ride with lugs

Last post on blogger

2006-10-24T09:08:00.000-04:00

We're moving to wordpress. So to get your fix of "lugs, tan sidewalls, maybe jazz, classical, punk and bluegrass, local riding, worldly riding and people, cool cats, lame ducks, 110 bcds, wool, and smelling like hell after a long ride." go to, http://www.ridelugged.com.

Fears

2006-10-20T12:31:00.000-04:00

So here it is. A photo of what is, according to Casey, the #1 evil in the universe. The "Pyong Jin Bicycle factory in North Korea produces 6,000 bicycles per year." And some of those chicks are cute, and can prolly take a beat-down ass bike and get it race-ready tuned up and running silent in 10 mintues flat. OH GREAT GOLDEN CALF OF GLOBALIZATION! HOW I LONG TO WORSHIP YOU AND KISS YOUR FEET!

doubts

2006-10-20T11:09:00.000-04:00

in case any one is wondering what we are doing post ride...

Wool Helmets

2006-10-19T10:21:00.000-04:00

tandem afros
Originally uploaded by chizang.

Here is a fine example of what a wool helmet might look like. Look at all of that natural fiber. You don't need 32 vents on that baby, wool breaths and is naturally waterproof. Get yours today.

living proof

2006-10-18T16:42:00.000-04:00

here is what i have been talking about. give it a good read. might make you wanna join the dark side. er my side.

ramble flyer

2006-10-17T16:08:00.000-04:00

So here are the details: Meet at 209 whitehill st lemont, PA @ 8am on saturday. we leave @ 8.30. cue sheets to all that need them. plan for an all day ride. this will be a casual, non racepants ride, with only a few hammerheads who dont know what a granny gear is. massive amounts of rain will only serve to shorten the ride by about 20 miles. bring lunch food, riding food, at least 2 water bottles, (refills availible halfway thru ride at lunch break...) warm morning clothing, maybe a poncho/rain coat/rain pants/shoe covers depending on weather. its been about 38 degrees here in the AM, until about 10, so dress appropriately. bring cameras, fall is in full bloom here. bring spare tubes, tire boots, the dirt roads are not in good shape. plan on drinking beer and eating prospectors bbq after the ride. bring say... 10-20 dollars for the communal beer/food fund, depending on what kinda drunk eater you are. directions to my house: from state college: take college ave east towards the mall. about .33 of the way to mall, turn right up towards lemont onto elmwood st. at the light in lemont go straight for about 100 yards, turn left on whitehill, we're the 3rd house up, red brick, big porch. kudos to those who ride to the ride. silent death stares for those who dont. from DC/b-more ect... once you get on 322, from harrisburg, stay on that for many miles (youll see signs for state college repeatly.) as you start to get closer, say within 10 miles, start looking for the lemont/oakhall exit. take that exit, go left at the stop sign (at the end of the exit) and go pretty much exactly 2 miles, then go right on whitehill st. 3rd house on left, brick, blah blah blah. if you get to a stop lite, you went 100 yards too far. scroll down for a list of recommended stuff to bring/be equipped with. a small tail light and hbar lite wouldnt be a bad notion, either.

Sleepin' in a scout pit

2006-10-17T14:51:00.000-04:00

I attended the Rabbitstick Rendezvous this Sept. in Rexburg, Idaho. While there I participated in a shelter building workshop with a really cool dude named Tom Elpel. He writes some great books about wilderness skills including "Participating in Nature" and "Botany in a Day". In the workshop we built a scout pit shelter. Its basically a shallow grave dug out with sticks. A fire is burned in the pit to dry it out and heat up the ground, then the coals covered with a few inches of dirt. After this we built a roof from sticks, covered the sticks with clumps of grass, and then pulled the dirt over the grass. This creates a roof that is water and air proof and almost invisible. Although, we decided to cover the roof with a log baracade because there were moose in the area and I didn't want one to step on me in the middle of the night! We pushed some dry grass inside to pad the ground with and made a clump of grass to plug the doorway with. I volunteered to sleep in this thing instead of my tent. That night it rained pretty heavily and was probably in the low 40s. I slept without even a blanket in just a t-shirt and long underwear and was so toasty warm that I had to leave the door unplugged. In the morning when I crawled out the earth was still warm and dry beneath me from the coals. When I got back to my crappy, old tent I discovered that it totally leaked and my sleeping bag lay in a big puddle. I was glad to have spent the night in the pit shelter! Try it sometime if you're not too claustrophobic (or however you spell that).

what the?

2006-10-11T09:17:00.001-04:00

motorola's razr costs 2 hundo; the company says its expected life span is 6-7 months. wise investment.

Custom bike painting

2006-10-11T09:09:00.000-04:00

This might be a good guide to custom painting a bike. I'll let you guys decide.

Ramble Checklist

2006-10-11T08:24:00.000-04:00

If this helps, great, if not, screw you, I like to make lists. tires: 32mm minimum, although I have seen cory ride 25s off road, its not something I recommend, comfort and safety wise. Some of the decents are gunna hairy enough on fatties... not to mention flats. Tubes: dont be that guy who only has 1 spare tube. Patch kit: I like the rema touring kit. 1 person at least bring a good spare pump, in case my frame pump craps out (unlikely but...) Multi Tool Fruit Assorted snacks/lunch Emergency poncho or light rain coat Long fingered wintery gloves, its probally not gunna be warm out, and its cold up in the mtns long sleeve jersey...er should be wool. Here's a link to semi-cheapies (but nice: made in america): a few bucks, for water/gatorade whatever 50 cents, to call home when your will is finally broken. I'd be willing to bet that the mtns dont like cell phones. A small camera. lets document. Thats all I got. Lemme know if you think of more. So I can make a new list.

Keith Bontrager's quote

2006-10-11T08:19:00.000-04:00

I think this is a fairly telling quote from keith, who has ridden "over 50 24 hour events in the past 3 years", and placed really high in all of them. "The woods around State College are laced with singletrack. If the devil rides, and I am pretty sure he does (when he is not running along chasing pros up the cols in summer) it is very likely that he had a hand in laying these out. They are about as rocky and evil as they can be and still be called trails. In fact, it is occasionally not obvious that they ARE trails. There are a few big rock gardens that make one think they must have taken a wrong turn - the trail just seems to stop at this big pile of rocks... Then with a closer look, the trail doesn't stop. It goes out the other side, so these rocks are part of it. It just goes straight into those rocks, intentionally. If you think you are good at riding rocky singletrack, or you just want to appreciate how good the locals here actually are, this has to be one of the stops on your knobby life tour. The folks at Mt Nittany Wheelsworks will be happy to show you the good lines. Watch them closely. And give it a couple of days too. You'll want to do it all properly, and it takes a few rides in the rocks to get the knack. Maybe more than a few. After that build up you'd be pretty disappointed if the course wasn't pretty damn gruelling. Here's what I consider to be an apt description from a local, swiped from a web forum (that I lost the url to - apologies to the author): "I rode this course (probably pretty much the same course as ECNASSCU*) a few years ago....brutal. Make sure your dental insurance premiums are up to date. There are so many rocks here I think they imported them from the rocky mountains. Sharp, jagged, pointy rocks. And beside the start the first couple of miles are a rocky ridge ride, either up or down. Of course, I liked the uphill better. One section that I remember that was particularly brutal was the 12 minute white knuckle descent. It was by far the most exhausting. My arms were on FIRE at the bottom. I had to have the race promoter peel my fingers from my handle grips. The second notable section of terror was the downhill from hell with a monster rock garden of death at the bottom for which spectators gather to watch 80% of the riders endo, faceplanting on the rocks." From cyclingnews.com, in the 2005 diaries section.

pro vis 5 cranks

2006-10-09T10:02:00.000-04:00

so the TA cranks I got at the swap: 305 grams. suck that XTR.

some shots

2006-10-08T16:28:00.000-04:00

these were taken with a pentax digital SLR, out at whipple dam state park. I saw a black snake, a bullfrog and a red dragonfly, all of which I was too slow to take a picture of. This thing is much better than taking pictures with those little cameras which never focus quite right and never let you do macro type stuff.

Oct 21st Centre PA Ramble

2006-10-03T17:24:00.000-04:00

Even though I havnt been making posts, that doesnt mean I havnt been working for the greater good. I've been painstakingly contructing a super dope fall ride, to take place the weekend before halloween, the 21st, according to someone with a "calender". Its going to be rough, with I think at least 15 miles of dirt roads, some of those barely more than jeep trails. There will be at least 3 major climbs, and by that I mean continuously difficult climbs, almost all on dirt. There will be at least 3 major decents, all on dirt. There will be a huge view slightly more than half way through the ride. Thats where we will take a long break. I might even stash some refreshments out there. The ride will start easy, with about 30 miles of rolling to flattish farmland, passing only one small town and using only 1 mile of semi major roadway. The ride will actually get acutely more difficult as it progresses, with one of the last climbs lasting at least 3 miles, on dirt. Recommended bikes: touring or cross, with a granny, unless you are a beast. I have flatted alot on these roads, with touring tires, so I would say at least a 35mm tire, with a kevlar belt... Something to carry food, warmer clothes, tea, ect. At least 3 water bottles. We will only pass one place to get more water, not counting mtn streams. Here is the Gmaps map I made. Don't let the shortish mileage fool you, it'll feel like 100. Adult beverages, heaping piles of BBQ await those who finish. The area we are riding is hard to navigate in a car, so no sag wagon. There will be a place, shortly before the major climbing begins, at about 30 miles, where people of lesser constitution, or singlespeeds, can sign off. Cue sheets for any rider who wants in. Be there. Accomodations: my floor.

B-R-O-O-K, L-Y-N Is The Place Where I Stay

2006-10-03T14:10:00.000-04:00

In the rain soaked night before the rain soaked day that was the 24-hours of Seven Springs, as Casey and I were bullshiting about bikes, he said something I never heard him say before: there was a bike company he hasn't heard of. That company was Coast Outta Brooklyn - Johnny Coast, proprietor. Frames run about $950, give or take, with a 3 month lead time. The stem pictured is also a Coast. Handmade in Brooklyn, where Johnny will let you drop by to check the frame out at any stage of work.

Interesting factoid: the guy who's bike is in these pictures, is also the guy who first discovered the "pick-a-kryptonite-with-a-pen" situation.

Razor scooter bike

2006-10-03T09:06:00.000-04:00

This thing is retarded. Yeah, it folds up to the size of a skittle but I can't imagine that it's comfortable to ride. I do think it would be a good first bike for my dog though. Now this is what I want to see business people riding to work on. It even has a rear shock, or something.

Spyker bike

2006-09-27T14:48:00.000-04:00

Ok, I saw this thing in Maxim, it's like a train wreck for me, I couldn't look away. more detailed pictures. Corey, notice the Rohloff hub? Over all a total waste of money for $16,000 but I do like the leather grips and the absurd use of carbon. I think they said that all of the leather is comes from the skin of the endangered orange bellied somolian goat herder's dog. It's very rare. This is the car you are supposed to buy as an accessory to the bike.

Make Blog, Bicycles

2006-09-27T12:28:00.000-04:00

I really like the Make blog. They have a lot of interesting DIY posts. They created a section that's devoted to Bikes. For example: check out these shitty laptop bags attached to a bike, sweet.

Dog riding a bike

2006-09-26T11:46:00.000-04:00

Tricycle

2006-09-24T14:10:00.000-04:00

I was perusing google images and came across this tricycle: Anyone know anything about it? The site that it's on has some interesting stuff. Check it out. Be sure to check out the antique bikes section. You've gotta love that break. From the website, "Alternative Needs Transportation, or A.N.T., is a one-person shop run by Mike Flanigan. Mike is dedicated to building bikes for transportation that have the right combination of function and style. Mike has been in the bike trade since 1983 and joined the Boston bike building scene in 1989"

the brilliant minds of Penn State University

2006-09-20T08:24:00.000-04:00

My TA assignment this semester to grade papers and artwork for an online art appreciation course. Here are some selected quotes from essay submissions. Some make me laugh. Some make me cry. All make me wonder about who will be in charge of our future fate. "I could spend all night buggedly altering and tweaking proportions, effects, and boundaries to my fixation’s liking." buggedly? "My artful knacks are not the noble of them." Has a certain ring. "Laughs a lot, loves to play, and smiles constantly; three short descriptions of ME!" I know exactly what you look like. "I like so many things. Where do I begin? I like butterflies, the color purple, puppies, flowers, red toe nail polish, New York City, my parents and pets, my friends and extended family, traveling, speaking French, and so much more I can’t think of right now. Things I am interested are so varied." Thats a real gem, one of my personal favorites. Who doesnt like purple puppies with butterfly wings? I mean, really. Not surprizingly, this is from the same author as the previous quote. "I was chosen for this program because I excelled in every subject area including: mathematics, science, writing, art, and music; I even graded papers for the teacher in some subjects." no joke, she is talking about elementary school here. "All in all, I am a pretty laid person." smooth. "Oh yeah, I’m white…did I mention that?" in reference to the fact that he raps. I bet its heavy hitting politio-social stuff. "One of my goals in life is to have a successful career in a company that is seen as being the top in my field, like a Wal-Mart." is it wrong for me to hate on this guy even though i've never met him? no. "Lastly, internship is a word with a lot of symbol behind it." I think these sentances are proofread by a seeing eye dog. "I believe that having no negative space would implement that my life is cluttered and overbearing and this is just not the case. " have there been language developments that I have not been privy to? "I use the internet more often than I use the bathroom, partly because of interest and partly because of necessity." Fuck, did he need to go there? This is the same guy that's the white rapper. "To me there is nothing more exhilarating than knowing that there is 1200 pounds of pure muscle beneath you," slightly out of context, but still distrubing. furthermore: "I found my true passion in the form of a gangly Appaloosa horse." gross. she goes on to say: "many days I would dismount in tears of frustration and find myself questioning not only my ability but my willpower" graphic. "Slowly a transformation took place, and the animal that had once angered me to no end was bringing me countless hours of joy" really graphic Ok that wraps up this weeks installment of schlockery. Stay tuned next week for more from the greatest minds of PSU.

