chewy

Sometimes its best to get help from friends you can see touch & feel It could be lack of tecnique, or like most of us older riders your knees are knackered. A good thing to keep in mind is that riding is like walking ,you cant walk with stiff knees!, regardless of what position you put bike in you stand vertically centred , you point your feet and shoulders in direction you want to go keeping bars paralell to your shoulders.

perhaps they will make a no covering whatsoever to go with my hair!

Adrrien Prato www.trialsparts.fr does exchange for any colour wheel speaks english lvely guy but will be on his way to 4 day trial in Aveyron this weekend

I.ll be looking out for this guy with crash of the day award in mind

Oh dear!!!

Dont forget Aveyron next week Moto club 12...it's a classic Also ther is loads of simply great riding to be had down that way, there's another english trials guy who must be living quite close to you Stuart (something?) he makes and sells trials bits around the place.. short stock guy with a grey beard I'm sure if you find him you'll be well introduced

World trials rounds must be a very expensive circus. I'd rather wait and see how they go at SSDT

Trials on tv is rationed here... if only by ability to pay..just like food oil and every other commodity I guesse

Yea I reckon we all come to that ..Are you approaching middle age? I had it through early years of my forties tried and did everything mentioned above. My understanding is that we have a bunch of tendons to anchor muscle to bone which are housed in a sheath (I imagine a multicore wire) these tendons get inflamed , the body releases platelets (that whit/clear mucus you get when you graze yourself) the platelets tend to gum up the tendons which if we overwork them get even more inflamed and it is a vicous circle. Whether it was co incidental to arriving at middle age i'm not sure but what I ended up doing was moving my handlebars back so as I was standing on my feet .effectively what I had to do in order to go on enjoying riding was to modify my attitude to suit my aptitude ..result still enjoying at 57.

Just read this lot a day late ..it all seems like a storm in a teacup but is of great interest to me as I run two of em! It can be so so annoying to be let down by the bike There was a guy last year at SSDT (no names or pack drill) who got through everything up untill last 30 miles on the Saturday when his Beta stator packed up. The gist of all the comments it appears, is that it is a reliability problem (probably due to efforts to keep manufacturing costs down) which in circumstances as above is simply unforgivable . But these sort of problems are not unique to Beta and we generally do give these poor little bikes some pretty extreme parameters (i.e cost nothing suffer any abuse for several years) Other interesting bits were is it moisture related??? Who is the guy in Bradford who will rewind it to bulletproof spec? Surely Beta must be aware of the details of the problem and able to resolve it and offer some gesture of recompense in order to keep thier market position/ reputation so clearly demonstrated by riders choices for SSDT. Just in case it happens to me or the Missus does anybody have that repair contact detail?

Its only a memory but wasn't white smoke indicative of water (pumpseals ) leaking into g.box oil and being sucked in to crankcases by due to knackered crank seals? Whatever you find it sounds like a strip and replace job

Cor a bit different from our club trial last weekend we did see the sun in between the snow showers....I reckon you guys would get better grip (not that you need it ) using slicks.ever tried it?

I think this question must be just for me! I bought a couple of rev 3 200 08's last November Janet & I had been riding Montesa 4RT for the previous year. Just to qualify my opinion (as we all like to do!) I have been competing in trials regularly for the the last 38 years and have had every bike that has come out in that time going right back to a Greeves. The 200 Beta is a pussycat..dead easy to ride doesn't get you into trouble, There are very few situatiuons where you need 4th gear in sections and it is possible to get enough power for most challenges by using modern riding techniques (just watch the youngsters on 125's) of course there is going to be a lack of grunt but on balance for most riders this is a good thing, paticularly if one is a bit throttle happy as most of us are. As a general rule of thumb to answer your question regarding throttle / riding technique; I started using the 200 a lot in second gear but have found with gentle right hand that it will grip and grip and grip in bottom giving me more time to deal with the section (I am of course old and slow now) I have to agree 4th gear for me is generally a no no in sections but I avoid big sections nowadays anyway.

As an old git in a digital world i never measure my tyre pressures with a guage I just sit on the bike and adjust visually a new Michelin on a cold day would be chalk to cheese of a used (especially down the road and get some heat through them) IRC for example. Of course you must also conder where and what you are riding... Horses for courses!

