psycholist

If the grinding is when you pull the lever and its a cable disk then the cable is rubbing on the cable outer, lever or caliper. Check the ends of the cable outer have been cut smoothly without leaving a point that rubs the cable as it moves.

Try www.magura.de and look for a UK importer or post on the forums on the Magura site.

A friend of mine got parts for a fork sent directly from Magura after he emailed them. This was a good couple of years ago though and may have been their response to him mentioning that the Irish Magura importer asked for 3 or 4 times what Magura charged and said it would take 2 or 3 weeks when Magura got it delivered from Germany in days. If the brake is less than 5 years old it might still be on the leak free warranty...

Should do, but FSA are bastards for coming up with slightly different designs to those that will fit standard tools, so there's a danger it's an obscure tool, but usually Shimano BB tools will fit provided the hole in the tool is big enough to fit over the axle (I had to buy a new BB tool to fit Echo ISIS BB's for example as even the Race Face ISIS tool I had wouldn't fit over the Echo BB).

First off what doesn't fit? If the spline in the BB cup doesn't match the tool that's one problem, but if the BB axle is too big a diameter for the tool to fit over it that's a different problem... Head for the Tarty or Chainreaction site and look at their BB tools to see what should fit.

The reason many people hate opening SRAM powerlinks is because they don't understand how they work. I've got powerlinks off peoples' bikes with my bare hands in seconds after they've been cursing them for not opening when they try. The trick is to squeeze the side plates together in the direction of the pins (Sometimes you have to wiggle the chain around each pin to clear grit out of the pivots if its muddy) before sliding the link apart...

My bike is on house insurance. Insurance with a lock only covers the bike where you can prove the lock was broken to steal the bike. On the house insurance my bikes are covered while in the house, locked in a car, anywhere in the EU for up to 30 days in a row and 60 a year, and anywhere in Ireland and the UK ... I've never had a bike stolen yet though as I have a cheap nasty bike, which is the only one I ever leave locked outside. I got insurance online with 123.ie - there's a www.123.co.uk as well...

I never had a powerlink snap on me while I used an 8 speed chain on my last bike. I did have chains snap from fatigue in under a year though, but I don't do big gaps. The one Wippermann connex link I tried did snap when used for trials though...

Organic pads tend to bite better than the equivalent sintered pads for a particular brake.

I haven't tried bikes with properly set up BB5 or 7, so I can't really comment. Your cable choice for a cable disk makes a huge difference to the feel and performance - a quick search on the forum for brake cables should give you a few leads.

For similar money the Magura Julie or a Shimano Deore would have my recommendations. I haven't tried them, but enough people recommend the BB5 and BB7 mechanical disk brakes that they should get a look in too... The automatic wear adjustment you get with hydraulic disks means there's no routine maintenance, which is nice...

The Louise is a bit under twice the price of the Juicy 3 IIRC, so you will have to pay extra. I weigh over 90kg and can wheel swap front to back onto things using a 160mm Louise on the front of a 26" bike (When I don't screw it up )... Thinking about going to a 185 disk to make gaps to the front wheel a bit easier alright though... 5 year leakproof warranty is a nice extra detail too - though I did have to put a few extra drops of fluid into the reservoir on mine before it would bite consistently as it was underfilled when I got it from Chainreaction.

What are you using to open it? Have you tried turning clockwise to open it - unless the Tensile freewheels are a strange exception clockwise should unscrew the lockring. Unless you've got the right pin spanner you'll have to hammer it with a centre punch or something similar to open the lockring.

I like my Louise a lot ... I also like my dual control XTR levers with XT calipers and my 2002 4 pot XT disks (For which the total servicing consisted of adding a few drops of fluid to the reservoirs since I fitted them in 2002 and feeding them brake pads every 1500miles. The disks are starting to wear noticeably thin on them now, but they're still working perfectly)...

Magura Louise's cost a lot more than Juicy 3's. Julies are more comparable in price. I've never had trouble with Magura brakes (That I didn't get second hand for half nothing, with loads of miles or a known fault and a previous owner who adjusted them with a hammer)... I'd go with Magura or Shimano from a reliability point of view if you want to stay with hydraulic brakes or Hope if you feel like spending 3 times as much as the Juicy 3...

