I’ve been riding 127mm at the back in the Lakes no issues, in fact no issues riding my hard tail in the Lakes to be honest. I’ve been bottoming out quite a lot though and bent a couple of rims as a result. Given the other bikes I’ve got it makes sense to get a proper long-travel bike for that sort of stuff and I’ve never had such a long travel trail bike before, so it’ll be a bit of an adventure. Might as well retain the option of 180 forks though, whether I fit some or not as it’s no different pushing a bigger fork up a hill!

Not in any rush to be honest, got a few things going on at the moment so it won’t matter if I don’t have a bike for a while.

Ok, I’m maybe sold. When are they due, where’s best to buy one and will anyone chuck in a free reverb?? The Mega won’t mind a 180 fork will it, I’ve seen someoene running one before and no one died, but is it rated up to 180?

The new Mega does look very good, it could be an option…

Yeah, I was actually supposed to be getting the Rune as a replacement frame, but long-story-short ended up with a refund instead. Haven’t ruled that out, but thinking there might be cheaper options out there and weighing up going second hand instead, which I couldn’t do on the new Rune.

Very tempted with the Mojo HD as I can set it up 160/140 for smaller stuff, then swap a few bits to give me 180/160 when I’m in the Lakes etc. I’m moving up from a 160/130 bike, so either options would be as capable. Negative is obviously that £1k is a lot to spend on a second hand frame.

Covert is an option, I was trying to get a swap to a Covert rather than a refund, but now I’ve got the refund everything is back on the table.

Cool, how are you measuring your angles? I’ll put Lyriks on because that’s what I have, but I’ll likely be changing them to something else eventually. I want 180s really, but will have to see how it rides first before doing that.

Still think RS are missing a massive trick by not doing Totem’s with U-Turn, maybe it’s just me though. Makes a big difference to climbing with the Lyriks and you lose that with 55s. The only 180 forks with similar are Fox, which fall to bits and cost a bazillion pounds.

Cool, sorry, I meant in general not weather as I’ve never ridden it. Plotted it on Memory Map and I’ve basically got a 30km climb to somewhere about Rookhope, turn around and head back.

Worth doing? More importantly, are any of the footpaths that head off from the trail viable?

What’s the Waskerley Way like, any ideas? Moving to Lanchester fairly soon and could do with something decent out of the door.

This is a great route, one of my favourites, though I normally bin off the descent into Wasdale and go onto the top of Great Gable, there’s a great descent off there, though the very top bit is a bit tricky! Warnscale Bottom is probably my favourite descent in the Lakes, but you definitely need the right bike and to be on good form for it.

Need to find some time to come back up and ride, I miss being in the area after having to move back to Manchester 🙁

The problem with using any sort of compound to take up the slack is that it would have to be done as the frame is built up. If it doesn’t work not only do I need a new rear triangle, but I’ll then need the iDrive lump that holds the bottom bracket as there’s no way to separate the two if the axle is bonded in place.

The frame would then be limited to the lifetime of the bearings, which may easily get damaged by the compound as it’ll get everywhere when installing. Although the bearings only need to be able to rotate a few degrees and it would be possible to remove seals and replace balls and regrease.

High risk approach I think.

My other thought was to drop a billet of steel inside the axle, assemble the frame then drill through the frame to the billet, tap the billet to allow me to bolt the axle solidly to the frame.

Thanks, will have a look…..

It’s not cheaper to get a new frame, but it’s not a cheap job to replace the rear triangle. I’ve not ridden a better bike, so I won’t be getting a new frame I don’t think.

It’s not massively oval, but the effect is that if you rock the cranks side to side they’ll move about 5mm. What’s bearing retainer?

I’ve rolled it, it’s fine.

I’ll be just South of Healey Dell. This is going to be ace isn’t it!

Zee is identical to SLX, except that it is short-cage. There isn’t a short-cage SLX for that reason. They’re really part of the same range, just one has a ‘cool’ name.

Have you tried a Banshee yet? I reckon the 2013 Spitfire (with bearings) is what you’re after. I have the bushing’d one, it’s great but I can’t recommend it as it destroys axles every couple of hundred miles.

The route is actually in WMB this month, I’m now officially famous!

I’ve not looked at the bus timetable, but it might be worth you making that point to the operator as they might be able to put on a mega-early bus in the winter in the future. in the summer you’ll be fine with a mid-day start though.

Alternatively you might be able to do a ride and then get a return bus back up later int he day rather than a point to point.

I’m no expert on wheels, but I’m running the stock wheels on my 5.5 and they’re great. They weigh very little and have bladed spokes so make a cool swishing noise that implies unbridled speed. I like them.

I have the same silver and white 5.5. I can confirm that it is very very fast. Ridiculously light. Did you take advantage of the Wheelbase sale in February like me? Was reduced from £3.3k to £2k. Utterly bargainous!

No idea why my postcode is in that post, the word I was looking for was “way”.

You can’t just add up the weights of your bikes, you need to calculate the leverage applied vertically at the tow ball. It’ll be much more than 75kg because a lot of the weight is a long WA158UU behind the tow ball. You’re unlikely to get caught, but I think you’ll find when you’ve then on that the handling becomes very dodgy. If you’re in any sort of accident you’ll have the book thrown at you too.

I bought a load of Karrimor gloves from mandmdirect a while ago, they’re really warm, waterproof, and were £3 a pair. I got matching liner gloves for extra warmth too and have enough pairs that I can alternate while they dry. I’ve been taking in a spare t-shirt so I ahve dry for the evening and coping with wet lycra. I always wear my waterproof at the moment as it’s pretty much rained everyday and I’ve not ended up getting too hot yet.