Ditty bops are still mongoloids

2006-09-17T22:12:00.000-04:00

Yeah, they look good in that photo but there was a lot of touching up to get them to look like that. Look at the picture before the photoshop guys got a hold of it.

atlantis and bridgestone, because because

2006-09-17T18:04:00.000-04:00

various cats havnt seen these, some dont care, some care a little to much. me for one. anyway, as some know, cory aka voice of reason, crafted those wooden fenders, all i had to do was sand and varnish them. on the bridgestone, the main thing of wierd guy note is the crank set up, a 48/46/26, making the 46 the middle ring, so its usable across the cassette range. i never use the 48t, its mainly there cause the triple cranks look lame without the outter ring. just saving up for a TA crankset.

different light

2006-09-16T11:59:00.002-04:00

Its all about the lighting. this is the same day the "mongoloid" photo was taken, but it was after the sun came out.

Ditty bops

2006-09-15T23:28:00.000-04:00

Ditty bops are not hot when they are riding their bikes. It might only be the big one but she looks like a mongoloid. and just for comparison.

http://ridelugged.com/

2006-09-13T22:54:00.000-04:00

You can get to this blog through http://ridelugged.com/ now. We'll still use blogger to do all of the posting stuff but it's nice to have a real domain name.

"Sport Utility Bike"

2006-09-13T12:42:00.000-04:00

This is an interesting writeup on a city bike with a rack. It's kind of cool to see the parts break down. More interesting though is in the comments where a guy specs something similar and the price tag is around $3000. So here's the question, would you feel comfortable leaving it chained up while you go buy orgainic croutons from wholefoods? You know the granola hippies who hangout there wouldn't stop someone from stealing a bike. "Hey man, I saw that guy stealing your bike and I tried to stop him, but he wouldn't listen to reason. I said, Karma is going to get you man!". Damn hippies.

Wooly Nelson

2006-09-13T11:41:00.000-04:00

Ok, I normally don't like to provoke Casey on topics that are pretty much opinion, but here it goes. When we were at the 24 hours of Seven Springs Casey had a nice wool jacket. I think it was Filson, either way it looked like it was high quality. He also had an Arc'teryx jacket with gore-tex. Casey always spouts the virtues of wool and complains about gore-tex when his jacket can't wick fast enough. But I do remember that the wool jacket was soaked and wasn't going to dry out any time soon in the conditions we were in. So I guess my question is what is the solution? Or do basically all materials suck when it comes to really we cold conditions? Sheep may be warm in the rain as they regulate their body temperature with the wool coats but they are wet and probably not happy about that. James

Moab, cause we don't like rain in PA

2006-09-11T17:32:00.000-04:00

Ok so Veronika and i decided to go to Moab instead of 7Springs. I think we made the right call. Anyway it rocked. Lots of good things happened. We drank good beer, hung out with good friends and rode killer trails. The last pic of Burro Pass trail started at 8500ft and topped out at 11500. It was an epic 3 hour climb followed by 2 hours of downhill overlooking the desert. It was rad. (OK, so flikr is cheap so you'll have to wait for more cool pics.) OK, here's your friggin slideshow!

Wherein The Kid Returns To His Roots

2006-09-11T10:46:00.000-04:00

While I had a super time racing in the muddy forests of Pennsylvaniashire with you fools last weekend, it drained all my strength. In order to recharge my cycling power meter I spent this weekend tearing around Brooklyn, New York City. The traffic, shitty streets, and disgustingly industrial environment stimulate the core of what drives my little biking heart. Some pics are here (no fancy slideshow): Other things which are not fancy (cause I couldn't figger out how to inbed it in a post), is this movie I took of the opening run at 7 springs.

Frederick watershed night ride September 2006

2006-09-10T09:44:00.000-04:00

It was a good uneventful ride. Great conditions not to hot not too cold and the best part was that it wasn't as dusty as the last two rides up there.

A Starmer recount of the 24 hours of Seven Springs

2006-09-10T09:39:00.000-04:00

Seven springs recount. We arrived at Seven Springs around 5pm on Friday, drove around the mountain a bit looking for the camping area, which was just a huge field at the very top of the mountain. Casey saw us driving around and directed us to the area he sectioned off with about 10 gallon jugs of water. It was bitterly cold for the summer, maybe somewhere in the 50s and raining a bit. We setup the tents and the canopy and were out of the rain. We had dinner of burgers and chili, drank some beer and played cards. Nick rolled in somewhere after 10pm. It was still raining and still cold and now the ground under the canopy was starting to get mushy. We slept through driving rain and strong winds. Rachel and I thought the canopy was going to lift off the ground and smash us in our tent. In the morning everything had been knocked over under the canopy, beer bottles and cards floating in an inch of water. We moved everything to higher ground had some breakfast and got ready for the race. We drew straws and the order was Casey, Gary, Nick then me (James). Casey started the race with the sprint to his bike. The fog was thick and there was still a light rain. We all waited at the transition tent for Casey to roll in. We waited a really long time, we saw some medical trucks roll out and we thought he might have take a bad spill. When he finally got back he was covered in mud and he had had three flat tires. The phrase peanut butter like mud was uttered and stuck in my head for the rest of the race because that is exactly what the course was like. Gary then rolled out on his freshly converted fixed gear surly. Nick was able to convince him that he should leave the front break on. Gary went on to log the best time for our team for the whole race, I think it was and hour and a half. On his last uphill climb he was rick behind tinker jaurez but he didn't pass him out of respect or something like that. Nick was next out he was visibly nervous with good reason. Pretty much everyone who riding up the hill to the transition tent either looked totally worked over and pissed off or they looked giddy with excitement, meaning they had gone insane. Nick got back with a good time, I don't remember but it was excellent considering he could probably count the number of off road rides he had done in the past ten years on one hand. I was next and the first few miles were actually kind of fun minus the jarring rock gardens which I walked a large portion of. The pain of the course didn't really set in until about mile 9 that is when the real peanut butter mud starts. The trail proceeds through this stuff until about mile 11 when it then takes a turn up a ridiculous switch back up a black diamond. That is the last mile until you get into the transition tent. It's one of those climbs that some people are able to ride the whole thing but for the most part you can walk about as fast as they are riding. I did have the honor of passing and EVLI on that uphill. He muttered something about telling them elvi is coming. Rachel was waiting for me at the transition tent and Casey was in there ready to roll out. When casey got back the idea of calling this the last lap was tossed around. It wasn't settled until gary got back and said he didn't think he could do another lap. So Nick did his last lap somewhere between 1am and 4am and I did mine between 4:15am and 6:45am and that was it for us. We broke down camp and we were ready to leave around 10 or 11am. Just as we were ready to leave the sun came out and the fog and rain cleared. God had just smote us for quiting. if you didn't see it below check the pictures from the race on flickr

where fog sits like a fat woman on a mouse

2006-09-05T13:33:00.000-04:00

i wrote a bit of journal entry before the race and later, after my second lap, i wrote one at 12pm on saturday, when i couldnt warm my feet enough to sleep comfortably, and the rain sluiced off the car with such abandonment and quantity that i felt the car would surely leak. anyway, here's my contribution to the story of the race, again written before i had a chance to reflect or gloss over certain details. friday morning: collected black berries, a whole pot full, the wind whipping the bushes so furiously that it was like grappling with thorny tenticles. stove fell, launched off its stand horizontally by the snapping wind, bacon somehow stays in pan, still crackling, the stove still lit... camped next to 8' hill crowned with bushes and scrub trees furiously belowing, redolent of a pounding prehurricane surf. i arrived second on the scene, after kona jeff, we shared a beer, he talking about where he lived and what he was saving money for. all my comments/jokes whatever fell on deaf ears, talking to jeff is like talking to a wall with a dirty blond afro. he had a gold plated pint glass... lives on a peak visible from my camp site. the meadow where we camp looks out over rolling hills, small mountains and patchwork grey green farmland, the view seems to go on for a 100 miles, but is probally more like 30. the air is clear, odd considering the rolling grey clouds that damp out all vestiges of the sun. elvis guys show up in the nite, shining headlites into tent, and then flashlites, but i was tired and couldnt be bothered to get too pissed, and didnt end up saying anything, which was good cause they had no idea how close they were and apologized in the morning. they brought a TV and karayoke kit... pissing up by blackberry bushes, when pissing with side to the wind, urine flys out at an abrupt right angle... very comical, unpredictable. as clouds become denser, low drizzle, demoralizing, starts in, entire meadow looks ripe for flooding. vienna fingers arnt as good as i remember. forgot soap. rachel will bring... 1.40pm, two hours 20 minutes till theyre supposed to show. Wind is furious, driving discommodious rain around at all angles, none of which are strait down. thank god for duct tape, its not only patching tarp holes but also sealing seams between tarps, holding tarp poles up, and securing black trash bags which are serving as additional walls of my 4x7 room under the rain, very 2006 john steinbeck. must continually lower tarp support poles to lower ceiling as rain increases. winds become monumental, the noise acting like lightning before thunder, a huge gust wails thru the trees and moments later rolls down the hill, lifting and snapping at the blue tarps like a sail luffing aggressively in a gail, the tiller unmanned. the wind comes up, lifts tarps with a waffling snap, strains the stakes and slacks the guy lines making continual readjustment a must. my window on the world shrinks as snapping/luffing plastic noises increase as i routinely add trash bags to buffer the rain. 5.00 theyre an hour late. this is unsuprizing. tarp leaking gobs of cold water. trash bag walls failing, toes numb, fingers could, cant feel heels, half gallon of beer killed. long cold wait. sunday morning 12pm: time will blunt my current woes, so i'll write now while my pain is fresh. finished second lap about 15 minutes ago. lets attempt to describe the conditions. foggy, visibility less than 5 feet w/ headlite, worse as a slanting fog wrapped, thin but fast rain coats everything with an other worldly jewel like quality, including my glasses which are rendered useless by the combination of elements assaulting them. the ground has been transformed. the course is normally a slightly loamy rock singletrack, but has been turned into a vile peanut butter stew, a stew that not only stunk but stuck to tires and filled in the spaced between the knobs, making your tires heavy slicks, tractionless in all conditions. you slide around all corners, over rocks, across logs, with only a semblance of balance and a glimmer of hope that you'll stay upright. downhills are suicide, trees being brought into regular employment as a braking agent. such is the nature of the stew that even strait, flat pedaling can cause the bike to slip from under you without the slightest warning. the rain soaks my cotton and leather gloves, causing leather dye to leach out and roll down to my fingertips, staining the nails a dark yellow brown and making me look like a very tired cronic smoker. i flatted 3 times on my last lap, mini-tool-less so i had to wait for some slow guy to catch me and offer a tool, and i eventually had to patch tubes to get back, leading to a shit 2.3 hour lap time. i flatted twice on this past loop, getting more and more innundated with the grainy stinking mud every time i had to pull a tube out. my gloves became saturated with the grey brown mire, and started to smell like a septic system. the climb to the finish is one mile, a mile so steep that all but the most badass pros walk it, and most mortals can only ride the last 300 yards of. its an incredibly demoralizing way to end a lap. even the last ridable section is painful beyond reason, leaving your legs burning and your mind filling with the strange black void called defeat. i enter the tent seeing black spots, guided to my transition table by encouraging voices rather than by sight itself.

24 hours of seven springs 2006 slide show

2006-09-04T12:49:00.000-04:00

i hate the beach, but this piece turned out aight.

2006-08-25T17:18:00.000-04:00

finally finished my beach/florida/pinball campy coffee table project. here it is in all its pastel glory...

those little white dotted lines are not a force field!

