Cycling UK Forum

MIB2020 wrote:Update, I also put some fast skinny tyres on , 35c ! Not only does it feel like a racer after the 40c Land Cruisers but it stops dead with the Deore V brakes, have to be careful how much pressure I apply!

Excellent result, I wouldn't go so far as describing 35s as 'skinny' though Having something that feels/is faster on top of the improved braking sure makes cycling significantly easier and less stressful all round.
Pigs back to longer days and warmer temps so you can enjoy even more

that's some properly bad luck regards punctures, that bit of stone should be nowhere near a gritter, I run my tyres faitly high compared to some, 32mm rear on my daily is 80psi, just swapped out to vittoria hypers after years on Specialized Borough Pros but simply wore them out as opposed to cut based or delamination issues. I also run the front 28mm (Giant wire bead) at 80psi also.

The rippling of the continental I'd deffo be sending it back to the shop, that's not normal for a tyre that is nowhere near even a 1/3 worn.

1st pic is a nbit bothersome, look slike the centre channel of exposed tarmac ends a bit further up, did you have to dismount at that point or was it slush that you could ride through? The channel on the left is plenty wide enough, the water in itself isn't a massive deal unless you're having to go up a steep incline.
I've often taken to the grass on the way down the hill to the shops after it's snowed, even with slicks it's doable, tried the riding/sliding down on compacted snow thing, even with one foot out as an outrigger I ended up battering my glute I really should just get the MTB out when it's like that but once you're on roads that have been cleared you make so much more progress and make up any time you might have lost by been on road tyres been an awful lt more careful or even dismounting.

Luckily in most of England we don't get too many days of really bad weather that it's too dodgy or just too unpleasant to be out, sometimes going out when it is a bit challenging is part of the fun, but there's a balance to be had.

Brucey wrote:if you are sceptical, this may be because you have never had to remove a broken cable end from deep within a shifter, or seen a shifter break because of such a broken cable. To those who have seen either or both, 'lifeing' a cheap consumable like a cable inner makes perfect sense.

Remember that cables in shifters always violate design rules for near-infinite fatigue life, so it isn't a question of 'if' the inner cable will fail, merely a question of when.

FWIW cable inners break in DT and bar end shifters too; this happens less often, because few riders so equipped shift as frequently as with STIs. When the inner cable starts to fail in a DT lever or BE shifter, this commonly announces itself by the broken cable strands repeatedly stabbing you in the fingers.... nice....

cheers

I've done a few on shifters bought second hand, yes it can be a pain but that's because many people either don't set up the cables correctly or use cheap cables and/or simply never bother to check their cables. A few minutes of undoing the cable end at the RD and checking once a year is more than suffice for 99.999% of users.

In your example of someone changing out every 9 months, people having to change so frequently are either do something wrong or use inferior products whilst doing no maintenance or even changing under duress. Repeating the same mistakes, ignoring maintenance will keep on having the same problem, looking at what you might be doing wrong is going to save a decent amount of time and cost over the long run.

And let's be honest 150,000 shifts over 9 months could equate to 7500 miles or 150 x 50 mile rides, 800-1000 gear shifts on a 50 mile ride that's even a bit up and down are easily done, considering the number of shifts just in the course of approaching and departing a junction, a seemingly high number of shifts are really nothing out of the ordinary, changing a gear cable so often however is even with the hidden cable gear systems seems out of kilter.

andrew_s wrote:Advantages of washing line shifters:

The cable run is a single large radius curve, rather than several tighter bends, so, all other things being equal, shifting will be better.
The shifting mechanism is of easier access, so maintenance, such as replacing a fraying inner cable, is much easier, and less likely to involve further work, such as replacing the bar tape..
The stem clamp area is less cluttered, making the fitment of accessories easier.
The washing lines can be useful for hanging things on, such as washing, or route sheets/maps.

Disadvantages of washing line shifters:

They look less tidy.
There's a little more wind resistance.
They get in the way of handlebar bags.

I like many have used all the iterations of Shimano integrated brake shifters (and Campagnolo), the shifting on the older Shimano 10 speed 'clothes line' types was very nice, the 6600/7800 very nice indeed, however I've had 5800 STIs for what, 7 years and they are superior IMO in terms of shifting. The Dura Ace first hidden cable shifters are good but not quite up to the previous iteration but are still a world away from the 8 and 9 speed STI units. By time you get to 11 speed it's a different ball game. As for easier access to replace fraying inner cables, how hard is it to check your cables once in a while before they get too cream crackered to be easily removed no matter which system you use? I've never had to replace the bar tape on the later units because of cable issues.

Stem/clamp area isn't cluttered, quite the opposite in fact as you've just mentioned regards fitting a bar bag, I can fit two clamp on lights plus a GPS on my carbon bars of my racing machine, how many more 'accessories' does one need?

