Thanks for the info, good to know how secure they are tho.

Think ill phone my insurance and ask them about it.

Thats good to hear, it does look like a good bit of kit.

ChrisI – Member

philwarren11 – Member

Crazy money for a cassette and chain. That 42t general lee thing doesnt look as bad now price wise.

Not so sure you know.

I paid £230 for my XX1 cassette on Bike-Discount. The General Lee is £107 and a PG1070 is what £60? So yes its an extra £60 for one more gear with the spread being both higher and lower than the General Lee can manage. But we don’t know how long the General Lee will last. Reports I’ve read is that the XX1 cassette is lasting way longer than XX and more than general ones like the PG1070, so I would be too sure its bad value for money just yet compared to buying the cheaper 10sp versions and a General Lee. The rest of XX1 (or XO1 once the prices drop after initial release), its pretty reasonably priced compared to 10sp, in a most cases a bit more expensive and some bits cheaper. Admittedly the whole lot could be a bit cheaper but I can see why the cassette takes 3hrs of machining now I have one.

But dont you need to add on the cost of a 10sp chain. Plus if you already have a 1×10 setup, changing to the general lee to get that range is WAY cheaper than a 1×11 setup.

Crazy money for a cassette and chain. That 42t general lee thing doesnt look as bad now price wise.

Rowsells Tony Le Mesmer stare scared me.

Doesnt look like blade will be a new W2 link imo. The route i’ve seen is around skyline top loop area, around heartburn and joyrider which means they might put in a new W2 singletrack link.

Here’s the plan…

http://www.vattenfall.co.uk/en/penycymoeddwindfarm/file/FactSheet_Forrest_Users.pdf_23632419.pdf

One of the three trails, in current state, will have to share a climb or descent unless they put in another climb/descent which looking at that map there will be branching off the bottom of joyrider on skyline.

I cant wait personally, I can ride from my house onto skyline pretty easy so this additional stuff in the skyline area is gonna be awesome for me.

Good times.

Blaengarw for an hour.

Only whites climb and descent and some of penhydd is missing trees.The wall hasnt lost any trees, windy point, energy and goodwood on whites are still wooded and awesome.

Where theyre planning on putting this new Blade trail is proper heavy tree line stuff.

Skyline is all still rideable if you know it or have a GPS map phone thingy.

Nothing wrong with the changes to Whites in my opinion, even tho I do miss the old descent, even that is coming back tho.

New trail Blade and Penhydd will be open end of this year apparently, probably put back coz Back On Track have been working on gethin so much.

Afan is in the middle/end of an awkward time due to the windfarm and tree disease but will come back better than it was in my opinion.

Totally agree, it was blaengarw which got me most excited about gethin.

Also got some of my best strava bragging rights at blaengarw which always helps. lol.

I reccomend doing the full loop, then do the official shortcut, its an extra bit of trail before linking onto the black just after the rock garden, which means you get all the drops and most of the best bits of the black without that steep climb up to the top.

Isnt it like 3.50 to park in afan and glyncorrwg? I’m more than happy to pay 5 quid to ride what they got on offer.

Easy climb for 8-10 mins down sounds like a great XC route to me, dont know why people are moaning about it. Probably same people who moan about taking some rocks out of cwmcarn.

150mm bikes will be more than capable to do most of the stuff there i reckon.

Just over an hour to brechfa.

3.5months on my SRAM PF30 before it died. Onto a FSA one now.

If that goes soon ill get a Wheels Manufacturing one.

singlespeedstu – Member

Shame they couldn’t have inhereted the chair lift that used to be on the other side of the valley.

Was never a chairlift there, it was a button lift.

I got an opening day uplift booked, cant wait!

I live up the rhondda if you needed any help with routes.

Whats the planned route for Number 1 option?

Tubeless. Just not for me.

Just dont ride all the way down, push up back to the fence up the middle path. Use two cars with a mate, park one at the bottom, drive one up to the top up by the mast, ride up to the mast, session the fence area when you wanna finish ride all the way down and drive back up to the other car.