I’ve also got some 3M reflective tape (black) that I found on eBay that’ll go all over the rear of the bike when I havea chance. I have a DX 300 lumen rear light thing that is on the back of the pannier rack and one of the original 900 lumen ones on the front. Full length mudguards that are adapted for group riding, so I have no issues ploughing through puddles.

I remember last time I commuted daily that I rarely got wet, but something is different this year. Hope when winter comes the rain elvels return to normal!

Thanks, that’s all useful. Have showers at work, so that’s all good. I’ve got most of my clothes at work and am using the dry-cleaners roudn the corner to keep clothes clean. I’m just struggling to find somewhere to dry my cycling clothes and to hang my shirts and suits in general as they get a bit creased in the locker when it’s got all my biking kit in.

Most amused at the comments regarding spare clothes or a waterproof just in case it rains, I’ve done the journey 14 times so far and stayed completely dry once. Twice I’ve encountered light showers, the rest of the time it’s poured down. And it’s raining now….

Got them, they’re great. Mine are the 29er ones that I’m running on a 26″ bike with 26″ wheels, perfect.

http://www.meetup.com/manchester-mountain-bikers

I tried once and failed, so took it to a shop who also failed. For me it was a temporary borrow of the headset I was after as the wrong race came with a new frame that I wanted to ride, so I was able to just leave it.

I did ask on here about getting it out as there’s not enough room between the aluminium insert and the top of the headset to drift it out, as you’ve just found.

Brant replied and said that the way to do it is to put the headset into a vice and to then twist/wiggle the frame off. I never needed to give this a shot though, so I don’t know how hard it is.

I have x-lites, they’re awesome.

Clubs work fine in Manchester, not as described at all.

If the sport needs clubs to give it the sort of structure that would lead to influence in decisions that affect where people can ride etc, the solution might be to look at the reason clubs exist in other sports.

They usually exist so you can take part in team competition. With MTB you can sign up to do SITS with whoever you like, the same event in road riding or running you’d need to be part of the same affiliated club. So to do these events people need to be in a Club, so club’s exist.

If that’s what the sport needs, there’s an obvious solution. This place would go into meltdown though if British Cycling started telling people who they could and couldn’t race with!

Not sure why you would buy this over a Whippet, especially as On One are selling some at £250 right now.

You might not do it, but my old postman did this so often I ended up making a complaint about him. If you’re in and waiting for something important and a card gets put through your door it gets pretty irritating quite quickly!

Awesome, will look those up.

Ha ha, no it’s one of them there £250 Whippets what On-One are dishing out right now. Cheaper than China! X-Lite 29er forks. It’s a 16″ frame, which is identical to the 18″ Transition TransAM that it’s replaced.

Just waiting for some cranks and some SS swap-outs and this should fly:

I’m after a cheap 54 to 56 cm track bike. I’m not looking to race, just train two or three times a month on the track, so not after anything special. 58 would be too big I think.

Yeah, always start from the source data if you can!

IF is the function you want to use, you can nest them so that they work through each scenario in turn and do different things depending on certain conditions.

It doesn’t sound overly complicated, but you need to be 100% on top of what the mathematical model is that will give the output that you’re after if it’s going to be accurate and useful.

I presume your customers usually pay x days after you issue an invoice and that x is fairly static? If that’s the case then I’d be happy relying on the cash-flow forecast, but the more x varies, the less reliable it will be.

I would do this by starting with a system that records the number of days taken to pay by each customer. For each future invoice I would then calculate an expected payment date based on the invoice date and the usual payment pattern. I would then use the IF statements to pull together the values of all invoices that you expect to be paid in the time periods that you’re interested in. I would probably also look at a measure of the consistency of invoice payment times and use this to feedback into a level of confidence for the output figure and then apply this by highlighting the cell green for good, red for less reliable etc.

That any help?

It’s the 456C that you want chap.

Yeah, there’s usually a few adverts up at the Velodrome in Manchester that I’ll check out when I’m back in Manchester in September, but was hoping to find an online resource of equal value. I did have an option lined up……. but it got sold to some fixie **** for a shed load instead. Poor thing.

Sometimes a frame is welded up a little out and the brakes rub.

My Transition TransAM needs a couple of spacers to make sure that the brake disc doesn’t catch the inside edge of the caliper, but that’s because the frame is slotted for singlespeed so gets used with the wheel in a variety of positions.

Which course at Manchester MWM had a drop in that hospitalised people? I did two of the three courses last year and son’t remember anything like that. One of the courses was fairly flat with one very sharp climb twice each lap, the other was three decent sized climbs each lap. Both were really good fun to race on, both might have been a bit dull to just ride around.

That’s the point really, any course is great to race on, if you’re going as quick as you can round every corner etc it’s not going to get more technical than that. If you’re pottering around it’ll be dull.

There’s quite a few on here that clearly aren’t interested in pushing themselves physically, which is fine, but XC doesn’t need to change so that those people enjoy ‘doing’ a race too, there are plenty of things for those people to go and do. And they do, as you can see at Manchester Mid Week madness; Manchester Mountain Bikers has over 200 members, but only 3 or 4 are interested in things like Manchester MWM.

The issue isn’t the people riding mountain bikes in general, it’s the people not riding mountain bikes. There’s no reason why you should be interested in xc racing just because you own a mountain bike. As has been said earlier, it’s the road cycling drain that is taking most of the people that would want to race XC as it is away and the best ‘solution’ is to look at that rather than worrying about what the typical MTBer wants to do with their time.

Oldgit knows the score.