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Jez

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Everything posted by Jez

  1. Jez

    New frame...

    I've got a Base TA26 at the mo, which has served me well for years but has just developed a crack in the seat tube, so it's days are numbered and it needs replacing. It's main use is getting me to and from work, so it's got a 30T ring and a 9sp cassette on it. I don't properly ride trials any more, just occasionally on the way to/from work; however, I hate 'normal' MTB geo...and also hate huge BB rises and long wheelbases. I like oldschool trials geo - I absolutely love how my TA26 feels. However, I'm a difficult customer because I want the following specs: 0 bb rise Short wheelbase (somewhere between 1010 and 1040mm?) V brake mounts (this is the killer problem) Able to take a 9sp cassette Able to take a 32T ring without it fouling on the chainstay There are a few options out there - e.g. Tarty have a Monty dirt frame in (although it has a 30mm bb drop...not sure how I feel about that), or some oldschool trials frames knocking about, but it's really difficult to find out what the geo on those old frames is. I wish I could find an Inspired Flow 26", but they only seem to come as the full bike. There's a Heavy Tools and a Saracen X-ess on ebay that I'm considering, but again, no geo details - does anyone know what they are? Or can anyone think of any other options I should look into? Thanks
  2. Degrease your rim and pads and make sure they're aligned properly (which is never easy with Vs). Wash off with water (no soap or shit), then ride around dragging the brake for about 5 mins. If they're still crap there's either something wrong with your rim or your tektro poor excuse for a brake (I had a pair, and replaced with SD7s as soon as I could), or you can't align brakes to save your life. In which case, get a mate who knows his Vs to do it. I've had reds on both my bikes (smooth rims all round) for ages now, and they've always been spot on unless it's pissing with rain, in which case, yeah they are crap. But in the dry and even slightly damp, they have bite and hold for days. I've not even got a booster on my stock (there's boss flex, but the brake's powerful enough that it's not an issue). Oh and here's a simple alignment test: sit on your bike stationary, feet on the floor. Pull the brake lever quickly. If you hear a 'clack' as the pads hit the rim, they're probably pretty well aligned. If you don't, likely you need to break out the allen key.
  3. Will probably be there now I have a non-cracked hub and a working rear brake.
  4. I'll probably be there as long as I can get some degreaser for my rims before then (had an unfortunate moment involving some oil and a pair of heatsinks). I'll probably be well late as usual. Also, New Street Gap for those that don't know: http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&...mp;t=k&om=1 Pretty much smack in the middle of that where the two roads join. you can zoom in/out, change it to a map view etc to get yer bearings.
  5. Beeb weather forecast says sunny on saturday. Bonus. I'll probably be there...late, seeing as my lazy ass rarely gets out of bed before 12 on a saturday.
  6. Depends how oldschool you wanna go... I was around at the time when everyone bought Saracen X-Ile frames and pimped them up into trials bikes. Back when Pashley had just brought out the 26MHz. We all had bikes with 32T rings and DH bars that you could jump as well as trial (for the record I've built up a Base TA26 along those lines recently; pics on their way, stay tuned). Dayglo yellow maguras were the order of the day in the brakes department, and if your tyres weren't Tioga Factory DHs or IRC Kujos (or later El Gatos), you may as well have gone home. There were a lot of Zaskars and DS1s around that time as well. Montys and Megamos were like rocking horse shit in the UK; if you wanted a mod you had to either spend forever finding one, or special order the Hans Rey GT mod. We could all recite most of the commentary and interviews from Chainspotting word for word. Trials was a lot more closely related to mountain biking in general - we'd be out riding with guys on DH and freeride (which was a new concept back then) rigs regularly. Things were different back then - the whole tone of the trials community has changed massively, and the riding has come a LONG way...but it was still more fun back then for some reason. Bouncing around on massive bikes and sidehopping OFF stuff. </nostalgia>
  7. Mine are on smooth and are spot on for everything except wet riding. Had em on for...um...18 months or summat? Possibly longer, and judging from the amount of material left, they've probably still got another 18 left in em. And that's on both my work bike and my mod; the work bike gets ridden 10-12 miles every day + trials as well.
  8. OK the Kot forks arrived today. I got the curved ones in silver with V & disc mounts. So far they feel pretty good; certainly a million times lighter than the original Base forks (the bike actually feels like it wants to stay on the back wheel now, rather than fighting to keep it up...so to speak ) They DO make the bike feel a gnat's tit longer in some weirdass way, but not annoyingly; it feels like the cockpit length has changed a bit, even though technically it hasn't. I think they are a wee bit shorter than the old forks as well, and also the steering has gone REALLY quick and nippy. It used to feel like something that would be more at home in a bombhole, but now it feels more like a trials-specific machine (at last). So whichever way you look at it, it's a good upgrade from the old forks. Whether the Echo forks would be better, I can't say. Either way I'm happy. At the mo I'm running a stem that's something like 100 x 15 or 100 x 20 I think (can't remember) with a coupla spacers underneath it. One thing I will say is to be a bit careful putting the crown race on if you do get the Kot forks, mine didn't want to go on straight at first for some reason, despite it being a tapered affair. I had to put a lot more effort into getting one particular side down the steerer. EDIT: forgot to mention, mine's the £99 TA26 off Tarty, so I'm guessing that makes it a Mk III. In related news, the silver Kot forks are EXACTLY the same finish as the silver Base frame, so they match pretty well if you care about all that malarky.
  9. Jez

