Put it this way – most of the fair trade coffee I have had has been pretty poor. So I don't buy it. I'm simply speculating as to why that may be, if Ethiopian coffee isn't known by the coffee cognoscenti as the urine of satan.

To further speculate, I wouldn't be surprised if there wasn't a central co-operative packhouse / processing facility, much like small farmers had here, which meant that there was little comeback for farmers sending poor quality product in. Apply a bit of game theory and you can see that everyone will come to the same conclusion. Of course, if the game is to be repeated, you are then gambling on two factors – 1) the fair trade buyers being mugs, or 2) the farmers simply looking for a short term pay off.

I would guess there's a combination of these factors at work – studies have shown that farmers often don't buy fertiliser for next year after a bumper crop, even though they know that doing so would further improve their returns next year. Give them the opportunity to buy fertiliser via finance when they need it, and they do. Similarly, the fair trade buyer knows that there are hordes of Tarquins and Jemimas feeling horribly guilty about those poor sods toiling in the fields, who will buy anything with a fair trade label.

Perhaps just Ethiopian Fair Trade coffee isn't any good.

Certainly if someone agreed to buy a certain amount of my produce at a fixed price, then I'd cream off the best to sell on the open market, and give the Fair Trade chap my floor sweepings / low grade stuff. In that situation, that is the guaranteed method of maximising your returns.

Look. You take your hose to a shop, show them the connector you have got, and they give you the bit you need. Not everything is easy to do from behind a computer, but that's life.

Think of it as the tool equivalent of getting new cranks when you're new to bikes and don't even know what a bottom bracket is. Your best bet is to show it to a man who knows.

The actual size of the thread on air fittings is more or less irrelevant as 99% of the time it is the same. Google would suggest 1/4" BSP. If you want to make a purchase from the internet right now, then I would suggest buying a coupling that looks like the one I first linked to. There aren't that many types around, so just buy a cheap one of those with the correct thread (ie, male or female 1/4" BSP) to fit your tool. FWIW, I have the Aldi compressor from a year or two ago, and a load of different PCL fittings. The ones that come with the Aldi gear are interchangeable with the PCL fittings I linked to. And the photos on the Aldi website show the same fittings.

What do you mean here?

I mean that I suspect an Ethiopian coffee farmer might more efficiently apply his time to some other form of employment. Creating a price floor for coffee encourages him to grow coffee, which for whatever reason, his farm isn't well suited for. On the other hand, he could perhaps grow some other crop, and live on the proceeds of that, without needing the Fairtrade middleman / subsidy. Or he could do something entirely different.

Essentially, if you take things to extremes, you can use a system like Fairtrade to impede the industrialisation and economic development of a country.

I try not to, as fairtrade coffee is almost always ethiopian. Ethiopian coffee is cheap because it isn't very good. I also doubt that it's efficient in the economics sense. Or sane.

I wouldn't be at all surprised if it's not unlike the various Farm Standards that exist in the UK, whereby a farm can be excluded from the process and forced to sell their goods through far narrower channels.

If you went to uni, go back to your uni and pester them, or try the local one. I know that some unis will give advice to anyone who's got a degree, irrespective of where it's from.

Concerned? MTFU. They aren't unobtainium fittings, they're not commonly used in garages because changing all your fittings is a faff once you've got a few, and because the main advantage of the type of fitting Aldi have used is high flow, which is useful for painting or the hobbyist with a marginal compressor, but not the bloke in a garage with a massive compressor and a rattle gun, who has a load of fittings that he's had 20 years.

PCL is Pneumatic Components Ltd, and they make connectors. Other people copy them.

As for adaptors and the like, it's fairly simple – you take your hose to the local motor factors / machine mart, along with your tools. You either buy a hose to match the connectors on your tools, or connectors for your tools to match your hose. Hose connectors are not always easily changed, tool connectors always unscrew with a spanner.

