>>1688
>Also, would you advise me getting a triple chainset so I can increase the number of gears to 27?

Haha, only if you're an old woman heading up a mountain (with her shopping). Honestly, 10(ish) gears is more than enough and the additional chainring will just add weight. What's the terrain like around you?
You were wise to go for the older model, the only noticeable difference is the price with most modern bikes, looks like a solid starter.
Do you have much experience with bike maintenance and repairs? If not, you're probably going to want a few tools (just ask if you need advice).

Right now, I'm pootling about on an 80s tourer 'cos I'm a big wanker I've got a taste for the steel aesthetic.
Thinking of splashing out on a colourful Dutch racer though.

>>1689

The extra chainring is easily worth the 200g or so of extra weight. Road bikes are massively overgeared for solo riders - a standard double setup is designed for an immensely strong professional riding as part of a big, well-organised pack. Even a 50/34 compact with a 28t sprocket at the back is inadequately geared for serious long-distance rides with any amount of luggage. You can make do with an overgeared bike, but you don't have to battle on with one either - on a correctly geared bike, even the steepest climbs should be as easy to pedal as on the flat, just slower. We're attached to the idea that steep climbs mean getting out of the saddle, but it's bio-mechanically inefficient to do so.

Whether it'll be worth upgrading your current bike depends on the specifics of your drivetrain. If you've got double-only shifters, you'd be better off selling it and buying something else, as STIs cost a fucking fortune. Recent Sora shifters will shift both, but 2300/2200 is double or triple specific. Beyond that, you'll need a replacement crankset, a new chain, a new front mech and possibly a new rear mech, depending on how much capacity you've got left with your new chainring/cassette combo.

A potentially cheaper option for lower gears is to keep the double front and swap the cassette. A 12-28 would give a nice spread of gears with a compact and you might just squeak it with a short-cage mech, meaning you'd only need a chain and cassette at a cost of £30 or so.

My top tip is mudguards - they make all the difference when the weather starts to turn. On the Airlite you'll need to change down to 23c tyres if you want proper fitted guards, or you could keep your current 25c tyres and use Raceblades. I'd recommend the latter, as the extra traction of bigger tyres helps in the wet - Raceblade Longs are nearly as good as proper Bluemels, just a bit fiddlier to fit.

In answer to OP, I ride a Hewitt Cheviot for proper rides, or a Brompton M6L for anything under 50 miles or so.

lads.

Well I was just about to make a bike thread myself. As soon as it gets a bit sunny we're all out.

I'm mulling over getting a road bike - nothing too fancy, a Specialized Allez, or whichever Giant Defy is about the same price. I might also creep up to a Secteur.

The thing is though, as much as I LOVE the idea of a superfast road rocket, mainly for fitness (I get at least an hour a day every day at the moment) there's a little man in my head going "get a cross bike, just in case! you could go on light tours! You could pop off camping for the weekend! You could do LEJOG!" While these things aren't daily routine (but blasting out 30 road miles a day is) it would be REALLY nice to have something that's pretty much a road bike, but that could carry a rack and wider tires if I wanted it to. The Secteur has back rack eyelets but I can't imagine doing serious miles on it (100+?), but maybe I'm wrong.

Basically, in my drooling over shiny bikes, one always pops out at me: the Tricross - http://www.specialized.com/gb/gb/bc/SBCProduct.jsp?spid=62009&scid=1101&scname=Road

Which looks, to me, like a road bike that can tour, and if you throw slicks on it you'll get a fair speed anyway. But then there's yet another bloke in the back of my head going "it'll not be as fast as a dedicated road bike!"

So I don't know. At this rate I'll end up with three bikes, heavy mountain, general offroad/touring and road. This isn't a sustainable solution. I just want to know I could achieve the proper road bike experience on the Tricross, I think. First thing I'd do to it is put narrower slicks on it, and probably replace the gearing with road specific ten speed.

But then I could buy an Allez and save money. Fuck me I just don't know.

TL;DR do I get a road bike or a road-based all rounder?

>>1693
+1 on the mudguards, even when it's just a bit wet out, the huge streak of black road grime from your arse to your neck is not a good look.
I've had a bike with 3 chains rings and tbh, I hardly ever used to the smallest, admittedly I don't have many serious hills in my area but on the steepest switching to the middle was enough.
From the picture in OP, the lower chainring seems dinky enough to handle most things anyway.
Then again, you do seem to know what you're talking about.

>>1693
Cheers. It's a Sora shifter and is compatible with both double and triple derailleurs, thankfully.

>Beyond that, you'll need a replacement crankset, a new chain, a new front mech and possibly a new rear mech, depending on how much capacity you've got left with your new chainring/cassette combo.
Are you saying here that I'd still need a new chain and front derailleur? And possibly rear derailleur as well?

And yeah, will definitely be looking for mud-guards, no doubt. They're not too heavy and it's well worth it for sure.

>>1689
I live in South-west London and it's mainly just undulating at most round here. Although I do laps of a park nearby (Richmond Park) that's fairly hilly.
I have a basic amount of knowledge when it comes to bike maintenance but that's only for basic things that I've done for my hybrid and a few friends' MTBs. Only ever needed an Allen key, screw-driver and a spanner - what else would I need?

I am sort of walking into the field of racing bikes blind but I pick things up like this fairly fast usually.

>>1696
What do you ride at the moment?

>>1698
You can buy a lot of tools as and when you need them, get them online for a third of the price.
A 14mm socket and adjustable wrench is a good idea for removing your cranks and depending on your bottom bracket (probably a shimano type) a BB too (shops will charge £40 to replace your BB, you can do it, with the price of the tools for £20 in 20 minutes). Plastic tire levers & patch kit ofc, I'd recommend you get a track pump with a guage as well (£20 online), a hand pump is fine for emergencies but you'll never get 'enough' air otherwise. There's tools for your chain and cassette but as with your BB, you won't have to worry about that for a while.

You might spot me puffing around Richmond park on a red bike.

>>1699
Yeah, I think I'll just get things when I need them. I have an adjustable spanner and socket sets, track pump, patch kit, and a hand pump which I can take round with me.

And interesting, indeed I could be seeing you once my bike arrives within a week.

Fastest lap time round it?

>>1696

Racing exaggerates our sense of "fast" and "slow", because the margins of victory are so narrow. For people who aren't riding against the clock, the differences in speed between most bikes just doesn't matter. Using the Kreuzotter calculator[1], we can see that adding 4kg of weight to an average road bike only decreases speed on the flat by 0.1kph, or speed on a 4% gradient by 0.4kph. Tyre choice makes a bigger difference, but not by all that much - switching from a racing slick to a heavy touring tyre costs us 1.9kph on the flat, 0.6kph on a 4% grade.

Over a 200km audax, a brick shithouse of a steel tourer will be around 36 minutes slower than a full-on racing bike. Fit that tourer with 28mm slick tyres instead of 37mm Marathons and the time difference drops to just nine minutes. Nine minutes difference over nearly eight hours of riding, in return for full mudguards, wide gearing, a big comfy Brooks saddle and somewhere to put your butties.

When you do the sums, it's a complete no-brainer. If you're absolutely addicted to the feel of a lightweight racing bike, then by all means get one. But if you're after one bike that can take on any kind of riding in comfort, you want a tourer. They tend to be pricey, but a tourer is excellent value compared to buying two or three good bikes. There are lots of people doing serious off-road journeys on tourers, check out the Rough Stuff Fellowship for that[2] Your £500ish budget will buy an excellent second-hand Dawes Galaxy or similar. The CTC forums small-ads [3] are usually cheaper than eBay for touring-type bikes.

[1] http://www.kreuzotter.de/english/espeed.htm
[2] http://www.rsf.org.uk/
[3] http://forum.ctc.org.uk/viewforum.php?f=40

>>1700
>Fastest lap time round it?

I aim for 3 laps in an hourish (counter-clockwise) though I'm a bit porky now, so I stop halfway for a smoke usually, not pushing it, but getting back up there.

>>1701
STEEL REPRESENT!

>>1698

To switch to a triple, you'll need a new front chainset and front mech at a minimum - a triple mech needs a deeper inner plate to lift the chain off the smaller cog. You could try using your existing double mech, but it'll probably work very badly.

You'll probably get away with your old chain unless you're going to fit a cassette with a bigger bottom sprocket at the same time.

You may need a new rear mech if your current one is a short-cage version. On a triple setup there's more potential for slack in the chain, so the mech needs a longer cage. The specifications for your rear mech will state a maximum capacity - this is the sum of (biggest chainring - smallest chainring) + (biggest sprocket - smallest sprocket). For example, a compact double with a 11-25 cassette will need at least 30t of capacity ((50-34)+(25-11)). A typical audax triple setup will need 38t of capacity ((52-30)+(28-12)). It's possible to exceed these specifications, but the further you vary from Shimano's diktats, the better you need to be at fettling.

The cheapest option for wider-range gearing is to change the rear mech and cassette for mountain versions. This is fully compatible with your existing shifters, but will provide you with a gear range similar to a road triple setup. This might seem bonkers, but Sram built the Apex groupset around exactly the same concept - it has a 50-34 compact crankset and an 11-32 mountain cassette. Total cost would be £50-£60 if you shop around, with probably a tenner back from eBay for your old mech. If you wait until your cassette is due for replacement anyway, your only real expense will be for a new mech. The disadvantage to this solution is that the gaps between your gears will increase, but that's only likely to be a problem if you do a lot of riding as part of a tight paceline.

