Unless you go to fort William and inhospitable cycling holidays then orange 5 is dull

International Richard think you have hit it on the head

Nah, I reckon he slipped and skelped his thumb good and hard with that comment. Theres far more gnarlier places in Scotland than fort flippin william!

Putting aside how good a product should be in use or how intelligent the designer might be.. before you splash the cash you HAVE to put yourself in the customers shoes for a moment before going to town on the development of whatever you plan on making and ask yourself about the RRP,the packaging,the function and the look of the product amongst a heap of other things I have failed to add.

First thing’s first.. you ask yourself if you would pay retail for a front mudguard that’s supposedly one of the best out there at £59.

I sit here typing this and feel confused as I try and picture the folk behind it honestly saying they would have no problem spending fifty nine pounds on this product.Even if they did.. did they all agree that people would happily spend this sort of money considering the prices of crud guards and everything else on the market? Did one of them convince the others? I can’t help but see this as something that has snowballed into a product that has ended up costing a hell of a lot more than they predicted.

The ZX9R for me is the epitomy of dull… it’s just a terrible terrible bike.

Was out on one of my R1’s last weekend and a mate wanted to try the R1 out, (he has now sold the 9R and bought an R1 BTW).

The tank on the 9r was VAST… like… well… enormous !!!, handling was average… performance.. OK… but it looked it’s age a lot more than the R1 and really felt it’s age.

I rode 2 R1’s of similar age one day from 2 different dealers up here and although I liked the look of them more than the zx9 I just couldn’t get past the gear shift feel compared to the 9. They must have been a bit thrashed as I would guess both would be just as slick as each other when in good condition. Maybe I’m wrong. The more head down position of the R1 left me aching before I got the bike out of Elgin. The handling felt sweet right enough.. like something between the zx9 and my cbr125 but that wasn’t going to be the deal breaker.
The nail in the coffin was the smooth power delivery of the zx9 from slow speeds through the gears compared to both R1’s. The R1 was screaming,lively,wanting to be revved to get the same oomph out of it and the 9 just seemed to get to where it was wanting to get to.. quick,smooth,composed,no fuss. Something that neither of the R1’s felt like they had.They both had at least 10k on them over my zx9. I admit that they weren’t the freshest of examples and on paper/everywhere you look the R1 seems to have the edge over any zx9 so I’ll still keep it in the back of my mind that I need to try another example at some point. In the meantime, I’m no spring chicken and quite enjoy the more comfortable position of the 9!

Nobody mentioned a Ducati because its not a ‘triple from britains finest’ as pointed out by someone earlier.. that somehow managed to see straight through the OP’s original shortlist of 2 kawasaki’s an Aprillia and a Triumph ;O)

I kind of agree with the principle, but not the actual result… TBH the 955 was aimed directly at the soulless inline 4 market, it doesn’t really do anything all that different to the japanese alternatives, other than being a bit bigger, a bit heavier, and a bit slower.

That sounds like a fairly good reason for me to steer clear then! Oh I forgot, I can’t steer.. I own a zx9 lol.

Back to the OP. Like mentioned above, I reckon the zx9 would fit well. Its a bit long for me (bar height fine,but just a bit stretched) and I’m 5′ 8″. It gets uncomfortable at slower speeds/around town but I find it fine once out on the open roads. Not sure if that makes sense. Possibly to do with the weight being taken off the arms a bit once around 59mph ;o)

It’s a bit more mid school so I can’t see it as a sought after item. You never know,though. Some folk like collecting stuff and they might be after one for their collection. The next question is how much it would be worth in great condition. I would guess around £30-40 bare frame at a push but maybe someone will be along soon to put me right.

No,2nd shelf in fridge.