Almost all air kit is the same size – I'd guess it's 1/2" BSP but I've really no idea. You very rarely encounter unusual sizes in normal applications. Sandblasters and the like might have special hoses that are wider than 10mm ID and connectors to match, but 99% of stuff is standard.

The Aldi compressor I have (from a year or so back) came with 2 outputs, both are fitted with a PCL type high flow quick release fitting. The aldi compressor I have came with selection of cheap'n'nasty plastic hose with the connectors fitted.

Like so:
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Air-line-coupling-PCL-High-Flow-AC34-Quick-Release_W0QQitemZ290283179516QQcmdZViewItemQQptZUK_Air_Tools_and_Compressors?hash=item439639cdfc

Not the more common curvy type of quick release fitting.

Second Magura Louise.

All the time I've been riding, I've always been the wrong side of 15 stone. They've never let me down, even on long descents in the peak district. Bled them for the first time the other week, after 5 years of use. Hydraulics over cables every time in my book. I was always meddling with V-brake cables, but need to do nothing to hydraulics.

Octalink cranks & BB.

I would try to be in a different country.

Does Cardiotrainer exist on the Iphone? It does all that sort of business.

5 seconds with Google says yes.

What he said. The 1.8T drops into the MK2, MK3 and even the MK1 Golf relatively easily.

Find out what the thing's failed on (Cat or lambda sensor = good, as anyone doing an engine conversion can remove these). If the turbo's dying, that's another matter.

Anyway, get it on ebay with "1.8T" and the engine code. If it's an AGU then you're quids in, as they're one of the easier ones to install due to a proper cable throttle.

£600 on a hardtail!

Slightly unfair if half of STW takes advantage of their opening offer. Not as if many of us might turn up with repeat business :lol:

Which model are you looking at? There are pappy ones with Alivo kit hanging off them, and later ones with full Deore group…

Worst I've ever seen was in Eccy Road Tesco in Sheffield. Studenty sort of lad, looked like he spent half his life in the gym and on sunbeds.

His trousers were so low you could see his pubes. Not at all pleasant.

Forks aren't much bother – 5 allen bolts to get the stem, top cap and brakes off, then 5 allen bolts to put it all back together again. That said, it's something I always do with a helper, and will do once in a while.

On the other hand, tyres involves messing about in the kitchen with tyre levers, tubes, the compressor etc. Too much faff.

Hah! So are the Fat Alberts. I thought Inbreds had masses of tyre clearance until I stuck those on. I suspect the Contis will work out a little smaller, which may be no bad thing.

Anyone know if a 2.4 RQ is bigger or smaller than a 2.35 Fat Albert?

A kilo a tyre seems a bit steep! That said, the Alberts have gone out of stock on CRC. Which is nice. I may well be asking to have the the Panaracers I gave away last week back…

There are some Rubber queens on ebay, cheap. Might be a plan.

Lots of places have the Specialized BG measuring kit, but they're not always keen to use it. Poor lad at the bike shop on Saturday looked like he wanted the ground to open up and swallow him when he measured my girlfriend's sitbones :lol:

Hmm. Mavic list a "Spoke Support Diameter", which you apparently add 3mm to in order to get ERD.

EN521 is listed as 532, so 535 ERD.
EN321 is listed as 536, so 539 ERD. That said, it's an ounce heavier than the 521, and not welded.

Currently the spokes look like they could be wound in a max of 4mm more. Most are just level with the heads of the nipples. So in theory, it looks like I should have just enough slack to fit a 521 without spokes poking tubes, with it being a fairly deep rim.

Barker do good made in England shoes, as do Loake. However, some Loake stuff is made in India. I don't particularly rate the John White shoes – the leather isn't as good as other makes.

Both Barker & Loake are £100+, but I did pick up a pair of Barkers for £60 or so in a sale at House of Fraser. There are also a number of places that sell Loake seconds cheaply if you look around.

