pav

8,22kg stock over here!

http://www.youtube.com/user/ExpressiveBikes#p/u/6/NEezZeqmVO8 Thank Le from TNN for this, I love him!

Pics from my first ride on my new slate. Nothing overly amazing, just doing old moves really effortlessly on it now! Apologies for skins in the pics, it was a REALLY f**king cold day and they are the best way to keep warm without a million layers of uncomfortable clothing!

I finally got my Slate II now! It's only about 2 months late because rockman took ages to send to my dealer, then when it got here, they didn't even send a grey one which I'd ordered. I've settled for silver, but was worried how the forks would look with it, but now it's built I love it and cant be happier. Absolutely ridiculous to ride, I just cant believe how good it is and that it is my bike to ride. It's too good to be true! Special thanks to Will at Trialsden for hooking me up with the rockman and 90% of my parts. Also thanks to Owen at biketrialsdirect.com for getting me a heap of nice stuff, David at Trialshive.com for my mounts and Kevin at wherestheseat.com for putting up with my tyraid of questions and harrassment about what parts are good and what will work on slate 2, etc. Not 100% sure on the weight, it's only been weighed with bathroom scales, first time we did it we did it wrong and it was 8.5kg, next time was right and it said 8.4 then after I ground rims it went to 8.2 and then after a ride 8.1kg. I have no idea what to believe or if any of those a right because it seems too good to be true, but I will check on a bike scale some day!

Really? I've heard people say that but never really had that problem. Could it be related to the rim used you think? Like how long it holds a grind or something? What pads are you using now?

Gilles uses Coust pads. Same pads Giaco uses front and rear. However Gilles said he is contracted by Koxx to use some of their pads so he has to use Koxx Yellows on the front but he would prefer to use Coust because he says that they're better. Coust pads are available here, they just got a delivery of them Trials Den. Their shipping is very reasonable too so don't be discouraged by where the shop is! I just bought some coust pads from them, BEST PADS EVER. I have been running them for years and tried TNN, Koxx, Heatsink and others. I havnt tried new TNN beleay, but everything else is pretty crap compared to Coust.

I am getting a Rockman 108.9? I am in aus and got mine from www.trialsden.com so works out same price as echo sl

As said earlier, just check that they are perfectly square. You might need to do a fresh grind or 2 to get them going good. I've found they take longer to bed in with heatsink backings than when you buy them re-done from the cousts themselves in plastic backings. But don't worry, once they're going good, they're the best!

I am going to build these forks onto a grey slate 2 with black everything else. Should look good hopefully?

Here is a funny little fact about my membership on this site; I joined in 2004, but did not get full member approval until this week. This is not a go at the moderators or anything by the way, its just because I signed up and didn't really use it until recently! I thought it was pretty funny none the less though!

This is the best advice you will get for riding any sort of trials. Watch videos of your favourite riders, pick the moves that you like them doing and then learn those first. No doubt, once you play with them a little, you will want to learn more, and you will. There is no point spending months learning a move because someone told you to, when you dont even like doing the move.

Hubs and freewheels get quiter with more oil/lube in them. Over time, this lube may or may not seep out, and your hub or freewheel will get louder. Currently, I have a Chris King hub, every 6 months or so I service it, and I notice that it gets a little quiter every time. I can tell when it does need a service because it seems to be a little bit louder. Another thing I have noticed is that the more lube I put in when I service it, the quiter it gets. If you want to make your freewheel louder, you need to service it, but when you do so, take out some of the grease/lube/oil that is in there. This is kind of un-servicing it though. I have not done it on a freewheel for a long time, but on a friends ACS when we did do it, we had to take off the freewheel and then undo the lockring face thingo thats on it. Then you can see inside it. But beware, when we did this, we got all the ballbearings EVERYWHERE and it was so annoying to put back together. I am not sure if newer freewheels will be the same though. In a month or two, I should be rocking an Echo SL freewheel, if it is really quiet, I might open it up and make it louder like this and let you know how it goes.

hehe valid point. You can never have too much power. Thanks why I switched to front magura with a nice grind and heatsink blue pads. I would never look back. Some days now, my front brake holds better than my back one!! But on an Inspided, you wouldnt need more than 180mm I dont think? At least if your worried about compatability, with 180 you shouldnt have any worries.

Water bleeds feel reallly good. I have only ever done it to mine with a brake that I know was already leaking and it was unreal. No squishy-ness or anything like that. It's what Gilles Coustellier was running at the world champs in Canberra last year. BUT, it does apparently make your brakes leak, but I have never come accross anyone who says they have had a problem with it, and if they have, it was only after a very long time. Another thing, if you have plenty of oil and time, try bleeding your brakes a few times and trying some different things to understand how it all works. Once you work out what does what, you'll get a better understanding and do better bleeds all the time. There are even a couple of little shortcuts you can do sometimes if you have just changed a lever, cylinder or your brakes have leaked a little to top them back up!

Hey there, I had echo pure forks and was running a 180mm hope trials on it. 180mm is pretty much standard and will fit most trials forks without any adapters or anyhting like that. I pretty much just got it in the mail and then bolted it straight on and it was good to go. Plenty of power in the 180mm hope too. I have only seen bigger on those 203mm avid mechanical ones, but I dont really like mechanical brakes so i never needed a rotor so large. Given that your on an inspided, you wont need anyhting bigger than 180mm anyway.