Report and advice

krys said:

2) I want a cycle computer thingy, but the range is a bit bewildering. I
think I want a wireless one, and I want to know trip distance,

Wait for special offers from Aldi or Lidl. Cheap and work fine. I have one,
as do other people on this NG.

krys said:

Hiya,

I meant to post here last week, after the event, but I've been so busy

1) I reckon on getting a new bike. How on earth do I go about choosing
one? The kind of riding I do is mostly on road or what passes for it
across the 'Levels.

Krys, I'll bite.

You are looking for a hybrid.
A bike with smooth tyres, or a little bit of tread.
Pump the tyres up hard and you can roll along easily.
Be a LITTLE bit flexible with your pricing!

Some suggestions:
Edinburgh Bicycle Revolution

http://www.edinburgh-bicycle.co.uk/catalogue/searchresults.cfm?ID=2939769&CFID=218610&CFTOKEN=76566364

http://www.edinburgh-bicycle.co.uk/catalogue/searchresults.cfm?ID=2939768&CFID=218610&CFTOKEN=76566364

The Courier 05 at £245 is well within your reach.
The Race has more fragile wheels - you may want to avoid that for off-road
trails.
Well reviewed, and I saw one recently and it looked good.
Only a single front chainwhell, which might surprise you.
But it cuts weight and complexity.

On the first link is the Revolution Trailfinder. £215
Delivered to your door.

Do we have a sale? I'd go for the Courier depending on how hilly it is
near you.

Halfords Carrera Sub-7 This is over £350, but has a hub gear.
Little or no maintenance.

Decathlon has a line of city bikes.

Ridgeback are a good brand of hybrids.

At another time of the year, maybe looking for last year's models would be
good.
Look on the Evans website.
Buy Cycling Plus and look through the adverts.

Last, and very much not the least, find a good local bike shop.
They have experience. Ask questions. Who knows - they may have just the
thing for you.

Happy trails.

krys said:

Quoted message said:

Why don't we go sell lucky heather? Well, let me see, maybe because we
were raising money for a local child with cerebal palsy who didn't feel
all that inclined to go and sit outside a shop with a begging bowl by his
wheelchair? Personally I'm very proud of my achievement, and proud of the
money I've raised to be able to help a very good cause.

Pat on the back heading your way.
Yo

Quoted message said:

Anyway - I did it! Bude to Padstowe, along a NCN3 route, over a totally
cloud bound Bodmin Moor and along the Camel Trail, a total of 51 miles, 4
hours 10 minutes ride time.

Well done. I like the Camel trail and have done it every time I'm in
Cornwall.

Quoted message said:

So, now I've got the bug.........there are a few more rides
planned.......and I've got a couple of questions.

1) I reckon on getting a new bike. How on earth do I go about choosing

one?

Quoted message said:

The kind of riding I do is mostly on road or what passes for it across the
'Levels. Not a lot of off road, but the odd bumpy trail. Currently my
Stirling House MTB has been enough, but I want something with decent
reliable gears, a good shift between 'em, and tyres that don't look like
tank tracks! So am I after a hybrid? A tourer? What?

Think a little further ahead. Do you think that you'll ever want to go
camping?
If so you'll be looking for a hybrid or tourer with pannier rack mounting
points.
I used P clips to convert a road bike to a tourer but it was only just
satisfactory
as the gears were too high.

A tourer will cope with roughish trails but the riding position offered by
drop
handlebars may not be to your taste. My Dawes Galaxy copes well with cycle
trails and green roads but it's traction is compromised when the routes are
wet.

My Ridgeback Adventure hybrid is little used by me now and my kids ride it
as well as colleagues who I introduce to cycling by doing the Selby York
cycle
path. I have found it to be totally reliable. I fitted it with a rack with
a view to my son
coming with me on cycle tours but it was not to be.

I have a Raleigh road R500 road bike. Whilst not a state of the art
machine, it's got
A Shimano Sora group set and meets my road needs more than amply. It's not
up
to rough stuff though.

I also have a Carrera Kraken (Halfords own brand) 27 speed mountain bike.
It
has had decent reviews and is a competent bit of kit at £350. There's
currently
a promotion which chucks in £100 worth of accessories e.g. Camelbacks,
tools,
helmets (ducks to avoid flack) etc. I have been very pleased with its
performance
and it earns its keep when I take it out.

Quoted message said:

And where should I
go - on line or a shop? How much is this going to cost me - I want to

spend

Quoted message said:

enough to get a decent long lasting bike, but I'm not fussy about labels

or

Quoted message said:

top of the range?

