Alcohol hand gel and a spoke worked wonders for me last week although as mttm said I ended up poking the spoke through the grips (can’t find the hole now) and slightly scratching the bars. I’ll try the zip tie method next time. Patience is a virtue though…it takes a little patience & perseverance to work the gel under the whole grip but it works well.

Cheers Trail_rat, that was my thinking when I compare the other products I’ve got. Just need to decide whether the extra storage space of the Koala over the Tiger would be missed.

It now works for me with the same model and spec as you although my HD has being dying for a few months now so I swapped out my original HD to a new 250gb SSD and dumped ALL my files on to the cloud so effectively all the SSD has on it is the system. Runs VERY fast now!

1 x sour (lemon / lime etc)
2 x sweet (sugar / honey etc)
4 x strong (whisky / brandy etc)
8 x weak (hot water)

Followed by 2 x paracetamol chasers and you’ll be out like a light!

nemesis – Member

This also might be worth considering
http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/thoughts-on-science-and-perception

Good article…just ignore what I said above and go ride both!

I spent time on both (Jones diamond frame / unicorn fork in 2.4 29er format v Mk1 Stooge with Stooge steel forks running a 29+ front end) and was able to carry out same day comparisons. I was looking to buy one as a ‘fill in’ bike whilst my custom fat frame was being built.

Funds eventually influenced my decision so I now own a Stooge Mk2. I’ve also ridden a Stooge Mk1 and a Stooge Ti.

I found the Stooge unicrown fork harsh

I’d agree with this. It’s a full rigid bike so no surprises but I’m now running with LB carbon 50mm rims & an On One carbon fatty fork. It’s a very different bike now and the front end just skips over things effortlessly. I’m about to press the button on some carbon loop bars to replace the aluminium ones which should smooth things out a little more.

I was also a little surprised that the rear end felt a little harsher than my previous Solaris. It’s a HT so no complaints but I was hoping for a little more vertical compliance. Incidentally the Ti Stooge has this vertical compliance.

clearances a little tight on the back end

I’d agree with this, hence why I went for the Mk2.

The Ti Stooge was simply lovely and I seriously thought about getting one. On fast rough trails the Ti compliance has to be ridden to be believed.

a fat front and a 29 x 50mm rim and 2.4 in the rear.

This is my next plan. I’ve just bought a SH front fat wheel so just need to get some 4.8’s Bud’s sorted.

My Jones flight time is short by comparison but here’s my 2 pennies worth. It was very nice & nimble without being twitchy. It ‘fitted’ me of the peg very well (probably better than the Stooge) and was very comfy. I’d say the font end on the Jones was possibly easier to loft but that may be down to the ‘normal’ 29 front end as opposed to the 50mm 29+ on the Stooge. I’d say that my current carbon front end combo on my Stooge is now as easy if not easier to loft.

I’ve had to play about with stem length on the Stooge as I initially found it a bit too twitchy on slow techy trails but have settled on 70mm. By comparison the Jones also ran a 70mm but never gave me twitchy issues.

As bedmaker says, a high front end is the way to go if you’re sticking with rigid. They are both very confidence inspiring, not forgetting that they are both rigid bikes so have their limitations. Coming from a 120mm Cotic Solaris, it took me a wee while to get used to a high front end as my head kept saying that the front end would be too light and wash out in corners. In reality, there’s more front end grip than I’ll ever need.

If you can try both and your budget allows you to choose, then a test ride is obviously a good way forward.

Paceman – Member
I’m running a Dirt Wizard up front with a Chupacabra on the rear…

Where’d you get the Chupacabras from? Heard good things about them…

I just swapped my front end Chronicle for a DW and although its a smudge smaller the extra grip is welcome in the mud.

AWRE you say…do you have a geiger counter handy or does it glow in the dark?

Unless it’s something to do with bike building…I’d be a nice person and sell it!

So…are there any automatic watches that have alarms as per my original query? I’ve searched the world but have come up with not a lot within my price range!

The St Moritz Pathfinder looks nice…might be just the job. Thanks….

Ex-sparky here…the things you can do with an old coat hanger!

I just form a small hook on each end of a straightened hanger and leave one end hooked through the end of the chain whilst it’s ‘frying”. It also means you don’t get burnt fingers as the other end of the hanger isn’t near the hot oil when I ‘hang’ the chain on an old nail above the tin after frying.

I recon it takes me no more than 15mins to do the whole thing which is more than enough time to fettle / clean / caress everything else on my bike!

Simples…

I’ve been using Putoline for the last 11 weeks after recommendations following my post here and so far it’s the best stuff I’ve used to date.

To date and with 420 very muddy miles under the belt my new chain is still nowhere near the 0.5% wear mark.

