Just out of curiosity, who knows the correct procedure for calling Mountain Rescue out?

Thought I would typ some stuff down here. My self loathe has taken a huge dive over the last week. To the point where I am beginning to question if I should compete at all this year. I’m stuck in two minds about it. On one hand, I am thinking about doing better and being recognised for it, and on the other I am worried that I wont improve at all. Went out on Saturday afternoon for a spin on the road and burned out after 15 miles – though I partly blame not fuelling myself properly beforehand and during.

Thats seems to me like it’s coming down to the same argument again – you need to start riding for the hell of it. Sod the training program, blow the performance stats. You sound like you’ve got an absolute fixation with how you are performing, and whilst it’s great to be able to stay fit, who is it that you’re trying to impress exactly? Because if it’s you, it clearly isn’t working – in fact it’s having the opposite effect.

Like somebody’s already said, try to recapture that vibe you had riding your bike as a kid. Did you care about how fast you were going then, or how many calories you had burned? No, all that mattered was the wind in your hair, your time away from your parents nad having a gas with your mates. Like Cinnamon Girl said, go exploring – don’t ride the same old routes over and over; find new places, see new things, experience new sounds and smells. You could do worse than go on some day rides with your local CTC group or touring club.

Don’t compete this year – but don’t look on it as a failure if you don’t. Take a break. Tone things down. Chill out. Read a book. List to some music. Find a pub with an open fire and real ale.

But whatever you do, have fun.

Don’t put all your weight on the saddle – hover over it, you’ll soon find out why on our roads, unless you like being kicked up the arse repeatedly! Similarly don’t death-grip the bars, light touch/hover over them.

Learn to pull as well as push on the pedals, you may not have the luxury of ultra-low gears to grind your way up big inclines, so you need to make the best use of every pedal rev to keep going forward. 39 x 26 is a LONG way from 22 x 34…!!!

I started road riding again this year after 20 years on mountain bikes and it was a real wake-up call – it’s pretty uncomfortable at first, but you’ll get used to it.

Plus it will wash straight out again as soon as you go anywhere near it with washing powder. Pointless exercise.

Deffo sell the lenses seperately, the bodies you’ll probably be lucky to get £20 each for. I wouldn’t say film is “trendy”, more “niche”. To all intents and purposes it’s stone dead in the mainstream.

I mounted the socket up underneath the back bumper. It was easy enough to “feel” the plug into it and it never caused issues on the MoT. Never towed anything but I had a towbar fitted as a defense in case of tailgating incidents. Which given that I live in a notorious “crash for cash” area was quite an expedient thing to do.

Where a £35k Audi or BMW with a 3 litre diesel and a huge fuel tank would have been a MUCH better tool for the job!

Don’t think that was the point really – granted he wouldn’t have had to stop for fuel as often, if at all and he wouldn’t have been as knackered as he said he was, but assuming that he stuck to the speed limits all the way through France (which is VERY difficult not to do given the Froggies love of speed traps and timing on the autoroutes) would he have won? I doubt it.

At the risk of a STW barney I would recommend the early proper Fields Of The Nephilim. Their 2nd album is best. Last Exit and Psychonaut are my faves.

No, you’re bang on. It’s far better than the later stuff, although I do like Mourning Sun. The backing vocals by Carl McCoy’s twin daughters is absolutely spine-chilling in places.

DO NOT get anything by “Nefilim” – it was a side-project of McCoys (singer with Fields of the Nephilim) and in general it stinks. Real fans of FOtN will ignore you to death if you do.

Fields of the Nephilim. VERY niche and very difficult to get your head round but persevere with it.

Start with Revelations (the double album if you can get it), or Elysium. Of the later stuff, Mourning Sun is probably the best.

Other bands to look for – Sisters of Mercy (natch), Mission, Danse Society, March Violets, Skeletal Family (again, pretty rare but keep looking), Elements, Hunting Party, Ann-Marie Hurst, Alien Sex Fiend, Red Lorry Yellow Lorry, the list goes on…

I’ll have ’em, you can never have too many maps!

