+1 for the Aldi watch. One of the best battery lives out there. It’s nice and light, you don’t realise you’re wearing a GPS watch. You can still export as a gpx for Strava. Not sure on the waterproofness, it says up to 30m, then in the instructions it says avoid getting wet. Hmmm.

I’ve had one for 12 years, change the battery every four years. The solar charging doesn’t seem to do jack.

What about a used 705? That’s what I have and it works well.

Look at the difference between .gpx and .tcx. I personally prefer .tcx. The auto routing part of the Garmin is a bit carp!.tcx, you follow waypoints as opposed to letting the Garmin try and navigate you to the best of its ability.

Cheers, I did try my LBS who is a Trek dealer but I think he may have just palmed me off as he didnt want the hassle. I’ll try a bigger shop next.

I know of a 2007 Enduro Pro Carbon for sale…

We stayed in Riverside Palace for four nights. When hearing that is was our honeymoon, we got offered an upgrade. Usually 50euros a night but we could have it for 200! Bargain.

We booked direct with them, nowt fancy but the beds are hard and the aircon didn’t work.
If you havent been before, everyone is trying to rip you off. Best and cheapest coffee was Maccy Dees!

Ooo, never thought of the warranty. I have read that its for 12 Months, then another 12 months covered by the seller. Apple in this case. I’ll give them a call. Cheers.

I don’t really want to leave my phone with one of those @phone repair shops’. I have too much work (yes, real work!) related data on there and simply don’t trust them. Nor do I know what battery they are fitting.
That’s why I was wondering if anyone had managed to buy a decent battery online. I’ve changed other batteries and screens myself so will be able to do the job.

Works fine, get the same battery life as I did from the old one.

That’ll be 3 hours for me then!!

Ask for a pot of the paint they have used. It’ll be like a magnolia chalk board in there. You only have to look at the walls for them to mark. And you cant wipe off the marks, as they only put 0.001nm of paint on the walls.

Our Bovis home came with tiles and door handles and all the while goods. It also came with plaster dust everywhere. Hairline cracks on the stairs, smallest garage ever and a lovely rubble garden.
Bovis do give you a 2 yr warrantee on everything, including white goods, then a 10 yr guarantee on the building.

Blackwoods 60% and Fevertree

Ive just bought a Giant TCX 2. Really like it.

Thank you very muchly, much appreciated!

I have spent the weekend trying to get my head around this Garmin mapping system. Are you able to clear a few things up for me please?

So the gmapsupp.img is a map, correct? When I select and add maps with MapInstall, how does this differ from just copying the .img file directly to the sd card?
I can choose between the maps I’ve added with MapInstall on the Garmin’s menu. How do I choose between the .img files I’ve added? Surely as they have the same name only one is allowed on the sd card?

Thank you again for the maps, will try them out tomorrow. And thanks if you are able to clear up my badly worded questions above!

It’s cavitating. Mine did this and its a warranty job. The kind guys at Mojo sent me a Kashima one as a replacement!

I prefer the chest mount too. It gives better perspective.
However, do a few test videos to make sure its angled correctly. I got 5 hours of my stem at coed y brenin.

Yeah, better be safe than sorry!
Different one this time… :roll:

Hence the :wink:

You will need 205 60 R16 size tyres.
Someone who doesn’t understand tyre sizes obviously,

But thanks for playing

Lots of other sizes will also fit without any problems at all, as mentioned above.

The 215/55/16 offered above being a perfect example.
Yes, I do actually know how tyre sizes work thank you very much.
He wanted to keep the size the same, not something you can do when fitting a DIFFERENT size tyre.
Thank you for playing :wink:

You will need 205 60 R16 size tyres.

Jamie, thank you for your link, lots of reading over a coffee tomorrow.

garthmerenghi, our scheme is Cycle to Work through Halfords too. But there is a network of LBSs that take the vouchers. Interesting that they managed to get the croix de fer even though it’s more than a grand. I thought £1k was the absolute limit on the cycle to work scheme.
And yes, I would certainly rebuild a halfrauds bike!

http://2014.merida-bikes.com/en_gb/bikes/2014/Cyclo+Cross+4-1215.html
This looks good too. Any opinions?

You might want to have a look at section 4 of the official guidance:

I can read! :wink:
My company isn’t bothered really, they realise I’m not going to commute 100 miles a day.

Thanks for the hint on the Kinesis, having a look at it now.
Tricross is 9 speed in my price range isnt it? Thats so 2010! But otherwise the Tricross would be top of my list.

Ahh yes, Apex. Thanks!

The Giant does look tasty and my LBS can get it in as opposed to going through Halfrauds. I don’t like to think of myself as a bike snob but sometimes it cant be helped!

