It seems that, judging by the tone of many of the replies, a fair proportion of you must ride your bikes exclusively on man-made trails or roads; the minute you ride on singletrack you’re at risk of causing damage. Fair enough.

There’s plenty of singletrack in the wooded areas of Swinley without the need to ride in the cleared areas, also, just to be pedantic, all the trails at Swinley are man made. As the tree’s are clear felled, the endangered species move back in to the cleared areas.

but I strongly disagree – humans are the dominant species on this planet and we should not be bombarded by this endless guilt propaganda about the catastrophic consequences of our actions. I’m all for protecting the earth from the obvious harm of global warming/pollution/resource depletion/paedophiles etc., but why should we have our enjoyment to roam freely on our bikes curtailed by a few ground-nesting birds?

Unfortunately, people with this kind of attitude are not an endangered species, They need culling. It’s no wonder the planet is in a state as it is.

Get these.

Next generation LED chip, reasonably priced and the closest to Halogens in terms of lumen output and colour(if you go for warm white) I’ve seen so far.

As a QPR supporter, I am most pleased this has happened. 😀 😀

Being fitting LEDs around various commercial sites for a while now, If you are going for a “dedicated LED” then have a look at JCC’s Fireguard LED7’s.

On the other hand, These 6Watt Gu10’s from megaman are very good. They are a next generation LED, and are much better than any of the other retrofit LEDS we’ve fitted so far. Colour rendering is the closest to halogen I’ve yet seen.

Were they being chased by a dog?

Fenton!!! Jesus Christ….

If only. It would have made short work of the dog and the owner.

Not been attacked, but had run ins with two of them in Richmond park of all places.

The first one was sitting by the track in the ferns and the first I knew about it was when it jumped back into the ferns right alongside me. all I saw was it’s back legs disappearing.

The second on the same ride was on the track when I came round the corner. Caught it in the lights, it just carried on doing what it was doing. It then turned and looked at me. A small voice in the back of my head said sh*t…I was only about fifteen feet away. It then trotted off into the bushes.

I feel sorry for the guys who build the trails (who some morons in this thread won’t to stop) that do all the trail work only to have a load of brake dragging squids turn up and get stoked every weekend but never lift a spade.

Perhaps they should build trails to a better spec?

The troll is having a rather large three course meal tonight gents.

Or hang around outside the American school in Cobham and i’m sure you’ll find one asap.

[Just up the drive on the RHS is a nice place to wait, apparently. Leave you parking lights on and shortly some one will be along and fill your box in for you. or something]

😆

About to fit 24 Led downlighters into a new open plan kitchen so will lurk with some interest in what others have to say…..

Being a commercial electrical installation business, we have installed all sorts of LED’s. Here’s my take on it:

1: Replacing 12v? If each fitting has its own transformer, replace with 12v LED and replace the transformer with an LED driver. Old wire wound halogen transformers are better suited to take the low wattage required by LEDS, electronic halogen transformers require a minimum amount of watts before they operate. OR,

2: Convert to 230v. This would usually require replacing the 12v fitting with a GU10 and the wiring going to it, but also take into account the type of LED bulb you are fitting in relation to the width of fitting. While the LED bulbs are designed to fit into GU10 fittings, a lot of the fittings have spring clips that hold the fitting onto the ceiling. Depending on your ceiling thickness(sometimes two layers of plasterboard as a fire barrier) this my force the springs in and may fowl on the bulkier type of LEDS. Also consider how much depth between the floor above and ceiling below along with fire barrier ratings.

3: If the 12v’s are not supplied by an individual transformer, have fun ripping up floorboards and the like looking for it and the junction box.

4: Retro fit Vs purpose built LED fitting. Retro fits are designed to fit into Halogen, All I can say that get a good quality LED bulb from GE/Sylvania/Osram/Philips/Toshiba/Samsung. These may be twice the price, but the light output is better.

