Look Quartz pedals - Debby goes clippless

Debbs took the plunge this week with her first ride on her new Look Quartz pedals. I had been trying to persuade her that clipless was the way to go but I think she just couldn't get her head round being attached to the bike and not being able to bail in an emergency which, of course she could.  Debbys flat pedals were nice but they terrified me with all those sharp pins just waiting to shred her shins to pieces. The pins they came with were basically just rounded off screws, so we replaced them with some nice colour matched pins with bolt heads that screwed in with a little spanner, very tedious.  They were a lot safer but they would still make a mess of her legs if she stacked or her foot slipped.  Debbs was struggling with getting her feet positioned right on them which was starting to bug her so she finally agreed to give clipless pedals a go.

My first experience with clipless was in the late 90's with a set of Ritchey copies, which themselves were a licensed version of Shimano's SPD setup. I never really got on with the direct feel you get with the SPD type of pedal as I have a bit of Osteo-Arthritis in my left knee which gives me pain from time to time, but is generally ok as long as I don't play football as it's mostly sideways movement that causes the problems.  I did a lot of reading of mags and stuff at the time and they were saying that if you suffered with knee pain you were better off with a pedal that gave you lots of float, which basically means a pedal that gives your foot a bit more movement and a less direct feel when your clipped in. At that time to my knowledge there was really only one company that was making a pedal that provided lots of float and that was Time with the Attac. I bought the Attac and used them for a few years and much prefered the open twin bar design that gave your feet more movement and good mud shedding ability but still gave you that connected to the bike feel that clipless pedals give you. The Attac is a great pedal but they weigh a ton so when Crankbrothers came out with the Eggbeater pedal which was a lot lighter but a similar twin bar system and which I liked the look of straight away, I had to try them. They were great from the off with a 4 way entry and easy to service too as they had a grease port so you could pump fresh grease in and force the old grease out, but you would end up using a lot of grease. I happily used the Eggbeaters for the next few years even though the bearings didn't last that long, until I came across the Look Quartz . Like the Eggbeater I liked the look of them straight away, but what was most striking was the weight ! The standard model weighed less than the bling carbon ti models of their counterparts offerings and they were cheap as well, about £50 if you shopped around. I've used these pedals for a few years now on my mtb's and now on my Pompino and think they're great. I have read a bit on some forums that people can't stand them, that the cleats are a nightmare to setup , well I just don't know what they are doing because I have found just the opposite,  you get some different thickness wedges that enables you to set the cleat up easy to clip in and lots of float or setup to make it harder to clip in and less float, simple.  I had no problems in advising Debs to go for the Quartz and that goes for anybody new to mtbing who is thinking of trying out clippless pedals, they make sense for a new rider because of the easy way they clip in/out and the generous float they offer.

Debby is using the pedals with Shimano SH-WM62 womens mtb shoes which are a great shoe for the money and makes Debb look quite pro. She loves the pedals and shoes and has found them to be quite easy to get the hang off and she admits to being quite frightened off them at first, but to her credit she just got to grips with them and is now clipping in and out without incident but I'm still expecting her to have the falling over clipped in moment that most of us have had when we first started out riding clipless, I just hope there's no one around unlike when it happened to me many moons ago.

I'm still pinching myself with how much my girl has taken my passion for cycling to her heart...

On One in the Peak District

Hi de- Hi Campers

Deb and I spent a night under canvas on Saturday. It's been a couple of years since I slept in a tent and several years for Deb, although I have bivvied a few times, but the way Deb slept like the proverbial log and I tossed and turned you would of thought it was the other way round,  the campsite being near a busy road didn't help but it didn't bother Deb so I shouldn't really complain about that.

home for the night

The tent is only a cheap little two man or a one man & one woman to be precise but it did the job although we very didn't nearly make it only arriving at the campsite at Newhaven in the White peak, Derbyshire at 9 pm and it's only just over an hour drive from where we live in Stoke on Trent. We decided to camp because I wanted to give Deb a flavour of some real offroad riding that you get in the Derbyshire Peak District and because we are pretty crap at organising ourselves, always getting side tracked with kids and all the other stuff you have to deal with day to day, so I thought it would give us more time to spend on the ride.

