I have, and have bought several (as gifts) Revolution Air track pumps from Edinburgh Bicycle Coop, when I used to work for them – found the Pro model very durable and pumps road tyres easily. Both models have a universal head, with just a thumblock, Heads are quite chunky mind.

Revolution Air Track Pump Sport -£18
Revolution Air Track Pump Pro -£30

Due to relocating and not being able to take all my kit with me, I now have a Joe Blow Max II. Good for MTB, awful for road (impulse buy – no homework done). I can barely push the handle down above 100psi…

32:16 here in Delaware.

I’m a Hope lover too, although I appreciate that some people can’t abide them.

Minis – 2/3 years use, one bleed, ate pads (on bike when stolen)
Hayes HFX 9’s – <2 years, great when they worked, but pistons wouldn’t retract enough, sometimes pulled to bars with no bite, ate many pads- sold for spares.
Mono M4 – 4/5 years and counting – one bleed, one pad change, front in storage, rear in regular use.
Mono Mini Pro – 2 years and counting, original pads
Also OEM Formula Oros – 1 year use, no pad changing, no maintenance – (bike now in storage)

Find a rhythm and keep plugging away. It sounds silly, but don’t spend too long in the pits. Once stopped it’s hard to keep going. I struggled when I did one fully solo, no support team. When I’ve had the wife in the pits to sort me out, feed me and send me out, I’ve done a lot better.

Don’t try to hang with the faster riders who are in teams.

Eat regularly and frequently, with a mix of food. I used to take cake, chocolate, dried fruit and nuts, filled rolls and hard boiled eggs. Drink enough.

Don’t drink so much energy drink that your stomach can’t handle food… :roll:

Take good, tested and reliable lights. And good, tested, reliable backup lights. If you can afford them, take spare charged batteries to cover all your night laps, relying on the charging stations can be fraught with disappointment.

1) Not sure – never had an inbred frame

2) No, you can fit whatever ratio pleases you or makes most sense for your regular riding, so you can tune it to how fit you are and alter as needed. I’ve found I need more upper body strength to ride all day on the singlespeed as compared to the big bouncy bike.

3) I wouldn’t choose a singespeed if I rode mainly in big hills. It does take more determination to get up steeper inclines, and fast downhills are, as you’d expect, spinny.

4) Not mine :-)

I’ve unscrewed the BB out from the frame and used the BB shell to take the crank off. Obviously, this only works on one side of the BB, AND relies on a well-greased BB.

As you said – it’s a commuter bike. Go fixed and quit whinging!

I’d recommend staying away from White Industry hubs, unless you want to change the bearings almost immediately. I got perhaps 300 miles of dry riding in on mine before the bearings were shot. Thankfully Kael/Katec sorted me out with another set so all was well.

Never been a fan of HR in dry conditions, so it’s Minions for me (2.5″ front up front, 2.35″ front at back)

Giffgaff do a Sim only, non contract deal for £10 per month, 250 mins to any UK number, unlimited UK text and unlimited data, and the ability to change packages month by month. Great if you like/need lots of data, or are an occasional user.

http://giffgaff.com/goodybags

They make those kiddy bikes of deleted uranium, lead alloy, something similar. +20lbs

Is that uranium that no longer exists? Matter and Anti-matter style? :D

I’d know how to do it in Illustrator, but not in Photoshop.

(…ponders…)

I’ve ridden with Chris Hollins and Carol Kirkwood from BBC Breakfast, for Children in Need, betwixt Glasgow and Edinburgh. They were on a tandem and she fell off it.

I tore the fixed cog off of the Langster on the way to the ride start, and had to bodge it onto the freewheel thread…

You can get by without a guide – we have every year we went. The Portes du Soleil map shows the main trails, and the lifts that are open. Having said that, we went off piste exploring a few times and ended up on some dismal trails!

Definitely get a lift pass for the duration of the trip, it allows access to such a huge area, you can cover serious ground with it.

We’ve had good days by taking a car across to Chatel/Super Chatel and Morgins and riding there, rather than spending a few hours lifting and riding to there.

