What frameset is it? Looks great!

I have a lathe. Happy to tinker if you supply materials. Send me a message.

edit. too slow!

£75 here. Feel like I’m long overdue the £1m. It would really come in handy.

Slight aside, but has anyone else overcome massive difficulty in getting their laptop (or Applle TV?) to connect to the turbo and HRM? I have a Wahoo Kickr Core and Garmin dual hrm. Laptop is aa ~2015 Dell i7 with what was a reasonable spec for the time.

I have an ANT+ dongle on a usb extension cable, but both that and bluetooth are incredibly unreliable and will drop so much it’s basically unusable. Any thoughts as to whether a newer machine is likely to help?

These have served me well and offer pretty good weight:cost. Mine have Novatec hubs so no worries about spares being available.

What do you mean by not-too-expensive? Sounds perfect for laser cutting from stainless steel plate. Most places have a minimum order charge of £70 (or more), but the part value will probably be less than £10 – if you can find someone with an account or able to tag on to a bigger job?

Tell me your small desk fan is good enough when it’s 25 degrees in summer

Ah – no, I only Zwift in the winter when it’s too cold and grim to ride outside. And it’s generally in the garage with the door open. Zwifting in the summer sounds even more miserable than the winter!

I thought I needed a really big fan and got an 18″ one. Don’t do that. A small desk fan will be fine.

Same story here – I got the 8″ Bosch sliding saw. It has a smaller blade than some, but the slide length is huge so the whole thing is about 1m from front to back. No way it’ll fit on a normal workbench if the bench is up against a wall. I should have got something with a bigger blade (i.e. depth of cut) but shorter slide.

1750g sounds really rather heavy to me – but my baseline is these 50mm deep wheels at 1360g that I got from Ali Express for less than £400. There are lots of other wheelsets around at the moment less than 1400g, but I guess Prime is perhaps the only proper UK brand at this sort of price point. Still, 3-400g is a massive difference, especially as I expect a good proportion of that is in the rim.

I tend to prioritise weight a bit more than some, as all my rides are hilly and I’m not very heavy. According to plenty of folk on here I ought to have crashed and burned several times by now for riding around on Ali Express gear…

Thanks for all the thoughts. As someone pointed out, I’m new to this and coming at it from the employee side as much as management, and trying to pre-empt some of the obvious questions before asking around. One reason I’m not really pushing C2W is because it’d only benefit a handful of people, and as someone’s said above, it could backfire if it’s preceived as only benefitting a few.

We all work on computers all day long, so I think we ought to be covering peoples optician’s appointments as a minimum. I guess we could just offer ability for people to claim on expenses rather than enroll on a scheme. We’ve a fairly young healthy staff so the more medical cover might not be so useful, and is prbably much more costly. I expect physio and sports therapy stuff might be appreciated by half, and ignored by the others.

We already have life insurance. Anything car/travel/transport related is not going to be appropriate as we mostly wfh these days. We introduced an option to buy an additonal week leave which has been well received. Attempting to offer more flexible working hours also, but that has been a right admin hassle keeping track of everything and avoid people gaming it too much to the detriment of the clients. I guess we’ll find a balance at some point on that.

Cheers,

You think it would be that simple! But asking about this sort of stuff has it’s downsides – some will be grumpy if we ask and then don’t go through with it, some will say ‘yes that sounds great’ but will never use it. I was just hoping for a few perspectives from folk without a vested interest. Also it’s useful to know about the tax implications – I’ll have to check that, as it would certainly be unpopular if take-home went down!

Cheers. Yeah c2w is another option – I think for that I’ll do a quick survey to see if there’s any interest. There’s only 25 people and I doubt there’s enough interest to make it worthwhile, but worth checking.

With the medical stuff I’m trying to gauge whether it’d be seen as useful and appreciated, or a waste of money and people would rather have the £25/month.

£75 here. Return is about 2.3% since July when we opened them, so doing ok but still losing money in real terms.

Being able to limp home sounds like a good result, considering. Heal well.

