I bought a halfprice Hydrapak Jolla last week from Merlin, (apart from sending me the wrong colour) it seems very well made and the bladder is way better than camelbak – better bite valve and bigger opening for cleaning

The bag is massive though – 18 litres. Should probably have got the morro

Also bought an insulated tube for a fiver at the same time

I have an old mule and its indestructable but just too small

Its Shootah

and the the op has the wrong forum initials if he is class concious!

You know your neighbourhood is middleclass when the doorstep salesmen are selling woodburners!

Do you get cold called by Aga?

I’ve just been informed by CRC that the parcelforce 48 bike that was absolutely definitely going to arrive today is in fact going to arrive tomorrow due to somebody forgetting there was a bank holiday monday in the week which has aparently led to a PF backlog

So………16.15 might be optimistic

Hooray! Thats 2 of us getting a new bike tomorrow IF the vendors come good on original mistakes. Fingers crossed.

Don’t get the 9-5 aero estate – too much power for the chassis and the front wheels to handle. The 9.3 aero is a peach though and doesn’t break down so much

yeah, the 8v is 95bhp and seems to have some limiter on it – just has no go
but then its mostly driven in a 40 zone so i don’t really care

We have 3

Ocean Kayak Malibu XL – seats 2adults and used to fit both kids on as well when small
Ocean Kayak scupper pro – faster single seat for fishing and distance

we also have a small single which is good in surf but also for my 9 year old to paddle by herself

They are fantastic and we never go on holiday without at least one of them. Work in lakes and rivers as well.

They are heavy though and the XL takes 2 to lift onto a rack, especially on a land rover or tall mpv

They are bombproof and hold thier value so well that if you buy the right make (Ocean Kayak, Perception, Robson etc ) they will be very easy to resell – my Scupper Pro cost £500 and I often see well used 5 year old ones on ebay for £350

Remeber to budget for paddles (50-100) good bouyancy aids (30-50) wetsuit shortie and waterproof bags plus fishing tackle!

There is nothing like eating freshly caught mackeral cooked on the beach

We have a 05 plate 1.6 8v 40k which I bought last year as a school run car

They are basically white goods – i.e driving it is like operating a dishwasher, you switch it on it does its cycle and then it switches off.

Seems reliable (touch wood) but they are so underpowered that with four adults and luggage they struggle to keep up with traffic on motorway inclines

Build quality isn’t that day to day but they don’t seem very strong i.e loaded up with a couple of bikes and a canoe the suspension looks like it might collapse!

There are literally hundreds for sale and some with very low mileage (like mine 05 bought for 2k with 33k last August) so I wouldn’t bother with anything over 100k unless it was free

Missed out Shap fell

Check the max nose weight and construction of your towbar – 4 bikes bouncing up and down is a lot of leverage, especially if they are mountainbikes. I put four on mine and the flex was so alarming I took one off and put it in the boot.

I see Sektors can be dropped to 140 fairly easily or even 130 if the frame angles could handle it

05 2.3T Vector Sport Estate bought 3 years old with 41k on clock
I had it for 2.5 years in which time it needed:

ABS Collars x 2 (they had corroded….in three years?)
Power steering gubbins
Various engine problems which meant the dashboard invariably looked like an xmas tree
Xenon light sensors (convinently situated under the wheel arch for maximum exposure to corrosion)
Xenon light unit – I was actually quoted £750 plus fitting for this – thats one light unit!

This was all in addition to the worlds most expensive servicing (and I’ve had a merc) plus I presume platinum brake discs with gold pads going by the cost.

and the washer jets broke (somehow!)

Shame really as it was a beautiful car to drive and looked great in black with leather heated seats etc

You never regret a water butt – they are addictive! I’ve now got three and a pump which connects to a hose to wash car, bikes, cat etc

Probably doesn’t make much difference to my water bill but makes me feel good

I only posted this thread after my third and final brush off

I’ll hold fire commenting further but I stand by what I have said up to now and they haven’t actually done anything yet so we’ll see.

Looks like they might sort it out in a better way afterall……

I’ll hold fire on commenting till then.

Mistakes happen, you failed to plan for a reasonably foreseeable contingency (wrong product or delivery delay)

Fair enough – I’ll take that one as my bad planning

Jamie, I’m pretty good with a hacksaw ;0)

yes they are going to collect and refund (surely the absolute least they could do as they sent me something I didn’t order and can’t use?) but this means me staying home for another day – and no I can’t take it to work even if I could fit it in the car.

Of course I make mistakes but then i rectify them without (hopefully) putting the other party to trouble of if there is no choice, compensating them with something that will smooth the issue over

I stay home and lose a day of leave, they knock something worthwhile off a more expensive bike – everybody wins surely

But perhaps I’m out of step with the retail world – I mean I ordered a hydration pack last week from Merlin in black and black, stealth black (there was a choice) and got the red and black one – really bright red……obviously its send out a random product week!

I was thinking more of chris.watson@blabla,com?

speed is not the issue – they have responded poorly to a mistake they made
(sent me wrong size bike, can’t exchange as no stock left now)

Or Breaking into Heaven by Roses

Best Intro?

