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Found some DuraAce AX brakes, for cheap because a part of them was missing. Despite their bad reputation, I was very keen on having / using them.

Made the missing part on saturday, installed the brakes on sunday. I have to agree with what's been said before, their braking power isn't amazing... Should improve with new pads, these are very dry, although hardly used. I will keep them for now, they are not bad to the point they would be unsafe to use I think, and they look great on the Roberts...

Neat work! Presumably you could alter the braking characteristics by making cams with different profiles. Do you reckon you could improve their stopping power a bit by tinkering with that?

To ease the stress on my knees I'd like to get some shorter cranks on my beater. So if anyone has some MTB-style 4-bolt cranks that are 165 to 170mm long let me know. Preferably black, square taper and cheap, condition's not really important. I don't need a chainring as I already have one.

Edit: I'd also be interested in similar 5-bolt cranks if they have a SS 3/32" chainring and bashguard on them, but that seems less likely.

Dibs long straight bars. PMing!

Nicked that and posted it there, should have asked first, sorry!

No probs, I was thinking about posting it myself, but couldn't be bothered to register.

Also ^ that woman - who thinks the important factors of her life are mother wife me - oh feminism where art thou - describes nearly side swiping two cyclists. Sounds like a confession of driving without due care if you ask me.

This bit is a particular joy

"If I hadn’t been fully concentrating I could have knocked one or both of them off their bikes."

Because full concentration is an optional extra, a bonus if you will, when driving a car in the city.

Use a shorter stem and move the levers further forward on the bar? That will reduce the gap from the lever to the drops and still allow you to reach the hoods.

25.4 has been taken via pm earlier, will pm you if it falls through

Ta

A Towel.

That's because you're a hoopy frood!

Any details of the new style 25.4mm seatpost?

Greggs:

Public perception = greasy steak bakes and sausage rolls

Reality = top twat mince pies and baguettes and bacon rolls

ftfy

Dibs multitools.

Better still might be to not focus their limited time and resource on motorist placating victim blaming antics.

I guess you're not talking about the lights suggestion. Giving people a constructive way out of avoiding a fine and complying with the (very sensible) law seems a fairly sound idea. Good way of keeping bike shops in business too.

Might be interested in those silver bars pending deets and postage costs.

The people who beep all their stuff and just plonk it down, pay for it and then start packing it. Why not do the sensible thing and scan it and put it straight into a bag, dickheads.

Are they overrated? I mean, does anyone actually rate them? Hate them, sure. But rate them?

Ikea hacking! I've got a daft idea in my head that I'd like to make this thing about 250mm narrower so the speaker will fit between it and the chimney breast...

+1 on the "not worth it" theme, but also won't putting a speaker in the alcove next to some cut-down shelves make it really bassy and boomy?

ffm - might be along the lines of your eye being drawn to one cyclist flashing light so when you look away during the off-flash you dont see the second? I find when behind a large group of cyclists the off-sequence flashing of various lights gives you a good idea of how many you are approaching. However, having never approached a group flashing in unison I have 0 basis for comparison.

Something like this could be the case. Or it could, as you say, just be that encouraging perceptual grouping of a number of objects reduces your ability to judge their number and direction. So, for example, if all but one cyclists turns off left and one carries straight on, will your judgement of the lone cyclist's position, direction and speed be skewed by the action of the larger group of cyclists? I could be 180-degrees wrong about this, it might actually help!

maybe quite useful in terms of road safety as cyclists would appear like a continuous mass.

There may be a down side to this. Difficult to pin it down precisely, but making things on the road look like other things strikes me as a bad move.

A secondary pleasure of this relaxed commuting style is drafting the first few cars through the junction and overtaking the gutter riders and wobble-merchants with impunity.

This. So. Much.

Enough. Just... enough.

RIP

Bump, now £7. It's going to get cold soon, someone must want this.

He wants to make a nice bike theft resistant...

Maybe, but he doesn't actually say that, everyone's just inferred it. My inference was that he wanted to mask the components to keep them nice and shiny so that the resale value was higher. For example, you'll get a better price for a bike if the paintwork's not chipped.

This does beg the question, why buy a bike you plan to sell? Seems odd.

Sometimes it's cheaper to buy a nice item and recoup a high percentage of the cost through a high resale value than it is to buy a crappy item (or several, if they won't last as long and so have to be replaced) and not be able to recoup anything, since it's worth basically nothing 2nd hand. I saw some calculations once which showed that it's ultimately cheaper to buy a BMW for about £25,000 than it is to buy a fairly anonymous Japanese saloon for about £15,000.

I'd like to get a decent bike, but given my living arrangements it will have to spend a lot of time locked up outside. I'm tired of spending the odd £100 on a beater that I can't even pay someone to have once I'm done with it. I'd like to invest in something that's a pleasure to ride and that can be passed down once it's been preloved.

My question is; does anyone know of a way to 'cosmetically mask' components (especially the frame) in such a way that when the time for resale comes I could restore the bike to its former glory?

The idea came to me of wrapping it in tape (electric tape or something) and cleaning it off with an alcohol that wouldn't strip the paint (not white spirit then right?) when it's time to resell. Is this nuts or has anyone done something similar?

Why has this been moved to "Making your bike theft-resistant"? This OP was about how to maintain the resale value of a nice bike by protecting it (and specifically its looks). To avoid the problem of having to repeatedly buy beaters.

That's so gross it took my breath away.

It's happening inside you right now! Although, if your lungs got as small as they look in the start of that gif you'd be in big trouble.

And breathe in........ and out....... and in...... etc.

Someone posted recently that motorcyclists were, from an insurance claims point of view, significantly better car drivers.

Given that insurance is so expensive these days it would be nice to see discounts offered for proving that you are trained to operate other vehicle types- including bicycles.

There's a "how to encourage people to take up cycle training" Thread, in which I made this suggestion.

When you apply the cable and housing, it worth giving the levers a really hard pull to compressed the housing as much as possible.

I usually do that with new bicycles so the customers wouldn't have to come back and get their brake adjusted again.

Sheldon says you should do this anyway to check that the cable anchor bolts are well done up

Brake cable anchor bolts are the most important fasteners on a bicycle. They are small, and many of them have holes drilled through them, so it is easy to strip/break them, but...

             If you don't get the anchor bolts tight enough, the  brakes will appear to work properly in normal use. Then, someday a bus  will cut you off, and you will squeeze the brakes extra hard to make a  panic stop...just when you need the brake to work their best, the cables  will slip and the brakes will fail completely, with no warning. How to  test that cables are secure? Grab each brake lever in turn with both  hands, and squeeze hard. Shift cables aren't subject to as much strain,  but still, shift to the position with the tightest cable, and pull hard  on the lever to check.