Brecon Beacons & Cwmcarn
It's a Stag weekend, so the pubs of Tredegar have a certain draw*

*this is just one option of about a dozen that we are pricing up, so don't go telling me there are lots of bunkhouses in better locations!

Bump
I'm having trouble getting hold of them – are they still in business?

Nothing wrong with STI's like that. Been running mine like that for 5 years now. Have tried to put drops on 3 times and couldn't get on with them.

Mudguards come off & tri bars go on when I'm battling for 57th place in the local triathlon – although I will admit that tri bars are the work of the devil.

I'd post a pic but I'm too lazy to learn how.

2:1 ss on the road is prob asking for trouble. Will up the gear to give me a bit more pace.

Get gears so you can a) go faster and b) don't have to worry about maintaining momentum and can go slower when the situation arises

but am almost always late so opt for the shortest/ quickest route

As above, leave earlier and relax, I'd say that if you're in a rush then you're in the wrong frame of mind as soon as you step out of the house. If you feel the ned to film your commute then you're expecting problems and more aggressive and again in the wrong frame of mind.

For a 10 minute commute I'd be pootling along on a sit up 'n' beg cruiser town bike and chilling out(or my £20 ebay pub bike), in fact I'd probably be walking as I'm too lazy to put all the hi vis gear on for such a short ride.

and assume that every car is driven by a dribbling moron that's out to get you, who's blood pressure is so high that he could keel over with a heart attack if one more **** cyclist gets in his way.
and then relax 'cos that start of your day is so much better than his.

The engineering company that I use have invested in £250k machines that could knock out caliper halves in large (500+) batch sizes for a few quid each. So in theory I could copy a hope caliper and change a couple of details, job done.

The question is, could me and said engineering company design a complete braking system to the same quality and cost as Hope?
The answer is – not a f**king chance!!

and yeah, I like the "machined" look of hope stuff

As above,
Full mudguards
Rack & panniers
Lots of lights – remember to change the batteries often

plus buy an outdoor thermometer so that you can check the temp each morning and dress appropriately. I can now tune my riding kit according to temp and avoid excessive sweating from too many layers (and wind chill on a shaved head)

Could be his new bunny boiler girlfriend getting rid of the competition for his affection

I've always been confused on the biodegradable nappy front.

My boys pampers is non-biodegrable, goes into landfill and sits there doing nothing much for 100 years

My mates boys biodegradable nappy, goes into landfill, degrades, creates methane, which escapes into the atmosphere and does it's bit as a greenhouse gas.

Which is best?

nb, one of the funniest things I've seen in the last couple of years was a bloke who tried to compost "biodegradable" nappies at home. The sight of him racking through a years worth of old nappies to remove the non-degradable tags and stretchy bits was something to see. It appeared that they were only 70% biodegradable!

How do you explain the fact that you seem to do 10 times more laundry than we do? I'm saying you could maybe be more efficient with your clothes changing that's all

My baby – he's a greedy boy with a strong stomach, what goes in stays in. probably 1 extra load per week, 2 max.

My Sister' baby – Delicate little girl with a weak stomach – I reckon 3/4 of what goes in comes out again. Multiple changes of clothes for baby, mum, sister and sometimes dog as well.
1 or 2 extra loads A DAY in the early months (my sister objects to smelling of baby sick)

Don't assume all babies are like yours………

I had a bike like that once.
I stripped it, put the frame on ebay and bought an on-one + some coil sprung bombers. Ran it SS for a while, but now geared. Comes out of the shed more regularly than the old one.

N power on-line tariff. Crap customer service, but it's cheap.

With bills that high I'd be looking at using less energy in the first place! (But I guess that's not want you wanted to hear)

unless we pay them £1k for their "Independent Financial Advice"

That would get me running for the hills right there

wot simon said, and buy a few spares – you'll notice that it's mainly the rear drive side that goes, so you just need to replace that one most of the time.

I prefer to agree with the creationists on this – but replace "god" with "an alien bloke in a lab" and surmise that we are actually a virus in a petri dish and our total span of evolution is actually the time it's taken him/her/it to set up an experiment, go get a cup of coffee and have a quick look on alientrackworld while their boss is in a meeting. This leads ultimately to one of 3 destinies for us :

1) We'll be a successful virus and will be given the means to infect other planets and solar systems as a means of biological warfare
2) The boss will come out of a meeting and explain that funding has been cut and we'll get thrown into the incinerator
3) The alien bloke will drop his morning eclair into the petri dish a la Robbie Coltrane in the Young ones and we'll all die under a flood of whipped cream

So in summary, yes there probably is life out there

I'd probably get a custom Thorn galaxy tourer, so that I can use it for ferrying the kids about and get my Inbred SS back.

and a Ventana Tandem
and a custom touring tandem
and a custom Ti HT
and a custom 953 HT
and a big bouncy bike including all body armour & big balls to go with it
and a spanky carbon road bike
and a spanky carbon tri bike

and some new forks for my dialled PA

but I probably wouldn't have time ride them all, so just my SS back would be nice

If it's rusty that means there isn't a good covering of lube on it.
Get some proper gloopy winter lube.

