Wow! So I’ve come back to this after posting nearly 2 days ago and not one reply, does nobody ride bikes on here anymore? 😯 😉

I ‘think’ you also need to have an emissions sticker on your vehicle now, sure I read this somewhere so worth a Google, as there’s restrictions in some cities.

Other than that we went Dieppe to Pau a few years ago in our campervan and set the Tom Tom to no toll roads and it was fantastic, nice quiet roads through the countryside and we stopped at loads of interesting places and lovely villages, took us 3 days but we weren’t in a rush and it was part of the holiday.

’13” with 1TB drive’ oof, from £499! Bit over my budget if I’ll need to get a new pc as well. My Acer Aspire 1 with 250gb was only about £199 5 years ago, that would run HD gopro videos as well as most of what my pc could do – is there nothing like that available now? I’m going on a big campervan bike trip soon so want to take videos but save them on the way, whats going to be the best way to do that (maybe another thread for that one?)

Il2 1946 is what I’ve got on disc, great game!

Mmm, think a new one might be needed (about time I suppose)

*Another thing – thinking of replacing my notebook, but a quick look at pc world shows anything small 10 to 12in screen, only comes with ssd or emmc memory now, is that right, and it seems very small memory 16/32gb, I’ve got sd cards bigger than that! What gives? No hdd? Only when I’ve gone away before I’ve taken my notebook and when I’ve recorded gopro stuff I’ve transfered it to my notebook to watch and clear the sd card, if I do that now I’ll be filling up that memory in no time?

*it’s been a while since I’ve looked at this sort of stuff 😳

Thanks, I’ll try a disc check, I cleared the browser history and cache too.
If I get a new PC will my old software work on it, I think this is a 32bit and aren’t new pc’s 64bit? I have photoshop, vegas movie studio HD, office 2003, some games like half life, IL2 Sturmovik, old games but I still like to play them now and then. It’ll be an expensive pain if I have to update all my software too?

Laurie Pettit, that name rings a bell!

I’ve been away from the ‘scene’ about 10 years, used to do more when I lived near London as it was easier to get to Santa Pod and all the meets around London and get to the south west. Bug Jam, Big Bang, Run to the Sun, great crazy days!

Friend of mine used to crew for Pete Englezos (Cog Box) with his Fiat so we got a good price on the gearboxes at the time, and he got an engine built by ??somebody?? Clarke (can’t remember first name) who was a drag racer and well known.

Used to be a group of us all with baywindows that would head off and have fun, all moved on now, sold their vans, moved, emigrated. Good times 😉

Hi Rich, I’m in the southeast – Brighton way, so right at the bottom of the UK.

Engine as built by JH Aircooled Engines about 2001 – just google’d them and looks like they might not be around anymore.

That photo was taken about 5 years ago on the way to the south of France (it’s what I had on photobucket), unfortunately the body work has deterioated a bit since then, some bubbling up so needs a bit of tlc, something I don’t have the time or place to do – I’ve looked over the last couple of years for a garage or space to rent so I could sort it out but there’s nothing down this way. £20k would be great, but it could do with some tlc, some new foam and a few minor things to sort out on the interior so maybe £12.5? I need to get some good photos done today and then I’ll put it up on latebays 🙂

Well that’s a bit confusing, photobucket let me put a photo up there, thought it had all gone ‘pay me $400 or you can’t post photos’ ??

It’s a type 1 engine built with a stroker crank, mild cam, can’t remember the bore x stroke but when I was into all this stuff I did a lot of research to get the right bits and pieces for a torquey engine. Gearbox is a 2 lt box as well, stronger than the stock 1600 box and a slightly higher ratio. Anyway, not quite perfect to camp in, we’ll happily camp in it but there’s a few little things that could be easily dealt with such as we never used the sink so it needs a submersible pump and wiring up, little things. I’ll get an ad up on latebays and see how it goes, sad to see it go as I’ve had it 20+ years but we just want something bigger now. Thanks all! 😀

Going to see if photobucket will let me add a photo??

7-10k, ok, thought maybe a bit more, it’s not rotten but could do with a bit of tlc, welding and respray about 8 years ago, the engine is a 2007cc with dellortos and it’s a cog box gearbox, foksy adjustable front beam, remote oil filter, extended sump, original interior, tax exempt, 12month mot. Trying to get onto latebay as I type this, I’m sure I joined before but it’s been a while and can’t remember password and I’m not getting the password reset emails (can’t register as my email already registered) I’ll advertise it on there, at least I’ll get a better idea of price/feedback somewhere like that.

Thanks, all, I’ll look at latebay and car and classic.

