Wasn’t it Liam Killeen that crocked himself on the first lap on the rock garden at the Olympic MTB?

not the rock garden, was “Dean’s Drop”, the sort of rocky chute earlier in the lap. Obviously just as crap though!

+1 for an Ender 3.

I’ve got an Elegoo Neptune 2 (which is basically an Ender clone) to go with five resin printers and it’s been great. Auto-levelling may make things easier, but I don’t find the levelling onerous.

Sorry, bit of a thread resurrection, but these tend to remain topical and this was the first Google hit, so I’ll just add my latest views here. Just been around the merry-go-round with ours trying to get the best deal. We’d been with PedalCover, but then moved after the price rose and they invoked the 50% limit on bikes over 5 years old or whatever it was. Been with Hastings Premier for a couple of years, but M&S Premium have now seemingly out done them (not least as the Hastings renewal was up 30%).

Looks like M&S have changed underwriter again. The house is specifically said to include the garage and outbuildings. You don’t need to name bikes unless you want cover away from home, when you just specify the value of the most expensive one, and all others are covered automatically up to that value. You don’t actually name any of the bikes. No stipulations on locking at home. For cover away from home it just has to be in a locked building or locked to an immovable object. Premium was the same whether that limit was £3k or £5k, so went £5k to be sure!

I think the basis of the confusion here is that I have no bloody clue what is a scam in this. Are you suggesting the RM are operating a scam, whereby they withold a letter to see if you’ll pay a fee, only to say “LOL, joke’s on you, that one was fine”…? Given that isn’t what they’re doing, it would appear not to be a scam, but there must be some reason they’re being withheld, at which point it isn’t a scam, you just don’t understand why it’s happening.

Sounds like your mum has bought some dodgy stamps. Do they have any ‘security’ features at the moment? I’ve always assumed they’re just bits of coloured sticky paper.

Not helpful, but the Lexus sounds expensive in the first place, £700 for you and your wife sounds like a lot. We pay £400 for a 2015 Seat Leon FR

Came here to say that. We pay <£300 for a 2019 Golf R. That said, the risk with new/young drivers is hitting things not the theft, so postcode is less of a factor, but I agree that’s a very expensive baseline.

Otherwise not a huge amount to add beyond what’s been said. The market is hugely fickle too, so whoever is cheapest now won’t necessarily be next time.

Sounds like a decent result.

It could be worse someone put diesel in a mclaren F1 Here

THat is all kinds of special.

I’ve also ordered lots; loads of electronic stuff, three frames, 4 pairs of rims and some built wheels. Never had a problem. As said above, if you’re expecting genuine branded suspension forks you may be in for a shock (not guaranteed, mind), but I’d have no qualms buying through a well regarded AliExpress seller.

Definitely train. Tube will almost certainly be fine, even if it’s not then one of the Thameslink trains to Sutton stops at Wimbledon, where you can switch to the SWR trains to Leatherhead (Dorking services). In fact that may be easier anyway than navigating the tube.

The people of Leatherhead will not like being told they’re in SW London I suspect though :D

It’s a very long time since I used 7700 (which I never had issues with), but the 7800s were really nice, great ergonomics. I had them on my turbo bike until quite recently, having used them for about 15 years on the road. The external cables made for a nice light action and somewhere to hook your thumbs, and I always liked the ‘fishing float’ type indicator.

Went out with a few friends back in 2017, and also going again next month, see you there! These were the rides we did. Maybe a bit shorter than you’re after.

This one is fantastic, there’s a bit of gravel over the top of Villard Notre Dame, but we all just rode it on normal road bikes with no issues, the views were amazing, and the descents were brilliant fun on quiet roads:
Villard Notre Dame and Bons.

Alpe d’Huez, then coming along the balcony road, down into Freney d’Oisans and up to Deux Alpes, which is similar to AdH, a bit tougher I’d say, and not as pretty.
Alpe d’Huez, Balcon Freney & Deux Alpes.

Croix de Fer. It poured with rain solidly once we got onto the climb, and didn’t stop until we came down back into the valley. It’s a very long climb, much more undulating than AdH or some of the others, there’s some material sections of descending in the middle. Cafe at the top did a decent croque monsieur though, even out of season!

We had plans to go over the top of the Glandon, down into the Maurienne valley, and then back over the Telegraphe/Galibier/Lautauret (ie the Marmotte without AdH at the end), but the weather wasn’t up to it (we were there in September last time).