As I said I didn't get much sleep so we took it easy Sunday morn not putting the coffee pot on till about 9.30 am but that and the bacon butties soon got me going. We weren't in a rush but that didn't stop me from leaving one of my bidon's in the camp toilet block ..Doh

The ride started in Youlgreave and followed some quite technical bridleways along small valley gorges that characterize the area. Most of the climbing was on roads which were long but not too steep, again I was amazed how Debs toughed them out and kept the hammer down trying to keep up with me because as I was on my sscx pompino I have to keep my cadence up. We did a bit of hike a bike & pushing along Gratton Dale which was a bit too technical in places and hemmed in with overgrown Hawthorn bushes making it even more difficult without getting off and pushing. Debs was on her new 14" Inbred which she was glad of or else she would of had to get off and do more even more pushing.

Gratton Dale

By the end of Gratton Dale Debs was beginning to flag but with 2/3rds of the ride done I wasn't too worried but I couldn't say the same for Debs though because after I showed her the map she was convinced we had another 15km to go instead of the 5 there really was. We had a little steep push up out of Long Dale, which was rewarded with a fast 1.5km 80m decent along rutted double track, across some fields, dodging the cows down to Smerril Grange which put a big smile back on Debs face and a Queen of the Mountains award on Strava and 10th place overall out of 34, pretty good for a novice.  She says she was glad that she was following me or she wouldn't have gone that fast. I came 9th overall which I'm pretty pleased with, I would be interested to know if any of those that are higher were riding a ss cross ?
There were a couple of little road climbs left but it was just a short ride left to where we started after that.

Overall it was a great little taster for Deb for the hopefully bigger and better adventures to come, I for one can not wait and I hope Debs can't too

14" Inbred

Debs new 14"Inbred frame arrived today and I managed to get everything swapped over and even found time to press the headset & bottom bracket in my new Lurcher frame.

14" Inbred

Debs looks a lot better on the smaller 14" but only just.  At just over 5 ft tall she only just fits the smallest of adult frames and it takes a lot of messing about with stem lengths and rises. We had put a 50mm 6º rise stem and flipped it so it was negative but it looks like the 70mm 9º rise stem that was on originally will have to go back on flipped negative too and possibly a flat bar so that she isn't in a too sit up and beg position. But she says it feels better than the 16" but she's not had chance to ride it yet so we will just have to see how it all fits.

My new Rock Shox Sid's arrived too and jolly nice they are too. They are the 120mm XX tapered steerer 15mm maxle light with the hydraulic remote lockout flavour, which is quite a mouthful. The Lurcher is stated as being suspension corrected for 100mm MAX but On One aren't getting anymore 29er 100mm Sid's in stock so a 120mm it is.  I don't think 20mm shall be catastrophic and I can always reduce the travel on the forks which isn't too difficult, I've done it on a set of Reba's before,  but I'm just going to see what they are like setup with some extra sag before I start stripping them down. 

The Lurch is starting to take shape nicely now, it's just a case of being patient now..

SPAKCT CYCLE JERSEYS

Cycle Diaries

Mens long sleeve

 I have always had an interest and fascination with the Che Guevara story and an admiration for the man himself. I'm a bit of a Socialist at heart and like to think of myself as a bit of a rebel (in reality more of a dreamer) so when Deb and I came across these Che Guevara jerseys from Spakct we just had to have them. They came up in a search for pink ladies cycling jerseys as the ladies version is pink. I had never heard of Spakct before as it seems they are quite a new brand made in China for the US market and we had to buy direct from China but you can get them them on Amazon now. The jerseys are really well made with mostly flat stitching and the material looks to be quality stuff and price wise they are a bit of a bargain costing about £45 for the long sleeve version and that's including the shipping costs. The only issue we had was the sizing.

womens short sleeve

I had to get the XXL and it's still a bit tighter than I would normally wear and Debs got the S long sleeve but went a size up to medium when she bought the short sleeve. I'm normally a large when I buy UK or EU made stuff but saying that a Santini jersey I bought recently was XXL but that was what the sizing guide said I would need and that top fitted great. The sizing guide for these though was wrong and I was just lucky Debs had bought her's first so I took a gamble on the size I'd need and it paid off.

So if your looking for a jersey that's a bit different you won't go far wrong by checking Spakct out. Just be careful with the sizing !

