I eventually realised that he actually enjoyed all the stress and the shouting and arguing, that was his fun time, he set things up like that on purpose so he could shout at some people.
Don’t be that guy !

Are some people really like that? I just don’t understand that at all. Sounds like a nightmare.

I want to do certain things on my holidays. My wife does too. Those things don’t always match up. However I have found (20 yrs experience) is that if I stop being selfish and make my wife have a great holiday I have a great holiday too. And I know she does the same for me (letting me ride the slickrock trail on my own in Moab when she couldn’t manage it was a great example!). Both happy.

If all you do is do things the way that pleases you then not even you will enjoy the holiday in the end. Unless you’re that selfish of course.

If you adjust it correctly and it binds when you turn the axle then the axle is bent. It might be just that bearing cover (not really a cover as mentioned above but just a locator for the rubber outer seal) is bent when the bike has been hit on the side (BMX with pegs is it?) in which case all should be ok as long as you can adjust it properly.

If the hub was a bit “grumbly” you may have already left it too late anyway, hopefully not, were the bearing races still smooth?

The problem is the list of rules and regs and fees are so long and complex now you’ve only got a chance of knowing them well if you’ve been buying and selling for a long time and keep up with all the changes.

eBay are facing more competition so they have to charge more the more business they lose – in this case they’ve seen a loophole people are using and closing it.

I don’t sell stuff on eBay now, it’s just not worth it. There’s loads of good stuff you can buy on these cheaply brand new but apart from that it’s a nightmare.

But a quill stem is adjustable with one Allen key? And it can go up and down without removing or faffing with spacers!

Get this headset for it…. http://pages.ebay.com/link/?nav=item.view&alt=web&id=191648261669&globalID=EBAY-GB

Some of the older lower range Konas had 1″ forks while their more expensive brothers converted to 1.125″

I have no idea why you would want to swap one of the best rigid forks ever made for something that won’t be as good, and won’t match and look weird. Stick with threaded, there’s nothing wrong with it.

I waited years for it to be put onto DVD as the VHS copy I had was wearing thin!!

My desert island disc number 1, slight cheat as there were 2 CD’s but hey ho. ;)

If anyone wants a remap for a VW Van I can recommend http://www.ecdigi.com very highly, specialises in VW vans and knows them like the back of his hand. Well worth contacting.

I go on retrorides website a lot and one of their rules is that if you don’t have something positive or constructive to say just don’t say it. I suppose it’s easier as they are talking about individual cars a lot of the time but it’s a nice place to be, plenty of posts and discussions. I like it here but I really wouldn’t want to meet some of the posters on here in real life as quite a few sound like negative argumentative whingers.

I don’t think my problem is as bad as some other so I’m hopeful this will work.

I wish I hadn’t seen that Klunker. Now I want one.

Been to the doctors this morning and was prescribed a 2 month course of Oxytetracycline – 224 tablets! They are an antibiotic. Slight problem is that they can make my skin photosensitive and I could get rashes but I’m doing a 3 day tour next week so was advised to start taking them after that.

Al – it’s blooming painful the ones I get and no fun at all now after 2 years of having them. :-(

Thanks for all the help guys.

Not bothered if they aren’t waterproof if cheaper and will dry out quickly. Some of the modern more casual mtb shoes tend to hold water for a long time and won’t dry out while riding.

Bikebuoy – did you get sore skin round your nose too? I get smaller spots around the sides of my nose at the bottom on top of really red and sore skin.

Did that drug actually affect you physically other than sorting the skin out then?

Those Giro ones look nice but are a bit spendy but worth a look. The Sidi ones just look like cycling shoes really.

Found the Specialized Cadet, they look ok and I know Spesh shoes fit me nicely.

Cut down on the Anabolic Steroids? See some truly terrible skin conditions in my local Power Lifting gym…..

I already have seborrahic dermatitis on my face and scalp as well as this acne so taking anything else which might make it worse would be a big no-no! My face would probably fall off!

I’m amazed people think pubs are important. :-/

Daleftw – which way did you come up Hartside? My Achilles went going up that on my C2C and I then had to walk most of the hills to Tynemouth from there. :-( The cafe at Hartside had some epic tiffin though which lifted my spirits after the beast of the uphill to it from the west.

That Euro touring bike is so typical Euro – no cares about what it looks like, just comfort all the way. Butterfly bars, Rohloff, Maguras – love it!

It’d be nice to start making some custom spacers and washers, I’m always finding I need to do something that would look great if I had a special bit of metal or something that I could make on a lathe. Just read about some safety stuff, I can see it’s very important and I’d probably have a checklist up around the machine I could work to – yes I am that organised!

