Thanks for the comments all.

I have a 3GS currently unlocked but stuck on IOS3.1.3 (I think). I’m working on getting it unlocked permanently but this hasn’t happened yet – until it does I cannot upgrade it to IOS4.

Ideally I’d like the earphones to have volume, FF, RW, stop, play & pause. Not fussed about mic capability.

i didn’t realise the stock earphones as pointed out by 3Fish actually functioned as a remote – thought it was just volume! So this might go some way tbh. However if I did go for the Bluetooth remote I could at least choose a decent earphone rather than the Apple tosh (geddit?!)

Turd & Bird aaarrrrgh.

Mr Maker – excellent stuff 🙂 And (youngster Sam &) I quite like Grandpa in my Pocket. Worryingly I’ve developed quite a thing for Jason’s mum too.

Aphex – what was the ebay seller you bought from please? I searched ebay for Visionary Lenses & get 3 results none of which are Oakley lenses…..

Cheers

Egg sarnies IMHO

I’m with 360 (hello fella, you still oop Norf?) we went straight for a cnoc 16 for the same reason – especially with lots of rooty bits around the North Downs at the mo, it’s (slightly) harder for Mascy Jr to flip himself over the bars.

Size is a consideration though – He well outgrew the Rothan & he’s not a short @rse. Our Rothan was one of the 1st without any brake which took a little getting used to before we put the pedals on too. Loving it now though. As he bounced down Summer Lightning on Leith Hill the other day he called out to Mrs Mascy & I ‘Summer Lightning ROCKS’!!

Nuke – there’s loads in Dorking / Westcott as they all fly in to say goodnight to my son most nights 😀

(plus as mentioned they have permission to land at the foot of the N. Downs in the evenings & it fits in between Gatwick / Heathrow civililian traffic)

Ok, so it’s not a Fratello, but it is the right colour!

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It’s VERY orange, although the Fratello is nicer as it’s not one solid colour. If you go for the orange one, for the full glamour look, make sure what you’re wearing doesn’t clash!

This one’s for sale if anyone wants it for £650…. Only selling it because I need to thin down our 13 bikes in the garage.

-1 for DMR singulator
+1 for Rohloff one (although a lot more expensive)

Coppaslip everytime here. No probs in years of use.

On this subject though – and not wishing to hijack the thread – why oh why did Shimano switch to Torx bolts after years of 5mm allen heads? I understand the point above about potentially better purchase etc but it's an odd sized Torx (T30 if I recall?) and no multi tool manufacturer I knew of at the time had a T30 on their tool. If you don't overtighten a 5mm, they're just fine. T25 I could have lived with being the same size as disc bolts, but T30 just pissed me (and I'm sure, plenty of others) off.

(Admittedly, I was doing the Transalp that year & it was just one more tool I didn't want to pack every day!)

Surrey Hills! Buy my place in Westcott! Nice house, we've done everything to it; GCH, glazing, patio, proper secure garage, 2 decent sized beds etc

Housey link here….

A good Chiroprac will sort it out. I jest not.

+1 for the Fishy one (3?)

Apart from the bit about SRAM chains. Never broken one in 15 years of road & mtb (ab)use. I've broken a few Shimano's (HG pin dodginess – bad installation I expect – it was 15+ years ago)

Most recently (May 2010) a Connex one (road bike) on which I broke a side plate in half – right in the middle of the plate, nowhere near the pin, oddly enough.

I'm 6"4 & 83kg so hardly lightweight but would consider myself a smooth rider (!) I'd like to say I've never broken a pedal, but I did the day after the aforementioned Connex chain breaking incident!

In reply to Bedds though – crashing, it's part of cycling. You can minimise it by preventative maintenance, becoming more skilled etc, but face it, it'll happen to us all sooner or later when fate deals her (his?) hand.

I have an ali Fort winter bike which has been fairly extensively upgraded over the years with my old 9s Dura ace sti's, Mavic Aksiums etc.

I love it because it keeps me dry (proper full length mudguards), but it's still horrible to ride in comparison to my race bike!

Yours looks lovely though 😀

As Charlie said. If it fits your bikes, life is sweet. If it doesn't, when you do a sharp turn, it pitches the kid's bike the other way (to the outside of the corner, which is totally counter intuitive.

+1 from me. Dan's always really freindly & gives quality service whenever I've been in.

Is this what was the Karrimor Enduro 6 a few years ago? A clubmate & I came 2nd to Barry Clarke & one of his team mates back in the day @ Trentham Gardens!

Tips? Ride fast, take risks 😉

Good luck. Lovely weekend for it.

If you fancy Dorking – we're selling our place in Westcott (adjacent to Dorking) – right at the foot of Leith Hill.

Linky here….