Sheffield to Strensham Service today, 195km. Nearly cut short after I decked it on black ice in Belper but thought I’d push on. 288km total now which is good, but I’ve probably ruined myself for the next couple of days at least.

Think I’ve managed to wangle a Sheffield-Bristol attempt on Boxing Day, with the Mrs driving down in the evening to pick me up en route wherever I’ve got to. I love a linear ride, although I wonder if knowledge of the taxi pick-up might take the urgency out of it. Weather is looking great for the 24th as well so hoping to get a ton in then. I can see things tailing off fairly rapidly though…

Those cheap spikes look good. How are they on tarmac? Are they just for full ice and snow, or ok when it’s patchy?

I love riding in the snow. It’s so quiet.

In these troubled times, your membership is more relevant than ever.

Yep I saw that and groaned. Employer still paying so I guess I’ll stay a member another year, albeit through gritted teeth.

I once made my own spoke washers from standard stainless m4 washers and a nifty little bending jig to make them curved. Almost certainly not worth the time and effort but quite satisfying

There’s good demand for engineers across all disciplines. Starting salaries for graduates are ok. Automotive might be slightly more limited geographically – all the people I know in that field are linked to JLR in Coventry/Warwickshire, either directly or part of the supply chain. Civils will probably open up more options around the country. Worth thinking about structural and mechanical as well, or find a general course (Engineering Science?) so that he doesn’t need to specialise too soon if there’s no particular field that really appeals. Atkins were doing an apprenticeship program where they’d pay you through BEng or even MEng and therefore avoid the massive debts that msot students end up with.

I have a new one in the classifieds at the mo. Hadn’t realised they’d be selling for a reduced price so I’ll knock down my asking price.

Don’t you have your own bank account? Some people’s relationships with money (and each other!) are weird. If the bills are paid and there’s food in the fridge, why is it even a question?

I spent ages on this with my Tempest and Sram Red cranks when the sram BB died (which took less than a year). From what I remember, GXP works by locking the axle to one of the bearings (nds I think) and the other is axially free – so only one of the bearings sees axial load and the other is purely radial. The problem with HT2 type BBs is that they rely on a bit of axial compression as they are angular contact bearings (hence the preload tool you get with Shimano cranks). You can’t really use this type of BB with GXP cranks and acheive the right preload.

I went for a Gusset GXP BB and it’s been quite good for about 4000km so far.

Sorry I can’t recall if the wavy washer was needed or not, but for a small outlay I’d probably just get a GXP specific BB. Gusset were very helpful when I called them up.

I had my Rocket cerakote’d last year. It looks great but the abrasion resistance is nothing like I’d hoped for. Luckily I invisiframed it straight away so it mostly still looks good. It wore through pretty quickly where there was some unprotected cable rub – but maybe that was asking too much of it. It was cheap enough to have it done so I’m not unhappy with it.

Some pics in this thread https://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/cerakote-for-bikes/#post-12134059

I did this last week to replace some rigging on my Dad’s boat. No idea about sailing but do a lot of climbing. I used the mainsail halyard which is a 4:1 I think, with me pulling myself up with it, and him feeding it around the cleat at the bottom (effectively belaying). I have a ton of rope access and climbing gear available but this seemed the easiest and safest method given that the rope was already up. But then I’m not scared of heights and am fairly comfortable with this sort of thing – if you’re not, I could see you getting into a bit of a mess. I think doing it ‘solo’ is asking for trouble – at least get someone else to help out from the bottom, either providing backup to the rope or just to talk things through with to make sure it’s sensible.

Aha – that’s much better, thanks Tracey!

Employer hasn’t decided yet if it’ll be paid Bank Holiday, open and working as normal, or mandatory use of annual leave allowance! I don’t think the last option will go down well…

I’ll have a rethink about a wet system I’m sure it was over 5k to buy and install last time I looked versus about 2k for electric and rads.