2006-08-25T16:10:00.000-04:00

How hard is it for everyone to just stay inside that cushy 12' wide lane. I mean come on, the Honda Odyssey the lady was driving was only 77" wide. I mean keeping a 6'5" car in a Interstate highway lane. If you put two of them next to each other their tires would barely hang over the lines. Anyway people are really bad drivers. Be careful. Now my precious 60mpg Golf is going to be in the shop for a while. V and I got to slide sideways down I-70 at 70mph, and do a little NASCAR action over to and along the guardrail. And now I'm stuck driving some Pontiac getting 25mpg, sticking bikes in the back of Veronika's jeep, and nursing a stiff neck and shoulders (with beer). Be safe. Keep the rubber side down. -cory "Tailspin" benson YIIKES!!!! I just got word that i won't get my car back until September 19th. 26 days without my car :(

Frederick watershed night riding photos

2006-08-24T10:23:00.000-04:00

Here are some shots from the night ride in the Frederick watershed last night.

we are defined by what we bling

2006-08-23T10:23:00.001-04:00

conversely, you could be the coolest cat in the world, but if you drive a honda, wear gap clothing, and ride a specialized allez with 105 parts, i'm probly not gunna relate. how could i? people need visual identifiers to see if and how they relate to someone. ie suits vs punks vs mods, its all a form of visual identification. how am i to know if you are aminable to my mental style if i cant relate to your physical choices in the world? yes that amounts to abject consumerism, i know, and i know thats not very pinko of me, apologies to all. we are like a book with an interesting cover, only to be opened by the right reader. lets make this an indiana jones analogy: by flying the right colours, or dressing a certain way, we allow strangers to in essence, "choose wisely", and thereby advert the horrible consequences that result from talking to a heel. your bike bling is your societal crutch, nick and i wouldnt have met if he rode an allez, and had no interest in my bling, or cory's bling, ect ect.

You Are (Still) Not What You Own

2006-08-22T13:12:00.000-04:00

Questions of personal identity cannot be answered, nor broadcast by having or riding a certain style of bicycle. Imagine young Johnny, alone in his parents house in a suburban location of your choosing, spending hours on his broadband connection reading, reading, reading, he finds Bike Forums, and jumps into threads posted there about the whackness of aluminum bikes, and why Keirin bikes are so much kewler than Italians. He constantly visits his local bike shop to talk tech and gear with the guys there, his mailbox fills with catalogs that he reads like magazines; how many colors does this come in? How much does it weigh? Sizes? What is the raddest pair of [bike parts] I can get? What does Trackstar say? Do they have it at King Kog? All these questions are in his head. What our imaginary protagonist is doing is designing his identity through a bike. When summer comes and he’s mowed enough lawns, he’ll eventually piece together his dream bike, and when he rides it he won’t just be riding a nice bike, in his mind he’ll be riding his own essence made into bike. This is not a phenomenon only for bikes, it’s also very obviously for clothes, cars, houses, beer, and more. Anyone that produces a consumer product will tell you that the center of the all-important “branding” is getting a product to have a definition. Rich guys have Litespeeds, hip kids ride Surly, etc. One thing that obnoxes me to no end is the bike enthusiasts need to “comment” on strangers bikes. While in general people are complimentary of my trusty steed (espec. with sparks can where the water is supposed to go), every time this happens to me I want to yell out, “It’s not about the bike” man! This kind of peacocking, of "cocking" (mine is bigger (faster, shinier, with more street cred) than yours) is the last thing any really cool person wants to do. It's the calling card of a buster. That I use a cykel for my primary means of transport is part of my identity, that it keeps me (reasonably?) fit is part of my identity, that I occasionally ride competitively is part of my identity, the color of my rims and the gear ratios that I use are not. A deeply cool thing, does not a deeply cool person make. This Is Modern Man

huge debate over at the forum.

2006-08-18T21:28:00.000-04:00

read or not to read, that is the question. yer call, it might be tedious or you might like it. james, you wont care. Originally Posted by ridelugs i hate nashbar. hows that for intolerance. they suck the lifeblood out of local bike shops. nashbar is nothing more than the walmart of the bike world. support your local shop. a sram pc 48 chain is 20 bucks for crying out loud, and it shifts flawlessly. not to mention its well made, stronger than a shimano of a similar price. and its not made in vietnam or singapore. Wow, that's a lot of misplaced anger, in my opinion... Your hated Nashbar often carries the SRAM chains, and sells the PC-58 for about $10 typically Also, the Nashbar-branded chains are actually made KMC (it's stamped on the links), which makes their chains in Taiwan. SRAM chains are made in Taiwan as well, I believe. It seems like a vast range of bike parts are made in Taiwan these days, except for very low-end (China) or high-end (USA, Europe, or Japan). Taiwan is a democracy and, in my "freedom loving" opinion, a country and economy very much worth supporting. The main reason they dominate the bike industry is because they do good work at a good price. All the Nashbar metal products I've looked at are made in Taiwan; chains, pedals, cables, tires, lights, etc. Their panniers are made in Mexico, I believe, and their water bottles are made here in the USA (and have the Specialized logo stamped into them). Nashbar certainly takes business away from LBSes everywhere. But they do a LOT more than that. I wouldn't have nearly as much bike stuff, or nearly as much fun with it, if it weren't for Nashbar and Performance and the used market. Hell, I might never have gotten into repairing and tinkering with bikes at all, since it would be unaffordable. Nashbar will sell me a wheelset for $100 while the big, well-known LBS in town will tell me they can special-order it for $250. As a bonus, one of their mechanics rolls his eyes at me and makes disparaging comments about how I waste his time asking about low-end junk. Nashbar seems to recognize that people who like to do-it-themselves often don't have that much money to spend, so instead of stocking Dura Ace and Campy Record, they have lots of 105, LX, XT, Centaur stuff. They also do a really good job of finding generic products to put their name on, I think. They dig up 1" suspension forks for folks looking to upgrade their aging MTB, JIS headsets, the best red blinkie light I've found, good cheap clipless pedals, and some very nice cantilever brakes. (My reviews of some Nashbar-brand products here: http://www.bikeforums.net/showthread.php?p=2876112) So Nashbar may be putting some LBS out of business if they fail to adapt, but it's ALLOWING a lot more folks to afford a customized bike that they'll enjoy riding a lot. The big LBS here seems to make all their money on 40-something professionals who bring their Cannondale in on a roof rack and care deeply about the color of their hubs, and that totally leaves me out in the cold. Frankly, I'm a big Nashbar fan I also like Harris Cyclery, which is Sheldon Brown's shop. Despite the fact that they're located in Massachusetts, they have excellent prices on a lot of things like wheelsets, and they seem to pick and choose their online products carefully to find the ones that are a good value for DIY types. to which i responded: nashbar makes thier money, as does supergo, like this: trek buys 5000 wheelsets from taiwan, knowing they will only use 4000 of them. but 5000 is where they get the break, ie the cheaper price. they then strip the bontrager stickers off, or never have the put on, and call up supergo, who buys the remaining 1000 at OEM pricing, which is way under wholesaler's wholesale. they then sell the wheelsets for a very affordable price, more or less at wholesale, to the rabid public. this isnt what walmart does. its not quite as evil. walmart forces companies to sell to them at whatever price they dictate and thats that. nashbar can afford to sell even things like derailluers at mere dollars over cost, because they dont have tons of storefronts. 50 guys can run a huge operation. the sram pc 48 chain costs a bike shop 8.5 to buy, if they buy in bulk, (50) without boxes, so lets see, thats 425 dollars just for one type of chain. thats alot of money in product thats not guarenteed to sell right away. then you have all the other 8 spd chains you have to have at least a few of, the 9 speed chains, the track chains, the bmx chains, the 10 spd chains, and soon, very soon, in chains alone, you have almost 1000 dollars just in chains, lying around, because you have to have them in stock. you have to pay for storage space. all storage space is space not used to sell stuff. the affordability issue is a real one, but fault does not lie with the local bike shop. they do what they can with what they are given. you said: "I wouldn't have nearly as much bike stuff, or nearly as much fun with it, if it weren't for Nashbar and Performance and the used market." this basically is a statement saying i'm only happy with lots of stuff. thats kind of misguided. or at least a bit glutonous, dont you think? your implying that quantity matters over quality, and that having lots of taiwanese stuff is better than having a few things that work well. i'm all for custom bikes. thats all i own. i'm all about quality, and i dont even hate taiwan products as much as i should. i love japanese products. (er not new shimano bits) so its not like i am saying screw nashbar cause they sell taiwanese stuff. i'm saying screw nashbar cause if you dont give them your buisness, someone else will, but if you dont give your local shop buisness, no one else might. maybe you only have one local shop. that sucks then. support harris. they are a family owned shop. great. but local shops are run by local people with big stakes on the line. when most shops fold, the owners loose everything. cars, houses, they have to literally hide from creditors to avoid having thier ipods taken. its not wonder they are pissy sometimes. some days they are literally at the poor houses' door. if they screw up on a bike order, say the rep told them the colour purple was the hit for womens hybrids, they ordered 6, only six! and now they are sitting on 1800 dollars worth of big stuff they cant even push out the door. they would try to sell those for 600, at a 50% margin, while nashbar goes and buys the other ones up, after the maker can sell them, for 150 dollars a piece, and sells them at 250, 50 bucks less than it costs the shop to get them in the first place. you see, its not a question of adaption. what needs adaptation is the buyers attitude. just like people thrived before the cell fone, people could still enjoy cycling without the internet and mail order catalogues. its a fact. and then anouther fellow chimed in: Interesting debate that my need its own thread... But you guys are arguing the realities of the fabled Al Gore "new economy." Reality: giants (Nashbar) will exist to satisfy demand as will more thrifty and swift lbs (Harris--god willing! and my lbs). You both are examples of savy consumers each purchasing with clear intent rather than for consumption for its own sake (Walmart). The cycling marketplace it is still a niche thus divided into price category (I don't own a Lemond or Campy anything but mid market products instead). A logical solution to such a competative market would be to increase participation by increasing the number of cycling consumers...thus the unlucky lbs may close (sucks?...not in all cases!) but other more aggressive, savy and slick lbs (with a website!) will maintain and thrive within a one niche while the huge (Nashbar) may serve to lure the price concious newbie in another. High road economic development does not really fit into this market because of its size...even nashbar is re "small" (50 employees?= 6-7 decent sized shops?). And while a store may close, most likley it will not close because of larger online retailers but because of the extant local market and the minimal demand of the consumers. (Demand is never "wrong", only the supply-side responce to it can be!). Remember the number of choices that a retailer has at their disposal and the number of mistakes or incorrect assumptions one can make. It is a shops responsibility to maintain customers; cycling is such a narrow market that we go to the same store, the same wrench guy, the same routes...unless there is a problem. And remember, while 20 years ago we all could have had this debate...I doubt any or us would be willing to drop the $ on a phone bill, or wait for the local post to deliver a reply. I know that I waited a whole 10 days for a special order (online) part to come in from Cali...so my lbs could finish the work I asked them to do... Ultimately, consumer choice reflects personal values and both of yours are valid, as are the means to satisfy both sets of demands short of murder or war...apples and oranges. At least we use a minimal amount of petroleum based products... good stuff, i think. but people say i'm crackers.... wait, theres more! Senior Member Join Date: Jul 2006 Slim: You raise some valid points, for the US market, however in many countries customer service is defined as being able to go into the shop, and have a chat with the guy behind the counter, who knows his subject really well, and is able to get the part you need. Modern bike shops have computers and internet connections, because it cuts down on inventory. There are probably 8,196 different chains out there, a shop probably sells 3 - 4 different ones 98% of the time. However if you really need a 5 speed chain, many bike shops can order one, shipped next day air, because the shipping costs are less then the cost of maintaining inventory on something you might sell once in a blue moon. While people can get stuff cheap, so can bike shops. The price difference is the cost of providing service, and many times being able to take a bike to the shop, pointing to a part and saying I need one of these, and the bike shop being able to provide one. I see the bike market as two things: service and product. The product is not that special, a type of commodity like the hard disk to a computer. Some have better design and thus perform better for its intended use. But the big thing is really service. So the local bike shops should stop trying to make money on a mere commodity and start making money on service. The mechanic, the bike fitter, the coach, the physiologist, are all part of services. Also important is the manufacturer that brings their product to the distributors like the Nasbars and Performance, or any other mail order Taiwan based entity to the consumer. I think the consumers are a dynamic bunch with money to spend via baby boomers getting back into the past time they enjoyed as a kid. They're the ones who buy bikes all tricked out. They're the ones who go to the 24 hour fitness centers and do spinning. They're the ones who will buy services. I agree with both of you, Garfield Cat & Wogsterca. The service element (even in the US too!!!) fits neatly into demand and it is this kind and range of service that is getting bigger. Some people don't care about the chit chat and will order the part straight away online; however others that value the banter and other useful value a lbs brings (me) pay for that service because it has added value that others may not choose to "add" to their bill--and depending on my ready cash (or not so ready) that is how I make a decision where to purchase, and I don't think many pepople are alll that different regardless of their location (deal is a deal). And right, like I said before a savy and swift lbs will learn how to construct their busniess model such that they can use technology to maintain a healthy business rather than suffering "standing by wayside" effects and problems of inventory...Harris and my lbs are perfect examples of this. Garfield birings up a good point...there are lots of people that don't realize they need bikes just yet...but they will! and many will and many will not care about the lbs--so to stay in the race the lbs must stay fit (create/modify business model). Remember, if you want expert advice from 100 different, knowledeable and articulate if not cranky sometimes experts, where would you go to get these answers in less than an hour while you are at work? Answer: bikeforums . We are all participating in something that could help--but will not--destroy the need for a lbs! The reason I can say "will not" is because of the values that many here hold that include the lbs. I do, Garfield does, Wogsterca, Moxfyre, Rudelugs, etc...but we have also used/use a mechanism that can threaten old cycling (lbs, online shopping/links, face2face interactions, etc) and also strengthen it (advice, race/events and announcements, information in general, etc). As a point, I have used my lbs more because of this forum, others may experience the opposite... So, Garfield is right, lbs should begin to court these baby boomers and learn to answer questions more affably and also who don't know or care about the diff between campy and sram (yet!), or have a vested interest in an sport/hobby/fun thing to do sometimes/or the LBS that we do...but these are the people that can make or break a bottom line...and also get more bike lanes painted, help get less cars on the road... I wonder if this sort of thing is discussed in the "shop owners" forum?...if not it should. crackers crackers crackers.

