Vodafone thrash everyone on signal, including orange.

Linky ?

Was a special offer at On-one the other week. You needed to be signed up to their weekly email to get it.

Stuff syringes. Dip a straw or the middle of a biro into the oil, put your finger over the end, remove.

I don't really understand why the Tories are / would be anti BBC.

I'd be willing to bet that if you look at the data Experian and the likes hold on constituencies and wards that consistently vote Tory, ITV viewing will generally be way below the norm. Everyone knows Sky isn't worth watching for things other than Sport and Films, so they must be watching the Beeb's entertainment, news and documentary output.

The x-tools one has the stuff you want for a modern bike. People will arrive soon to tell you that they're made of cheese, buy Park etc. but I have a very similar kit and it's fine.

The Marzocchis will be better in terms of not having to do anything to them often / reliability. Which is my main criteria for forks 😆

There are some decent 07 forks around with the open bath setup. It's the fancier cartridge damping tech that's been a bit ropey as far as I know. Some of the Marzocchis got better lower castings in 07 too.

If I were videoing myself eating, with the intention of publishing it on the interwebs, I'd try and take mouthfuls of food I could actually contain in my mouth. Grim.

Discs are the same both ways – there's no dish or offsett to them. The only difference is whether the metalwork is being stressed in the directions it was designed to be or not.

I reckon the adaptors are the wrong way up, or just plain wrong..

I've just stuck some 2.1 DTC Nevegals on. Previously had a 2.4 Rubber Queen (front) and 2.35 Fat Albert (rear). Way less drag, plenty grippy enough in dry conditions, and nice and light.

Best bit was getting them for a tenner each though!

Hope hubs don't come with a Hope QR?

Balfa? Googled and found them. Not a bad idea…

I think they're m525s – google suggests 04-06 for production – bought them second hand off here, so I can't be over sure of year etc.

In two weeks, it'll be August. All of France will be on Holiday. No traffic problems at all for me when we drove around. Motorways are far far less congested than UK.

Take a warning triangle, your hi-vis jackets (inside the car where you can reach them!) and a set of bulbs (not specifically required by law, but the police won't let you carry on if you have a blown bulb, so you need em). I also have a fire extinquisher just on the off chance.

My top tips would be to avoid Vannes (it's a dump), and to make sure your car's up to travelling long distances (tyres) and getting stuck on the M25 (radiator, water pump and fan). I saw more breakdowns on the motorway around Dover than I'd see in a month of normal motorway driving.

So, what's stopping you?

It's not my place to start it. I'd not go back to stuff I've bought and leave "Feedback" now as it wasn't the norm when I bought the kit, and everything has arrived / been sorted out now, so I don't think it would be fair. And I've no plans to buy anything else off the classifieds in the forseeable future.

It would also need to be adopted pretty much en masse to work – ie, encouraged by STW towers?

I can see that it's a headache for STW, but at the moment the situation places all the power in the seller's hands. If someone rips you off, they've got your money, they're probably miles away, and you're pretty stuck.

On ebay, they're apparently very good at snatching back money, and feedback creates a serious incentive not to misbehave.

It could even be as informal as posting on the Classifieds thread once you've got the kit that it arrived in a timely fashion, is OK etc. Not formal feedback but it's a lot better than trying to work out if someone's a chancer or not from their posting history.

I absolutely love the literal input system & the ability to look back through previous lines of calcs. Really makes doing work, checking it and correcting it a lot easier.

I think the classifieds desperately needs a feedback system to try and limit people's ability to take the mickey on both sides.

A lot of stuff gets traded on there at good prices, but from now on I'll be using ebay after having a few purchases that were a bit troublesome – not horror stories, but equally not smooth running.

In the distant past I have been properly ripped off on the classifieds (entirely different item to what was listed), but I managed to flog the kit on and get my cash back through ebay.

My girlfriend has her stuff she does, I have my stuff I do.

Perhaps she's just got the monk on because she's pregnant and less able to do what she likes?

Don't get too hooked up on the dog walkers, people cycling the wrong way are way more dangerous, if less common. There are lots of short descents followed by short climbs at Pines, and it's very easy for cyclists to be closing on each other at 30-40mph.

Are they supposed to be like race tracks? Can understand being upset at oncoming traffic if they are.

Well, at Pines, the Blue and Red trails are waymarked as one way, and I believe the Green is too. There's also a load of waymarked footpaths, along with unmarked singletrack / paths, and obviously fire roads.

Maybe I’m being naïve here but if there isn’t actually a “Correct direction” indicated then surely the trail is “Bi-directional” and can be ridden either way…

The Red at Sherwood pines is one way. There are signposts with direction arrows showing you where to go if you're heading the correct way, but nothing on the backside of them. A lot of the trails at pines have very short sight lines, obviously having been designed to work one way only.

To me the idea that people shouldn't be discouraged from heading up the trails the wrong way is stupid. We're talking about avoiding needless accidents on purpose built cycling trails, not banning conkers or the Kinder mass trespass. To me, it's as daft as having people wander around a ski slope or stand where they want at a race track.

It's not as if the woods are a wild places that needs to be kept from looking urban – it's a tree farm with a caff, car park and bike shop!

