I’ve run tubes (fat and skinny) with Stans and Slime (TM), they both work up to a point.

The points being those of T. terrestris that tend to hang on in the tyre and waggle around keeping the hole open (differential movement between tube and tyre). What I’ve also observed is you tend to get leakage between the tyre and tube so the volume of sealant available in the tube reduces faster than in a tubeless setup.

I’m now ghetto tubeless on fat bike and skinny bike. Still get the odd occasion when a monster thorn falls out and needs a plug but significantly better than sealant in tubes.

A lot depends on how independently you want to travel, and how confident you are.

£2000 will get a lot done if you have the time to use local transport and make safari plans through backpacker hostels/lodges. If you are on a tighter schedule then it’s probably worth going with an operator that can build an itinerary around available time, transport and accommodation.

East Africa would work for this – Zanzibar, Serengeti, Kilimanjaro etc., and also (personal bias here) Botswana/Zambia/Zimbabwe/Malawi.

Globalti’s mention of Gaborone can be misleading: the only reason to go there is in transit from Nairobi to Maun or Kasane. If Botswana is an option you’re better to fly to Johannesburg and get a direct flight to Maun, and from there you can fly or bus to Kasane/Vic Falls and meander up through Zambia to Malawi.

Little relevance to mountain bikes, but apparently a Reynolds carbon road rim and tubular tyre give up at 370psi:

If you go down the Concept2 route it’s well worth installing and subscribing to RowPro – a much easier interface for setting up irregular intervals, visualising HR/pace/cadence limits, online racing, training plans and so on. Makes things a bit more interesting.

Further inspiration available in a “workout of the day” email.

(Owner of a Model E/PM4 and about to go over 3,000,000m.)

Edit: probably generates as much noise as a turbo trainer, doesn’t like to be too close to curtains and will slide on a smooth floor

For hardpack gravel with a smattering of dust and sand the default choice in these parts is the Maxxis Crossmark – so much so it seems to be the only tyre kept in stock by the local bike shop.

The dissenters seem to like Kenda Small Blocks.

For number-nerds reading the meter doesn’t give enough detail – unless you’re prepared to sit in front of it all day.

Yes, common-sense will tell you what devices are using the electricity but some of us like graphs! (I guess the nay-sayers also don’t need GPS trackers or HR monitors)

I saw an Efergy[/url] unit partially rebranded by a local supplier of electrical consumables. The additional clips for 3-phase are not available locally though, so I went digging and found OpenEnergyMonitor[/url] – more of a tinkerer’s device though.

Have now spent ~4x what the Efergy costs on Raspberry Pi and emon stuff but will be able to monitor 3-phases, individual air-cons and the water heater (solar with electric element for when the sun don’t shine).

Seems like many UK energy companies give out Efergy and similar devices (e.g. Owl) for free.

Is it a proper water-slide if you sit in a raft with 4 other people? That’s just a waterborne roller coaster. I’d allow a bit of thin foam to avoid /reduce skin-friction.

You can delete the files from the History folder via your PC.

It is also possible to upload courses and things the same way rather than using TrainingCentre, BaseCamp, etc.

Useful resource here[/url].

The Germans make good ones.

I must be a complete <insert derogative> then, because mine has got a belt-drive, hub-gears, ghetto tubeless and lives in a land-locked country in the tropics.

The url for this thread is most telling: the “-4” means there have been 3 previous threads with virtually the same title:
http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/fat-bikes
http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/fat-bikes-2
http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/fat-bikes-3

…and let’s not even go with the longer fat bike thread titles – it’s like being stuck in a revolving door or lurking on Pistonheads’ General Gassing.

I’m with motorman’s closing sentiment and would like to add “leave nothing but tyre-tracks and footprints”:

Are you trolling STW and PH?

Both places have their recurring topics and this is a common one on PH.

I think I’ll just leave this link here – worth a visit to the rest of the website[/url] if you like the technical details of nuclear weapons.