Installing Breaks

2006-08-18T07:30:00.000-04:00

I had to install some breaks (LINEAR PULL BRAKE (V-BRAKE TYPE)) last night and I couldn't remember the correct order for the steps. So after perusing the internet for a few minutes I found the park tools website and it has a decent guide. There are more guides for other parts of a bike too.

lower georges valley ride

2006-08-16T16:19:00.000-04:00

sunset coming back into centre hall some jerk ass dumped thier trash right on this farmers field, which was not only rude/illegal but coulda burned his crop down. big views over georges' valley.

Bikes Which I Have Met In Sweden

2006-08-16T10:20:00.000-04:00

The culture of cycling in Europe is very strong, and nowhere more so than in Sweden, where I had the pleasure to be all of last week. The availability of well marked cycling lanes, many separate cycling paths, and driver’s awareness of and courtesy for cyclists, lends a kind of legitimacy to “cycling as transport” that doesn’t exist in this here U.S. of A. The thing which I found most interesting was that since most peoples’ bikes serve a transport function (rather than an activity or hobby function) what I saw everywhere were non-racing bikes. Furthermore, these bikes came in every possible different design, many with fenders, some with baskets, others with racks, single speeds, internally geared hubs, etc. Basically, what happens when market forces demand a practical “bike vehicle” is that bikes become more personal, and functional. The idea that everyone should have a Trek Hybrid or ridiculously over-designed mountain bike for their weekend neighborhood pedal-around, is laughable in a culture where people really use their bikes and need them to do certain things. The photo at the top for instance, I find to be a classic example of a European style bike: exuding that heavily ridden charm, yet fully functional, and unattractive to thieves. Note the detail on the chain cover.

Here is Nanna's bike: a variation on the previous: it has front and rear hand brakes, a coaster brake, a 5-speed internally geared hub, front light, fenders, and large rear rack with spring "hold-em down" thing. She's had it for 10 years.

This bike caught my eye immediately: a fully-suspended-externally-geared-folding-commuter-bike, with fenders!

Lastly, this all plastic bike which I saw at a "Cykel" shop in the Stockholm suburb of Saltsjö-baden.

Bike messenger video

2006-08-12T15:00:00.000-04:00

proofs that everythings been done

2006-08-12T08:31:00.000-04:00

anatomical saddle design, pre 1900. moustache bars, cantilever brakes, 1931 even bad frame designs arnt new! and apparently, nor is the colour purple. co2 cartridge, 1958 cinelli i dunno about that lug design, but its lasted over 45 years... hollow chain side plates, obsessive compulsive behavior. all sorts of ugly ideas. end of lesson

when bikes had steel rims and pneumatic air was just a nice way to say fart

2006-08-02T18:03:00.000-04:00

john dunlop is my new hero. i was out on a ride today, against centre county weather advisories. i forgot my helmet and my gloves. i was going to do a 50 mile loop with roughly 7000 feet of climbing, and just as much descending...on 90% gravel roads. i wanted to ride in the mountains, as its cooler, and the shade is fairly consistent. also, i knew i would be downing some serious water, as it was almost 100 degrees out, so i plotted my route near 3 springs. before i even got to the mountain, my shirt was soaked though, and i was dripping sweat from my elbows onto my pants, which were becoming saturated. let it be known here that i have forsaken all non natural materials for road cycling, and i was wearing a seersucker shirt and cotton shorts with cotton underwear. i started my climb up tussey mtn, which starts around 700 ft, and climbs to over 3000 in about two miles, all on nicely graded ie smooth, but rather steep roads. i climbed and climbed and climbed, for maybe 20 minutes, before i started feeling a bit woozy. the cool mountain air i had banked on wasn't coming through... then i flatted, which was a good excuse to stop. it was a pinch flat, which made me slightly nervous, as i only had on spare and i was scarcely 8 miles into my trek. i figured though, ok its a pinch flat, i'm riding fairly narrow tires over kinda nasty terrain, i'll just pump the new tube and my front tire up higher... with that done i set off again. shortly after that, my cycling cap was saturated to the point where it was letting a constant stream of sweat roll down my back and face, causing droplets of moisture hang perilously from my eyebrows, only to splash onto my glasses at various inopportune moments. but i kept going. soon my cotton bar tape was so wet that i could wring it out just by grabbing the brake levers or shifting. i rode through various switch backs and eventually the air became cooler. i rounded a bend and saw my first car of the ride. it was parked to the side, and there were 3 asian people sitting in the road, as if at an impromptu picnic. however there was no food being eaten, no blankets out, they were literally just sitting in the road. the father was washing the car with a large bucket of water, no soap. he accomplished this by throwing water at the windows and letting to roll down. further adding to this curious carwash conundrum was the car floor mats, which were layed out as if on display on the opposite side of the road. none of the mats matched. mind you, this is all quite aways away from the nearest town, so it would have struck me as quite bazaar, but i was buggered from the heat and climbing. but as i started to ride by, i noticed a spring, between the car and the road sitters. so i stopped, ditched whatever hot water was left in my bottles, and filled up. goddamn that water was good. it was cold, clear, and 5 hours later i still havnt shat myself. i finished my climb with vigour. the top yielded a vista of surrounding green mountains, and a stiff breeze. i rested momentarily and wrung my hat out. even when i wasnt on the bike, my bar cons dripped sweat at an alarming rate. i continued on my ride, over a ridgeline that ended with a thousand foot decent over loose gravel and 180 degree guard rail-less turns, past various hunting lodges and minor views. i then turned on the road that would mark 1/4 of my journey complete. the road was steep, steep enough to warrent traverse climbing, but the pitch of the road, and the thick pile of loose gravel prohibited this. so i buckled down, tighted my toe straps and lurched up 1000 feet of climbing in under a mile. this climb was followed by a 6 mile 2000 foot decent to whipple dam where i had planned to swim, and get more water. i began the decent with little trepidation, but my worries quickly mounted as the gravel became thick, and tire tracks from cars could not be relied upon to show the safest route. within a mile i flatted again, but with out a spare tube or patch kit i had to ride on. riding on a flatted rear tire is hard when you are on dirt or the pavement, but with millions of chunks of loose gravel, the bike refuses to fly strait, and the rear end is in a constant state of drift. the flat had somehow knocked my rear brake pads askew, leaving me with only my front brake. i had new pads, though, and they were koolstop salmon pads, so thick, with no glazing, but within a mile my rim was so hot that i couldnt touch it at all, and my pads sounded like a ref's whistle. i stopped and doused them with water, but to no avail. continuing down, at a decent clip i might add, only marginally slower that one would with a functioning rear tire, as my front brake was becoming less and less affective, i soon rounded a bend and saw a large rattlesnake, at least 5 feet, but more probally 6 stretched across the road. his midsection was as big round as a mans arm, and he seemed to glow a fluorescent green. anyway, i hate snakes, but couldnt control my bike enough to miss his head by more than a few inches. i flew by screaming like a girl. for those who dont know, i once ran over a copperhead, mistaking it for a stick, and it tried to bite my leg, but instead was chopped up in the rear spokes. i finished my decent, and had to climb 500 feet into whipple dam state park, which was much nicer, except my fenders made a huge racket only slightly less annoying than my refs whistle front rim. mel rescued me from the park's store. my rim needed a bit of fileing after 5.5 miles of gravel roads at 20 miles per hour, my tire was shredded, and my tube in tatters. but, the rim is still true, and only slightly dented, and in perfect round. so those who doubt my wheel building skills be damned. mel bought me an ice cream cone for my heroics.

super fat guys and foreign girls cross race

2006-08-02T09:42:00.000-04:00

lets just say taking our shirts off was my idea, and lets add that i'm probally not the first guy to take an xo 1 off a teeter totter, over a rock drop, and over two bridges, but i bet i am the first to do that drunk, shirtless, and during a cross race in damiens backyard. i think i'm safe with that brag...the rules were convoluted, mainly to confuse the foreign girls, and the beer was running out. luckly i was smashed, and so it didnt really matter. our audience comprised of 3 dogs, flies, some foreigners, and parents. we rode there, mel and I. nice ride, good views. two monster climbs, one steep enough that i had to transverse it in 26:30. we had just eaten a fat wad of ice cream thou, i'll blame it on that. after the first lap we had to drink a beer, surprize surprize...

the legend of the elusive caramubaicanus anodizious

2006-07-31T20:20:00.000-04:00

i just found these pictures of caramba cranks, one of my top 5 favorite mtn bike cranks ever, and the only style i dont own. but i do have: crank bros rcrs... syncros black revolutions, middleburn r 8s, and kookas... carambas are def the most rare, and strangest, but cool from a design prospective. anyway, i've only seen one pair in person, and hardly any online, so this to me is a treat.

a domestic or euro crankset?!

2006-07-31T17:23:00.000-04:00

OK, so I am building (after many years of lusting and sweating it) a 29er Moots YBB with S&S couplers to travel the US and Europe, and wherever the hell else dr. hot czech and i end up and want to mountain bike. With that I had the idea to make the bike primarily of domestic US production, which is impossible because of tires and tubes and cables and such. But anyway as much as I am an idealist it has more to do with the fact that I don't really want a $500 set of carbon cranks made by a machine in Taiwan on my handcrafted in the US from wholly US materials custom titanium bike. (and i'm even down with carbon) So I'm thinking that with European parts filling out the rest, since this is where i'll be riding, I should be able to make the most of it(outside of my avid disc brakes which i am unwilling to part with.) But I haven't found a good set of cranks. I want bearing durability (ie. no ISIS) so a square taper or external BB and to run a single 38T chainring with a bash guard to a Rolhoff hub. So where do I find this mystery crankset. I'm completely open to anything from a Record aluminum crankset(Casey wants me to use a track crankset, although the availability or bashguards is slim) to some locally machined thing, so long as it's not one of the Kooka deals that likes to snap off. What do you think? Could a forged aluminum road crank be up to mountain abuse?

low end of the dollar

2006-07-28T12:30:00.000-04:00

Exclusive things will always be around, whether or not they are mass produced or handcrafted. They are what define us as a class society. if we could all party like paris hilton, she wouldnt have a platform to project herself from, and would be therefor unmarketable. Our world has been, I would argue, and always will be class and exclusivity driven. That is the only thing that makes things special, and therefore marketable. Nick made the point himself saying that the tour bikes are rad, and as such saleable because they are expensive, light, and fast. these things of course have nothing to do with rideability, or the ability to enjoy something beyond mere ownership. At the low end of the economic spectrum, in America, people are stuck with subpar choice via forced marketing, ie poor people watch show X and brand Z advertises during that show, so brand Z becomes the poor guys' brand o' choice. Why else would anyone in thier right mind drink bud, or coors? given a blind taste test of 10 cheap beers, those would undoubtably be near the bottom. To further that, why do poor people smoke marlboros and not american spirits? american spirit doesnt have a nascar sponsorship...I dont think we are moving towards a classless society. I think we are simply diminishing the middle class, and polarizing our current population. What were we talking about again?

