The new forums will be named Coin Return (based on the most recent
vote)! You can check on the status and timeline of the transition to the new forums
here.
The Guiding Principles and New Rules
document is now in effect.
I Want To Ride My Bicycle [Bike Thread]
Posts
in 1 you get 1-4, 2 you can use 'em all and 3 you get 5-8. Basically top half/bottom half with the extreme up front. Crossing over (1-8 or 3-1) is called cross chaining I believe.
I slowed down and rolled through. It's not like I just blew through it.
Fucking pig.
I just built a new bike with the frame I posted in the OP, I will have pictures of it as soon as my digital camera returns to my possession, but in the meantime... hoo boy is 47x17 a lot steeper than I remembered. Or my new hills and extra 3lbs of bike are just too much for me now.
EDIT: Marshall, I didn't see your question, but the answer is: don't. Bikes hate being outside, and no amount of cover will stop moisture from condensing and ruining all your moving parts eventually. Make room inside somehow.
Late, but if you're reassembling, SRAM powerlinks are great. A lot less hassle than shimano-style replacement rivets, and you don't have to buy new ones every time you split the chain.
Rule #1) Don't buy a chain delinker from Walmart. Seriously.
Rule #2) Look, if the old chain is a rusty piece of shit that's going straight to the garbage, just use bolt cutters on it.
Rule #3) If the new chain has a master link, just use that instead. I mean, why make it hard on yourself?
I broke each of these rules. To be fair, I didn't have any bolt cutters.
But I should have replaced this thing sooner; it almost feels like a new bike. I didn't realize how bad it had gotten. Now if only my rear derailer wasn't a piece of crap...
I recently bought a Park chain tool. I don't know what took me so long. I'v only used it once so far and I still consider it 30 bucks well spent.
took out her barrettes and her hair spilled out like rootbeer
Seconded x 1 million. I'd gone through four other chain tools before buying the Park one (mainly the little shelves that the chain sits on snapping, but sometimes the handle, sometimes the main threaded bit). The Par one is so much better than any other one it's hard to express. CT-5, to be precise:
It's the only time I've sent mail to a company to say "thanks for making such a great product".
Ride? Most recent one I built up was from an old Catamount URT dual-suspension frame I made into a fixed-gear -- I'd been riding it singlespeed before but thought I should give it a try fixed in honour of Sheldon. Conclusion? Downhills _suck much ass_ -- it's geared 32:18 because I'm a wuss uphill on trails, but it's just stupidly spinny downhill..
Picture (from this winter, thus the snow)
(Normally I'm commuting on an old beat-up $5 thrift store bike I turned into a fixed-gear; that's running 52:21 or something, which is tough on uphills but manageable downhill; when it's nice and sunny, there's a lovely '86 Marinoni Special that comes out, a BMX when I want to frustrate myself, and an old geared '93 steel Specialized S-works for when my knees are sore)
oooo.
got a pic?
took out her barrettes and her hair spilled out like rootbeer
I used to have a dura-ace rear cassette (I do a lot of riding, in fast paced groups, over long distance so it made sense)
the teeth wore out (of course) and I ended up "Settling" for a nice SRAM rear cassette and chain.
It's weighs slightly more than the dura-ace but less than an ultegra and honestly who cares about a few grams here and there. It's really nice, cost me under 40 bucks, & the SRAM chain is sweet. Their power link is way better than Shimano.
Save a few bucks (more like 100 in this case) and go SRAM if you are re-doing the drive train.
And yes, in Idaho, you can actually treat stop signs AND STOP LIGHTS as yields. Very progressive.
P.S. Don't buy anything at Wal-Mart for a bike! You can buy a cheap chain breaker at any bike store for under 20 bucks (even 10 at some places) and it will pull a chain off quicker than you can cut it. When you cut it you have to use some muscle, that's just silly. They sell bikes with PLASTIC DERAILLEURS at Wal-Mart..... not a place for bikes.
The derailleurs and shifters on my bike are all Shimano LX, the cassette and chain are SRAM. Shimano chains and cassettes don't seem to last too well.