Yup, I have it regularly at a nice little restaurant in Bergamo, Italy. They do a brilliant horse steak and I’ve never had a bad one yet. Sweet, juicy and every bit as nice as beef fillet. And cheaper.

surely a front wheel skid is more dangerous than back wheel skid regardless of where weight, centre of gravity is etc. I wuold rather my back wheel slip sideways than my front sliding out when braking.

In a way you are correct – unless you’re an absolute genius, a front wheel slide is way more difficult/impossible to control/recover from.

Think about it this way – most modern cars (bear with me) have the brake bias about 60/40 front/rear. Assuming that you are travelling at a constant speed and press the brake pedal, the weight of the car continues to travel forward (momentum) even as the car slows. This compresses the front suspension and presses the nose of the car down, increasing traction through the front tyres.

As long as you brake progressively then the wheels won’t lock and break traction, which is when the trouble starts, because a locked wheel is neither slowing you down, nor can it be steered. If this happens, the correct remedy is to release and reapply the brakes, “pumping” the brake pedal (cadence braking). This is essentially waht ABS does for you, it pumps the brakes very rapidly to prevent the wheels locking completely and allowing you to steer under hard braking.

Now look at a motorbike – a motorbike (with a few exceptions) has independent brakes. You operate the front with your right hand and the back with your right foot. You can stop a motorbike safely and quickly on a dry, non-slip surface by applying the front brake only, even if you really anchor on. Look at a modern sport/racing motorcycle – the front brakes are huge in comparison to the rear, often twin four- or six-pot calipers hauling on discs which are approaching 300mm diameter whilst the rear might be half that size with a measly single-pot caliper. All good motorcyclists know that all the braking is done on the front, in a straight line and bolt upright.

HOWEVER…If you are on a loose or slippery surface you need to adjust your braking technique accordingly. You need to give yourself longer to stop; and you need to adjust your bias accordingly (with a few exceptions you can’t adjust the brake bias in a production car, which is why you need to leave longer and longer to stop as road conditions deteriorate).

For motorcycles, the police “Roadcraft” driving manual recommends 80/20 bias on a dry road; 60/40 in damp conditions; and 50/50 in wet or icy conditions, increasing braking distances accordingly.

Where am I going with this? Weeellll – personally I’m an advocate of using the front brake sparingly in off-road conditions, and the worse the conditions get, the less you should use it; BUT at the same time, good technique is just as important – grabbing a handful is asking for trouble; firm and progressive is where it’s at and if you lock up, let go.

Anyone who runs unless it’s being employed as a method of survival (i.e. escaping kidnap, large carnivores, kids, wife, etc.,) should be summarily executed. They’re all miserable bar-stewards.

I bought a Mythic Scream frame on eBay a few weeks ago. No idea why. Oh yeah, now I remember – I was smashed out of my tree at the time… 8O

The same chain you use in the summer.

This.

Never had it with any of the other bikes….have a suspicion this is first SRAM chain I’ve run – previous ones have probably been Shimano. Maybe SRAM just aren’t as durable.

SRAM chains are miles better than Shimani IMHO. They don’t wear as fast. Never had an issue with them rusting though. Always degrease/dry immediately/wetlube mine, never had trouble.

I’ll be dead by then, so who ****ing cares. Now wheres my massive chauffeur driven car, to take me to the airport?

This.

Why would they do that, each time there is a revelation about oil, it isn’t that they have been hiding how much they have, it is that they don’t have as much as they said they did.

Because these are oil companies that you’re dealing with – probably the most devious, hypocritical, dishonest, machiavellian organisations on the planet outside of the Catholic Church.

Remember hydrogen fuel cell cars? The next Big Thing about 20 years ago? No? That’s because the oil companies have bought the technology and shelved it. There’s only Honda who are man enough to stand up to them about it, and even they don’t shout very loud about the fact that they’ve had an H-cell car on sale in the USA for the last 10 years.

