Cycling UK Forum

Yes, I think they get paid according to the amount of mess they leave on the road with an extra bonus payment if a cyclist gets a puncture.

1300 miles in a fortnight, with camping gear, that's some pace.

You could ask the local cycling clubs if they are considering arranging group rides on days other than Sundays, there are likely to be others who have similar time constraints as you do.

pwa wrote:

Oldjohnw wrote:The paying for road use argument is nonsense at every level, regardless of the terminology used.

I have paid no "road use tax" for any of my last 4 cars, including my current one.

You are making the mistake of engaging with his arguments. It isn't worth it. You have more rewarding things you could be doing with your time.

Whilst this may be true, I fear that now Farage is looking for another purpose in life he is quite capable of whipping up hysterical emotions and causing a lot of damage.

Isn't a hub dynamo going to be an expensive solution? I use daytime lights on flashing mode during the darker winter days, I woudn't like them helmet mounted as anything that adds weight to the helmet could get uncomfortable in my view. There are sets of lights by Cateye which are very good when mounted on the handlebars and seatpost or rear forks.

Yes! Been caught out a few times. I find the brighter headlamps or daytime running light are dazzling, which makes it more difficult to pick out the flashing indicator.

I have been puzzling over the last few days trying to work out how to fit my disc brake rotors onto some new wheels (it's part of my new bike build project). I had to admit defeat as none of my tools would fit on the securing ring (long boring technical description can be provided on request). So, reluctantly had to admit defeat and take the wheels and rotors to my local LBS (Owen's Petersfield, if you are interested). Whilst waiting outside the shop I spoke to three ladies who had just picked up hired ebikes form the shop and wanted to know the best way for cyclists to get from there onto the Southdowns way, so I was able to provide directions for them, it looked like they were going to have a nice ride. The bike shop fitted my rotors while I waited so I didn't have to make the return trip to pick them up later.

I bought one, about £25 on eBay. It came with two wall brackets so I've got one installed just above waist height and one just about my eye level, it just slots in to the brackets so it's easy to move up or down. It's superb as I've limited space in my garage and I can do just about all maintenance, build/rebuild jobs on my bikes using it. The only slight disadvantage over a free standing work stand is that I don't have access to both sides of the bike, so it does mean that I have to take it out of the stand to turn it around, but this isn't much of a problem as most of the items needing attention are on the right side of the bike.

I've been cycling for many years now and every now and again experience an "incident". I find it helps, regardless of who may or may not be to blame, to analyse the incident carefully after the event to see if there was anything I learned from it and how it could be avoided in future.

gaz wrote:
The most obvious demonstrator for me is that there are roads I'll ride when I'm coming back tired from a long run that I rarely consider when I'm hauling 40Kg of shopping in a trailer.

Manoeuvring across two lanes of 30+mph motor traffic whilst I'm climbing at 8-10mph to reach the right turn lane is uncomfortable at best, when I can only manage 4-5mph it's time to find a different route.

Good point, I realise that I should perhaps have thought about our route and taken into consideration our slow speed. In the case of the crossroads we might have been better becoming pedestrians to get across the road and remounted on the road after the right turn. In general I think that things are much more difficult for slow riders.

I am a fairly experienced cyclist, usually completing several thousand miles a year, so I’m well used to putting up with the fearsome traffic on some of our roads. However today I had an experience of a different kind. I persuaded my wife to accompany me on a ride to a country park, about 5 miles from home and involving a ride to the outskirts of our town and beyond. She’s definitely not the world’s fastest cyclist so we proceeded very sedately but surely to our destination and back. What really was an eye opener to me was how much more vulnerable I felt riding along at less than half my normal pace and the terrible lack of patience and consideration we experienced from passing motorists. The worst example was as we were attempting to turn right at a busy crossroads, something I do on my own 4 or 5 times a week without problems. I was signally right in my usual demonstrative way and as we moved out to the centre of the road a following car decided that there was time for him to overtake us into the face of oncoming traffic and then cut across us to turn left nearly knocking me off in the process. Is this sort of intimidation normal for slow riders and if so is it any wonder that there are still relatively few cyclists on our roads?

It's a shared use path so one would expect users to share the space. Letting your dog off its lead is not sharing the space as it is not only dangerous, it's annoying for non-dog lovers. If people want to let their dogs off the lead then they should find an appropriate large space where they can safely do so.

You may find that there is a local mobile bike mechanic, try searching for local bike repairs.

Many years ago now I was taking my daughter for a walk in the local park in her pushchair and some youths playing football kicked a ball into the pushchair just above her head, I can't remember, however what the daily fail headline was in that instance.

Buy a cheap bike, ride it a lot, work out what you like/dislike then build up your own bike using your ideal components.