Both the above brands use traditional construction techniques, so the shoes do look like shoes, rather than the disgusting offspring of trainers and shoes. For me, that's a good thing, but you may view things differently.

Avoid like the plague any of the shoes advertised in the newspaper / circulars as being made with the same processes (Goodyear Welted etc.) as top brand English shoes etc. normally on a silly deal like 2 pairs for £50. Unsurprisingly, they're totally rubbish.

Even if you can hack it day to day, there'll be days when everything goes wrong at work and you have to stay late. Even staying until 6 or 7 will be an absolute nightmare when you have that kind of commute, nevermind the days when you're stuck there properly late.

G6 and a wool bonnet is the only thing that will cut some paints. Like the rock hard white 2 pack on my Golf.

G3 advance & a normal bonnet will do near enough anything. I'd be surprised if 3M perfect it is drastically different stuff.

Got some thermal bib longs. I like em. Red chamois.

Michael Douglas breakfast special down the LEA?

That's what I'd feel like, living in an advanced country that can't even sort out basic educational neccesities like having enough places for the children that were born 11 years ago.

They were all frozen solid round my way. Frozen ruts are interesting!

Blame the Nigerian government for a) massive corruption and b) lack of environmental enforcement. It's hardly difficult to make oil companies work in a fairly clean manner, as they have something you need!

I've had some budget tyres that I literally had to swap because they were terrifying in the wet. Budget turned out to be not so budget.

Golf. My girlfriend's one cost a smidge under a grand, it's a 1.6 MK3 and it's done 20k in just over a year with no undue bother – servicing, tyres and brakes. And it does 40mpg, happily cruises on the motorway and so-on.

It's certainly possible to find decent cars at the sub £1k level. You do have to be *very* fast on picking up the Autotrader ads that look decent, and be very specific when quizzing buyers on the phone, or you end up looking at lots of tat.

You'll never make any shed secure. Or house. They all have windows and doors. Bikes are light enough that they can be posted out through almost any break in point.

Best thing to do is make sure that getting in / nicking stuff will be noisy, and that there's a security light on it. And the stuff inside is locked up.

If doing by hand, don't use machine products. G3 and the like break down as you use them, in order to cut well at first then produce a good finish.

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Silverline-180mm-Car-Boat-Polisher-Sander-Buffer-230v_W0QQitemZ360168166806QQcmdZViewItemQQptZUK_Home_Garden_PowerTools_SM?hash=item53dbb21596

That kind of sander.

Machine polishing isn't the terrifying nightmare of burning through paint that most make it out to be. Hand polishing with commercial compounds is a quick way to tire yourself out. As for sanding, you will not remove orange peel without it. If it's just dull, it may polish up.

If it was sprayed in someone's shed a few years ago, it's unlikely to be 2-pack. Very poisionous to spray, and as you need 2 compressors (one for fresh air to breath), not much used by DIYers.

As for the MG, it is either a) stuffed, been sprayed in someone's shed and dust has settled in the paint, or b) needs claying. Poorboys clay is fairly cheap, use Meguiars quick detailer as a lubricant. Also fairly cheap.

Farecla G3 and a machiner polisher. Machine should be a dirt cheap electric sander / polisher (approx £15-£30), use proper Farecla foam polishing mops.

Sand down any dull / orange peely panels with 1000-1200 grit then polish up. If he used 2 pack paint and it's been on a long time, be prepared to a) be patient and b) buy some farecla G6 and a wool polishing bonnet.

All this kit is available on Ebay.

See what they offer if you reject it. May well be enough for a new car and a few hundred quid. Sometimes glass' values are way out of whack.

Possibly, which would explain why one side's more stretched, and the twisting was purely incidental… On the other hand, twisting the tyre does seem to affect the diameter a little…

3 hours on a Sunday morning, with a few short exercise bike sessions during the week. The exercise bike sessions are all out intervals for 20 minutes or so with the aim of improving my Sunday morning ride. And because I get easily bored in the gym.