Dealers always inflate second-hand prices a) to give them room to negotiate and b) on the offchance that some sucker will happily part with the asking price. Private sellers inflate the price because in the main they’re idiots and think that their car is worth twice what it actually is.

If you’re buying from a dealer, bargain hard. And I mean, be absolutely ridiculous. If the dealer’s asking £7k for the car, offer him £5k and work your way to a compromise.

Example – my current car cost me £2750. The asking price was £4000. I knew that it was worth nothing like that so I offered him £2000. When he’d stopped swearing and come down off the ceiling I asked him what his best price was. He immediately dropped it to £3200. I offered him £2500 cash there and then. He said make it £2800 and it’s a sale. I said £2750 and we shook on it.

Love it. Nowt like bargaining over a car!!

That’ll be the Geoff Cox who recently changed his name from Isaac…

Don’t Pentaxes have a weird/non-standard hot-shoe? Or is than Minoltas?

Too late, it’s been done. He only needs to visit Shadsworth in Blackburn. Oh wait, no, that’s unfair to Neanderthals – at least they were intelligent and good looking…

Not sure I would use aluminium tbh. Surely you need iron/steel really for high temp use (mechanical wise) and also higher specific heat capacity (will hold a lot more heat).

Agreed.

Try your friendly local neighbourhood laser cutter if you can live with a stencil-type brand. If you’re prepared to wait for one of their larger customers to get a large batch done in the material that you want then they will probably shoe-horn your part into the corner of a sheet somewhere. I’d still expect to pay around £20 to £30 though for mild steel.

I’m just waiting for someone to quote the velominati rules as if they weren’t a joke…

You’ll be telling us that all the world’s major religions are just for $h!ts and giggles next… :roll:

All persons other than me will leave. Now.

….. apart from the fact that they are completely soaked in creosote and other very nasty stuff – basically very bad for your flue and bad for the environment.

True, but 1) twenty odd years of experience would dictate otherwise about the flue – a spoonful of cleaner every month and emptying the thimble out regularly keeps things drawing nicely, and 2) environment schmenvironment. For the short time I’ll be on the planet it makes **** all difference.

Any long f2.8 telephoto is going to cost a fortune.

Not necessarily. I bought an almost new Tokina ATX Pro 80-200 f2.8 on FleaBay for just shy of £250. Granted it weighs a ton but stick it on a monopod and it’s great for football and other fast action. Full autofocus no problem. Linky to some stuff of mine HERE[/url].

For my money a mid-range DSLR with a couple of lenses is money far better spent than a system or micro 4/3 setup. They’re just too expensive for what they are and don’t give you the control that a DSLR does, especially at high speed.

Buy from your LBS guys.

And pay over the odds? Not likely.

But to answer the OP’s question – if it’s supposed to be brand new and not OEM, reject it. It should be perfect.

The manufacturer wouldn’t supply it to the wholesaler/supplier like that unless they had very slack QC procedures, so why should you accept it?

MTFU

Either buy the bike and put up with the moaning/potential complete breakdown in the relationship, or get rid of her and buy the bike anyway.

Worst case scenario – if she walks out, you’ll be upset for a few days. Then you’ll go out on your shiny new bike and wonder what all the fuss was about. Worked for me and that old trout I used to be shacked up with.

Bitter? Moi?

and a big dent in the right driverside pillar

+1 for being majorly concerned about this before anything else.

Take it to a reputable body shop and get their professional opinion. A scratched windscreen/bonnet is a minor imbuggerance (to quote Terry Pratchett); a damaged A-pillar is potentially lethal.

Do all you can to scavenge wood – it’ll save you a fortune in the long term. Look out for dropped logs/branches off trees in the woods (and obviously in a location where no-one will see you lifting it), wood in skips (look out for people stripping houses out, staircases are great. Ask permission before taking), scrounge pallets, whatever you can.

Don’t feel that you need to burn hardwood exclusively. We run our stoves on a mix of softwood and hardwood, probably about 75% softwood and 25% hardwood.