Gear set-ups come down partly to personal preference.

My advice is to stick with what you've got for a few months, learn how the different gears feel and the range you generally use. You wont benefit much from a third chainring unless you find that you're always going down to the lowest rear gear. Another thing to consider is the number of teeth on the chainrings, you might have a choice between 50 or 52 teeth on the outer chainring, but those two teeth can make a huge difference, and you wont know what suits you until you have more experience.

Save your money now, your current set-up will suit you well enough and get something right for you later.

>>1703
Unrelated to everything itt but I had an old lose axle bottom bracket on my steel road bike, then one day the non drive side cup fell out. The threads on the cup itself are worn but the threading inside the BB shell seems fine, so I went and ordered a modern Shimano BB of the same axle length.
Fitted it fine, went to stick the cranks on, 'Ah' the inner chainring (double) contacts with the chain stays. The axle is too short. Did some reading online, found out about ISO/JSO incompatibility etc. (old cranks and BB are ISO) but according to Mr. Sheldon Brown, the cranks should sit out further by a few mm with this set up?
On closer inspection of the old BB axle and the new one, the old ones drive side is longer than the Shimano one (explaining why the crank arms sit too far in). Now I'm a bit stumped, I could go for 122mm axle which i'm 50/50 about giving it enough clearance (and it's not ideal having a ISO cranks on a JSO BB) or say fuck it and track down a cheap JSO Crankset and maybe find I'd need another new BB anyway.
I'm almost completely broke as it is and don't fancy spending £60 on mistakes.
Any ideas?

>>1708
Oh yeah. The current BBs is 118mm and the chainring I have on atm seem a little more recessed than usual.

In return, here's a picture of a scantily clad lady, licking sand off a magazine.

>>1708

Bottom bracket installation is a bit of a black art, especially if you're mixing components. I have a sneaking suspicion that you've just ballsed-up your maths and ended up with a too-short BB, which is an easy mistake to make - I've done it many a time.

If you just need a couple of mm of extra chainline, the cheap and easy option is to add a spacer to the right of the BB shell. Should cost no more than two pounds.

Token still make ISO BBs, which you can find for about 20 quid, part number TK867. You do need to hunt about a bit for stock though.

>>1710
Ah, I thought you had the ticket for a moment, though unfortunately, Token don't seem to do spindles at 118mm (as far as I can find). As for the spacers, the BB I've got is a bit sensitive, it won't rest on the cup unless it's at 68mm exactly.
Urgh, this is a massive headache as the bike's my primary mode of getting around.
Cheers anyway!
[x]whinge

Thanks for the advice lads, had my bike for a few days now and probably done about 50 miles. Everything seems so much easier on a racing bike than a hybrid. I'm loving it.

Ordered mudguards (Airlite Raceguard) - they're small but all I'll need I think. So far I haven't found it necessary to increase the amount of gears so I'll stick with the double chainset too.

Hello all.

Well I've recently got back into cycling after a long break. On days where it's not pissing down here in sunny Wales I've been exploring the b roads surrounding town. I haven't done more than 20miles yet. I've also been commuting to work (although that's only walking distance)

The issue is my current bike. It's a reasonably heavy steel specialised hard rock MTB from the 90's with front suspension (added because I thought they looked cool at the time)
It was bought with my paperround money and has been a reliable steed but I'm thinking a lighter, nippier upgrade is in order when I can raise the cash.
I'm very torn between a Hybrid or a Road bike. My budget really can't exceed £500. I will also have to get rid of my MTB to make room, so will only have one bike.

Will a decent Hybrid suffice for enjoyable 20mile plus bike rides?
Or should i really just be looking at road bikes?

Pictured is a decent hybrid "Cycling Active" magazine recommended. A Pinnacle neon two.
Apparently it's a "fast" Hybrid, has disk breaks and is £350, perfect for commuting, but what about those longer rides?

>>1746
A hybrid will do for 20 mile rides just fine. usually I'd say fuck it and go all out on a road bike but it sounds like your area's more rural and hillier than mine so that might be bad advice.
If, however, you're pretty much only going to be riding on roads then why bother with a hybrid? A bit of both, not as good as either.

>>1758
Your advice actually sounds very logical to me.
I should really be looking at the roads I will be riding on. Indeed I do live somewhere very rural. There's loads of hills about, and many of the quieter roads have potholes. There are flat roads about too though, and I won't be living where I do forever.
Might be worth asking some local cyclists about it. Cheers, your post gives me a new way of looking at this.

Just wish this fucking rain would let up. I'm not getting into good habbits stuck inside.

>>1759

The term "road bike" is a bit of a misnomer - they're really racing bikes. The problem is that most road bikes are heavily optimised for racing, which badly compromises them for other uses. The riding position is very hunched-over, which is great for aerodynamics but awful for comfort, putting a lot of weight on your hands and arms. Skinny saddles are fine if you're going hammer-and-tongs, but are a literal pain in the arse if you prefer to cruise along and enjoy the view. Road bikes have really tight wheel clearances, which means you have to use hard, skinny tyres and often can't fit a set of proper mudguards. Without mudguards, you end up covered in oily road grime whenever it rains. A lot of road bikes don't have fittings for a pannier rack; Those that do often aren't stable enough to handle properly with a full load of luggage. The gearing tends to be very high, which is fine for short rides on flat terrain, but becomes increasingly energy-sapping on long hilly rides.

Most serious non-racing cyclists use a touring bike. These are designed specifically for long-distance road riding and the best bet if you want one bike that can cope with most sorts of riding. Tourers are basically a racing bike with the sharp edges knocked off - a more comfortable all-day riding position, plusher tyres for a smoother ride, proper mudguards, wide-range gearing and so on. For £400 you could have a Raleigh Royal, or a Revolution Country Traveller for £500. You get an awful lot of bike for the money - I do over 8000 miles a year and would happily do those miles on either bike. There's a weight penalty in choosing a tourer over a more stripped-down bike, but it makes practically no difference to your speed and all directly contributes to your comfort.

>>1760
This.

One problem with the ultra-skinny tyres that racing bikes use is that they puncture easily and can quite easily kill you if you hit a pot-hole or drain.
The touring tyres will slow you down, but it will be imperceptible to anyone but a racing cyclist.

Currently I'm using a mountain bike with these semi-slicks because as well as using it on the road, I do a lot of riding on a muddy canal towpath, a hybrid would be fine in those conditions normally, but I ride fast enough on clear stretches that anything slicker would skid.

>>1761
>riding down a canal tow path
>skinny road tires

So much rage. Until I learned which spots to avoid, I was getting 4 or 5 punctures a month doing that..
It's worth pointing out you can get really tough road tires though.

>>1760
Good advice, although tourer frames can be a little stiff when unloaded. My 80s dawes galaxy feels stiff and unforgiving when ridden unloaded yet absolutely luscious with a full (30-something kg) load.

A lot of the older racers are less optimized and better all round bikes. Ian Hibell went around the world on a Freddie Grubbs 531-framed 'racing' bike, and other 531 frames are just as good.

>>1766
IMHO the tyre argument can be summed up in two words: Schwalbe Marathon

>>1767

>Good advice, although tourer frames can be a little stiff when unloaded.

To some extent, but tyre pressure makes the biggest difference. Often when people complain that their bike is harsh unloaded or wallowy with luggage, it's just because they haven't adjusted their pressures for the change in weight. Large-volume touring tyres are surprisingly fussy and 5psi can make all the difference. Panniers can dramatically shift the weight distribution, so you often just need extra pressure in the rear tyre.

> IMHO the tyre argument can be summed up in two words: Schwalbe Marathon

Won't argue there - you can't go wrong with a Marathon. That said, I've been using Vittoria Randonneurs lately, mainly because I'm a tightwad and they last forever.

>>1769
> To some extent, but tyre pressure makes the biggest difference
Good thinking. I always keep mine at max pressure for puncture resistance.

> I've been using Vittoria Randonneurs lately
Are they as puncture-resistant as marathons? It took me about 1100 miles of fully loaded touring before I got my first puncture (and to be fair, the tread was quite worn too).

It's useful to have alternatives for when I can't get my beloved marathons. I had to put a Continental Top Touring on last time instead (seems to be holding up ok though).

>>1770

I'm very light on my bikes and prefer smooth roads, so I rarely get visited by the puncture fairy - I got 5500 miles on my last set of randonneurs without a puncture. They're probably not as puncture resistant as newer Marathons with the GreenGuard belt, but I've no doubt that they roll better.

If you can't abide punctures, your best bet is probably the Marathon Plus - I've literally never even heard of someone having a puncture on them. Twice the weight of Randonneurs or Duranos, not very smooth-rolling, but astonishingly tough. They do a Marathon Plus Tour now, which has a semi-knobbly tread pattern if you need grip in the mud.

>>1772
I once got a puncture on an M+. Bigass shard of glass. This was only once in two sets of tyres though, so it's pretty rare.

