Why spend anything on a watch? There are clocks everywhere. Your PC, your TV, your hi-fi, phone, even on your washing machine.. What a waste of time a watch is!

Are you quite sure it’s the brakes? Is it a diesel? My TDCI occasionally judders in engine over run really badly for just a couple of seconds. It feels almost exactly like brake judder, but goes away instantly on de-clutching. Something to do with the engine nmanagement, but I never put my finger on the exact conditions. It’s definitely not reproducible, but’s it’s dependent in some way on temperature, speed etc. It did it fairly often last year, but nowadays it’s become very rare, perhaps once a month.

Have posted a link on Thorn forum for you. – It helps the cause.

Wohoo, I’m in, thanks. bump…

Yes please Rip.
Emailing now.

Rgds

M424’s are cheaper and they work just fine.

It’s funny you should say that BJ, because the same thought occurred to me after a long delicious relief on the way home last night.

a) No
b) Don’t like them, Riding glasses press my temples and behind ears and give me a headache. I have tried several styles and spent ££ a few times, but can’t get on with them, and they all remain in a drawer.
c) Nearly with sticks, yes with dirt. I ride full mudguards though which stops 99.5% of the muck. Adjustable visor on Xen stops the rain and helps with flies. Mostly I put up when flies go in, and I swear a lot when they go in both eyes at the same time.
d) 99.9% without glasses.

Help keep the flies off

I have not used a trailgator, but I was wary of them for most of above reasons. I have loads of use with 6 speed tagalong though. On and off road. Even gnarly rooty descents and climbs are possible if you get the teamwork right. You’d be amazed how much a 6 fit year old can contribute if they have the right gears. I recon we go up hills almost as fast together as I do on my own. The geared tag-alongs are SOO good.

I’d be concerned that on the flat, a trailgator would make it impossible for many kids to pedal and contribute, because they are too low geared and couldn’t keep up at ~ 200RPM. That might lead to some problems and boredom on long rides. My 6 year old daughter gets enormous satisfaction at making a really big contribution to the effort both on the flats an up the hills. Worth remembering.

Also what happens to a trailgator off road if the kiddies front wheel (not very far off the ground) touches down? – What gives? – And is it extra fun if it happens in a corner?

OK, 2 years old.. but you’ll be itching to have one in 18 months!

A tandem geared trailer looks the buisiness. I recon you need one of these:

http://www.sjscycles.co.uk/product.asp?pf_id=16569&src=froogle%5D

If I:
A) Needed to ride the roads a lot, and
B) Lived somewhere with little traffic, no kerb-hops, barriers, chicanes, pedestrian and dog dodging.

..Then I’d definitey ride one! I’m dead envious of low drag set ups.

I recently got the Flymo Woodshark from B&Q. It’s well built. I use it only for firewood logs on a sawhorse. I have never cut down a tree. I got a helmet with metal faceguard and kevlar gloves, but not the kevlar trousers (££).
Get plenty of chainsaw oil.

Read all the stuff you can find and do watch the Youtube videos of chainsaw accidents for some reality checks.

The Flymo Woodshark is scarily easy to use, very smooth and loads of power. Superficially it’s extremely easy to handle, and that’s the worrying thing really. It’ll go through a 12″ log like a hot knife through butter. I keep trying to remember that could be my leg or my face, which helps keep me standing in the right place and treating it with some care.

Lots of fun though.

More generally, do you swerve, slam on the brakes, or stick fast to your line when the real aggressive ones come at you?

I tend to the latter, and they have always dodged so far, bar the odd nip.

I guess for the dog it has an upside, since riding straight ahead regardless means it has a predictable target, to hit or miss according to what it choses.

I believe it’s good. I nearly broke my neck (not on a bike, something a bit more dangerous), three years ago. It helped sort me out. I notice if I stop taking it for a period, – more clicks and aching in the neck.
Take MSM also, – and I’d recommend a daily tablespoon (or quantity that works for you) of of flax oil to go with it.

Healthspan do a vegan version, in case you are concerned about more damage to ecosystems from standard shellfish derived Glucosamine. (Similar price, free delivery and money off coupons knocking about on the web).

Fast cars are dead. R.I.P. It’ll do us all good in the long run. (Carbon emissions hat on).

Solamanda..”I will barely get out of 4th gear, so will use more fuel on roads” – Rubbish.

Actually there is a whole new sport here. It’s MPG. Since I got a ticket, and accepted that driving extremely carefully is the only way to go. There is a whole new challenge. You can discover a completely unexplored layer of frustration to vent off at when someone pushes up your arse, whilst you ignore them and accelerate pitifully slowly from 30MPH in 5th. People cornering too slowly and and anything else which makes you touch the brakes will be sworn at. Draughting lorries on the motorway can raise plenty of adrenaline, and is equally as dangerous as driving at 75MPH on a country road.

