It was sold without the bolts, I couldn't check the frame alignment without bolting it together, so the problem was effectively hidden when I bought the frame.

The problem is that the top arm sits inside two metal plates on the bottom arm at the FSR pivot. As the top arm is bent, then this pivot is scraping on both sides of the lower arm pivot housing, bearing alignment isn't the issue, the frame simply doesn't fit together any more.

I will get a picture for you later as there seems to be a few issues in visualising the problem judging by some responses.

Twisting it back might be an option, but it would require some very complicated clampage, possibly buying a new and bigger vice and god knows how I'd go about applying the required leverage?

Seriously, it isn't just out of line, it's twisted. It wasn't like that from new, honestly, it couldn't be put together without a lot of difficulty and the rear end is stiff to the point that the suspension wouldn't work properly. Honestly, please believe me, 3mm might not be much when the mating surfaces aren't parallel, but it's a lot when it's been twisted.

No, it's not 3mm laterally, it's a 3mm maximum gap caused by the frame being twisted, not bent. New bearings won't make any difference.

It's not that it doesn't match up, but the pivot is twisted, so the two surfaces that should sit parallel don't any more. It is twisted enough that if I build it up and do that bolt last I can get the bolt through the pivot, but not into the threaded hole on the inside of the frame; the two holes are out of alignment by about 3mm.

I can put it together by doing this bolt first, twisting it a bit to do the second bolt, then twisting it a bit more to do the main frame bolts, but the mechanism is very stiff.

If it just needed bending in or out a bit then it would be fine, but there's no way of getting it together without this one pivot being very stiff, I suspect it will simply not work well, destroy bearings and slowly wear the frame. I suppose as a last resort I could have it machined back parallel and fit spacers, but then a cheap frame becomes and expensive one with a weakness.

Apparently it isn't convenient to view it at all, ever. Also, apparently 30 people have asked the same question. I do hope the Police are dealing with this now?

If you just want to track routes, google for Lem's TrackMe, or look on http://www.xda-developers.com for it. It's really good.

Can't offer anything other than my own sympathies, I remember being pretty pissed off when I had to renew my photocard and passport, it's other people that want to know who I am and what I look like, so they should pay…

Yeah Stu, I wasn't saying all walkers are like that, there are a lot of friendly ones too. More miserable bastards on the way to Angle Tarn from Langdale than friendly ones yesterday though.

A lot of walkers are complete miserable bastards, there seems to be a significant proportion that disappear into the hills because they hate society and people in general. I do a reasonable amount of walking, and running and biking, so I'm pretty fit. I grew up in the Lakes, know most of it extremely well, have a good sense of direction and can read the weather well enough to not end up getting lost/wet/cold/dead. I get all kinds of dirty looks and comments when I'm out and about if I'm wearing a pair of jeans.

It's as if me being up high and walking in a more relaxed/casual attire somewhere they consider a challenging day out cheapens the experience for them. Blencathra in the snow at Christmas was a particular highlight with the crampon brigade.

These sort of walkers simply aren't happy to share 'their' hills with anyone else and you just have to let them get on with it. They're my hills by the way.

The thing is, in the Lakes if I go up Helvellyn I often get asked by walkers if they can take my picture, they're more amazed that people could get a bike up there, than objectional to your presence, especially as riding onto the top is feasible and gives the impression that you've ridden the lot. But if you drop down Scarth Gap pass, then have the audacity to ride around the back of Buttermere Lake, you will be abused left right and centre. There seems to be a good correlation between attitude and altitude. Ie the miserable selfish **** tend to be too unfit to get to the top.

I wouldn't worry about this crank too though!

Yes, but you have the flexibility of dropping one, two or three mountains at the end if you get too tired, it's one I've got planned for a trip in June or July time.

If you're after a good long ride in that area, give this a bash:

It has absolute DEATH written all over it. Hard work mind.

anc, agree with all of the above. The descent out of Coledale is good, but you can get better, love Wandope and Whiteless Pike. Not done Robinson to Buttermere or Ullock Pike, but I might have a look on your recommendation.

I like the idea of having a favourite 200m of trail; mine is Gasgale Gill in the Lakes, it's fooker of a climb up to Coledale Hause, but in the middle of two hell-ish push/carrys there's a cheeky bit of hidden singletrack climb that make sit all worthwhile.