As for sources. Only the mountain bike was bought from new. The rest were
bought
from the small adds in the upmystreet.co.uk web site. The small adds are
now
on an independent site at http://www.adtrader.co.uk/

A quick browse of the cycling magazines will reveal many bike shops/dealers.
There is
much to be said for buying a new bike from a local bike shop (LBS) if only
to deal with
the servicing and any warantee issues. Halfords does get slated but I have
no complaints
about the service that I have had from the branches in Leeds and like most
chains (pun
intended), service is variable from branch to branch. The kit is OK the
workers sometimes
let the side down.

Quoted message said:

2) I want a cycle computer thingy, but the range is a bit bewildering. I
think I want a wireless one, and I want to know trip distance, (with
automatic stopping when I do!), average speed, that kind of thing. I

don't

Quoted message said:

want to spend a fortune, but haven't really got a clue where to start, so
could you guys point me in the right direction?

I use Halfords own brand. They do a decent job. Lidl and Aldo do them once
or twice a year
but the Halfords ones are available on demand.

Quoted message said:

Thanks for all the help you gave me before the trip - it was
invaluable......and now I'm hooked 🙂

Good for you! I really enjoy cycling. So does my wife by proxy...the house
is peaceful when I'm out
as I'm not winding up my boys :-)

Charlie said:

What a nasty, mean-minded mentality you've got!

Maybe so, but view it through the lens of being bombarded
with leaving collections for people you've never met, sponsorships
for "good causes" that seem marginal at best, and it's very easy
to become a wee bit (or a great deal) cynical and jaded.

Feel free to continue chucking your own cash at these
causes, but frankly, I'm *skint* for the last week of each
month, and none of these generous souls is chucking cash
at me when I need it.

<[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

Correct me if I'm wrong...

You are wrong.

in message <[email hidden]>, krys

(') said:

Anyway - I did it! Bude to Padstowe, along a NCN3 route, over a
totally cloud bound Bodmin Moor and along the Camel Trail, a total of
51 miles, 4
hours 10 minutes ride time. Me and my cycling mater were 1st in -
huge
grins on faces 🙂

Congratulations!

Quoted message said:

And my bike held out, tho' the chain fell off a few
times. I had a fab time, and can't wait until the next one! I just
wish collecting in the sponsorship money was as much fun......

So, now I've got the bug.........there are a few more rides
planned.......and I've got a couple of questions.

1) I reckon on getting a new bike. How on earth do I go about
choosing one? The kind of riding I do is mostly on road or what passes
for it across the
'Levels. Not a lot of off road, but the odd bumpy trail. Currently
my Stirling House MTB has been enough, but I want something with
decent reliable gears, a good shift between 'em, and tyres that don't
look like
tank tracks! So am I after a hybrid? A tourer? What? And where
should I
go - on line or a shop?

Find a decent local bike shop where they know their stuff and don't
patronise you.

You probably already know the priorities:

As light as you can for the price - sacrifice 'features' for light
weight;

Hard, slick tyres are less work than knobbly, soft ones, and slicks are
only a disadvantage if the surface is very slippery;

As to whether to get a hybrid (straight bars) or a tourer (dropped bars)
that's up to whether you think you can cope with drops - but if you get
straight bars I'd really advise getting bar-ends.

Quoted message said:

How much is this going to cost me - I want to
spend enough to get a decent long lasting bike, but I'm not fussy
about labels or top of the range?

You can get decent long lasting road bikes from about £250 upwards. What
you get for more money is better engineering (things which work more
reliably for longer) and lighter weight. Only you can decide where to
stop. My present road bike cost about £1500 all up, and to me it seems
a bargain. But a £500 bike is not twice as good as a £250 one, and a
£1000 road bike is definitely not twice as good as a £500 one. There
are real diminishing returns. And frankly if you're moving up from a
Sterling House bike even a £250 bike is going to seem wonderful.

Things which make a real difference include:

Carbon fibre forks - more comfortable ride
Carbon fibre seat stays - ditto
Carbon fibre seat post - ditto
Suspension seat post - not as good as carbon, but cheaper

A full carbon frame is wonderful but expensive - the cheapest full
carbon road bike I'm aware of is the Claud Butler Strada at about £800.

For your sort of riding suspension is not a benefit. On the contrary it
adds weight and complexity. A set of 'rigid' carbon forks will cost the
same as a cheap set of suspension forks, be much, much lighter and
under road conditions give you just as much comfort.