A New Paradigm Emerges or Why Casey Is A Facist

2006-07-28T11:17:00.000-04:00

A healthy skepticism about the progression of the TV-as-babysitter and the newer Internet-as-babysitter culture is good – these are not exactly virtue based entertainment devices. However, as a larger cultural shift the rise of cheap information and communication technologies will change our culture for the better. One of the points Casey was making the night this conversation originated ((resurfaced?) also the night these rad pics were taken) was that the value of objects is based on their exclusivity. In terms this blog would understand: a Bridgestone bike is kewler than a Cannondale because it is more exclusive. I’m sure Casey won’t mind me saying, since he is of his own admission, “on such a retro program,” but this view is old fashioned. It is based on the 18th century “economics of scarcity” worldview, that while still dominant in the world, is changing. What I believe is foreshadowed by the rise of blogs, as well as the oft mocked “hipster culture” is that once our (earth humans) ability to produce exceeds our ability to consume, then old ideas of “better/worse” and “exclusive/common” will cease to be relevant. When everything is equally available (due to increased efficiency in production, distribution, etc.) then all choices become only a matter of taste. In this theoretical (though not far) future, the availability and cost of a lugged steel bike is virtually identical to that of a carbon one. I choose lugs, Casey chooses lugs, and we are friends and ride together. Others choose plastic and ride with people who make the same choices. Communities become based on groups of people making similar choices – out of the infinite variety available. My central argument is that these communities are more “natural” than what exists today, which is based on the scarcity principle (big houses are scarce so only rich people have them – but being with other rich people is not a community forming function). I think that this point of view extends from bikes to clothes, music, and pretty much all consumer products. Truly hand made things, where art and craftsmanship is involved will still have value, even more so than now. But those things will represent a statistically insignificant percentage of the total. The thing is, the world is moving this way whether we like it or not. While the increased sterility of the objects with which we all must interact is not exactly a romantic notion, the fact that the plainness and sameness is a byproduct of efficiencies that are allowing people (for the first time ever!) to exist at the lowest end of the scarcity food chain and still have food, acceptable housing, access to the mainstream flow of information, and yes - quality mass produced bikes, is something which we should all support.

Too Many Choices, by Mel

2006-07-28T08:21:00.000-04:00

This is probably part of the reason why kids are more A.D.D. than ever. Too many choices on TV, too many video games, too many extra-curriculars, too many things to buy. I think all these choices they have to make early in life makes people fickle. Fickle people are less likely to commit to a good relationship as an adult. Adults are divorcing each other left and right because they get bored with each other and because they refuse to put any effort into developing a strong foundation from day one. They are frustrated and argue with each other and think that it’s grounds for divorce. People are also just plain selfish. People get tired and bored with each other because they don’t want to work at the relationship because of their selfishness. They have lazy personalities because their ADD or whatever causes them to give up. People put less and less effort into all relationships these days. Just look at IMing and text messaging, that My Space crap, and this stupid Blog shit. People are less intimate with one and other. Everything is superficial. Do kids even hang out with each other anymore? I realize that this statement is a generalized and biased but I think there is some truth to it. I myself have this fickle attention problem (part of it is inheritance) this makes it hard for me to read and write or sit still and write this. I’m not even going to bother editing this article because I’m multitasking as we speak while my parents watch “America’s Funniest Animals”. Unfortunately there is always a screen in front of us, cameras, phones, TV, computers etc. Too many things to look at. This is why James and I don’t have a TV. If we did we would never enjoy simple things with each other like playing music or cards. It’s bad enough we have a computer that we both fight over. (we fight over it? ed.) I’m sure someone has a different opinion on this. Let it out. -Mel

A Little Bit of Mutilation Humor Never Hurt Anyone

2006-07-27T15:37:00.000-04:00

An update on STARMER's post with the video of the bike thieves in NYC: apparently the guys who made the video got asked to be in a piece about it on Fox's NYC affilate this morning and played a little prank. The ruthless bastards who run my life at Gawker have the links: description here and actual video here. FOX sucks, and so do blonde airhead "reporters" - they are "so not cool dude."

intangibilities

2006-07-27T13:37:00.000-04:00

ok so we, ie nick, this dude joe and i, were having a super good (i thought) conversation about some fairly intangible stuff, ie feelings, and technologies role in feelings, and quantities, ie having too much of one thing makes choice not only hard but not fun (my opinion) my take was this: if you can have as much as you want of any one thing, that makes it less special: ie music on your ipod. also, i argued that downloading music wasnt as fun or special or exclusive as going to a record shop and shoping for vinyl, and that therefor degrades the value of downloaded tunes, and even makes them not as fun to listen to. I want responses on this, but in the form of posts, not responses. hop to it.

Coppi's Organic

2006-07-26T18:32:00.000-04:00

Casey (Johnson) took us to this Coppi's in DC last friday. Beacuse he was wearing "vintage" pink jersey we got free drinks (limoncello and sparkling water, I think). They have very good food their too. He also got a picture on their website, check the bottom of the page. We then proceded to the Konono No.1 show where there was the Air Conditioning was not working. We didn't even make it to the end of the show and this is the result:

Regarding Compact Cranks

2006-07-26T13:07:00.000-04:00

I am considering a set of compact cranks. My rationale is that, while I don't need the extra climbing capability, I also don't really need a 53-11 gear very often and that a compact crank would actually give me more gears in a tighter range for the mostly flat city environs. Most of my riding around town, commuting etc. is done around 53-16, with the addition of a compact crank's 50 tooth large ring in order to get an equivlent gear I could just go lower (I have an 11-23 cassette). Often times though, I find myself slowing mashing up a hill or overpass because the situation doesn't exactly warrant a drop to 39 in the front, but 53 is too big. So I end up staying in a bad gear for whatever reason, maybe just laziness (but Nick you have hyperglide it doesn't take any effort at all!(yes I know)). Possible complications are that I have a braze on front "derail-her" which I heard often doesn't work with compacts. While I realize I could saw that off and get a clamp on, I'm not yet in the business of hacking on european steel. Also this post is largely an excuse to post the above pic. Thoughts from the gallery?

Bike tricks

2006-07-21T07:32:00.000-04:00


From google video, "This was filmed by me in the year 2000 or 2001 in Wuerzburg, Germany, and still i have not seen something like this anywhere. P.S. music by Vanessa Mae"

These Bikes Are So Up Johnson's Alley It's Ridiculous

2006-07-20T09:34:00.000-04:00

Portugese made wooden frames from Xylon Bikes. I emailed them for more info on availability, sizing, and pricing. Will update the post when I hear back. UPDATE: Here is the email I got back from Xylon: Dear Nicholas, Thank you for your interest and positive comments about Xylon Bikes Currently, Xylon Bike frames are hand crafted and individually built to order. Depending on the model, and availability of components and equipment, delivery time is between 6 – 8 weeks from receipt of order. Prices range from 1500 – 2000 euros. At the moment there are no plans to sell frames only (ready to install customer’s components) but to reduce shipping costs Xylon Bikes could ship frames if the customer underwrites the security of the bicycle. Xylon Bikes are supplied with single speed (ratio specified by client) and 3, 5, or 7 speed internally geared hub with roller or coaster brake. (Xylon Bikes does not recommend the use of rear or front derailleurs) Presently Xylon does not produce "Radical Sports Bikes" but rather "Lifestyle Cruisers", however Xylon prototypes have been tested for 100s of kilometers with no changes to the overall structure of the frame. Prototype Xylon #0 was exhibited at the 2nd International Bike Show in Santarem, Portugal and was subjected to jumps and stunts at the hands of a well known BMXer, the only resulting damage was a broken chain! Due to the shock absorbing capabilities of the wooden frame and the recommended use of semi ballon tyres the use of suspension forks on Xylon Bikes is not recommended. Custom built frames can be made to individual customer’s requirements on receipt of relevant data related to the customer’s dimensions etc. Custom frames are liable to a surcharge depending on the extent of modification reqired. A range of juvenile bicycles is programmed for release in October or November this year. If you have any further queries please do not hesitate to contact me Nick Taylor Technical Director

Dual tube setup

2006-07-18T12:45:00.000-04:00

I can't quite figure out if this is just stupid or really cool. Looks like it might be a good idea if you have a city beater bike that you wouldn't mind drilling holes into. I guess it might minimize the gear you would have to carry around for a single speed beater with a bolt on hub. Maybe it would be good if you were setting up a bike for someone with an aversion to changing tires.

Tuesday Poll:

2006-07-18T12:22:00.000-04:00

Is this guy (answers in the comments): A. A hard-core, ride-some-more, do it till you die, all Euro, all the time, brakeless beastmaster. B. A douchey hipster trustafarian twat, whose body art and gold anodized cranks are funded by his parents adherence to Americanized protestant values of hard work and stability. C. Secretly yearning for acceptance among the ever-shrinking messenger community of which he would be a part were winters not so cold and icky. D. Pissed that he's now stuck with those Campy cranks, since the Italian fad is so over, and there's no way he's gonna find any keirin NJS cranks that match his tat just right.

ramblin's

2006-07-17T22:49:00.000-04:00

So when I’m not mucking about riding bikes, reading old books, or setting up my studio for the upcoming year, or sneaking slices of cake out the fridge or driving around on my lawn cause I can, or cursing those round weeds that my rotary mower wont cut, or drinking beer downtown, or squishing earwigs in my helmet, I’m thinking about bikes, and about traditions, and how those old frenchies got their bikes so damn light without titanium, or plastic, or computers. 15 lbs for a bike with lights, fenders, clips and straps, normal spokes, leather saddles, ect, is just nutso. My XO-1 weighs maybe 26lbs with a rear aluminum nitto rack, no lights, two cages, and a brooks professional, sans ti rails and lightweight fenders. I don’t have anything overtly heavy, a light cassette, a lightish bb… nothing stands out as a culprit of weight. I mean, I know those really lite French bikes had all aluminum bolts, but that adds up to under a quarter pound savings, I know cause I looked it up, and its fucking pricey, over 80 bucks for every bolt to be ti or aluminum, which is a lot of money for a little savings. All I can really think of is a Ti bb, an Action Tec one, not too pricey, with sks bearings, would save a quarter pound, and would outlast the Shimano unit by years… But that still doesn’t account for that ten pound discrepancy… ok a lighter frame, yeah they had that, a lighter saddle, they had that too, with aluminum railed ideal saddles saving maybe a quarter pound. Ok so that’s maybe 2 lbs savings, max, and they didn’t have ti bbs… lighter cranks ok, but not by too much, lets say 200 grams… tires no lighter, tubes definitely not, spokes not, hubs maybe, but freewheels not. Rims maybe, but I have 390 gram Valiants… that’s light. I just don’t get it. I don’t get how they did it, and I don’t get how Shimano or Sugino or whoever cant fucking get on the ball and do it again, but for less money. Maybe we’re lucky they don’t try, it would probally all look shitty if they did. It would have to look contemporary, read ugly, and would look old before the year was out…look at Shimano Saint, whose ascetics have tragically descended to the whole Shimano lineup, making everything look like Honda designed it. No, scratch that, a Honda intern designed it. Why, when Sugino is making the halfway decent TA copy the PX, does Shimano insist on making everything look like a car door handle? Their cranks are so thick, so boxy, so antiBIKE that they seem to insist on being installed on a carbon crap pile with fat tubes and big shitty graphics that some high schooler couldn’t pass off as a graphic design project. The goddamn cranks wouldn’t, couldn’t look good in a steel bike. Shimano might as well be an American company. They should design suvs. Maybe they do. All the other Japanese companies love beautiful and functional products, and many go out of their way to make contempory, nice copies of old parts, see Nitto’s racks, stems, posts, ect, Sugino’s XD and PX cranks, MKS’s pedals, Diacompes brakes and shifters, panasonic’s alex singer copy commuters that cost 700 bucks with hammered fenders and lugs… Shimano acts more like a Taiwanese company, not making what makes sense, but making products that Americans gobble up, but only because shimano lets them. Shimano could make a touring grouppo and pass it off as the next big thing, use skinny cranks and normal bottom brackets, and a nice brushed finish, but they don’t. It must be too easy to dupe the American customer into making that other shit. Sugino used to make derailluers, they should get back on the bus. I am thinking about making a 4 speed rear cluster. Using action-tec cogs. It would be light as fuck, never wear out, and be super fuctional with my new gearing set up. I just worry about how it will look with an 8 spd rear cassette hub… I also wonder if I can score a fatter bushing chain from mel pinto, in silver… did they even make silver chains 20 years ago? Ok here’s the gearing plan, its straight old school cyclotouriste, 46/26 up front, 14, 18, 22, 26 out back. I tried it out on a recent ride, just skipping over the gears in back that weren’t part of the program, and it was fine, the jumps took a bit of getting used to, but it wasn’t lumpy feeling or anything. With only 4 gears out back, I can custom tune the chain-line like all get out, and make the 46t front shift perfectly over all the gears in back. I wanna get a TA pro 5 vis crank: But they are spendy. Good news is they work with English bbs, which means I can rock them with an action tec bb… they cut out the weight of a traditional spider…I guess traditional spider isn’t the word cause the ta style crank predates contemporary spiders… They arms are skinny as hell so I imagine they arnt heavy at all… I have an old campy 90s ft mech that’s a total turd, ie its powder coated and ugly and its just a front mech, not something special, so I’m gunna carve it up some. Old French derailluers never had the connecting bolt on the tail of the mech. Also, their outer cage plates were very minimal. So its off to the hacksaw for it… That’s about it for now. Keep up the postings, I like this better now.

Stealing a bike in NYC

2006-07-17T09:53:00.000-04:00

This is pretty sad. These guys show how easy it is to steal a bike in New York. Got it from here.