The thing that turns me off about the M+ and the reason I went for marathons in the first place is they're an absolute bastard to change. If one of them actually did have a puncture in an inconvenient location (and dark and pissing down with rain, of course), it really could be very difficult to fix. But yeah, they're heavy, slow, and suboptimal for touring. Probably good for a city bike where broken glass is the norm and one cannot afford to be late for work due to a puncture.

>>1770

>Good thinking. I always keep mine at max pressure for puncture resistance

Hang about. Now, I'm a mountain rider so maybe it's completely different on road, but I was under the impression you risked more punctures at max PSI? When I ride, 35psi is about the sweet spot between my bones breaking on every drop and getting pinch-flats every five minutes.

Also, talking of punctures - those 'slime' tyre liners that are supposed to protect/fix punctures - any good? I can only assume they do something horrible to performance, like run-on-flats do on cars, but if they don't then we're quids in, right?

>>1778
Pinch flats usually only happen at low pressure. If the pressure is too high to deform the tyre much then the tube can't get pinched by the rim. As for normal punctures, at high pressure sharp objects are more likely to be deflected or break, but are also more likely to go all through if they aren't.

The slime is meant to work quite well for slow punctures, but add weight, and more importantly add a lot of extra rotational weight which is more noticeable. If you're riding a long distance they could get you home, but I prefer to carry a spare tube and a puncture kit. If you mean the solid liners, I've heard they work for some people, but in certain tyres if the fit isn't perfect they actually cause pinch-flats.

>>1778
Those green ooze things look awful. A decent touring tyre really should not puncture very often (unless it's thorn season) so you're better off fixing it properly rather than using some dodgy hack.

>>1778
Slime got me home on my motorbike a couple of times (the bottled stuff, not some kind of liner), but for cycle use I wouldn't recommend it. The idea is neat, but whether it's really worth the extra weight and cost… just keep a patch kit on you. Pic is what I use which works great (and fast!) but I'm sure there're plenty of similar and equally good alternatives out there. Ideally you'll have a small saddle bag with a few essential tools on you anyway, so you can slip it in there.

>>1806

Rema Tip-Top, accept no substitutes. People fuck up with traditional puncture repair kits because they think that the tube of stuff is glue. It isn't, it's vulcanising fluid. You need to apply it, wait until it's just tacky, then stick on the patch. Done that way, the patch melts into the surface of the tube and the repair is stronger than the tube.

Also, hardly anyone bothers to repair a punctured tube at the side of the road - it's nigh-on impossible if it's dark or raining. Just carry a spare tube and patch the old tube when you get home. It's only worth using a kit if you've got hub gears or roller brakes, in which case you can avoid taking off the wheel by patching the tube in-situ.

The most important thing when dealing with a puncture is to figure out what caused it in the first place. You need to inspect the tyre casing to make sure there's not a piece of glass or flint still stuck in, waiting to puncture your tube again. Regularly checking your tyres is one of the easiest ways to prevent punctures - often glass shards take many miles to cut their way through the tyre casing.

>>1808
I've done a few road-side patches now, though in my case it's quite easy because most of my punctures are caused by big fat shards of glass — hurray for urban commuting/cycling. (And because I'm not all that conscientious about my tyre pressure). Makes for nice big easy to find holes (even in the dark by torch light) and with the self-glue patches I'm up and running again in under 10 minutes and minimum fuss even when it's a bit wet (though when it's pissing it down it gets tricky to keep the tube dry). I've not had any problems with undue loss of pressure, yet, despite a record of four patches on one tube. The tyres themselves (Schwalbe Marathon Racer) are not to blame, incidentally, and are in fact holding up very well. I've sort of given up on galvanising patches because of that, though I accept they are technically superior. The rest of the post I agree with entirely.

I just get my patches from the 99p shop, never had any problem with them.
>>1808
Another tip with the vulcanising fluid, less is more. I've accidentally splurged a massive blob on the tube and found the patch can't make proper contact with it.
Also, a little piece of chalk to mark the puncture can save epic amounts of frustration and swearing by the side of the road.

>>1811

I've got a nostalgia lob-on. Where do I know that arse from?

>>1819
>nostalgia lob-on
Understandable, I'm sure a tsunami of teenage wanks were had over arr Sally >>37810

>>1810
>four patches on one tube
Pussy. I have at least seven on my on tyre at the minute.

>>1823
Retard. They're meant to go on your tube, not your tire. No wonder you're having so many flats.

>>1823

I always thought the phrase 'more patch than inner tube' was hyperbole, but then I found a shortcut home down a flight of concrete steps.

As it happens my bikes been out of action from a puncture. I've tried repairing it fuck knows how many times now, but the puncture is right by the valve.
Well i've done the unthinkable and just bought a new tube from the local bike shop (£4) and now it's time to get this bitch on and ride baby ride. In a bit lads.

>>1811
WHO IS SHE

>>1822
Oh. Bad feet.

>>1844
Oh balls, the kids show thread in IQ has mention of her. Sally Gray, from it'll never work.

Do those spandex/lycra whatever the fuck they are shorts help with sweat? I'm just getting back into the saddle now the weather's nice but found I get a huge, highly visible pool of sweat around the arse, it forms a perfect dirty outline of the saddle from bollock to crack.

>>1876
Yes, that's half the point. It doesn't have to be skin tight (though that helps with wicking sweat) but they (the proper ones, at any rate) are made from synthetics which dry very quickly. The result is that even when you're completely drenched it doesn't take long to be comfortably again, unlike what would happen if you were plain cotton or similar.

Just a reminder to keep your rims clean and to pay attention to the wear on your break pads, because once they start looking like this…

>>1886
The result can be this. When it happened at ~15mph, the entire rear wheel seized resulting in a near-crash and a nice black line on the asphalt and the rear tyre getting its last kiss goodbye. An expensive oversight.

>>1886
Good job it wasn't your front wheel, or you could be looking for a new set of teeth.
Did that jagged metal bit grind/slash the rim?

>>1888
> Did that jagged metal bit grind/slash the rim?
Yep, and quite noisily too so I really have no excuse; that's what I get for putting it off. Once the "tooth" had sheared through it wedged itself solidly into the rim which caused the wheel to lock. Took quite some doing to yank it out so I could at least push the bike the rest of the way home.

>>1889
Haha, yeah you should feel a bit silly. That's quite impressive!
Never seen anything like it, though in a similar vein, I ignored my slightly wobbly cranks until one day the BB cup unscrewed itself completely and fell out. No tools, had to walk the 12 miles home.

>>1891

Normal wear will eventually destroy a rim, something which usually happens suddenly and catastrophically. Most rims have a wear indicator, either a groove or a drill-hole that's the depth of your minimum safe rim thickness. If your rims are often dirty or salty, they can go after less than 10,000 miles.

Shit my rims are well grimy.

Here she is lads, Ridgeback Voyage 2011. Bought her early last year as part of a deal with my insurance firm on my old bike which some bastard in london knicked. She sitting pretty at the parents' house at the moment. Looking forward to getting out on her, little excursion planned to North France/Netherlands in a couple of weeks.
Racks and Guards are sitting around, I just appreciate the beauty of the frame more with them off.

>>1895
Tidy!

>>1892
> If your rims are often dirty or salty, they can go after less than 10,000 miles.
Or, as in the case of >>1887 very much prematurely after around 1,500m. Anyway, my new rim has arrived so tomorrow it's wheel buildin' time — first time doing a rear wheel, should be "interesting".

>>1895
That looks pretty swish! Though I keep looking at it and thinking "adjust your saddle".

>>1898
Sounds terrifying. Do you have to dish it and everything?

>>1899
Yes. I had to rebuild my front wheel before so it's not entirely new and scary but the asymmetric spoke pattern proved to be "interesting" to get right as expected. That and some general cleaning is all I managed to get done today. Dishing and truing will happen tomorrow or Friday, but those aren't so much difficult as they are just plain time consuming.

>>1900
Do you use a truing stand, tension reader or do you just play it by ear with a spoke key? I've read a few guides but it seems beyond me, maybe I should attend a class.

>>1901
> Do you use a truing stand, tension reader or do you just play it by ear with a spoke key?
The latter. I try and follow http://sheldonbrown.com/wheelbuild.html as much as possible, but I'm rather limited in tools, space and time (without going into too much detail I'm mostly limited to daylight hours) as well as being piss poor. The dishing tool I use is bodged together from a coat hanger that happened to be the right size for my 20" wheels, tension is judged by feel and truing is done first with a finger as the feeler then with the back of whatever cutlery is to hand for the "fine tuning". The result holds up OK, but it's far from perfect and ideal.

Oh bike tinkerers, hear my words!
Some bellend kicked my rear derailleur last night while I was in the pub. I hopped on and got about 3 inches before grinding to a halt with a disgusting racket, I realised the derailleur was catching on the spokes. So managed to flip it over and bend it back enough to get me home but the chain line running through the cogs is pretty wonky and the derailleur itself is curved out of shape. Other issues, the chain now rubs against a bit of the metal and it certainly feels like there's more resistance while riding.

Do you think it's possible to straighten it out myself and what would be the best method of doing this?
I'm not too keen on taking it down to a bike shop because I'm tight and also worried they'll try to make me buy new parts which I'd rather avoid.

