I’ve not been on the Icknield Way beyond Great Chesterford, but regularly cycle on the bit between there and Newmarket; it goes passed about a mile from the house. Bit’s of it are singletrack through woods, bits of it are gravel (of various sizes) farm roads and some of it’s the main road. There are a couple of bits that can get clarty, but should be easily ridable.

I suppose I’m mostly pissed off at the, perceived, brush off. If I’d been a deceitful 🤬 and taken it in with the original seatpost, would they have treated it any differently…? My reading of the email suggests they would’ve.

Here’s a shot showing how far into the frame the seatpost actually was:

I ran a Spesh Hard Rock for years, with a longer seat post, that had less tube in the frame and it was fine. I find it hard to accept that the replacement seatpost is the full cause. 🤷‍♂️

Turns out I bought the bike on the 25th of April last year, so it’s getting on for a month out of warranty. I appreciate that switching the seatpost for a longer one, is most likely the reason for the failure.Here’s some photos of the replacement and original seatpost.

The photos are a bit sqiff, but it was in by about 13cm:

Whereas the original was in by about 10.5cm:

You can see the difference between the two here:

Would the original 350mm post adjust to your ride height, or would it have been 40mm over the min insert?

It would have been 40mm over the min insert.

I’ll be emailing Go Outdoors back and contacting Calibre directly. But I guess I’m going to have to suck it up, so time to start looking for a reasonably priced gravel bike.

🤬🤬! So, Go Outdoors are claiming that as I’m running a slightly longer after market seatpost, it’s not a warranty case. I replaced the original 350mm seatpost with a 400mm one, which was set to give me another 40mm of height; so it wasn’t at full extension.

🤬 fuming.

I’m not a chancing 🤬, so I took the bike in as I’d been running it. By the sounds of things, I should’ve put the original seatpost back in and tried to con them that that’s what I’d been running.

I’ve got a pair of the X-Track Race Carbon on my fat bike. Never had a set of SPDs, so can’t comment on how much better these are. I like them though, they keep my feet attached to the pedals, which is nice.

I though the Dune issues were due to chain suck cracking on of the stays, not the seat tube…?

Get yourself a Calibre Dune, fat fun for the win!

I’ve been looking at these as an upgrade for my Calibre Dune, can’t get my head around the pricing though. I’ve seen a few places with a front and rear set for £150, but Rose has front and rear separately for less, even with shipping. Am I missing something here? Does the front and rear set have something that the individual ones don’t…?

Got to think Team Sky will want to bag all three grand tours to go out on a high.

Managed a wee Global Fat Bike Day ride on Saturday, after patching 15 holes in my front tyre. 🙄It was very wet and muddy.

My new Vaude Bike Gaiters kept the shoes clean and dry, which was nice.

I recently bought a pair of the Look X-Track Carbon Race for my fat bike. I have zero complaints so far.

Can only agree with the tyre pressure comments. I’m 73KG and I run 8psi front and 9psi rear on 48″ Jumbo Jims. Any lower and they feel horrific…

So… Don’t be checking out Rhyanna Watson yoga videos at work. 😱

She’s not wearing much… 🤔

If anyone is interested in Becoming a Supple Leopard (as mentioned by thisisnotaspoon), then Kelly Starrett has a YouTube channel that’s worth checking out.

paulneenan76 Yoga With Adriene is probably a good place to start. If you don’t like her, then there’s plenty of others…

What thisisnotaspoon said. Although depending on the size of the thorn, it may or may not totally seal…

My current debate is about future upgrades to the Calibre Dune. Either upgrade all the running gear, 1×11 or 1×12, hydraulic brakes, second set of tyres. Or, get some sort of suspension fork, i.e. a Lauf Carbonara, just to ease the chatter. Or, go all in on some snazzy bike packing kit. Choices, choices…

rOcKeTdOg They were very accommodating and knew I couldn’t afford the top of the range ones. They had the non-wide fit version of the ones I eventually bought, but they didn’t fit and the UK importer didn’t import the wide fit at the time, hardly my fault.
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I ordered a load off CRC and sent them all back as they were too narrow, I also trawled various local bike shops and tried on anything they had in a wide fit, all of which were again too narrow. I then looked at various manufacturer website for sizing charts and tried to find a pair that would fit my feet, for example Bont’s and Lake’s (note that Lake have different lasts, with different fits). Finally, I tracked down a local shop who got in a pair of actual wide fit shoes for me to try, then I baulked at forking out £330 for a top of the range pair and ordered a mid-range pair from Germany, as the ones I could actually afford weren’t imported into the UK at the time…

Lots of faffing, and searching, and time. But I now have a pair that actually fit, for the first time ever. Totally worth the ball ache and months of searching…

People don’t believe me when I say that cows are the spawn of Satan. I’ve turned round a number of times, both on foot and on the bike, when I’ve found that I’ve got to go through a field of cows. I’ll even avoid the commons in Cambridge when the cows are out in the summer. 🤬 evil things…

Seeing as how Enve have just released a fat wheel set and fat fork, I’d say the answer to the original question is, no.