Would I go back, if that was the only option financially/availability wise yes, but only to the 5600/6600/7800, everything before that is incomparable and sub par to the hidden cable stuff by a distance IME.

slowster wrote:Are these aerosol greases truly semi-fluid? From some of the descriptions it seems:

a) they are designed to be fluid/foam immediately after spray application so that they will run and cover all the moving parts/surfaces requiring lubrication,

but also

b) once the solvent that allows it to be thin enough to spray has evaporated, the residual grease coating is quite sticky.

In contrast the grease used in Landrover swivel housings (which has often been mentioned when SFG has been discussed in previous threads) is sufficiently fluid/thixotropic that it would tend to leak from components which do not have seals.

Therefore are these aerosol spray greases sufficiently fluid to be used on freehub pawls, or are they likely to cause the pawls to stick like a non-semi fluid grease would do?

Define 'quite sticky'? Compared to thin oil or WD40 of course it will be 'sticky'.

Standard grease is far more 'sticky' than this stuff, it won't hold a bearing in place like solid grease does, I think you're worrying over something that simply isn't a thing or are misunderstanding the product.
I've used it on more than 20 freewheels, they've all been better afterwards.

£6.99 seems expensive, I know it's a few years ago but I bought a tin of auto care spray grease from tesco for under £2 - 400ml tin.
There's loads out there to choose from.
Holts do one, here for £3.79/500ml, however only free postage with orders over £15 but 4 cans for £15.16 delivered seems pretty good if you want a job lot https://www.carparts4less.co.uk/p/holts ... TtEALw_wcB here for a single 500ml can for £5.99 delivered https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Holts-Spray- ... SwRn5dMJ0-
Or maybe you can collect direct from Eurocar parts for £4.09 https://www.eurocarparts.com/p/holts-sp ... pKEALw_wcB

400ml PTFE https://www.halfords.com/cycling/bike-m ... rvEALw_wcB

As for use, freewheel sprockets have been my favoured use, always seems to work a treat, also the splines on a freehub body, sticky STI units post cleaning as mentioned previously, generally places that might be impossible or really difficult to reach with appropriate blob of solid grease without fully dismantling or really fiddly.
Only on a cheap pair of pedals would I use it, decent ones you might as well dismantle and go the whole hog of cleaning out, adjusting and relubing properly.

PH wrote:

Ride-sleep-repeat wrote:Having read this,Guardian 22/01/21 my 25% could be too low!?

For example, a £200 coat bought from a German website could attract 12% or £24 customs duty. VAT at 20% is then applied to the total of £224, giving a VAT bill of £44.80. Once the courier has added its £11.50 admin fee, the UK consumer must pay £80.30 to the courier on the doorstep before it will hand over the item – adding around 40% to the coat’s price.

OK - I'll have one more go at this.

For example, a £200 coat bought from a German website could attract 12% or £24 customs duty. VAT at 20% is then applied to the total of £224,

The import duty varies between products, 12% in this case, but it's 4.7% on most bicycle components.
Then, if they had bought that in Germany they would have paid 19% German VAT.
The UK import should be without the German VAT, you don't pay VAT of exports, but then you do pay the UK VAT on import. What you don't do is pay it twice. The SOMA frame set I imported from the US, was without the US Sales Tax (Which varies with state), plus the UK VAT.

From a quick check the .gov website is showing an import duty of 4% for frames

Valbrona wrote:Assuming the Specialized is carbon ... it wins outright.

Why?

If you want the sharper handling bike then the CAAD13 would be considered to be slightly better from users overall views that I've been reading over the last 3 years, there's really not a heap load in it. I must admit from my use of high end alu to mid range carbon I'd rather have the alu frame.
Not tried either but seems to me as much as I love my conti pro level carbon bike, in the saddle and out it's lovely, being able to kit 40mph on the flat in a faux sprint it really does the business BUT in handling terms I'd still say the high end alu frame I had - Principia RS6 (also had a REX) was superior, same wheelset/kit, but that's just me.

Ultimately, go and ride both or you'll be left not knowing which suits you best.

GrahamJ wrote:

The utility cyclist wrote:Please show some hard evidence for this hypothesis because despite many making this claim the numbers simply don't work out, only when you inflate a wider tyre to the same higher pressure of a narrower tyres does it equal or have a slightly lower rolling resistance on rough tarmac.

