Cycling UK Forum

Loads. Bike covers for touring and go under your tent. Tape measures. Tork drivers. Camping air pillow. Small files. Small screwdrivers for your glasses frames. Shower cap to go over your helmet or saddle in rain. Batteries. Sticky tape. Etc etc...

Great places. I read an interesting magazine article on these shops. The importer pays up front for a container full at 40p each. He gets 60p from the shop chain. The shop gets a £. Must be harder to run a dollar store - perhaps we are getting goods for a £ that the yanks get for a $ ? ie the usual rip off.

Al

Child seats are not recomended until they cansit up/support themselves. About 6 months.
My son was 7 months before he went into a bike seat, that was partly due to him being able to sit up... think is baby ready to sit in a high chair.. and partly due to time of year. ie he was warmer and more sheltered from the weather by staying in the trailer. The weather was not good enough before he was 7 months to put him into the seat and even when he did go into it it was Easter week and we had some bad weather.. so he was in and out of the trailer / bike seat depending on what the weather looked like it might do.

Trailer; Not sure they are available any more but we had a Winchester trailer, it folded down so it was easy to transport in the car, and could be transferred from one bike to another.
I was able to adjust the adjustable seat so baby was lying flat, and padded underneath the seat with a pillow. I know Meic has had a trailer into which he has attached / secured his baby's car seat to keep her secure.

As an aside, each winter my son went back into the trailer in particularly bad/cold weather to keep him insulated from the weather, until he was ready tostoke the tandem.

I always leave unwanted gear in a bin liner, in the panniers, on the bike, a yard from the bivvybag. The only things I take in are the bar bag which doubles as the base for a pillow and contains all the valuables, plus the heavier part of the toolkit . Like CJ if camping wild I eat beforehand somewhere else, arrive late and leave early.

Found a guy asleep on the road , using a speed bump as a pillow when i was a milkman , about 3 am.

Luckily he was right next to the kerb ....

Once found a drunk guy asleep on a drive with no trousers or pants , not a pretty sight

julk wrote:The typical weight carried for camping ranges from around 25Kg to half that.
Make sure the rear wheel is strongly built, the most common problem touring is probably spokes breaking in a rear wheel.

What you carry depends on how minimal you are prepared to go and how far from civilisation you will be riding.

I tour with around 22Kg of load which includes a 4Kg 2man tent, Trangia stove, full fuel bottle, Exped down mat and inflatable pillow, Alpkit sleeping bag, small stool, emergency dried food, 2 full drink bottles, enough clothing for a complete change and another base layer, flip flops for use showering, small camera & radio, bike spares, tools, pump. The bike is equipped with 4 panniers, mudguards, lights and a computer.

I tend towards comfort and probably carry too much, especially in the way of tent and warm clothing. I like space in the tent when it is raining and find you can cool down very quickly on a campsite once the cycling is over - so warm clothing!

A good idea is to go for a couple of trips locally to find out how you like to cycle camp.
Borrow some camping gear and see what works, or not, for you before splashing out and buying something.
Have fun.

Good advice - you dont have to be minimlist - you are on holiday - need to consider what suits your way of doing things - mine is 1) that I spend more time camped than I do cycling so during that time I need to be dry, warm and well fed 2) you cannot control the weather - it may be all right to brazen it out on a day ride when you have a warm comfy home to go to complete with hot bath and a warm duvet but on a multi day camping tour even in the summer you can spend days riding through not good weather - becomes a bit disheartening if you are not equipped properly

The typical weight carried for camping ranges from around 25Kg to half that.
Make sure the rear wheel is strongly built, the most common problem touring is probably spokes breaking in a rear wheel.

What you carry depends on how minimal you are prepared to go and how far from civilisation you will be riding.

I tour with around 22Kg of load which includes a 4Kg 2man tent, Trangia stove, full fuel bottle, Exped down mat and inflatable pillow, Alpkit sleeping bag, small stool, emergency dried food, 2 full drink bottles, enough clothing for a complete change and another base layer, flip flops for use showering, small camera & radio, bike spares, tools, pump. The bike is equipped with 4 panniers, mudguards, lights and a computer.

I tend towards comfort and probably carry too much, especially in the way of tent and warm clothing. I like space in the tent when it is raining and find you can cool down very quickly on a campsite once the cycling is over - so warm clothing!

A good idea is to go for a couple of trips locally to find out how you like to cycle camp.
Borrow some camping gear and see what works, or not, for you before splashing out and buying something.
Have fun.

Might be worth thinking about a new pillow,
the stiff neck/headaches could be aggravated by a pillow which is not supportive enough.

sorry for the late update but better late than never
anyway the thermarest pillow is only fantastic at last a nights sleep in a tent.
i went for the large size which i thing was the right choice packs away pretty small as well .
so if anyone is having sleep problems you would do worse to go and try the thermarest compressible pillow.

