Heatsink

Hey Simon, I've just contributed a nice chunk of cash which should help lubricate things :P Now that I've read your initial post (I was in work earlier today!), I acknowledge that I will fall under the "account sharing" tag. Hopefully the money I've contributed will help keep the wolf from the door :P Cheers, Steve

Don't tell Scott, but I was going to send them to him gratis anyway! Also, I'll see what I can do for you Tom.....Special deal because of the mutual support that we've got going :S

Sorry I haven't read your post completely, but we should definately all chip in to support Trials-shack, which is in turn doing a sterling service enabling us all to download the latest riding vids from this thriving UK (and world) scene :- One point though, I've got an account which presently hasn't been used, but I had intended making it available to all the 20 riders I support for them to upload their videos as they see fit. Maybe there should be a staggered payment scheme set up because in theory there could be 20x the normal amount of vids on one account. Maybe it should be 20p (or less) an upload or there should be a similar scheme based on the number of uploads done on an account? £2 a month for an account is a steal! Steve P.S. Sorry if someone has already said this, I'm in a rush and haven't got time to read the whole thread :">

Scott! Don't quit yet! Here's a reason to be cheerful - I've got a set of Heatsink Vees here which will be sent to you in the next couple of days. These are freebies if you keep on riding! Steve

Good point! The replacement pads would indeed be cheaper than buying a complete pad & backing, the same as they are for my Vees. It would be easy to change pads at home using the same method I have for the Vees as well. I guess the attraction of having a pimpier looking brake (and stiffer backing) plus cheaper pads after you've bought the backing will overcome the slight inconvenience of having to take out the old pads, tidy up the old glue, and glue in the new ones.

http://www.observedtrials.net/vb/showthrea...light=home+made ^ A very nice job. To create the fit onto the maggie piston thingy, there is an o-ring captured in the back central hole of the backing that compresses to hold the pads on. I could make something similar if there was enough interest, modifying the basic design of my curved Vee backing to add this fitting idea, adding the tabs back to run in the maggie brake guide and getting the o-ring fit idea to work too. Could cost around £10-£15 a pair of backings (including a first pair of pads), beautifully machined in the UK, for those wanting to pimp up their maggies a bit! Steve

Good luck! How are you going to cut the Alu? Even on a bandsaw and only a few mm thick it's slow and hard work. By hand it'll put hairs on your chest. You'll need a few lunch hours I think! Steve

Hey up, ^ Functional I guess!

If I was ordering one, my current preference for be for a rather catching yellow! Steve

I'm about 78kg (over 12 stone!) and run 40 PSI in my rear tyre. Could never contemplate running lower than 30PSI or even less than 20PSI as some people seem to do because it causes rimming out and general folding over/squirmyness even though I have a relatively thick tyre on the back. For the front it's less than this for comfort, but I don't know how much exactly because I tend to let air out after over inflating, and I find a point that gives some comfort through the front of the bike to my wrists, without allowing folding or general deformation which leads to lose of control. I guess it's a personal thing really, Steve

Mr Tom ^ is the man who can and has :( Onzaboymark mentioned a post I had a hand in on this subject. This was in the SM area. For a while I was enthusiastically finding out about materials, where to buy them, pricing up equipment, but it all stopped when I was at the point of having to shell out £300 on a brazing set! When my enthusiasm had died down, I realised that I'd probabily quickly get bored of it and my would be left with £300 worth of no longer used equipment whilst in my shed resided a couple of bottles of gas that could blow up my entire street.... I still want Tom to teach me to braze though! Steve

Fat and proud at BMI 32! Anyone that knows me will confirm that I'm far from fat. Despite getting bored of Judo a few years ago I haven't lost the physique. Just proving that BMI doesn't always tell you something meanful! On the same website it points out other measureables to take into accound like the hip to waist ratio. I'm definately not planning on dieting anytime soon! Steve P.S. Alexx you must post pics of the new you! It sounds like you've undergone a phenomal bulking up since I visited you in Cleethorpes!

^ Hey! I recognise those jumps! They're my local ones (Y) In Royston aren't they? Had a go at them once, and came a cropper on them vowing never to try jumping again! I used to live in Royston, but now I've moved away. Anyway in an uncharacteristic fashion for me here is a succinct post: 1. Commuted by bike when at Uni come rain and high water (lack of money for a car) 2. Joined XC club 3. Really got into XC - plenty of riding in the Bath area 4. Started reading the mags and got inspired by the Martins (Y) 5. Very slow progression commenced! 6. Left Uni and bought my first bike specific for trials (or at least I thought) 7. Have been bumbling away since, improving at what is surely the slowest rate of anyone! It's only now I live near Cambridge that I know some good trials riders, but I mostly ride alone in snatched moments near my house because it's hard to find the time to make the car journey. 8. Became a Dad, and the bike only comes out once a month now! I'll have to be world champ in another life :) Steve