I must confess that may cummute is generally incident free. However for the sake of an anecdote,

One morning last year I was sitting in the middle of the lane, STATIONARY behind a STATIONARY car waiting at a RED light…
…..and someone tried to overtake me, blocking the other lane for the oncoming traffic.

A mate had a bongo, I know it was very thirsty (20mpg for a deisel) and he got a very large bill when the head needed replacing, and then he sold it to buy a car + tent

I can feel the trail that much better

If you rode around here where the trails have 6″ deep hoof prints* that have set like concrete in the dry weather you wouldn’t be saying that. Bouncy forks rule.

* the horsey people keep the bridleways open & well used so I ain’t complaining mind

I can set off one of the smiley 30mph flashy signs quite easily, coming down off the ridgeway into a village with 30mph limit, I can be doing over 40 without too much effort at the speed limit signs but am generally hard on the brakes at that point in self preservation mode.

An old tourer from ebay

Just got little trb an Isla bike Rothan for his 2nd birthday in June. He loves it aleady & can just about scoot around the back garden on only the 2nd ride (and insists on me riding my bike in circles with him)

The Rothan was £112 delivered, but the build quality is excellent – just what I wanted after watching nieces & nephews be put off by riding cheap rubbish.

To be able to jump in it and drive, transporting bikes & camping gear I’d get a modern T5

To spend ages preparing for every trip away, look cool driving slowly, visiting VW shows, spending lots of money on parts and all your riding time working to on it to get the bloody thing through the MOT I’d get a T2 or T4
Where do they rust? Everywhere, teach yourself how to weld before buying or get VERY friendly with your local mechanic
Common problems? Lots

trb
Aircooled VW owner since 1992. I love ’em but I wouldn’t buy one for weekend bike transport.

You’ll get given all the forms when the sprog arrives.

Child allowance – fill out the form & it goes straight into the bank account every month

Child tax credit – fill out the forms and it gets paid into the mothers bank account every month, you’ll get a a little bit for the first year and not very much after that – if you’ve got several degrees in tax accountancy you MAY be able to work out if they are paying the right amount. If the monthly amount pays for anything more than nappies then they are probably paying you too much so save it & wait for them to demand it back next year.

Working tax credit – unless you are on the breadline you’ll probably earn too much to be entitled to this.

Child trust fund – you’ll be sent a voucher for £250 to invest as you wish & give the ungrateful sod a pot of cash to spend on beer & dope in their first term at university.

It’s not actually very difficult, they send you all the forms, you just have to remember to fill them out in your sleep deprived state.

I’ve got 105 sti shifters and Tektro Vs (both as supplied with the “build it yourself” bike kit) which work fine.

But I still can’t turn sharply as full mudguards + big feet = lots of toe overlap 😐

We found it cheaper to get a round the world ticket when we went south. Out via N america, back via asia.

We spent over 3 weeks just exploring around sydney and up to the barrier reef, so I’d say you want at least 3 months to stand a chance of getting around all of Oz.

We used a wicked camper in NZ, it was OK, nothing fancy & small enough for mrs trb to be happy driving it around town, it was luxury after 14 weeks of cycle camping!

Do organisations, such as Relate, help much? Do they ever suggest that breaking up is the best option?!

Yes they do help
Yes they advise breaking up if you both think it’s the best thing – they did with me and the councilling helped us stay amicable and avoid the cost & hassle of using solicitors

Ta for the info,

Just have to go home & write a presentation for the interview now & try not the make it death by powerpoint!

I believe Kona made a Full suss SS a few year back. Don’t remember what it was called.

You’d have to create your own clique and ride alone if you did it though, as you’d be shunned by the SS crowd and the FS crowd 😕

utterly pointless, but a good excuse to get together with mates and ride somewhere you wouldn’t normally ride without the hassle of planning up a route, stopping to argue over the map, getting lost, finding the only shop in the country that is closed when you’re about to bonk etc.
Plus if you get dropped there will be another group along soon that you can tag onto.

What wwaswas said.

Although they are standard industrial bearings, so you can get them from your local bearing supplier (Brammer/Eriks etc) for less than a tenner and fit them yourself.

Where : Faringdon <=> Swindon. Via Coleshill, Sevenhampton, S/Marston & Stratton to Cheney Manor

What : Sand PX Kaffenback with panniers

Not yet, But I will be redundant sometime between 27th April and 24th Dec 2009. Just as soon as we’ve successfully transferred all of our machines, processes & jobs to the Czech Republic.

On the plus side our company has a very strong Ethics & Integrity policy – indeed in the US head office they have a whole department focussed on it. So when our savings are spent & the bank manager comes round to repossess the house at least I’ll know I was f*cked over in an ethical manner

Process/manufactuing, Six sigma and Lean Engineer looking for something near Swindon

Ta for the info chaps (especially chaps) I’m off the fleabay