Odd Socks

I know that this is not trials, but this is a video that we did at our local school of a MTB skills track that we built. We are looking to update this video as we have since added to the track with some more north shore, a bomb hole and replaced the banked corner with a wooden banking. I wish that when I was at school my school had had a track like this.

Hi, Thing to look at is how long the final sequence will be. 6000 frames at 25 frames per second is 240 seconds or 4 minutes, sounds about right to me.

Hi I use Open Office. Seams to work well and opens almost any file ( Apart for Publisher, no one opens Publisher even Publisher ) The best bit about it is that it is free and will work on any platform Here is the link

I didn't even know there was a Senior members forum I don't know what happens there, and don't really care, I enjoy the trials forum as appearers to me. I know that out there in the real world there are lots of people talking and having parties that I will never be invited to but so what. Get your own friends have a conversation and have your own party, I promise I wont insist on being invited.

Hi, I am using them at the moment and think that they are pretty good, but I have only been riding my trials bike for 3-4 months though and previous pads were the magura black pads and my understanding is almost anything is better than them. My main thinking was that for a fairly small outlay I would get better breaks and have CNCed backings that I can reuse. My next experiment is to try grinding my rims to improve the breaks in the wet. Tim

Hi, My better half did experimental psychology when at university and I think I remember some sort of study on an incident where a woman was raped in public on the street and people just walked by. Can't think exactly what it was or where but I will ask her and see if she remembers. Something to do with mob mentality, "one person walks by, everyone walks by" What might be interesting is to try a number of different levels of the same sort of situation as people may react to different offences in different ways. eg. man arguing with woman, man hitting woman, man struggling with woman on ground, compared with same but role reversal. Good luck and let us know where you get with this. Tim

Hi My concern with the ffw is the trend to go for smaller cogs as this will place more tension on the chain, leading to more stretch and failure. As a side note, if I remember correctly, at one point in the distant past someone came out with a free wheel that used rollers, not ratchets. This meant that there were no clicks and instant engagement. I think I remember one of the Martins testing them for MBUK and stating that it was quite weird having an instant drive. Are these still made by anyone. Tim

Hi, How much detail do you want. Each wheel could be broken down to component parts: Axle, Bearings, Retaining & locking nuts, Hub, Spokes, Nipples, Rim, Rim tape, Inner-tube, Tyre, Air Could go on for the rest of the bike but you get the picture. Tim

Hi, Don't know if you have checked this, but when I got a second hand bike and it started creaking at the bottom bracket, I found that it was in fact the bolts holding the crank on. Now that I have thread locked the bolts and done them up tight, no more creaking Tim

Hi, I use GIMP ( Link to Home Page ). It is a full blown photo editing program and with it being Open source, ( FREE ) it is regularly updated.

Hi, So much choice it really depends on what you want to do. Most hardtail bikes above £300 will handle reasonable off road riding, above that you pay your money and make your choice. Full suspension you are looking above £500. Mostly the lighter the better, remember that you will be carting it up hills, this goes double for the GF as she may not have the extra strength. For the GF get a bike built for a woman as the ratio of the top tube / seat tube is different, also spend a bit of extra money on a proper saddle designed for a woman. These are worth there weight in gold and quite often make a difference between getting in to riding and stopping. We bought a saddle at a bike show for my wife, from a company called terry who specialise in women's bike equipment, the first time she rode with it she said that for the first time she was actually not in pain after 10 minutes.

Hi, I don't know what your background is but there are a lot of people on this forum who have been doing trials for a long time and have been using water in there Magies for a long time with no bad effects. You've said What gets me even more is that people take said bike and take an angle grinder to it The idea of grinding a perfectly good rim, removing material so reducing the life of the component seems wrong to me but lots of people swear by the performance improvement, so it is up to them. You won't use water in your brakes fine, that's up to you, but I don't think that you can come on here sounding off at people who do. P.s. I have one brake with water in and one with oil I'm just indecisive me.

Hi, Are the brakes working OK, plenty of bite and hold? If so don't worry about it.