If I ever get around to upgrading it, it'll probably be with SRAM parts.
The girlfriend and I bought POS mountain bikes from Wal-Mart. We're both overweight and are working on losing it. We both liked to bike when we were younger, plus there are some nice bike paths, trails and lanes around here (college campus FTW). However, due to my large size, I blew out the back inner-tube after being on the bike all of 45 seconds. Is there some kind of better / stronger / what the hell ever tire or tube I can buy that will support my fat ass, or am I doomed to ride the stationary bike in the apartment complex weight room for the next six months?
I just got a new bike, I fucking love it. It's a Trek 7200, 22.5 inch frame (I'm 6'3). It was around 530$, which was a lot for me, I'm 17. I really want to take care of this bike.
Problem: I don't know anything about bikes.
I plan on riding around 5 or 6 miles around every day, around every 3 days I'll ride around 16 miles. So, what kind of maintenance do I need to be doing? What kind of stuff should I be checking every now and then, adjusting, etc.? Thanks.
That honestly sounds downright defective, assuming the tubes were full of air first and that you don't weigh upwards of three hundred pounds. I'd say go see if they'll give you a free new pair of tubes.
The tires called for a max of 55 psi and knowing my girth (I don't own a scale out of fear, but I'd bet I'm pushing three bills) and I pumped them to 52ish (just short of 55, basically). The front tire/tube is fine. I think my campus bike shop replaces them for like $5 or something, I'll probably give that at least one try before worrying a lot.
Yeah, sounds like a bad tube. Knowing walmart quality, it's not surpirising. A decent bike shop tube should do you just fine. I wouldn't bother going back to walmart.
If you have a lot of weight on your tires for whatever reason, the best thing to do is keep them inflated to the proper psi. Don't worry about staying under the max, they are really conservative with those numbers. You could probably inflate it to 100+ before it burst (assuming the tube isn't defective). The reason why you want to keep them properly inflated is that tube are more prone to flats when they are under-inflated and have weight on them. Plus they roll better.
If you are still having problems with blowouts or flats, the other thing you could do would be to buy wider tires. I use wider tires on my commuter for exactly this reason.
Also, if you plan on staying on paved roads, look at getting some smooth, road style mountain bike tires. They'll make the ride much nicer (and faster) for you then knobblies.
The one good thing about a walmart bike (besides the price) is that when you do wear it out, you'll have a much better idea of what kind of bike you like before you shell out the cash for a nice one.
took out her barrettes and her hair spilled out like rootbeer
I can't say for sure without seeing what it looks like, but pinch flats usually have long, thin breaks in the tube like it was slashed with a knife. Oh, and by "long" I mean a few centimeters. Blowouts from defective tubes will be much more obvious. They're huge and usually along the seams of the tube. They're also pretty rare.
Chop: Don't do any maintenance unless you know what you're doing. Get the bike tuned up one or two times a year depending on how much mileage you're putting on it. Get it looked at any time you notice the shifting being weird or anything like that. The shop you got it from should help you out, especially with the first tune. The first one's the most important, and is usually free from the place you got it. Once your bike's settled in after that first 10 hours/100 miles, you won't need to get it worked on unless you notice something wrong.
If you're really that interested in working on it yourself, start picking up tools and find someone with bike knowledge to show you what to do. I'll give you a tip. Most people who work on their own bikes don't actually know what they're doing.
The Park Chain Tool is fine, but you need to be very careful that you're not pulling tiny ribbons of chain out with them. They don't sit perfectly straight, because the threads on them aren't super tight. They also have this thing where they develop tiny ridges around the cylinder that pushes the chain pin out, and they like to steal bits of your chain. You may notice little rings developing around the formerly smooth cylinder that pushes chain pins out. You can pull them off with pliers or a bench vise. That's pieces of your chains.
If you're going to use a Park Chain Tool, keep the very last bits of the cylinder ground down and smooth. If you can run your fingers up and down it and you feel a little lip developing near the edge, put that motherfucker on a grinding wheel and take that edge in.
