following on from my post above…. actually I didn’t fit the new stem, I made him do it!
If you’re gonna ride ’em, you gotta learn how to fix ’em, right?

16″ Mondraker carbon frame – nice & light. Full XT drive train’ mavic/XT wheels from the spares box. Put on a shorter stem since the picture – he’s 11 and it fits him pretty well – he flies round the blue at Swinley with me!

Both good calls – I’ll check.

MoreCashThanDash – Member
Legoman – it is a milestone. But no one has died. Some parents need a little perspective. Or less guilt about whatever it is that is driving their behaviour.

Yeah of course it needs to be kept in perspective but I’m not commenting on ‘some parents’, just my own recent experience: small village school, no prom, no parents meals, just a bunch of like-minded people enjoying seeing their kids say goodbye to somewhere they’ve spent the most important 7 years of their lives.

If that resembles a US teen movie, it must be one I haven’t seen!

WTF is wrong with you lot?
Kids leave school and go to new school. So what? Why aren’t they going the same school as their mates? Is it down to your choices?
Jesus. It gets more like some teen US movie everyday on here.

Way to suck to joy out of a thread about people discussing a milestone in their kid’s lives.
Well done you.

Was last Friday for us. Barely a dry eye in the house.
My lad had been pretty laid back about it all week, then the whole class got up on stage and sang Keane’s Somewhere Only We Know – the gravity of it seemed to hit him halfway through & he was in floods of tears (along with most of the other kids)..

Of all the school plays, assemblies etc we’ve attended over the last 7 years, I wouldn’t have missed this one for the world.

Did get a bit dusty in there, I must admit!

Weintraub has now resigned

Suspended on ‘administrative duties’ according to the Daily Fail (not linking to that rag though, obv)

I’ve got a 2004 Stumpy in my garage (well, more acurately, my wife has).
I’d flog it for a quarter of what you’ve been offered.

£2.5k! Flippin’ Christmas come early is that!

Our 2nd car was written off cat C a few years ago. Bought back from insurance company, never repaired and never had any issues with insurance

stanfree – Member
Giant surely ? , I’ve never heard anyone bad mouth them.

I think they succesfully reversed that with their epic 650b shark jump tbh.

Sorry if I’m being a bit slow (wouldn’t be the first time), but can someone explain the shark jump thing?

Some people gave an annoying knack of being able to repair anything.
If I tried to lash up a stone gate post using a few old tyres and a trailer I know exactly what the outcome would be – not a good-as-new, much admired stone structure, more likely a pile of rubble and a trip to A&E!

I’m totally with you – had a blast round the blue this morning with my lad (who loves it there), returning tomorrow for some quicker blue-red-blue action. Can’t wait.
And I have to drive 45 mins to get there!

Great stuff – love the sound of all the spectators cheering him on. Brilliant!

If I was him I’d be asking the Raleigh guys some pretty searching questions about their brand strategy. I’d want to know exactly how they plan to bring the brand back from the wilderness – what’s the marketing plan for the next 5 years, how much will they be spending to support it.. etc.

They need to spend big bucks to regain some credibility, but it can be done (think along the lines of what VAG did with the Skoda brand).

Try this: http://www.jumpking.co.uk/product-GB.asp?id=1000

Our still looks very presentable after several years (we replaced a torn net last year).

We splashed out about £500 on a decent one 4 years ago.
I was worried the novelty would wear off after 6 months, but they still use it almost daily.

Without doubt the best value thing we’ve ever bought our kids.

The climbing frame, on the other hand,…….

Your own premiums will still go up.

This ^

Even if you make full recovery of your costs, your insurance premium will go up next year as your now a higher risk.
Worth it for a £15 wheel repair? You decide.

After the way volvo uk treated me I haven’t touched a volvo since

This is my main issue with Volvo. I love my XC90 but when it comes up for renewal in March I probably won’t touch another Volvo because of their crap service.

Maybe not such an issue for the OP as I guess you’ll be looking at indies for servicing rather than main dealers on a car this age.
Independant Volvo specialist seem to be a bit thin on the ground though

Story picked up by the Beeb too.
Hope they catch someone and make an example of them
Click me

Bregante – wasabi peas are good, I’ll give you that. But they ain’t peanut butter pretzel nuggets

I think leythervegas is getting a bit of a hard time here.
You’ve only got to look through the classified front page to see how much value we* place on spangly parts.
Not saying everyone agrees spec trumps test ride, but you can’t dismiss the spec sheet as an irrelevance either.

(*we being a generalisation for the majority of the STW populous. Feel free to consider yourself not representative of this)

I’ve mulled over getting one of these too.
Just out of interest, would a third party’s insurance company accept your dashcam footage as proof of their client’s fault? I wondered if they would view it as impartial evidence.