Something like HDMI is very different to say, the digital signal used by a CD to DAC or even for 5.1 audio.

Have a read at this http://www.dansdata.com/rcables.htm for an explanation. It's a very different application (hard drive cables) but it explains some of the issues.

My view is that a cable needs to meet the specification set out. A carlos fandango one will make naff all difference, but one that's not up to spec will.

I would think that an Inbred or 456 would be a good start. How hard is he going to hammer it?

Hang on. Is that a V-Tech engine that's gone boom? I thought Honda claim that they've never had one fail…?

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

The V-tech mechanism itself has never failed according to Honda. The block could be in a thousand pieces…

I'd put money on liquid gasket holding it all together. That said, I'd get a book or get on one of the Honda forums. If there is a bolt or stud you have missed, you will not be happy.

Have you belted it one?

Cut the beer. You'll lose the weight fairly easily, you don't feel like you've eaten less (so no placebo effect making you think you're tired / fagged out), and cutting drink out gives you more energy anyway.

Here's an illustration – how many folk on here ride Specialized MTBs? And yet how many do you see out on the trails?

Hah! Just last week I commented on how every time I saw someone on a Spesh they seemed to be taking riding very seriously 😆

What would happen if you went down the trail and found someone crashed just around the corner?

I'd stop, like I stopped when I found a couple riding the wrong way. Crashed riders are very rare occurence (I've never actually come across anyone crashed, though I've encountered a few chatting / fixing punctures in inopportune places).

People walking dogs on the trail and riding the wrong way seem to be very common, and they've got the added fun factor of moving, often quite quickly.

Why don't you get in touch and ask them?

I will.

Its always seemed to me that cycling is just one of several things that is being encouraged at these sites, but perhaps we should put a stop to that.

Of course it is. But, there are lots of unmarked paths / singletrack through the woods, loads of fire roads etc. Surely the point of the purpose built & waypointed cycle trails is to minimise conflict between the different groups that use the place?

To me, you need the frame to be a reasonable weight and have decent geometry.

For components, you're looking for reasonable weight and performance.

To me, that means decent forks are worthwhile, as are brakes & tyres, but the drivetrain can be whatever works well.

It isn't really a problem – your forks will never turn that far during riding.

If it really bothers you, look for a higher stack headset.

Ideally you'd get someone on each side of the car to stop the engine swinging about. If you're careful you should be able to swing out out on your jack jones, but it's reassuring to have someone to help / point and laugh.

I looked into this on some of the car audio forums. They reckoned that the Elemental Designs 11Kv was the best option for a smallish box & driver and not wanting huge amounts of bass.

As for fitting them under seats, it's a bit of an ask. The phsyics demands a decent sized box. The best place I could think of to locate one in a hidden way was behind the glove box – there's a fair bit of room under the glove box / behind the knee bar in the cars I've looked at (Golfs).

I thought these Vtec engines had a failure rate of zero. If so honda might be interested to hear that you have blown one.

It's not the engines that have a zero failure rate, it's the V-tec mechanism which as never failed! Does nobody pay attention to my pedantry?!?!!

😆

BBB, I seriously recommend having a couple of mates to help – you don't want to swing the engine into any bodywork.

I also wish you luck in freeing the exhaust manifold – might be best if you can pull the engine with the manifold on. You could split the exhaust system at the first join, or take the downpipe off if it's seperate. I wouldn't be surprised if a Type R engine has a big 4-1 manifold and no downpipe.

That way you can split the engine and mani at your leisure, with the help of a blowtorch and plusgas.

Do you have a stand to hang it on?

do you think i would make much money if i opened a topless barbers……….with girls cutting the hair…..not me.

You'd seriously clean up. Female hairdressers are consistently ranked as the profession blokes fancy the most in the highly scientific surveys done on the subject by esteemed journals such as Loaded and Nuts.

I wonder if topless would need a special license. Skimpy would probably work 90% as well and attract less of the dirty mac brigade 😆

And it's £7.50 to £12 or so round my way. My gut feeling says a fifteen quid is the limit for a bloke's haircut.

Google suggests that there is boggo Avon and Avon with IR3535 repellent…

Can you not see from marks in the paint where the old one sat?

When setting up mechs, I've been known to cheat and use a biggish allen key wedged in the back of the mech to see how it will sit in the big ring, when waggled it up and down until it clears all the rings.

any statisticians want to shed some light on the way these data were interpreted. I'm wondering who they surveyed and in what types of areas to get the results they did!

A mate spent some time collecting some crime stats for in house use (he works at a crime reduction partnership or whatever they're called this week). What Rich Hall said about the people who get surveyed being the people who are too dumb to swerve a bloke with a clipboard in a shopping centre is very true.

Most memorably, he asked about crime that people felt weren't being tackled. One response was "They aren't doing enough about animal cruelty, they do people for not looking after their dogs properly, but what about fishing? It's disgusting, it's so cruel. I was in WH Smiths the other day and there was a fishing magazine, and the man on the front was holding up a dead fish, it's not right."

These are the kind of people who respond to surveys.

Cheers PP, that was pretty much my thinking.

LoCo, I've emailed you.