Piedi di formaggio,

42008 and 42009 available as a single item on eBay with international shipping from a seller I’ve used before… that BiN button didn’t stand a chance.

Brakes:
– morning
– in my current location the last measurable rain was in April
– crackers and cheese
– crackers and cheese (outside chance of tuna and mayo on ryvita)
– Ponatshego Honorius Kefaeng Kedikilwe (sneaky edit – missed the word “deputy”)

Thread title typo and tabbed browsing:

No snow, no beaches. I love my 9:Zero:7.

I would have to say that fatbikes look wrong with chains and derailleurs though.

Loose, dry and dusty, you say?

They used to advertise the Stumpjumper M2, stating it used to be aimed at Moscow

I don’t remember that, but do remember this:

Disappointed at the lack of Big Audio Dynamite in this thread.

Why wait?

Bought a contemporary one from JE Models as they did international shipping.

Relatively simple to build and pretty robust (assumes your child has mechanical sympathy – we hide it when cousins are visiting…)

Chose the digital radio and ESC option (had one 20yrs ago with a variable resistor…), I also replaced the plastic bushes with metal bearings from eBay (Hong Kong seller) – runs a bit smoother, so presumably more play-time

Battery is good for 20 minutes or so and is 7.2V Ni-Cad, if memory serves me right. Buy 2 or 3 for extended play.

For anybody interested in the production side of things, here’s a little background on the printing process, also mentioning that they use a different list of names and endearments depending on the end-country.

Since the thread is thoroughly derailed, here’s another Ridgeback:

Also have an interest in this, as my Stan-filled tubes leave the wheels looking like a German-movie actress after some rides.

What size tube did you use for the split tube method? (happily ghettoed on 3 normal bikes, but a normal 24″ tube isn’t wide enough to get over a fat rim)

Gorilla Tape not available here, would duct-tape work?

Edit for OP: I think the low pressure allows more movement between tyre and tube so the point of the thorn keeps wiggling the hole open

What do I win?

Half of my fleet:
– V8 Range Rover;
– 1.0 Micra imported from Singapore with idiot dents from fence posts in the driver’s door/front wing.

9:zero:7 with sliding dropouts and a belt drive? Look over there…

I’m liking mine a lot (apart from having to work out a solution to a thorny problem).

EDIT: but it wasn’t cheap, although you could ditch the hub gear and won’t have to deal with hefty shipping charges.

The joys of the day job keep me far away from the bike, only managed a couple of short rides with wife and kids in the last 2 months so not much to report, except that the village kids love it: had a gang of them running after us for 5km last time out.

Thankfully Easter provided a long weekend at home so I managed to get out for my first proper ride on it: a 20km loop with some nice streambed singletrack (mix of hard ground and soft sand patches).

(Hoping the images work for everybody: Picasa has merged into Google+, but I think I’ve got the sharing set up right now.)

On the spec: it’s exactly as per Fatbikes’ Tusken build kit:
– Medium frame in anodized black (matt finish but doesn’t match the glossy forks
– Nuvinci continuously variable hub gear
– Gates belt-drive (42:28 (1.5 primary ratio) with a 128T belt to suit 456mm BB-Rear Axle, pretty much central in the sliding adjustment with 7/10mm fore/aft adjustment left)
– Dillinger tyres (website now changed to Knards, tubed with ~150ml Stan’s sealant in each)

My thoughts so far:

Frame: for my build (178cm) and riding (dry, dusty, sandy) I think the large frame might have been a better bet as the dropped top-tube for better standover in winter gear is kind of redundant.

Gearing: feels a bit short on the faster bits (spins out at 20-25km/hr), but might order a 46:24 (suits the belt and frame) for a primary ratio of 1.92. Will have to see how it fares in more challenging Kalahari sand. I also rotated the cable-hub interface to point up the seat-stay.

