You could get deore or slx for even cheaper?

If you buy the shimano master cylinders you could shift them on for not much loss afterwards if you didn’t like it. I guess you know what you’re going to get with the magura options.

I really like my shigura setup, I like the level close to the bar with a very firm feel. However I’ve never tried magura mt5 levers

I don’t think that anyone has said anything bad about them. People seem to really like them in spite of some of their obvious shortcomings.

It genuinely makes us smile when you hear the tiny tiny roar when you put your foot down. It also feels like you are going really fast when you aren’t. So you get all the fun without the speed or horsepower. It’s a bit like a 4×4 go kart.

At work everyone else has big black rangerovers, bmws, audis and we turn up in a bright yellow panda. That also makes me smile.

Fiat used to do really good discounts (25% off new, spec of your choice, etc) for NHS, police, fire, army, civil service etc with very little confirmation, so if you know anyone in those jobs..

I guess it depends on your usage. We have a panda cross twinair, it’s great for what we want. but we live in the country with lakeland passes, narrow and poor quality roads and we almost never go on the motorway. There’s also only two of us and we have a van if we need more space. If you are outside of that usage there are definitely better options.

Our panda is bright yellow…

Have you tried Sellafied Ltd?

This. There’s cracking riding up in this corner of the world… Not a bad place to spend a summer…

Putoline hpx 2.5 fixed the wandering bite point issues for me. Its like water so makes the bleed process much easier too.

Earfun air pro 2 for me, sound ace, good battery and ANC works well. Newer model now has an app, that would be useful.

There’s a good headphone review website here – https://www.scarbir.com/

Both of the shimano issues are due to the caliper, the wandering bite point and obviously the micro leaks go when you change to a shigura setup.

As suggested above, I’d go with magura MT5 and swap the levers over if you feel you need to (or when you break them). Shugura works really well

Aliexpress ZTTO hubs for me… the ones ‘inspired’ by dt Swiss star ratchet hubs (following expiration of the patent obviously…) about £80 for both hubs and all the Dt Swiss 240s spares fit perfectly.

We’ve had hens for a number of years, had both the egglu type coops and also a local (to us) company making hen coops out of recycled plastics. They are very durable and while without fancy stuff you get in an egglu, perfectly adequate for the job.

Have a look here  https://www.solwayrecycling.co.uk/shop/pig-poultry/hen-houses/solway-mini-hen-coop

Just out of curiosity, which ones would I buy to replace the 4 pot XTs on my Occam?

Having dreamed of an XT equipped bike for well over three decades, now that I have one I’m pretty unimpressed.

What magura brake is light as possible but capable enough to slow 110kgs of all-up weight down the side of Helvellyn etc?

Keep your XT levers to use with the Magura calipers. The best of both, comfortable levers, easy bleeding, light lever action and massive power. The shigura setup really works well

The ZTTO hubs I bought are interesting, complete copies of DT Swiss 350s, the DT Swiss spare parts fit perfectly… However they were released by ZTTO on the day the star ratchet patent expired. Which I thought was good form.

Loads of stuff. I find it generally pretty good, but you need to do you due diligence on the seller by reading the reviews.

From AliExpress I’ve just kitted out a bike with:

Ztto hubs (same as DT Swiss 350) for £90

Sroad 12s cassette – £100 (same weight as x01 cassette)

Slx brakes

Slx groupset

Slx cranks

Away from AliExpress, bought a carbon catalogue frame and carbon rims.

Bike is ace, no issues with a quality of kit, price or delivery times.

If going with Bluetooth, you’ll need a set compatible with LDAC / AptX HD for sound quality, but for watching films or gaming you’ll need compatibility with AptX LL to reduce the latency.

You can get a Bluetooth DAC to plug wired headphones into to get both of those protocols. Something like fiio btr3 – https://www.fiio.com/btr3

The Nespresso insulated mugs are very narrow at the bottom, perfect for our little fiat Panda. I think we’re on our 3rd or 4th as no other mug will fit.