Mountain bike Goddess

Today's ride broke the 20km mark, big deal you might think and so probably would I before I started riding with my girlfriend but for my girlfriend who has never ridden anywhere near that on a bike before it is a big deal.Most people have no idea how far you can ride on a bike with a little effort. In the past when I've told friends and family that I have ridden 60-80 km they seem unable to comprehend that it's possible to travel that far under your own steam and that isn't that far for some riders.

My girlfriend Debs was over the moon today with her achievement and rightly so, I'm really proud of her and how she is doing, the way she hauled herself up a fairly steep and extremely rutted farm track only dabbing her foot down once when a big boulder caught her out  was pretty amazing considering she has only been riding a couple of weeks, she is even a Queen of the Mountains on a downhill segment on Strava.

It's difficult riding with a novice at times as you don't know if your pushing them too hard or on the other hand not hard enough as to help them to improve.

Debs worries that she is holding me back and says she feels sorry for me having to wait for her to catch up when I've rode off thinking she is keeping up with me. That's another thing when riding with someone who is not as fast as you, you keep forgetting and before you know it you have dropped them, which then makes me worry that she is working to hard to catch me up and she's not enjoying it.

It's all a learning curve and on the whole we are having a blast, there have been a couple of moments where we have got a bit annoyed with each other but we quickly got over it. I have done most of my riding by myself for the last 20 years so it's great to have some company and especially good to share something you love with someone you love. I've never looked forward to my rides so much as I have these past couple of weeks and I'm enjoying passing on some of the stuff I've learnt over the years as Debs is really picking my brain with loads of questions  about all things cycling. She is even talking about wanting to get a road bike, she has been truly bitten by the velo bug..

I'm starting to wonder who's more nuts about cycling, me or her ?

A Trio Of On One's + One

A Dream Come True

I've always done most of my riding by myself as none of my friends are into riding and I'm not really into the club thing, so when my girlfriend (Debby) said she wanted to get a mtb I was like a cat that got the cream. 

I have always dreamt of having a girlfriend who I could share my passion for biking with and now that dream has come true. She is really throwing herself into it and genuinely seems to be interested, asking all sorts of questions, even wanting me to show her how to do some wrenching, I'm over the moon. 

My rides have gotten a lot slower and shorter and my fitness has suffered but it is all worth it.

I'm helping Debs to build up a lovely white On One Inbred with pink highlights adding a further addition to the growing quiver of On One's. It's a real girly bike but I don't mind I think it looks great. The bike was in the clearance sale, it came with a 16" frame,steel rigid forks and road tyres as it was branded an urban mtb, a misnomer if you ask me ? After seeing her ride it a few times I think she would be better on a smaller 14" frame so we're just waiting for them to come in stock. Also she has bought a lovely set of white Rock Shox Sid RLT forks with a poploc lockout lever to go on the new frame but we couldn't wait so I've fitted them to the 16" and will just swap them out with the rest of the components when the new frame arrives. I've fitted a lovely pink 34t Blackspire chainring with pink bolts and in the process doing away with the big ring making it a 2x9 group. Also I got rid of the heavy Avid discs and replaced them with some lovely light (80g) Aligator aries discs and again in pink. Nice. The oversized handlebars have been replaced with some narrower Race Face bars I had in my parts bin and I've replaced the 70mm stem with a lovely 50mm kcnc jobby and finished off the cockpit with some limited addition bubblegum pink Oury grips. Probably the most important change has been swapping out the On One Big Nose saddle for a beautiful white with pink flashes Selle Italia SLR lady id match saddle, not cheap but worth every penny !

Debs new Inbred

Debs
 my cool & sexy bike chick 

SS/Fixie Macinato

I finally got the Macinato finished and I'm pretty pleased with it, I've not gone mad with the spec this time like I did with the Pompino as it will be just a little bit of fun for getting round town on. I bought the frame and forks cheap just after Xmas and  have only had to buy the crankset,brakes,seat,tyres and chain as I already had all the other parts. It's a lovely ride, very smooth but firm due to the thin 23c tyres. I'm not sure about the flat bars, I've cut them down narrow which has given the bike laser sharp steering which is good but I think I'll chop down some risers I've got in my parts bin and see how they feel and at some point I'll throw some drops on too to see which I prefer.