The frame is the most important thing when you buy a bike. Everything
else you can upgrade over time in 'bite size' chunks as cash flow
allows, but swapping the frame is a big and expensive operation. So if
money is tight buy a bike with a good frame and poor components, rather
than a bike with a poor frame and good components. What's a good frame?
Well, it's light, and springy enough to be comfortable but rigid enough
to transmit power well and handle well. These days cheaper bikes tend
to be too stiff rather than too springy.

As to components, generally I have more confidence in a bike which has
been built up with a matching set of components from one manufacturer
than with an odd mix from here and there. Don't get any manufacturer's
bottom of the range stuff, not even Campagnolo's. For Shimano the
decent road component sets are in ascending order Sora, Alivio, 105,
Ultegra, Dura-Ace; for Campagnolo, Mirage, Veloce, Centaur, Chorus,
Record. Something with 105 or Veloce parts is going to be very nice
indeed, and the top end (Dura-Ace, Chorus, Record) really are for label
junkies and weight weenies.

A bike I'd start by looking at is the Specialized Dolce. It's women's
specific geometry (which basically means a shorter top-tube - women, on
the whole, have shorter torsos and longer legs than men), good
aluminium frame, carbon forks, adequate but not special components, a
bit under £500. I'm not suggesting you should necessarily buy one but
if you have a good look at one you'll have something to compare other
bikes with.

Quoted message said:

2) I want a cycle computer thingy, but the range is a bit bewildering.
I think I want a wireless one, and I want to know trip distance,
(with
automatic stopping when I do!), average speed, that kind of thing. I
don't want to spend a fortune, but haven't really got a clue where to
start, so could you guys point me in the right direction?

Cat-eye are in my experience reliable, and the low end of the range seem
perfectly adequate.

One thing - I know it's easy to look at the difference in price between
a Sterling House special and a reasonable road bike and think 'eek!'
But if you enjoy riding it more, you will ride more, and that will mean
that you get fitter and feel better. And £500 does not buy a lot of gym
or squash-club membership these days. Also, if you use your bike for
getting about, it doesn't take very much cycling to save £500 worth of
petrol - how much did you spend last time you filled the car up?

--
[email hidden] (Simon Brooke) http://www.jasmine.org.uk/~simon/

Morning had broken, and I found when I looked that we had run out
of copper roove nails.

<delurk>
"Simon Brooke" <[email hidden]> wrote in message news:b076p2- wrote:
many goodly things, but in particular :-

Quoted message said:

A bike I'd start by looking at is the Specialized Dolce. It's women's
specific geometry (which basically means a shorter top-tube - women, on
the whole, have shorter torsos and longer legs than men), good
aluminium frame, carbon forks, adequate but not special components, a
bit under £500. I'm not suggesting you should necessarily buy one but
if you have a good look at one you'll have something to compare other
bikes with.

I persuaded my wife to try the Dolce as it appeared to be amongst the best
reviewed ladies bikes available, but I was unsure if she'd 'get on' with it
as she only learnt to ride a bike as an adult and is not too confident tho'
rides well - cadence rates always between 80-100 and 25/30 miles without
batting an eyelid, and takes herself off to the Spen Valley Greenway for a
quick 10 miler 2-3 times a week if able to (sorry I'm rambling a bit).

After trying it she said that 'I wasn't riding on it - I felt part of it!'
so needless to say she is the (very) proud owner of the Dolce.

and Simon also wrote:-

Quoted message said:

Cat-eye are in my experience reliable, and the low end of the range seem
perfectly adequate.

We like the Cateye Astrale for the cadence function as we always
try to spin our legs rather than mash our knees, and this model does
that for about £25 - or treat yourself to ShimaNo Flightdeck about
twice that, but it's cordless and you can see when your chains about
to fall off one end of the block...

Neil

<relurk>

Simon Brooke said:

For Shimano the
decent road component sets are in ascending order Sora, Alivio, 105,
Ultegra, Dura-Ace;

Subsitute Alivio for Tiagra (Alivio is MTB). Tiagra is a good point at
which to enter. The lower end of the reasonable bikes often have Tiagra
rear mechs and Sora or unbranded fronts. 105 is pretty decent (IME) and
a friend did ride Sora for a year or so, but the shifting wasn't
brilliant and he never used the front mech as a consequence.

If you can get near them, I'd second the recommendations to take a look
at the Edinburgh Bicycle range.

