I'm healthy, but busy! Velochocolate is a spare-time venture, and I've had no spare time. Got a promotion at work which has meant super busy times. The folding bike market is all but dead over the winter, and that's why I've been slow to fix the site. It worked fine, then everyone upgraded their browser, and now it doesn't work at all. I'll be trying to put some time in over the next week or two to make it work.

Regarding mudguards, though, I just couldn't find anything that would work for the rear. I've got good p-clips for front guards, but the frame piece that's where the brake bridge would be is a weird oval profile. I can easily bend a p-clip to fit, but that's just not good enough for something I'm offering to customers. Also, this years full suspension bikes have a different arrangment at the rear, and only seem to have one mudguard fitting, rather than the two we had previously. I may try to bodge a solution for my 07 bike for full coverage guards, and then try clipons on the 09, for comparison, but I don't see myself able to offer a retail solution any time soon.

I've been very frustrated in my attempts to start velo chocolate by the way. Most distributors will only deal with me if I have a shopfront, and that would mean going full-time and raising finance. Those few smaller manufacturers who will deal with me are incredibly amateurish, to the point where I've actually given up trying to order anything other than Downtube bikes. I'm going to fix the site, and I may try again to build up the product base when I'm less busy and have more energy and motivation for it. In the meantime, it's just gonna be the Downtubes .