Ok I'm back, that was a long bit

measurements taken start at the spoke hole, and have an intermediate measurement between spokes as well.
where a .005 is given it's because it's midway between say 0.01 and 0.02

spoke hole 19.22

spoke 1 19.225 intermediate 19.23
2 19.23 19.23
3 19.225 19.23
4 19.22 19.22
5 19.23 19.235
6 19.24 19.245
7 19.24 19.235
8 19.225 19.225
9 19.225 19.225
10 19.23 19.235
11 19.23 19.23
12 19.225 19.235
13 19.23 19.235
14 19.24 19.24
15 19.24 19.235
16 19.225 19.22
17 19.23 19.23
18 19.23 19.245 midway point measurment taken either side of joint
19.235
19 19.235 19.225
20 19.22 19.215
21 19.23 19.225
22 19.223 19.22
23 19.215 19.22
24 19.215 19.215
25 19.225 19.22
26 19.215 19.215
27 19.215 19.22
28 19.225 19.225
29 19.22 19.22
30 19.215 19.22
31 19.215 19.22
32 19.215 19.22
33 19.22 19.22
34 19.22 19.22
35 19.215 19.215
36 19.215 spoke hole, as at start

I have found that there appears to be a discrepency in the well dimensions between the old Chrina rims and the new ones, but I want to check the figures and make sure my adding up is correct, (much prefere takeaways ) I'll come back when I've got the well figures, it might be tomorrow as I'm up at 5 am and I can hear the pillow calling

Given the figures above the maximum diference is .03 of 1mm or 3/100 of 1mm I would think that is quite an acceptable tollerance.

Malc

ps not sure what happend with the list it was all laid out nice and neat but the software has scrunched it up

I have done several long tours with a tent in terrain ranging from the Alps to Denmarks near billiard table flatness. I always use 5 bags - handlebar with all the valuables in, two front with the clothing, two rear with tent and everything else. It would all fit in a pair of rear bags but for lots of reasons its not a good idea. My bags this year weighed a total of 12kg and the bike 10kg - i know because the airline weighed them!

1, weight distribution should be 40/60 front to rear for bike stability
2, put all the weight on the rear and [list=](a) the back wheel is severly overloaded
(b) you will have very light steering[/list]

If you want to lighten the load there are lots of ways to do it, here are some suggestions

Ti stove
Orikaso folding crockery
Ti cutlery
use walking clothing off the bike
lighter bags - I've even managed to lighten my Ortlieb classic rollers!

Of course you could treat your bike to some Ti bolts - you'd be amazed at how much this can save, consider everything you take and whether it could be either replaced for lighter - believe it or not a Decathlon blow up pillow weighs less than the microfibre one i used before, or whether you need to take it at all!

Here's how i packed for two weeks camping in the Alps last year

Barbag 2 kg
Passport
Money
Camera
Phone
Headlamp
Batteries
Sleeping mat (strapped under)

Front left Pannier 1.9 kg
Shorts
Trousers
Socks + underwear
Spats

Front right Pannier 1.8 kg
Tops
Waterproof jacket
Shoes

Rear left Pannier 4 kg
Sleeping bag
Sleeping bag liner
fleece pillow
Tent – pegs + canvas only
Mallet - a real wooden one!
Lock + cable

Rear right Pannier 4 kg
Maps/Guides
microfibre towel
4-litre water bag
Wash kit / lotions & potions
First aid kit
Cook equipment – stove, kettle, and cutlery
Plate, mug, cool bag, Gas
Food supplies – dehydrated food, instant white tea
+ coffee
Plastic box with electrical equipment + souvenirs

Seat Pack 0.9 kg
Bike spares
Tool kit

Elsewhere 0.7 kg
Tent poles (strapped to rear rack stays)
Bike bag
Bush hat
Water bottles

thats 15.3kg including the bags and food - i've since reduced the weight of loads of kit without reducing my comfort or the kits performance.

With this set up i rode over at least 15 passes with sometimes extreme (1:6 or steeper) gradients and the bike was stable enough for me to hit over 75kph on the descent of the Silvretta in Austria - the side with the hairpins!

In the last eight years my touring rig has lost nearly 10kg just by changing kit - not reducing it.

graymee wrote:The head section, as far as I'm aware, is designed as a hood to keep your head warm in cold conditions so you would want it to turn with you and the bag.

that's what I thought before I got one, but on mine it's definitely designed for a pillow.

Si wrote:that's the bit that i sometimes find, well, not so much awkward as strange. my mummy bag has the head section that takes a pillow inside of it. but if you turn over and take the whole bag with you then the pillow ends up behind rather than under your head.

The head section, as far as I'm aware, is designed as a hood to keep your head warm in cold conditions so you would want it to turn with you and the bag.

Some people feel restricted in mummy bags but that depends on your size and the make of the bag. My Eurohike bag is quite restrictive but my Mountain Equipment one has more room.

Si wrote:also, if going for a mummy bag, make sure that you get one with the zip on the correct side for you!

Or her?

For the pillow and turning chestnut... see my pillow saga elsewhere.

When you turn over you may rotate inside a parallel bag, but in a mummy you turn the whole thing

that's the bit that i sometimes find, well, not so much awkward as strange. my mummy bag has the head section that takes a pillow inside of it. but if you turn over and take the whole bag with you then the pillow ends up behind rather than under your head. so i gave up using the pillow holder and just bung the pillow straight on the mat.

also, if going for a mummy bag, make sure that you get one with the zip on the correct side for you!

thanks everyone but i went ahead and ordered the thermarest compressible pillow from alpenstock i should have it next week so I'll report back on it ,i'm praying this will do the trick
it's amazing the lengths people will go to find the perfect pillow all kind of combinations used .