>>2060
Sure, just set to it (carefully) with pliers.
If something's actually broken / popped out, mend it. It might be easier / nicer to work on after a bit of a clean, though.

>>2061
Ah cheers, I hadn't thought of using pliers for some reason.
Was planning to use a wrench and hammer to tap it back into shape but pliers do seem like a more sensible solution.
Will definitely give it a good clean too. Still massively pissed off someone would just think "Ah I'll give this bike a kick 'cos I'm a cunt"
Wankers!

Anyone here got any advice on choosing SPD type pedals?
Just borrowed some 20 year old shimanos to get me going; they're in pretty good nick, but they're an obsolete design with no float and probably not quite as easy to get into as newer designs. I might just buy some modern SPDs for 30 quid or so, but I'm vaguely considering Looks off-road offering.

I'm a long-term MTB rider but I'm looking at a road bike for fitness/going really far on.

At the moment I'm looking at the Specialized Secteur or Roubaix - they're basically the same bike, but aluminium vs carbon.

Is it better to spend £800ish on an aluminium Secteur, or splash out a grand and a half on a carbon Roubaix? Should I just buy the cheaper one, ride it until it falls apart (if it ever does) while saving up for something truly spectacular? I could easily put aside some money and have an S-works, or a top end Bianchi or the like within a year, but of course I'd have to justify a purchase like that with a LOT of miles on whatever I get now.

Also, does anyone have any other recommendations in the under-a-grand-ish price range? Bearing in mind I'd like to do hundred mile plus jaunts on it. I do often lean towards Specialized as they've served me well for MTB, but I am aware that what you gain in frame craftsmanship you lose in groupset luxury. I wouldn't be looking to upgrade this bike, it is merely a means to get me fit enough to justify a gorgeous, expensive machine further down the line, at which point it would become the winter trainer.

Pic slightly related. Some day.

>>2065
I don't have any useful answers for you, except I'm almost in the same boat and really really want one of those Pinarellos one day.

>>2065
You could always spend less money and get an objectively better aluminium bike. Buy a (well reviewed) knock off Chinese/Taiwanese frame off ebay for £150 and slap on the sexiest parts of your choice. With a carbon fork the weight difference between that and some uber expensive brand jobby will be minimal.
You might even get a better ride.

My biggest grief with carbon for non competitive riding is that if you crash, you'll probably have to chuck the whole frame or risk riding something with a hairline fracture that could snap and have you eating the road.

I'm no expert though, so feel free to disregard.

>>2065
Surly "Long Haul Trucker"(http://surlybikes.com/bikes/long_haul_trucker/). It's a pretty solid choice, only downside is they go for around 900quid. If you intend to use it as a winter run-around eventually, though, it's an ideal choice.

>>2067

You're probably right about going all out on the components instead of the frame. As long as the frame is relatively stiff I'll be happy.
Has anyone ever had a Ribble? I've heard good things and bad things, but I'm beginning to think the bad things were simply from snobs.

I could really go mental with this thing : http://www.ribblecycles.co.uk/bbd/road-track-bike/Ribble-Sportive-7005?part=BB12RIBSPORTIVE7005&sub=conf_BBRA&bike=1

I could have a full Ultegra gruppo in budget, and a pair of very nice wheels indeed too. It seems too good to be true, really.

>>2070

I am a huge fan of Surly, but that looks a little too upright for me. I'm young enough and bendy enough to want a bit more of a sporty position.

>>2070
A colleague at work has one of these, rides 40 miles per day on the commute and swears by it.

>>2061>>2060
An update. I managed to bend the curved arm back into a straight line, before realising Professor Bellend had given it a harder kick that I first thought and it wasn't just the arm that was bent but the thicker piece of metal that holds the arm pivot in place.
I tried partially dismantling it but stopped short, not wanting to really fuck it up by being heavy handed. Not really sure what to do now, it's such an awkward bend and in such a tight space I can't really get much purchase with my pliers or wrench to give it the force it needs.
Bugger.

>>2063

You almost certainly want M520s - they work as well as anything, but are less than £20 a pair. If you spend more money you get less weight and a slightly more open design (which works a bit better in heavy mud) but the bog-standard M520s are rock solid and most keen tourers use them exclusively.

The only other pedal worth considering is the M324, which has an SPD mechanism on one side, but a standard platform on the other. Really handy for utility bikes where you might want to ride in standard shoes.

>>2065

Race bikes are properly hardcore and sacrifice a lot of versatility for a tiny amount of speed. You really only want one if you have clear plans to race competitively. There are lots of more practical bikes that will still keep the pace on a fast training run, but offer more for your money. 2kg of weight saved will only give you about a 0.5% speed improvement over a typical day's ride - a huge amount if you're a racer, but insignificant if you're not.

If you don't race but want to cover long distances, you want an Audax bike, which are built for the job. Audaxes are non-competitive events of distances from 200km to 1400km, so Audax riders really know what works over the long haul. These are fast road bikes, but with enough clearance to fit 25mm or 28mm tyres and full mudguards, plus a pannier rack. They really come into their own in winter, when wider tyres provide better grip on wet roads. My pick of the bunch would be the Dawes Clubman, which is brilliantly well equipped and has a lovely retro-modern look to it, or the Dawes Sportive, which is a similar concept but with a more modern race aesthetic. If you must have something racier, take a look at the Ribble 7005 Audax/Winter with Sram Apex gearing.

Double or triple crankset is largely a question of how strong you are and how vain you are - there's less than 150g weight disadvantage over a double, which is a cheese sandwich or a few glugs of water. If you plan on covering long distances (especially if you'll be carrying luggage), a triple crankset really comes in handy as a bailout gear, for those times when you're knackered and the hills won't stop coming. Sram Apex is a compact double with the range of a triple, the downside being slightly bigger gaps between gears.

If the idea of touring more extensively appeals to you, consider a proper touring bike - with the right tyres they're not significantly slower than a race bike, but can carry much more luggage and remain comfortable and stable on rougher roads and bridleways. The Dawes Galaxy is the canonical tourer and is the preferred bike of a large proportion of super-high-mileage cyclists, because it's quick but comfortable and easy to ride. Edinburgh Bike Cooperative offer the excellent Revolution Country Explorer, which comes fully equipped for touring and features disc brakes.

All of the above bikes are under £700 if you shop around.

>>2073

Until British riders started winning stuff and Murdoch and Brailsford started chucking money about, you used to see tons of pros training on Ribble 7005s. Very much a race-oriented bike rather than a tourer, but brilliant for what they are. The frame and fork aren't exceptionally light, but they're durable and the handling is sorted. A surprising number of better cat 1 riders race on quite humble bikes like the Ribble or the Planet X Team - the fastest riders in any group usually have the shabbiest kit, because they work part-time to fit in more training.

>>2075

A new mech will cost less than a tenner for a proper Shimano part or £5 for a Chinese knockoff. You'll be able to find a suitable Suntour replacement for a couple of quid from eBay or a bike jumble if you want to use vintage parts. Any 5/6/7 speed rear derailleur will work if you're using non-indexed gears. You'll need some allen keys, a screwdriver and a chain tool. You should be able to re-use your old chain, but if not expect to pay about £4 for a cheap Chinese chain or twice that for a KMC. Again, any 5/6/7 speed part will work.

>>2080
Cheers, I did find the same mech on ebay for about £25 tot. but I would consider something similar (shiny) for cheaper.
Do you know if there's any regular jumbles in London? I stumbled across one in Hillingdon once and saw some bargains but they don't seem to be particularly well advertised otherwise.

Anyway, I had a couple of beers, umm'd and arr'd then just spat on my hands and brute forced it sort of back into shape, it's not perfect but a lot better. Will have to see if its made a difference tomorrow when I slap the wheel on and take it for a ride.

>>2078

Whoa now, I never said anything about a race bike. Sportive is definitely the word. I know enough to know that speed is all in the legs, not in the frame. I know from years of MTB I don't need a triple, but I'm not going to be too miffed if I end up with one, I'm not a weight obsessive either. I think at this point I'm just going to go to the lbs and ask to sit on everything under a grand, see what fits the best. Shame I can't do that on a Ribble though.

>>2082

Bear in mind that road gearing is vastly higher than MTB gearing - road bikes have bigger wheels, bigger chainrings and smaller cassette sprockets, so the whole gear range is shifted upwards. A road double is 52/39 or 50/34 and most road cassettes are 11-23 or 11-25. A MTB triple is usually 44/32/22 with an 11-32 or 11-34 cassette. I've included a chart comparing the range of a traditional road double with a MTB triple, which shows just how big the difference is - you can see that the lowest gear on the road double is higher than the middle gear on the MTB triple. A road triple is still geared considerably higher than a MTB triple - the inner ring on a road triple is equivalent to the middle ring on an MTB triple.

What bike shops call a "road bike" is really a race bike. If it doesn't have pannier rack and mudguard bosses, clearance for 28mm+ tyres and triple gearing, it's been designed for racing, whether it's used for that or not. The whole of the bike market is skewed towards a racing mindset, because convincing people that they need a superlight bike is good for business. In truth, the overwhelming majority of riders would be far happier on a steel-framed club bike.

