died of cancer should take offence when a moron mocks a charity that is trying eradicate the disease?

Blooming heck that bloke was married and she’s got rid of him because of this.

“At the moment the raw wool is sent from New Zealand to China where the fabric is spun, and then it is is shipped back to New Zealand then to Fiji and then back to New Zealand before finally being flown via LA to London and on to Cardigan Bay. As they say: ‘No matter how you look at it, it didn’t make good reading’. So now they are looking at ways to cut the carbon footprint either by doing everything in New Zealand or getting the clothes made up in China as well as spun there.”

God love Howies. The only company that can say that it’s looking to use Chinese sweat shops and then try and put a positive spin on it by saying it’s for ‘environmental reasons’. I’m sure that’s why Gap, Nike and Primark use them as well.

The hackers took over stw and have been impersonating the staff. Mark and Chipps are really tied up with ball gags in their mouths locked away in the loft at stw towers.

deadlyhifi – the music industry has already wised up that times are changing and have changed their business models accordingly. As I said in a previous post there was more music sold in 2008 than in any of the previous 10 years because of the growth in legal downloads.

It’s been proposed before by more learned people than myself that file sharing is nowhere near the menace that the music industry makes out, but is instead a smokescreen for justifying the ridiculous prices being charged for legal downloads. Even though there is no manufacturing and distribution costs they can still charge 60p-£1 per song because they claim to be losing so much revenue in illegal downloads.

richmars – I suppose you have a point. Technically it is theft, but is file sharing really morally wrong?

If you steal from a shop the shopkeeper/owner has had to pay for the product in the first place so they are 100% out of pocket. The morals involved there are a no-brainer, by you taking something it’s to the detriment of somebody else so that has to be morally wrong.

If a friend of mine buys a CD and lends it to me to listen to is that morally wrong? Technically it’s copyright theft, but morally wrong?

The problem with file sharing sites is that rather than my mate lending the CD to me and a couple of other mates he can now lend it to millions of others as well. So in the ‘old’ days a CD that cost £10 would be lent to a couple of mates to make copies so in reality each copy in the public domain has contributed £3.33 to the publisher, ie; 3 copies in the public domain for each £10 given to the publisher, therefore £3.33 for each copy. The publisher is obviously not happy with that but it’s a situation that doesn’t threaten the existence of their business.
Now if that one £10 CD purchase is copied by 1000 people then the publisher only makes 1p for every copy in the public domain, which I’m sure anyone will agree is a massive drop in turnover.
Now the simple maths involved make for a compelling case in arguing that file sharing is morally wrong. Yet, even though file sharing has become more prevalent in the last 5 years or so how come the ‘record industry’ sold more music legally in 2008 than at any other time in the last 10 years?

TandemJeremy – After reading some of the reports Anaan, etc, I have come to the same conclusion as you that the forces necessary to loosen the quick release are present. Also that should the quick release be loose and thus no friction between the dropout and the hub during braking then the wheel will eject from a fork with vertical dropouts. This I’m sure is one of the reasons that ‘Lawyers Tabs’ were fitted as a fail safe.

What I don’t believe is that if a functioning qr is fitted correctly that under braking it is able to stretch/deform enough to not only become loose but to also clear the layers tabs with out even marking them. I just don’t see how Russ’s accident could have happened without either user error or a malfunctioning quick release being the most significant factors.

aracer – I’m sure Russ and his legal team considered asking for donations as it is quite common for plaintiffs to make appeals for ‘fighting funds’ for cases when the outcome will be of benefit to interested third parties. I’m sure if Russ had put such an appeal on here and similar forums then he would have got plenty of support. A problem with that sort of appeal though would be that he would then be obliged to follow the case all the way through and would have to forgo a significant out of court settlement.
By not following the case through to a conclusion it seems apparent that the reason that this case was taken to court was simply to obtain compensation, where there is blame there’s claim, and all that.
Now there is nothing wrong with him doing that, I’d probably do the same myself if I was in his situation. What I wouldn’t want though would be my mates implying that I’m some sort of a saint fighting the big company for the sake of the common mountain biker.

As for your second point ‘why is the skewer to blame?’. If you don’t believe the performance of a skewer on a bike plays by far the most significant role in maintaining the wheel between the dropouts then it’s pointless discussing this with you. Even a child would be able to identify that a skewer is what keeps a wheel within the dropouts regardless of the orientation of the dropout.

BearBack – I’d presume that the reason Russ didn’t go after the QR manufacturer is because in effect they don’t exist any more. The Syncros that designed/made Russ’s QR had gone belly up and GT bought the name for their OEM stuff, since then the name has changed hands again and is part of the same group as Ritchey.
As an aside the QR design was so old that I’m pretty sure that when it was designed and manufactured disc brake use was not prominent so it could easily be argued that it was never designed to be used in conjunction with a disc brake.

aracer – If Russ believes what was claimed in court to be correct then he also believes that the sequence of events that led to his accident WILL happen again to somebody else. His claim was not that a use of this qr, with this brake on this fork is dangerous but was in fact ALL forks with vertical dropouts and disc mounts are dangerous and wheels WILL be ejected from the dropouts regardless of which qr, hub or brake you use on a fork with vertical dropouts.
Now of course I can sympathise with his situation, I can’t even begin to imagine how horrendous paralysis must be. Yet by taking the out of court settlement he has missed the chance to stop what happened to him potentially happening to THOUSANDS of other people if what he believes to be true is just that.

To be honest though I don’t believe that vertical dropouts are to blame for his accident I think using an ancient, stretchy, knackered qr is the more likely culprit but as I said at the top of this post chasing them for money was never going to be viable.

I’m dissapointed that this wasn’t seen through to the end. If I remember right there had been posts on here stating that Russ’s main motivation for bringing this case to court was not finacial remuneration but to attain a ruling so as to prevent this happening to anybody else.

If Russ had proved his case in court it would probably have resulted in a recall of all forks with horizontal drop-outs and disc mounts. Yet by settling out of court and signing a confidentiality agreement if this was to happen to anybody else (which if Russ’s claim is correct then it’s only a matter of time) then is he now partially responsible?

Contract mobile phones are really ambiguous with regards to the Sale of Goods Act.

I’m not 100% sure but I think that we are the only country that customers expect to get a ‘free’ phone with a mobile phone contract.

What you have purchased is a service from Orange via CPW to supply you with airtime for a fixed price for a minimum period. I’m pretty sure that no where on your contract will it say that Orange or CPW is obliged to supply you with a phone with which to use your airtime with.

Erm, don’t want to seem a kill joy but don’t you guys with XTR front mechs think you’ve been ripped off?

If an XTR front mech hasn’t got the better quality finish and extra cut outs shown in the picture then haven’t you just paid over the odds for an XT front mech?

The current off-the-peg steel xc frames for 130mm forks that haven’t been mentioned yet are NS Bikes Society, Dialled Bikes Alpine, On-One 456 and Genesis Alptitude (any more for any more?).

Haven’t seen one in the flesh yet but the new steel Maxlight looks like it might be a decent frame. Obviously STW’s favourite Guerilla Marketer Brant will have his new stuff available soon enough as well.