Let's offroad / mountain bike / mtb / ride dirt

I somehow doubt that Beastway is a rock-fest :-)

I sold my MK2 Cotic Soul (853, 1 and eighth head tube, 27.2mm seat tube) for £250 on fleabay in immaculate condition. They ride really well and look more classic than the Mk3 with tapered HT and 31.6 seat tube. I was pleased with that price to give you an idea of value.

I somehow doubt that Beastway is a rock-fest :-)

Don't forget that Howard will be carrying the mother of all hydration/spares packs

I've got 2 x 1.8 Panaracer Fire XC folding tyres, and 1 x 1.8 Panaracer Fire Mud tyres (all 26", and lots of life left) that I'll be selling elsewhere. £15 picked up from Leyton.

dibs
interested of stratford

Here's a few photographs showing the condition. They're fine, just a bit narrow for my tastes. I can meet you in Stratford, but it's a bit rainy today.

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if you are in no hurry can collect once the sun comes out and you are available

I'll send you a PM tomorrow, the rain will have stopped by then. I'll be around at the weekend as well.

Spokes for a 29er wheel to be used on a rigid xc bike, any off hand recommendations? Does it make a significant difference? Only built road wheels before so not really sure.

Sapim D Light are a really nice compromise of weight and strength and not that expensive. Got them with Crests and they cope with my 75kg fine.

I'd second the D-Light, Mick. I tend to favour Sapim Race, but then I weigh twice as much as you do and have a habit of overbuilding things.

D-Light thirded

Has the Epping ride been repped in this thread recently? Honey badgers assemble!

16 May 10:30am

Spokes for a 29er wheel to be used on a rigid xc bike, any off hand recommendations?

DT Alpine III.

Does it make a significant difference?

No. To the extent that it makes any difference, the benefit of the Alpine III over skinny spokes (stiff, meaty where spokes actually break) is much more significant than the cost (slightly heavier). If 32 D-Lights are stiff enough, use 28 Alpine III instead and get the same stiffness and weight plus a small aero benefit from having fewer spokes.

yeah. get that aero fam

My friend & I took our fat (Avanti Tracker) and semi-fat (Krampus) bikes for an Epic Ride™ last weekend.

We started off from Dunedin (the city farthest from London in the whole wide world). We had a coffee at sea level and reached a 750m hilltop called Swampy Summit around 11am. This was on-road for probably 15k, then the same again on a mixture of good gravel roads, bad gravel roads, and downright impassable 4wd tracks. We passed a huge group of about thirty hikers on the way.

Then we entered an area called the Silverpeaks which is very popular with hikers due to the scenery, and hunters due to the huge numbers of feral pigs. The hunters are quite popular with the hikers as you usually get a free pork chop from them if you happen to camp nearby. The terrain got steeper and the track narrower and narrower.

The place we were aiming for was right in the middle of the photo above - a logging road that took us to another track that led to my friend's house, which is by the little bay to the right of the photo.

Eventually we made it to the logging road to discover it was soon to be closed for some NZ rally stage. We rode to our junction and watched the cars for a bit while I fixed a slow puncture (still haven't set the front wheel up tubeless yet...)

Then down an unrideably steep and overgrown hiking route to a little stream, which we followed to my friend's house, arriving about 5pm. The trip definitely confirmed my view that the Krampus is seriously over-geared and under-braked, at least for this sort of terrain. Probably 90% of my riding was in the lowest three gears, and my forearms ached for days afterwards from yanking so hard on the brakes. I have ordered a 26t sprocket, although I'll have to do some witchcraft to make my XT brakes fit (they clip the spokes). Otherwise it handled the ride fantastically - no loss of traction even on the steepest out-of-the-saddle climbs or the boggiest corners, comfortable all day long, and the enormous wheel diameter is a bonus when you're too knackered to hop little obstacles, just a casual weight-shift will do it.

This weekend I rode my SS Inbred on my regular MTB ride. The narrow Mary bars are such a luxury threading between trees. I might chop the Krampus bars down to 730 or so.

Anyone still looking for 26" tyres? Have some Rocket Rons in 2.1", Nobby Nics in 1.75, Specialized Storms in 2". Need them gone, so will be cheaps.

I was reading a few pages of this thread and someone was after a 27.2 dropper post... Well I've got the Ice Lift V8 and reckon its pretty good. Cheapest 27.2 with a remote I could find (I paid £105) and it does the job. I was worried 90mm of travel might not be enough but its plenty in reality. Also the saddle sort of wobbles around a bit (just a few mm at most), but its nothing you could notice when sat on it, particularly if off road, which is sort of the point.

Nice, thanks for that!

A great story, thanks for taking the time.

I find that FAT wheels need a lot more braking, just because of the rotating mass (I think). So go mad, put 200mm's on and it should stop the caliper clipping the spokes too.

Heh, that's what I thought, but even with the 203s there's enough clearance for a credit card with XTs - with a bit of wheel flex it'll clip. I can either machine up a new offset adaptor and spacer for the rotor (engineer so not a big deal), or cross-spoke the wheels (i.e. left flange to right hole) or put up with BB7s (albeit with a bigger rotor).

No more 26" XC biek then?*

*I'm assuming those tyres are too puny for the Stanton.

Too puny for the stanton and I've side-graded the tyres on the XC biek. Nics for Winter, Rons for Summer, the Nics being burly enough for Stanton duties too.

Can't really speak for the GD, but I splashed out on a 27.2 Thomson for my Karate Monkey... have to say I really, really love it... that was until I saw my mates KS Lev that he put on his Krampus... it looks and feels as well built as the Thomson but somehow works without any cable sag... a thing of beauty. Not sure if it meets your length requirements, but if I was to go back and spend a huge amount of cash on a dropper again, I'd probably go for that one...

Here is a link to it:

http://www.sprocketscycles.com/ks-lev-272-remote-seatpost#.VVsOHlVVhBc

And here is a shot of my Karate Monkey with Thomson

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ive actually splashed out on a Thomson also. The KS wasn't long enough for me.

Not ridden off-road with the Thonson yet but pretty happy with my choice. The cable is a bit strange though eh? Kinda drags it down a bit. I've actually replaced the inner already as the clamp pretty much cut through the original cable.