Jon

in message <[email hidden]>, John Hearns

(') said:

krys said:

1) I reckon on getting a new bike. How on earth do I go about
choosing one? The kind of riding I do is mostly on road or what
passes for it across the 'Levels.

Krys, I'll bite.

You are looking for a hybrid.
A bike with smooth tyres, or a little bit of tread.
Pump the tyres up hard and you can roll along easily.
Be a LITTLE bit flexible with your pricing!

Some suggestions:
Edinburgh Bicycle Revolution

http://www.edinburgh-bicycle.co.uk/catalogue/searchresults.cfm?ID=2939769&CFID=218610&CFTOKEN=76566364

Quoted message said:

http://www.edinburgh-bicycle.co.uk/catalogue/searchresults.cfm?ID=2939768&CFID=218610&CFTOKEN=76566364

Quoted message said:

The Courier 05 at £245 is well within your reach.
The Race has more fragile wheels - you may want to avoid that for
off-road trails.
Well reviewed, and I saw one recently and it looked good.
Only a single front chainwhell, which might surprise you.
But it cuts weight and complexity.

She's a long way from Edinburgh, otherwise I would have suggested the
Courier Race as a bike to look at. But I do think that having a
relationship with a /good/ LBS is a good thing, and a bike she can buy
locally - and try before she buys - seems to me pretty important.

There's nothing wrong with 700c wheels - they're used on lots of heavy
tourers which use rough tracks. In my opinion the Courier Race is a
worthwhile upgrade on the Courier.

--
[email hidden] (Simon Brooke) http://www.jasmine.org.uk/~simon/

;; MS Windows: A thirty-two bit extension ... to a sixteen bit
;; patch to an eight bit operating system originally coded for a
;; four bit microprocessor and sold by a two-bit company that
;; can't stand one bit of competition -- anonymous

"John Hearns" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

krys said:

2) I want a cycle computer thingy, but the range is a bit bewildering. I
think I want a wireless one, and I want to know trip distance,

Wait for special offers from Aldi or Lidl. Cheap and work fine. I have
one,
as do other people on this NG.

My Aldi cheap wirelesss one started reporting strange things, like the fact
that I had done 3 miles whilst in fact I was sat at a table. This happened
after quite a lot of cycling in torrential rain but even so..... I replaced
it with a cheapish wired one. Really very little hassle to add it compared
to a wireless one and no worries if the distance was close enough. Just
make sure you buy one with autostart. Even the cheapest will do trip
distance.

--
Tumbleweed

email replies not necessary but to contact use;
tumbleweednews at hotmail dot com

"krys" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

Hiya,

I meant to post here last week, after the event, but I've been so busy
that
well.......

Anyway - I did it! Bude to Padstowe, along a NCN3 route, over a totally
cloud bound Bodmin Moor and along the Camel Trail, a total of 51 miles, 4
hours 10 minutes ride time. Me and my cycling mater were 1st in - huge
grins on faces 🙂 And my bike held out, tho' the chain fell off a few
times. I had a fab time, and can't wait until the next one! I just wish
collecting in the sponsorship money was as much fun......

my advice for next time would be to go to www.justgiving.com and set up a
web page there. They take 5% commission but IME that is far outweighed by
(a) the 28% gift aid they collect which is difficult/impractical/impossible
to do if you do it yourself, (b) you may well get more money because its
easier for people to donate, and (c) you arent left with the hassle of
tracking people down and getting money out of them.
On my JOGLE(now completed) I have so far raised about £850 and I'm sure if
I'd just gone round with a bit of paper I'd never have got anywhere near
that. Also, it means you can give the people the web address and there is no
pressure on you or them, they can donate if they want but arent embarrased
into doing it and neither are you offended if they turn you down directly.
Personally I can find it irritating to have sponsor forms put under my nose
especially if its for someones thinly disguised foreign holiday. In case
that sounds hypocritical since I was sponsored, in my defence I was doing
the ride anyway and lots of people kept asking me if I was accepting
sponsorship, so eventually I set the web page up, and then if asked, pointed
them at that.

--
Tumbleweed

email replies not necessary but to contact use;
tumbleweednews at hotmail dot com

Quoted message said:

You're not compelled to support a charity, either by
sponsorship or by donation, nor are you compelled
to put anything in a collection for someone you've
never met. Next time someone asks, just tell them
that you're a bitter, evil-minded [censored] and would
rather not contribute.

I assume you didn't mean the above to suggest that anyone who doesn't
give every time they are asked is a bitter, evil-minded [censored]?

