Hey, I never followed up on my 60-degrees-and-raining commute post.
Conclusion: Long sleeve jersey (thin merino wool), rain jacket, and baggy shorts are fine, bordering on too warm.
The next day was a 50 degree ride through dense fog. I had forgotten one little aspect of fog: It makes you wet. I frequently had to wipe the front of my glasses down with my gloves, and it was chilly--right at the point where I was pondering to pull out my jacket, but not quite enough to motivate me to do it. Plus I was running late and didn't want to stop.
One of the things about riding in the cold--you can feel fine while on the bike because your core remains warm, but when you change at work, notice that your skin feels quite cold to the touch. After a few minutes at work, the chill starts sinking in deeper....I'm generally much colder 20 minutes after a ride than during. I may start leaving a jacket at work (where I am normally quite warm).
Did some mountain biking again yesterday, I was finally able to coordinate with my rother and get him on the trails again. We hit John Bryan State Park and did 8.5 miles or so, at roughly half the speed I commute to work. That's a pretty simple trail, and I am quite slow on it. I have concluded that it's hard to actually be bad at road biking, but it's pretty easy to be bad at mountain biking. It's still fun, though. Oh, and there were some very attractive women hiking. Maybe I should take up hiking.
Oh, on the way back I had to purchase gas. I was on the same tank from Aug 28 to Oct 11, so the driving less seems to be working for me.
Sunday, October 12, 2008
Tuesday, October 7, 2008
More saddle problems
Well, the lacing of the Brooks seemed to be successful at first...but now it's too soft toward the back, where there are no laces. Not wanting to destroy the saddle by less-than-judicious twisting of the tension bolt, I have posted to Bikeforums for advise.
In other news, the commute tomorrow morning will be cool and rainy. Not sure how I'll handle the clothing issues...it will be (according to weather.com) 59 degrees and raining, so I will have a thin wool jersey with my rain shell over it, but for the lower body I'm not sure. Baggy shorts by themselves might make me a bit cold, but if I wear rain pants over them I have a feeling I will be sitting in a mobile sweatbox for the entire ride. I could try lycra shorts and wool tights I guess, but I have a feeling that would be the worst of both worlds-too warm from the insulation and soaking wet from the rain (though given the choice, I think I would rather be soaked by rain than trapped in my own sweat (as long as the rain isn't too cold)).
This is a difficult time of year to dress for, I always have to choose between being being pretty sweaty in the morning or being uncomfortably cold on the whole ride in.
Maybe or some of the dry rides I should wear two layers of jerseys and forsake the wind shell.
Update: The plan is to wear the baggies and pack the rain pants. If it gets chilly, I can pull the pants on, so the wind will be blocked and I'll be a bit insulated. If not....well, they aren't very heavy and they take up little room in my trunk bag.
In other news, the commute tomorrow morning will be cool and rainy. Not sure how I'll handle the clothing issues...it will be (according to weather.com) 59 degrees and raining, so I will have a thin wool jersey with my rain shell over it, but for the lower body I'm not sure. Baggy shorts by themselves might make me a bit cold, but if I wear rain pants over them I have a feeling I will be sitting in a mobile sweatbox for the entire ride. I could try lycra shorts and wool tights I guess, but I have a feeling that would be the worst of both worlds-too warm from the insulation and soaking wet from the rain (though given the choice, I think I would rather be soaked by rain than trapped in my own sweat (as long as the rain isn't too cold)).
This is a difficult time of year to dress for, I always have to choose between being being pretty sweaty in the morning or being uncomfortably cold on the whole ride in.
Maybe or some of the dry rides I should wear two layers of jerseys and forsake the wind shell.
Update: The plan is to wear the baggies and pack the rain pants. If it gets chilly, I can pull the pants on, so the wind will be blocked and I'll be a bit insulated. If not....well, they aren't very heavy and they take up little room in my trunk bag.
Friday, October 3, 2008
Winter's coming...
Well, the time that I can leave work without lights on has officially passed. Before leaving, I always set my Planet Bike Superflash and home built LED headlamp to flash--the headlamp must be dimmed from max brightness before setting it to flash, otherwise it could blind oncoming cars. It's is really bright.
I turn off the headlight when I get to the rail trail now, but I turn it back on before I get home--it just gets too dark for me to feel good about biking without it. It's doubtful I would see a fallen branch that would end my fun pretty quickly.
Night rides are definitely exciting every now and then, but I have a feeling that lonely rides down a deserted trail will begin to wear on me before too long. Maybe I should look into alternate routes that are slightly more urban--though between 7:00 and 8:00 when I'm on the road, it's likely they would be travelled a little too well for my tastes.