Nice single speed with clever ads

2006-07-14T10:32:00.000-04:00

I found these single speed city bikes here (clever ads): The bikes seem decent. I'd like to try those the handle bars. The idea of a bunch of different design companies coming together to create a bike company seems like the most interesting part of the bikes. -Starmer

The Miami Beach Cycling Scene

2006-07-12T08:56:00.000-04:00

Cycling in Miami Beach is a combination of chilled out on-vacation-time cruising and urban busses-cars-red-lights biking. On trip to South Beach over 4th of July weekend, Nora (pictured) and I rented some bikes from a shop called Miami Beach Bicycle Center. Not the most creative name, but a decent shop nonetheless, and they had exactly what we wanted: beach cruisers. For $8 bucks an hour or $20 a day, what we got was basically this, with a lock and a basket. A heavy ass one speed bike (gear ratio unknown (chainring had a guard over it, and I didn’t care to count)) with one-piece cranks and at least 3” tires. If I saw someone riding one of these in D.C. I’d laugh a little laugh inside at their naiveté. In South Beach it’s a completely different story. These bikes are completely standard issue – everyone rides them. Even the more style conscious, and or cycling enthusiasts, ride cruiser style bikes – like the one pictured with dual-crown fork and radially-laced wheels. South Beach is small enough and with enough “beach lifestyle mentality” that having a geared bike is ridiculous overkill. You’re only headed to catch some rays, so why go faster? It’s completely flat and you’ve only got one easy gear, and so a coaster brake is all you ever need. Additionally, two of the main restaurant/shopping/nightlife streets are Lincoln Rd and Espanola Way, both closed to motor vehicle traffic. Interestingly, South Beach may also be one of the only places in America where a skateboard is a legitimate means of transportation. The beach there is wide enough that between the small dunes and where most people lay out, a concrete base has been placed beneath the sand so police and emergency vehicles can drive more easily – and so can bikes. My last day there I rode from the very southern tip of South Beach all along the beach up to 16th street where we were staying. Cathartic. I saw loads of bikes laid down in the sand next to topless sunbathing beauties all along the beach. While there I only saw two “hard core” roadies: one on a Colnago Masterlight in full team Mapei kit, and another guy in plain jersey on a Felt with Ultegra-10. Both guys were spotted soft-pedaling on Lincoln Rd. looking a lot more interested in scoping ladies than maintaining optimum heart rates.

whats goin' on

2006-07-09T22:50:00.000-04:00

word. i've been trying to read a book a day. not a good book, just anything. i'm working now on longfellow's favorite poems, a james cain book, the collected short stories of nabokov, and martin dugard's account of james cook's voyages... only 25% off all that is of any merit, but its vacationy feeling up here, cant i read crap? went to a drive in last nite, super dope. tons of people there. 5 bucks! per car! listen on your radio. felt very american and happy about that. its fucking 2 miles from our house. next time we're riding bikes there... its over 56 years old... i got a slushie to feel extra american. mel and i went on a fairly long ride the other day, to boalsburg, a small very victorian town with a tiny square and some chic shops, had a bad sandwich, and then went up tussey mtn, on a fairly deserted dirt road that climbed next a brook and gobs of blooming rhodidendron, (i know i cant spell) and all of these rad old cottages that persumably were for rent. they were all next to this brook, and all very cool 1920s style, but none were the same. the road climbed to a ridge, and we rode along the ridge until we came to a lake, ate some fig newtons and then pedaled down the mtn, thru some incredible farmland. mel stopped to talk to some sheep and a goat that was so excited he fell backwards into a stream... anyway, it was the longest ride i had taken mel on, and she just got faster as it got longer, so i think as long as i keep the rides fairly super big climb free, we can go pretty good distances... rob rides a sketchy loose headset nishiki at a high rate of speed while i snap pictures without looking at the road for some time... we hadnt even started drinking yet... it was a good, if shortish ride, weather perfect. i've since added fenders to the b-stone, the rain has been sporatic, and i hate on a wet ass crack. took mel on a 35 mile ride the other day, up a mtn road next to a gushing stream... crested at a lake, break there, then rolling farmland all the way home...

Larch Mt. Tour

2006-07-09T19:53:00.000-04:00

I just checked out "The Golden Age of Handbuilt Bicycles" by Jean Heine from the library. An amazing book that embodies a cycling ideology and style of days gone by that makes me want to ride off to the mountains every free moment I get. Cyclotouring, or "riding for the enjoyment of riding". So I packed up the ol' Peugeot yesterday and set out for the Columbia River Gorge. I decided I would do it minimalist style, no tarp, no sleeping bag. Just some extra clothes, water filter, tools, camera and food. I rode the Max train out of the city to the last stop with my bike. I have ridden from my house to the gorge before but I prefer to just bypass all of the urban/suburban wasteland and just get on the back roads as soon as possible. I got off the train and on the road by 3:30 or so. The route I took descended to the Sandy River where I have been taking the same ride to go swimming this summer. From here I ascended out of the valley on the Historic Columbia River Highway. It was a bit busy until I made it past most of the yahoos on their way to swim at the Sandy. I climb, climb, climbed about 3,000 feet up to Larch Mt. It was gettin late though so I didn't go the whole way to the top, which does have a splendid view indeed. I first turned off a logging road and gave my bike a workout over the rocky, unpaved surface through a clearcut. It handled it well. I thought maybe I would camp here but it didn't feel good. The ground was dry as a desert and the surrounding stands of immature hemlocks were so dense they allowed no light through creating a dark, ominous wood that gave me the creeps. Not to mention all of the beer cans, shotgun shells and other debris left by hunters and backwoods street sign shooters. I decided to coast back down to some more inviting forest I passed on my way up the mountain. I found a spot not far off the road. The swainson's thrushes were cheerily making their spiraling call and all around were red huckleberries ripe for the pickin'! This area had obviously been clearcut at one time too but it felt more pleasant and my mood immediately changed. I remembered why I had ridden out here. I went to work picking huckleberries (and eating them). The simple debris shelter I planned to build for warmth was soon forgotten about as I filled up on berries. As the sun set I found a spot to bed down in some moss under a baby hemlock and some huckleberry bushes. I always seem to think I will fall asleep easily in these situations but I never learn my lesson. Ants crawled up my pants and mosquitoes kept buzzin me. As the night went on my feet became cold and I curled up tighter. At some point I finally slept long enough to have an obscure dream about finding a cougar skull in a pond or somethin but was awoken by the sound of a mouse running around my head. Soon the thrushes were singing again and a new day was dawning. I stretched, ate a few more berries, and made my way back to the road, eyes burning from lack of sleep. The ride back was mostly downhill. I was back to the Max by 7:00 am and home in the comfort of my bed by 8:45. Here's a picture of the Columbia River at sunrise and of my trusty Peugeot.

welcome to paradise...

2006-06-29T19:52:00.000-04:00

here's some photos of a recent maybe 10 mile ride we did, this morning actually. we have, within easy riding distance: all you see here plus mtn biking, trout fishing, hiking, camping, good barbque, fire roads, dirt roads...

cranks shaving and pedal frenching

2006-06-26T11:59:00.000-04:00

random pictures from our first week and a half in Lemont, in no order what so ever. I have been reading/looking at to much old school french touring bike action, and its tainted me into thinking i could do some of the stuff they did for the concours d’ machines, or technical trials. basically these craftsmen, builders, constructeurs, would take thier already light parts and further hone them to the bone, to the essential elements, to make them as light as possible, regardless of the handwork involved. Cory always said the reason that zero gravity brakes are lighter than dura ace or campy was how much time it took to make them. in other words, the zero gravity brakes are just as strong, but took 3 times longer to make, and thats something a big company like shimano or even campy isnt into. The zero G brakes only go so far as an example, as there is little, if any handwork aside from assembly in them. But Singer and Herse and all those incredible makes would lavish hours of hand work on thier once year super race bikes, and even hours of hand work went into the regular production bikes, no two bikes ever being contructed in the same fashion. Anyway, they obviously have/had more files, knowledge, patience, ect than I do, but i thought i would try a bit of modification out on some relatively cheap to replace mks pedals, and sugino cranks, turning them from a fairly light triple to a rather light double. I’m not sure how I feel about either results yet. The pedals would benefit from some really small files, and the cranks maybe a buffing machine and a dremel. In other news, my shop set up nicely, both the art side and the bike side. So theres pictures of that going on. Also: the riding around here is scenic and close by. From the top of the hill in front of our house you have a pretty decent vista. The mountain picture is from a recent road ride mel and i did. That view is under 3 miles from our house, and theres lots more. Rolling scenic farms, tons of streams, and that kinda stuff. There are tons of road riders who live in our super small community, which is both cool and wierd. Theres some folks who live behind us with santa cruzes and some other folks with bianchi grizzly mtn bikes...steel... Also: I will not field any questions as to why I cut up my cranks and pedals. You can say yeah thats cool or damn thats dumb, but dont ask why. word.

scotia riding, dynamo action

2006-06-20T17:28:00.000-04:00

ok, in Lemont PA now, big house, computer room has view of hill where roadies climb all day. Yesterday I was riding my witcomb back from blockbuster (scant 2 mile round trip) and a guy on a cannondale slowly ie nicely took me over, and say hello, and was nice and we chatted, then I chased him up a hill, and it was nice. The absolute first cat on a cannondale i havnt wanted to deck. Things are looking up. Mel and I went for a Mtn ride this morning, very flat but nicely groomed trails with the occasional cool woop or twisty bit. She loved it. You could ride a fixed cross bike there, no worries. I spent 3 hours hooking up my busch and muller dynamo, with stand light and tail light, looks fairly clean. I'll post pics of that and the ride we took. Look, I'm away now, this is a good way to communicate interesting shit or pertinent events or nudie pics or whatever, so post some stuff. If you just wanna post links, at least say what you liked about em.

touring vs racing

2006-05-24T13:27:00.000-04:00

touring and racing today seem like drastically disparate ways to ride a bike. this was not always that case, in more ways than one. 99 percent of those racing today know little to nothing about tourings influence on racing, bike design, and technology. racers were stuck with singlespeed bikes with heavy cottered cranks, steel rims, bars, stems and posts, while tourists were riding, pre ww2, hollow alumininium cranks, indexed shifters and rear mechs, aluminum sealed bearing hubs, and bikes weighing sub 17lbs. there was an annual, now mainly forgotten french touring event called the technical trials that took place after the tour de france, and followed its course. the trials were a builders competition, the object to see who could build the lightest, most durable bike for the trial. women tourists, and men, routinely set speed records and hill climb records that the racers couldnt touch. it is only within the past 15 years that tourist have been dismissed by the popular media, and have been tainted with generalities such as touring being slow, heavy, and for old fucks. its only that way if you make it that way.

Antelope pot roast

2006-03-17T20:50:00.000-05:00

Ok, so I haven't contributed anything to this blog yet. I guess my only excuse is that I try to spend as little time online as possible. Noticing the emphasis on naturalness and handmadeness on the account of James, I have something pretty natural and handmade to contribute. This is the flyer from a Wild Foods Feast that I hosted last weekend. It was fucking awesome to say the least! Our menu came from many people and included: Antelope, Wild Boar, Bear, Nutrea, Steamed Nettles, Nettle Pesto, Acorn bread and muffins, Dandelion/Chickweed/Miner's Lettuce Salad and Black Berry pie to top it off! My goal is to host these things once a month or so to teach and learn about the real bounty of our land that existed long before we enslaved it with agriculture. Shit, once you know how to survive off the land there's no need for fancy saddle bags. Although, that bag looks really good Mel and James! I want to see more pics.

i cant skateboard anymore

2006-03-10T14:46:00.000-05:00

Before you, ill-conceived bangs pasted to my face ending in a mop of white recently unwashed hair, covered by a hat. On the hat, salt stains spread from the button like an ice-age glacier model. The same color too. A lump like a caterpillar sewn into my gum, Chewing Tobacco (hmmm skoal mint long cut) is co-authoring the day, the next trick, my mood, my hopes and the erosion of what otherwise is a healthy mouth, along with the Coke. The Coke, always by my side should come with a holster. Like perfect sets of waves, rows of what looks like rows of dirt, which are in fact rows of dirt (applied by my face, greasy with tenacious auto exhaust), are breaking down from the sweaty collar of a faded and now collectible t-shirt. Breaking down, along my shoulder, from the collar to the cuff, beaching on my chubby sunburned arm at the end of which is my hand. The hand shades my eyes; Vietnam veteran-like eyes freaky with intention and determination. Centered in a collage of what amounts to baby fat, freckles, an earring, a no lipped but committed smile and snot are two tiny reflections of a curb. I'm staring at my opportunity and your curb, bench, staircase and handrail. The blood from my knee and shin intersect, marching downward, leaving watered down proof in abstract shapes on my socks. I hike the socks. My shoes, a â€œwet dreamâ€ for budding forensic scientists; ripped, retied, re-ripped shoelaces, countless marks, abrasions and modifications. I'm assigning numeric value, storyboards and scenarios to your different architecture. Designing, no manifesting a map of my world; a world of concrete, steel and glass with illegal gymnastic points of interest. I am drawing fluid hopeful lines from one object to another. Inhale, spit and move. Left behind is a pool of sweat and an invisible beginning. This is my first and sixtieth attempt. I've been here forever. I'm rolling. Comforted and invigorated by the fact that life is rushing at me sideways. that was written by danielwakefieldpaisley, not me, about 5 years ago.

also: a plea for entries

2006-03-09T21:15:00.000-05:00

hey this is supposed to be a forum, not a monologue, and I'm only gunna keep writing if people not only post responses but articles to, i know you kids have shit you need to air, get it out there, fucking tell a friend. Someone besides me likes good knives, good tunes and good bikes, fucking prove it you wanks.

a good thing

2006-03-09T21:07:00.000-05:00

I was recently downtown here, and came across this knife. Its a great product, 11 bucks 6 inches long, real wood, good blade, brilliant locking mechanism, dirt simple, nice finish, and made in France. For 11 bucks. Why isnt there a bike like this? Simple, good looking, affordable, made somewhere they dont eat cats and practical. Why doesnt Kmart sell a bike like this knife? Instead they sell the equivalent of a swiss army knife made of lunch tray plastic and cast low carbon steel. Too many gizmos, no eye to anything that actually makes a bike a pleasure to ride. Not light, not good looking, not quiet, not comfortable, not fast, no ability to use it for anything practical...ie no fender mounts, rack mounts ect... Very frustrating.

