To Druidh. The cupboard tops are hinged for access to the stowage and padded underneath the dark carpet covering so make good seats for picnicking in less than perfect weather. I made them wide enough to get an inflatable mattress on top. So, yes I am very hapy with the layout. I’ve found that the carpet lining marks quite easily so now I’ve got some old carpet tiles that I use to protect bikes and lining from each other when the bikes are strapped to the side.

Someday I’ll get a window put in the side door.

Carpet lining from Megavanmats.
The lighting is self adhesive LED strips originally intended for kitchen/bathroom use and wired in to the interior light power supply.

My Porsche costs less to service than does my Giant. Car needs a service every two years.

Despite being a relatively high performance car your Porsche has been designed from the outset to meet consumer’s expectations in longevity.
Bikes could be made far more maintenance free than they are with shaft drive, hub gears and enclosed brakes but then how many of us would seriously consider dropping £2-3k on an XC bike that weighed 50 pounds?

If you read the owner’s manuals for most high end forks and shocks you’ll see that they stipulate service intervals of 50 hours riding. Would you consider that a worthwhile trade for losing half the weight of your car?

In terms of servicing requirements, the bikes most of us on here ride have more in common with F1 than any road-going car.

e.g. £22 for a bottom bracket installation

I’d love to be able to get away with that. I usually ask £6 and absorb the extra on the difficult ones that are rusted in place and have to be got out with the angle grinder.

A common one round here is “I’ll be back after I’ve cleared it with the wife”.

where full speed = 8 mph

In addition to learning to grunt your way up hills you’ll learn to spin like a hamster in a wheel. 25mph is perfectly achievable in a sprint.

Sundays are far more do-able for me. Count me in.

I’m sure I could get back over for the day. Someone care to set a date?

I’ve ridden the West Wight quite a bit but how about heading for the East with a mid ride pint at the Culver Haven before (cheekily) whizzing down the cliff path to Yaverland?

Does the Totland Pier cafe still do HUUUUUUGE plates of fish and chips? If so then that’s a good reason to walk there from the Yarmouth ferry.

Plenty of good walking if you just want to chill out ad enjoy the views. Plenty of pubs right on the coast. Osborne House or Carisbrook Castle for the history.

Find some trails with nothing solid on the outside of the bends so crashing will give you minimum pain and will yourself to lay off the brakes. Get used to feeling your wheels starting to drift and learn to be comfortable with that. Learn to look for and aim your wheels at any berms or the outside edge of the trail, anything that will give you extra support mid corner.

Having the will power to lay off the brakes is the hardest bit.

It does very little that 8 and 9 speed didn’t do perfectly well before it but it’s progress so your life won’t be worth living if you don’t buy it.

Couldn’t get on with rigid forks on mine. I’ve been loving it far more since I put a Manitou Minute on the front.

I’ve got a custom Ti frame that I had made by Dean USA six years ago. The geometry is the same as my much loved 1993 vintage Orange Clockwork but adjusted for a 100mm fork. Like the original it’s a demon on tight twisty trails and climbs really well. Seems to work better as a singlespeed than geared though, maybe too much flex when grunting in the big ring?

In case you hadn’t guessed, yes I’m loving it. And it hasn’t cracked.

Rather Robust?

Will the there be a singlespeed version?

Me and the gang have boycotted the Montagu Arms ever since I saw a group asked to leave just because one of them asked why there was no cider available.

The pub on the Lyndhurst-Brockenhurst road is the Crown Stirrup.

Personal faves are the New Forest Inn at Emery Down near Lyndhurst and the Hare and Hounds at Sway. Also maybe try the Jolly Sailor down at Ashlet Creek near Fawley. I’ve no experience of the food beyond plates of chips (which have been very good) but the staff have been very welcoming and you’re on the waterfront with scope for riding or walking afterwards.

Thanks for the ideas folks. There’s a woman locally with a business altering clothes that I may talk to and I’m also now wondering if I can use a toe clip strap in place of the buckle to adapt a helmet.

New one every year for me for ‘aromatic’ reasons. Usually the cheapest that fits and is comfortable so I won’t feel too guilty about binning it 12 months later.

Try it whats the worst that can happen?

Shrapnel from the exploding wheels rips your knackers off.

Loving my 29er now, it covers distance easily and I wouldn’t race on anything else.