This was my first ride of the year. A loop around Loch Ness.
ZX9R E1. 20,000 miles (around 28k total) and only the horn has just failed in my ownership. The pic was taken at Glendoe,not Glencoe.[/url]
Kawasaki glencoe rear view scenery 1 10 3 12[/url] by martinxyz[/url], on Flickr

Yes it should work fine. Like pinder has an etype changed to direct.. I have this on my zesty. For some reason I found the set up and range of gears easily adjusted. I have also used the 9 and 10 speed combo front and rear with 9 & 10 speed chains! No excessive plate rubbing issues in crazy gears,not even in usable gears. You would expect things to be a bit poor but nothing at all has shown up. It’s not what I would fit on a customers bike but being my own.. it wasn’t a problem so I gave it a go.

and it’s now 7 inches higher than the hub.

The above pic reminds me of trying to keep my Cannondale beast of the east looking like new. I used to dip a cloth in petrol and rub hell out of the skinwalls to get them looking like new.

Petrol!

It’s a bit like breaking the speed limit and driving like a prat.. all without a roll cage installed! Such a dangerous thing to do.
So so dangerous..

Controlling the temp can be a bit of a pain. Or maybe it’s just the old iron i used to use. Be careful on a new board!

..I also appear to be riding things faster than I thought I did.

One of the reasons why I don’t want to spend all that money making myself look faster than I really am. It would make my slow riding look good but it’s not really what I’m into.

Roll on the production of the Gopro with a lens that shows it like it is.

Well I have better things to do with my time than write or phone up the people that make these things to moan about how long they last. To solve (or at least make things last a little longer) I don’t mind smearing in a bit of grease either side of a bb unit. It takes about 1 minute.

It’s crap having to do extra stuff to new parts,yes.. but If it can help in any way then I don’t grudge that minute.

I have a pair of 650 ss wheels listed for sale at the moment. Search back to last week :O)

I slapped grease into my bb when I got my zesty,refitted the chainset and its still fine after 10 months. It gets 5 hours use on just about every weekend and a minimum of 2 night rides a week lasting around 1 hour to 2.5 hours.

Like the ht2 bb on one of my other bikes that is still going after 6 year or so of use.. it looks like if I keep the hose away from it and keep packing it with grease then it should last for a few more years. The folk that destroy bearings are usually the ones that think they are going easy with the hose and bike cleaning chemicals.. when they aren’t at all.

squarewheels show quite a few Cube 29er’s on the site. Sizes can be found of each model if you scroll down the page and click on frame size option. If it’s in stock it’ll show what’s actually in stock.. not a ‘we can get it for you’ option.

Leftfield – Leftism

Dj Shadow – endtroducing (Best electronic album is not going to be awarded to brainfreeze!)

Opiou – Slurp and Giggle

Opiou – Slurp and Giggle

and maybe Opiou – Slurp and Giggle. Buy it,plug yer lugbuds in and try it out on the bike. He’s going to be famous soon,you know.

^nice.

Personally I wouldn’t go near stans rims with metal levers.

I do the really hot water over the mug thing too. I also get paranoid about a wee spoon draining the heat away from it so I never leave it in there ;O)

Sad,useless facts that probably don’t make one bit of difference.. but I do it anyway.

Anyway, in the interests of science, just made myself another cup of tea. Less than 2 minutes from pouring boiling hot water into the cup, I’m able to swig fair mouthfuls of tea

You need some super-slim built Royal Albert! I can drink tea from a cup 15 mins later and burn ma tongue. Well,not quite but a lot longer than 2 mins!

I do the really hot water over the mug thing too. I also get paranoid about a wee spoon draining the heat away from it so I never leave it in there ;O)

Sad,useless facts that probably don’t make one bit of difference.. but I do it anyway.

That’s just another example of how certain camera’s and type of lens can make people look like they are riding faster than any world cup downhill racer since the sport began!

On a shimano xt wheel the carcass measures 55mm.

As above,you can buy the shim for around 7 quid. They fit in nicely,and they have a nice lip on the top that you can pinch when pulling the post out to keep it in place without it budging. I swap over my dropper post with the other bike quite often and the shim isn’t a problem. I would never buy a dropper post in 31.6,it would always be 30.9 to make it more swappable between my bikes. If i had a carbon frame on the other hand.. I would be fitting the correct size post in there.