Make sure the tires are inflated to the proper psi.
Keeping the drivetrain clean is one other thing. Wiping down the chain and the gears/derailer and lubing the chain will go a long way to keeping those parts working well.
Honestly, just get Zinn and the Art of Road Bike Maintenance (he has a mountain version too). It's only 16 bucks and it'll teach you how to do everything on your bike, from general maintenance, adjustment, replacement, etc.
took out her barrettes and her hair spilled out like rootbeer
IMO, the maintenance books available really aren't that great without a hands-on teacher as well. I see too many bikes from people who think they know how to adjust things from reading those books that are way, way off. If you're really that interested in learning how to work on your own bike, take classes. If you're much more than casually interested, go to BBI.
Thanks, I'll keep an eye out for that.
Just for future reference, is there a chain tool you like better?
took out her barrettes and her hair spilled out like rootbeer
Belatedly (hmm. I guess I did 'subscribe to thread' wrong), here you go:
(you can't see it there, but the frame is signed by Giuseppe Marinoni..)
I replaced the original tubular wheels with clinchers because I don't want to have to deal with gluing tyres; new brake levers because the original hoods perished and I couldn't find replacements, and new back derailleur because the old one was only 6-speed but the new wheel was 7-speed. Otherwise pretty much stock.
No kidding -- this morning, I switched from 700x38 to 700x28 on my everyday commuter, and man, do the potholes suck that much more.. On the other hand, the bike is noticeably lighter; I'm tempted to pull the mudguards off now it's summer to see just how light it'll get, but I just know that'll summon huge rainstorms.
I'm gonna try and get Marinoni to paint the bike I built I think. I hear their prices are pretty reasonable.
took out her barrettes and her hair spilled out like rootbeer
28 is still pretty wide/cushy. Go climb some big hills with it and appreciate the lesser rotational weight. Depending on the tread of the tire, you should be fine in the rain.
Heh, tell that to my rattled-loose teeth..
I don't understand the physics there -- I can see why rotating weight makes a difference when accelerating, decelerating, or changing direction fast (sprints / crit racing), but once I've got the wheel up to speed, why does it make any difference?
And on hills, lighter wheels = less weight to lift against gravity, sure, but why less _rotating_ weight? It's not as if gravity can tell that the wheel's spinning.
analyticcycling.com has a bunch of info about this -- if you run the model here making both riders identical:
http://analyticcycling.com/WheelsClimb_Page.html
then increasing rear wheel inertia (heavy tires, light hub) by a factor of 100 only costs 2.3 seconds on a 5k climb.
Increasing rear wheel weight from 2kg to 3kg costs 13.6 seconds on the same climb, and a kilo is a lot of extra weight..
-- dan
Yesterday I was in one of the higher end bike shops in the city and they had a set of these hanging up:
http://www.carbonsports.com/LW_Standard.lasso
Price?
4400
took out her barrettes and her hair spilled out like rootbeer
The weird thing is, having ridden home up some hills, it _does_ feel easier with lighter tyres. I don't know if it's just less weight overall, less rolling resistance, or what, but it felt easier than I'd expected it to. Very strange.
Me and a friend put this together in the fall, its been treating me alright.
My mom got a new bike recently with one of those big cushy seats, and that seat doesn't feel good either. Besides a recumbent bike what are my options?
If you don't get a bike to fit right, any amount of distance is going to make it a bad experience.
http://bikeunion.to/clipping/deadly-door-prize-driver-faces-110-fine-death-cyclist
The short of it? A cyclist was killed last month by a negligent driver who opened her door into traffic. She faces a 110 dollar fine. And that's it. No criminal charges at all. Sickening.
took out her barrettes and her hair spilled out like rootbeer
Cushy seats are horrible for you. They might seem comfy at first, but they put pressure on all the wrong places.
read this:
http://sheldonbrown.com/saddles.html
took out her barrettes and her hair spilled out like rootbeer