Favourite short ride is Barrow, from Uzzicar, up the mining track between Barrow and Causey Pike, left onto Barrow summit, then downt he grass track to Braithwaite. About the most fun you can have on a bike with only an hour to throw at it.

Favourite long ride; Helvellyn, coming up from Thirlmere, down via Raise and Sticks Pass.

Hardest thing I've ridden; Causey Pike. Brilliant.

Yeah, I figured cornering loads would cause less twisting with bolt-through, but if you're trying to corner hard enough to twist your forks much and braking heavily, a bit of extra flex is the least of your worries. I hadn't thought about the braking force trying to twist the fork; I guess the stiffer axle would reduce this twisting.

I think it's a false economy to by anything other than 20mm forks and wheels these days though.

How does bolt-through (horizontal stiffness) translate into less flex back and forward under heavy braking? The forces are perpendicular to each other.

At least you can just ignore the BBC on facebook/twatter etc, it's this whole, "txt in let us know what you think" thing that pisses me off, why the **** do you think people care what some random knob stuck in traffic on the M1 thinks??

"Shut up woman, get on my horse."

I reckon I could find a use or two for such a line.

HRMs aren't much use unless you use them properly; that is use them all the time, upload data to a computer and learn what your heart does etc. Anything else is just information rather than useful information.

My HRM takes your heart rate, age, height and weight and you tell it how active you are. It uses all that to approximate your calorie useage. As I said, I don't think it's accurate enough that I could compare my numbers with someone elses, but it gives an accurate enough picture that I can compare one training session to another. I use the calories as a measure of weekly training volume, rather than a specific tool though.

Ade, you can't go posting old pictures when you've already fixed the issues, it just makes people look silly! Alfine is cool, good thinking, but the chain tensioner leaves a lot of room for work.

Pike, I really don't know why Magura supply their brakes with the same length hose front and back? It's a tough call, curl it up, or chop it and re-bleed? I've decided to sort it when it does need bleeding. Magura were kind enough to supply all the fiddly parts to shorten it though.

Kingtut, how did you get the url off of flickr?

Crikey, Ade is that single speed? My word.

Ade, you're running one v-brake, one disk, start with that and we'll take it from there…..

Can I link to a photo on Flickr? Can't find the direct url.

It's here though:

Send abuse!

PS – I know the front hose is too long, someone should tell Magura.

one mans pimp is another mans pig

Definitely, me and my housemate are currently in disagreement whether my baby-blue frame can be ridden with the following mix of colours:

Frame – Baby blue
Seat/Stem/hubs – white
Headset/Seat clamp/valve caps/grips – red
Wheels/bars – green

I think it looks ace. I am right. I think.

Actually hang on, it's a slow news day, I should really put up a pic…..

It was in jest, don't worry. Well so long as taka's first post was in jest :wink:

Taka, that really isn't pimped, it's just a dogs dinner of parts thrown at a frame, try not to confuse the two.

I'm trying to help you here, so don't take offence at these observations:

1. Green stem – matches nothing and is too long, just because it's 'team only' doesn't make it right.
2. Seat post – silver and with a curve at the top. You need a black one with a machined head.
3. Your saddle is far too big for your bike.
4. Ditch the chainstay protector
5. Either get a black headset or red spacers. Also, you have too many spacers. You should have a little extra rise on your bars, a little angle on your stem and remove as many spacers as you can.
6. SLX cranks – no objections, other than the bashguard is horrific. You might strugle to sort this without new cranks.
7. Blackk fork stantions – this only really works on Bomber 888s. Sorry.

Let me know if you need any more help.

OP – that looks good, first time I've seen a gravity dropper with the corrugated sleeve thing that didn't look shit, would be interested in a picture of it with a normal seat post though?

Cheers

On these, is the actual steerer tapered, or is it just stepped at the bottom?

How does a headset take into account the angle the bearings need to be at for the taper given that head tubes are different lengths?

That doesn't really work in the real world because your brain and stomach adapt themselves to their circumstance a fair bit.

For example, if you stuff yourself silly one night you can stretch your stomach to the point that you can eat more before you get full for a couple of days. If you do this, then eat until you're full your stomach can stay stretched and you'll get fat, all other things being equal.

Similarly, if you swap your three meals a day for 6 half the size, your stomach will contract a bit and your overall intake would fall, applying your rules, and you would then lose weight.

