We pleased to learn that author Stephen Lord recommended Wallingford Bicycle Parts as a source for Brooks saddles in his Adventure Cycle-Touring Handbook. We ordered a copy of Mr. Lord’s book from Amazon and found it to be a very good read.

This 288 pg book addresses its subject matter in a comprehensive way. Skimming the table of contents we find:

• Planning
• Choosing a bike and equipment (by cagegory and by brand)
• Transport
• Route outlines around the world
• Touring stories
• Bike maintenance

There are numerous black and white pictures and a few beautiful full color photos of exotic touring locales.

We looked at this book because our name is in it (thanks, Stephen) but we recommend it because it is a rich source of information for the bicycle tourist at all experience levels.

With this book we are going to try the Amazon Associate program. If you click this link to buy the book from amazon.com then Wallingford Bicycle Parts will get a little piece of the deal. The alternative is stocking the book ourselves and charge you 50% more than they do. We are curious how this will play out and we would be glad to hear your opinion about wallbike ‘partnering’ with the e-commerce giant.

Tags: amazon, book, touring

The Brooks Saddle group on Flickr has 310 members and 1591 pictures.

The Flickr Carradice Club has 40 members and 187 pictures.

Racks n’ Sacks has 116 members and 904 pictures.

The Bagmatchers group has 44 members with 108 pictures.

All Flickr groups have discussion forums.

Tags: Flickr, pictures

I learned about a service that digitizes a couple of my favorite magazines while browsing the EcoVelo blog.

VeloVision and A to B both come from England and they both focus on alternatives in the cycling world. Both magazines envision a world in which the cycle is more integral to our daily lives.

The Exact Editions service provides scans of these magazines and a bunch more on a subscription basis. There is a free copy for evaluation. Exact Editions offers a wide range of specialty publications with a Eurocentric orientation.

EcoVelo is an attractive, interesting blog. Exact Editions is an interesting alternative for information enthusiasts who want to reduce their paper consumption. Between the two of them I lost about half of my morning

Tags: blogs, magazines

Zack White is a well stocked leather workers store. You can find leather, tools, and fittings (including rivets)

Caswell will show you a lot about polishing metal.

McMaster-Carr carries a wide variety of mechanical components.

Tags: leather, Resources

We get the occasional mail or call from someone who wants to get their saddle repaired. We sell replacement parts for Brooks saddles but we don’t work on them. The only reference I have is Tony Colegrave, in England. It would be nice to have a resource in America.

Does anyone in the US do this kind of work? Would any of you like to do this type of work. You could perform a service to the Brooks community and make a little money.

Tony Colegrave – tony_colegrave@hotmail.com

Tags: opportunity, repair

When I am interested in a new product, or I want to see what people are saying about the products we carry, I hit the forums. They are a great source of information. There are many cycling forums on the web but I have four that I turn to most often:

BIKEFORUMS.NET – This forum has been around a long time and has lots of traffic covering all types of cycling. Wallbike.com gets more hits from bikeforums.net than any other source.

For a woman’s take on cycling matters the forums on the TEAM ESTROGEN site are active and informative. I learn a lot about women and saddles on this forum

CRAZY GUY ON A BIKE is an on-line cyclotourist community. Webmaster Neil Gunton has built the framework. Cycle tourists from all over the world provide the content. This is another one that is rich with age.

And finally there is the FULLY LOADED TOURING BIKE PHOTO GALLERY. Not many words here but picture after picture after picture of loaded touring bikes. If you want to see how others do it – this is the place.

At Wallingford Bicycle Parts we want to carry the gear that your research will lead you to. Time spent on these forums will be rewarded.

Tags: touring