The M685 is available as rim only $999 or as complete wheelset built with Industry Nine hubs for $2800, while the ENVE Fat Fork will retail for $625.

No riding again this weekend. Although I did managed to re-attach the derailleur hanger with new bolts and thread lock. Must have been running with it like that for a while, as the paint has rubbed off on one of the chain stays. 🤔

Marked all the spots on both tyres that were weeping sealant. Decided to start fixing the front tyre first, removed three massive thorns and patched five holes, before running out of patches. Still got four to five weeping spots on just the front tyre, so need to buy a job lot of patches from somewhere to get them all fixed.

Have a look at the Reddit Body Weight Fitness Recommended Routine.

I’m also not particularly hirsute and I have a Smith Rover MIPS that I picked up cheaply from Evan earlier in the year. I wouldn’t buy it again, apart from the fact that Smith’s owners fund the NRA, it’s very large and really quite hot. Other that that, it’s quite a nice helmet, but nowhere near as light and ventilated as my old Spesh S-Works road helmet that it replaced…

No riding this weekend as the fattie is still out of action.  I have all the bits to fix it, however, all the motivation has disappeared. Went for a wander with my daughter to take photos yesterday, instead of fixing it. 🤷‍♂️

Not since I switched to riding a fat bike… 🤣

I was looking at getting an Alpkit Rhythm Thicky, though I’m not sure is strictly classifies as a soft shell. It’s either that, or a Spexcel Gabba / Perfetto knock off.

I’ve had a Topeak Joe Blow since the late Nineties. It hasn’t missed a beat, thoroughly recommended…

I had a pair of Altura bib longs when I used to commute, they didn’t hold everything in place as well as normal summer lycra ones. Try a light weight pair of under crackers to hold everything in place…?

＋1 for Milton fluid…

Yours for £550…

https://www.gooutdoors.co.uk/calibre-astronut-dirt-jump-bike-p445240

Oof, looks far too much like hard work asbrooks! 😰

I think Paceman wins! 👍

I’d love to go somewhere like that…

Lake shoes are your friend… They do a standard fit, wide fit and extra wide fit, plus sizes down to 36. Just be aware that the different series 1xx, 2xx, 3xx and 4xx have different lasts, some of which are wider than the others. I have CX 237 Wide and MX 237 Endurance Wide and they are the dog dangly bits.

The rear derailleur hanger on my Calibre Dune has issues, so that needs sorted. Then time to look into some mudguards, at least one for the rear. After Xmas, I’ll be purchasing a Surly Moloko bar and some Ergon grips. Then maybe look to switch to hydraulic brakes, or get the old road bike back on it’s wheels…

I’m spending the weekend attempting to remove a sheared bolt from a derailleur hanger and patching the numerous holes in my tyres. Oh deep joy…

Cheers jonwe, given the cost of the enclosure and batteries, I can see the allure of just buying Torchy’s ready made battery pack…

jonwe which of the myriad of Torchy’s cells do you use…? Also, if you find asbrooks mods post, a link would be appreciated…

Lake are the dogs dangly bits, especially if you have feet shaped like a very wide brick. I’ve got CX 237 Wide for the road and MX 237 Endurance Wide for the fat bike. They are the only shoes I’ve ever bought that I don’t get some sort of pain in, as they are actually wide enough.

Shimano are narrower than a Cambridge cycle lane and their wide fit is laughably anything but.

I have also run one of the lights dazzzzbo has mentioned for a number of years. A couple of observations, if I may. The beam pattern is pretty shitty, two circles of light, the outer is really wide and not very bright, the inner is quite a tight spot and plenty bright enough.

On it’s own, I found it adequate for riding on the road, Although the outer circle of light doesn’t have a cut off and even on low power I found it to be quite blinding to oncoming traffic, even with the spot pointing right down.

Off road was another matter, as a single light, it’s not enough. The spot is not wide enough and the wide bit, not bright enough. So I’m always moving it up or down depending on what I’m riding on, which is a pain in the arse. Two of them would be better if you’re heading off on a bridleway or byway. Currently I’m only using the one, so YMMV…

Ditch the supplied battery pack, its utter shit. Mine could hardly last an hour after a few months of use. I bought one these to replace it and it lasts for ages on full power, in comparison (they came in multiple flavours of connector, so if you get one, make sure it’s the right one). I know this doesn’t fit your requirement for AA/AAA batteries, but I think you can get a pack that you can change the batteries in.

Finally, if you cycle through the modes to go from High to Low a lot, you have to pass though Blink and Off, which can be annoying while bumping over rough ground. This light unit is pretty similar, but the light doesn’t go into Off while cycling through the modes, and it meets your replacing batteries requirement.

HTH, HAND, etc…