See page 43 of Thorn's Touring Bike Bible (http://www.sjscycles.com/thornpdf/thorn ... ochure.pdf). Andy Blance provides these links to support his statements.
https://janheine.wordpress.com/2012/08/ ... on-losses/
http://trstriathlon.com/talking-tires-w ... -poertner/
https://janheine.wordpress.com/2016/06/ ... confirmed/
http://www.roadrevolution18.dtswiss.com/endurance/

I'd read most of that and elsewhere previously, Jan Heine using rumble strips is just ludicrous, not a single road surface replicates that, the bike rolling resistance drum has a continual uneven surface but not extreme, it's as close to a rough road as you're going to experience, the evidence shows that wider tyres are not quicker/lower roiling resiatance unless you inflate them to the same higher pressures of narrower tyres.

cycleruk wrote:This thread prompted me to go check my A600's. They have been on a bike at least 3 years but the bikes not been ridden for about 15 months. Once I got it into my head which way to turn they required some force to remove. They were quite tight and you begin to wonder if your undoing them in the right direction. At least they did come off but would prefer it if they had spanner flats. I have the A520s on my other bikes and save the A600s for best and touring.

P.S there are a couple or so ad's on Ebay and some new ones but from America.

which means +20%VAt including on the postage +£9 RM handling fee, so that gets it down to about £69 for a new pair, might as well buy all three (postage is only $3 more) and then sell the other two.
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/SHIMANO-TIAG ... GTR=1#shId

Brucey wrote:mini Vs will work with full V levers but they will be a bit down on power. If the bosses happen to be an odd height on the frame too then that could be worse than normal; you have already used your 'wriggle room' if you like. Also the clearance isn't as great with mini-Vs as with full Vs so on some touring bikes mini-Vs require stuff like notching the mudguard to fit properly.

Anyway I'd keep the cantis and swap the levers as first choice, second choice use full-Vs with the present levers, third choice is 'something else'.

IMHO where mini-Vs really work well is on bikes with tyres no fatter than about 35mm (with reasonably close-fitting mudguards) and where you want to use current shimano dropped bar STIs; the 'NSSLR' brake cable pull is a pretty good match for mini-Vs, but is less easy to make work really well with cantis.

cheers

The CX9 are 90mm, you lose nothing in 'power', your ability to read the conditions and tyre traction is ultimately the defining factors in stopping/braking capability , even some average brakes can lock a wheel up

simonhill wrote:Having a look at the Schwalbe range of touring tyres might be an idea. Some will be too heavy for your use, but they will give you an idea of what is out there. It also is worth thinking about what you want from your tyres. The idea of very thin, high pressure for speed is losing out to the concept of something a bit fatter which gives a better ride and is (counter intuitively) often faster

Two to think about are the Marathon Original Greenguard, a great general purpose tyres which is very puncture resistant, but may be a bit slow for you. Also the Marathon Supreme which is very popular for general use and also touring. It is a lightweight slick tyre - available in 1.6" and 2" both of which are wide enough for a bit of comfort as well as a reasonably fast ride. I've been using Supremes for some years now.

(Edit cross posted with above)

Please show some hard evidence for this hypothesis because despite many making this claim the numbers simply don't work out, only when you inflate a wider tyre to the same higher pressure of a narrower tyres does it equal or have a slightly lower rolling resistance on rough tarmac.

If the OP is just riding on a dusty canal path with maybe some loose surface here and there as their 'off-road' then there is no benefit whatsoever to having anything heavy or with insane amounts of puncture resistant layers or even any knobbles. I ride on far worse with my 700C slicks 32/28mm rear front and have them set for road riding with a small load so 80psi in both.
Wider than 45mm is IMO not of any additional benefit whatsoever and is just adding weight and width for the sake of it.

I used to run Conti Goliath tyres with my Kona Lava Dome https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Continental- ... SwVhFfz26I they were great as they had the knobbles on the outer if you were cornering on looser stuff off road.

As far as out and out slicks go, these are probably the fastest rolling 26" tyres you can get right now, basically a road tyre in 26" guise. https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Vittoria-Rub ... SwRyhfSSX7

Brucey wrote:

MIB2020 wrote:Great info , thanks all.

the important thing is that the brakes are matched to the levers. This is much more important than what type of brake you have.
If you presently have deore levers with cantilever brakes this is a bad mismatch and feeble braking will be the result, every time.
The two easy options are to

a) fit full V brakes (not mini-Vs) or
b) fit levers which better match the brakes you have eg

IME if the cables are in good shape, fitting brake levers is a lot easier and cheaper than new brakes.

I presume you have actually tried the CX9s with V brake levers? they are long enough to work just fine, for many people CX9s are possibly too grabby for canti/road levers as they have tiny rim clearances.
Either way for sake of cost, a set of brake levers that can be adjusted for Vs or canti/road is going to give more flexibility, the Tiagra 4700 for example are able to be set for whichever brake type you chose options, there are also a few others that can be used with cantilevers/road and Vs