hmm, thanks all. i did look back a few pages to see if there was any pentlands chat – but clearly didn’t try hard enough! so failing pentlands, where would people suggest from edinburgh?

i don’t think it was them, coulda been though. some kind of fork that had solid legs to right under the stem, just like there them girvins…

merlin wheels are handbuilt anyway aren’t they? just like the LBS does…

ah ok. but who was the other company that made similar forks?

anyway, i always fancied one of those frames; i remember some touring story in MBUK many years ago with a couple of them loaded with panniers and set for offroad adventures 🙂

i like that! are the forks not those girvin lookalikes? i thought it was always elastomer for girvins?

http://www.richersounds.com/productlistmanu/TURNTABLES/ALL

i think it’s the stupid link between veggie = not someone who would go riding. i’ve never heard anything so utterly dum. are you seriously saying everyone you know who eats meat rides mountainbikes offroad? i bet not. but from the account of one vegetarian you see fit to generalise? do you not see anything wrong with that?

if a tosspot like you asked me along for a ride i think i’d find any excuse to not join you.

doesn’t fentimans have alcohol in? i used to drink a lot more, i just have tea now! not tried this at a social occasion though, mind…

a grizzly bear,

or, failing that, a pterodactyl

i’m not convinced. i can just as easily visualise 4600km as i can 4.6billion years. i.e., not very well!

as if the tories would do such a thing 😮

rootes1 – good point. i’ve not heard anyone mention the union and the politic stuff in the north with regard to this. this is about oh so much more than just having somewhere to export goods to, i wonder if it’s about the UK having a show of strength over the republicans.

all IMHO of course 🙂

i went to an LBS once for cables. they only had super- XTR and charged about £18 for only the rear mech. so i guess it ain’t that bad…

my friend told me how he got a train to afan, did all the trails, all the riding to and from the station both in wales, and in london village, in constant rain… and ended up with a cold that lasted weeks…. 😆

wrt point 1 – happens all the time to me in the burgh. most fun when one gets one’s face right up close to the driver’s window and shout loudly at which point they often poo themselves!

partner works in the (scottish) public sector and gets bullied into rubbish shifts… this has only come about recently too.

i’ve done this, back when i had a car. i had a couple of days in the forest of dean, some in south wales, some in and around hopton in shropshire some in the quantocks and some in exmoor…

No locking facilities? Take the bike in with you.

that’s what people do. except, when i tried, the only space was taken up by a cage… so nowhere…

jason mcroy:

big mig indurain:

salman agah:

jason mcroy:

big mig indurain:

salman agah:

18yo HP was declared “Best Spirit in the World ” in 2005.

but that was five years ago – the current batch would have been made 5 years later! does whisky have good and bad years like wine? 😆

they opened a brand new tesco down from me. no bike parking facilities to be seen. even the lampposts are too wide to get a d-lock around…

if they can’t keep their pledges because “they’re not in power”, just why the hell did they even enter into the coalition? oh wait, it’s because they ARE in power! who’s the deputy prime minister? a lib-dem! 😮

“Blue was the color of the eyes of our savior Jesus Christ”.

I bet he stood out a bit, then.

i bet those magic tricks were what did it for him though!

i’m under 14″! but that’s less weight to carry 😉

did you speak to the guy with long hair who was in video ‘home’? i once did a loop from the car park, got back later than most other riders (seemingly) and he came out right across to my car and had a chat, top guy!

El-bent, there’s no such thing as an unloaded question, don’t ya know?

if you want to hammer down the pleney run 15 times a day, yes, you will ruin your bike. you will ruin any bike. save your money for repairs when you get back.

i did that on my XC hardtail with 100mm 2004 fox floats and they are fine. i also felt i rode pretty damn hard (kicking my mates butt who was on a 120mm full sus). seems a little excessive to get a new set of shocks for only one week, when you could just fix what you’ve got (which i doubt will get that broken anyway)

i’m more left and libertarian than ghandi! 😀

ernie_lynch – i’m not really sure i buy your absolute conviction in the superior ideals of the allied forces in WWII – look to russia and their subsequent acts – isolationist and partitioning, they put a wall through berlin! it’s nice to say that the best side won after the war, cos ‘look at how great things are!’ but in my opinion there is no way to know for sure before a war that your ‘country’ (read: ruling elite as mentioned before) are really doing this to make things ‘better’. so for that, i’m out.

bikeworks?!

i always heard it was good so took my hope tiglide in to get the BEARINGS replaced. they gave me back the wheel with PAWLS replaced and insisted there was nothing wrong with the (12 year old) bearings. the guy even span the wheel, and said “there, wheels don’t roll much better than that!”

got home and spun it – it felt like it was running on grit, exactly as when i took it in. so i never went back (except to get them to put new bearings in FOC), because TWO people showed their incompetency – the mechanic and the sales person. awful awful awful

the bike chain, on the other hand, helped me size myself to my bike quite nicely 🙂

legitimate and necessary animal tests

you mean it’s legal and you think it’s necessary? doesn’t make it right you know 😮

tories in being tories shocker! 😮

I am lucky not to have lost my hands to frostbite !!

hahaha, you’d surely be the first person to lose a finger that way in Somerset!

i don’t use specific winter gloves, i run regular fox gloves with silk liners. they’ve been cosy so far this year; i might get some winter ones if i feel the need…

It has been said that democracy is the worst form of government except all the others that have been tried.

said winston churchill. correct, says i.

cheap 24″ disc wheel, 80mm mtb 26″ forks, cheap cable disc?

off the top of my head:
http://www.wiggle.co.uk/panaracer-trailraker-folding-mountain-bike-tyre/