A great source is also old telegraph poles. We recently had a load replaced in our neck of the woods and I managed to get three delivered to the door by the crew that was replacing them! A weekend’s work with the chainsaw and my massive chopper ( 8O ) filled the wood store nicely.

There’s the Castel Sant’Angelo too, which used to be the Papal residence before the Vatican. If you get chance to visit the catacombs too it’s well worth it.

Whatever you do, don’t try to look cool or “blend in”. You can’t. You won’t. You’ll stick out like a sore thumb. Which you will anyway, unless you are actually Italian….

Enjoy…

The “plastic side jobbie” is just there to preload the bearings – the crank shouldn’t fall off if this is missing, it’s held on with the two screws through the end of the crank arm itself.

I can’t see the splines on the axle being mullered – it’s hardened steel. More likely the splines on the arm will be fubared.

Ebay an option?

Not a lot. Different casing.

Specs HERE, oddly enough…

I’m struggling to understand some of the choices on this thread

This.

I’m amazed at some of the titles that people are pulling out for being shite! The Hurt Locker for one – it’s an amzing film! I’ve watched it over and over and it STILL has me on the edge of my seat.

Bladerunner is one of the all-time cinematic greats – yes, it’s a sprawling mish-mash but it’s supposed to be! Again, I can watch it over and over and still find something new about it, it constantly has the power to surprise.

For my part I can’t stand anything with Jonah Hill or Seth Rogan involved (except “Paul” – but that’s because Simon Pegg and Nick Frost thought of it); any of the American Pie or Hangover films; anything to do with Harry Pothead; and any of the “Brat Pack” films.

That said, films are a very personal thing; I think a lot of people form an opinion about a film before the’ve seen it and consequently get very disappointed when it doesn’t turn out as they expected. Most creative media is like this, and surely that’s the point – there is no “right” and “wrong” (granted there’s a few absolute stinkers out there, there always will be) but ultimately it’s up to the viewer to decide what is valid.

Get proof of posting and send it via a tracked service. Make sure that it’s insured for loss or damage. Keep the paperwork for a good month or three.

Photograph any distinguishing marks on the goods and get an overall picture (make sure it’s clear, well lit and in focus).

If the buyer claims damaged goods, at least that way you can show that you’ve gone some way to retaining evidence that it was in good condition when sent, and you can prove that you sent it.

@pjm84

I have a Drive V70 and I can achieve 50mpg. Although the 1.6d is not to the liking of the STW masses.

How do you find the drivE? I have a D5 (183bhp variant) which goes like stink (after all it is a 2.5 turbo) but I’m lucky if I can get 45mpg out of it. I like the idea of the drivE but I can’t get my head round a 1.6 motor in such a big car, especially fully laden.

Copper Bolt

Dreadnaught

Transatlantic Cable

The Cosby Kids (as in, doing Bill an a favour and dropping them off at the pool…)

The Slaves (as in, freeing them…)

Blackpool Brown Trout, the only fish that floats.

Brown baby (“Bloody hell, I think I’ve just had a brown baby! Better out than in, eh??”).

Then there’s the different types – such as the Pace Car (First one out pretty slowly then pow! pow! pow! the rest follow at speed); The Phantom Poo (where you know SOMETHING has been dropped off but when you turn to look there’s nothing there); The Perfect Crime (like a Phantom, but when you wipe it’s clean already); and several others.

Tebay Services, M6 Northbound.

I never understood what all the fuss was about – the majority of forestry under the remit of the FC is privately owned anyway. Was selling 15% of the remainder going to make that much difference?

The Goverment has absolutely no right to sell OUR forests

…er, yes they do. The government are the elected representatives of the people. i.e. you and me. Assuming you use your vote of course…

Born and live in Burnley, home of the mighty Clarets and world-record Benedictine consumption.

Is it not an education thing?

You can’t educate people who don’t want to be educated and/or think that they know better. Which unfortunately is the majority.

Stick to natural trails. Closures are VERY rare…