Aside from the Croix de Fer in the pouring rain, where I donned a gilet, I wore shorts and short sleeves the whole time, but as noted the weather is obviously incredibly changeable. If you’ve not ridden out there before rides do take a long time, we weren’t killing ourselves admittedly, but I’d happily do 18-19mph over that distance at home, so 12mph came as a shock!

If you want any of those GPXs just shout.

No, plenty of pubs are now cashless, particularly in London. I can’t remember the last time I went into a pub that didn’t take cards.

Only time I ever use cash now is the barber, where it seems to be a universal truth that they all only accept cash. Can’t think why…

+another for Nationwide though, I’m actually surprised that any bike is entirely mandating smart phones with no alternative, that seems pretty insane.

TP Link Deco M5s here. Had them a few years. We pay for 500mbps, get ~350 next to the router, and at least 150 even at the far reaches of the house/garage now with everyone streaming. Completely revolutionised the network.

Did a 300 mile charity ride thing; joining up a few company offices, so had to ride through Central London, Manchester and Liverpool. Was really boring, and physically no where near as tough as the South Downs Way or various other rides I’d done. Quite fun though, riding up the A5 in the middle of the night was surreal.

Route here if anyone wants it :D

A company based in Korea, with a US warehouse, shipping to the UK? Who also have woeful customer feedback. What could possibly go wrong?

Weirdly I looked at this the other day. I’ve got this one which I think actually predates Strava, but when I signed up it just uploaded all my old GPX files off my Garmin. So July 2010. It’s also my ‘best’ according to Veloviewer!

Virtually nothing slips through now. Over £135 and you pay. Dunno what duty is on bike parts, 15%? It’ll be expensive. Most German shops seem not to post to the UK anymore.

Having a car is NOT a right – its a licensed activity

Was my sarcasm really that subtle?

Because having a car is a right. So using it to bully people is, by extension, your right. I’m sure if she ran her over she could just claim sun in her eyes, and get a £20 fine and asked politely not to do it again for 2 weeks.

The Titanic looks amazing! Can’t help but think it might be a bit of a dull build though, very repetitive.

I wouldn’t do the US FWIW, great for a single journey as an experience (Chicago to LA, or San Francisco, or Seattle takes 3 days), but there isn’t the variety of European railways, nor the density, plus obviously not the same variation in culture and destinations.

Haha, yes, I happily would actually! I may need a lathe to go into large scale production…

In the interest of rounding this out:

thats very fine for an aluminium bolt – got a pic?

Yes, 1.5 pitch one, measured against “The Robert Axle Project’s” sizing guide.

Thru axles by njee20[/url], on Flickr

Surprisingly difficult to photograph because of the angles, but you can see the LH side lines up with their guide.

My one (does not line up, 11 threads versus 10 on the replacement):

Thru axles by njee20[/url], on Flickr

But I liked this:

Or if you have a tap and die set do it yourself using the old one for measurements

So job jobbed.

Thru axles by njee20[/url], on Flickr

Not perfect, but it’ll do. Goes in nice and smoothly.

Quite want to do the back now as well, to get rid of the crappy QRs. That has a nut with the thread on the outside for the mech hanger and the inside for the axle, which again seems to make it hard to replace. Somewhat easier now things are standard! Thanks everyone for the help, particularly @damascus for the solution.

or how expensive annual insurance must be with that number of offences or points. Driving must be very important to her.

Given that one of her offences is driving without valid insurance I doubt that’s a huge factor for her.

Njee can’t you go in at Sheen if avoiding Priory? RP is probably still safer overall than cycling through the traffic and random pads of Tooting though!

I did also think that :D

I’m actually going to go via Tooting etc tonight, I went that way for years, but haven’t done so for 5-6 years (since discovering the RP route), so it’s more about nostalgia than actually avoiding stabby thieves; I like the morning ride in via the park, but actually on the way home the route is a bit of a slog!

Ah, so pretty much diagonally across, so any diversion is going to be a big one, thought I may be able to help, but can’t really suggest much more than you already know.

No worries, cheers for the thought!

I’m conflicted by the responses saying people will avoid the park. On one hand of course people should try to keep themselves safe, however, on the other hand there is safety in numbers and avoiding the park will make it easier for riders who do continue to go to the park to be isolated and targeted.
It’s also kind of letting the ‘terrorists’ win.

Arranging to ride round in groups would be ideal.