It’s hard to work out a price for it, I’ve looked on ebay and they vary a lot, some reasonable some loads of ££s. It’s a 1976 Devon conversion, might be a Moonraker, I’ve had it a long time, engine and gearbox a bit special but nothing radical, great overall condition, loads more I could say but then it would begin to sound like an advert ….. although I don’t think anyone on here would be interested in one of these as most can’t even coordinate 2 thumbs at once let alone set up the points on a dizzy 😉 😆

Mmm, thanks for the replies. As far as I know I don’t have any 3D models or flash stuff, it’s just text and photos so I don’t understand what I’m being asked to change. I’ll leave it and see what happens?

Kind of … work at a school DT department, a lot of kids on study leave or doing exams, other department staff out, I could clean and check the machines and equipment, well I’ve kind of done one piece of equipment then go and have a coffee, then another machine, then it’s lunch, in between I’ve looked at campervans on ebay, read newspapers and run out of things to look at on here. But luckily I’ll be off early on the MTB going home via the SDW 😀 … think it’s time to go and finish the papers with another coffee

“I just put mine on like any other bag”
This. I don’t think the idea is to take the weight off your shoulders completely so you have the straps flap about otherwise you might just as well use a bumbag. I don’t over tighten the hip straps either, I just have it all comfortable and find it fine, it’s more about having the weight lower on your back than high on your shoulders, kind of like a bumbag with shoulder straps?

Did you re-pressurize the boiler?

Not a plumber so just a suggestion … but we had similar after bleeding a radiator, the pressure dropped and the heating and hot water wouldn’t work. A quick goggle said to re-pressurize the boiler so I looked at the manual that came with the boiler and it was easy, a tap thing underneath turn until it’s (the pressure gauge thing) in the green, turn it back off and it’s been fine since.

I think back in the day it was all about being light as we focused more on climbs and getting up the hills, there’s no way I’d be able to ride my old rigid bike like I do my fs bike now, now it’s more about going fast on flat and downhill. I’m still doing my old routes in the same times I did back in the early 90s but that’s probably due to good suspension, brakes etc

Ah, there seems to be a bad one going around at the moment. I know some one whose had it about 7 weeks now, doctor put him on antibiotics and steriods and he’s still hacking away. I’ve had it coming up to 5 weeks now. Makes my hearing a bit funny sometimes too, like I’ve got cups over my ears. Had 3 weeks off work, holiday, we had great weather and I only got out about 3 times on the bike but it made it worse, it’s ok now but just won’t go lingers on and on. Just want rid of it! 👿

I flew to Beijing last year which seemed to take forever and I was going nuts by the end, I find it difficult to sleep on flights, a good airline/seat will probably make more of a difference on a long flight if we do it all in one go.

Only reason to have a day somewhere is to break up the flight, not sure I could stand such a long one in one go. The next question was going to be about arranging a day somewhere – a quick look on skyscanner and some flights have a stop of an hour or so before getting on another flight.

Thanks all. Going from Heathrow to Sydney, ideally want a day stopover but not sure where, Singapore maybe, depends on what comes up in any deals really. Had a quick look on BA and not much change from £2k, looking at early December to end of December which I guess will be an expensive time anyway.

Nice, I’ve got these on my 29er, good fast all rounder, go up very easy tubeless, 4 for the normal rrp price of one! 😀

I think the expert version are a bit heavier with thicker sidewalls – not a bad thing imho

Nice one.

Got some recently from Evans for £25 without liners … didn’t stop me getting some more though 😀

it doesn’t have a screen on the back to see what you are recording whilst holding it

I’m not a 100% on this but can’t you connect the session to your phone via bluetooth and view where it’s pointing with the app?

Anyway, I’ve got a Session too, it’s great, simple to use and once you’ve got a hang of pointing it in the right direction it’s easy to set up. But, I don’t use it much these days so not sure about it being great value, but it is great when I do use it and look back on things.

RNP – just looked on your link to the van, that’s something I was thinking of getting but did I read right that’s £2.5k to insure?! If so how come?

Edit, just read it again and saw the first bit, blimey! What was insurance on something like this before that happened?

Curious … what tape do you people in such a hurry use then? Is it quicker undoing several bits of taped up stuff on a frame or unzipping a bag? Not a racer or in a hurry mostly.

I’m looking around myself at the moment, ebay or autotrader seem to have the most. I’m torn between a VW or larger vehicle, I like some of the home build larger vans on here but want something I can use daily too. You can get VW T4’s in a petrol version, I think they used the Golf GTi engine but won’t get the same mpg as a diesel but they do seem to be cheaper, but diesels seem to be a premium price and reading about some of the costs for repairing diesels scares me – why are diesels so expensive for some parts? I’m also liking the idea of getting a caravelle or tourneo minibus type van and converting myself, but we only need something like a day van rather than full on camper. Caravelles and minibuses seem to looked after a bit better too.

I’m also wondering if diesels will end being penalised as there seems to be a lot of stuff about bad emissions and banning in city centres? Wil the tax go up on these a lot, at the moment it seems diesel are less tax based on co2 emissions?