    Lm Fluid

    Citroen LM is what I used to use in my maggies many moons ago (before I got a REAL brake ). I was told it was identical to the "official" maggie stuff. I never had any problems, and yeah, WAAAAAAAY cheaper than what maggie will sell it to you for.
  10. Bollocks, wish I'd seen this a few days ago...just ordered some cheapy Kot forks off Tarty for my TA26. Should be here tomorrow, I'll let you know how they ride.
  11. I've done almost exactly what you've suggested with a TA26. It's got a 32T ring (probly gonna put something a wee bit smaller on soon), with the bash plate bodged out with the aid of a steel plate with 4 holes in it to be big enough. Gears on it, Avid V's front and back. I use it both to ride to work and for trials. It's the mutt's nuts. Or will be when I have some forks that don't weigh 50 tons on it. But bear in mind that I'm oldschool as fook (I'm from the "X-Ile you can both jump and ride trials on" era)
  12. Think about height as well as length. My Base was a piece of shit to do anything with til I got a higher front end on the go.
  13. Heatsink reds on sd7s/smooth rim here. f**king fantastic, just don't ride in the rain. Work best either a) when just slightly damp (when it's spitting) or when ragingly hot (i.e. an hour or so into a ride).
  14. Jez

    Rim Cleaning

    Muc-Off. Spray on using the bottle, spray off using an old bottle full of water, ride around with brake on for a few minutes to dry it out, and voila, one immensely loud/grabby brake. This works for smooth rims, never tried it on a grind. Using Vodka is a complete waste, you heathen. Drink the damn stuff!
  15. The Quando hub on my monty did that years ago. I got home one day to find no bearings in my rear hub. I'd wondered what the grinding noise was and why my brake was rubbing like f**k.
  16. There's been loadsa parts like that over the years for me. The highlights include: A pair of Wellgo caged pedals. The bearings got so bad that you could spin the pedal and it would continue spinning for a good 7 seconds or so. The only thing that killed them in the end was that I battered all the teeth off them so they got to chocolate-teapot status. In the end I did an epic bodge and turned one of the cages into a homemade chain device. I've still got the centre CNC'd bits complete with grease-free looser-than-a-scouse-bird bearings and a bent axle. A UN52 that made some downright HORRIBLE noises. Lasted about 2 or 3 years of VERY hard abuse in that state until the bike got nicked. My first MTB frame - a steel Gary Fisher XC bike that got ridden into the ground until the headtube cracked, and later the forks as well. Many a pair of BBB V pads. They seemed to last forever. Also my Monty milk pads had just as much material on them when I sold my X-Lite (2 years later) as they did when I bought it. A pair of Tracer cranks; for about a 18 months they were at a slight angle to each other (i.e. not straight) - the left crank was rounded a bit, and was bodged on using bits of biscuit tin lid to pad it out. I've still got one somewhere. Pretty sure I had some Sachs chains back in the day that went to hell, back, and then back into hell again. You could say that they had a one way ticket to hell. And back. And back again. They took some ridiculous heavy-bike-heavy-rider-landing-to-bash-very-hard-on-a-brick-wall abuse, and never broke. They just stretched real quick. I remember riding a cracked axle for a few weeks before it finally gave up the ghost. Pretty sure I was running a 1.95 tube in a 2.3 Tioga for about 6 months as well. There was more...I've got an LX left crank here that I remember