Temperatures have been as low as 50 when I've left for work in the morning, and I've been fine with baggy MTB shorts, light long sleeve jersey, a wind shell, and some thin long-fingered MTB gloves. Another 5 degrees and I'll have to add some lower body covering though. I'm thinking of carrying a pair of rain pants in my trunk bag all the time in case I get chilled on a ride--they are made to fit over regular clothing so I wouldn't have any problems there. Until it dips below 40 I'm not too worried about being chilled though. We'll see what my coworkers think when I come in wearing tights.
I was tryingto figure out what to do about foot warmth this year, and decided I'd just swap out my Eggbeater Candy SLs with some cheap MKS rat trap pedals from Rivendell. Then I'll just wear my hiking boots with some wool socks (I bet they'll look awesome with tights).
I've been pretty successful at biking recently, I have over a hundred miles more logged on the bike than in the truck for last month--I'll have to figure up the exact total later. But at the current rate of gas consumption, I would only have to fill up 6 times a year. Not quite car free, but definitely moving in that direction.
One thing I experienced for the first time on Monday: Commuting home in a nighttime thunderstorm. It started to rain right as I got to an underpass on the bike trail, so I stopped and dug out my rain jacket/wind shell. It works pretty well, and it was still in the 60s so I didn't regret my lack of rainproof pants. It wasn't too windy, but the rain did come down for a while--enough to make it exciting, with some flashes of lighting in the distance.
Interestingly, when the rain ended I discovered that I could see the paved surface of the trail exactly as well with my headlight on as with it off. The headlight did illuminate the sides of the trail, but that wasnt' really necessary. It should be noted though that nighttime rides in rain while wearing glasses aren't great if tehre's traffic about--I need to wear some sort of goggles in that case so I can wipe the water off.
I suppose that's all I have for now, more to come next week.
Saturday, September 27, 2008
Burley Update
Some things I didn't mention the first time around:
One downside of the Burley is they even though it has a cover, it's not completely waterproof. I would not be surprised is water could come in through the bottom around the wheels, and I know for a fact that spray from the rear wheel frequently gets thrown under the front flap and into the cargo compartment--even with full coverage fenders.
The push/pull I mentioned definitely seems to come from the tow bar flexing. I loaded it up with 80lbs of cat liter today (and a few small items) and rocked it back and forth, and could definitely se flex. I don't think it's really anything to worry about though, and it's really only noticeable on roads that are crappy and have deep cracks at regular intervals.
The trailer handles just fine with 80lbs of cargo. Definitely slower, and you will pay for any attempts at ast acceleration, but decent top speeds on the flats and high top speeds on the downhills are the norm. Much slower when going uphill, but that's why the Long Hual Trucker has a 26x32 granny gear (though I didn't even need to use the granny ring today, and I don't think I even used the 32 in the back.
Top speed with the trailer today was 26.4, top speed with it loaded was 26, ride length was 12.21 miles.
One thing to be careful of: The trailer rides so smoothly sometimes that it's possible to forget how heavy it is, but it definitely takes a toll on braking. And mounting the bike when facing downhill, it is more vital to clamp down on the brake levers.
That said, I really want to get one of the Rans Hammer Trucks this spring, as shown by Commute by Bike. I was disappointed when I first learned what they aren't compatible with Xtracycle parts, but they also have a much higher cargo capacity, so I guess that's a win. I was never a huge fan of the crank forward bikes before, but this seems like an ideal application. I'll have to go about 30 miles to get to a RANS dealer though to test ride one to see if it works for me. But hey, I think I should be able to get there by bike, so I can score poiunts with myself at least.
Oh, I also forgot to attach the third pic of my trailer shopping trip the other day, it does a bit better job of showing how much it was carrying:
One downside of the Burley is they even though it has a cover, it's not completely waterproof. I would not be surprised is water could come in through the bottom around the wheels, and I know for a fact that spray from the rear wheel frequently gets thrown under the front flap and into the cargo compartment--even with full coverage fenders.
The push/pull I mentioned definitely seems to come from the tow bar flexing. I loaded it up with 80lbs of cat liter today (and a few small items) and rocked it back and forth, and could definitely se flex. I don't think it's really anything to worry about though, and it's really only noticeable on roads that are crappy and have deep cracks at regular intervals.
The trailer handles just fine with 80lbs of cargo. Definitely slower, and you will pay for any attempts at ast acceleration, but decent top speeds on the flats and high top speeds on the downhills are the norm. Much slower when going uphill, but that's why the Long Hual Trucker has a 26x32 granny gear (though I didn't even need to use the granny ring today, and I don't think I even used the 32 in the back.
Top speed with the trailer today was 26.4, top speed with it loaded was 26, ride length was 12.21 miles.
