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Gravel Roadster – Big Apples on the Utopia

I bought some 60mm Big Apples for Jim’s old Gary Fisher Utopia. These things are so fat that when I opened the box, I thought there were two big pythons in it!

These tires make this bike into an ideal Gravel Roadster.* Two speeds, super fat tires, flared drops, rigid fork. It’s pretty light, even though the tires are not. The tires barely fit in the back, solely because of the front derailer cable stop, which I filed down two millimeters for a little extra clearance. You have to look at the gap square on to see that the stop doesn’t actually touch the crown of the tire.

I did see with these tires that the wheel needed a little dishing adjustment – the tires almost rubbed on the right stay, but had lots of room on the left. I gave the left-pulling spokes a half turn tighter, and the right-pulling spokes a half-turn looser, and it seems perfect now. I don’t know if the frame is misaligned, or the wheel was improperly dished, but it doesn’t really matter now, and I can always adjust the wheel later if it’s an issue. These 60mm Big Apples actually measure 53mm on these WTB SpeedDisc rims

“Roadsters” apparently lack of any form of weather protection, but I’d like to make some demi-fenders like Sycip’s Oregon Manifest trike. A full fender in the rear would take a lot of modification: a slot for the seat tube, and possibly a split at the seatstay bridge. I plan to buy a dynamo hub for the front, but not for a while yet.

* Near as a Google search can tell me, I picked up the term “gravel roadster” from someone on the RBW list describing their Rawland rSogn, and “dirt roadster” appears regularly on Coconino Cycles’ blog.

October 8, 2011
new Sturmey Archer S3X internals

new Sunrace Sturmey Archer S3X internals, originally uploaded by BikeTinker.

Sturmey Archer’s U.S. rep got the parts to me in TWO DAYS, no questions asked. New internals for the S3X, and a new shifter because some of the first ones had been mis-indexed, and may have caused the problem in the first place. I could have shipped the wheel to Napa, and the rep would have done the repair, but this seemed faster and more fun. It kind of was.

I had to take it to Tommy’s to get the left cone nuts removed. They were on so tightly that I bent my old Eldi cone wrenches trying to remove them. I ordered a pair of Park wrenches for the future.

While I was there, Ben was like, “It’s out – do you want me to just put the new one in?” Umm, “yes please.” I was on my way to the Oregon Manifest party, and didn’t really want to be doing the operation in Chris King’s parking lot. Might’ve garnered some attention, but still…

I need to adjust the cones, I think. I read something on the internet about setting the right cones exactly, and then adjusting from the left, but didn’t want to get all “I read this on the internet” to a professional bike mechanic.

So I’m happy, the bike rolls well, it works in all three gears, and the slightly higher gear I chose when I put it back together is better for keeping up with traffic.

October 1, 2011
Brake arm light mount extension.

Super cool idea from John Potis, spreading via Flickr. .

What we’re looking at here is the Mafac ‘Racer’ centerpull arm used as a bracket to put the light where he wants it. I think an eBay Racer would cost more than a new Herse bracket, though.

bottom of the rack, originally uploaded by john potis.

The phoenix bracket, originally uploaded by somervillebikes.

light mount based on somervillian’s design., originally uploaded by skvidal.

And another direction, also very cool… “Campy Light Mount” for the win. You could get 4 or 5 out of one chainring. Depending how big it is, I guess…

new light mount, originally uploaded by ericmplatt.

September 25, 2011
The real Inglis Oregon Manifest bike

Curtis Inglis-Retrotec-2-40, originally uploaded by BikePortland.org.

main pic from BikePortland. I love the screenprinted decks to death. It is a nice match for the blue bike. Too cool. Curtis puts the Tec in Retrotec.

September 24, 2011
Inglis Oregon Manifest 2011 bike

Update! This is NOT the Oregon Manifest bike… it’s Curtis’ wife’s town bike. The OM bike was inside the car the whole time! Maybe this is why my career in industrial espionage never took off.

Inglis Oregon Manifest 2011 bike, originally uploaded by BikeTinker.

This was parked across the street from my work today. Pretty sure it’s the Inglis entry for the Oregon Manifest Challenge. Internal 8 speed, dyno/drumbrake front hub with a clever ‘slot’ for the reaction arm to make it simple to remove the front wheel.
Seeing this made my day! I brought Ari and Mitch over separately to be amazed. They were.

September 22, 2011
Relative sizes of smaller Carradice Bags

I was having the darnedest time figuring out which of the smaller Carradice bags I wanted. On the internet, they all look relatively the same size, because the sellers maximize the size of the picture, and the Barley looks exactly like the Nelson. I have the Cadet, and would like something the same size, but with side pockets for keys and camera.

So I painted this little cheat sheet. As soon as I was done, I started looking at other bags, though.