Here's a quick mock-up of one that Alexx might recognise, he had it in his back garden (lay out from memory (Y) ) ^ Relatively compact but lots of lines. © Alexx! It's maybe not a complete park, but as the first actual layout in this thread, there may be some good ideas to build on :) The circular thing is a tractor wheel, or it could be a cotten real. What's good is the two central stacks of pallets can be approached from all sides. The lower can be ridden up, side hopped up or form part of a gapping sequence. The higher can be sidehopped if you're getting good, ridden up (if you move the tractor wheel to allow a run up), you can use the pallet ajoining, or the ramp. You can gap up from the lower stack which is seperated by a gap. Thinking about it, the higher stack of pallets, maybe with a lower obstacle/ramp alongside to enable most people to get onto it, creates all the larger dropping moves. You can try and gap drop onto the tractor wheel, or maybe a longer gap could be added. If you had more space, I was thinking maybe you could fit in some elevated beams for riding along and gapping across. I'm trying to remember the Spalding rig which had them (Y) Nice to have it on grass - no need to fear bailing! Steve

If it's covered up as people have suggested, so it's not obviously a bike but rather some luggage and not in the path of a likely fire escape route, then they won't be interested. I suspect that seeing a bike that's ready to ride in a room makes them think about the mess (muddle wheels, oily chain) and damage that you could be causing, and they wheel out the fire hazard excuse to rain on your parade. Bag wise, I recently looked into bike bags for my trip to Llandudno. I had to bring my bike into the Travel Inn overnight. I found you can pick unpadded ones for £40 but they seem to require removing both wheels and taking the bars out (or the stem off if you don't have a removeable front plate on your stem). I also contacted some Army and Navy stores to see about using a body bag, but the chap on the end of the phone was swearing blind that you couldn't fit a dismantled bike in one, contary to my belief! I only wanted the minimum of dismantlement to get my bike in the car along with all the rest of my luggage, so in the end the solution was to buy some bin-bags about £1.75 for a roll - the ones for lining wheelie bins because they were the biggest. I bagged the frame (minus wheels) from both ends of the bike. Maybe you could do similar with some big sacks corner so there's no need to remove anything, and tuck it in the corner? Steve

Just to nail the mech hanger question - that's the same as all the other TA26 '04 Bases, and as Bigman pointed out (nice one!), you can buy it from Supercycles for £8, but I don't know how much postage they charge: http://www.supercycles.co.uk/site_details.asp?ProductID=351 ^Type 4 Booster wise, I had no problem fitting a standard 2 bolt maggie one, and I did have a Tektro on there too which attaches across the brake bosses. Very hard to set up the magges with this set-up though, so I ditched the Tecktro after a while. In fact, I think I'm going to put a Vee brake on the back because I love my new front one so much. So easy to set the pads up straight compared to the maggie ones, I can unclip the brake really easily to remove the wheel, and I'm getting fantastic braking with the pads I have on there (Y) Steve

There's no need to spend all that extra money on the Crescent, it would be wasted in my opinion. I'd take advantage of the recent relatively great value frames that are now available. If I was looking for a frame I'd consider the '05 Saracen MAD one too. From first glances it looks to be a good value frame, which has an improved seatstay-seat tube junction over the Base. Not as if I'm ever going to break my Base though! I wonder how much the Saracen's will be - maybe they're already on sale. One of them has 4 bolt rear mounts which I would think is an improvement making it easier to set my brake up - it usually takes me ages! Steve

^It's me & Tracy my wife :ermm: We'll be the ones with the loud baby! ^ The Base See you there! Steve

Here's a convenient photo of the Base Hanger for comparison (N) The hanger on my TA26 was already bent when my frame arrived. It was a stoke of luck that I had both an old X-ile and and old X-tort frame which have exactly the same mech hanger. I did get a replacement one of these from Halfords a while ago, and I had to pay around £10 from memory, and had to wait a few days for it to come. When it breaks you hardlt want to have to wait so I remember thinking it was pretty rubbish really. I'd love to know the cheapest and quickest place to get a new mech hanger for a Base TA26 if anyone has the definative answer. Steve

I'm in the process of speeding this on at the moment (Y) I'll post information in my Heatsink '05 News thread in the news section with updates on the new product launch timings when I have confidence in them. Thanks for your interest! Steve

I am indeed driving up from Cambridge, and I wish I had a larger car because I would have given lifts! I've got to fit me, my wife, baby Callum, my bike and enough stuff for a weekend away (the pushchair takes up 1/2 the boot!) into a hatchback. My mum lives in North Wales, so I'll be spending the following weekend with her. Apologies in advance if the event is marred by a continually screaming baby! I think it'll be easy to pick me out, and please come and say hello! Steve

Hey! You've got plenty of time (2 weeks) in which to buy a helmet. We wouldn't want a nasty injury to occur at the event :D See my sig for the reason why you should get one! Also don't worry about being shit. I'm shit too, and it says that all standards are welcome. It's all about the taking part and riding with mates :D After moving around some things in my diary, I'm definately going to be there! Steve

This event deserves to be a well attended success! Respect to the organisers! The great thing is that it will hopefully be a top example to help make it easier to convince other councils etc to support similar events in other locations around the UK. Maybe Spunkey Monkey boy could pass on any useful tips on setting up such an event, and also experience after on how to run it, to others that want to run a similar event in their area. Keep some good notes now to help later on! An indoor scene that can take place regardless of the weather and daylight will be a hugely attractive fixture on the trials calendar to compliment the natural trials scene! I'm looking into whether I can make it! Steve