One thing to be careful of: The trailer rides so smoothly sometimes that it's possible to forget how heavy it is, but it definitely takes a toll on braking. And mounting the bike when facing downhill, it is more vital to clamp down on the brake levers.
That said, I really want to get one of the Rans Hammer Trucks this spring, as shown by Commute by Bike. I was disappointed when I first learned what they aren't compatible with Xtracycle parts, but they also have a much higher cargo capacity, so I guess that's a win. I was never a huge fan of the crank forward bikes before, but this seems like an ideal application. I'll have to go about 30 miles to get to a RANS dealer though to test ride one to see if it works for me. But hey, I think I should be able to get there by bike, so I can score poiunts with myself at least.
Oh, I also forgot to attach the third pic of my trailer shopping trip the other day, it does a bit better job of showing how much it was carrying:
Thursday, September 25, 2008
Burley Nomad
As promised, the possibly long-awaited Burley Nomad review. I'm going to pretend that you're all interested and rapt with attention, so bear with me here.
OK, the Burley Nomad:
http://www.burley.com/products/adventure/nomad.cfm
Narrow enough to fit through a door, light enough that it doesn't kill you by itself, and carries 100lbs.
Here are a few pictures from my last shopping trip (try not to judge me by the food:
As you can see, it holds quite a decent amount of groceries even though the front section could have held quite a bit more. I usually don't use the divider (if it's not velcroed around the crossbar it just lays flat) but I decided that my bag of salad and bagels probably didn't need things on top of them.
How does it handle? Pretty well! Making extreme right turns can cause the wheel to hit the towing bar, but that rarely happens to me--and never will at high speed. Left turns are limited only by the bicycle's turning radius. The way the tow bar attaches, the trailer rides a little bit to the left--the right wheel of the trailer lines up pretty close to the wheels of your bike when going straight down the road. Very convenient as it means if you move over to let a car pass, you don't really have to worry about the trailer falling off the edge of the road. I suppose it's less convenient in countries where they drive on the wrong side of the road, but that's what they get for being weird.
I have mentioned before that on crappy pavement it feels funny. The road that I take to Kroger has lots of cracks in it, and riding along it feels like there's some push/pull aaction from the trailer--I don't know if this is the tow bar flexing or if it's simply the trailer pushing and pulling slightly as the wheels ride up and down the breaks in the pavement. I've come to believe it is the latter.
One has to give a little extra room when cornering, obviously, since like a car trailer it will have a shorter turning radius than the bike.
I have also used a BOB trailer before, an old discontinued model called the Coz. The only difference in the Coz and the Ibex seems to be the way they carry cargo--the Ibex has an open cargo area where one is meant to put a dry bag, and the Coz just has a rubbermaid container bolted onto the bare frame. Handling and attachment should be identical though.
The #1 advantage of the BOB over the Burley is that due to the attachment system and the articulating yoke, it will follow the back wheel almost exactly through turns. This means that you don't have to take turns any wider, and it can be used while mountain biking (very useful for carrying trail tools). The fact that it has only a single wheel in back also makes it narrower, and the whole trailer tilts along with the bike when cornering.
The BOB requires a special skewer to attach to the bike, the Burley needs nothing special to attach, it has a special clamp that fits on the left side of the rear triangle. Note that this means it woin't work on a bike with disc brakes, they make an adapter to attach to the skewer in this case, but I have no experience with it.
The Burley ca be easily attached whether empty or fully loaded, and it's designed so that the tongue weight should only be 10% of the total load weight. BOBs are not supposed to be attached when loaded (and it's really hard to do anyway), and transfer more of the total load weight to the rear wheel of the bike. Burleys also have a higher maximum load, 100lbs vs 50lbs. For touring, this shouldn't make much of a difference, but I like to take mine when I go to buy big bags of cat litter, so higher weigh limits are welcome.
I think when pulling the Burley I get more room from cars. I think this is partly because it sticks out more into the traffic lane and partly because people think it might be a child trailer. For some reason it's OK to hit adult cyclists, but it's not OK to hit kids.
I would definitely recommend the Burley for shopping and touring, but I still think an Xtracycle would have advantages--hopefully I'll be able to build one up by spring and report back. I suppose I could always have an Xtracycle and a trailer attached, but I think that would get a little heavy.
I should go to work soon, so I guess I'll cut this off here.
OK, the Burley Nomad:
http://www.burley.com/products/adventure/nomad.cfm
Narrow enough to fit through a door, light enough that it doesn't kill you by itself, and carries 100lbs.
Here are a few pictures from my last shopping trip (try not to judge me by the food:
As you can see, it holds quite a decent amount of groceries even though the front section could have held quite a bit more. I usually don't use the divider (if it's not velcroed around the crossbar it just lays flat) but I decided that my bag of salad and bagels probably didn't need things on top of them.