Everything's Alright, Not Ever

2006-02-21T17:54:00.000-05:00

This may or may not be worth saying but here goes. Recently I desided to revisit some music I listened to in highschool. I continued listening to some of it over the years...Fugazi, Morphine, but lost track of others, or burned out on them. Anyway, I went to look up this early 90s band, The Boo Radleys, who kinda started as this poppy My Bloody Valentine, went to just strait pop, to some shit that was alternatively a heavy British Smashing Pumpkins and sort of Blur on a drug that magically made all theyre songs both weirder and catchier. Of course I tried, in vain to get everyone to listen to this stuff, but no one would. Long story short, they were pretty big in a small kinda way, think the Toadies for points of comparison, and they made quite a few albums. None are in print any longer. You have to buy them used on Amazon. Why do things go out of print? Are CDs that expensive to keep in print? Is public taste that fickle? Anyway, if anyone wants my Boo Radleys self made best of, let me know and I'll make you a CD. I think its important that these guys stay somewhat known. -Johnson

if jazz had a viking

2006-02-16T19:13:00.000-05:00

If Jazz had a Viking, it would be Charles Mingus. He was a fucking maniac, and was all about beating down his audience and living in cold water flats, and being skitzo, and playing bass with clenched fists and writing self agrandizing autobiographies, and fucking shit up. You've never heard of him cause he's that good. Recommended listening: itunes music store: charles mingus: oh yeah, the whole fucking album, turn it up, turn up the bass and yell alot. Feels good, dont it? -Johnson

ride with lugs

2006-02-16T12:35:00.000-05:00

ride with lugs Jazz is gay.

ride with lugs

2006-02-16T12:30:00.000-05:00

I dont blog. Jazz is eterenally gay. Your bag looks sweet. I dont get to say that enough. Why should I ride with lugs. What will riding with lugs accomplish. What are you going to do, organize a ride but require confirmation of "lugs" before acceptance to said ride is advanced. Nazi. Somtimes I dont shower that often and I smell bad. I think you should make me a handlebar bag. I will give you money or something even. I need something that leaves rooms for my hands on the bars even when my hands are book-ending the stem. I dont always ride in the hoods. I never ride in the drops. In fact if my drops were taken from me beyond the visual que I would never know. Until maybe that one moment when cornereing fast swooping curves at forty plus, this happens infrequently, that I drop for the drops. I'm not sure I would notice immediately that they were gone, what with the smearing of my body across an uneven and corse landscape occupying my thoughts, if at this point you could call that kind of synapse firing thoughts, or later, if I survived, when I regain conciousness and ten years has passed.

prototype bag action

2006-02-15T21:32:00.000-05:00

Here's the beginning of our bag series (hopefully). No orders yet please. A few kinks need to be worked out. A few test rides to be had. I would also like to know if any fellow riders have suggestions or ideas about particular needs or features they'd like to see in future bike bags. Facts about the bag: Fabrics are as follows, waxed cotton(waxed in our oven, ED), waxed herringbone style wool suit from Goodwill. Leather and buckles from some guy in Maine, tanned by the most expensive processes you can git. Swanky swank and looks chocolatey delicious. None of that cheap-ass Coach like leather. Custom designed and hand sewn in Frederick, MD. OK, so obviously Mel is stoked on this bag. I am too. My fingers are close to bleeding from all the handstitching. It fits gobs of stuff, in the photo it has a heavy sweater and two long scarves in it, so thats pretty big if you think about it. It has external tie down abilities, so you could even go with more stuff, say anouther jacket. Very practical, not nearly as heavy as one would assume, and its very water resistant. The wool is waxed to, for further water repellant actions. Anyway, we think its smarter than those dumb trunk bags which look like soft cheap lunchboxes, and they need racks too. So we figure this thing will go for maybe, i dunno, 140ish, and its handmade, and one of a kind, and lighter and not much more expensive, if you figure a blackburn rack is 45 bucks and its heavy, and ugly, and aluminum, and not handmade, and a trunk bag is a pain to get on and off and there's velcro which wears out, and tears at your fingers (brass buckles feel great) and is made in china and is black and has zippers which jam, anyway, a topeak bag which is kinda middle of the line, as 60 bucks, so thats 105, not counting installation if you have yer rack installed +15 bucks, its heavier, uglier, not made to last ect ect. -Mel and Johnson

gerd and the va-j-js

2006-02-15T08:17:00.000-05:00

We went to the beach this weekend and played some music. Some of its regretable, but some might actually, oh never mind. Here's the link, and a recommended playlist... www.james.starmer.com/mp3s click on the beach bits zip, and when its done, toss it in itunes. then listen to these songs: dont you pray, its what i say, and this day, and maybe nothing else yet. and this day is a work in progress. It should noted, if you undertake the listening of this stuff, its all done in two takes or less, made up on the spot, with improvised lyrics, and many beers in the bellies. by the way...gerd is hans' middle name, and its also some sort of disorder, which we assume his dad knew being a doctor...hmmm. -johnson

gobs of cash money

2006-02-15T08:14:00.000-05:00

the venerable voice of reason seems to think that I would personally make these bikes, and that they would be ridden like bmx bikes, and that this will happen in the near future, and that I would even offer him a bike... These bikes are long term thinking, made after jerseys and bags and racks and jackets take off, which they probly wont, so the bikes are figments of whatever now. And the voice of reason wouldnt be my target market anyway, so pflmbbbbbbbbbt! -johnson

stick to the soft stuff!

2006-02-14T18:37:00.000-05:00

sounds great. don't mess with frames though. they're a bit out of your league. your skill is better suited to selling someone on a funny looking hat or bag your wife made. and it's dumb if you don't make the frame yourself anyway, and i would not ride a bike you made. but i would rock a sweet micro wedge saddle bag, or a tool roll out of some fine recycled sportscoat, waxed by hand in your oven.

cottage industry vs factory production

2006-02-13T15:08:00.000-05:00

So here's the plot as far as I can see. Homespun enviro/natural clothing/baggage/acessories developed by hand with no computers, just old school knowledge. Jerseys, arm warmers, tights, knickers, sweaters, harris tweed jackets, riding scarves, beanies, hunting caps, h bar bags, saddle bags, ect ect...I would also like to do a series of racks...thats way out though...maybe start with clothing and baggage, and go to racks, then bikes? but heres the plot seriously: develop this stuff personally, then take it to a small, independant, high quality american or canadian or english company...probally american, and get small lots made. very small. change stuff around, see what works. need money though. I can maybe get 10 grand by summer, but i'll wanna put at least 3 in savings, so thats 7 grand. if we can double that, we can do a jersey run, at least i should think. maybe two jerseys and a bag, that would be a good start. I think the cottage industry is on the move, i think people are realising that natural shit is the way to roll, nike is even making wool jerseys... theyre 120-150. I think they should be 100. theyre chinese... anyway. a harris tweed riding cap? perfect... we'll need a FREElance web designer, who maybe gets a jersey. think about it. I would like to do shoes too, maybe thats even more out there than frames. post ideas. lets talk. -johnson

stolen goods

2006-02-08T18:58:00.000-05:00

Grant Peterson mocks the new Bridgestone bikes... they are quite tawdry.. here's a link to an interview with Grant by Sheldon Brown, http://sheldonbrown.com/podcasts/grantpetersen.html but I'll throw out a few excepts for you lazy fucks. Grant: Yeah, but overall I'm a little bit disturbed by the shape of modern bikes these days. And I mean that probably literally. I mean I think that saddles are high and skinny and the tubes are sort of out of proprtion, at least for steel tubes. You know I look at them - I'm used to slender tubes on a bike and now, the tubes aren't really tubes anymore, and they all seem to have this similar look, you know that bladed high-volume carbon fiber look. Sheldon: I prefer the term 'plastic.' Grant: They are plastic, but you know, if they make people happy, that's good, but they aren't the kinds of bikes that make me happy. On the other hand it probably helps Rivendell because we don't have as much competition. .... Grant: I think the worst thing thats happening in bicycles these days and it's been happening for years is using racing and competition bicycles to sell bicycles to people who are not going to do that. I mean, it wouldn't happen in cars. You don't see people driving around in cars that people race on the dragstrip or in NASCAR cars but that's the kind of bike that people get on and ride. It's not a practical bike for everyday living, but people, I don't know, they get caught up in the excitement of racing, and in the bike industry, everyone is sort of fretting about "what's going to happen with road bike sales, now that Lance Armstrong is retired?" And that's a pathetic way to look at it. Normal people should be able to ride bikes and they should be able to be comfortable on a bike. Riding a bicycle is a fantastic thing, but if you have to dress like Lance (and I'm a Lance fan, by the way.) Sheldon: Oh, who isn't? Grant: If you have to dress like him and look like him and try to ride like him, you are not going to have a fun time on a bike. I would have a miserable - the most miserable rides I ever do are the ones where I try to go fast. I try to go fast about once a week, and those are the rides that I don't like. I'm caught up in it a little bit, and everybody is. Sheldon: It really bothers me, the concept that you need to wear special clothing to ride a bicycle. Grant: I think that's what keeps people off of bikes. If you had to wear an oddball uniform to go buy a McDonald's hamburger, McDonalds would go out of business. Sheldon: Good point. Grant: People who don't ride bikes now, want to ride a bike, but they don't want to have to change who they are and thier whole look. The look that you have may seem casual, what I'm wearing now may seem casual, but there's a certain amount of calculation in it. anyway, its availible as a podcast too, so check it out. QBP is gunna be releasing a Rivendell designed lugged 650b bike soon, that outta be hot. Keep yer eyes pealed... -Johnson

so last time i checked

2006-02-08T13:54:00.000-05:00

last time I checked, which was 1 minute ago, there are no other good blogs. I'm sure there are some that are hidden somewhere, but just click next blog and you get page after page of dumbass shit. I scrolled thru maybe 50 and couldnt find one that was even funny in its badness, much less really funny or informative or opinionated, mostly they were about sock collections and what color the garage door got painted last weekend. oh boy oh boy! fuck people! tackle an issue! tackle a joke! tackle an invalid and take a picture!

red box trot

2006-02-08T13:12:00.000-05:00

waddayathink? -johnson

on being a shop guy

2006-02-08T11:01:00.000-05:00

Here in Frederick we have a shop noted for its assholishness. They are mean to everyone. Customers regularly defect to other shops as a result. I never had good service in there, and I know what I am talking about, so wasnt bumbling around asking dumb questions. I was an ideal customer. "Howdy, how ya doing? I need some sis housing, about 5 feet and some ferrules, donuts and sis cables..." They gave me that are you a leper look... Anyway, the other day I needed to adjust my rear mech hanger, and they were my only option on short notice. One of the guys recognized me as being ex Under the Sun, and I was in. They joked with me, gave me free use of the shop, and I now get cost plus 10 on parts. What jerks. I didnt change, but my affiliations did, and I became part of the in crowd. Now they wave when I pass on the street. I use the discount, but I'd like to take this space to give them a low key but much need rasberry. -James

rivendell influence or no?

2006-02-07T11:53:00.000-05:00

Cory brought this bike to my attentions. He thought it was funny. I thought it was close to brilliant. I dont know how much it costs, and I'm too lazy to find out, but its got gobs of smart stuff, like a flip flop rear hub, moustache bars, silver rims and fenders with mudflaps. what it should have but doesnt, is silver cranks, a raked fork, rack mounts for the rear... and possibly cantilevers. Cory claims this bike would have come into being if Rivendell/Bridgestone never hit the scene. I say, yeah it would have came into being, but only in Japan. Anyway, its proof that Rivendell is still making waves, and that sometimes traditional ideas can make it onto the market in affordable and almost goodlooking format. -James

if you like it so much...

