Well, this happened to my T130s rear wheel 

Typically it hit dead opposite the valve & so about 15mm from the rim joint, which has shifted as you'll see by the warped sticker & irregular gap *sobs* 
Obviously the standard rims are made of cheese and kit kat wrappers, so I'm looking to get new rims built onto the stock hubs. Any thoughts on Mavic 423 vs 729 ??

P.S. New rims will mean new spokes too as these are asymetrical, so I'm trying not to bust the bank on the rim bit as suitable spokes will be £96

Well worth a looky here for a few parts going at bargain prices.

I got a 10spd XT Shadow + Mech for £39.99

https://www.bird.bike/product-category/stock-clearance/

I have some work offshore from Ramsgate, potentially for a while, which means I never know when I'm working but if it's windy I'm not.

Been exploring round Blean way and I did some club ride there when I was working here before in September 2013 which was great but I can't remember how I found out about that ride!

Anyway it looks like I'm weathered off until probably Sunday - is anyone riding tomorrow, Friday or Saturday?

Forest of Dean/Bristol local by the way!

Cheers.

The skids will be riding a 25k ish ride of kings wood this Sunday, meet in the main car park on white hill ready to ride 10am.

My next jaunt up to Surrey will be Monday 10th April. Got a nice little 18-20 miler from Holmbury YHA out & over to Pitch & back. Starting at 10am.

Great to meet Skid last time... all welcome.

Telegraph Rd, Dorking RH5 6NR
https://goo.gl/maps/49dXMmkPXp92

Cooped up in Centre Parcs for the weekend doing the family thang... luckily wife allowed me n my son to bring the bikes, so we could have some boy time while bird n daughter had gurl time.

So, just got back from a lap of Thetford's 'Lime Burner' "Red Trail"

Similar to Pines... it's a nice pedal, nothing challenging. The "Red" is barely enough of a challenge to be called a Blue, & I would happily take my non cyclist missus round.

Not a place I'd travel to specifically to ride, but it's still good to get out for ½ a day rather than pay through the nose constantly to do stuff here in Centre Parcs.

Top tip... don't pay the extortionate fee to park at Thetford.
Brandon Country park is only 3miles from Centre Parks, picks up a waymarked family trail that leads to the Reds, (The Poacher Trail) only costs £3 to park all day, the food is cheaper, and nicer too.

This "The Beast" is not much of a Beast at all but is the most fun part of it all.

Waiting to do a pick up from ashford train station, I killed time and went to have a nose at the bike racking that was installed about a year ago? Very impressive
They also have an undercover locked in bike station that you can pay to use.
Another great feature was a bike tool station that you could hang your bike on to perform repairs with the tools on hand.

Good to see inventive ideas on getting people out of cars on onto pedal power for getting around.

Looking forward to this coming out in April. Clay porter and Brendog filming all sorts of riding with some of the best bikers on the planet in some of the best spots on earth. Had a chance to check out the jumps that are on the edge of the cliffs featured in this trailer, while riding in Mardeira last year and to say their massive and scary would be an understatement. Feel a film night and pop corn coming on.

Dropped pin
near Hurt Wood
https://goo.gl/maps/BuwTjzSWNyo

51°10'22.9"N 0°27'26.3"W


Starting .....11:00 at Car Park 3 (Pitch Hill)
Finishing ....When we're done, or done in (whichever comes first)

Going up to Surrey Hills with some mates with the aim of playing on some of the trails that we know, as well as using Trailforks (or local knowledge if any is available) to sample some bits that we don't know so well.

Fairly loose plan with no specific route as such but be prepared for a day on Pitch, lunch in Peaslake, possibly venturing into Winterfold as some of the guys I'm with have never been over that way. We may choose to session some trails & generally have fun.

Expect trails such as:

Proper Bo
Curly Wurly
Capt Clunk
El Capitan
Barry Knows Best
Supernova
Thick n Creamy

And if we get to Winterfold perhaps
Evian
Twix
Northern Monkey
etc

(I don't know Winterfold very well so will bow to superior knowledge)

Any other trails in the area that local knowledge may dictate.

So far I've got 5 confirmed with 3 maybes coming up from Hastings area, so it should be a great sociable session of a day.

Having a great experience with Trek's customer support recently.

Last ride, I noticed nasty cracking noises coming from my frame while doing the drops on Thick n Creamy... so last Saturday after a long fight with my bike, vices sockets, hammers and bolts I stripped down the frame and discovered that all my pivot bearings were either rusty, or seized or both, and one bearing was seized to a pivot bolt. 







So I went online to Trek's customer support and got into a live chat with a guy called Ian who was really helpful, immediately emailed me the tech drawings of my bike so that I could get the bearing numbers and part number of the knackered bolt.

Off to my LBS who ordered the replacement bolt and online to MB bearings to order the pivot bearing kit.



By today, all the bits had arrived and I finally had the time to put the bike back together... so I started.

Got almost to the end of the job when I was doing up a pivot bolt that joins the chainstays to the seat tube .. the tech drawings and the bolt all said to torque up to 34nm/300in-lbs .. which seemed like a lot to me and my wrench only goes up to 24nm, so I set it to 20 and thought I'd see how it went.

The bloody bolt sheared!!! 






So... got the part number & rang my LBS, but they couldn't order it till Monday. Then thought I'd give Trek Support a try, to see if they could help...

This was the Live Chat Convo:






How good is that!!!

Then I went to rebuild the rest of the bike and think I've lost a couple of washers, back on to customer support and the UK office was closed, nevermind, you get put through to Wisconsin, who emailed the transcript of my washer request to UK and said they'll send me a pair of washers too!!

Very chuffed with the customer support!

Makes an amateur mechanic like me a lot more able to do the big scary jobs.