Thanks for the heads up on the rims. I was hoping to fit some 28 tyres to the bike as I’m riding the Norwich 100 with work. Told them I’d do it if they signed up to the cycle to work scheme!

Commuting, I already get up at 0430 to be in work by 0700 and I get home at 1830 so going any part of that on a bike will be murder!

Oh my goodiness, haven’t seen the hoover one before!

unless you’re French and like your steaks ‘badly injured’ rather than ‘medium rare’

Just spat coffee at the computer screen! :lol:

http://4h10.tumblr.com/

It has been posted before but there are some cracking cafe racer pics on here

How long have those poor blokes been doing that drill?! They have dried a route through that puddle!

I mean, £800 for 3 days of snow

I spent £120 for a set of steel wheels and £272 for 4 Falken Eurowinter 449 tyres.
That’s less than I’ll lose for two days of not getting to work because of snow. So it can snow for three days and I’ll have made it work for me.

Not ALL winer tyres are worse in the wet. Have a look here at these reviews http://www.tyres-pneus-online.co.uk/tyres-full-tests.html

Please don’t. I don’t want your smoke in my kids’ lungs ta.

Umm, what do you think happens when the filter is clogged?
It dumps all that nice black soot out the back, usually in the countryside where you are doing a higher speed with more revs, as opposed to town driving.
That’s how they are designed to work. If they prevented all the bad stuff coming out, they’d be called a catalytic converter.

Remap all the way.
Those chips are generic and may be harmful to your engine. All the do is confuse your ECU into thinking more or less air is entering the manifold, thus increasing the fuel flow. There are alot more parameters that need to be taken into account.
You can get tuning boxes that plug into the OBD2 port, these have a bespoke map for your car. Often you can get a few maps wich you can switch between. Useful if your car gets serviced by a main stealer. About £200.
A rolling road map is even better but more £££.

I have a map loaded onto my ECU, the guy comes to your car, fiddles with it, drives it and then if you’re happy, loads the map for you. Its permanent though.
Always read the reviews and dont go for the cheapest!

Yip, smaller taller steelies for the win!
My Mondeo has 235 40 ZR18 for summer and 205 55 R16 for winter.
The poverty spec Mondoe comes with 16 inch steelies but it has the same brakes. So check what the poverty / rep spec version of your car uses, could be smaller steelies.

have a look on the DIY lights forum on MTBR. There are holders available…
http://lmgtfy.com/?q=18650+battery+holder

Yeah, I’m all for a short working day. When I got offered the job, it was 0730 til 1600. With an hour commute. Now it’s 0715 til 1700 and every second Sunday for me. The overtime is at x1.5 and weekends at x2. That’s we the blokes want the hours, but in the end something will give. Either a major accident or illness. Neither one we can afford to have against the companies name.
Thanks everyone, I did just think it was HR’s interpretation of the Working Dir. I’ll tell everyone that it’s company policy and they’ll just have to suck it up buttercup!
Surely that should be the management that do that… Haha!

No shift pattern, just 12 on 12 off. There are a select few that pattern but everyone is complaining. As usual!

I totally agree mikewsmith and matt. You need down time to perform at work. I need downtime to ave coffee and ride my bike! Its only a few of the guys that are wanting to work like machines, but they are after something written down by HR.

argee, again, couldn’t agree more. She hasn’t been here a month and is already causing problems on the yard.

So its an interpretation of the law that says about the day off after 6 days work. The Working Time Directive doesn’t mention the length of the shift, just that you are entitled to a break after so many days.
When we were doing shorter shifts, we could work as many days as we wanted. Now they are just greedy, give them an inch and they will take a yard. Or however that saying goes.

I’ll tell them tomorrow that its new company policy and and they must just enjoy their Sundays off!

I was slow to type there!
Sandwich, well spotted! We are onshore.
I’m all for a weekend off. I only work every second Sunday and my usual Mon to Fri. Got to have time for my bikes too.

Drac, I think thats what the Dragon saw too, but everyone here is concentrating on the ‘entitle’ part, thinking is isnt mandatory.
That 13 week period is interesting, they are doing it as a 2 week period. And the 12hr days are only until Crimbo. So theoretically we could work 12hr all the time.

Thanks for links. I didnt mention, we are on shore so cant pull the off shore working practices!

Before the increase to the 12 hrs, the guys were doing 11:30 a day, 7 days a week, every week without a problem. Most of them are greedy and want the extra half an hour, but they will be worse off because they are being forced to take the days off.
I’ll just tell them its company policy and they must stop wingeing!

The Oil & Gas sector are very concerned with time lost to accidents and is one of the major factors when attracting clients.