Bikes | RandoTips

The Broken Seatpost

I take a long time to learn my lesson.

There are plenty of documented times when bike maintenance should have been done, but didn’t get done, resulting in a not-so-good ride. There are other times when I’ve done some slightly crazier offroad riding and broken parts, which is to be expected, and that is all in good fun.

But this time the blame falls squarely on crappy bike parts.

The Start

I was heading off on a ride early in the morning, I started at 4:15, which was a little later than planned, but that’s par for the course.

The destination was the 600m peak of the hill between Shrding and Pinglin on the 106A. To get there I had to head off towards Nangang, pass by Academia Sinica Road then head on.

Now, the most obvious way to Shrding is by going over the 109, but I wanted to try something new. With Google street view on hand I planned a decent looking route over a smaller road that would achieve the same elevation, but add some variety to my ride.

A Little Lost

The main turnoff to the road up the hill was where the Google car had decided to go the other way, so I was on my own to figure out which roads went where.

I made it through the first intersection unscathed, keeping to the left and avoiding a detour to a deadend in the middle of nowhere. But my luck would change.

Later I was faced with a similar choice.

The road to the right didn’t seem to have any more lights while the road that dropped sharply to the left was well lit. So I took the path down.

Grab a Fistful

Something I love about roads in Taiwan is that there is no maximum grade. If that’s where the road has to go, then that’s where it has to go.

Back in South Africa there were some steep hills, but they were all limited in how much they would challenge my breaks when needed.

So on the way down this “little” road down I ended up braking so hard that I had to carefully alternate front and rear brakes to give them time to recover from the glazing over that occurs during heavy, continuous braking.

And…

It was the wrong turn…

just a dead end…

should’ve taken the other turn, so I had to slog back up after trying to check my location on the map (BTW a map on your phone is only really useful if you have a GPS to pinpoint your location, duh, I don’t have a GPS).

So up I went, kept following the road, the lights returned and then I started heading down.

The Bang

Riding in the dark requires and abnormal amount of trust in the state of the road you are riding on.

Very few bike lights will light up enough road to allow for evasive maneuvers when travelling at 30kmph+

So I was following the road as usual, keeping to the parts of the road I could see, or at the very least not riding off the edge of the road.

When I spotted a construction team I had to change tact and move left into a darker area….

Whack…

Slide…

Quick recover…

Although my front wheel made a big move to the right I did manage to stabilize and continue.

But something wasn’t right. The saddle felt strange. I put it down to the seat being shifted slightly during the little incident that just occurred. I continued, and finished a wonderful ride to the top of the big hill.

Holiday Time!

So I headed back to the office and went off to the Taipei main station for a slightly early holiday (on a Thursday, a got the day wrong in the video).

Disassembling my bike outside the bus terminal and shock and horror I see my seatpost is bent, no quick realignment of the saddle needed, but a full replacement of the seatpost. And this is the third one I’ve had that’s bent, just none of the others have bent so far.

The insanity is that until more recently Giant have insisted on installing 27.2mm seatposts with a big old shim, whereas the inner diameter of the seat tube is actually made for a 30.9mm seatpot without a shim. Dumb, dumb, dumb, raise the skinny one to a height suitable for me, put my fat ass on the saddle and the poor seatpost doesn’t have a chance.

Well, all should be good and well in seatpost land from now on.

Here’s hoping.

Conquer the Rain: The F Word

Rear fender & mud flap

They beat me to the ground, kicked me aside and called me a “wuss”, but inside I was warm and smiling.

As far back as I can remember there has been a stigma against certain bike parts. Bits of bicycle artillery that through poor development, genetic disposition, social stigma or just plain bad luck, have permanently slipped away from the realm of “real” cyclists. Bicycle indicator lights, rear view mirrors, bells, horns, even full panniers are seldom seen on bikes ridden by “serious” cyclists. To install such things would lose friends and possibly end if physical harm for offending those higher up the coolness ladder.

But are those things really so uncool?

Being stuck inside on rollers because of the rain is not fun and it’s been like that for a few weeks now. It’s been at least a few weeks since I managed a long ride and it’s depressing. But how can I get out in the rain?

Traditional Wisdom

Traditional answers to riding in the rain have proved lacking.

