So did this thread get resurrected by a spammer who’s post was swiftly deleted? I’m sure there was a post above Stoner’s last time I checked…

Ouch. Now you’be made my brain hurt too… :-(

there’s not much a PC/laptop will do better than a Mac

Accept viruses?

Cos I had one at my last job and got used to using one for doing design stuff on them, I find it really easy to swap between lots of programs open at the same time.

And I like writing applescripts to make my life easier.

And I like apple stuff. :-/

the penny farthing

Time Atac on the MTB SS, DMR V12s on the big bike, and SPD-SL on the fixed road and the racing bike. Didn’t like the way the foot rolled around on the pedal when I ran Atacs on the road bikes, so went first with Time RXE pedals, which were poo, and then SPD-SLs which are great.

Stiff MTB shoes, 5tens and Stiff Roadie shoes respectively. And oddly, I’m quite happy to wander around all day in SPD and SPD-SL shoes…

Ok, here’s a related question. I’m needing to replace my wheel bearings too. (White Industries ENO standard bearings have developed play in less than 3 months of dry weather riding, but that’s another matter…)

What’s best for wheel bearings in terms of clearances? Some bearing site was spraffling on about C3 clearances and whatever, being good for wheels. I had thought higher clearances were of use when the inner wasn’t 100% aligned with the outer – swingarms for example, possibly out of alignment…

her lips. Suddenly

necklace from her

What he said ^ ^ ^

You can take the cassette off to remove it easily, or just smash it up and tear it out. Carefully.

Yep – cheap Guizzo flat carbons which were lighter than EC90s

What could possibly go wrong?

and…

Any good?

That’s true – I hadn’t thought about that…

Thinking about resolution purely, for decent print quality it’s wise to stick to 300dpi, maybe 240. We used to aim for 300 for our print work, and accepted a minimum of 240 if we had to

10MP = about 3648px wide x 2736px high (assuming ‘normal’ aspect ratios)

3648px /300dpi =12.16″
2736px /300dpi = 9.12″

3648px /240dpi = 15.2″
2736px /240dpi = 11.4″

So, 12 x 9″ would be fine, 15 x 11″ would be about passable, anything larger than that may end up looking jagged. Of course, careful use of Photoshop or similar can give you a tiny bit more leeway.

Edit: Are you talking to yourself up there?

its a teatowel, a rather greasy mucky one haha.

Looks like one of those 19p Ikea ones that I bought a bunch of for bike cleaning.

Great job on the wheel – it’s so satisfying building wheels. I still make a mess of them and have to undo and start again on occasion, but once built they’re perfect.

You can put them back in the frame/fork and by sticking a pen or similar to the frame/fork use that to true them. Not as easy as in a stand, but it does work.

I go for windproof unpadded bib longs over padded bib shorts or if really cold, padded 3/4 roubaix bib knicks. Sealskinz Mid Thermals sleeve underneath the foot loops on the bib longs, and Endura neoprene overshoes over the top. An extra pair of socks inside the Sealskinz if required. Oh, and Juice Lubes Fork Juice sprayed onto the overshoes did a wonderful job of keeping them waterproof.

Mudguards on the road bike make a lot of difference – the spray from the front wheel used to fire straight onto my shins. Worst was icy slush from melting snow.

An all DH commute one way sounds icy painful. I used to start with a mile downhill and was almost in tears from the cold before I could get warmed up.

I use a lightweight folding stand, but have to rest the front wheel on the ground to keep a big bike (37lbs) from toppling over. Worked with a Kestrel in the bike shop I used to work for and they were great. All bolted to the floor, and steady enough to do bottom brackets – so that would be a great option IFF I had a permanent area to set up as a workshop. I doubt that any practical weighted flat base would be heavy enough to stabilise said big bike.

Having space for a tray to hold bearings/bits and bobs/tools is great – but inevitably they just accumulate junk.

Yep. IIRC the way it works is that gear inches are the equivalent diameter to a penny farthing with the same gear – the bigger the wheel, the higher the gear.

Also, multiply the gear inches by Pi to get the distance travelled for one turn of the pedals.

Thanks both!

Edit – all 3

Nope, I skipped the gear inches. Gear inches here would be 26*0.75 = 19.5″

Those are just equivalent ratios.

24/32 = 0.75 ~= 22/29

Never moved mine once!

Replace it with a bolted one then. :-)

My 2p – comfiest seats I’ve ever had the pleasure of sticking my bum on have been in 3 different Audis.

Only 2.5 seconds here, but that was enough for what I was after.

1. Does anyone volunteer and, if so, doing what?

I build and maintain bike trails in the local State Parks in Maryland and Delaware, USA.