Other advice – take mud tyres. And waterproofs. It’s quite common for it to rain every day for a week, and if you want to do any riding in this case you’ll want the tyres.

Yes you can unlock without going down the jailbreak route.

Didn’t know that – got any more details?

No, I don’t think there is anyway to unlock a non-jailbroken phone. But I’m pretty sure it’s legal these days.

I jailbroke (jailbreaked?) my 3G using Pwnage tools, and I think UltraSn0w. Search for it (iPhone dev team), there’re are too many variables depending on what model, firmware and baseband you are using. There are also other unlock tools available, each for different situations. For me, it was pretty straightforward…

HOWEVER, do read up a lot before you do anything. If it’s a new phone running the latest iOS, then the baseband may be too high for the unlock to work, and jailbreaking it won’t help.

You can restore back to a non-jailbroken iOS by using a custom restore through iTunes. Be very careful about not doing a ‘normal’ restore from iTunes, as this may lead to the baseband problem above. I’d also read up about how to save your SHSH blobs through Cydia; I’ve not used them but I read that it was pretty important to have these.

Hope that helps

I have no personal experience with any of these, but a blog I read has a fair bit on the LX5 which might be useful.

http://manessinger.com/tag/panasonic-dmc-lx5-review

I’m a Specialized kinda person too, but I have narrow feet! How the heck do they manage that? Perhaps having the ratchet strap at the top makes up for extra room in the front… The BG Pro road shoes with the Boa system are all kind of snug. :-)

Disliked my first pair of Shimano shoes, but they also lasted for years, so I disliked them for a long time (I had no money to replace them) Felt heavy and clumpy and my feet swam around in them.

Also love my 5:10s. Specialized are always my first choice though, I know the size that fits me and they just feel good (to me). Never had them squeak though?

EDIT: how could anyone think that that was his own work and it needs referencing to avoid confusion

I didn’t think it was his own work. I knew it wasn’t his work. Thats. The. Point.

Well, you posted it with no reference to where you got it from, under your forum name, so yes, I’d say you did pass it off as your own work.

What would have been so hard about putting;

From today’s New Scientist;

Whatever your opinion of President Barack Obama, it isn’t hard to find someone who disagrees. A recent poll in the US found that Ob…
Then it really would be clear, rather than you just ‘thinking’ that it was.

Because otherwise it’s just plagiarised…?

Perhaps a wee mention of New Scientist would help… :roll:

Awesome! I used to love building those when I worked in the bike workshop. Or more accurately, I used to enjoy test-riding them ;-)

Is it just the picture, or is the saddle pushed quite far forward and nose down?

I think the

thankfully the supermarket is within a walk, and there are weekday local trains to Philly and NYC, and the trails are within a 5 mile road ride.

bit covered that molgrips… :-)

I sold both my cars when I moved to the States. And despite what people say, you can exist in the USA without a car – thankfully the supermarket is within a walk, and there are weekday local trains to Philly and NYC, and the trails are within a 5 mile road ride.

I existed in Edinburgh for many years without a car, used to get the train to Pitlochry area to ride on occasion or ride to Glentress/Inners, or car-shared with others. Tesco delivered the groceries. However, once I got a car, I did a lot more varied riding, and it made getting stuff for the house much easier. Car was generally only used at weekends; I am quite pleased with myself that I continued to commute by bike even in nasty weather

Really? Current models come with high sensitivity GPS chips, which means they rarely lose the signal. What GPS have you tried and how inaccurate do you think it was?

Dunno exactly, I’ve personally never used one (except the iPhone!). But I’m going to guess it was a good one given the rider who had it (he has everything, is better equipped than some bike shops) It was a high end Garmin unit IIRC. I know that whenever we have a group ride on twisty trails (proper twisty, doubling back, see other riders through the undergrowth, trails) the riders who have GPS units log about 10% fewer miles. It’s not about losing signal, its about not being able to distinguish this side of the loop of the trail from that one 5ft away… The only unit that IS that accurate that we use for mapping the trails, is ridiculously expensive, and has to held carefully in order to be that accurate.

