All posts by Andy Henderson

Historic Billy Trail planning document

This document was produced by the Railway Path Project based in Bristol - a precursor to Sustrans. It was commissioned by the Havant and District Safe Cycling Campaign - many of the activists were Portsmouth CTC members including current members Keith Wileman and Mike Edwards.

The document was aspirational but you can see much of what became the Billy Trail in the proposal.

All the pages of the proposal follow as scanned images. Click on sections of the document to zoom in to that section.

A souvenir from 1932

I've been sent a souvenir programme of the 1932 South of England Cyclists' rally organised by Portsmouth CTC (then the Portsmouth District Association) and the Portsmouth Centre of the National Association of Cycle and Motor Cycle Traders. It's a fascinating piece of history.

Portsmouth DA put up a prize of a years' CTC membership to "the cyclist not already in a cycling club, making what the Committee considers to be the most meritorious ride to the Rally".

"Our Message" on page 5 applies equally well today as it did in 1932!

Our thanks to Gwelda Swindells who found the programme while going through the belongings of a deceased relative and who took the trouble to get in touch and send it on to us.

These are the pages of the programme, click any page to see a larger image (if you have a big screen).

SE Cycle Rally 1932 page 1


SE Cycle Rally 1932 page 2


SE Cycle Rally 1932 page 3


SE Cycle Rally 1932 page 4


SE Cycle Rally 1932 page 5


SE Cycle Rally 1932 page 6


SE Cycle Rally 1932 page 7


SE Cycle Rally 1932 page 8

Lorries and cycle safety

Exchanging placesA group of us went to Guildhall Square in Portsmouth to visit the 'Exchanging Places' event organised by John Gosling, Managing Director of TJ Transport Limited, working with Portsmouth Council and the Police.

It allowed us to see a driver's view of cyclists and to discuss safety issues directly with HGV drivers and operators.

Exchanging PlacesThe picture on the right was featured in the Portsmouth News and shows: me, Tony Light and John Gosling.

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Checking/replacing a derailleur hanger

Until I saw this video, I had no idea what a derailleur hanger was, or what it did. It turns out to be a useful part to know about and is easily replaced if necessary...

Checking/replacing a drailleur hanger

Making gear adjustments

These two videos describe how to make adjustments to your gears:

Set your derailleur limits . Note this video makes no mention of the 'half cock' position that some bikes use to allow the full range of rear gears without the chain rubbing against the front derailleur. If your bike has that feature, you'll need to use it to check all combinations of gear positions work OK.

Adjust your indexing .

Dr Bike videos

I've volunteered to help with Dr Bike sessions being run by the CTC for the Prudential RideLondon event.

To help prepare for the event, I've been sent some links to YouTube videos. I thought they might be of wider interest so I've included them below.

Quick check for road bikes

DrBikeRoad

The 'M' check for MTBs

DrBikeMTB

Why don't I get PCTC emails?

The emails get sent - honest. But several people claim they don't get them, or that they get them intermittently.

There's nothing special or different about the Portsmouth CTC emails. In fact, when people manage to track them down, they usually find emails from other people have gone astray too.

This note will hopefully help you find out where they are going and how to make sure they arrive OK.

It describes:

  • Some basic principles
  • The main reasons for emails going astray
  • What you can do about it
  • What we can do about it
  • Some specific step-by-step instructions

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