How does it handle? Pretty well! Making extreme right turns can cause the wheel to hit the towing bar, but that rarely happens to me--and never will at high speed. Left turns are limited only by the bicycle's turning radius. The way the tow bar attaches, the trailer rides a little bit to the left--the right wheel of the trailer lines up pretty close to the wheels of your bike when going straight down the road. Very convenient as it means if you move over to let a car pass, you don't really have to worry about the trailer falling off the edge of the road. I suppose it's less convenient in countries where they drive on the wrong side of the road, but that's what they get for being weird.
I have mentioned before that on crappy pavement it feels funny. The road that I take to Kroger has lots of cracks in it, and riding along it feels like there's some push/pull aaction from the trailer--I don't know if this is the tow bar flexing or if it's simply the trailer pushing and pulling slightly as the wheels ride up and down the breaks in the pavement. I've come to believe it is the latter.
One has to give a little extra room when cornering, obviously, since like a car trailer it will have a shorter turning radius than the bike.
I have also used a BOB trailer before, an old discontinued model called the Coz. The only difference in the Coz and the Ibex seems to be the way they carry cargo--the Ibex has an open cargo area where one is meant to put a dry bag, and the Coz just has a rubbermaid container bolted onto the bare frame. Handling and attachment should be identical though.
The #1 advantage of the BOB over the Burley is that due to the attachment system and the articulating yoke, it will follow the back wheel almost exactly through turns. This means that you don't have to take turns any wider, and it can be used while mountain biking (very useful for carrying trail tools). The fact that it has only a single wheel in back also makes it narrower, and the whole trailer tilts along with the bike when cornering.
The BOB requires a special skewer to attach to the bike, the Burley needs nothing special to attach, it has a special clamp that fits on the left side of the rear triangle. Note that this means it woin't work on a bike with disc brakes, they make an adapter to attach to the skewer in this case, but I have no experience with it.
The Burley ca be easily attached whether empty or fully loaded, and it's designed so that the tongue weight should only be 10% of the total load weight. BOBs are not supposed to be attached when loaded (and it's really hard to do anyway), and transfer more of the total load weight to the rear wheel of the bike. Burleys also have a higher maximum load, 100lbs vs 50lbs. For touring, this shouldn't make much of a difference, but I like to take mine when I go to buy big bags of cat litter, so higher weigh limits are welcome.
I think when pulling the Burley I get more room from cars. I think this is partly because it sticks out more into the traffic lane and partly because people think it might be a child trailer. For some reason it's OK to hit adult cyclists, but it's not OK to hit kids.
I would definitely recommend the Burley for shopping and touring, but I still think an Xtracycle would have advantages--hopefully I'll be able to build one up by spring and report back. I suppose I could always have an Xtracycle and a trailer attached, but I think that would get a little heavy.
I should go to work soon, so I guess I'll cut this off here.
Monday, September 22, 2008
Useful new knowledge
Still no internet so I am posting from my phone again, excuse the brevity.
Discovered something quite useful the other day and have been able to duplicate it twice. I can trip traffic lights with the Long Haul Trucker. Must be the combination of steel frame and rims. Definitely makes handling non-busy intersections easier.
The technique that has worked for me is to pretty much park right on top of the sensor loop along the right side. Considering that I have waited through 2+ cycles if these lights when nitrate on the sensors, this is a definite time saver.
Working on a writeup on the Burley trailer for whenever internet returns.
Discovered something quite useful the other day and have been able to duplicate it twice. I can trip traffic lights with the Long Haul Trucker. Must be the combination of steel frame and rims. Definitely makes handling non-busy intersections easier.
The technique that has worked for me is to pretty much park right on top of the sensor loop along the right side. Considering that I have waited through 2+ cycles if these lights when nitrate on the sensors, this is a definite time saver.
Working on a writeup on the Burley trailer for whenever internet returns.
Thursday, September 18, 2008
reason for not updating
havent een able to post this week since hurricane ike took out my internet.
i dont know at exactly what point hurricanes became a threat to ohio, but it is not my favorite thing to ever happen.
hopefully i will have cable back soon, being without internet access is quite annoying. not to mention the savagery of being reduced to broadcast tv.
by the way, i am updating from my phone, so that explains the lack of caps and proper punctuation.
i dont know at exactly what point hurricanes became a threat to ohio, but it is not my favorite thing to ever happen.
hopefully i will have cable back soon, being without internet access is quite annoying. not to mention the savagery of being reduced to broadcast tv.
by the way, i am updating from my phone, so that explains the lack of caps and proper punctuation.
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