Plus One

A Trio of On One's

The expanding quiver of On One's will soon have a fourth addition as I have taken advantage of yet another amazing half price deal on the carbon Lurcher 29er frames, a deal too good to miss.

On One Lurcher 29er

This will be my fifth On One build including my first Inbred that was stolen but my first 29er. I've really enjoyed riding all my On One's, they really do give a great ride for the money so I'm fully expecting the Lurcher to follow in their tyre tracks and be a great ride too. The frame is pictured with a Token press fit BB92 bottom bracket and a FRM mixer 1-1/8 to 1-1/5 headset in red. Red is going to be used for some of the bits and pieces with a bit of white here and there to tie in with the white forks. I've ordered some white Rock Shox Sid 120mm XX tapered steerer forks with the hydraulic lockout which are going to look great with the black frame. I was originally going to fit rigid carbon forks but with On One again doing some great half price deals on Rock Shox forks it was another deal to good to miss. The wheels will probably be Stans Crest tubeless rims on red Hope hubs, a nice and reasonably light wheelset and I have always coveted some Hope hubs so now's the time.  The groupset will be Shimano 2x10 or 1x10 and I will be keeping it light and staying with the carbon theme with carbon bars & seatpost.

Looking forward to sharing mine and the girlfriend's adventures in the near future..

New cross/mtb route

These are some pics i took recently on a recce of a new route i've been planning to do for a while now.  I started looking for a new bike route when i got  my new Samsung smart phone, which gave me access to some great mapping apps with OS Explorer on them. My local riding is not bad really with some decent woodsy trails like Hanchurch woods only a 20 min ride away, but even linking up with some farm tracks its only good for short 1-3 hr blasts and i wanted to see if i could link up something bigger. As it turns out there are quite a few bridleways (bridleways are tracks where its legal for bikes & horses to ride) and farm tracks that link up pretty good with some forest trails I haven't ridden before.

This first recce has given me a round trip of 45 km with the outward leg being mostly off road. From Loggerheads, where I headed back on this first trip I will carry on due south next time and head up a bridleway, which will take me up to some woods called Bishops wood. On the map It looks about the same size as Hanchurch and im expecting the trails to be similar. The tracks on the outward leg to Bishops wood are great with a mix of wooded singletrack paths, farm tracks and some field crossings. The wooded singletracks look to be ancient pathways to me as they are sunken with dense wooded sides and have obviously been in use a very long time. The only negative I could say really is the amount of gates, but unfortunately in the UK you can't go far when your out in the sticks without crossing a few gates. One other thing to note is that when I did the ride we hadn't had much rain so the ground was firm in most places but there were a couple of boggy bits, that would probably be ankle deep when wet. The full route will probably be around 65-70 km with a 50-50 mix of road & off road, but there's certainly scope to stretch it out a bit further to maybe 100 km to make it a real lung busting monster ride !

I have been impressed with the Maverick app as it only cost about £1.50 ! It gives you access to several mapping databases, but the most useful here in the UK is the Ordanance Survey 1/50, 000 & 1/25.000 Explorer maps which are quite expensive on other apps where you have to buy the individual tiles, so its a genuine bargain. You can record grid refs, altitude, latitude, longtitude, time of last fix, bearing and all the other usual things like speed, avg and max. By sharing to google maps you can also get your stats for altitude loss/gain. I've not been able to share my Strava files to it but Google tracks are compatable. There is only one problem that i can see i might have trying to record the whole route ? Battery power ! The Samsung S2 has a pretty weak battery, running out about   a km from home, although i was running my Strava app at the same time which I won't do next time, so fingers crossed I can record the whole route. So now im just looking out for a good day weather wise and getting some miles in so it's not too much of a lung/leg killer.

Wish me luck...