Whilst not sharing the "pikey" part of "nob"s views, I also strongly
dislike being asked to sponsor/donate on a daily basis to causes of
which I have never heard and whose worth I have no way to assess.
(Well, to be precise, I don't mind being asked, it's the dirty look you
always get if you decline that I resent.)

And, as mentioned elsewhere in this thread, the modern scam of
"sponsoring" people to go on exotic holidays to do
marathons/triathlons/centuries/etc. (with maybe 25% of the money ending
up with the headline charity) is outright disgusting to me.

--
Peter Headland

Tumbleweed said:

"John Hearns" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

krys said:

2) I want a cycle computer thingy, but the range is a bit bewildering. I
think I want a wireless one, and I want to know trip distance,

Wait for special offers from Aldi or Lidl. Cheap and work fine. I have
one,
as do other people on this NG.

My Aldi cheap wirelesss one started reporting strange things, like the fact
that I had done 3 miles whilst in fact I was sat at a table. This happened
after quite a lot of cycling in torrential rain but even so..... I replaced
it with a cheapish wired one. Really very little hassle to add it compared
to a wireless one and no worries if the distance was close enough. Just
make sure you buy one with autostart. Even the cheapest will do trip
distance.

Seconded. My Tchibo wireless computer frequently shows my speed as being
in excess of 80mph for a few seconds (usually when I am stationary) and
was impossible to set up in the same room as my PC.

It also doesn't autostart so needs the damn button pressing before it
starts working, can tell you the temperature, but will only do this in
fahrenheit if you've set miles as the working units and then converts
this from centigrade. So while it seems to measure in about 2C steps
displays the fahrenheit temperature to 1 decimal place of (in)accuracy.

Oh, Did I mention it was solar-powered too :-)

julesh

Hiya,

With regards to the charity thing - I agree with some of you on some fronts.

Our charity trip was done as a group of like minded people (all from the
local pub) to raise money for one local lad. We made a trip out of it -
Sharp's Brewery helped us with transport, we all stayed at B&Bs overnight,
had dinner, and a brewery trip there the next day. We funded all of that
ourselves. This was by no means one of those foreign holiday trip things,
which I never have quite understood. I mean - how does that work? Be
easier just to write the charity a cheque, surely? In this case ALL the
money raised is going to the child involved. The trip was a fun event that
wouldn't have happened without the charity element of motivation for it.
Local folk, raising local money, for local people.....

Now that I've gotten the bug, and people can see that, should I try and do a
sponsored event any time soon - I know I'd have limited takers for that.
Why pay me to do what I want to do anyway? People would rather sponsor you
to do something "difficult".

As it is, a week or so later, most of the charity money is now
in......nearly there. Hopefully together we'll have raised a substantial
chunk of the sum required.

krys

In article <[email hidden]>,
[email hidden] says...

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

You're not compelled to support a charity, either by
sponsorship or by donation, nor are you compelled
to put anything in a collection for someone you've
never met. Next time someone asks, just tell them
that you're a bitter, evil-minded [censored] and would
rather not contribute.

I assume you didn't mean the above to suggest that anyone who doesn't
give every time they are asked is a bitter, evil-minded [censored]?

Absolutely not.

Quoted message said:

And, as mentioned elsewhere in this thread, the modern scam of
"sponsoring" people to go on exotic holidays to do
marathons/triathlons/centuries/etc. (with maybe 25% of the money ending
up with the headline charity) is outright disgusting to me.

Agreed. Want to sponsor me to walk the Great Wall of China?

--
Hywel

Kill the Crazy Frog
http://www.petitiononline.com/crzyfrg/

Hywel Jenkins said:

In article <[email hidden]>,
[email hidden] says...

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

And, as mentioned elsewhere in this thread, the modern scam of
"sponsoring" people to go on exotic holidays to do
marathons/triathlons/centuries/etc. (with maybe 25% of the money ending
up with the headline charity) is outright disgusting to me.

Agreed. Want to sponsor me to walk the Great Wall of China?

I'm planning an intrepid ride tomorrow from the historic city of
Kamakura (used to be capital of Japan) to the famous port of Yokohama,
site of the first major settlements of foreigners (well, the important
ones anyway) when Japan first opened itself up to the outside world.

I'm accepting donations via my paypal account.

I'd ride to work today as well, but Wednesday is Japanese lesson day
(which means getting the train) :-)

James
--
James Annan
see web pages for email
http://www.ne.jp/asahi/julesandjames/home/
http://julesandjames.blogspot.com/