Driving slowly needn’t be dull.

Meanwhile, long live fast bikes, ride as hard as you like – and feel smug.

Data won’t always be faster on 3G. It depends on how busy the cell is. Sometimes you will find it better to fix it on 2G.

Battery wise, 3G will be worse, but you should find the newer phones better, and you should still get several days standby. It also depends on how strong the signal is where you live, weak cells use more power from the mobile. But it’s the display backlight which eats most of the the battery if you are browsing and using maps a lot.

re 500Mb, that’s a lot of data for a mobile. Unless you are downloading music and videos stuff you won’t have a problem. If all you do is stuff like maps, assisted GPS, and static web pages, you are unlikely to have a problem. There is a data counter on the “logs” page of the phone so check that out if you have doubts. I browse about in idle moments, Google things, use Google maps and sportstracker sometimes, but never any videos, and only a few photos to Flickr. That’s stacked up 150Mb in two months.

BTW1 you might find the 3G system locks you out if you spend time high up (eg riding up on ridge tops etc). If your phone can see too many 3G cells, the system gets in a mess. I find I sometimes need to re-set the phone (or run 2G) if I’m in placers like that.

BTW2, Asda PAYG does 20p/Mb data rate for anyone who wants to keep off the contracts. – I just got one out for Mrs MC.

Where: Farnham to Farnborough, via Caesars Camp and Long Valley area.
What: Dark blue Thorn Enduro hardtail, Rohloff, Full guards, Lycra.

Oh, and TJ. On the few occasions I go road biking with my family I do a lot of hard downhill braking (trailer bike in tow). Brakes thereafter do feel smoother – like indeed the friction material has worn to a gloss, they also often begin to squeal after these rides which they never normally do, indicating something has altered.

I’m sure pads like this would last me a long time if I could keep this up. (Is this your Adherent stuff?)

It doesn’t last. First rainstorm on Surrey sand, and it’s straight back to grinding pad demolition 🙁

Hi TJ.

Interesting, and I’m sure this may have some validity in clean conditions where most car brakes would work.
Do your articles suggest what happens to “adherant friction” when samples in question are sprayed with wet sand throughout their lifetime?

“Warning Cyclist- I might turn left”.

So they can overtake us and immediately turn left directly in front. Of course when it happened to me, I got knocked off because they had no warning sticker. Doh!

That’s all right now then.

Ho Andyp
“are we talking about the same Ventoux? From Bedoin it varies between 2.7 and 10.8%? ” Yes I think we are.

I was disregarding the shallow bits at the start which are just the warm up really. What struck me most was just how remakably even the whole thing was. In 22KM of riding there was just one flat part which was about 50 Metres long outside a restaurant, before the rocky limestone section at the top. Other than that there were scarce opportunities to go up or down just one gear.

Anotherdeadhereo. – You are clearly in a different league from me!

I was Rohloff actually. After the first 5KM, once the gradient settled to unrelenting UP, I stuck with 19 to 22″ gear all the way. Some roadies hauled past.

If you can pull 39×25 (on 700c? – that’s 45″) up Ventoux, then I take my hat off. You’ve got deeply impressive legs! Good luck 🙂

I did Ventoux last year. Lovely ride up the Bedoin side, I still have the postcard by my desk! If someone tells me it’s the hardest I’d be chuffed, but I think it isn’t! Same gradient all the way on ultra-smooth road, amazing. If you can spin a granny for 2 hours you’ve got it made.

You need to include the parents!

Kids up the road keep asking me to fix their punctures. I’ve done it two or three times. (Yes, and naturally trying to show them how to do themselves).
I keep telling them it’s a job for their Daddy not me! “Our Dad can’t do that…”

Rationel, Nor-Dan, Fakro, Russell, green building store.
That should also get you started.

If it doesn’t hurt, keep it very clean and it shouldn’t much matter for a long time – provided you eat vegetables not sweets.
I had a massive hole in a molar for years after a filling wore out. (Courtesy of a mad dentist when I was 20). There was no problem except the dentine wore down too fast on the biting surface, and the very sharp edges were a nuisance. I had a crown put on only recently, but no decay and never any pain.

So some years ago, I got bounced right out of my (then flat) pedals (ouch) on a downhill, and vowed never to use them again.

OK then you flatties, – So what was I doing wrong? (Gravity too weak?)

SPD’s ever since and never looked back.

Hi TandemJ, So where do you mostly ride?
“I really can’t get to grips with this premature wear some folk have – partly ‘cos its never happened to me and I can find no theory that covers it.”.

The local soil type makes a massive difference. It’s very sandy here, and the spray is a terrible abrasive in the wet. In winter I get less than 250 miles out of SS pads, and that’s through hardly even touching the brakes.

Clay “mud” in lowland areas may be very different with much softer rounded particles.

