Have been using a 32 tooth up front and 11 at the rear since I started mountain biking 5-6 years ago, but just recently have started to find that a bit limiting at certain trail centres, mainly llandegla, glentress and innerleithen.

So have just swapped to a 34 up front, I think this will do me fine.

Specialized do consider the rear triangle on full suspension frames as part of the suspension, and technically not covered by the lifetime warranty. But they still replaced the rear triangle on my enduro at no cost when it was 5 years old and had cracked at the chainstay weld, and I didnt have to ask twice, they just replaced it immediately.

Very good service , in my opinion.

So I would have thought you’d be ok with the road frame.

Went to llandegla for a decent ride today , it was absolutely packed, overflow car park was full.

New damper is excellent, better small bump absorbtion, better large bump absorbtion, just generally all round better,super smooth. I turned the high speed compression and rebound damping down a couple of clicks, compared to my riding off kerbs setting.

It was worth the money I would say. I’d imagine that you could get the normal damper custom tuned to give the same effect though, but you dont get the adjustability.

I can see myself varying the high speed damping depending on what sort of trail I’m riding.

fitted the forks on the bike and had a ride round outside the house to try and get the settings into the right ball park.

ended up with maximum low speed compression damping, the high speed somewhere around a quarter up from no damping, and the rebound set to the middle setting.

I wont try and pass judgement on the new damper yet, as riding up and down kerbs is hardly a decent test, but what I have found is that even with the low speed compression turned up to maximum, theres still a fair bit of dive under braking.

got my fork back yesterday, not got it on the bike yet but for the weight freaks its 100grams lighter than when it went in, it was a 2005 TALAS R, now its a 2005 TALAS, but with 2011 RC2 damping.

k9 mail

or cant you just turn on pop3/imap on your exchange account and use the build in default android mail client?

or upgrade to newer version of android that support native exchange sync.

Will give some basic (riding around the local woods) feedback when I get them fitted, but probably wont be able to give feedback from a proper ride for a few weeks.

£259 inc VAT for the upgrade to the RC2 FIT cartridge and a full service.

I looked into buying new 2011 RC2 Talas forks, but you’re looking at at least £650-£700 for some with a 1 1/8th steerer. Theres some cheap taper steerers knocking around though, if you’ve got the frame to use one.

The 10-12 weeks is the norm for omega (and Tag) servicing/repair work, and as everyone has already said, 4 sec’s per day is considered acceptable, but thats not to say it couldnt be made more accurate, but it debateable as to how long it would stay accurate.

This is why buying relatively expensive watches is completely irrational, as a £20 timex will be significantly more accurate and functional*

*I say that as someone who has a couple of pointless inaccurate but fairly pricey watches (as well as a few cheap accurate ones), so I do understand why they’re bought before I invoke the wrath of the timex/omega people.

specialized enduro?

lapierre spicy?

santa cruz nomad?

ibis HD?

We did it on a fairly small scale.

Didnt tell anyone (including parents) we were getting married, went to registry office in gibraltar, had two strangers as witnesses and then went to seville for 4 days for the honeymoon.

Worked well for us, really enjoyed it, much more than I would have enjoyed the big wedding that most people have.

I have an sram 980 cassette on a hope pro2 hub,and it worked loose a couple of months ago, so thought I’d better take a look at it after seeing those pictures.

The cassette slid off fine with no extra force required, there were a few dents in the aluminium similar to the 3 small ones in the first pictures on this thread, but that was about it.

Will probably change it for a 990 when I replace the chain, I’ve tried an XT cassette, but I just bent the larger cogs through normal use, so I wont use one of those again.

Just got back from cannock, its now a muddy hell hole, one to avoid unless you’re a masochist.

Its the actual canvas threads showing through, I dont think I run the pressures too low, generally around 35psi, I use the same pressure front and rear, but its only the rear that have the canvas showing.

I did consider it might be a rock scrape, but its pretty even around the whole sidewall and on both sides, so I dont think it is due to rock scrape.

Mud rubbing the tyres sounds the most likely candidate, but I’ve never noticed this on any other tyres.

Will probably run them tomorrow and then replace with some specialized eskars, too late to change for tomorrow.

Its a shame as up until now I thought they were pretty good tyres, but expensive. If the sidewall is going to be the weakspot and fail after not that much use I might as well get something thats 90% as good but 50% of the cost.

I saw it when I was sailing a boat from falmouth to gibraltar .

To be honest it wasnt especially spectacular

61 p per mile for an audi s3 that was bought new in 2007 and covered 30000 miles over three years.

Workings below:-

£10000 depreciation
£2280 tax/insurance/servicing

24mpg average over 30000 miles (assuming fuel has averaged £1.1 per litre)

Its a common misunderstanding that the haldex only engages the rear wheels when the fronts start to slip. This was the case with the first gen haldex, but the newer versions are more complex:-

From a standing start , if the front wheel starts to slip (by something like 6 degrees) the rear wheels will engage.

if the car is already rolling, then the computer that controls the haldex sends a varying amount of power to the rear depending on various inputs, such as throttle position, speed of throttle press, yaw/pitch/roll angles etc. So its constantly varying the amount sent backwards between 0% and 99%, although in practice you would rarely get 99% at the back.

In practice, It works brilliantly, the car never feels like a front wheel drive car. From a standing start in the wet, if you dump the clutch (and drive like a ****t), all four wheels will spin up and its impossible to tell that the fronts span up slightly before the rears.

I’ve got a 2007 s3, had it from new.

Its very fast, and surefooted in all conditions. th 4wd works well in the snow and has got me places where other cars have failed.

its practical and reliable, and a nice place to sit.

