They may stream it but more importantly does anyone watch it…and why?

Ep 3 got that bad I zoned out completely and had to rewind the it when the credits rolled, convinced I had missed something

It’s what I do.

The main thing for my role is making sure ‘improvements’ are based on actual data and not just the whims of someone in the operation. Almost every company I’ve worked in has suffered from people that think they know what is wrong and what will fix it. Usually they are wrong.

A good one will be able to identify root cause, define the scale and impact, understand if a solution will work, and to what extent, then be able to communicate that to both the operation and to developers. A bad one will take whatever the head of a department says they want and in a roundabout and complex way misrepresent that to a developer so the solution neither works nor gives anyone what they want, never mind what they need.

Looking at the same thing – getting a 10spd MTB cassette on the road/CX bike. My understanding is any MTB 9spd mech will work (inc. Altus/Acera etc.).

What is the true difference in Shimano groupset quality? Is Altus or Deore just as good at shifting (all other things being equal) as an XT but heavier? Or is there a difference in shift quality also?

Stick with the Garmin for your use case (or upgrade to a newer Fenix).

Apple Watch is a great smartwatch for day to day life but battery and lack of features (or using multiple apps) will quickly make bike touring/navigating etc. a real pain.

Or…get the Apple Watch for a daily wear and keep the Fenix for longer rides.

I gave up – simply not worth it any more now the chinese lights are so good

That’s pretty much where my head went. About all I would do these days is adapting lights to take bigger battery packs.

Tow bar all the way. Easier to fit, easier to load, no impact on fuel economy or parking. Keeps the roof clear for using a roof box as well if you decide to go camping or the like.

Just a thought though – how about just a strap on rack (a better quality one like the Saris) until you know for sure if she is going to keep riding? Tow bar, electrics and a rack are an expensive option and only the rack can be sold on if you find yourself not using it.

I ‘rode’ large parts of it years ago on a Giant Reign (the original, much burlier version, with Fox 36 forks). There was still hike a bike, but as others said it was primarily pushing rather than carrying. The bike was fine, if a bit slow on the better surfaced sections. Based on that I would say the Vitus would be just fine as its almost certainly lighter and better suited to the task at hand than mine was!

Your previous experience in Glen Tilt says to me that your CX is going to make things hard. Whilst a hardtail is likely the ‘best’ choice, I don’t think its worth buying a new one and stripping the Vitus to rebuild a hardtail for a few days riding when you can just take the Vitus and save yourself a lot of hassle and money.

Oh and South Beach area of Blyth but the town itself is a shit hole and the schools have some interesting pupils.

Very much depends on the school but yeah that pretty much sums it up! If you are in South Beach or South Shore and the kids get into the local primary then it’s great. The other schools not so much, and if they fed into the ‘other’ high school then I wouldn’t still be living here!

Lots of other nice places suggested, schools may or may not be better, decent riding is probably closer from the other areas (but not by much if you are driving to it). The two big pro’s are the beach on the doorstep and the value for money – you’ll get a lot for your budget around here and not a lot in many of the other places people are recommending.

Cycle commute really depends on what you mean by ‘just North of Newcastle’ for work! I agree with others though – avoid having to cross the river if you can. I go North to South on days I go to the office and its not too bad but coming back each night is awful.

A cycle from Blyth or Cramlington is perfectly reasonable if you are working outside of the city – say Killingworth or Benton. If you mean going all the way in to Jesmond or the like then its a bit far.

Blyth might fit the bill if you stick to the new estates by the beach. The town centre isnt up to much but the schools are good, beach is nice, prices are very reasonable.

I read about using flashing but a few folks said it ponged a bit, what with the bitumen.

Have you found that?

Can’t say I noticed any smell whatsoever. Certainly not once it I installed insulation, boards, carpet etc. It did make a huge difference in road noise (I drove it for a few days without a bulkhead and fully stripped out – could barely hear myself at motorway speeds. Just adding the flashing and nothing else made a massive difference).

So what’re you putting on the CX bike then?

RRs see me through all year in Cardiff, on that bike. Because I’m usually riding something with a surface, because it’s not mud slogging MTBing.

Reading back I perhaps wasn’t clear. My thinking now is to keep the MTB setup for natural trails, including the boggy, muddy ones we get a lot of up here, and to put something beefier on the CX to handle the better surfaced ‘gravel’ type roads.