Tyres: running at quite high pressure (haven’t measured it, but maybe 5mm of give under the thumb). Had one wash-out in a fast corner on soft sand but otherwise no problems…

…except for thorns. Got home and de-thorned the front and the Stan’s just flowed out for quite some time, much pumping and spinning later it seems to have stabilised. I’ve left the thorns in the rear tyre, will see how it holds up. Thinking of ordering up a few extra tubes and trying a ghetto tubeless rig. Anybody tried it? Have also read of people using motorbike tubes (heavier, but might offer that fraction of extra protection.

Weighs in at 14kg according to the bathroom scales, tail heavy due to the hub gear.

Thanks for the linky bruneep: will be over there in the hopefully not too distant future.

Pushbikerider: I believe you still have the white stuff… was 20C at 9am here.

Oh, and it’s FUN: more relaxed than my 100mm hard-tail Cube but still a blast.

If you find yourself in a place where pepper spray is allowed, don’t use it on a day without wind when there’s another group of riders a short distance behind you…

The Reg is disappointing on weight conversions.

However, if one assumes “litter” is similar to domestic waste it seems like 700kg/m3 is a reasonable approximation for density and so end up with 150,000 footballs or 0.34 Olympic swimming pools.

sam69: the forum that the New Street Epic Thread lives on is pretty good, and seems to have a wide range of abilities, my impression is that it is less elitist than rmweb and others, although I haven’t lurked on them to the extent I do on NRM.

The parent site of the New Railway Modellers Forum[/url] also has some good tutorial type pages.

A non-computery friend of mine asked the same question and I sent him to Gantt Project.

He replied the next day saying

I tried the Gnatt program. It works

Thanks

I have not tried it myself, so can’t comment (paid up MS Project user).

Another one that looked promising was Vertex24 Excel Gantt Chart Template.

75kg, mid-30s: did a 7:38 in November, prefer longer distances though.

Current “favourite” challenge is 10km: starting at 20spm, increasing 2spm every 2km. Took my best 10km pace in previous 3 months, subtracted 2sec/500m to use as target pace.

Very weather dependent: lots of claggy mud, also depends on what kind of riding you want: not much in the way of waymarked rides though (may have changed in the 13yrs since I left).

Link up Through Whitley/Neston/Rudloe over to Box Woods.

Rudloe round Slaughterford (mudfest) to Biddestone.

Westbury White Horse.

Longleat Estate round Centre Parcs – name of the place escapes me for the moment.

Via Bromham or Sells Green to get up on to Roundway Down, can even go across to Cherhill, Avebury, Ridgeway if you’re up for long distances, or drive to Avebury and there’s a relatively straight forward loop from there along the Ridgeway, Barbury Castle and back across Fyfield Down. Silbury Hill and West Kennet Long Barrow for bonus UFO sightings and prehistoric crypts.

There was always talk of some trails on the hills between Bradford on Avon and Bath, again the name escapes me and I never got round to exploring that area.

Well, too late for Christmas, but here we go:

Quite a lot of material at Quackometer[/url], especially this one with links to BBC reports.

Other views are available.

Read around, go and visit the school, make an informed decision.

Ah, a water birth. Trendy guardian reader NCT types?

Few minutes earlier and it would have been “kitchen entrance of the Royal United Hospital,” apparently.

Place of birth: Bath

magic anti-lock laser

Having seen it done first-hand within the last 12 months I can confirm that holding down the button of a remote control gate/garage door opener within 10m of a Nissan Pathfinder is sufficient to prevent the vehicle remote from locking the doors: always wait for the beep or pull the handle before walking away.

(granted, not a laser but close enough)

ETA: started typing before footflaps posted…

Nice info Shred, are you down there, from there or just horribly (disturbingly) familiar with SA debt recovery arrangements?

I would be expecting the more creative members of the community to “make a plan” as seems rather common.

Payday loans are big business here in BW with lenders charging >15% per month last time I looked. They used to take your ID card, bank card and PIN number as security: last week of the month there would be queues of loan company employees drawing cash from the lendees’ accounts… thankfully this practice has been legislated against.

They’ve recently launched in South Africa.

Would love to see that risk assessment…