There's a lot more to this than the rate you burn calories. I have a Polar HRM that estimates calories based on heart rate, age, weight and a notional level of activity. I don't think it's accurate enough that I could compare my run to my friends, but it's good enough to compare today's run with yesterdays, or last nights run with Sunday's bike ride:

Biking on Sunday – 5 hours in the Peaks at about 800 calories per hour.
Running last night – 70 minutes at about 900 calories per hour.

I wouldn't worry about what the biking is, because if it's hilly then you'll work harder on the climbs, but get a rest on the flat; I've always found my rate of calorie burn doesn't vary much between a flat road bike ride and a hilly MTB ride.

Both those sessions above are very different, but I would say they both took a similar amount out of me as a measure of how able to exercise I feel the following day. I would always say to someone that is talking about exercise as a means to control weight that cycling is the solution, for a number of reasons:

1. If you're over-weight then running has a greater chance of causing injuries due to the impact with each stride.
2. If you have the time you can cycle for a lot longer for the same level of tiredness afterwards; the example above I burned massively more calories cycling than I did running and I'm about as tired today as I was yesterday.
3. Cycling doesn't feel as tough on your body, so you're more likely to enjoy it. If you enjoy it, you'll find more time for it, start looking forward to your exercise and then achieve far better results in your quest to manage your weight.

Running is handy because you can do it on pavements in the dark at night and straight out of your door, but that's really the only thing it has going for it, unless you're doing it because you enjoy it or you want to race.

Hope that helps.

I have Lyrik U-Turns on my Bullit, they're an awesome fork and having U-turn has transformed the bike significantly; winding the forks down lets it climb well enough that I'm happy using it as my trail bike whenever I'm riding good descents (Peaks) or with slower riders where the handicap helps even things out. It just makes the bike so much more versatile.

I'm building up a 5" trail bike thing at the moment, that will have Pike's on it, but not sure I'll bother with the u-turns for that.

"So they're going to do discounts for very small slim peeps then,…………………obviously!"

Presumably if you can share your seat with another very thin person?

There's loads of books available for windows mobile that you can just find lying about the internet.

I have a netbook, it's perfect for my mobile computing needs, but if you could ditch the keyboard that would be cool too, and more power. Put a decent OS on it, ie not one thats been cripled by Apple's non-apple software paranoia and we could be onto a winner. No doubt if they came up with what I wanted I couldn't stomach the price, my Netbook was £200.

George is your problem climbing up hills or climbing up hills on the road? Are you getting dropped by people on a road climb that you could normally stay with on an off-road climb?

If it's just the roads, it's your tyres; Peachos has lent me a Hi-Roller Super Tacky and while I can get it up hills off road, it is a complete anchor on the road. It makes me mad, every time I ride it on the road, though I should really just get some tyres of my own!

Sorry guys, I'm sure I remember in a recent half marathon thread, times of around 1.15 were bandied about by the great one. Hell, he's up there with some of the GB Reserve squad for his 2k time on an ergo.

What sort of around 1.15? I might be able to beat this, would that make me the fastest on STW????

My Dad is doing a camper van conversion at the moment, sadly it won't be available for mountain biking, but I as asking him about insulation. He said that the problem with most materials is that you get condensation that is then trapped against the side of the van causing them to rust. He is getting his done at a place in Bolton for £300 that is a spray foam insulation that is completely sealed against the body, so doesn't cause rust.

Steve Peat did run small rotors at the World Champs this year, but then he does use the brakes a lot less than you would, so don't read too much into comments like those!

Good thread! I've paid PRS for our venue, now PPL reckon I owe them money. The stuff they sent me seemed to relate to music videos rather than music though, so I've put them on hold. I tried their website, but as quoted above it's very vague and ambiguous. This is for a private function venue btw.

They're not checked at MOT, but under the Construction and Use regs you need one if your car was build after 1975(?). Incidentally if it was tested at MOT the absence of a bulb might be enough to make a case that there isn't a light fitted, would depend on the tester though.

Rice water.

My Bullit is awesome, use it for everything, Lyriks (U-Turn) for general riding, 888s for DH. Was a pretty cheap bike, though with the upgrades I've dropped almost 1k on it now. I would agree with the last poster regarding the bottom bracket height, it isn't very good in tight corners, I'm hoping that running it with Lyriks wound down to 115mm will help next time I go to a trail centre with it, if not it's no biggy.

If you only have one bike and want to do everything, you won't find something that doesn't have it's faults.

Oi! What the hell have you done to my bike???