Bikes like the Ribble 7005 or the Specialized Roubaix are marketed as being versatile road bikes, but even with machines like those you give up a huge amount of practicality for a little bit of speed. You can't fit tyres bigger than 23mm, so you're fucked if you want to ride towpaths or trails. You can't fit a pannier rack, so you're fucked if you want to carry more than a spare tube and a rain jacket. The low-spoke wheels will only stay true for a couple of thousand miles and the lightweight rims will be worn through after your second winter. If speed matters a lot to you then these are probably worthwhile compromises, but don't let the marketing machine railroad you into buying a bike that's designed to look right, rather than ride well.

>>2086

Here's a chart comparing a road triple (top) with a MTB triple (bottom).

>>2086

Thank you for the lovely charts. I didn't even think about the wheel size affecting the gearing, even though I spent an inordinate amount of time looking at the gearing differences between 26 and 29er mountain bike wheels. It's nice to see exactly the differences, but I've spent enough time on 'downhill' geared singlespeed bikes going very much uphill to know that I don't need to worry too much about anything with an actual gear range. I'll bear it in mind though.

As for your other advice, practicality isn't a concern at all. I'm fortunate enough to own several bikes already, including ones fully loaded and ready for the sort of touring I do (offroad, bikepacking, etc). I don't plan to go to the shops on this thing, or even ride to work. It's all about blasting as hard and as fast as I can, trying to top my own personal bests, and generally improve my fitness levels. I won't ever need to carry anything I can't fit in a jersey pocket. If I need 28mm + tyres, I will be on my singlespeed Saracen, which has 1 inch knobblies on it, for reasons which escape even me. When you lay your definitions out, then, yes, I suppose I do actually want a race bike, but a long distance one. Quite simply, the bike I want is one that I can do a hundred miles on, then hop off happily without collapsing under the pain of my strained spine and arms. Plush racer? Endurance geometry? mile muncher? Whatever the marketers call it, I'm sure you know what I mean.

As ever though, I will ride before I buy.

>>/spo/4394 here.

My boss has taken pity on my abysmal cycling ability and has donated to me his old hybrid bike. I managed to fall off on the way home from work (after being in possession of the bike for all of 10 minutes) attempting to signal I was turning right and I think I've knocked the gears out of sync.

I have terrible balance and I know bugger all about cycling; where would be a good place to read up on the basics about cycling/bike maintenance? I'm assuming I'll need some form of tool/repair kit. I don't think I should be anywhere near city roads, but I live near a park so I'm planning on practicing there to work on my balance and feel more confident.

>>2104
I would say it's a matter of practice. Get used to those gears, get used to riding on quite roads. Get more confident with your balance. Some puncture patches and a set of allen keys are worth having, i use a couple of tent pegs or butter knives to get the tires off.

My gf has started cycling recently and is the same position. I bought her a decent 2nd hand hybrid and although she's pretty rubbish at going up hills. I've gotta peddle like fuck to keep up with her on the flats and downhills. I'm on a 13 yr old steel mountain bike with smaller tires. Now i want to upgrade, If only i had the cash!

>>2104

If the bike looks properly ropey, get a bike shop to give it the once-over - there might be something glaringly wrong with it, like the fork being on backwards or something.

Gents, I'm tight (and broke), my Michelin tires are full of holes, punctures are getting me down but I still want to ride fast.
I need a pair of tires for less than £25, currently running 25x700, will either of these do? recommendations welcome.
http://www.chainreactioncycles.com/Models.aspx?ModelID=24611

http://www.wiggle.co.uk/vittoria-randonneur-city-tyre/

>>2160 I'm using a pair of Bontrager 23x700c tires. Not particularly comfy but have triple layered protection or something similar, not a puncture in 2 months now.

>>2162
>Not particularly comfy
What? Crap rolling resistance? Skiddy?

>>2162

Put less air in. Most people massively over-inflate road bike tyres. If your pump doesn't have a pressure gauge, get one that does.

>>2160

Vittoria Randonneurs are relatively weighty touring tyres, but they're tough and durable. Rolling resistance is very good for a tyre of that type. A lighter option would be the Vittoria Rubino for about the same price, or the Zaffiro for just £8 each.

>>2169
Ta, ended up going for the Rubinos, squeezed them on yesterday and very happy so far. Roll nicely and grip well, we'll see if they're as bomb proof as they feel.
My only regret was going for plain black when I could have had some funky colour scheme.

Anyone here have experience with folding bikes? I'll be commuting to a new job and my current strategy is to park outside town and cycle in. I don't like the idea of sticking my bike on a rack, rain or shine, so I think I'll opt for a folding bike. The existing bike is also well past its best. Thing is, I like cycling and don't want to sacrifice any functionality. Are there any folding bikes that come close to a decent road bike?

>>2178
I have a Brompton as per your picture. As bikes go I wouldn't say its fabulous, but it folds up really well and is quite brilliant for commuting when a train is involved.

>>2178
I've ridden a mates old Brompton about and it's surprisingly fun and fast, though a completely different experience from the road bike, the little wheels and relaxed position make it quite a laugh scooting about town.

>>2180

I reckon they're better than road bikes for inner-city commuting. You don't have the top-end speed, but the riding position and handling are spot on for cutting through traffic. Motorists seem to be infinitely more courteous when I'm on the Brompton in ordinary clothes.

There are other options if you want a bike with more conventional handling, but frankly they're all rubbish at folding. The least-worst alternative is one of the compact Dahons, but they're still far too bulky to fit under a desk or into the overhead racks on a train. If you live in a tiny flat and don't have the storage then they halfway make sense, but the Brompton is just a perfectly evolved machine for commuting and utility cycling.

>>2181
> The least-worst alternative is one of the compact Dahons, but they're still far too bulky to fit under a desk or into the overhead racks on a train.
Yup, but they're still a damn sight easier to get on a train than a full size bike and, best of all, they are "tube legal" (just don't be a cunt and try and take one with you during rush hour).

I have a Mu P8 (I needed a folder because I had a tiny flat at the time and couldn't afford an equivalent Brompton) which is reasonable enough to ride (main complaint is the amount of flex in the frame and lets just say the thing is not exactly "maintenance free") but the folding is useful. It'll fit in the boot of (almost) any car, it doesn't get too much in the way in a corridor but it's not suitable to carry around much (even with a suitable bag, regardless of what their promotional videos claim) and it can't be wheeled around either. Ideally it really needs a dedicated space for storage, it won't "just sort of fit somewhere" in the way Bromptons seem to.

If you have the space, though, you could look into their Vector range; they still fold quite well, (claim to) have much stiffer frames and cram some pretty nice gearing onto the higher end versions. It will not handle like a proper road bike, but it'll come as close as you'll get with a folder. An alternative is Tern's "Verge" range (the similarity in design is not coincidence, there's some politics and such going on in the background with Dahon) which shares similar qualities.

>>2177
Just want to add, these tyres are boom! The central rolling surface is slick and with high pressure (120psi) roll brilliantly. Had a couple of hairy moments when I started to skid, but then the side of the tire with the grip contacts the ground and you instantly regain control.
Perfect combo.

Anyone have any experience with cheapish folding bikes? I only need it for a few kms each day going up a cycle path.

>>2185
If you don't expect much from it, you can't really go that wrong.
Just read some reviews first.

>>2185

Don't do it. They're immensely heavy, the equipment is poor and the frame hinge will start creaking from day one. The very cheapest bikes have too many cut corners, too many cheap solutions that are meant to look OK in the shop rather than work on the road. Buy a second-hand Dahon off eBay, you needn't pay any more but you'll get a vastly superior article. If you must buy something off-brand, avoid anything with 6-speed gears - that's the very cheapest kit available and a sign that the manufacturer is cutting corners.

>>2187 Good info thanks but I'm not entirely sure what corners can be cut. For example, I quite like this one. Is there anything obviously wrong with it?
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Shimano-Commuter-Folding-Foldable-GNS028-20/dp/B008ESC1UC/ref=sr_1_fkmr0_2?s=sports&ie=UTF8&qid=1348445851&sr=1-2-fkmr0

>>2188
Has anyone left a review of that bike?

>>2189 Good point. There was one review and it was awful. I'll give it a miss.

>>2190>>2188

The industry uses the term "bike shaped object" to describe the very cheapest machines that look enough like a bike to fool your average punter, but are made with no regard to how well they'll work.

The most obvious sin is plastic brake levers - they look fine in the shop, but when you pull them hard they just bend, so the brakes don't work properly. The wheels often aren't evenly tensioned, so the spokes work loose and eventually the wheel just collapses going over a bump. If the wheel and pedal bearings don't have proper labyrinth seals, they'll quickly fill with dirt and seize up. Metal parts tend to be of cheap, soft steel that isn't heat-treated, so screw threads fail easily, rendering the part useless.

It's a million different things that are glaringly obvious to a bike geek, but that the average punter never sees. It's the main reason why there are so many rusted bicycles in canals and ditches.

>>2191 Thanks. As advised I've found a better bike second hand, re-conditioned by a couple of guys I know who run a small bike shop. It's a Raleigh Boardwalk Light (RRP 400 quid new) and I'm picking it up tomorrow. Anyone think I shouldn't?

>>2192

A Raleigh rebuilt by a local bike shop is absolutely perfect. Good choice.