The sudden temperature change from dropping the pads in cold water is not a stress the pads are likely to have been designed for - the mismatch between thermal expansion coefficients between the pad material and backing as well as the temperature gradients within the pad may lead to them cracking. To clean disks I use Isopropyl Alcohol (IPA) as it leaves no residue. With Pads if they're not badly contaminated I just run a file over the braking surface and it seems to do the job. Baking them in an oven or heating with a blow torch and allowing to cool in air should both be effective too.

If you're planning on drinking them probably...

I'm looking at getting a riser on my Echo control too... The Monty ones look like great value on Tarty, but my question is how strong are they and are they reliable? Suffice it to say I'm not the lightest person on the planet...

Hopefully you've just been unlucky. Only thing I've seen go wrong with Juicy's so far is one lever in the 3 or 4 pairs people I know use has got a bit slow to return after it has been pulled. If it's new get it sorted under warranty, if not the leak may be a bad caliper or piston rather than bad seals. I had the first (and last) Formula brake I'll ever buy leak at the pistons too come to think of it - Shimano brakes have given me no trouble in the 7 years since I bought my first set of XT 4 pots (Which are still running perfectly on my hardtail - the disks are worn quite thin though)... I wouldn't have thought Juicy 3's were a good trials brake though.

As far as I can find out your joints popping (2 versions - the repeatable popping like wrists is tendons/ligaments moving over the surface of the joint, one off joint popping where it takes time before that joint can pop again is due to dissolved gas coming out of the lubricating fluid in joints - it has to dissolve back in before it can pop again) has no link to arthritis, so it's not a harbringer of doom. If you keep hurting a particular muscle or joint find exercises designed to specifically work that muscle/joint and do them - the body will do its damnedest to fix itself when you're dealing with aches and pains and building the muscles around a joint will often sort the pain out. Sore backs are likely to be a symptom of something wrong with either your posture while on your bike or the bike geometry itself. Exercises specifically to strengthen your back as well as being more conscious of your posture can make a huge difference to this (I ruptured a disk in my back around 1996/1997 and have had no trouble at all from it in years with no intervention bar giving it some rest and doing a bit of swimming/stretching exercises to rehabilitate it). I'm pretty sure compared to most mainstream sports, trials is very safe in terms of regularity of injuries and their severity - the dangerous part of trials is the freak accident side of things where the consequences of a chain snapping or something like that can lead to very nasty falls, but that isn't common. I think basketball is the most dangerous sport from an injury per hours played point of view. Sports like golf, fishing and lawn bowls are the sports with the highest fatality rates (Usually through heart attacks) though ...

Jan to April is likely to be drier, not that there are discernible seasons in this climate. Sept to Dec will be warmer... I'd go for the drier option ...

If you run cage style pedals, softer soled shoes are usually better. If you've got pinned pedals a harder sole is better. For example a friend of mine uses Nike 6.0 skate type shoes on caged pedals and says they're brilliant. On pinned pedals I found my 6.0's aren't great all and in the wet they're lethal, while my harder soled Asics runners grip perfectly on pins wet or dry, but will slide more easily on caged pedals because the cages can't dig in far enough to grip. Many people like very flexy soles so they can feel the pedals, but I prefer a slightly stiffer sole as it feels more comfortable - the sole of my foot sometimes cramps if the sole of my shoe is too flexy, I'm guessing because of higher local pressure on my foot over the front and back of the pedal with a flexy sole, while a stiffer sole distributes the load more evenly at the expense of really good feel. So basically, if you've got pinned pedals you'll probably need soles that are a little harder than those for cage pedals. Since Shimano only make pinned flat pedals, I'm guessing the shoes will be better on those. After that it's personal preference whether you like a stiff sole compared to a flexible sole, as either can work well provided you're not talking about SPD shoe levels of stiffness...

60% of the time my lawnmower works every time...

Simple as that . Freewheels are refreshingly low-tech, that's why they work ...

If you can get at one of the pins in the face of the lockring with the cranks still fitted, you can use a centre punch and hammer to tighten it. It tightens anticlockwise BTW...