BUT – its the most boring fast car I’ve ever owned, its amazing how a car this fast can be this boring. I think its because its got no depth, any idiot can drive it and get to within 95% of its total capability.

I have an eye condition that means that glasses cannot correct my vision, so I am forced to wear (hard) contact lenses at all times, I generally find them no problem.

I wear a pair of clear or tinted (depending on the day) sunglasses to stop the wind , I also have a mudguard and one of those neoprene things to go on the forks. This works fine for 90% of the time, but if its really really wet, I use goggles with clear lenses to stop the mud/grit going in my eye.

If you get mud in there its unbelievably uncomfortable.

05/06 enduro

or if we’re voting for a series of bikes, the enduro in general despite its dodgy 07-09 phase.

according to the pub:-

“There are quite a few people biking and saying its good fun”

So, I reckon I’ll give it a go

Thanks,

I guess nobody knows, I would imagine the ground is frozen solid, but that woudlnt be too bad as long as its not really icy/snowy.

Been using MG1’s for a couple of years now with no problems, they get bashed off rocks fairly regularly, but no cracking on mine. Paint has worn off though.

My 2005 36r’s are still going strong, serviced every 1.5ish years, there was no stanchion wear at the last service 6 months ago.

I appear to be in a minority with this though, maybe I dont ride as much as everyone else? I guess they see about 75 hours riding a year.

I also experienced the opposite to the OP. My dhx air softened up dramatically the other day in freezing temperatures (started to sit 50-60% into the travel rather than the usual 25%). I thought the air seal had failed again, but when I put a shock pump on it the next day , the pressure was exactly as I’d set it and it was bahaving normally again.

I’ve been out in colder temps and never experienced that problem before, so I have no idea what the problem was.

Flaine has a good ski area, with some really good off piste areas, but the ‘town’ is absolutely horrible. looks/feels like communist russia, not much in the way of restaurants/bars.

I’d go back to flaine again though, but wouldnt expect much in the way of apres ski.

Grantway,

Was there a big improvement in performance?

The uppers are fine on mine, so it would just be the £259.

The way I interpret the ad, it means if you have 40’s the you get an RC2 damper, if you have 36’s then you also get an rc2 damper, if you have 32’s then you get an RLC damper

Is the 2011 FIT damping substantially better than whatever they had in the 36 forks in 2005? Seems like a relatively cheap way of getting 2011 damping ‘technology’ . The question is, is it all just marketing fluff or has there been a significant change in performance between 2005 and now.

Th website says the FIT damper can be fitted to any year 36 forks.

what? a subject where nobody has an opinion….

I had my audi s3 remapped 2 years and 20k miles ago, no problems so far, Car has significantly more punch now, it supposedly increased the bhp by about 30-40bhp, but I cant verify that.

Fuel economy is about the same as before, maybe slighty worse, definately not better.

I'm pretty sure my mishap was due to user error rather than some inherent weakness in the way the racks work.

I just make sure I do the clamp up very tight now.

I use the thule roof mounted bike racks, and on the way to llandegla once the arm that clamps to the frame came away from the frame, the bike fell sideways but still attached by the straps, we stopped, put it back upright and carried on. No damage to car or bike.

I reckon we just hadnt done the clamp up tight enough, it was a tapered frame , and I think the clamp slid off. I think thats the only thing it could have been. Never had a problem before or since, done thousands of miles.

We just got back from the Nevis Range. It is a really tough run, definately far more technical than the average red.

A friend was on a 120mm specialized hardrock and he managed fine.

We also did the world cup downhill, and whilst there were sections of the downhill that were a lot tougher than the red I actually thought the DH and the red were both quite similar in terms of challenge on the whole.

I didnt enjoy either that much though, because as someone else has mentioned, in places the price of failure is significant and that dented my enjoyment . I'm amazed there arent more significant injuries, we did see a guy part way along the boardwalk who had taken a tumble and looked in a pretty bad way

For me, its worth doing once, but I'll not be too bothered about going back.

Where does the new section start from?

I ride a 2005 enduro, it weighs ~33lbs and is my only bike.

I dont find the relatively heavy weight a problem, I'm generally last to the top of a hill, but thats probably more to do with my lack of fitness than the weight of the bike.

Having said that , I'd make it lighter if I thought I could do so without sacrificing the way it goes downhill, but I dont think I can do that, so I'll keep it as it is.

I used joes kit, and the rim strip was faulty on one on the wheels, it leaked air around the valve.

eventually worked this out and went ghetto in the end.

just picked the bike up, the chainstays are now black, which was kind of expected.

What wasnt expected was that they have replaced the chainstays with a completely different type. The new chainstays are symmetrical, whereas the old one was assymetric (with the non drive side being higher than the drive side)

I've seen pictures of replacement chainstays with effectively an extra plate welded where the old ones crack, but I've not seen this symmetrical stay before.

Anyone know anything about this?

I said I'd update this thread when the bike was fixed.

I received a text yesterday to say that the bike was ready for me to collect , so I'll be heading down there tonight to pick it up.

So thats just over a 1 week turnaround on a warranty job, where the parts had the be sent from specialized.

As I said in my first post, I'm pretty impressed by the service, both in terms of honouring the warranty from specialized and quick turnaround from leisure lakes.

I tried clipless pedals for about 6 months last year, and whilst they were far more efficient, and got me up hills faster, I was slower downhill and I have never had so many injuries/falls as when I had clipless pedals. I have now gone back to flats as I feel far more confident on downhill and technical sections , and for me that far outweighs the increased efficiency of being clipped in.

I also never felt the need for shin/knee/elbow pads until I started riding clipless pedals.

I'd use clipless if I was biking on the road/tame paths no question though.