Matt Baker does my head in too. I now turn the tv off or switch channels whenever I hear him.

Keep at it. It will eventually come good. Maybe try the bleed without all the lever pumping. It sounds like you might be getting closer to something along the lines of a milkshake.. instead of an air free system. I sometimes pull the lever very slowly about 5-10mm once I see the fluid appearing but I don’t continue doing it. Shimano are some of the easiest brakes to bleed and set-up so you should get there fairly quick.

Not chuggin’ enough!

The thing is,you pay for something else with xtr that nobody,until now,knows about. They have built in hormone sensors behind the pistons and they refuse to bleed if they sense excessive testosterone. Good luck!

You could go for a Mr Bathing Ape tweed jacket (currently in the sale if you look around) and maybe have enough change for a pair of ill fitting wrangler jeans to go with it ;O)

do you ever get them replying on the forum?

Yes.

Clean it up around the top,drip a drop of oil in at the edge of where the shaft rotates/passes the stationary part of the cartridge (I have used rock and roll cable magic on a few and it seems to help )Put cap on by hand and rotate it half a dozen times and also give it a wee rock back and forth to let the oil get around the edge of it.

Re-assemble it all and instead of tightening the cable as tight as you can by pulling it by hand,set it so that when you hit the lever on the bars.. the amount of cable pull will NOT pull it the full amount of it’s rotation. Just let it rotate it ever so slightly less than full rotation when in locked out position. You will find that one that functions well will work properly even with it not fully rotating. You might sort it without having to send it off for repair/warranty by doing this. Worth a shot!

The cable tension setup seems to be more worthwhile for me in the past over the actual cleaning and lubing of it.

I have a pair.

Awaiting payment in the basket! Looking forward to trying them out.

In the Fisher catalogue I think it shows them priced as 4 and also 100.

Nihilarianism

supercalifragilisticexpialidocious

No,not alone. I ride about 2 mins on fairly busy road to get onto a singletrack road climb to get to my nearest off-road trails. It’s never been bad for traffic but recently (past year or so) I have noticed that within those few minutes of riding,something more often than not happens.

To start with I have a set of traffic lights 10 seconds into the ride. Followed by a couple of islands in the middle of the road. Then 30 seconds up the road is an average sized roundabout.

In this short distance over the past week I have left the house and had cars trying to pass me or getting frustrated behind me when passing the islands.One of them burnt past in between the islands instead of waiting a few extra seconds. Then on another evening I was approaching the roundabout in the left lane to take the 2nd exit when a car drove past me about 50ft from the roundabout..only to pull in front of me and put the brakes on for cars already on the roundabout. This is the same 2 min ride I might have posted about a month or so ago when I was riding past the central islands and pissed off some old lady that couldn’t drive past me. When she finally got past (all 10 extra seconds) she aggressively pointed her index finger towards the kerb as she drove off into the distance. Cheeky old bag!

Today? Today I left the house and headed in the town direction. I approached a junction that takes me onto the said road and a car was coming from the town direction. He was indicating left. I nearly pulled out but going by his speed and eye contact, he forgot to cancel his indicator. Argh! So that would have been a right mess if I made the wrong? decision this afternoon.

For my fuji camera I havent bothered downloading or running fuji finepix software. I just plug it in and open up the files. You shouldn’t have to go to the Canon site to get a download to view the files.

Nice wee clip of Mark Gonzales. I have a picture of him standing on a grassy hillock about 20ft from my mother. Both of them on a hill with nobody else around,its mad! It was taken at Livi.

edit: you would have to know what the deal was with Gonz in the 80’s and early 90’s to appreciate it I suppose. :O/

I have an old Bell polystyrene with no outer shell (as standard) in white.

Also kept my orange and blue Giro Exodus.