Aldi's Special Buys for tomorrow is largely cycling gear:

http://www.aldi.co.uk/uk/html/offers/offers_week39Thursday12.htm

I'm going to have a look at the tool kit and winter clothing, but I have been warned - similar to the experience of >>/uhu/1085 - to go there when it opens or risk disappointment.

>>2197
Thanks for the heads up.
After getting drenched yesterday, the waterproof troos are top of my list.

>>2193 Actually when I went there in the morning there was a part they needed to send off for. Went to Evans Cycles to look and they had a Tern on special offer for 299. I know from my research that Tern is quality and that the guy who started it basically jumped ship from Brompton so I snapped it up.

>>2207

Terns are ace - they're eerily similar to Dahons, only with better-engineered hinge clamps. The whole Tern story is Shakespearian; Tern is run by Florence and Joshua Hon, the wife and son of Dahon founder David Hon. The cheeky bastards poached most of the best staff and claimed ownership of a stack of patents.

>>2208 My mistake.

>>2205
I regret not getting a pair of the trousers, I picked up the winter jacket, gloves and the tool kit. I've tried on the jacket and I'm very happy with it, although the cheeky buggers had put large price tags for the cycling shirts (which were £7 cheaper) on them.

>>2210
Hah.
Everything looked ace, I had my hands full of gear for about 10 minutes, hopped up on consumer dope, until I realised I'm broke and dumped it all back into the cage, sulking to the checkout with my solitary purchase.
Anyone have experience with the 'performance enhancing' undergarments? I usually just wear long-johns during winter but always on the lookout for something better.

>>2182
RIP the Mu P8. In a rather shit-your-pants kind of moment the whatever its called where the steering post attaches through the frame to the front forks snapped during my commute this morning. It must've looked hilarious for onlookers.

Looks like I'll have to make use of my rainy day fund to get a replacement, and this thread should come in handy. I'm sorely tempted to dip into my overdraft and stretch to a Moulton TSR-2 at this stage…

Ballot spoiled for what is clearly /blog/.

>>2238
Yow, I hope that didn't happen while you were rolling?
Has it actually snapped or what

Bad luck

>>2239
Actually snapped, see picture. I'm currently trying to hassle Raleigh (they took over Dahon sales in the UK earlier this year, it turns out) into giving me a replacement part, but in the mean time it's properly fudged and unusable.

I'd just set off from a set of traffic lights and maybe pedalled two or three times, so I was rolling but I wasn't going too fast. It's a bit of a blur, but at first I thought the handlebar post clamp had undone itself (that happened once before and is not a big deal).

>>2238
Does your work offer the ride to work scheme? You could save 30/40% off the price of a bike.

>>2241
http://www.cyclescheme.co.uk/ ? Work is extremely bike friendly and it's a great scheme but we discussed it and came to the conclusion that there are good reasons not to bother in this particular case.

>>2241

Not any more, the tax rules have changed such that it's rarely worth more than 10%.

Lest the whole thing is made to sound too negative: it's still a great scheme. If you're looking to buy a bike but can't quite (or don't want to) plonk down the money now^* then its the best of way bar none of securing financing for it. In a round-about way, it lets proper independent bike shops offer financing deals usually only offered by the big boys. It may not be one size fits all, but it will certainly fit some.


^* This is not meant to be an invitation to spend beyond your means, be sensible ffs.

>>2246

That's what it sounded like to me too, corporate-backed finance for little bike shops.

I don't suppose anyone knows what the company gets out if the scheme, tax rebate? Carbon karma?

>>2247
The repayments are made using salary sacrifice, so they will have to pay less national insurance.

>>2247

It was introduced as a government initiative, to provide a cycling equivalent to a company car. To encourage takeup, they gave the arrangement favourable tax status. A scheme could lease you a bike, charging the leasing fees as a pre-tax salary sacrifice, with a final payment to keep the bike. People totally took the piss, with firms like Planet X Bikes offering "Cyclescheme specials" - high-end road and triathlon bikes specced to come in at exactly the £1000 limit. HMRC changed the rules, taking away most of the tax incentive.

It's still an alright deal if you don't have the cash up front, but because of the admin costs, bike shops will only do cyclescheme on full-price bikes and won't haggle. If you have the cash up front (or put the bike on a 0% credit card) you can usually get a much better deal by shopping around for discounted end-of-season bikes.

Thinking of getting one of these on the CycleScheme. Comes in at exactly £1000, which is a bit over the odds compared to the Secteur Triple/Sport without the disc brakes, but I like them. Going to be used purely at weekends for long fitness rides. Work is a 55 mile round trip, I might do it once or twice but not every day.

Think I will change the tyres out to Marathon Plus's but thats about it.

Good bike?

>>2266
Looks quite neat, though I'd be a bit wary about the exact cycle-scheme friendly price. The brakes are fine — I've got BB7s on my bike, but by all accounts the BB5s are no worse to use. Only other thing I can think of is that you might want to consider Kojaks instead of the Marathons if you're staying on decent roads for your rides… no point getting a bike with carbon this-and-that only to weigh it down with some heavy rubber.

Can you lads recommend any bike racks? I'm planning on getting a high rear mounted one, but I'm not sure where to begin. I've had a quick look in Halfords, but that's it.

>>2623
Saris Bones, if you want it to fit every car ever (including MX-5).
If you don't have that requirement, I'm sure other racks are cheaper and fine.

Aldi are doing their cycling special buys again. They have a bike rack for £19.99:

https://www.aldi.co.uk/en/specialbuys/sunday-specialbuys-7th-july/product-detail/ps/p/cycle-carrier/

If I don't go for it then it's probably one of these three:

http://www.halfords.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/product_storeId_10001_catalogId_10151_productId_251011_langId_-1_categoryId_165477

http://www.halfords.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/product_storeId_10001_catalogId_10151_productId_951939_langId_-1_categoryId_165477

http://www.halfords.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/product_storeId_10001_catalogId_10151_productId_251029_langId_-1_categoryId_165477

Sorry to hijack the thread but I didn't think it necessary to create another bicycle thread.

I want to buy a bicycle for commuting.
I think I will be best served with a speed oriented hybrid, though i find the all terrain hybrids much more aesthetically pleasing.
I don't want to spend more than £400.
I live in a hilly city, and my commute is about 2 miles each way, through the city centre. The last time I rode a bicycle was at least 8 years ago.

I've narrowed it down to a few options;

Revolution Courier Race (Pic related)
http://www.edinburghbicycle.com/products/revolution-courier-race-disc-13

Carrera Gryphon
http://www.halfords.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/product_storeId_10001_catalogId_10151_productId_810613_langId_-1_categoryId_165534

Carerra Subway
http://www.halfords.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/product_storeId_10001_catalogId_10151_productId_810737_langId_-1_categoryId_165534

Vitus Vee-27
http://www.chainreactioncycles.com/Models.aspx?ModelID=81001

Voodoo Marasa
http://www.halfords.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/product_storeId_10001_catalogId_10151_productId_927619_langId_-1_categoryId_165534

Any advice, opinions or other suggestions please.

>>2646

A two mile commute should take you less than ten minutes, so practically any bike will do. Speed is essentially irrelevant over that distance, you're just not going to notice the difference between bikes in your journey time. I suggest visiting a couple of bike shops and test-riding a few bikes to see what you're comfortable with.

For commuting, the most important things are security and practicality. Most bikes can become an excellent commuter with the right accessories.

The bikes you've listed don't come with mudguards, which are absolutely essential on a commuter bike. Road spray is filthy and can badly stain your clothes, but good mudguards will keep you spotless.

Unless you have secure bike storage at work, you're going to need good locks. I recommend a Kryptonite Evolution or Abus Granit D-lock, plus a set of security skewers. Security skewers will help stop your wheels and saddle from getting nicked.

Punctures are the bane of the commuter cyclist's life. On glass-strewn city streets, a lot of people get punctures regularly. I always keep a spare tube and a pump in my messenger bag, because I prefer to mend a puncture and be on my way. If you really can't be arsed with punctures, fit a set of Schwalbe Marathon Plus or Durano Plus tyres. They're not cheap (about £50 a pair) and they don't roll quite as well as standard tyres, but they're almost completely punctureproof.

IMHO the best deal going at the moment for a commuter bike is the B'Twin NeWork 5. It's no featherweight, but it's amazingly well equipped for the price.

http://www.decathlon.co.uk/mens-nework-5-id_8222609.html

>>2650
Thanks for the advice about security and punctures.
That bikes really not my style though.
I want something I can twat about on, and have a bit of fun. Maybe take out for a blast at the weekends or after work.
Couldn't I fit mudguards to the bikes I posted?

I really like the gryphon but it only seems to be available in 21".
I'm only 5 8" , 21" will be too big?

>>2650
>fit a set of Schwalbe Marathon Plus

I second this. My commuter bike has a pair and they are definitely worth it. I can happily ride straight over broken glass without worrying about a puncture or having to swerve to avoid it. The rolling isn't too noticeable, though I had just switched from 2.1 hybrid tyres. One thing is the higher profile means cornering can feel a little different with them

>>2651

The 21" Gryphon will definitely be too big for you. Nearly all hybrids will take mudguards, although you can sometimes have issues with fitting both fat tyres and mudguards, especially on the back wheel. Fitting mudguards isn't hard, but it is an infuriatingly fiddly task.