I could put RRs on the MTB and use it for those rides, but would then need to swap back regularly.

Racing Ralph 2.3s are not draggy on my rigid 29er. I hold road PRs on it. Hand position is sorted with a high sweep bars and ergon grips with the stubby ends. No place I’d rather sit and pedal all day.

That’s true but it’s still a tyre change and a change of grips if not bars from the MTB setup to ride my usual stuff. There’s no way Racing Ralph could cope with Northumbrian mud.

I guess my thinking after all this is that either would work, the MTB can stay ready for natural trails and rougher stuff whilst the CX with new tyres can do the less rough stuff. The experiment now will be finding out which routes are which!

Food for thought all of this.

The MTB won’t be going rigid – it’s my go-to outside of trail centres (natural Northumberland riding). I guess the problem with longer ‘gravel’ days is the draggy tyres and fixed hand position. Then again I don’t fancy swapping tyres and bars regularly.

The CX sits in the garage doing nothing so maybe a cheap set of flared bars and give it a go is the starting point. It’s certainly lighter than the hardtail and the riding I’m planning doesn’t warrant suspension (and by default therefore I reckon cantis will do just fine).

Just a note for anyone reading this and planning their own – I used adhesive flashing instead of the ‘proper’ sound deadening stuff on my van. Worked a treat and cost a lot less (under a tenner from memory).

Never been to Paris but have done WDW in Orlando.

Some of the best advice above is to relax, dont stress about it once you are there, and have a plan – but we willing to change it on the fly!

Character breakfasts are great for the kids. Some restaurants if you time it right you get breakfast but it changes to lunch whilst you are there so you can sample both! Food otherwise is very expensive and average at best.

Never used a Disney hotel as the extra hours sound good but we found after a full day the idea of staying for another 2 hours didnt get a great reception!! Its a bit different in Orlando though as there are loads of villas with pools and things that work out a lot cheaper – not sure if Paris would be similar.

Balvenie Double Wood
Macallan
Cardhu
Dalwhinnie 15

Any of those would go down well. Aberfeldy 12 is decent as well and I believe on offer at Tesco at the moment (at least it was last week).

How much are you looking to spend? The SJ4000 isn’t that expensive and a refurbished GoPro (maybe a Session 5) wouldnt be that much more.

A lot of the less well known/unbranded ones on Amazon and eBay can be fairly poor. I would avoid unless someone can tell you exactly which one they bought and from which seller to make sure you get the same thing.

Chopwell, though – none of that Hamsterley nonsense.

#itsgoodbutitsneechopwell

And free parking…

So just to clarify. The world mapping I bought a year or so ago and was supposed to be life long doesn’t work anymore. Or have I misunderstood?

The world mapping still works, as does the ability to use it offline, plus all the features that Komoot offered up until a few weeks ago.

The new subscription is for new features that add to the experience but dont take anything away from what you had when you paid. I certainly dont recall ever seeing anything suggesting that all new features would be included and dont think it is reasonable to expect any business these days to continue giving new features and products to customers that paid once many years ago.

You can include points you want to pass thru and shape the route easily enough though.

I find it one of the easiest to use compared to the others.

I do it thru the website thou not via the app.

To be fair it is fairly easy to shape the route. It can still be annoying sometimes when you drag the route over to a different path and it decides to revise miles of routing for you!

All in I like it, it works well with Garmin, feel like I’m getting what I paid for (world maps etc.) and dont feel like the new features are necessary for my use case.

The subscription service is separate though from the existing mapping packages. I have it and use it on Garmin for navigation but wouldnt feel the need to pay for the subscription elements (multi-day planning, activity specific mapping etc.). The biggest downside for me is that its not that easy to manually plan a route (it wants you to put point A and point B and it finds the ‘best’ route between them).

Alternative opinion alert!!

A friend of mine ordered a helmet and light. Arrived two days later no problem.

I ordered one – changed my mind overnight (dont really need another helmet or a light!) – live chat answered in about 2 minutes (on a Monday morning) and cancelled it no problems with the refund showing the next day.

They may not be perfect but PX do get it right more often than not.

Tarp and bivvy for me (actually usually tarp and hammock if I know for sure there will be trees around).

The bivvy isn’t always necessary but it’s a thin one that packs down tennis ball sized so no harm done in my mind. As for poles I use whatever I can find (bike, wheels, fence/trees, sticks).