BUT

Also loving my 26er for playing in the woods and less serious rides.

NO I DON’T WANT A 27.5er………………

A pleasant hour’s viewing but then so is Top Gear and look how that divides opinions.

I’ve never known any sealant to be any use against snakebite punctures.

If snakebites are that much of a problem then you need to rethink something about your riding. Maybe run bigger, heavier duty tyres at higher pressures or even just pay more attention to your line choice on the trails

Sound like there’s a niche appearing for the smaller companies to exploit.
Microshift’s thumb shifters

are to my eyes truly beautiful and I’m ever more tempted to convert one of my singlespeeds to 1×8 just so I can have one of them sat on top of the handlebar.

scottfitz – Member

32:16 Winter bike
36:17 Summer bike
34:18 Wagon wheel bike
50:18 Commuter bike

Thats alot my wife would kiil me, any non SS?

Err, for the record then there’s a mid range road bike in the shed and a 1×9 full suss ‘holiday bike’ too. I own a bike shop so they’re all demonstrators really.

Two wheeled invalid carriage…………….

I appear to have accumulated a few singlespeeds:

32:16 Winter bike
36:17 Summer bike
34:18 Wagon wheel bike
50:18 Commuter bike

Doesn’t look as fluffy as the silver stuff above.

That actually is Megavanmats carpetting. Wished I’d bought some of their glue remover as well at the time.

I found that using loads of glue to make the carpet damp helped, but was messy.

The carpetting was a bit of a messy job with loads of aerosol carpet glue. A second pair of hands would have been welcome for the large non-door-side panel which I did without removing from the van. The hardest part was getting the (supposedly stretchy) carpet to follow the contours of the rear pillars before the glue dried.

Carpet lining bought online, Chequer-plate looky likey vinyl flooring from B and Q. Loads of storage under the bench seat and room on top for an inflatable mattress. LED strips originally intended for bathroom units. Strapping points now added to secure bikes.

I’ll go road riding with my Ayups occasionally when I haven’t the time to make the cleaning up after a winter MTB ride worth while.

British Heart Foundation are organising a night time London To Brighton this year which sounds interesting.

I took my son skiing three weeks ago, a couple of weeks before the half term break. It was not a case of ‘saving money’ it was the difference between being able to afford it or not being able to afford it. A secondary consideration is that the slopes and lifts were far less crowded than they would have been in the half term week.

I strongly suspect that many areas of the holiday industry, particularly winter sports, wouldn’t have the capacity to accommodate everyone who wanted to go if they were restricted to school holiday time only. Also, the term time weeks would become quieter resulting in employers being unable to justify the staff levels they have now, which would again be to the detriment of service during school holiday times.

Went to Vass with Neilson in 99,00 and 01 and had some of the best holidays ever. Note that Neilson have the sandy end of the beach. As you walk along the bay to the vilage past the other operations it gets much stonier.
Went to Finikounda with Neilson in 02. Slightly bigger operation with dinghy sailing on offer for quiet wind days. The day sail down the coast and back was worth turning up for. Not so much biking as Vass though.

In addition to what I wrote above, the DMR/On-One hubs have very wide set flanges which can cause the spokes to hit the brake caliper on a 29er build with 160mm disc.
Also, the Halo Clickster freewheel gives a faster pick up than a Shimano item and will run 8 speed chains.

If it’s a custom bling build then an SS hub is a must. You’ll hate yourself every time you look at it if you don’t.

In my own experience (and that of few friends):

Chris King, sweet but not that light and will need a strip and lube twice a year.
Hope, designed to take six cogs for trials legality so doesn’t actually look very SS, pawl assembly needs regular cleaning and lube.
On-One/DMR, essentially the same hub, cheap and easy to change bearings.
Surly, uses unnecessarily complicated and expensive bearings.
Superstar/Woodman, essentially the same design and similarly short lived.

I use them occasionally. Never had any problems.

It’s a bit of a long ride to the start of the Red

It’s a far shorter ride to the start of the black and you can join the end of the red from half way round to drop down for a pub lunch before doing the first three quarters of the red and the end of the black.

Glas Fryn now list bike storage on their website.

Glas Fryn[/url]

I’ve stayed at the Glas Fryn B&B in Brechfa a couple of times and found them very friendly and helpful. You can ride to the trails from there too.