I'd strongly recommend doing some test rides to work out what compromise between fun and practicality suits you. A fast bike is necessarily an uncomfortable one and vice-versa. For a weekend blast around the lanes, a road bike is a far better choice than any hybrid - the riding position is faster and more efficient and the bike feels sharper and more responsive. The tradeoff is that you're stuck with hard, skinny tyres and a hunched-over riding position.

Novice cyclists are notoriously bad at guessing this. If you have a skim through the YACF or CTC forums, you'll find scores of threads started by people who've just bought a new bike, asking things like "I can't get up the hills round here, how do I get lower gears?", "My saddle is a pain in the arse, what should I get?", "How do I stop my neck hurting on my road bike?" and "How do I fit faster tyres to my hybrid?". Most of these problems could have easily been avoided with a couple of test rides. Evans cycles will let you take anything in the shop out for a spin, as will EBC and any decent independent dealer.

>>2652
Ditto, I cannot recommend the Marathon Plus enough, though they do have downsides. One, they are comparatively heavy and as a spinning part of the bike that is noticeable. Two, they are a pain to get on and off the wheel unless you have a couple of cable ties handy, so emergency tube repair/replacement is no fun. That said, they are nigh on indestructible, so that doesn't come up too often. Keep them close to their max PSI and they even roll OK — not as well as Gatorskins or proper road slicks, of course, but well enough. When commuting longer distances, the peace of mind is great, though.

They are not peerless, however. Michelin City's (my front tyre for the past 2k odd miles has been a Michelin City 26x1.85) are also surprisingly glass resistant, have mostly slick tread when going straight and also tend be less than half as expensive than the Schwalbe's. They lack the lammelar edge structure of the Marathon Plus' as well as the dynamo rail, but unless you're cornering at 40mph on packed snow that hardly makes a difference.

>>2653
> Fitting mudguards isn't hard, but it is an infuriatingly fiddly task.
If you fit SKS ones, then yeah. You'll need a hack saw, maybe some pliers and a bit of patience because the instructions suck (you can tell how much they care when the first paragraph is "Make sure all parts are present" without giving you a parts list).

I did it lads. I am now officially a middle-age-man-in-lycra.

By heck its fast and by jove its cold when I do.

>>2864

As a grumpy old bike snob, I am immensely gratified by the cyclocross trend - the market is now filling up with brilliant bikes like yours, lightweight and sporty machines that still have clearance for fat tyres. Not so long ago, your choices were generally limited to all-out racers with clearance for 25c tyres at best, or stodgy old tourers with heavy steel frames and slack angles. Now you can walk into any branch of Evans and buy a bike that can legitimately do anything well, from a local crit race to a worldwide tour.

>>2865
Yes! A friend at work turned me onto the whole cyclocross thing - most of my riding is on canal towpaths (I'm blessed with many miles of them near my house) which are just muddy enough and lumpy enough to give a normal road bike pause for thought, whilst I've always found mountain bikes just too slow. I thought the chunky tyres might slow it down a bit, but damn its quick. I love it very much already.

I'm bike shopping at the moment. It's distressing how much you're paying for a branded frame these days. I'm seeing Pinarellos, Cinellis, and Bianchis for £2.5k that are fitted with absolute entry level kit - Campy Veloce or Shimano Tiagra. The best I've seen is a Cinelli with Campy Athena, their cheapest possible 11 speed groupset. And it's not even the full fucking groupset, they've stuck an FSA crank on there to save money. Two and a half grand! The wheels are shit on them all too.

I have no choice but to go for a Ribble. Not that it's a bad choice at all. Fuck the eyeties. Look at that. Might go campy wheels too for full wanky effect.

>>2867
Your pedals cost more than my entire bike. Wow.

>>2867
Yes, I was also looking at the Ribble site today too - their bike builder is very nice, I don't know why all bikes aren't bought that way (actually I do, as you point out, its so that manufacturers can quietly skimp on parts).

My new bike in >>2864 also has the cheap Shimano Tiagras - I was waiting for Cannondale to launch the model up which had the Ultegra group sets, but nobody seems to have any stock of them.

Allow me to ask a beginners question, I can just buy the Ultegra 10-speed cassette, derailleures and shifters and fit them myself, right? I'm going to stick with the FSA cranks until I get a proper fitting and I know the right size cranks for me - but there are no weird compatibility problems mixing up Shimanos as long as I buy 10-speed/dual levers? Forgive my ignorance.

>>2868

That sort of puts it into perspective for me too. I could spend probably a grand less and have a bike that would be very nearly as wonderful, but I'll be buying it to reward myself for losing nearly eight stone (mostly by pedalling my fat arse off on a much cheaper bike), so I'm justifying it that way. It's worth almost twice as much as my car.

>>2869

>Allow me to ask a beginners question, I can just buy the Ultegra 10-speed cassette, derailleures and shifters and fit them myself, right? I'm going to stick with the FSA cranks until I get a proper fitting and I know the right size cranks for me - but there are no weird compatibility problems mixing up Shimanos as long as I buy 10-speed/dual levers? Forgive my ignorance.

I'm not a Shimano expert, but there's almost no reason that won't work. The shifters share the same mechanics, and you are correct in thinking that as long as everything is 10-speed it'll all be compatible.

>>2867

Entry-level kit is really good though, the trickle-down of technology means that mid-range groupsets of today shift better than Dura-Ace/Record of a few years ago and are scarcely heavier. Personally, I think that there's little reason to go beyond 105/Veloce unless you're a weight weenie or desperately keen to get 11spd or electric shifting. I agree with you on the shit wheels though.

The weak pound means we're getting absolutely battered on bike prices, but it's still possible to get an excellent carbon bike for under a grand from Ribble or Planet X. The latter will do you a carbon frame with full Ultegra 10 for £1000, or Ultegra 11 for £1200. God only knows how they do it. Admittedly their Pro Carbon frame is a bit old fashioned with round tubes and external cable routing, but it also has an excellent racing pedigree. If you attend any amateur race in this country you'll see a lot of Ribble, Planet X and Boardman bikes and for good reason.

>>2869

Any road groupset will fit on any road bike. If you stick within Shimano 10 speed, you can freely mix and match - Ultegra, 105 and Tiagra will all work together perfectly. You'll see this often on new bikes, where manufacturers tend to scrimp on less glamorous bits like cassettes and front mechs. The only compatibility issue you might face is if you go up to 11 speed - most freehubs designed for 8/9/10 speed aren't wide enough to take a 10 speed cassette, so you might need a new back wheel.

>>2871
How much lighter are carbon frames compared to an equivalent level titanium or aluminium frame? Sure you're saving on density but you're going to need a much thicker frame to give the same strength, and the fracture toughness will be way lower regardless. Maybe for road bikes the stresses aren't huge but wouldn't carbon fibre composites be a bad idea for mountain bikes (the ones that actually go up mountains)?

I was talking to the guy in this bikeshop and he was telling me how some people pay £100 for two carbon fibre water bottle holders. Ridiculous when you can get polymer ones far far cheaper, for saving maybe a few grams?

>>2872

Carbon is a better material in every respect but cost. It is both stiffer and stronger by weight than aluminium or titanium; Gram for gram, a carbon tube has considerably better breaking strength than any metal tube. There's a good reason why the pro peloton has been an all-carbon affair for years. That why requires a little bit of explanation, which I'll come to in a couple of paragraphs.

The lightest useable aluminium frame I'm aware of is the Kinesis Racelight Aithein, which weighs ~1200g plus 330g for a carbon monocoque fork. They use every trick in the book to get down to that weight; The Aithein really is the absolute limit of aluminium and comes with a strict rider weight limit of 14 stone. At a heavy discount, you can pick up an Aithein frameset for £545. For £45 less, you could have a Planet X RT-57 carbon frameset, which is stiffer and 200g lighter.

Titanium frames aren't significantly lighter than the best aluminium frames; Titanium is preferred mainly by touring cyclists, because unlike aluminium it has a defined fatigue limit and so is more resistant to fatigue cracking; In practice, this is undermined by the difficulty in cleanly welding titanium, leading to a lot of cracked welds. Titanium is of course drastically more expensive.

Where aluminium is running out of steam, carbon is just getting started. At the absolute elite end of the market, you have frames like the Cervelo R5Ca, weighing in at a mere 667g.

The weight advantage is just a small part of the story. Carbon composites are anisotropic, meaning that their strength and stiffness is not directionally uniform. Carbon fibres are stiff mainly along their length, which allows a designer to put stiffness only where it is needed. This allows forks and dropouts to be very stiff in torsion (providing a stable, sure ride) but somewhat flexible under vertical loads, providing some suspension effect.

Beyond the entry-level, what really excites designers about carbon is that you can mold it into practically any shape you like, which is terrific news for the aerodynamicists. Carbon can be contorted and tortured into shapes that cut through the air smoothly, shapes that would be all but impossible in metal. It more readily accommodates features like integrated cable routing and integrated brake calipers, hiding these aerodynamically dirty components from the wind. The frame you see to the left (the Cervelo P5) is still considerably lighter than any aluminium frame, but is vastly more aerodynamic. Aero advantages aren't terribly important to a recreational cyclist, but they are everything to a competitive sprinter or time triallist. Professional mechanics and directeurs sportifs don't pay much attention to weight any more, the number they care about is drag coefficient.