Anyway, what sort of stuff have people made on these small lathes? Any examples people can share of bike specific stuff?

Thanks for the offer but too far away for us, we want to stay around Huddersfield. :-)

The house I put an offer in is the most expensive house on the street. I don’t like the fact they aren’t using an EA at all as it makes it very difficult to know what’s happening

They haven’t replied to my offer yet – the wait is killing me!

I like his videos because he rides a normal bike, rides normal trails or countryside and seems to actually go somewhere. There’s always loads of stuff he does which I genuinely think I could try to do myself, it isn’t all massive jumps and insane trials drops and tricks.

I would love a lathe but I have no idea how to use one, is it easy to pick up how to?

Monkeyfudger +1!

I suppose the best thing to do is make sure people take their property off the market if they accept an offer. If they don’t I would ask them why and explain that it would be hard for me to invest in legal stuff/searches/surveys if they might be looking for a higher offer (and therefore would result in me being gazumped).

Yeah I have thought of that, nothing I can do really as my maximum amount is just that, can’t go much higher!

One slight issue is that they don’t have an EA to advise them. The company they used to get their house on Rightmove are just an advertising company, not an EA, so I will be negotiating with the sellers myself. I would assume an EA would have advised them on the price for a start (what they have asked is a bit high) and maybe sold us as great buyers to them (we have already sold, don’t really have a chain as we are moving in with friends in the meantime). I think they are clever enough to realise all aspects of a offer are important but you never know.

A friend of mine accepted a great offer on a house of theirs and rejected all other offers but it turned out the great offer wasn’t backed up with a mortgage in place – they had to pull out quite quickly but the other interested parties had moved on and found something elsewhere.

I can’t wait till next year though, I have to move out end of August!

Thanks for the positive comments! We went through our finances last night and agreed what our max offer is. This first offer is a genuine offer of what I think it’s worth at its reasonable lowest amount. Not trying to get a mega bargain as we like the house a lot but the offer we have made is £10k less than they paid for it BUT they bought at the peak of the market in 2008.

We can go up a little and I will do as the house needs nothing doing to it and is pretty much perfect. Even has an electric garage door and a door into the kitchen from the garage – most important thing in my book!

I wouldn’t be shy about offering £30k under price, the worse they can do is say no.

It’s 14% less, which sounds a lot better than £30k less!

My sister was about to offer on a place a few years ago just around the corner from her house. She was walking round with my dad to show him and saw people clearing furniture out of a different house. Got chatting to the people who were relatives of the recently deceased owner. She looked a the house and shook hands on it 15 minutes later.

I had a drive round the area and found a house with a handwritten for sale sign outside it, enquired about the house there and then. Unfortunately it needed way too much work but its always worth checking in person around the area.

If you don’t cringe when you make your first offer, its not low enough

That’s a perfect way to put it!

Well I have just made a cheeky offer on the house we went to have a 2nd viewing on – offered 180k, asking price £210k

Well if you don’t ask???

Found out we may have to move out on the 28th Aug and we have nowhere to move to yet – thankfully some friends are putting us up for a while but I’d like to get an offer accepted somewhere soon!

Someone spat on Froome again???

A friend of mine just sold a retro steel bike that wasn’t as nice as that for £230. I’d say £300 would be a good price, especially with the Campag on it which looks in very good condition.

Maybe the TDF course suited him that year, but surely isn’t that the case for most winners anyway? If your weak point is climbing you’re not going to win, if you’re weak at TT’s you’ll certainly be at a disadvantage if there are 2 TT’s in there too.

You have to insure it for the price you would have to pay to replace it exactly the same. Unless components are not available any more (say retro/vintage stuff) the only way you’d replace the bike as it was is by buying the components again. As it would be done all in one go there isn’t any other way other than buying all the bits new. So what I do is total all the bits up, either the price I paid (if I had a receipt) or the price sold by Chain reaction or Wiggle at the time of calculation. You often find that, even if you bike has been superceeded and not available any more, that the figure you come up with closely matches how much it would cost for a full bike of equivalent modern quality.

My 1994 Kona Kilauea which had a ground up resto is insured for £1000 – it nearly cost that much for me to build but in reality to get a similar quality steel frame and forks with an XT group and nice Ti bits would cost about that much anyway.

My Spesh Pitch is insured for £2300, which again is around the price I would have to pay for a modern 6″ travel bike with XT/Hope bits.

I have an Exposure dynamo hub and a B&M front light/USB charger and rear brake and side light. Its very bright, fit and forget, and you can’t tell you have a dynamo hub at all, this new idea doesn’t seem like even half the quality/value. The light looks like Lego, and not good lego either….