Chris Borneo

1.5m of Magura hose from your good selves and 2m of white shrink-wrap from eBay. Total cost £7.41. Stoked

Plan was to take my time with my new Rocket build but today I ran out of patience and just chucked a bike together with any old bits I could find to go out for a ride. Some of the bits like the front wheel, forks, profile cranks and pivotal saddle/post will be going on the final build but most of the rest of it is just crap I had lying around. The rear wheel is the worst bit and I'd bent the axle after only half an hour. Amazing being back on a 26" street/trials bike though, even with only one shonky rear brake and the rear wheel of a budget Ridgeback from the early nineties. Gonna have to keep it rolling now until I can get the bits to finish it properly. Should have a rear wheel on the way from a mate who already lent me this fame(I have an identical one I'm stripping ready for respray) and I'm gonna sort a Magura for the back ASAP.

Genius! Hadn't even considered it but I reckon that'll do the trick and I can do the same on the front. Save buying another hose. Cheers

Cheers. Really after solid white though so I can match it with a white hose on the front when I get a Juicy 7 on there.

Can you get white hoses for HS33s and if so can anyone recommend somewhere I can get one for a decent price?

Oh yeah, of course, everyone has. Lets see your pics then.

Ha ha, that's nothin. Seen both my shin bones!

Bit of work with a file and some emery cloth and you could get those really smooth. This is the fork from my road bike where i removed the brake bosses. On the right is just after filing with a second cut file and on the left is after a bit of work with some emery cloth. I only polished it to this extent as I was getting it clear coated and didn't want any marks to be visible after shot blasting. If you were getting it powder coated a colour, you wouldn't have to be so thorough. This is the frame and fork when it came back from the powder coaters. I don't have a close up of the fork but you can see it came out alright.

That looks amazing. What's the arm made from? Is it a reflector bracket?

Riding with other people who can give you pointers and straight up loads of good old fashioned practice will help you get to were you want to go mate.

Reckon a good sharp file would be worth a try. Might take a bit longer than a grinder but you'll have more control that way and probably get a better finish. Make sure you put a good layer of chalk on the file before you start and it'll help stop it getting clogged. Always makes it easier when filing anything made of aluminium.

Sorry, should have explained this better. I'm not looking to have two cogs on the hub at one time. I'll swap the cog and the chain over depending on what setup I want to ride on that day. Also I'll be running a 1/8 chain and cog for the 12t setup. Would that be an issue with any chain tensioners?

Going to be running a 24 on the front I think. Suppose I was thinking I'd run the chain with such a small amount of slack that it wouldn't be able to hit the stay but I guess the chances of it working out like that may be a bit slim. Think I need to do a mockup tonight and see where I'm at. Two jockey wheels is going to add a whole load of issues to my homemade plan! Oh yeah, I'm going to be swapping between 12 and 16 I think but I'm not 100% certain yet.

Won't you get that with one jockey wheel pushing up on the chain from underneath?

I'm in the market for a chain tensioner for my Rocket build and I'm trying to sort out the options. Goin to need something that applies pressure under the chain as I want the option to run a 12t rear sprocket and I want to get as much chain wrapped round it as possible. Think I've written of the idea of using an old mech like I used to back in the day. I'll be carrying enough weight around anyway and it just seems a bit overkill. Been lookin at some of the sprung single speed chain tensioners on the market and some of them look pretty simple. Thinking I could make one by modifying an old v brake arm. I figure it's already sprung, I just need to bolt an old brake boss to my mech hanger and a sliding jockey wheel to the other end? Anyone else done something like this before? Also is there any real advantage to having two jockey wheels? I'm planning to run the absolute minimum amount of slack and maybe a half link if I need it so I figure one should do? The other option I've been looking at is a spoke tensioner but it seems a bit bodge. Anyone been running one for a decent amount of time? Does it do the chain any damage?

Not usually a fan of metallic green but that looks awesome, especially with the saint cranks and the other little touches. It's all in the detail for sure.

Definitely sounds like it's worth investigating further. Local bike shop may be able to take it apart and have a look for you, if you want to avoid buying a new one? Might work out more expensive if it is knackered though.

Anyone looked on the Avid website yet? Just had a look at their technical manual and spares catalogue and I think the bit you're after is the foot screw and I think might be part of the internals kit, not the adjuster kit. craigjames may have already bought this kit in the past though and tell me I'm wrong.

Did you email em? Maybe they can get hold of one for you.

Tarty bikes have BB7 adjusters listed on their website. Not sure what's included with that. Might be worth dropping them an email.

Wow, I thought I was old to be getting back into it at thirty. Fair play to you. Good to hear about a family getting into riding together. Like you said though, it's worth taking it easy to start with. I know from skating, my body doesn't bounce back from inuries like it used to and you've got 34 years on me. Be worth the odd bump though I'm sure.

Just got round to starting work on the Rocket. This was as much powder coat as I could get off with nitromors. Made the first cuts but couldn't get any closer with the full size hacksaw. Used a junior hack saw to get in a bit closer. Then started with the file. Last pic I could get before the light faded and the missus had me in for dinner. I'll finish it up tonight and start work on the custom head badge I'm gonna be making. Made this one already for an old club racer I restored with a mate in the summer. Not sure yet if I'm going to go with the same design or something new.

There was a thread on best vs recently. You might find that worth a look.

I stand corrected. Sorry for not being a sheep.

Harsh! Those kinda trips to hospital are never any fun! First one I've heard of snapping though. Seen loads of KMCs snapped but to be fair, a lot of that's probably down to the number of people who use em.