I would love to use my LBS except it’s basically a store front for Giant and stock almost nothing else (nor do they seem keen to order stuff for you). Other shops are more than an hours round trip and more often than not don’t have what you want anyway.

If the LBS needs to order something then I’m quicker, cheaper and easier to order it myself. On the (let’s be honest – very rare) occasion it goes wrong it’s a pain but 9 times out of 10 it doesn’t.

A few GTs from the mid-90’s – Zaskar, LTS, STS.

Klein Mantra (the one without a downtube)

Orange Patriot

But as others have said they are likely all horrible to ride compared to almost anything modern.

Comrie Croft is very rocky at the top. The blue sections might suit well but it isn’t really that long. There is a nice route away from the croft (towards Comrie itself) but like most things it has significant amounts of fireroad.

If the OP doesnt want anything more technical than flowy bermy blue routes then I would say it might be a case of accepting that the downhill sections are going to be shorter than he wants and laps may be required.

Garmin 245 is pretty good. I got it for running but also use it for MTB with no issues.

I’ve paired it with the Komoot app for navigation duties – whilst it doesn’t have mapping it is pretty quick to let you know when you stray from the planned route.

I have a Dacia Duster at the moment – almost 4 years old now. Never had an issue – bodywork is still perfect, no electrical issues. It’s a great workhorse and being less ‘refined’ I’m less concerned about throwing muddy bikes/dogs/children inside as most of it is wipe clean!

I think the earlier ones did have bodywork issues and came from a different factory. Anything from the last few years should be fine.

I wouldn’t. With a 16″ at 5’9 I’m already running a 400mm post at not far off max

Hope Mono M4 with 180mm on a 16″ here. No problems with it.

Compression effects of lycra on the quads ‘may’ lead to performance improvements and better recovery from a ride…making you faster.

That and without a pad my ass doesnt like being on the saddle for long.

I tried that Clee Cycles one on my Hope Mono M4 on Fox F100 – it doesnt work as the kink in the adapter gets in the way of the round cylinder (where the bore cap sits) on the caliper. That was a 180mm caliper (#3 or #8 maybe).

Ended up using the Hope +20mm adapter with a 200mm disc.

paulrockliffe – I’m trying it out at 100mm travel. I considered the Whippet but I’m likely to go with a longer travel fork at some point and I got these cheap (£120 for 2010 F100’s in ‘as new’ condition). They are the tapered steerer/QR15 version so more than capable of taking some hits.

I actually think a big 36 fork and 2.4 tyre might ruin the bike for me – too much extra weight taking away from the lightness of the frame. My last few bikes were built up like that and I grew to dislike them. I also happen to think it looks good in almost every built up pic I’ve seen.

Gave it a first ride today on the commute – ridiculously light (24.9lbs), felt like it was trying to out accelerate me when I got out of the saddle, handling was just the right side of quick (Fox F100 fitted). Can’t wait to thrash it around GT on Saturday.

I have to admit that their service may not be up to scratch but they do make some cracking bikes.

At the end of the day, I’m still going to ride it. Once I’ve thrown it down a few trails the finish doesnt matter to me. Its more the general lack of attention they seem to give things. The missing bolts issue isnt the first time I’ve read about this – the decals were just stupidly packaged from the start – the dispatch time doesnt match what they state (orders before 3pm dispatched same day) – and the frame finish isnt described accurately on their website.

It simply doesnt give me any faith that if I ordered something from them again it would be right so I would rather go elsewhere.

Definitely look at Osprey. I have the Manta 25 as I carry an SLR often but the build and bladder are exceptional.

I’m waiting for my c456 and Float 32 forks in the post at the moment (OnOne showing ‘ready to ship’ but as yet no dispatch notice). They will be white forks on the black frame.

Will look fine in my opinion – seen a few on here like that. Now my white saddle and seatpost on the other hand… 😯

I thought the issue was only with steel cassettes? The 990 is an alloy spider so shouldnt do any damage?

That said I’ve been running a steel cassette on mine for years – you can see the marks but it would have to be ten times worse before I change the freehub.

tony24 – Isn’t the 18″ a large already?

It confused me as they show geometry in S/M/L/XL but sell 14/16/18/20. I presumed the 18 was the large?

For what its worth I’m 5’9, 31″ or so leg, just ordered a 16″ based on the size of my current hardtail (presuming 16″ is medium).