The trails here in sunny Glasgow are the muddiest I’ve ever seen them so I usually just give the chain a rub down with an old rag after each ride and dunk it every 75 – 100miles or as it starts to get a bit crunchy. I don’t apply anything else in between ‘dunks’ and thus far…it’s the business. I just heat the tub up on an old camping gas stove 😯 and leave the chain to ‘cook’ for 5 mins or so and then lift it out and let it hang on an old nail above the tin…any excess oil just drips back into the tub. I know this is a risky way of doing it as the hot oil could catch fire so after reading some of the posts above I’ve just bought a cheap deep fat fryer from amazon for a few quid…thanks for the tip 🙂

It’s a little more faff but I don’t go through the same cleaning regime as highlighted in my previous thread so I’m happy!

Yesterday but hey ho…2 x Light Bicycle carbon 29+ 50mm rims….now to build them up to go with the new On One fatty carbon fork for my Stooge!

Having owned a Mk2 for just over a month, I’m still getting used to it. I’ve come via a 2 x FS (Orange 5s) to 3 x different HTs all with circa 120mm travel, the last one being a Cotic Solaris which then morphed into a full rigid carbon fork and 29+ front end.

I’m still forming my opinions on the Stooge but it does feel (to me) a little harsher in the rear than my last rig with the same rim, tyre combo (P35 / On One chunky monkey) but it works much better for me on 95% of all my local trails.

I can only compare it to my Solaris which laterally ran with a On One carbon fork and 29+ tyres. To me, the Stooge has got bags more front end grip, it’s considerably more comfortable with the higher front end and it’s much easier to pop over fallen trees and big rocks. It’s much more playful too and always make me laugh out loud when it’s up at a good speed with a few wee jumps thrown in. I agree, it can get a bit hairy when at speed on big terrain but it’s a fully rigid bike and in comparison to the fully rigid Solaris it’s much better fun.

It would have been good to hear Gregs views on how it handled on a wider spectrum of terrains and how he felt it fitted him compared to all the other bikes I’m sure he’s ridden.

At the end of the day, every bike is a compromise in terms of what it’s good at, they all have their pros and cons.

I’m happy.

So has anyone tried anything bigger than a 29+ on the front of their Stooge? I’m thinking the on one carbon fatty forks which maintain the 55deg offset but running 26×4.8?

The Foo Fighters in Edin on the 8th Sep
Kevin Bridges in Glasgow in the 21st Sep.

Looking forward to both, especially as they’re both free… 😆

US aren’t answering emails, so seeing if anyone in the UK has them.

Just PM’d you re an alternative…

Do I need to design another feature into this custom frame of yours?

Nope! Just messing with my current rig and wondered about the transferability. Any sign of those rims yet? 😉

No, yes, new headset.

OK, thanks… 🙁

😆

That grass needs a wee trim & the shed could also do with a paint…have you been sitting on your backside all day?! 😀

dalhalvaig will be along in a minute…I think he’s had mixed success with his. Keeps the face splatter free but that’s about it.

OP here….grinding it all out and not hosing the chain post ride is now the plan.

Because I’m sad I’ll probably still measure the chain to see how this new plan compares with the ‘pre-enlightenment’ maintenance regime.

Now the final decision…dry lube or wet? 😀

I run my own Contruction / Project Management company.

It’s just coming up for 2 years old so it’s still very up & down but still learning loads about how to do things better. Overall it’s a B+. Making enough to make ends meet is a D- but I’ll keep flogging the horse until I dream up a better way to make a living!

It’s a reflective process…i.e. “well that approach didn’t work…let’s try this one”!

The up side is I get to ride whenever I want to which is no bad thing.

yes, yes you are

I’ll get me coat 😳

A new Rohloff sprocket, £6 chain and two £20 chainrings in 10,000 miles costs £72. You fitting a new £16 chain every 500 miles for 10,000 miles costs £320. Just ride them until they don’t work and ignore your chain checker.

Mmmm…probably the correct way to look at it.

I suppose the only draw back to this is that the chain will stretch to a point where my sliding dropouts on the rear can no longer take up the slack.

I’m over thinking this!

So I’ve just read Sheldon Browns article on chain wear and after taking my old Izumi chain to bits the chain is a ‘bushed’ chain.

linky

From what I understand, a bushed chain makes it more difficult for the oil / lube to get to the pins which lie inside the rollers BUT it keeps more of the dirt out.

I think I’ll be ‘cleaning’ it less often and just applying lube on top of the old lube to see what happens.

KMC do a couple of bushless chains so if the above doesn’t produce longer wear times I’ll give one of them a go.

Fair point re allowing the lub to build up. I always worked on the premise that I should try and get any dirt off the chain before applying new lub as the old dirt will get dragged into the rollers and create a very effective grinding paste…maybe I’ll give that a go going forward.

And what chain?