I like mine, with SRAM shifter and chain with Shimano rear mech.

I’ve an Sroad cassette from China to put on my other bike, same weight, same machined billet with largest sprocket aluminium, but £100 cheaper. It was delivered in 10 days as well. Might be worth a look?

I started a thread about the garage floor… It’s still good, not as tidy or as clean, but so glad I eventually got around to sorting my garage out. It was a nice wee project!

https://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/boring-garage-floor-questions/

I was surprised how quickly the tiles lift in the heat. Black garage door will be insulated soon which will hopefully resolve that (and keep the heat in during the winter)

There are some bargains on AliExpress If you know where to look. ZTTO components is pretty good price performance, not the top end of performance but worth it for the price if you know what I mean.

For example – https://a.aliexpress.com/_uwcApD

I understand the patent for star ratchet hubs ran out, so DT Swiss 240 equivalent hubs for £70. (All DT Swiss 240s spares fit, for piece of mind)

I bought one of these – https://banggood.onelink.me/zMT7/193ed733

And it’s been great in my garage with some bookshelf speakers. It’s a bit more refined compared the simpler nobsound amp in the way it handles multiple inputs. Sound quality is great.

I have shigura brakes, MT5 calipers and XT M8100 levers. Really powerful and a little grabby which takes a bit of getting used to. Once you do get used to it there are no downsides. It changed my braking technique for the better, now I don’t feather the brake as much as I used to.

The biggest benefit for me is the really short lever stroke and solid lever feel. I run my levers really close to the bars to prevent arm pump and the shiguras fit with that really well.

Has anyone scratch built a DLG? Looks like there are a few forums dedicated to building your own. Looking at the creations from foam, balsa wood and sticky back plastic it looks quite doable on a wet winter’s day. The components look cheap and easy to source.

Something like this->  https://forum.flitetest.com/index.php?threads/nndlg.16730/

Any thoughts?

id also suggest Dalehead Tarn, High Spy, Maiden Moor and down to Manesty from the shoulder of Cat Bells. Spin back via back road.

I’ve gone for a Flysky FS-i6X…

Poopscoop the flysky transmitters are usually good for community firmware mods. I have the RC car transmitter and with a firmware mod, it turns a 3ch basic transmitter into an 8ch programmable one.

The flysky i6 looks like it has some mods for it to turn it into a 14ch programmable tx. Worth a look anyway.

As a slightly left field option… What about a Chinese clone of the dt swiss 240s? (ZTTO M1)

It uses the older style star ratchet freehub, same sealing arrangement, same bearing sizes. All the dt swiss spares fit, spoke lengths are the same etc. Unsurprisingly they are the same weight as well.

£80 for both front and rear hubs.

I’m in a similar position, awaiting a frame with a trunnion. Not used one before. As far as I’m aware the upside down shock position (like a Scott spark) the trunnion end doesn’t rotate much if at all. So I’m thinking there won’t be bearings and it’ll just be a bolt to the frame job?

That netherbeck track is just awful, we did it last summer on one of the hottest days of the year. Proper grim.

We were warned to be fair but thought it couldn’t be that bad… We were also warned about the bridleway descent being rubbish, so took an alternative line down from the top of Haycock. Heading west from Haycock then down to ennerdale from Caw fell. A bit tricky in places but very enjoyable.

Route here if you’re interested

I’m liking the geometry. I like the idea of chinese carbon frames, especially now the geometry has caught up with modern trends. However, i always a worry about quality/warranty issues. Have you looked into many frames? Any idea who the good manufacturers are?

Upgrade to a higher level OEM set. Eg XT jockey wheels have the cartridge bearing in rather than the bushing. They spin better and the lack of play improves the shifting.