And… I think the lowsaddle longflap is the step up from the Cadet. It’s (of course) not illustrated here, but it’s 15 liters, which SEEMS like it would be a Cadet with side pockets, which is exactly what I want, in green, for the front of the Quickbeam. I want the pockets for cameras and/or toolkits. I’m also considering a zipped roll to hang under the left side of my basket to hold a toolkit.

I like the bar-mounted saddlebag and basket combo. A camera or dozen eggs is isolated from the direct shocks from the frame, and when you put, say, a 12 pack in the basket, the bag simply rotates up to sit on top of the box. The only downside is that it’s more difficult to ride on the tops near the stem, which I never do anyway.

September 18, 2011
Surly Moonlander

This looks so cool to me. Even fatter than the Pugsley. Click it. You know you want to.

September 15, 2011
Ha! Old blogspot blog folded into the WordPress blog!
From now on…
```
Clicking this link »
http://sooper-genius.blogspot.com/2007/09/silver-wire-bar-wrap-finisher.html 
Should now redirect to »
https://www.biketinker.com/2007/projects/silver-wire-bar-wrap-finisher/ 
```
I used the “Import” button under the “Tools” menu to bring in all the posts. I deleted the non-bike posts (“The Truth About Circumcision” is no more), recategorized all the imported posts, and used the Blogger to WordPress Redirection Plugin to make redirects on the blogspot blog.

Easier than I expected it to be. I almost forgot – I also added a “nofollow” to the blogspot blog, so hopefully Google will forget that content was ever there.

It makes me happy to clean up that outstanding stuff, and I’m pleased that the comments came over, too. If you commented over there, it should show up here, including what I think is Keith Bontrager complimenting my mountain bike…

I probably did break some links on teh internets, though, and I apologize.
September 5, 2011
Thumbies as stem shifters

thumbies, originally uploaded by aaron schmidt.

I really like Aaron’s idea! He’s using Paul “thumbies” (handlebar mounts for bar-end shifters), in order to make a set of high-quality stem shifters.

September 4, 2011
The S3X needs the SHORT guide nut

E-Bike Stop told me my S3X has a two year warranty, so I called Sturmey-Archer America, and talked to David, the lone American S/A representative, about my broken axle nut, and how I can’t get the shifting to work with the new, longer nut. I had worried that I broke the hub completely, but it still shifted, even with the broken nut. Turns out it’s just the nut, and David’s mailing me a “short guide nut,” no charge. Super nice.

The long “guide nut”* I had gotten as a replacement (the right-side axle nut with the hole for the indicator chain), doesn’t allow the gear adjustment you need. I’m not entirely sure how that could be; it seems like you’d just slacken off the cable, but it sure doesn’t work that way. I think the length of the nut and the cable angle must act like a pulley, and change the amount of travel in the shifter.

If you need to replace your S3X axle nut, get the Sturmey number and call directly. A shop may not be able to get the short one from the usual channels, and it will most likely cost $5 or so.

I actually called David back and asked if Sturmey Archer had a quick release for the cable. He thought I meant a quick release for the hub, and said Coombs Cycling Components is going to be showing him an axle quick release system for the S3X at Interbike in a couple weeks. That sounds really cool. The Coombs quick releases look dorky with a QR lever on each side of the axle, but I had a flat the other week with no wrench, so I can see the value.

As far as a cable quick release, they don’t have anything like that. I’ll probably end up ordering a Bruce Gordon QS2s or Davinci cable splitter for it if I can’t find a SRAM cable release.

* I had no idea this is what they were called. Good to know.

September 4, 2011
On Your Left!

I used to ride with a bell, and used it every day when my commute crossed the Golden Gate Bridge. Foreign tourists seemed to know what it was, Americans not so much. It really saved me 5 minutes on each crossing, unless I got stuck behind a racer type with no bell.

After my commute change, I didn’t use it for a few years, and finally took it off the bike. Now I think of bells as foppish affectations, useful mostly as a McGuffin to drive DIY engineers to think up cool mounting points like headset spacers and unused DT shifter bosses.

To pass stealthily, or announce yourself?

Most of my life I’ve been a stealthy passer, until I rode with Scott, a friend who has distinct opinions on the subject. Apparently in the Midwest, failure to announce yourself before overtaking another cyclist is a sin, “You will be chased down by a beautiful young woman who is hard as nails and could tear you up in a crit, and she will chew you out for being an unsafe, inconsiderate asshole, and you will take it.”

I grew up in California, where the sin is failing to glance back before weaving or spitting.

Anyway, I’m always up for a scientistic experiment, and Scott has some force of personality, so I tried hailing before overtaking, mostly on the busy pathway. People seem to like it. I like it.

“On your left!”

“On your left” is more abrupt than I like (being from California and all), and I got a lot of people jinking left before their conscious mind decoded the message. “On your left!” is supposed to be a friendly warning if you have learned what it means. If you haven’t learned the code, it’s a command, and the verb is GO LEFT, like in sports or Drivers’ Ed, when “left” means “wrong way, dummy, go left.” Even if you have learned to ‘instinctively’ drift right when you hear it, it is still an imperative, it just means “GIVE WAY OR HOLD YOUR LINE.” So I don’t like it. I won’t say it,

“I’m coming up on your left, now.”