As for purpose built fittings, retro fit LED bulbs are restricted width wise because they have to fit into existing 12v/GU10 fittings, so you may get three or four LEDs per bulb. Purpose built fittings like these ones are wider and as such have more LED’s in them which does improve light output further. Once again they are a little more expensive, but having installed these ourselves they are among the best we’ve used so far.

Since this is a bike forum the bias will be towards Wiggins, and for the general public Ennis/Farah/miserable jock 😉 , But for me it has to be David Weir.

Too many Part P monkey’s running about.

Sky have ruined football have they! Haha what a stupid comment…. The Premier League is the most watched league on the planet as footballers can make a mint through extortionate wages and most of the clubs are in debt thanks to them.

Fixed it for you.

Sky coverage is more professional – BBC seems a bit too light hearted (to me) now, which probably good for the casual fan, but I much prefer Skys offering. Crofty and Brundle are the perfect commentary team.

Sky have ruined it, just like they ruined the football, with too much statistical and in depth blarney. They have taken two enjoyable forms of sport, and in an effort to justify the amount of money they are ripping their viewers off with, filled it with not particularly important stuff. BBC show what matters.

Begs the question, why you ask? The best time to ride them is in winter in the dark when they close the gates, sometimes all you hear is a deer and the odd light reflection in the not to distant ! Ace.

In the dark on the Tamsin trail for me. Met a few Badgers one March.

Mines exactly the same. Never really thought about it. The front mech is original, I’m sure I’ve replaced the cable once in the 11 years I’ve had it.

They aren’t DH, fro-riders, take the piss out of each other,

I ride with them quite often, they are a nice bunch. I’ll even admit to meeting Hora on a few occasions.

Piss taking is optional.

Are there any with laaaaadies?

There are now more female riders around on the Surrey hills than a few years ago, but I haven’t seen any specific groups yet.

I know you don’t like the look of the Trance but you can pick a TranceX 3 from here. They are great bikes.

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder and all that, but the Trance looks a lot better than those ugly spuds you’ve posted. 8)

I like football. I like it even more when it irritates morons.

I remember this bloke from a few years back.

I thought he had died.

Ah, I don’t think the company I use venture out of South London and Surrey.

My sister had timber replacement windows, but once again very London focused company.

Are there any friends/relatives/neighbours who have had replacement windows recently? Even if they are UPVC, a lot of the companies do timber as well.

I’ve just had nine windows replaced in my house(not timber). I had five different companies come round, one was stupid cheap and a bit vague, and Anglian quoted £19k! They then went through the usual crap of “we have a special deal on”, and “I’ll talk to my manager…we can give another two grand off” etc, etc. They still came in £3k over what three of the others were quoting.

Once I had told Anglian we weren’t going to use them and who we were going with, they did nothing but slag them off.

There are a lot of small glazing companies out there at the moment, who don’t have the overheads the larger companies such as Anglian have, so it’s very competitive market. Choosing one is a different matter, I chose one because a neighbour had their windows done by the same company two years ago, so I popped in to see how they were holding up.

I’m very pleased with the quality. What part of the world are you from?

In the woods to the right-hand side of the 13th hole at my golf club. Used the old “feet at the base of a tree, hang on to the trunk and lean back” stance to give room. Then used my undercrackers for the wipeage and buried both.

Thats simply unacceptable behavior. Playing Golf. 8)

@brooess – what’s wrong with Park Life ? Hardly unridable.

YP will always be Parklife to me. I think what Brooess is alluding to is that a lot of work was carried out on it a few years back, but this year the trail has been going south, so just needs a little TLC to keep it running sweet.

would never employ an electrician who has just completed an intensive course, no experience.

This in massive spades. To me, all these training companies offering electrical courses are like those companies who offered IT training in the early 2000’s, they will happily take your money, possibly offer you placement, but in the end its not enough.

Better to get onto an apprenticeship, pay isn’t good, Which is why the more mature student who wants to switch careers will struggle financially with it.

Qualifications is one thing, but experience counts.