On One Macinato - New bike build

It's been a long winter, and a quite one for me with not much riding done and not a lot to blog about, hence it's been a while since i've posted. I have got a new build project though, as i took advantage of On One's sell off of frames and forks in January to bag myself a set of Macinato frame and forks for a very reasonable £128.00 all in.
The Mac is On One's urban fixie/SS frameset and as i had a load of spare parts and wheels after my rebuild of my Pompino it had to be done. I had bought the Pomp as a cheap way to keep riding after i had my inbred mtb stolen as at the time i was out of work and couldn't afford to replace it.
I originally intended for the Pomp to be a fixie for riding round town on but after riding it a few times i just knew i had to build it up as a single speed cross, it just begged to be ridden offroad and i was more than happy to oblige.
I wasn't happy riding my pomp in town and leaving it locked up after spending so much on upgrading it, so that brings me back to the Macinato, like i said it was a no brainer with all parts i had lying round and just the job for a bit of cheap stylish urban transport. It's a nice looking frame and for the money you can't complain, sure the paint jobs on On One's are a bit thin but pound for pound they are hard to beat. I can't tell you what it rides like yet as it needs a crank as i had to cut the original crank of the pomp rendering it useless. The only other parts i've had to buy are the Sram Apex brakes. I'm not sure what bars i'll use yet so i'll try it with flats,risers and drops to find which i prefer, i've got them lying round so i might aswell have a play around.
I'm going to give fixed gear another try but not sure the local terrain suits it as there's a lot of hills but i'll give it a go. The first time i tried it i got a bit cocky and was sprinting out of the saddle when i unconciously stopped peddaling and the next thing i know i'm peeling my face of the tarmac and trying to pick my bike up with a dislocated collar bone ! Any hows here's the new toy !

Thought I would update this post with a pic of the finished Macinato.  It rides lovely, smooth but firm because of the 23c Vitoria tyres. It's only cost me a couple of hundred quid to get this bike built because of all the parts I had spare but I don't think it detracts from it, I think it looks the part.  I've not been able to ride it all that much yet but will be rectifying that as soon I can.

The finished Macinato

Want it Wednesday-Engin Cycles Single Speed CX

It's been a while since I last posted mainly because I havn't had much to post about so I thought I'd join in with Jez Andrews Want it Wednesday over at followingthechainline blog which was a good way to ease myself back into the blogging saddle.
I hope Jez won't mind as he has done a want it with Engin mtb's, but when I saw Engin's single speed CX I just had to do a want it.
Engin's are a bit special being totaly bespoke with rider specific tubesets using tubes from all the main players and painted on decals. Engin's SSCX is part of a new wave as cross is really big in the states right now and is growing beyond the traditional side of cross with it's hour long race format into a more longer endurance format called gravel grinding or graveling, using off the beaten tracks.

l think you will agree it's a really nice bike and it's my want it wednesday !

ENGIN SSCX

Sanguan SG-2200 Bike light Review

I finally managed to get out and test my new light last night that i bought a few weeks ago now. The ride turned out to be a bit of a suffer fest but more about that later. There's a lot of choice now for bike lights with uber expensive ones and budget ones. It seems that it's the budget end where there's a lot of new light's coming out this season, and it's the budget end where i was looking as i really don't see the point in paying £3-500 for a light set when you get a a perfectly good light that performs just as good for less than half that.
I went with the Sanguan SG-2200 from brightbike lights.com with the 2200 being the claimed lumen output. The light is available from other sources under different names and cheaper if you source straight from Taiwan but it's worth paying a little extra to deal with a UK distributor whose name is Trevor who is friendly and helpful to deal with.  At £115 these lights are a real bargain, I'm no expert on lumen output but what i can say is the 2xCREE XM-L led's used in the light are bloody bright !  They have four settings and one strobe setting, the second lowest setting (40%) was easily bright enough for riding off road. Run times are stated as 3 hrs on full and around 9 hrs on low so could be used for riding all night if you so choose. Out the box the light unit itself is lovely, really dinky and well made. The button on the left operates the four light settings and glows green at full power changing to blue at 70% and red at 40% and flashes red at 10%. The button on the right operates the strobe but is really too bright to use on the road, it would be use full if you could adjust the brightness as you can with some pricier light sets.

As you can see from the pic above the battery is nice and small and light too, i can remember my first set of lights with a massive lead acid battery that weighed a ton, with these you really hardly notice the weight at all.
Charge time is about 4hrs so is totally reasonable and the battery is fully sealed and waterproof.
You get some useful extras in the box too with a helmet mount and a head strap so you can use them for walking at night too a nice bonus over other light sets.