I did buy some very cheap AliExpress Alu ones, build quality was fine but they were so loud that it would annoy me. XT ones were much better

My SLX mech has a very inconsistent clutch. It is switched on, but if I simulate the cage moving fast a few times the clutch works and then stops working on subsequent movements. I have to switch the clutch off then back on again for it to work correctly for a bit.

The only thing that fixed it was a new clutch assembly, it used to work fine, I think the link between the cage and clutch has worn (you get a new one with a new clutch)

What do your rotors look like? The more holes in the rotor the better the rotor can remove water from the braking surface and the pad will get scraped by the trailing edges of the holes. Some rotor designs are better than others in the wet so might be worth experimenting?

I have the Magura storm HC rotors, they work brilliantly in the dry, bit of squeal in the wet until they warm up. Partly due to they being thicker than standard SRAM/Shimano rotors, but also because they have a section of rotor with no holes

I think it’s great. Takes a bit of time to get used to the bite and power of the brakes. But when you do, all other brakes feel like they don’t work very well.

Only annoyance is the pad / rotor clearance isn’t very big so brakes often squeak a little. The wheel still spins like there is no rub, so no real issue.

Do it!

Skinny tubed steel frame = sore shoulders when carrying.

Poor drainage, turning a bike over and creating a puddle on the garage floor.

Not something I’d considered when choosing a cotic!

I’ve done it a couple of times, latest with a mixed work group of non cyclists. Penrith is a good first stop, nice places to eat and good pubs, first day is long but not too hilly. Second day is hilly and long, but it does make for a short 3rd day as off the moor towards the coast goes on forever!

Everyone enjoyed it, even the non cyclists.

With the same gang, we also did the French C2C, Atlantic to the Mediterranean following the canal du midi. That was a slightly longer trip about 320 miles, but mainly gravel canal paths so easy to get the miles in. Nice weather, 2 3-course meals a day, lots of wine, bloody brilliant!

I’m currently getting 30 days out of the instinct solar, with continuous heart rate monitoring, step counting and smart watch stuff. The few days this year when the sun has been out has extended the run time by about a day for every 3 hours of sunlight. That stacks up with the 54 hours quoted by Garmin

The Garmin instinct solar does 90% of the fenix for £260. The battery life is amazing.

That looks awesome

Thank, it’s looks much better than it did and hopefully warmer and drier to store stuff and work in.

This is what it looked like before

Garage now has a floor. Plasfloor fitted over the weekend, easy to do to be honest, it was quite satisfying!

Ah, there it is. I don’t tend to use the bike/chat/member forums, only the overview. Thanks guys.

<span style=”font-size: 0.8rem;”>It still seems to search across all the various forums, so I’d have thought it would be appropriate to have it in the overview as well? </span>

Found it!

It’s in the members only forum. Is that intentional? Or a perk to us subscribers?

I’m just in the middle of a garage refurb 4.5m X 4.5m. Old single brick garage with a sloping roof, double storey at one end and single at the other. It was bloody freezing in spring, autumn and winter!

After 8 years of thinking that I’ll get round to sorting it, we’ve just got a professional in to do it properly. Battens on the wall (with air gap behind to allow the single bricks to breathe) 50mm celotex, false ceiling with 100mm of wool insulation. All covered with OSB. Lots of sockets and led lighting.

Almost finished painting everything white. OSB is not fun to paint!

Still to do: Vinyl floor tiles, threshold for door to stop draft, insulate up and over door, work bench to build, floor mounted bike rack, paddle board ceiling storage, open wardrobe for wet/muddy stuff, dehumidifier, amp and speakers.

I love my Mattoc pro 2, best fork I’ve ever had, cheap to buy and easy to service.

The IRT system can take a bit of setting up, but worth spending the time to do it right.

I bought a Manitou McLeod shock as I was so impressed with the Mattoc. It’s replaced a dbcoil inline and I much prefer it. It’s 400g lighter and cost less than an annual service of of the cane creek.

The manitou support isn’t the best in the UK, however there is loads of information on American forums and spares can be shipped in from Europe.