It’s an 1/8th Izumi silver track chain

There’s probably a marginal drop in efficiency from running chains that are 1%+ worn

It’s not the efficiency that bother me, it’s the chain ring / sprocket wear.

bonesetter – Member
It’s not full + in the rear

A Vee fits, and a 29 2.4 Ardent

When you say the Vee fits, do you mean the 27.5×2.8 or 29×3 Vee?

Here’s the Dirt Wizard on my ‘customised’ Reba RLT.

As above they are smaller so there’s considerably more clearance on the Reba than with the Chronicle.

Haven’t ridden them yet but I’d be tempted to keep this set up with the bouncy fork and just use the Chronicle on the rigid fork.

29×3 dirt wizard by Rosscopeco[/url], on Flickr

Mangina…says it all really

At last…just in time for winter coming…if summer ever decides to appear.

IME…oh, and I run a Rohloff so it’s cheating.

If it’s been a wet / mucky ride or when I see visible dirt on the chain, then I hose it down (not jet wash) dry it with a rag and (sometimes) blow it down with an air compressor to make sure as much of the water has been forced out. I’m currently using Progold prolink oil and I carefully oil between the plates…as I understand it the pins wear not the plates so oil between the plates is where it all happens. I clean it properly maybe once every 600 miles / every 2ish months with a Park chain cleaner and lots of hot water / fairy liquid.

IWFM…just changed chain after 13 months of use and circa 3K miles before it hit the 0.5% wear mark.

…and I do rate what Sheldon Brown says!

I’ve used Bain Engineering Ltd in Blanefield several times for bike related specialist engineering / machining. He’s got a machine shop full of top notch machinery inc lots of the old stuff that will still be working by the time I’m pushing the daisies up.

He’s an ex-rolls royce machinist and knows his stuff….good reasonable prices too.

The front page was too slow and behind the curve…bit like myself come to think of it!

reksa…as you’ve highlighted, the actual volume of oil differs significantly from the service guide ones.

I too had this issue when servicing my 2012 Reba RLT’s so I called round a couple of the well known tuning companies and they both stated that it’s a trial and error process. All the oil is forced through a very small top port in the damper cartridge so if you don’t leave enough room for the oil to expand above the port then you’ll not get the full travel…too little and you won’t be able to lock out….hence the trial and error bit.

I was advised to cycle the whole damper assembly when I had the whole thing stripped down and to make sure that I got full travel & lock out before putting it all back together. As you say, the bottom of the cartridge needs to ‘just’ sit in the oil. One tech guy suggested I could play about with this level of insertion and therefore adjust the forks behaviour when being compressed but that all sounded a bit too much for my usual riding so I stuck with what I had…IWFM!

Sorry if that doesn’t provide you with an exact number but I hope it helps a little.

just make one?
Find the biggest can that fits in your pot of choice,
find a can that’s a bit smaller. youtube the construction of wood gas stove.
bash on.

Spot on suggestion joshvegas….thanks.

Found the perfect size tin from our old paint tin collection in the garage. Now for some fettling!

Todays weather was lovely so headed out for a dry spin and a brew at a quite spot in the woods. Twig stove worked really well and despite a very soggy few days I was really chuffed to got it lit easily with a few strikes on a fire stick onto some old mans beard and a thin pine feather stick. It’s only the second fire this year I’ve managed to get going with tinder lying about as opposed to me stuffing some in my rucksack. The brupot worked great again and is taking on a nice black colouring on the bottom.

I’m now hunting for a smaller twig stove of the same design that I could either fit the Brupot / Ti mug into or visa versa.

Twig stove by Rosscopeco[/url], on Flickr

Twig stove by Rosscopeco[/url], on Flickr

Yes…got my Chinese copy of eBay for a few quid. To date I’ve used it more than gas. For me a wee cuppa tea and a roasted troll taste way better when you manage to light a few twigs with a magnesium fire stick and some dry tinder.

eBay linky

IMO (not that I own a particularly niche brand) but I’d have thought it’s about riding something where everything works together very very well: all the components, the frame, the geo work perfectly together.

I bought a Rohloff hub several years ago and just think it’s the best thing since sliced bread…IWFM. It might not for others but it does for me. I’m happy to apply the same logic to every bit of a bike cause at the end of the day when I’m miles into the woods and everything works perfectly then I’m a happy bunny IMO

I’d also have though that admiring something that’s taken years of honed skill to perfect is what some people get from owning these brands. I saw a Nicoli frame the other day and the welding was just lovely to look at…did it ride well….I’ve no idea but if I owned something like that I’d be stopping ever 10mins to sit down and look at it again!

If I was to calculate how much time I spend thinking about the ‘perfect’ set up / bike v the amount of time I spend riding, it’s heavily weighted on the former. That’s all part of the fun for me.

Another thing I’ve noticed over the years is that when it’s easier financially to buy something the less enjoyment I get out of it…and the more expensive something is to buy the more upset I get when I break it!