Moving to Abingdon for a course Mrs Mascy is embarking upon so expect me to ask the same question of that area shortly!

TandemJeremy – can you? Where's that then?

Similar dodgy neighbour issue here.

We have the misfortune of having a smallish shared courtyard area out the back of the house which is used for garage access on the far side. Apparently in the deeds for all 4 houses who share this courtyard it states this access should be unfettered.

We have a 16 x 6 ft 'garden' (the smallest of the 4 houses) and the courtyard is considerably bigger than this, so we made use of it as it's private.

Our neighbours, who are recently retired & thus spend lots more time at home have realised over the summer what a jolly nice time Mrs Mascy & our 4year old son have in this courtyard. Games, practicing riding his bike, outrageous & noisy things like laughing etc.

They've taken a dislike to this practice, despite very rarely ever using the courtyard for anything at all, and after a disappointing meeting where they told me they didn't want games to be played there they've mounted a couple of red signs on the wall of the courtyard saying children are not permitted to play in this area.

Nothing in my deeds about that, although we are now trying to move so I'm keen not to rock the boat right now. They **might** be getting them back after we move in pieces though.

If you have a choice, I wouldn't bother with suspension on a bike in this price bracket TBH. Heavier & probably won't work after a few weeks anyway – if they ever do.

Save the extra you need to get an Islabike, properly scaled bikes with proper equipment which works for kids.

Ah – but they were 6R4 metro's (or whatever that mentalist metro was called) were they not?

BigRich – ha! I had a neighbour like the one you describe. Loved the film but wasn't really bothered about next-door neighbour's Luke / Darth with the extending light sabre arm which I'd just broken (sorry Paul Sims wherever you are now!)

I had BigTrak (with trailer), I had a Starbird (no control centre), I had Scalextric and a Hornby; God I was spoilt. The lesson it's taught me now as a dad is that I shouldn't just go & buy spangly stuff all the time for my son as he should strive (quite hard!) to achieve something & then be rewarded for his efforts. It's all too easy to just stick another bit of Gucciness on the credit card & worry about it later.

There's a lesson in there for us bikers too I'm sure…!

I have a 125mm Syncros quill if you want it – old-school style. Your's for £15 posted if you want it?

Hope used to do a funky convertor too, no doubt someone will be along shortly if they're still available….

Coffeeking – is that your GT4 in the garage perchance?

bonesetter – serious question; you love tight & teccie, but do you actually prefer a 29'er for that then?

I know I don't; mainly because over the flick left, flick right stuff I'm way quicker on 26".

I not like; I love twisty singletrack, and the size of 29'er I need due to my 6ft 4 height means I need to pre-empt a tight bit about an hour before I hit the corner. And even then it's like turning the QE2.

However, over general mtb trails, even to reasonably-teccie Gorrick racecourses, I reckon the answer to your question is yes.

Kevin Costner, Jack Nicholson & Don Johnson.

(although I lived in Aspen for a bit!)

Ok – so here's an idea re the bombhole chicken runs; why not make them much longer than the bombholes themselves? Surely we want to reward the plucky?

FWIW – I thought the generator users were off the mark. There was a guy who looked as if he'd fired one up specifically to boil his electric kettle!!! FFS!

Yet another vote for a Condor "Accacio" (Italian for Steel!)

If you want a 58 in orange, I might sell you mine if you wish – my garage is fit to bursting at the mo!

They're good.

Although if you ride in winter that much why aren't you using hydraulic discs & a singlespeed?!

Hi Samuri – nope – the subdomain des not resolve externally. Ta

Hi Spawn – thanks for the tip – however – I've not changed the domain for which email is collected from though – effectively deleted the website & associated email accounts from one ISP's hosting & uploaded their site / recreated email accounts on the SAME ISP's hosting – no dns record amendments required.

Full fat email works fine, it's just the OWA webpage which doesn't resolve externally.

Well there's a surprise. The Grays Inn Road Evans utterly shagged my 'dale F2000 Lefty when it was returned for recall work. Was never the same after 🙁

i think they’re stalking me on this forum as they just replied!

£22.50 lloks like it’ll cover it with return postage! result!

Cheers

Not yet they’re not. I called, their automated systems said email. I emailed – they’ve not responed yet & that was 2 days ago.

Conti Ultra Gatorskin 700x23c for me @ 120psi, me being 84kg & riding on potholed & muchos gravelly roads thanks to the recent rain.

Honestly wouldn’t recommend the Conti GP4000’s at this time of year (for puncture-proofing) – even 4 Season efforts – although they do stick well when it’s dry.

I do about 7000km a year & usually get about 2-3 commuting flats / yr which I reckon is about as good as it gets on the (sometimes awful) condition of the roads.