2. Commitment – how regularly? This could be the stumbling block for me.

I volunteer on an ad hoc basis, no regular hours. Some weeks I do about 15 hours, other weeks almost none. Sometimes there is an organised event, other times there are just 1 or 2 folks going out, and sometimes I go out and do stuff on my own.

3. Did you want to use your specific skills or was it by chance that something appealed?

I’m not using any of my specific skills – it’s just something that was kinda cool and got me out of the house

4. Has this helped you, ie in your development as a person, and in what way?

I dunno, but I’m meeting a lot of great people, learning new trails, keeping myself busy, and putting back into the trail system.

xiphon – Member
That orange Sintesi was mine! Went through several builds, before it was retired.

Sorry! I just googled for a picture, couldn’t find a green and lime one quickly, so chose one off of the first page of google images.

CharlieMungus – Member
Really? the Sintesi is languishing for the lack of a hanger?? How complex is it?

I’m sure any number of the Mech Eng in here could get it made up for you in a workshop. If not, try the local uni.

I gave the 2 snapped bits to a contact at a uni engineering dept. who hung onto it, promising to do something about it, and then promptly lost the bit. IIRC it had extra flanges and lips on it, which would have made it a tricky piece to get made. It was also needing a shock service, and the linkages were getting tired. Coupled with a good deal on a 2nd hand Giant AC frame put paid to reviving it.

Friend of mine got a Sintesi Bazooka in ’98 (Lime green and blue – same design as this one)

He used it as a DH bike for a few years, ran it into the ground as an XC bike to get fit. (6″ travel both ends – stupid amounts of travel in 2001)
It got stolen, recovered 6 months later, he gave it to me, I used it as an XC machine.

It died when the last remaining gear hanger snapped in two – I tried every distributor in the world trying to get a hanger; getting a custom one made was stupid money as it was pretty complex. The frame now lives in his bike shed as a memento.

Not really – just ‘The Tarmac’, ‘The Genesis’, ‘The Langster’ and ‘The Bionicon’, or respectively ‘The Road Bike’, ‘The Singlespeed’, ‘The Fixie’ and ‘The Big Bike’.

Cars have been ‘Lance’ cos it had a lot of power in a lightweight body and ‘the Polio’ because it was crippled.

I’ve used TF 3 times. Had poor service from them once, which I attributed to sloppy communication. 3rd time they went above and beyond the levels of good service, which pleased me immensely.

You should be able to tell them what you want the shock to be like and they’ll sort it for you.

Rockdodger – that looks like the squarer Bulb spider…

Is it the ‘spiky toothed’ one rather than the ‘squared off’ tooth one?

Not that this is going to help you, but I struggled to find one a few years ago. Someone from here had one in a spares box and posted it to me.

Try ebay or the WTD classifieds?

Is worth it for me as I signed up for Premium in the UK before leaving, so I now have access across the pond.

The offline playlist feature on the iPhone is very useful as well – I use that instead of the ipod these days. It’s handier for me as I HATE iTunes and I can change the music on the phone without plugging it into the computer.

so i can listen to a lot more songs on my iphone offline as it only has 16gb

But when you make a playlist available offline, it does store it on your phone – maybe it uses less storage space than an ipod, but I wouldn’t have thought by much.

There’s plenty of variety and difficulty levels. I’d gamble and say most do not have >2′ drops nor gap jumps. (I haven’t been for about 6 months though…)

There are lots of older trails, no longer signposted, which are more mellow, with no significant drops. Marked trails like Make or Brake are pretty DH beginner friendly – none of the jumps are obligatory. What normally gets me at Inners is the steepness; quite a few trails have some tricky steep bits. I normally mince down them :)

Wet Screams will certainly tear up a soft trail if you’re not careful, the knobs are quite tall.

If the trail is hard and smooth, the sparse knobbed tyres can squirm a bit more, which can feel like worse grip

Massively ambitious I think! That sounds like a road ratio*.

FWIW I run 32:16 on a 26″, accepted wisdom is 2 teeth larger cog on a 29er, so equiv. to 32:18. If in the Peaks, perhaps still too hard so maybe 32:20 could be good.

(*…of course, I’m assuming you ARE meaning for MTB use)

I was never mentally determined enough to work on my own. I tended to stop, rest too long, spend a while eating, rest again. When I had my then GF helping me, it worked a lot better. Someone to hand me food and refill a bottle helped me no end. Also, taking a whole mix of foods helped me too, eating the same thing every lap or two really made me not want to eat.

There again, I tend to ride faster than is advisable, and rest longer – end up doing the same number of laps as some people who ride slower with less stoppage. Of course, if I could ride fast AND with fewer, shorter stops….

another +1 for kuler

Also, a few more via http://www.noupe.com/tools/40-useful-online-generators.html although I’ve not used them

Great video.

Was in Freiburg a few years ago for a tour through the Black Forest – lovely area. Didn’t get to go biking – wish I had!