I’m kinda the same. A big part of me thinks that taking a different route is a really poor response, why should I have to etc etc, and the chances of anything happening seem minuscule. But equally, clearly it’s a threat at the moment, and why expose myself to that unnecessarily? I wondered about just riding through with someone, but obviously people commuting can’t necessarily ‘arrange’ to ride together in the same way as if you’re out for a Sunday spin. I could say to someone on Priory Lane “hey, shall we stick together?!”, but that’s about it! I’m not normally one for overthinking these things, but this one’s got me a bit!

Where do you need to get to njee?

Ultimately London Bridge to Leatherhead, so I tend to come in via Priory Lane and Roehampton Gate, then go up to Sheen Cross, up past the ballet school and out Kingston gate. The obvious alternative is to go a totally different route and go down the A24 via Clapham/Merton/Morden/Cheam/Epsom. Once you’re in Putney the alternatives look a bit rubbish!

Just ride your oldest bike, they will be targeting high end disk braked bikes as that is where the money will be

Yeah I don’t have discs, and it certainly isn’t a desirable brand, they seem quite discerning from the photos I’ve seen!

This is ridiculously shit. I’m riding into town tomorrow. Not too worried about the morning, but it puts me right off going that way in the evening. I come in Roehampton Gate, which appears to be the hotspot! Don’t even know a decent alternative.

Can you buy a rear axle and take it to an engineering company, chop it to size and get a 1. 25 thread put on?

Or if you have a tap and die set do it yourself using the old one for measurements

Or can you remove the thread from the fork and replace it with a different size?

1 or 2 are great ideas actually. I wonder if the axles are a constant wall thickness. I suspect the Brand X one I’ve got is… I’ll have to check my dies, bet they only go up to 10mm!

Can’t remove the insert, not sure I’m brave enough for drilling it an helicoiling it.

thats very fine for an aluminium bolt – got a pic?

Will take one.

Deng Fu came back and confirmed that early frames did have a 1.25mm pitch, but they didn’t think they had any axles left. I’ve asked about a replacement fork. Looks like a Selcof one, which is probably the same product, is £100, so not catastrophic after 5 years use.

However, job loss could have much further reaching consequences.

Don’t be a massive tosser then?

Cheers, interesting thought. Hadn’t thought of that. Not entirely sure it’s worth the effort!

It’s a Chinese frame, DengFu. I’ve emailed them, will see what they say. New fork isn’t catastrophic, amazingly it looks like that’s probably the answer.

I exchanged emails with the proprietor of “Vaaru” bikes, as they have a footnote that some early forks of theirs were 1.25mm pitch. He confirmed they’re really hard to get, and had bought up a load of stock from the manufacturer.

Yeah, it’s their print out ‘size guide’ that convinced me it’s definitely a 1.25mm pitch, as they don’t do them :D

Pretty certain, yep, and yes, that is the issue, it appears not to be a thing. I think it was in the early days of disc frames before stuff settled down.

It’s nothing to do with LNER, it’s an open access operator (no franchise, but not allowed to directly compete with the franchisee, hence weird stopping patterns), owned by First Group.

But yes, they are using similar Hitachi trains, likely with similarly crap bike provision.

Richmond Park does have spates of it. They were going after people on Priory Lane a few years ago. Scary stuff though. I rode through on Tuesday.

You get a 14 day cooling off period don’t you?
Do that twice?

Some still charge to cancel in your cooling off period. Don’t take it as given.

Look for an annual policy with the lowest mid-term cancellation fee. A quick Google suggests NFU Mutual previously had no cancellation fee.

Re: nursery fees. Yes obviously we ‘can’ afford it, insofar as the mortgage isn’t going to go unpaid. But I don’t get to the end of each month and think “what am I going to do with this £1300 just sat here?!”, I’m not totally sure where it’ll come from, but it’ll be alright I’m sure. We could send her somewhere cheaper, marginally, or mrs njee20 could not work, it doesn’t make financial sense for her to in the short term, but as said previously I think nursery is great for parents and children, my son loved it (luckily he started school last month, so we’re not paying for both together) and it’s only for a few years until it all changes again.

Search for Lars Christensen for starters.
I am a mechanical design engineer by profession though, so I am not coming to it from a fresh position.

This (although I did come at it fresh and still found him good). For engineering type CADs for 3D printing etc then Fusion is much better IMO. I’ve not used Sketchup for years, but Fusion is great; I understand it’s an extension of TinkerCAD, so it shouldn’t be a huge leap if you’re used to that.

My daughter starts nursery next month, costing £1300/month. This feels like poor timing…