Exactly the same applies to wheels - carbon wheel rims are lighter and stiffer than aluminium, and can be made into deep foil shapes that offer big aerodynamic advantages.

There's absolutely nothing wrong with aluminium frames and they're excellent value for training or commuting, but the competitive advantages of carbon are immense.

>>2873
Ah I see, thanks for the explanation. I suppose the same arguments you would apply to cars don't apply equally to bikes. Titanium or alluminium alloys can withstand far greater strain (up to 10% compared to a fraction of a percent for composites) so I'd be worried about carbon-fibre or fibreglass cars shattering on impact, though I guess with bikes the rider will be thrown off from any serious impact and you're going to be a lot more worried about your skull cracking than your bike. When it comes to buckling there won't be much to choose between alloys or composites in terms of stiffness so having a thicker composite frame will beat a thinner alloy one.

Just wondering, the bike you posted looks very much like a very specialised racing bike. It was my naive impression that most serious racing bikes were singlespeed or even fixed gear but that appears to have rear dérailleurs? Is it more of a Tour De France type bike than a dedicated velodrome one?

>>2873
Oh and speaking of anisotropy, there will still be anisotropy present in alloy frames from cold-working (e.g extrusion), though not to the same extent as having uni- or bi-directional fibres.

>It is both stiffer and stronger by weight than aluminium or titanium; Gram for gram, a carbon tube has considerably better breaking strength than any metal tube.

CFRP can be stiffer than aluminium but is comparable to titanium and nowhere near as stiff as steel. And whilst it may have a better strength to weight ratio in both tension and compression, there are a couple of things you must remember here. Firstly, though tougher than its components carbon-fibre is still a brittle material compared to alloys. It's going to catastrophically fail with very little deformation, so will be more vulnerable to sudden impulses. Secondly even with the best manufacturing methods, the variance in strength is going to be far higher in composites than in alloys. Practically this means that if you want (say) less than 1 in 10000 bikes to fail under a given load, the usable strength will be significantly lower than the mean.

The only other option would be to build a certain number of frames and test each one up to the target strength, chucking away those that fail - however given that cost of manufacture this seems wasteful and likely to drive the price even higher.

>>2875

The anisotropy that can be gained from cold-working has little or no practical application in bicycle frame design.

>Practically this means that if you want (say) less than 1 in 10000 bikes to fail under a given load, the usable strength will be significantly lower than the mean.

Bicycle frames are stiffness-critical. An adequately stiff carbon frame will automatically exceed the EN 14781 standards by a considerable margin. Carbon does fracture rather than deform, but that's relatively unimportant. Road cyclists don't go about dropping off ledges and launching off ramps, if their bike suffers a big impact then it's due to crash damage. It really doesn't matter much what happens to your bike if you've already fallen off it. Any impact that could possibly fracture a carbon frame or fork would be more than sufficient to unmount the rider. Two decades of experience in the pro peloton has borne this out. An impact severe enough to fracture a carbon frame will irreparably damage any metal frame - even a modest dent is a fatal wound to a thin-walled butted tube.

The biggest practical problem with CFRP is that of delamination due to crash damage, which can cause serious safety incidents, but the industry is well aware of the issue and all major manufacturers offer non-destructive testing services as part of their frame warranty. Frame failures during use are almost always down to user error, usually the use of inappropriate clamping surfaces or excessive torque. Catastrophic failure of aluminium is far more common due to fatigue. This is particularly problematic in the fork steerer, which is heavily stressed, safety-critical and very difficult to inspect (see Hincapie's 2006 Paris-Roubaix crash).

>CFRP can be stiffer than aluminium but is comparable to titanium and nowhere near as stiff as steel.

A modern high-modulus carbon in suitable layup is in fact absolutely stiffer and stronger in use than all but the most exotic maraging steels (~350GPa/2000MPa on axis), but that's irrelevant as we're interested in specific properties; In this respect, CFRP has steel knocked into a cocked hat. The low density of CFRP (~2.4g/cc) is absolutely crucial, allowing for hugely oversized structures and the benefits thereof. That was the key benefit of aluminium, which otherwise has little merit as a framebuilding material.

The war is over, composites have won. The last holdout of metal as a structural material in racing bicycles was the venerable Ambrosio Nemesis rim, which saw a once-yearly outing in the professional peloton for the cobbled classics. Zipp showed that a properly designed carbon rim is lighter, stiffer and stronger than any metallic rim.

>>2876
A very interesting reply thank you. I must confess that I'm not a serious cyclist so I'm just looking at it from a materials perspective. May I ask where you are getting your numbers from? My source gives values of between 69-150GPa Young's modulus and 28-60GPa shear modulus for CFRP, I'm guessing the large range takes into account different geometries and manufacture methods? Also it seems to suggest densities of more like 1500-1600kgm^-3; 2400kgm^-3 as you say is barely any less than wrought aluminium alloys so this seems suspect.

>>2876
>It really doesn't matter much what happens to your bike if you've already fallen off it.

True enough for road biking, though for mountain biking it's quite important to know when to ditch your bike before falling with it down a drop. I know I'd be much more willing to do so if I knew the frame wasn't going to shatter.

Having said that...

https://www.youtube.com/v/7ZmJtYaUTa0

The gross and net result of all this is that people who spend most of their natural lives riding iron bicycles over the rocky roadsteads of this parish get their personalities mixed up with the personalities of their bicycle as a result of the interchanging of the atoms of each of them and you would be surprised at the number of people in these parts who are nearly half people and half bicycles. When a man lets things go so far that he is more than half a bicycle, you will not see him so much because he spends a lot of his time leaning with one elbow on walls or standing propped by one foot at kerbstones.

>>2877

CFRP is really complicated stuff. You're not so much dealing with a material as an engineering structure in its own right. It is very difficult to generalise and the "average" properties of CFRP depend enormously on the industry and application.

The properties of the fibre itself vary hugely depending on the fibre manufacturing process, with elastic moduli ranging from 55GPa to 900GPa and tensile strength from 2000MPa to 6000MPa. The best fibre is shockingly expensive, dwarfing the costs of even very exotic metal alloys. You generally can't get strength and stiffness in the same fibre, so there's a complex tradeoff between cost, strength and stiffness.

Once you've chosen your fibre, you need to look at the laminate. Fibre volume fractions can vary from 30% with a crude wet layup up to 60%+ with a pre-preg process. Excess resin is worse than useless, adding weight and undermining the strength of the laminate. Ideally, the fibre needs to be completely wetted-out without any surplus resin. Air bubbles (voids) severely undermine strength, riddling the laminate with nucleation points for stress fractures and delamination. Autoclave processing massively increases the strength of a laminate by reducing voids to a minimum, ensuring proper resin distribution and allowing for the use of stronger high cure temperature resins.

Standard woven cloth is very convenient (both in design and manufacturing), but it's a relatively poor way to use the fibre. The crimp created by the interlacing of the fibres translates some normal stress into shear and the uneven surface of the cloth reduces the fibre volume. Unidirectional fabrics maximise the properties of the fibre by avoiding crimp, but increase design complexity substantially and makes the laminate less resilient to mistreatment. A woven fabric allows neighbouring fibres to support each other, so that a break in a fibre caused by drilled holes or damage only affects the local area. With UD, a broken fibre can move within the matrix, contributing little to the mechanical properties of the laminate.

The net result is that there's a vast range in the practical properties of CFRP, with bicycle frames being at the higher end. Because a bicycle frame is relatively small and high-value, you can go hell-for-leather in optimising the layup. You can afford to use high-grade fibre, heated steel tooling with internal bladder moulding and a high-pressure autoclave; You can trust the user to care for the frame and inspect it regularly for damage, so you can get away with using mainly or exclusively unidirectional fabric. Most engineers using composite materials don't have those luxuries.

The range is fairly broad just within bicycle frames. A basic carbon frame costs about £500 and weighs about 1.2kg, a top frame might be ten times the price and half the weight for the same stiffness. The difference is mainly accounted for by better quality carbon fibre, a more complex layup schedule and more careful process control.

Compared to a hybrid is it harder to cycle on a road bike than a hybrid? Over the same distance / geography.

I have both and it certainly feels like that to me.

>>2882

Depends how you define 'harder'.

A road bike is easier in that it uses your strength and power more efficiently, so for the same amount of energy, you go farther and faster. But a hybrid is far more comfortable on your arms, back, arse, and feet, so the same ride may leave you feeling fresher on a hybrid. A hybrid may also be geared lower to make hills easier (but slower), though a compact crankset on a roadie does much the same thing.

A road bike is invariably more efficient though so if we're talking pure effort of legs vs miles traveled it will always win. In your case you may feel the fatigue in your body more than your legs, or maybe your road bike is less appropriately geared for your riding. Do you live in a particularly hilly area?

>>2883
> Do you live in a particularly hilly area?

Yeah I do somewhat.

>>2884

It may just be that your road bike is geared higher than your hybrid then. Though if you feel like your roadie is still harder to ride than your hybrid on flat roads, I may be talking out of my calloused arse.