DT Technician … in a private school! I’ve done this job about 10 years now but in another private school and in a normal state school. I tried teaching, really liked being in the classroom teaching but all the other stuff put me off so I went back to being a technician – that was in the state school. Really poor pay in state schools for all the skills they want. The school I’m in now pays almost double what I was getting before plus I get about 16 weeks off a year paid, nice! But again it’s not great pay for all the skills they need but the holidays keeps me sane.

I get to work on lots of different equipment and help the pupils with their project work. Day to day I can be using the metal lathe, wood lathe, sand casting, pewter casting, running CNC lathes and CNC routers, laser cutting, 3D printing, as well as all the usual hand tool work. I also have to maintain and service all the equipment. So it can be great fun and interesting work. Luckily I can forget about it all when I go home, the school has very high expectations on results so teachers are very stressed, tired and work long hours. I know it’s like that in most schools but here it’s A* all around or your job is at risk.

I enjoy it and can’t imagine going back to full time work 😀

Something I’m interested in too, noted the other link … so when is midge time, we’re thinking of going in August, is any area worse than others? We have 3 or 4 weeks so will and can move around a lot 🙂

Why do you have an aversion to dropping to the smaller chainring when going uphill?

It’s not that, it’s just there’s a few short sharp hills on my rides where the middle ring on the 3x and the large at the back is just right, but I find with the 2x it’s just not quite there and then if I drop to the granny at that point it’s too spinny. Just need to think about the shifting differently on the 2x, after a while if I ever get fitter I’ll probably just get used to it 😉

Mmm, so might be ok with my mech, not sure if it’s long or medium cage but guessing as it came as a 2x setup it’ll be medium. Not looking to go 1x, I need the granny for the long steep climbs I have locally and I need that 36 tooth front (think it’s 36 or 38 can’t check as I’m at work) as I often find on the flat and downhill bits I could do with another gear – on my 3x setups I use all the front chainrings on a typical 20 to 30 mile ride.

Think I might get one and have a play around to see if it’ll work. Thanks all.

Looks great! How are you making the units, are you doing these yourself or having them made to custom sizes, veneered MDF or ply?

Invisiframe – definately worth it. Had it done on my new bike, the bike was expensive so happy to pay to have it done and you have to look hard to see it. Done some of my older bikes myself with helicopter tape trying to shape it a bit, a right faff to do it properly.

Yeah I suppose they are stupidly expensive, I still think of them as a van with a bed and cooker in it and not a luxury 5 series bmw or c class merc.

This was our plan this week as we’re both off work, 3 or 4 days just to try one out but very expensive. We found about 4 places to hire from, only one allowed pets – we have a small border terrier, and worked out about £400 for 4 days, none of the others allowed pets, but they also wanted huge deposits, one was about £2k, all had minimum 4 day hire, anyway we didn’t in the end, so we’ll never know what one of these is like, might just have to do a cheeky test drive of one for sale?

I’ve got one of the Polaris bike pod things, a sort of semi-hard (snigger) case, eva foam I think. It’s been to India, Nepal, Tibet, Austria, Italy, Mongolia and back again and my bike was fine, no problems. Packing it well makes a lot of difference.

Check sizes, different airlines seem to have different weight limits and overall dimension restrictions and seem to change these on a whim.

Thanks, interesting, don’t know if we have cable in area yet, wasn’t when I asked a couple of years ago, will look into it but guess that’ll be more expensive. It was Plusnet I was thinkiong of changing to as Sky is about to go up in price anyway. Router also seems rubbish, we struggle to get a signal 20 to 30 ft away, is that normal too? Doesn’t seem good when I can get signal on my mobile anywhere but struggle with a mains powered device within 20 feet?

Looks a nice usable space in there. Always interested in threads like this, I’ve got an old VW T2 that we find a bit small really and I keep thinking of getting a T5 but it’s just as small and when I see conversions like this I just think get something beigger, but I’d need it for day to day driving too so not sure if I’d like driving a bigger van around all the time … somrthing to ponder on, keep up the good work and updates.

Yes, they did. I have one and it’s great, a good long distance all day bike. Simple single pivot, goes on forever frame, not that light though really. Bombs along nicely, all my fastest times are on this bike – although my new carbon 5010 is close and will probably be as good when the weather’s dryer. 😀

Mmm, you loved the 5010, get one of those then! That’s what I did, 50 next week but luckily I got a carbon 5010 on sale last year for 2800 and 0% finance, life’s short, so get what you want. Especially as your half a century now.

Thanks CraigW, I’ll have a look at that.

I’m after some comedy stuff like I’m sorry I haven’t a clue, the news quiz, etc as well as some music radio shows but they’re not always available as a podcast only streaming, and if I download it via iplayer and don’t around to listening to it before the times up it’s gone. I’ve found some stuff via podcast apps and I can keep that 🙂 but some stuff I just can’t find