The light performed as should on the ride with a good spread of light and good depth but what really impressed me is the light wasn't affected by the -8 temps and the freezing fog which is more than can be said for me.

On to that ride then.

I love riding when there's a good hard frost so after several nights of frosts i finally got my arse into gear after a few weeks off the bike due to my upgrading of my bike and with my new Chris king headset coming loose all the time putting me off (excuses). I have ridden in colder temps but last night was the coldest i have ever felt on a bike, i ballsed up my layers with not having enough, and also set off too quick, didn't warm up steady so sweated too much which resulted in me feeling very cold as soon as i had to stop for more than 2 seconds. What made things feel colder than ever before though was the damp air from the freezing fog which coated me in a layer of ice, I've had water bottles freeze a few times but I've never had ice on me before ! I wasn't the only nut job out there though as i bumped into Kevin Clews, and a mob of about 10-15 members of the Goldtec mtb posse in Hanchurch woods, i only stopped for the briefest of chats as by now i was not in the mood for small talk.  It takes me about 2hrs to get warmed up but i feel like i can ride forever then so when i got to the spot in  my loop where i can take a nice easy 6km road spin home, or the long way with a long steady rutted farm track climb i was feeling a little better so i took the long route. This choice nearly scuppered me as was it not for my new tubeless Stans Alpha's it would of spelled disaster because as i was riding up the farm track i was drawn to half a tree hanging out my front tyre and smacking the forks as it spun round ! Oh no ! Thorns ! Thank god for tubeless ! They  passed there first serious test as the tyre stayed up, i don't think I'd of been able to change a tyre as cold as it was (wimp) while soaked  from sweating too much from being idle these last few weeks. I was glad to get home.

Last night was my first using Strava and was happy to be 15th out of 44  on a segment of Hanchurch woods and will be using it for a bit of motivation so i don't spend the next few weeks off the bike, the headset seems ok so no more excuses and time to start getting the miles in, that is if xmas doesn't put a stick in my spokes !

Biciclista-Want it Wednesday

I came across this cool Italian clothing company a while ago and thought I'd share it via want it wednesday

These are a couple of my favourite designs paying homage to the Belgian classics races

They even do a set dedicated to the spaghetti western film The Good The Bad and The Ugly

Lee Van Cleef- The Bad

  

They look to be really nice quality from the website and they make the team jerseys for Singular cycles so they can't be too shabby . So this weeks want it is Biciclista cycle jerseys... 

Project Pompino Finito

Well that's it then the pompino is pretty much finished. It's probably going to be marmite to some as "cool" bikes these days seem to be very understated with black everything and a collar & cuffs approach to component choice. The only matching components are the Thomson stem & seat post binder and KCNC red chain ring bolts & red cable outer end ferrules, Cane Creek brake levers.

Spec list
On One pompino frame
Shimano PRO full carbon fork
Stans Alpha 340 rims,28 f&r black Sapin double butted spokes, red nipples on black Goldtec track hubs
Schwalbe Rocket Ron tyres
FSA carbon pro crankset
Goldtec 38t chain ring, red KCNC chain ring bolts
YBN superlight hollow pin slotted plate 1/8 track chain with KCNC half link connector
Red 18t White Industries ENO freewheel
Look Quartz pedals
Red Chris King Sotte Voce headset
TRP euroX magnesium Ti cantilever brake set with kool stop salmon pads
Goodridge brake cable outer & KCNC red ferrules
Thomson 100mm 0 rise stem
Thomson seat post binder
Planet X Strada compact light triple butted bar
Cane Creek SCR-5C brake levers
Cane Creek carbon cross top levers
Easton cork bar tape
eXotic carbon seat post
Flite XC ti saddle
Pauls funky monkey cable hanger

I'm very pleased with it but I haven't been able to give it a good ride yet as it looks like I will have to get the head tube faced because the Chris King headset is a right old pain in the arse to get set up, everything has to be perfect, at one point I was close to binning it ! The bearing cap/griplock will not sit flush creating a gap at the back  which results in the headset coming loose. I thought it was the cable hanger at first, which resulted in me buying the extravagant at £40, Pauls funky monkey cable hanger.  It was designed to work with the CK headset but I still had the problem so I will get head tube faced and if that doesn't work god knows what I shall do. I've always lusted after a CK headset but if I had known that they were so finicky to set up I would probably gone for something else, I might still if the facing doesn't work. On the CK website they recommend facing your stem but I would hope that a Thomson wouldn't need it.