Have an accident. When the H&S womble turns up to investigate, and then you can knock yourself out 😉 asking him/her questions.

And where’s the nearest ski slope?

That’s a joke, right?

The nearest place I can think of that gets snow is the stirling range North of Albany, and the snow doesn’t fall often.

These fellows from up the road in Farnborough, may be of use to you.

Tunnel hill Trolls

Bloody awful mate! The Bikeradar review gave them 2 stars out of 5… I’d say that was being generous, and 1 of those stars at least was cos they do have a very well constructed carcass and are light for their size.

Curious, I’ve used the standard Alberts(2.25″) from Wales, Surrey to the Alps, and they were good.

The £9.99 a go Michelin Dry2’s in 2.3″ from On One are infinitely better in just about all conditions, and they’re designed to be dry use only.

Those tyres do squirm a bit.

Been using the old faithful Schwalbe NN/RR combo.

So it was the tattooed one who organised it for his groupies to race in?

What a shocka.

Avoriaz is easy from Morzine, you might even try and sneak up the evening before to see if the office is open. The descent down from Avoriaz to Morzine is one of the better parts of the ride, don’t miss that.

We did PPDS a few years back and started at Avoriaz. We were staying in Morzine, The tourist info office there said we could go up to Avoriaz and pick up our packs. We got there and they refused to hand them over. It depends on who is running the show from the location as to whether they want to play ball.

This annoyance was made up however for on the descent back down to Morzine, with the Saturday PPDS riders, and then the ski lift people on the Sunday allowing us to hitch a ride without passes up to Avoriaz.

Had an account for a few years. Use it to keep in touch with people in other parts of the country/ other countries. Have a policy of having no friends or relatives local to me on it. If they want to talk to me, they know where my door is and what my phone numbers are.

Bullying is huge on there and as mentioned in a different thread, it made me sick to the stomach to find that some poor family discovered their only son had died on it. It is evil, intrusive, and should be banned.

Taken in that context, we should then ban:
the internet
school
workplace.

Learning guitar at the moment and bought a Takamine G320 in black:

Cost me £160, which isn’t too much for a good quality guitar as so far I’ve demonstrated limited talent for playing it.

Loved ’em but somehow (wonder if this is also reflected in the non-likers above*) our friends south of the Watford gap really did not connect with them at all?

Blimey, North/South bias when it comes to DJ’s. I’m from London, absolutely loved them and stopped listening to radio 1, the second their last show finished.

Even saw them on their Shire horses tour at the London Astoria. Though having Dick the buttock Scruttock on stage was off putting.

Thanks for all your replies, I’ve bought the Madison top, but on the lookout for others.

I already have Helly Hansen tops, very nice, looked at the Mavic tops and am tempted.

Even with the replies, it’s funny how little choice out there there is for someone who isn’t looking for either a tight fit or some top that would look appropriate on a 20 something, not a 40 something or in awful colours.

Grumpiness checking out.

I’ve been using that green oil chain de-greaser. Absolute rubbish.

A Michelin tyre love in? I thought it would never happen. They have always made some good tyres, just less “fashionable” than others.

I’ve got a set of XC dry2’s and they are ridiculously quick, and can handle wet light muddy conditions.

Feel a bit sorry for Bolton more bad refereeing.

It equals out over the season, as a QPR supporter, I remember that goal that was disallowed when we played at Bolton.

Turned out to be a win-win for me, QPR stay up and Man city Champions. I can imagine the stick the supporters of the Blue half of Manchester have taken over the years from the supporters of the Red side of London Manchester.

Blue moon indeed.

At least BKB seems to handle the wet weather well enough.

Thats because a number of sections of BKB have been built and maintained to handle wet weather, Unlike supernova.

Playing on the beach at Charmouth and climbing Golden cap, playing in the river Char. Also staying on a farm in Langton Herring close to Chesil Beach, going into Weymouth and playing the Star Wars arcade game(late 70’s)

And also driven about in a Vauxhall Victor Estate.