Any experiences?

Where abouts in herts legoman?

Whipersnapper it was Colney Heath, near St Albans.

Drove past the scene today and noticed that there’s actually an unofficial ‘no bikes’ sign attached to the ‘public footpath’ sign (presumably placed there by the landowner). If the old guy hadn’t been so confrontational about it right from the off I would probably have clocked the sign and taken a different route anyway

Cheers for all the advice (even yours Cloudnine!).
I think nuke has the right attitude – it just sticks in the throat a bit when no harm was possibly being done.

Hey ho – bet we had a better morning than he did anyway!

He cannot do anything to stop you unless he is the landowner or their appointed agent.

I think he might be the landowner, I asked him twice but he was a bit mutton & didn’t hear me.

He is a miserable git who gets off on making other people’s experiences less enjoyable.

I think he’ s this too

Glasgowdan – no extra topsoil was what the guy who quoted said (reputable local company)
It will need some leveling work, but I’ve done a lot of the prep myself as was originally planning to seed it.

He reckoned 2 guys would do it in a day, hence I thought the price sounded a bit high

any issues with foot operated handbrake or false warnings from engine sensors?

In 93k miles, foot brake is fine (it’s not electronic, so no reason it would be any worse than a traditional hand operated one). I had an air temp sensor fault which sent the car into limp mode a couple of times – cost about £150 at Volvo main dealer.

Ooh ooh ooh …. I’m so Stravaing my next lawn cut!

sigh…

Problem?

Accidentally stava’d my drive home from Swinley last Saturday.
Mostly M25 hence my overall average speed of 10mph!

Try Kinetic in Welwyn Garden City, they sell Genesis. No idea if they’ll have what you’re looking for it they’re good guys

Looks like he’s taken the video down from the hyperstrada website, which seems like an admission of guilt to me

I did the blue/red loop this morning – the trails are running best I’ve seen them in a long time & it wasn’t stupidly busy (though I was away by 10).
Lots of damage was done over the really wet winter but everything has been well repaired and most of it’s in pretty good nick now.

You’ll gave a blast – enjoy!

Bear – day got off to a nice start – took my lad to Swinley, he’s on the carbon Mondraker I bought off you & loving it.
It didn’t even rain!

Thanks, might swerve Eurovision in favour of Chernobyl Diaries downloaded on the Sky box.

Juniors are tucked up – they’ll never know!!

Just started on the Richmond Swale Ale (not in photo). Very nice it is too.

Went to a friends party last weekend and this guy was there:
https://www.facebook.com/christyemusic

He’s raising funds via crowdsourcing to record his next album.

I’m no music expert, but if you like David Gray, I think you’ll like this guy so give him a listen.

One minor detail – if you have the car serviced at Volvo, you get free Volvo assist which is basically free European recovery.
Mate of mine has used it a couple of times in France and was very complimentary about the service.
Probably not going to influence your decision, but a nice-to-have.

However my Dealer neglected to tell me anything about it until a few months ago so,I’ve be paying £90 a year for cover which I didn’t need!

We’ve got a 2010 D5 (185bhp) Active auto.
Had it from new and done 91k so far.

Great family car, done loads of trips to France, 4 bikes on top and loaded with camping gear. 3rd row of seats are actually good enough to use and you still get a bit of boot space.

Problems so far: 1 wheel bearing under warranty, since warranty expired:1 temperature sensor, 1 rear seatbelt, some creaking from front end which is still unresolved. All pretty minor stuff really although most seems to have happened in the first year out of warranty.

As for fuel consumption – those claiming mid-30s must be driving like Miss Daisy! Lightly loaded, set the cruise to 70 and you’ll get 30-32. My driving is a mix of urban/motorway & the computer average is usually 28/29.

My local dealer is a shambles – not sure if that’s typical though!

We’ll be keeping it as the long term family workhorse & I’ll get something a bit less fuel-hungry. Quite liking the look of the Merc E300 hybrid right now!

Edit: meant to say, I wouldn’t have one with a manual box. Personally I don’t think big heavy 4x4s are suited to manuals. I previously had a Disco 3 manual – always felt like hard work.

Yup – looks promising so far

A few useful tips here diz: Linky

We’re going in May with kids, our itinerary will be:
Eiffel tour (tickets booked in advance, or prepare for long queues)
Lunch cruise
Walk Canal St Martin to Parc de Villette
Visit Citroen and Renault showcase dealerships on Champs Élysées (my son is car mad & they always have something intersting on show)
Visit Place des Vosges

Try googling The Guardian top 10 free things to do in Paris – loads of good tips in the comments below the article.

Have fun!