The wheels feel lovely and light, tubeless definitely feels different and takes a bit of getting used too as this is my first time riding tubeless, almost feeling like having to learn how to ride again. The squirmy feeling is a bit weird so I have put some extra psi in till I can do some proper testing with pressures. I have gone with 28 spokes f&r and only time will tell if this was a mistake, like I said I've not had chance to go off road with them  and test their stiffness yet.

The brake set is proper bling with magnesium & Ti used in the materials-enough said !

The White Industries freewheel is a big difference to the shimano piece and ooze's quality. Now you can hear me coming from a mile away, sounding like a swarm of mechanical bees so hopefully I won't be getting the dirty looks you get sometimes when you approach deaf walkers from behind.

So that's it then project pompino finito,  it's a damn site lighter than when I started it's makeover though I don't know it's all up weight yet but I can't see where I could make it much lighter apart from maybe the crank set and going really mad on it with Ti everything . It pretty much matches the original picture I had in my head so I'm happy to leave it at that and start thrashing it which is what it's designed for....

Your never too old !

Cyclist Robert Marchand of France celebrates after setting a world record for cycling non-stop for one hour, in the over 100- year old category, at the Union Cycliste Internationale (UCI) velodrome in Aigle February 17, 2012. Marchand, born November 26, 1911, cycled 24.251 km (15 miles) around the 200 metre indoor track to set the record on Friday.

CHAPEAU YOUNG MAN !

TRP REVOX CARBON - WANT IT WEDNESDAY

Want it wednesday  has had a bit of a makeover after almost being binned but i'm glad Jez Andrews has had a change of heart and kept it going and in this new format of posting on any Wednesday when you have a new want it I think is probably easier as you don't always have anything in mind.
Anyway back to this week's want it which is the new cantilever brake from TRP the RevoX Carbon
I think you will agree this is a very sexy looking brake !

These brakes give you just about all the adjust ability you could want with a cantilever brake with individual spring tension, height adjust and adjustable toe in pads. Carbon brake arms and lightweight aluminium fittings give you a very light and distinctive though not cheap package. Form an orderly queue !

Yes I know it's Thursday...

Flite XC Saddle Premature Wear Issue

The image above shows a small patch where the Lorica cover has peeled on my Selle Italia Flite XC ti saddle. This is after 6 months of what I would say is moderate use,  by moderate I mean not every day,  maybe 2-3 times a week and some weeks not at all so to me this is a bit disappointing for a top line saddle.
I'm a big fan of Selle Italia saddles especially Flites having had an original with 10 years use out of it so I had high expectations for it and it being an XC model and designed for the rigours of off road  expected it be pretty hard wearing.

The peeling started along the stitching with the central rubber channel that's designed to provide some grip as the white Lorica side panel's are very slippy, not very good for off road. As the peeling started at the stitched edge I deemed this to be faulty and as the saddle is still within the warranty I contacted On One who I purchased it from. On Ones response was predictable stating that they considered it to be down to wear & tear and thus not covered by warranty. I replied arguing that it wasn't fair wear&tear as the saddle was little over 6 month's old and that the peeling had started from the stitching so it could be argued that there is a fault with the saddle but they didn't even bother to reply to that email. The last two bikes I've built have been On Ones so that's disappointing too.

I asked the good folk on the Singletrack forum for opinions which were pretty mixed but with one or two being a bit insulting with one even telling me to MTFU which is the kind a response that you can get sometimes on the ST forum as it seems to have more than it's fair share of know it all gobshites.

I know the saddle still performs as a saddle and that it's a small patch of peeling but to me a saddle that retails for £100 is not meant to have the cover start to peel within 6 months as some folk on the ST forum seem to think that it is. It's a very trivial matter but part of me thinks I ought to contact Selle Italia because I'm a fan and maybe they might just be interested in my feedback as I'm sure they don't expect the Flite XC to peel like that and that it's possible that it's a poor design with the stitching in a high wear area, but the other part of me thinks that don't be so pathetic and just get on it and ride it which is most likely what I will end up doing....  

Pompino update !