After some experimentation, I settled on saying, “I’m coming up on your left, now.” I try to say it in a way that implies “do what you want, but my intention is to pass you.”

It gives people time to assess your location in moving 3D stereo; their ears say “there’s someone about 8 feet back, to my left, 6 feet, he’s talking, four feet, he says he’s passing…”

It explicitly spells out what’s happening: “There’s a man coming up on my left now.”

It’s conversational and informative. It lets people assess your voice and tone. It’s polite. We’re all on the same side here, gettin’ down the bike path.

It’s chill. Everyone seemed to react positively and predictably. I’m trying to say it in an aggressive fashion, but the more force I put into it, the sillier it sounds: “I’m coming up on your LEFT NOW!” I just shrug at myself and say “so?”

August 30, 2011
S3X busted nut

S3X busted nut., originally uploaded by BikeTinker.

The wheel was slipping in the dropouts (yeah, yeah, “fork ends”) after I changed a flat, so I added two links to the chain and cranked down extra hard. Two days later I noticed the end had cracked, but it still shifted.

Yesterday, at the bottom of the hill on Willis Road, it snapped entirely. The top two gears still worked, but the low gear only freewheels. I climbed the hill anyway, and picked about two gallons of blackberries for jam. Then I went to the Hotel Oregon and put my feet up.

August 23, 2011
Quickbeam at the Hotel Oregon

Quickbeam at the Hotel Oregon, originally uploaded by BikeTinker.

Post “paleo” ride. I rode my bike to a big hill, broke my S3X low gear, rode up the hill anyway, and picked a ton of blackberries.

Yes, I wore the dorky hat the whole time. I really like it.

August 22, 2011
Looking forward to the Oregon Manifest!

OM March Diary Team Ziba x Signal Framestorm from Core77 on Vimeo.

And… I just love this video. All the Ziba staff designed bicycles. Ziba and Signal are collaborating on a bike design for the Oregon Manifest Constructor’s Challenge.

I’m excited to see it.

August 14, 2011
Busted eggbeater spring

I’ve had these for a long time, and they cracked a couple years ago. The other day they dropped a piece on the road. The down side is the fact that they also welded themselves to the cranks about a year ago! I can still use two sides of this one, and four of the other, but I don’t see these lasting more than three or four more years…

That’s also the ugliest pedal deck I’ve ever made. It’s a prototype for a mud-shedding deck that might be a hair lighter. It’s stupid.

August 9, 2011
Eat Sleep Ride – bike book review

Eat, Sleep, Ride is English journalist Paul Howard’s account of riding the Tour Divide mountain bike race in 2009.

I was pleased to see this book at my library, and picked it up. I’ve followed the GDR and Tour Divide off and on for several years, much more than I’ve followed any other bike racing, but had only read Kent Peterson’s Dirt Rag article peoples’ blog posts on it.

I recommend this book to people who’ve never heard of racing the Great Divide, and to people who follow it year-to-year.

Paul Howard ups the suspense of whether he will finish the longest mountain bike race in the world, by admitting he had never owned a mountain bike before the trip, and downplaying his cycling experience and fitness.

The book jacket calls the book “hilarious,” but I don’t hold that against the author. The book industry appears to be in the grip of a Humor Bubble; I’m reading a much funnier book now, which the jacket has to describe as “occasionally hysterical.” I would call Eat, Sleep, Ride “witty in a pleasant English way.”

Howard brings a sense of history to the land he’s cycling through. The stories, some of which I knew (the cannibal ones), complement the experiences he and his ad hoc group of racers have on the Trail.

While the Tour Divide is a solo race, riders of similar ability clump together for mutual morale and social support. Sharing physical support would get them disqualified from the race.

We get to know some of the riders he rides with and encounters, focusing mostly on the underprepared, which is inspiring and interesting, but slightly disengenuous. I’d do a little more research before making my plans for next year’s race. Non-super humans complete the race every year, but I wouldn’t approach it lightly.

I would have liked to see more on the leaders Matthew Lee, the winner, and Jay and Tracey Petervary in third on a tandem. Since Howard finished second to last, his group’s interaction with the leaders was mostly hearing that they’d passed through a town a week before, or that they were “only” one state ahead.

I also wanted to know more about Deanna Adams, and her experience in the race. She is the first (and only, so far) finisher of the Tour Divide on a fixed gear bicycle. I ride fixed offroad some, and I’ve been disappointed every year that the fixies had to scratch. I think riding the route on a fixed gear is even harder than it sounds, and this is the category I’m dying to see inaugurated. Unfortunately, Deanna was relegated (disqualified from official standing) for a route error. The next finisher will be referred to as the “first official fixed gear finisher.”

Recommended.

I liked this book, and now I want to see the movie “Ride the Divide” that Kent promotes on his blog.

August 7, 2011