2006-02-07T11:44:00.000-05:00

why dont you send your record mechs to patagucci and let them make you a nice floral motif thong... i hear they're into recycling plastic. -James

james is a jackass

2006-02-07T11:40:00.000-05:00

i like capilene. its shiny. and smells funny, like me.

Band name contest

2006-02-07T10:50:00.000-05:00

Ok here it is, a few of us have a band that play fairly irregularly. You can here some stuff here. Currently were are going by the 92s but it doesn't really fit. If you can think of anything feel free to post it. If we pick your name we'll pick your nose. So we all win. Starmer

a little rational thought

2006-02-07T10:22:00.000-05:00

just so everyone knows, this isn't just about James and his crazy ideas. There are at least three other people here with as much or more expertise and certainly different crayz ideas. But when it comes down to it, we all just like to ride bikes. (and in the end we do pretty much all like cool old lugged steel bikes. some of us just think carbon is shiny too.) and somtimes technology can be our friend. (i don't always want to be on my lugged steel road bike.) -cory

comments up for grabs...

2006-02-07T10:16:00.000-05:00

all this is in response to my derailleur comparision article, a ways down the page...feisty... cummon people. Post new articles, comments are fine, but new articles are whats needed! -James starmer said... At some point don't you think we'll look back at that carbon mongoloid and think ah I remember the days before laser actuated drive trains those were the days. It seems like looking at those three versions of the same component might be kind of short sighted. You could just as easily look at them as a grouping of things that were back in the good old days. Meaning the derailleur as a tradition in itself. That might have sounded a little BSy but I'm just wondering at what point does the contemporary become traditional? This is probably a simple answer since I have only taken one art history class and I slept through it. Since you're trying to apply the idea of contemporary and traditional to bikes I'm kind of curious where you think the turning point is. Aluminum? Titanium? Luggless steel frames? And at what point does the newest bike goods make whats currently contemporary traditional. 3:19 PM Johnson said... Good Points. How do we get it so these comments arnt hidden? Traditional anything is a vauge and loose idea, and as such maybe doesnt have a strict definition. TRADITION: n 1: an inherited pattern of thought or action 2: a specific practice of long standing If we use this definition as a starting point at least, then we can view traditional bike elements as ideas that have been in circulation for an extended period of time. That means things like friction shifting, drop handlebars, clips and straps, and polished aluminum crank arms are traditional, while anodised parts, clipless pedals, and flat handlebars are contemporary ideas. So if we go by this, we can track the egress of technology over tradition part by part, year by year. What year were more riders riding clipless than clips and straps, and so on. So in that regard the "turning point" is a multifaceted idea, and shouldnt be regarded as a hard and fast date or event or product. Does that make sense? 4:26 PM voice of reason said... James, you are dumb. Every bit of art that you refer to that is traditional and now timeless was avante garde at some point. Hell the avante garde period is even traditional now! Starmer, you are right, maybe you learned something from your art history class through osmosis( you know falling asleep with your head on the book, and all that knowledge seeping into your skull.) Oh, and James again, I hate to tell you but anodizing is traditional now by your definition, as is the flat bar. And neither are contemporary as they have been superseded by powder coating and the carbon riser bar. And don't even get me started on you riding toe clips, cause they are dumb, dangerous, inefficient, and just a point of evolution in the move from a platform to a pedal that actually attaches you to your bike, and the evolution is surely not done yet. Oh, and chucks are the stupidest thing I've ever seen someone ride on a bike for more than a quarter mile. OK, there's a rant for you. Fortunately for you all and me too, it's all true. Man, it’s a good thing I got on this blog to straighten you all out! -Cory, an oft needed voice of reason. 9:42 AM Johnson said... By your definition there is no such thing as an avant garde period, as everything was avant garde once. Avant-Garde: adj. Of, relating to, or being part of an innovative group, especially one in the arts: avant-garde painters; an avant-garde theater piece. avant garde isnt even really an applicable term here. Unless we are talking about pedals as an art form. Which I suppose you could argue. Anywho- anodizing and flat bars are not traditional by def, as they havent held to the test of time. Only recently have things become hard anodized, and the light ano of the 90s is all but gone. Flat bars came into style in the early 90s and fell out soon there after. they are kinda back, kinda never went away, but no one rides them for anything but xc racing.

"Frustra fit per plura quod potest fieri per pauciora"

2006-02-07T09:24:00.000-05:00

Occam's (or Ockham's) razor is a principle attributed to the 14th century logician and Franciscan friar; William of Occam. Ockham was the village in the English county of Surrey where he was born. Occam's razor basically says "when you have two competing theories which make exactly the same predictions, the one that is simpler is the better." We can apply this to any number of things, but I like to rephrase it a bit, and say "when your have two bike parts that do the same job, the better looking one does that job better." Maybe thats totally wack. But I dont think so. We can also easily apply to other things, razors themselves being a good starting point. Mel has a really nice old razor, that uses replacable blades that you get ten of at cvs for 5 dollars. Its a two sided blade, so when one side gets clogged with hair, you just flip it over. There are no weird speed holes, or aloe flaps or pivots for shaving cream and small hairs to get built up in. Its easy to clean. Because it has a steel head and handle, it holds heat well, so it cuts smoothly. Having only one blade keeps it from over agitating your skin. Its a simple, elegant design that wasnt improved on for over 60 years. Needles to say it looks better than any current razor. We got it for a dollar at a yardsale. Now we have this five bladed expensive pile of bile...the mach 3 gives me a severe rash, I'd hate to see what this does...removes the first 3 layers of skin? -James

whatsallthisaboutanyway?

2006-02-07T07:56:00.000-05:00

Maxicar hubs are no longer made. To me, they are the most beautiful hubs in the history of hubs, beating out Phils, Pauls, Campys and Whites by a healthy margin. They were making unbreakable, gorgeous, sealed bearing, polished, servicable hubs before anyone else, and no one has gotten close since. Some of thier high flange hubs were designed so you could replace a driveside spoke without removing the freewheel. That is technology working for a better product, not for a better profit. That is what I am harping about. Shimano wouldnt dare make a hub that smart, that strong, the beautiful. Technology is supposed to be a better way to do something. So if contemporary technology isnt as smart or as good looking or strong or user friendly, doesnt that make it bad technology? I recently set up those mafacs. It took me 15 minutes for both wheels, and they look great, stop great, and will virtually never need adjusting. They clear fenders like a champ. There isnt a brake on the mainstream market that works this well, looks this good, costs so little. Its a shame, but its true. I dont know where I am going with this, but thats what this blog is supposed to explore. On a side note, Mel and I were discussing craftsmanship, which is a huge topic in this house, both of us being artists and all. We were recently in a store that used to be a bank, and they had a safe door from the 1870s. It was Incredible. It was all polished brass and steel, with engravings on the littlest parts and etchings on larger parts. This was a door that was designed to keep people out. It served a purely utilitarian function. No customers would have seen this incredible worksman ship. Yet it was there. Someone cared. And the part did its job. It reminded me of handlebars, and how they arnt engraved anymore. What a shame. What an incredible pleasure it was to look at handlebars from the 80s and 70s. Now theyre black anodized in italy to cover the crappy polish job the tiawanese did in drawing out the tubing...on that note let me end with this picture of an alex singer seat tube cluster...a new bike mind you...proof that some things are still right in this world.

this is what i have been talking about

2006-02-06T16:01:00.000-05:00

From a recent Campy ad in Bicycle Retailer: Campagnolo components are designed to interface exclusively with the Campagnolo drivetrain...Every component works in perfect sycronism with the others...Replacing just one component makes the whole thing shift like shit...I, er...here it really is... Replacing just one component means losing the perfect coupling of the parts (isnt that incest?) the fluid and silent shifting, and the superior performance of a complete Campy drivetrain. what assholes... This is exactly the kind of retarded product development we dont need. What if I dont want my parts to be black and plastic? I have to downgrade to Centuar, the only Campy group that can't be reconsituted into a Patagonia Fleece... -James

flogging a dead horse

2006-02-06T10:07:00.000-05:00

Maybe some of you are looking at this page and thinking, goddamn get a new subject. Well, ok, give me one, asshole. In the mean time, I did some research on dead horses, and how to flog them, and came up with the following solutions. Dakota tribal wisdom says that when you discover you are riding a dead horse, the best strategy is to dismount and walk. However, we often try other strategies with dead horses, including the following: 1. Buy a stronger whip. 2. Change riders. 3. Say things like, "This is the way we have always have ridden this horse." 4. Appoint a committee to study the horse. 5. Arrange to visit other sites to see how they ride dead horses. 6. Rewrite the standards for dead horse performance. 9. Compare the state of dead horses in today's environment. 10. Change the requirements, declaring that, "This horse is not dead. 12. Harness several dead horses together to increase speed and pulling power. 13. Declare that, "No horse is too dead to beat." 17. Declare the horse is "better, faster, and cheaper" dead. On that retarded note, I declare there are many ways to keep talking about one thing, but only if other people chime in, so I'm not a blithering withering monologue loving fuckface. Comprende? -James

newness vs oldness

2006-02-06T09:53:00.000-05:00

This is a BTP rear mech, out of Germany. Its plastic, and weighs 125 grams, and costs 720 dollars. It has no guarentee, but they warn that its highly suspetible to crashes. This is the Huret Jubilee rear mech, over 30 years old, lighter, and in mint condition, less than a third of the cost. And it looks better. Those toothless pulleys are dope.

ruminations on weight, old stuff, price and so on

2006-02-06T08:42:00.000-05:00

So I scored these mafacs at the swap for cheap, 10 bucks for both wheels. In terms of modern style, they seem damn rudimentary, even for 10 dollars. But they have tons of leverage, you can adjust them using no tools whatsoever, and they use traditional canti pads, which are thick and last forever. Set up is a bit of a hassle, but setting up Pauls is a hassle to, just of a different sort. You use a hammer and crecent wrench on the Mafacs, and a 14mm cone and 5mm allen on the Pauls. That being said, once the Mafacs are bent into shape, they never have to be fucked with again, while the Pauls have to be fucked with everytime you change the pads, which will be often, cause they use thin v-brake pads. Which are more expensive. The Mafacs also pivot on brass bushings, which I am a big fan of, as they need little to no maintenance. All that being said, I do like the Pauls, and I'm glad he's making them. I think they are the best looking modern canti on the market. Or should I say best looking contemporary canti...whatever. So as to the weight, the Mafacs are all steel, with all steel and brass hardware, and no allen fittings at all, so super crude. They still only weigh 20 grams more than the Pauls. I did some stupid math and figure they could be lighter than the Pauls if you switched all the bolts to ti, and they would still cost under what one Paul would cost at wholesale.

the economics of practicality, art, and longevity

2006-02-04T14:56:00.000-05:00

I've often wondered how the early 80s, known primarily for bad hair, bad clothing, bad music (with some exceptions) and bad drugs, could be responsible for the pinnacle of the production bicycle. Never before or since has the market supported and excepted a bicycle with such beauty, simplicity and usefulness, not to mention a bicycle with such supreme longevity that many are still being ridden in thier inital format. Add all this to the fact that early 80s bikes were affordable, and we are left in a state of dull shock. What happened? When did bike makers start making bikes that were next to useless and disposable in a matter of a few years, if not a single season. I know a few cyclocrossers and roadies who would insist on a new bike every season. Unfortunately these "old" bikes are more or less relegated to the scrap heap, because the racer believes, maybe rightly, that they need every last advantage to win, which means a new bike with new lighter bits every season. Ironically, on a side note, the french have been making 15lbs bikes for 40 years, many of which are still ridden hundreds of miles every year. 15 lbs is still the benchmark for a light bike, so even with all this ti and carbon disposable crap, no one has bettered the French on the subject of light bikes that stay ridable through time. Case in point, the Huret Jubilee rear mech. Its gobs lighter than even the lightest, most tuned Campy Record Carbon. And it looks better. What gives? You'd think with computers and all that they could make a lighter mech, but no. Whats that say? I dont have an answer yet... As you might be able to asertain, I ramble so bear with me. I wrote a bunch of notes on this article, but I havent even looked at them yet. Ok, I looked. They make some sense too. Who knew. Ok the first reason is an economic one. The yen was low and the dollar high in the early 80s, so Japanese craftsmanship was cheap, which led to affordable jems like this Miyata. Shimano had gotten over copying Campy stuff, but that was ok cause thier early 80s designs were still nice and had a good finish. Suntour was making the best shifting rear mechs out there, with their slant parallelogram rear mech, and Sugino was (and still does) making strong, light cranks that were dirt cheap. All this meant that technology was reaching a point where it was still ascetically pleasing but more functional and affordable than it had ever been. Technology like hollow forged cranks, index shifting, and all that stuff we think of today as being new, racer technology, had been around on french touring bikes for 35 years or more, but only with the Japanese mastery of this technology was it made availible to a wider audience. Ironically the french makers who had been pioneers were now being supersceded by high quality overseas copycats, who were not only copying old ideas, but making drastic inroads at improvement. This will be continued and made more convoluted later, its lunch time. -James