Sram 10 speed powerlinks arent re-usable. Go for a KMC chain which comes with a re-usable link.

Why not a zee mech? One of the good things abotu 1×10 is being able to use a short mech.

I personally wouldnt run a 1×10 without a chainguide, even if it has a stepped teeth thingy.

Get some shorter chainring nuts and bolts as well unless your 2x setup are ok.

Any margam park getting route, and two more (penhydd and blade) at afan!

All go round here.

sunglasses shop, 15% off with voucher QUCO15 and 10% cash back with Quidco, got some Frogskins this morning with that bad boy.

Change the pads earlier. 3mm thick including the back plate is what they need, which looks like theres plenty of meat left on them.

Just gone 1×10 with a 33t and 11-36, MRP 1x top guide and X9 clutch mech. Second ride in i got a dropped chain, but this was hammering it down the final descent on the Wall at Afan. Ive taken some links out on the chain which should help and ive got a bottom device to try if it keeps coming off.

As for gearing it would be nice to have an easier granny but nothing i cant get used to and im not that fit, and about 19st geared up. All my climbs were PR’s on the second ride on saturday in the heat so it must be ok.

Thanks for the info, ill keep the water in the frame in mind tho.

Dont think im feeling that flush for a CK one. lol.

Ive got a wanga frame, new alu one, was given to me by Halfords as googdwill as i snapped my Bokor frame. Decently slack and ok weight, rides really well. For the money with all the XT kit and Revs its a quality buy in my opinion.

Done Cwmcarn uplift with my new 500 on my bars on Saturday. I still have it.

I live in south wales. Most people I ride with ride a 26″ FS, and if they dont they are saving to buy a one.

Yes its graded a blue but only because its slightly tougher than the green section. The blue at penhydd will be a proper blue imo. Similar to that of Blaengarw, fast and swooping.

Thinking about it, i reckon its part of the new stuff they plan on doing as part of the windfarm thing, seen here… http://www.vattenfall.co.uk/en/penycymoeddwindfarm/file/FactSheet_Forrest_Users.pdf_23632419.pdf

Go to Blaengarw for that. Also gethin will be open soon for that as well.

Link here, they sneakily added it to the trail notice, thats as much info as we know.

http://www.afanforestpark.co.uk/pdf/AFPMTBTrails120613.pdf

When are you going?

Skyline is ruined, and Penhydd is shut(re-opening end of this year along with another 30k trail called Blade, some old sections are stil rideable, same with Skyline, its all rideable), Whites has changed but is still superb. The wall has had lots of additional work, route options, extra loops and the bike park.

I would also throw Blaengarw into the mix if you’re doing a weekend in Afan. You can ride to it from Afan if you wanted some natural stuff.

Im local so know whats going on pretty well.

You can load a route onto most garmin devices and it will tell you where to go. It wont show a map but will tell you when to turn left/righ etc…

I use ridewithgps to create a course then upload it to my Garmin 405, i add some extra cue points prior to the turn and just follow it.

780 superstar for me, didnt even try one ride on my Stumpy that came with 720mm bars. I’m wide and 780 feels spot on for me.

Any chain reaction ones kicking about?

Its about 15 mins from Bridgend M4 junction, consists of a black run running into a blue for the final descent, making 4 miles. You can do loops of the blue or black, or shortcut to the bottom half of the black and so on. Great fun.

Park here and its superbly signposted.

https://maps.google.com/?ll=51.625904,-3.591548&spn=0.000517,0.000877&t=h&z=20

Do a youtube search of bleangarw trails or mtb. Nice little rock garden in the middle of the descent.

Probably my favourite trail in south wales, and im local. lol.

You do need upper body. Only thing that ever aches for me the day after a decent ride is my upper body.

For some extra smiles on those places i’d throw in 2 amazing 4 mile routes, Cwm Rhaedr when doing Brechfa and Blaengarw when doing Afan.

Bump.

My rear constantly vibrates when they get hot on my stumpy evo. Only real fix ive seen is to by deore/slx/xt etc…

180mm HS-1 rotors with Specialzed organics and Superstar Sintered and Elixir 5’s