Jambon's Bikes

There is a a load of new USE To seatpost on eBay for £40

Thanks for the heads up, will take a look.

If they’re the cyclops clamp I would steer clear, ridiculous clamp design.

Bike looks great, clearances look more Sunday best than rack & guards tho.

I wanted 700c X 32 with guards and this is 28 with no room for guards due to the frame being designed for med reach calipers, not long drop.

I wanted a fast touring bike which this kind of is but slightly give up at the moment looking for the right bike and just want to put some miles on it.

they are, good to know!

First ride on the Sabbath this weekend and I’m impressed. Despite the clearance issues mentioned, 28’s seem okay for a mile-munching Sunday best. I’m coming from a steel, quill stemmed racer with 23 tyres (the Moser) so it seems plush compared. Either I need to get fitter or use a compact chainset, but imagine both would help. Front derailleur dropped the chain a few times so will need to adjust that. Excuse the saddle position, seemed it wasn’t tightened enough but now repositioned and nipped up

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get the chainset @pryally is selling

Thanks for this, have PMd

Dibs when you’re bored etc

Looks great!

Was effort building this up after almost finishing the Equilibrium but does feel worth it now. Will feel even better when I’ve sold the Genesis though.

Couple more things on the ride, surprised how lively the frame is for an ‘audax’ style machine, I read a Road.cc review saying it felt livelier than the Ti Equilibrium which is nice to know as didn’t want it to feel like a touring bike. The brakes too are great, @sylem agreed, they’re just as good as the 6800 calipers they replaced. @TM noted & @andyp check your PMs. Thanks guys

Van Nicholas Ti seat post added. Have mainly been riding the 650b Genesis CdF so jumping on this today with clipless pedals forgot how spritely it feels, for an audax style bike.

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Saddle/seatpost is just gorgeous

Technically not my bike, but touring Scotland next month with the girlfriend and her bike was long overdue some love. Needs better wheels and metal guards then should be good for a while. Cheers @gfunk for the group.

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Looking good!

@jambon where abouts in Scotland?

Glasgow to Inverness, but getting the ferry across to the west coast (Campbeltown) then following NCR 78 (aka the Caledonian Way). Super chilled pace over a week.

@jambon Lovely.

A few weeks ago I took 5 days off work, cashing in on 2 weekends and the August bank holiday it ended up as 10 days to conquer National Cycle Network 78… AKA ‘The Caledonia Way’ which runs from Campbeltown to Inverness, along 234 scenic miles.

After work on a Friday, my girlfriend and I strolled over to Euston Station with our bikes and boarded the Caledonian Sleeper, waking up Saturday morning, sufficiently bloated from a full Scottish breakfast in Glasgow.

The first part of the adventure was riding to Ardrossan along NCR7, where we picked up the ferry to Campbeltown – the official start/finish of NCR78. The motivation for the trip was to ride through the Highlands on essentially one piece of tarmac where you’re safely separated from busy roads. As well as being safer it meant we could suffer, dragging our bikes and panniers up the hills in relative privacy, apart from the gaze of the odd highland cow.

Cycling along the shores of Loch Awe, Loch Lochy (Scotland’s lochiest Loch) & Loch Ness meant taking 3 ferries and crossing several bridges which all added to the excitement. One concession (less than I admit) from the girlfriend is camping isn’t allowed, which in reality means we ended up staying with some interesting characters – the wonders of Airbnb! ‘Beggars can’t be choosers’ comes to mind when you’re out in the sticks.

From riding through Wales last year (NCR8) we had a better idea what worked for us and seemed to have more fun, reducing the miles worked well. With a relaxed pace of 30-50 miles a day it meant we were able to stop along the way, exploring anything we found interesting (activities included bird watching and fishing) but with the long summer light all we had to worry about was looking for the blue NCR78 signs and trying to work out which passing pub was likely to serve the best macaroni cheese.

The highlight for us was probably the route from Lochgilphead to Oban, the amount of people we saw we could probably count on one hand. Oh and the Caledonian Sleeper.

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Sounds like a very good trip. Scenery and the bike looks very good.
Wouldn't mind doing something similar with the GF and the tandem.

awesome - quite bumpy along the side of loch awe. looks like you were fairly lucky with the weather

Looks great, would it be a comfortable ride with a road bike?

@MisterMikkel always liked the idea of travelling via tandem but the logistics with storing and transporting have put me off. Imagine the unbridled joy or riding one would make all those 'issues' disappear, even if it's just for the speeds descending fully laden!

@cozey there was just enough rough stuff to make you appreciate the smooth tarmac sections. Weather-wise we did okay, got drenched coming into Glen Coe but generally didn't pay too much attention to the forecast as it was so changeable.

@jono84 I'd say 32mm wide tyres minimum, otherwise there's be a lot of pushing the bike over the bumpy stuff. Saying that going June/July it might be more forgiving.

@MisterMikkel this was the 'ferry' we got into Fort William, we loaded our bikes onto the roof but not sure a tandem would even fit!

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