Shurley Money for Nothing by Dire Straits

spud

same thing happened to me – had a bike on the scheme (a folder that I did use everyday for work, not a bling 140mm travel ‘commuter’) and HMRC changed th rules halfway through. Because the whole ‘extend the lease’ hadn’t been dreamt up and there were only a couple of us on the scheme my employer simply said this is too complex and stopped running the scheme and I was left with a £250 bill for some reason – in the end my bike was RRP £975 and cost me about £920! I might as well have gone for a special deal or 0% etc.

I argued the toss and my employers ended up footing the bill and I just paid the tax on it as a BIK

Great scheme cocked up

Mmmmm Griso….Mmmmmm….Green…..Mmmmmmm…want

Barffy, two people I know were pretty underwhelmed with their MT’3’s once they got past the first few days. Too vibey and underpowered according to both of them and they are not speed freaks

Sorry , I meant the bought stuff at 128

Yes, properly ripped CD’s sound great through a good set up. I use a squeezebox to stream in various codecs to a fairly cheap Arcam and Richer sounds speakers – sounds good to me

Dab is rubbish – we already have an outdated standard and internet radio is far better anyway

Itunes will sound rubbish played through anything decent as it is compressed to buggery

so it doesn’t really matter what equipment you use for these type of sources

But CD’s and vinyl plus FM will sound better through your old Technics than a lot of the new cheap all in one systems

The reason people (and many non-audiophile shop assistants) think new cheap hi fi equipment is better is because they have grown up listening to clipped sanitised flat sounding electronically compressed music files and confuse the fact that it is clean sounding with good audio.

If you want to see how far a GS800 will take you….

http://advrider.com/forums/showthread.php?t=699326

Looks like he covered it with glue and rode througha a Touratech showroom..what is it about BMW riders?

Cheap soft luggage is a nightmare to fit and use plus everything gets wet or melted. Expensive soft luggage like Kreiga/Giantloop etc is great for offroad but just as pricy as hard luggage and so for an NCX, hard luggage would be my choice with a cheap ‘sausage’ waterproof bag accross it for camping trips. Lomo watersports do these for £20

I have no experiance of the Tzar but have had 2 Sunns, an Nvitro (alloy) and a steel one (Xircit I think) though it was a while ago. They were very well built, looked great and apart from the forks (ownbrand) well specced for the price. They have a good racing pedigree and are popular in France where I was living at the time

Blimey, your commute must have some serious drop offs….

Haven’t got a TV (so stop sending me **** TV license letters Grrr), my cars cost me 2k each and I can’t remember the last time I bought any clothes that wern’t sports related

But I love buying stuff me….We live in a nice house, the children don’t want for anything (except a tele obviously! tough) and I’ve got furniture and art worth more than my cars

Buy what makes you happy but if you can’t buy it and can’t get the money to buy it don’t worry

A book, a walk, even a bike costs peanuts and relationships just cost time

Those were the days….Friday Kylie….the Prawn….Hora was just a wee slip of a lad to take the pee out of and not a national singletrack treasure

Where did the decade go?

Hmmmm I’ve recently given up roadriding

Scared is right, not sure its confidence thats lacking though. I’ve been cycling for 35 years, cycled halfway round the world on a tour, commuted in London but I won’t roadride the lanes and B roads any more.

I’ve decided that the risk is just too high – I’ve never seen anything like the animosity towards cyclists that exists here in the South these days. So confident yes, scared yes, angry you bet – but with a family I just can’t put my life on the line anymore

insurance is cheap. I’m 43 and passed my test last year – I just insured a cbf600 TPF&T for £70 with Bennetts with only a 1 year NC on a 125

I’d echo what he said about about buying cheap though – bikes seem to be more expensive now than ever and I doubt you would get a decent ride for £500 unless you are a wizzard with the spanners. Gear can be got from ebay for a song and reasonable helmets are less than a £100 new though obviously they need to fit properly

That foam matting is pretty rubbish for anything other than hot fiat is using it for or perhaps a gym room

I used it in part of my garage but even a bike workstand loaded with a bike cuts through it in a couple of weeks plus it gets really dirty and you can’t clean it, and any solvents just eat it away

There is a reason its cheap

Miss Informer – so much promise but so little delivery

Op where are you specialising? DH, XC, Trials?

Flyweight

Bearing

Heavy Metal

Stripsearch

You might want to check out Ghostbikes.com – they have a budget inhouse range called Black

Not sure how cheap I would go for bike gear though….

Company car, so brand new when you had it then? Hardly suprising it didn’t cause much drama in first three years!

I’ve been a saab fan for years but my last one, a 2005 2.0 lpt 9-5 vector sport estate bought 3 yrs old cured me forever.

The 1.8t was the most reliable engine in the 9-3 though

There is nothing reliable about a 2004 saab

They are like printers, cheap to buy horrendous to run.

Look nice and drive nice though

Not sure wheels are the issue here…Just been looking at a number of superb second hand and nos titanium / steel frames all with standard headtubes

Then looked for new (don’t like buying s/h suspension) forks to fit them

Most of the air sprung quality forks are tapered