Thats it ..blame the bike! my memory aint brilliant but...the CCM was more challenging by far than the Fantic to ride ; has this changed

It sounds like you guys have thought police , health & safety officers and general do gooders as well, no doubt all paid for out of your taxes..what we folk outside of USA can't understand is how the devil can can you be penalised restrained controlled (call it what you want) regarding a handfull of off road bikes (and it looks like you got plenty of off road) when you have gas guzzling trucks cars planes in fact just about every polluting factor going being advertised and sold to you as the way to live? It seems from observing this not unique situation in several countries that you have to act according to your concience. e.g. the French will fight for every last right of access and freedom and if not simply resort to anarchy,.... I have a Swiss friend who has got himself a united nations pollution inspector badge which enables him to ride in open country in Switzerland; Here in the UK we appear to be just keeping our heads up with concerted organized opposition. It would be interesting to hear of how other off road (particularly trials) folk are doing elsewhere in the world. (I seem to have fallen straight into the divide and rule trick there vis enduro, moto cross, green laners, quad bikes , 4 wheels drive vehicles.) It is a very rightous thing to be or think you are are "green" perhaps we could universally become inspectors for the U.N. or find such similarly acceptable functions.one thing for sure there is no way we can "fight" it head on being such a minority group.. there just isn't any political gain in representing lepers.

Never had a problem in U.K. Some european scrutineering check for date / compliance tag usually found on inside of straps I had to buy a new helment last year even though I thought my 10 year old NZI was fine!

Hi Martin didn't Know you were into thiese forums etc. we said hello at Mendip vale trial.. wow wern't it a good un! try looking up no 91 for ID

It sounds like you got some good riding terrain..reckon you will get plenty of offers to bring bikes to try! I've had all of the bikes you mention including a TY Ease of riding.... I 'd say Gas Gas & new Beta's on a par Mont more of a thouroughbred.. Quantity of Maintainance.... least required is Mont then Beta then Gas Gas ( that kinda relates to thier toyughness/. durability as well as getting best out of the bike) Build quality ..mont stands head and shoulders over the rest

What's an ACL? Janet my partner has just had her second Knee "go".. it's ligaments: I understand there are four in or around the knee and that ligament connects muscle to bone.. and in the case of the knee hold the joint together, she has been to the GP who as usual fobbed her off (is this the first duty of GP nowadays?) and gone to local "health" shop seen a physio and ordered a couple of braces, she had been borrowing one from a friend and found it benificial inso far as her knee was unable to collapse when dabbing. It seems there are loads of people with dodgy knees in trials most, probably like me with a bit of arthritis, then you have ACL (is this jagged edges of cartiledge scraping about?) and then you have the ligament folk. Is it one cure for all ? how do you get to see somebody who knows what they are talking about? I would be interested to hear from people who have or have had ligament problems

Had to catch my interest with this one I manufacture footrests for trials bikes and was the first to recognise the importance of this. Clearly you want all the ground clearance you can get and it is also obvious that if it made life easier we would all be walking around on stilts so you want your body mass interacting with the bike at maximum leverage; as low as possible. Clearly this is going to be a compromise and several other factors are involved. One thing for sure is that everyone in trials is an expert on such matters and in my experience over last 15 years of design and manufacture is that there are nearly as many opinions as riders. Most of the top riders can ride anything well and it is an easy connection to make between what they use and what is the best; generally speaking bikes and after market bits are popularised by a mixture of good design and good margins but mostly by evolution and feedback from the buying public. Going back to original hypothesis; imagine putting your engine in a rucksack and hanging it around your upper body and then walking up or down a section on 12" stilts whilst holding a broomstick in your hands. Quite ridiculous isn't it. You don't need to be Einstien (or Newton) to rationalise these ergonomic relationships it should help to reach the best compromise for you.

Now I am worried. I (and the missus) have 08 Betas (200) one of the reasons I bought them was because we need lights etc. to pass scrutineers for trials in France and the layout of the switches, "bulbs", and buttons is neat. We have had no apparant problems, the only time nothing wants to work is after washing. My problem is that if presented with 3 wires to connect you can bet your last dollar that I will make 9 efforts to do it and end up with burn't wires or fuses... now it seems possible or maybe even probable that the bikes can do this for me automatically and it is likely that the first time we notice this will be in the middle of Rannoch moor when one or both of us run out of sparks. I shall watch this space with intertest.

I have been trying to get information on this perhaps somebody can explain to me how one event insurance works and the problems with it:... .as surely there must be for there to be such a low uptake

wont standard fat bars fit?

I enquired with the acu (via thier website ) last week and the silence has been deafening!! It would appear there is a catch 22A and a catch 22B with current system. If you could put a meter on my bike and divide the mileage at trials by the annual premium the price per mile would be not much and in any case the insurers would probably be able to welch on the deal due to catch 22B (competition is a dirty word) At least I can cover catch 22A and get my road tax paid and insure against theft for around a pound a week (I am an old git!) which is better than some of the deals advertised to simply insure your off road bike against theft. If the ACU could ever achieve anything usefull for the average rider (and the future of real trials) it would be to sort this issue out with the underwriters or do we/they still have to involve brokers? either way it is a central issue to proper trials and in consideration of the income to the ACU from trials it is one they should sort out pretty damm quick!.