Just get wet is the first choice. You’re hard, just stick it out, be tough. Uh, sorry but suffering for nothing doesn’t make sense. Works fine if it’s balmy 30C outside, but not when it’s getting to the low teens. Staying dry is also helps keep warm.

So keep dry. A whole slew of waterproof gear is available, but with high-tech materials like GoreTex, you’re pushing big budgets for a full set of gear. But you’re still getting really wet, and simply holding the enemy at bay.

On the cheaper end, a 7-11 disposable raincoat actually does a pretty damn good job at keeping the upper body dry. Underneath that plastic bag almost any combination of layers of clothing will warm you up enough. But what about the legs?

Legs just aren’t designed for being wrapped in bags. Feet can handle bags, but they will wear through in less than an hour or two or solid riding in the wet and rain. Once the water seeps in, all is lost. They will not dry, even if you ride them in the glorious light of the warm sun for the rest of the day. And legs will get drenched, the splash from the front wheel spraying up covers the legs and deposits most of itself on your shoes. Same goes for the spray from the back wheel that will strike the seat tube and join forces with the evil front spray to thwart even your boldest efforts at keeping dry.

But what if you could keep the rain from reaching you in first place? What if instead of hand to hand combat against the foe, you could simply lift the drawbridge and leave him shouting at you in your safe haven? What if all our current schemes have been fatally flawed from the start?

The Hero

The hero of our story arrives. In gleaming armor he steps up to claim his honor.

But he needs some introduction, because he has been neglected and put aside for quite a while now. Now, bikes in Taiwan are used much more as commuting machines than back in South Africa, flat roads and close proximity to the places you need to go make it very easy to do a short ride instead of a long walk. They’re also very cheap and practical, keeping them well clear of the fads that sweep the world of fancy bikes.

Bells are cool, flat pedals are cool, single gears are cool, low prices are cool, racks are cool, front baskets are cool, upright riding positions are cool and so are… fenders.

And as it turns out, the fender is the long-lost hero and the key hours of unadulterated pleasure in the rain. This unsung hero will stop almost all the water before it even gets to you. Clean little raindrops are an easy force to deal with when the onslaught of streams of muddy grime don’t even make their way into the picture.

So that is my next accessory. I’m gonna geekify my ride, add long mud flaps and just kit my beast out with the most killer rain-stopping accessories known to mankind. They’re still in the works, but when they’re done I’ll have a full report back. I’m looking forward to some seriously geeky fun.

I might never be cool again, but that’s okay, ’cause it will be a “happily ever after”.

[Here’s a nice link about fenders http://www.sheldonbrown.com/fenders.html. And a design for mudflaps linked to from there http://phred.org/~alex/bikes/fendermudflap.html ]

First image credit, Second image credit

Cargo Bikes

While stumbling around the Internet, looking for interesting cycling stuff I stumbled upon this blog here.

The blog is about a family in the US who completely gave up their car and attempted to live with bicycles as their sole form of transport. A pretty lofty goal in a country which is not particularly designed for that lifestyle, unlike Amsterdam and other such European countries.

One of their big helpers was the cargo bike.

What is a cargo bike?

A cargo bike is designed to carry a whole lot of stuff. It is designed from the start to support very heavy and very big loads.

The Yuba Mundo shown above is designed to carry up to 200kgs. The whole rear triangle is stretched backward to provide greater stability with increased load. The large rack is a part of the frame and it comes with a double-kickstand, perfect for loading on a few bags of cement. The folks from the blog mentioned above moved a washing machine and drier on one bike so it can take a fair bit of strain.

The other kind of load when dealing with a family is kids.

The bike featured above is strong enough and long enough to take two bike seats, so you can drag two little mites with. With Christina and Christopher I have my eye on this bike. Christopher at only 6 months is probably still a little young to go for a ride, but this makes a nice getaway vehicle for when he gets a little older.

Great for shopping and carting

I am very impressed with this bike. The model shown above costs USD$1,100 which is still expensive but much cheaper than any other bike in the same category. The kid seats are USD$150 each.

The utility of this bike makes a lot of sense. Here in Taiwan, long distances are never an issue, with most things being within a few kilometers of home. The only issues is the extreme summer heat and making sure a unique bike like this stays locked up.

If I had enough money to spare I might actually go for one of these. I would have to admit I’d put the money into my own bike stuff first, but this would make a great extra bike and perhaps when the kids are a year older it will look that much more appealing.