lasting a while. And an STX left crank. And a cheap unbranded left crank. And another left crank that looks like it also said "LX" on it at one point, can't really tell. Spotting a theme here? This is all from my riding days about 5/6 years ago. I'm yet to have anything like that this time around. EDIT: Just remembered the threaded headset with a rounded and later crossthreaded locknut that lasted a good 2 years, even though it had more play than a theatre in it. Unbranded, came in the Gary Fisher XC bike. My mates were dumbfounded as to how it survived so long. In the end I upgraded to threadless due to cracking the forks I had at the time, and getting rigid beefy *threaded* forks turned out to be damn near impossible.
  17. Jez

    Police Info

    It's all bollocks. I've been riding on the pavement for as many years as I can remember, and I can tell you right now that the cops don't know their arses from their elbows when it comes to the law on such matters. You ask them what the law is on it, and then to PROVE it, and they won't be able to unless they are REALLY on the ball. They'll be able to recite word for word the flavour-of-the-month laws like ASBOs and that, but riding on the pavement? Nah. They have bigger fish to fry. You could probably blag that 20" IS allowed on the pavement, and when they argue ask em to prove it. Pretty sure they wouldn't bother. But that's beside the point. Use common sense, you see a cop you stop riding and start walking, or at least slow the fook down to walking pace and look well in control (which always seems to work for me). If you're blasting through a busy town centre spinning like a madman, then yeah, they're gonna give you grief. But yeah, if you're riding ON shit, you will also get given grief. At the end of the day benches/walls/whatever ain't designed for trials use, and that's all that they care about. Same applies, see a cop, stop until they've buggered off. And preferably tell the people you're riding with there's a copper in the area; the longer cops in your area stay ignorant of the fact that trials riders exist in your town, the better. Also, ironically I see cops on 26" full bounce Konas razzing around Birmingham city centre on the pavement/large pedestrianised shopping areas. Pretty sure their footbound colleagues ain't gonna stop them and fine 'em any time soon. The whole thing is just one massive grey area, and it ain't gonna get clarified any time soon because the people who do said clarifying have way bigger fish to fry. You can always try the "what damage am I doing and who am I annoying?" line on cops if they try to fine you though. Be polite until they ask for cash, then protest like a b*****d...but intelligently.
  18. Jez

    Chain Line.

    Gentle adjustment is always a good thing Failing that if you're really desparate, angle grinding away some hub/BB-related bits may help...but then again that may do the exact opposite and result in a hefty bill and a punch in the face from said mate...
  19. Beeb site says rain around 12pmish: http://www.bbc.co.uk/weather/24hr.shtml?id=1045 So Astorrrn uni might be a poo idea. Wet picnic benches are bad news. T'other way would be better (i.e. broad street way)
  20. OK I'm defo on for this if my ass gets outta bed in time.
  21. Jez

    The Legends

    Who was that dude who used to ride with Jez Avery back in the day? Paul something? Last name began with a H? Used to ride a Haro...more of a tricky guy than a trials guy. And is Rob Warner dead yet?
  22. Mummy might well be IN it, in which case we do have a slight problem...
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