It's been a while since I last posted probably the longest gap since I started posting. I've been busy starting a new relationship and college so there's been quite a lot of change to get used too so my  riding for fun as taken a back seat a bit but I've probably ridden more but it's been more of a commuting and just getting about type riding.

The Pompino as been fitted with the FSA carbon crank and I have to say that I'm very pleased with it as I wasn't too sure when I bought it. The Goldtec chainring looks great with it too and finished off with red kcnc chain ring bolts.

It feels like it's lost a shed load of weight and that coupled with a slightly lower gear it's a lot easier to get up the hills now . Just a slotted/hollow pin chain and the White Industries freewheel and that will be the drivetrain taken care off.

I've been having a clear out of old parts to make some funds for the new wheels that hopefully I should be able to get in the next few weeks, still not sure what build to go with yet though !

Stay tuned !

Want it Wednesday-White Industries ENO freewheel

It's that time again to join in with want it Wednesday at Jez Andrews's following the chainline blog and it's where anybody who's interested can share there biking related wants and desires with the blogosphere .

My want it this week is a White Industries ENO freewheel for my single speed Pompino . Anybody who's familiar with the whole single speed thing will probably have heard the name of White Industries before as they make what is regarded as the best freewheel on the market. They also make some of the nicest blingest hubs and crank sets too.

Although these lovely pieces of kit are the most expensive on the market at around £65-90 sheets, typically cheaper units can bought for between £10-30, but on most there are no seals, so for off road not much good.  I have to say though that the cheapo one on my bike at the moment is still running ok through some pretty shitty conditions with just a bit of oil poured in now and again ! But the ENO's are totally serviceable, with sealed cartridge bearings, that provide a smooth movement with no tight spots and grinding that you get with cheaper units. On the standard ENO there is a 36t engagement system with a case hardened electroless nickel plated outer gear case. They come in a range of size's from 16t to 22t. There's also a tougher model intended for Trials with a 72t engagement but the real mackdaddy is the ENO DOS which gives you an option of two gears either 16+18 or 17+19 which is tempting.

ENO DOS

Having the different gear would mean you having to manually change the gear by moving the chain by hand, and probably having to adjust your brakes too. So the jury is still out on this option for me as I'm pretty sure what gear I want and you would probably only want to change it again pretty soon anyway.

So there it is this weeks little addition to want it wednesday !

It's a jungle out there !

I've not been riding much lately as I've said in a previous post, so when I got a couple of rides in last week it was a bit of a shock to see how much my local loop had turned into a jungle in the space of about three weeks. I can't remember seeing these trails this overgrown before. I did wonder whether I wasn't the only one who's not been hitting the trails lately and that it was down to a lack of traffic, but judging how many people I'm seeing while out riding these days I'll just put it down to the lovely summer we've had.

 Now that's some serious foliage and with the brambles lacerating my legs and wrapping round my crank it made this section a right old stumble slog !  Think I'll  give this little section a miss for a few weeks or just  take a machete with me next time  !

This field of wheat/barley (not really sure) looked like a nice healthy looking crop to me which was a surprise as I thought all the rain might of ruined something like this, I mean it could be for all I know but I hope not for the farmers sake. It makes a good back drop for taking nice pics though !

What would you do ?

This amazing act of generosity warmed my heart the other day when I read the article, and made me think that the guy in the shop would probably not have been moved to help if the kid had been asking his mum for an X Box or Playstation ?

Bicycles in one way or another just seem to bring the best out of people...

Want it Wednesday-Swrve Urban Cycling wear

Want it Wednesday is here again and is a reminder of how quick the weeks fly by !  Although I've got an extensive list of  "want it's" I had to think a bit this week and thought if I had a bit of spare cash at the moment what would I spend it on, and apart from bits for my bike it would be some new clobber from the very stylish urban cycling wear company Swrve .

As I use my bike for getting about on Swrve's apparel is right up my street and are packed with features for cycling in such as there jeans having slightly stretchy material and pockets that will take a mini D lock.

The one item I would really like is their wax riding jacket , which would be a nice jacket even without the cycling features.

Now I know the stuff ain't cheap but I think they compare well with designer gear and with all the added features you get they ain't too bad.  So there you have it this weeks want it wednesday-Swerve Urban Cycling Apparel.