Dr Ferrari's Camper Van (off-topic discussion)

Also..am I missing something here? Di2 7970 shifters for around 200 euro on Amazon.com

http://www.amazon.com/Shimano-Dura-Ace-Shift-Brake-Lever/dp/B002LGESDG/ref=sr_1_1?s=sporting-goods&ie=UTF8&qid=1372367051&sr=1-1&keywords=Dura-Ace+Di2+ST-7970+STI

Maybe discounted since DA went 11 speed?

Great deal for someone though

Seaneh wrote: »

Here lads, this seems as good a place as any to ask.

I'm going to be moving to Publin in Late Aug/Early September to be re-edumacated at a 3rd level institute in Dun Laoghaire.

I have no bloody clue where to be looking for a gaff.

I'm thinking maybe somewhere in or near town and cycling too and from college, which would be a grand wee spin of a morning.
Only condition is it would need to be on/near a dart or bus route for mornings when I might not be fit to cycle (Hypothyroidism kicks my ass sometimes and I could barely walk to the bus stop when it's bad, and I'm prone to serious man flu).

Where should I be looking to find a house share? what areas should be avoided?

If you're cycling to Dun Laoghaire for college, you'd probably be looking at somewhere like Dalkey/Ballsbridge/Rathfarnham. Nice areas, rents would be a bit high though, always are over the Southside of the city.

Could be a bit of a trek from the Northside, you could look at somewhere like Marino or Artane/Killester, couple of dart stations that would bring you to Dun Laoghaire. Areas wouldn't be as nice as the ones I've mentioned on the other side of the Liffey, but they're decent enough and cheaper rent.

Seaneh wrote: »

Here lads, this seems as good a place as any to ask.

I'm going to be moving to Publin in Late Aug/Early September to be re-edumacated at a 3rd level institute in Dun Laoghaire.

I have no bloody clue where to be looking for a gaff.

I'm thinking maybe somewhere in or near town and cycling too and from college, which would be a grand wee spin of a morning.
Only condition is it would need to be on/near a dart or bus route for mornings when I might not be fit to cycle (Hypothyroidism kicks my ass sometimes and I could barely walk to the bus stop when it's bad, and I'm prone to serious man flu).

Where should I be looking to find a house share? what areas should be avoided?

Alternatively, head out Bray direction. Still on the Dart line and much nearer the Wicklow mountains for impromptu spins...

I am trying to cut down meat intake, and I tried quorn.. damn this thing is nasty.

AstraMonti wrote: »

I am trying to cut down meat intake, and I tried quorn.. damn this thing is nasty.

If you cut down meat, you have nothing left to eat!

ThisRegard wrote: »

Get a live in wife or girlfriend if you don't already have one, get them pregnant and if they're anything like my wife the mere thought of any meat product in the house for the first few months of pregnancy makes her feel ill will make you a vegetarian by proxy.

Mine went mad for the meat when she got pregnant, so it's not always the best idea!

I tried the "I can't believe it's not chicken" chicken pieces.. even with sauce was quite bad. And it feels like a brick now in my stomach.

TinyExplosions wrote: »

Mine went mad for the meat when she got pregnant, so it's not always the best idea!

Big fan of the sausage ey? :cool:



heh heh heh

AstraMonti wrote: »

I tried the "I can't believe it's not chicken" chicken pieces.. even with sauce was quite bad. And it feels like a brick now in my stomach.

So you could believe it wasn't chicken?

Zyzz wrote: »

Big fan of the sausage ey? :cool:
heh heh heh

RobFowl wrote: »

Must resist smutty comment.......

Thank god she doesn't read boards

Moving on from the Quorny stuff, I got an email from CRC yesterday titled "Celebrate the Tour de France with £15 OFF". The actual message offers €10 off if you spend over €100. When I queried why sterling customers seemed to be getting a better deal I got a new email offer today offering "Extra £10 off everything to celebrate the 100th Tour de France". When I actually went looking for a few things I needed, none of them had the TdF tag.
Oh well, up to Humphries in the morning.

ROK ON wrote: »

I have spent spent much of the evening thusfar reading my first ever copy of Rouleur. It really is a fantastic cycling magazine.

Really interesting articles and brilliant photography.

Highly recommended.

Yeah, I picked up one a couple months ago, and was pleasantly surprised at the quality -will definitely get it again.

I encountered my first Nexus Di2 8 speed IHG in the last few days, interesting I must say, electronic automatic shifting powered by a front dynamo hub, it seems like the future is here!
I'm not so sure about the automatic shifting but the rest is pretty awesome.

The hub internals are fooked though so I can't give it a test ride:mad:

Planet X wrote: »

About '63 or so.....

Nice to see you have your domestiques leading out...

This morning saw a good bunch of people running around the park across the street, felt a strange urge to find my runners. Resisted. Did some gardening instead.

So. Honeymoon over. 9lbs the fatter. I was good to myself.

Now, back to the business of bike racing.

rollingscone wrote: »

Am pondering trying my hand at converting an old Raleigh Outland MTB that's been sitting in my Dad's garage for the last 15+ years into a single speed beater that I won't mind leaving locked in the city centre/ locked in the carpark of our building (alternative to Dublin bikes).

Mostly I want to do it for the experience, I found a few threads on other forums about people converting them into tourers but really I'd like to get a cheap SS chainset and hub, not sure whether I'll need a new BB but I'd imagine I'll need to replace at least the back wheel for a SS hub?

From what I understand the original bikes were borderline BSOs so really don't want to do anything I can't do by scrounging or buying for cheap in Rothar

You might not have to replace the back wheel, and you might not even have to replace the chainset or cassette assuming there is still life left in them. The cheapest and crudest (and ugliest, if that matters) option is to use the existing chainset and wheel, remove the derailleurs and gear levers, and just cut a chain to run from your chainring of choice to your cog of choice amongst those on the cassette. The difficulty there though is that you might find the chainline to be poor for your preferred choice of chainring and cog. You can get some flexibility by removing the chainring you don't want, and mount the one you want to keep on whichever side of the spider provides the better chainline (you'll need shorter chainring bolts to mount just a single chainring to the spider, which are typically stupidly pricey for what they are!), but that might not actually solve the problem for you.

As a step closer to a conventional single speed, you could replace the rear cassette with a conversion kit. I've not used one but as far as I know it's just a set of spacers. You determine where you want your single cog to be positioned for the best chainline, and you pad out either side of the cog with spacers. So you are re-using the existing freehub (assuming it actually is a freehub that is, obviously something to check first) and essentially replacing a real cassette with a mock-up of a cassette. Being able to position the single cog anywhere on the freehub should allow you to obtain a good (enough) chainline.

The options above, if they prove viable, would save you some cash, but if the existing wheel is one with a quick-release then re-using it also has another benefit (in my view anyway). I've only ever looked at flip-flop hubs (which allow you to have one fixed or singlespeed gear on each side) and they were all held in place either by nuts or allen key bolts and personally I find that awkward and tedious compared to using a quick-release.