GPS systems miss a fair bit of distance, especially on twisty trails. Much better to have a regular computer.

I’ve got a Velo 8. It’s fine for what it is, nice and simple to use, although the cable is on the thin side. It has the pacer arrows you want.

I’ve once had something similar happen; wife ordered some train tickets online, confirmation email to her address listed our postal address but someone else’s journey and card details. On the phone, the customer services couldn’t have been more unhelpful “perhaps you asked someone to order your tickets?”, “you must have given your email address away”. Nothing untoward happened, nothing was charged to my wife’s card.

I put it down to inept session handling by websites. At a guess.

Having said that, after doing a bit of trawling on intertubes (“PC1s are shit!”, “KMCs are shit!”) I’ve ordered me an Izumi… Eco.

Cheers for the recommend. That’s one pimpin’ chain – but probably more £££ than I want to spend/be able to justify to the wife…

Broke my arm at the elbow in a November, full cast from palm to shoulder, but only for a month. It was another 3 months before I could straighten my arm enough to ride a bike. That was the longest break I’ve ever had. Was it awful? Not really, whilst in cast I met the girl…

Did I consider giving up? Hell no, I had just bought a new frame the day I broke it, and spent the time building it up (only to have it stolen after 3 rides)

The Portes du Soleil website do a good pdf one

Map of Portes du Soleil – VTT- Summer 2010 – Quite detailed, zoomable.

You can do a lot of varied riding by sticking to these posted routes, but there are also a lot more off-piste rides for which this map is a bit rubbish.

I have several pairs of casual shorts I bought at work because I had forgotten to bring shorts/trousers along. Ditto t-shirts. And socks, but through the unexpected-downpour-leading-to-sodden-feet events.

I’m in Delaware currently (second smallest state, Mid-Atlantic, just below Pennsylvania)

It’s a small college town, but is a great place. People are friendly, generally slim and healthy, travelled and educated. I end up having a conversation with just about everyone I speak to in the supermarket. There is a lot of employment here, Dupont, Gore, Bank of America. The roads are far friendlier than Edinburgh ever was – I think I’ve had 2 ‘incidents’ in 9 months on the road, a horse trailer came far too close during a long overtake, and someone yelled ‘Asshole’ through a window. I’d get that every day in Edinburgh.

Food is excellent, lots of great seafood – crabs from the Chesapeake Bay etc. Portions are moderate – the only time I’ve been shocked was when ordering a half plate of nachos which were too much for me to eat – and I can eat.

Beer – pretty good. Local brewery in Delaware produces some great bottled beers. Drinking laws are pretty severe here. They’ll ID you if you look under 40, alcohol is only available in the liquor store. You can’t drink outside.

Restricted riding – yes that is a pain in the backside. However, I’m lucky; I have ~100 miles of singletrack in the woods within a 5 mile road ride. Night riding can be done but only with special permission.

What do I miss? Haggis, back bacon, sausages, hills, manual cars, fast twisty roads.

I saw Jon Snow ON a bike. In that there London.

Does that count?

Mr A doesn’t want to leave Mrs A. Mr A loves Mrs A, but is frustrated that he can’t lead a ‘normal’ life with her. Mr A is frustrated that Mrs A refuses to face the problem.

Mrs A has never smoked or done drugs. She walks a few miles every day to work and back, although she admits she should be fitter, and will get fitter ‘once I get better’

is there any reason for this?

Oh for an answer to that question!

P.s Is everyone else’s formatting screwed up? Seems the LI tags don’t play nicely with the rest of the formatting.

Tiger6791 – Member
TandemJeremy – Member
I do most of it – but I work less fewer hours than Mrs TJ

HTH

:P

Edit – you and your sneaky edit :D

That’s fantastic. Next time I have something come out dirty I’ll blame a lack of spatial awareness too.

:lol:

I live on my own daughter.

Is that legal?

All the planning, buying and cooking of food, the dishes, the hoovering, the laundry. I don’t iron.

She, however, brings in all the money, so all’s fair.