Tentatively for my September week in Maui, I plan to take my SV90TBV, 2-inch diagonal, F2 finder, 27 Panoptic, 12 Nagler, 7 Nagler and 3-6 Nagler zoom, along with Pentax DCF SP 10x42 binoculars, my Canon G10 and its charger, plus various small accessories that I have left out for purposes of illustration. That would be an O2 filter, a green laser, hex wrenches, dual red/white LED light, etc. This very high quality Think Tank case empty weighs 3.6 lbs., exactly half as much as the C7 case which came with the scope, and which lacks the all-important set of shoulder straps and waistband, essentially for today's LONG walks through airports. One minor accessory still needed is the plastic near end lens tube cap, to allow some dust sealing. I figure that the overall weight of the outfit will come to around 21 to 22 lbs. I used the same bag on last year's trip to Colorado, when it weighed at least as much, holding a lesser quality Brand XX scope. Anyway, I have decided that this scope actually packs as easily as the SV70ED, given that the latter does not have a removable focuser, which complicates placing the partitions, even though it is lighter. I do think that the SV80ST would fit into this case WITHOUT removing the focuser, which would make it desirable for someone who wanted to take a bit more camera equipment on a trip, i.e., a DSLR and lens or two. I also would hardly blame anyone who opted for a WHEELED case from Think Tank, Tenba, Lowe or other good quality maker.

Rear view. Notice the original small chainring-to-crank bolts which had 7 mm hex heads. These often became rounded out badly for simple lack of the proper sized metric wrench. Personally, I find it easier to use two opposing hex wrenches than fidgeting with the two-prong slotted nut tools - like those used on this outer ring. This inner ring has 40 teeth. A 38 tooth chainring would be oh so nice. Unfortunately, whenever they surface on eBay the prices are always quite high. A 38 x 52 chainring set would compare nicely to the modern road bike crankset norm of 39 x 53... even a tad better, to my mind. Notice that the inner support band of the smaller ring (near the chainring bolt holes) may look bulky when the inner rings are viewed alone. But, they become nearly invisible when shadowed behind those of the outer rings. Perhaps the additional band was a good (and necessary) idea for the model 49d chainrings. It added additional rigidity to the completed chainring sets which were otherwise unsupported by a conventional spider... Later style (type 200) inner rings designed for the more hefty 5-arm cranksets lacked that band. But it had been present on the 5-arm model 63 crankset and then carried over to the mod 93. I've never had an unsupported inner ring used on those cranksets warp at all. So, I suspect it was really just an overly cautious design element.