Hi, Don't want to be hijacking your thread so do tell me to bugger off if you want, but we have the same sort of problem at our local school. I have tried to create a short course to test and improve the skills of our youngsters. If you could look at this short video and comment on what you think, and any improvements that would be great. The problem I have is that most of the young people don't have any trials skills yet so the idea is that the first part of the course is relatively easy, but that it then gets harder. Thanks, Tim

Hi, I''m with these guys. You are never to old. I have been riding my mountain bike for years, with a little bit of low level trials thrown in. But now at 40 I have got my self a little mod to play on. I might find that it takes me a little bit longer to get the moves but I will get there. What gets me is when someone asks "who's bike is that?", and I answer " Mine", some times they come back with "Who's is it really?" Go and enjoy, and sod the rest of them Tim

Hi, It would be a good idea to go round and check all the bolts and nuts on the new stuff that you have put on and make sure that nothing has worked it's self loose. Tim

Hi, I think that this country could be a better place if everyone tried to help each other, especially the kids. But most people are scared to try in case they are attacked, physically or verbally. Now reading that back I sound like a "high horse do gooder" , but I have seen how much a bit of time can make a difference. I don't think I am brave enough to do this cold but I found a project and offered my help, and had my hand snatched off. I help out at our local school, working with kids that find the academic lessons difficult. They come to us for one afternoon a week and we fix up bikes that have been donated or rescued from the tip. Once the bikes are fixed they get passed on to social services for family's that can't afford bikes. The kids love it as they are learning to fix bikes and take these skills home and fix there own bikes, also when we get letters of thanks from some of the people that receive the bikes it makes their day. I have since been approached about helping out some other young people in Hull, setting up a small business to get them some life experience. Go on help out however you can Tim

Hi, I have a mate who does juggling and he swears that if he has a trick that he can't get he will leave it for 10 minutes and when he comes back to it normally he gets it first time. It is supposed to be something to do with the way the brain learns, along the same lines as visualisation. I am also in favour of chocolate , isn't it supposed to be an antidepressant Tim

Hi, New on here and to trials, but have been MTBing for a while and have built and trued a number of wheels. How do trials bike wheels cope with the stretching stresses of a disk brake as well as the extra stresses of all that we do to them. I have to say this is one of the reasons that I have gone for magies, along with what in my mind is an advantage with leverage. Tim

Hi, I have got fed up of fighting with grips. Getting them to stay on when fitted, getting them off once they need changing. I am now using lock-on grips. These are so easy to use i don't know why everyone dose not use them. Slide them on do up the screws, there on and won't move. Undo the screws and off they come ready to fit a new set. Tim

Interesting looking design. I have to say if I was rendering that for publication I would smooth the tubing so that they look round and not polyhedral. I don't think I would ride one though, it all looks a bit fuzzy for me Tim

Sorry for a stupid question, but what is the advantage of using water over oil. I would like to know as I have just started on trials and recently flushed and bled my brakes with new oil, what a mess I made Trying to think of some possible advantages I came up with; . Quicker response as water is thinner than oil. . Feel is better as water is less compressible than oil. . Environmental water is better for the environment. . Cost water is cheaper than oil My problem is I don't want to drain the brakes and then fill them with water only to find that there is no advantage and I could have left it until the system needed doing anyway. So I am after experiences of people who have tried it. Tim

Hi, I once watched them live at the "Bike Show" at the NEC. Stood on the balcony watching when I realised that I was stood next to this lady who was getting on a bit. Turned out that this was the granny of one of them, can't remember which one. She admitted that it always made her nervous watching them and their mother just couldn't watch. Tricks and Stunts, is an awesome video, my copy is at the after school club I help run at the moment. The kids think it is great. Tim

Hi, I have used a program called Blender for video editing. It is primarily a 3D modelling application but it also has a video editing / compositing function. Here is one of the videos that I have done using Blender. This a track that we have created with an after school club, the idea being that we can teach and improve the skill level of the club members using it. It has been added to since the video was made but we haven't done a new video yet. Blender can be downloaded free from Here. It will run on a number of platforms. Tim