That sounds far too much. I did a DIY between-the-joists wet UFH system for about £1k. It doesn’t add any height whatsoever as there’s no screed, just aluminium trays which hold the pipes, and PIR insulation board between the joists. STS concrete board instead of chipboard flooring, and you can tile straight onto that.

If you have a concrete floor rather than joists you might be forced into a screed system which will add a bit of hieght, but even so it’s an obvious choice given where energy costs are going and likely move to ASHPs. You probably will be able to get rid of the radiator(s) too which will free up some space.

We had a similar situation with 5ft of made ground (rubble fill with patio on top). We ended up digging a trench (~£600 for digger, labourer and skip), getting 5 tubular piles put in and a ground beam cast over the tops of the piles (£4k). The piles added probably £3.5k compared to if we were starting at natural ground level. I had worked out a slab would have been a bit more expensive, but there wasn’t a huge amount in it. It’s a lot of money for a tiny area, but it allowed us to open up a lot more internal space so worthwhile.

In your case could you go down a lean-to non-structural sort of structure, if it’s just for washing machine, shoe store and dog bed?

I have a 4a which does very well, and also a spare brand new one in the classifieds…

<smug>
Our 2 x 1000 litre IBCs are still more than half full after a good top-up from the rain a couple of weeks back – that’s with daily watering anything in pots.
</smug>

I don’t know why IBCs aren’t used more for domestic water storage – we had a couplef of 200l ones and they’d be empty after a couple of weeks. The IBCs have a cage so you can grow stuff up them, and a flat top which can be turfed. It needs a bit of plumbing bodgery to make sure they fill efficiently – ideally diverting 100% of the run-off rather than using the crappy diverter things.

£25, and £75 last month :-)

Yeah, website is terrible now – not just the 2 factor nonsense but just moving between pages takes an age.

shark – I’m in Woodseats. You pay me, I order, I drop it off with you when it arrives. I might need to pass on any VAT that gets charged.

Northwind – msg me and I’ll add yours in.

Cheers,

Thanks Colp, that’s kind of you. I’ll see if sharkattack and another chap have enough order value to put something together, if not I might take you up on your offer.
Cheers,

Thanks for the responses chaps. I had a closer look (first post was in a bit of a grumpy hurry). There is binding between the back of the fork crown and the head tube, and the top bearing cap and the top/front of the head tube. The bearings are sitting too deep into the head tube. VB say they are sending some new (thicker?) bearings. Seems a bodge, but ought to sort it.

I agree there’s a lot of post out. It’s about 15mm above min insertion (the correct side of min insertion, if you see what I mean). I think it’s just that this frame has a very low top tube, and I chose the size based on ett – didn’t really occur to me that length of post would become an issue. I don’t have freakishly long legs! But I get knee pain if I’m sitting too low – my leg is almost straight at the bottom of the stroke. I have 170mm cranks.

The flexy bars I think are just cheap construction – seems a common issue with this brand (didn’t find this out till now). I’ll probably swap with a Deda or FSA stem – need to find something that can send the cables into the head tube, and there don’t seem to be load of options.

It’s the Small frame, and I am 5’8 (possibly with long legs). The stem is 100mm and the bars aren’t particularly long – I think it’s just that the Ultregra shifters themselves are quite long. I would have gone for a 90mm or even 80mm stem if it were available – I may still. A medium frame would have been better in the leg but would need an even shorter stem.

A branded integrated bar will cost almost as much as the whole frameset (£450+), so I’ll need to figure out a cheaper alternative which can still get the cables into the head tube.

I will investigate the headset spacer a bit more; thanks.

No bar tape yet, in anticipation of a bit more messing about before it’s finished!

Not planning on pissing anyone off

So you’re not planning to ever use it within say 2 or 3 miles of any other people? It takes a particularly self centered kind of **** to see any appeal in these idiotic machines. Ban the lot and shoot the owners.

23 days after order, it’s arrived! Includes custom paint as well, so pretty decent turnaround.

I weighed the main bits as I know some people like that sort of thing. Frame and fork came in a bit heavy, presumably due to the paint. Still not bad though.

Purchased from Velobuild.