I had to correct a SS pad the other day after adjusting calipers, and was shocked just how soft they seemed. A normal file took the material off like it was cheese.

Trapped nerve in the neck can do it.

Maxxis Ranchero are a good compromise

A ventilated drying room for gear would be very handy. At our place we have nice showers, but nowhere to leave (and ideally dry) wet and muddy gear. Mine and most other serious cyclists stuff gets draped round the office, across the filing cabinets, hung under desks etc.

Chippers/Choppers were too pretentious for me, but I did have a secondhand girls bike aged about 7.

I was disappointed because it looked girlie (ie no crossbar = no street cred). Believe it or not (Ahem, about 1973), it used to be possible to actually BUY a bike crossbar on it’s own, – specifically for this purpose – and to bolt it on!

It was a pressed steel thing with a inverted u section and boyish graphics on the side. My father fitted it up, and I was soon the prowd owner of a boy’s bike complete with a real crossbar!

The Governments the world over for not policing the price of carbon.

The entire world economy runs the way it does, only because there has been a (so far) effectively limitless supply of cheap polluting energy from fossil fuels. The economy boils down to basic thermodynamics. Put energy in and get goods and services out. This affects every single aspect of our life, the price of consumer goods, food, travel, houses, absolutely everything.

Everything we do has been too cheap because we have paid nothing for the global pollution it’s been causing.

So energy too cheap (ie no effective carbon taxes from our limp Governments) = cheap goods, cheap travel, cheap services, cheap food. = Massive overconsumption = massive runaway demand = global boom and bust.

It will use more battery, you need to experiment with that. It may very between phones though. Leaving the display backlight active (showing the data continuously) whilst it’s going (this is an option) will be the biggest drain though. I find it’s perfectly ok for a ride if the battery is charged beforehand. Problem is without the backlight, many phones have an almost black screen.

As far as data is concerned, the data rate is fairly low so I’d not expect it to run away with your cash too much. I have checked, and the data file sizes mine downloaded whilst live tracking look to be about 20Kb for half an hour ride, so work that out at your GPRS rates. (Plus some for overhead). GPRS rates vary from about £4 per Mb down to 20p (Asda Mobile 🙂

The Sportstracker app which runs on the phone is neat and works very well. My gripe is that the Beta software which runs on the web machine at the observer end is pretty clunky when run on a mobile phone. So you can report your position pretty well to someone sitting at a PC, but if you are mobile yourself, and want to look up the Sportstracker web site using your phone to check on someone else, that is not slick.

GPS in mobile phones is nowadays “network assisted” if you enable that option on your phone. Doing so helps enormously. This enables most of the coarse aquisition code (basically timing data) for GPS to come from the cellular network rather than the GPS satelite. This greatly improves GPS reception, and appears to allow operation in really GPS areas. My N78 will pick up half a dozen satellites even from inside my house, the Garmin strugles to do that.

Take a look at the Google Latitude also. I ran that up the other day and it’s very neat. It gives no logging, but is ultra easy to show people where you are. It definitely was much more heavy on data than the Sportstracker though because it runs in mobile google Maps. So it downloads maps as it runs as well as reporting your position. I think once they are downloaded they get saved so the data usage for that bit should peak out after a few MB, at least for a local area. Nice thing is the “observer” can be mobile as well using another phone.

The number of emails will drive you balmy unless you use Outlook rules to filter them out under “offered”, and dump the thousands of “wanteds” direct to the bin.

Hi Phiiiil,

Couldn’t agree more, it was fun and grippy for the first day, tolerable for the second, then it froze into clods of ice across the whole trail. I’m pleased it’s gone. This morning was 95% clear for me for me. It’s so good being able to (mostly) speed along again.

You’ve got to ask if they were taking unnecessary risks with air experience cadets. Two instructors with two teenage girls? One is left wondering just what they were trying to prove. Why couldn’t they just fly a bit further apart? There has to be some serious investigation of this one.

Hi Whytetrash.

Well I’m going to stick my head above the parapet here. My little girl (now aged 6) has had NO vaccinations at all. I also would like to say I don’t believe this is the forum do discuss the why and wherefore of this sort of choice. It simply can’t be discussed in a few sound bites. We spent many months reading deeply and researching this stuff before coming to this conclusion. I believe it was the right decision.

If you really interested, there are groups about the country who have formed up to support this. Now I’ll be the first to say that the area isn’t run through with quacks and crystal healers. This is unfortunate. Tread carefully to avoid this stuff, and you do find a level of remarkably good science and dedicated study amongst academics who will support these views with solid science to back them up. I am an engineer by profession, and I don’t go into these things without reason.

My little girl has had much of the standard childhood stuff which anyone over thirty will probably have had as a child. We are waiting on the Measles, but have seen off Mumps, Whooping cough, German measles and Chicken pox, none of which were serious enough to warrant a doctors visit.