James Brown

There will never be another. Rest in peace.

The devil is in the details

And although she may wear Prada, she prolly weilds a set of vernier gauges too.

I went to change the aluminium blocks that hold the rails of the saddle and allow rotational adjustment on my Moots seatpin today. See, the rear sections had distorted around the saddle rails and I had wondered if I had, y'know, over torqued the bugger.




























After that tense, breath held moment of forcing open the top clamp area, I pushed in 2 similar clamps I had left over from an old Control Tech seat pin and which I had decided were the same thing.

Hah! Nope, one was, the other was not...see it seems the top half and the bottom half on the moots are not the same. One has a chamfered edge, the other not, one is narrower than the other also. The 2 from the control tech seatpin were both non-chamfered edge, and thus the overall diameter of the barrel thus formed holding the rails was greater than the originals. So, I sent another quiet 10minutes changing them back again.

Oh well.

Just a few things that have been going through my head recently

1) Dignity: Leaving rubbish around. Claiming you are something you are not. Stepping on others on the way up. Politicians lying. Only seeing what is right in front of your eyes, not the milieu it is part of. Poisoning our children's world. A lack of dignity in all.

2) Time: Too little of it spent with family, friends, self. Ignoring the personal development time known in Zen as 'mindfulness'. The seepage of time as your goals edge further away and deadlines creep closer.

3) Happiness: Is not directly correlated to money. Seemingly this has been proven by studies in the UK showing the National Wealth has more than doubled, yet people are less happy. Is the distribution even vaguely fair? Does gaining wealth beyond a certain point lead to an emptying of the soul? See point 1.

Winter coat

Despite the best intentions, I was always going to don the winter coat as the weather turns nasty and the food and alcohol began to pile up around my ears.

I niggling voice is asking me just what I want to do with next season. Do I want to race? If so what? And if so, how hard? Should I (gasp) train?

Lots of questions and as yet no answers. However, I did invest in some new running shoes. It was one of those afternoons and I just needed to run, but the only shoes I have are trail runners and they rip my ankles to shreds on the roads. So I popped by a running shop called Achilles Heel and got the full intro to running shoes and then tried out a few with the friendly, non pressurising staff. Got me a pair of Asics with an extra squishey sole. I am fortunate (I think) to have non pronating, wide feet so I don't tend to tip over. I am still unclear if this is the case when under the influence.

Anyways, put an hour of tarmac pounding into them and whaddayaknow? they are pretty soft and forgiving. Definitely a step up...(ha ha!)

The thing that I found out whilst embarking on the early season running was that my non generic ipod mp3 thing (made by sony) needs some way to attach to my person that does not utilise the finger and hair elastic method. This is not confidence inspiring and can lead to an mp3 player nasal passage interface if one is not careful. Fortunately, Santa was listening and I am the proud owner of a wee clippity thing which will attach said black box of rock to my chest.

In the past 48 hours I have slept 25 hours. It seems cooking crimbo tea is just too much for a softy like me, and I couldn't cope with the chef's specials all afternoon as I chopped and whisked. So more early nights and looking forward to hogmanay.

What are your plans for the coming 12 months?

Roasted

So we are cooking for crimbo this year. Me and trina and david (trina's bro). We decided on roast beef, as lets face it turkey is always a little dry and disappointing. Red meat also goes better with red wine, and that is the only thing that will save me from a Bloody Mary induced coma, so that is it.

It's been a steep learning curve tho'. We have never roasted anything but chicken and assorted fowl, so beef was a shocker. How hot? how long? how prepare? and how do you time the tatties and veggies.

I sort of felt that because of my chromosome arrangement I would have an innate ability to cook meat by roasting. I s'pose it should be the dowry with willies on shouldn't it? but having studied the usual texts I am faced with trial and error. Today's effort was passable. Not rare enough, too little oil on the bits and bobs in the roasting tray, but the Madeira gravy was good, if a little short on fat.

So: we are almost there, with no more practice runs and a 3kg block of Scotland's finest rolled sirloin to go...

Wish me luck.

Too much, too much

Several things:

Calderfest this last week end. Huge fun, huge riding, huge laughing, huge smiles.

I feel sure the tales will be spun for some time to come...

See flickr for photos: these borrowed from Makinster and Philipdiprose1974


























If you happen to be finishing off a wheel (like, say, my DT rim to DT hub....) and find there is a flat spot in the rim when you have got to the end of radial truing, I found this can be alleviated. Use a 2cm or so doweling and run it perpendicular between the spokes - stand on it, then pull with all your might upwards. At the point you feel you are about to pop out a hernia, you may have a round rim again, like the DT turned out.

Shaggy is a double world champion adventure racer after this week end. Check his blog. I'm sure he'll update when he wakes up. In the meantime, hardcore brah.

Calderfest also saw the first Skull and Cross bikes.

No rules, no entry just horrific weather, super hard course and a few very stalwart gentlemen.

Hardcore indeed.

S S W C 2 0 0 7

As you may well know, I am one of 3 who are organising sswc2007.

So, we put up a wee flag in the corner of the internet and called it our own.


sswc2007

More as soon as it happens.

Shine

Building another wheel. I found the front wheel I was using on my Seven road/cross/road thing was, lets say, less than smooth. the bearings were gubbed, and the axle was bent. Yep, bent. Anyone bent a front axle recently? weird. It was a deore hub, so no great loss.

I decided to build a lighter/better wheel for replacing it, and thanks to dave at Alpine Bikes, I picked up a DT RR 1.1 single eyelet front rim, and a DT 340 road front hub. Together with comp spokes and steel nips this should be a long lasting tough wheel.










The rim has been interesting to build with. I haven't built many wheels that have had anything other than mavic rims and there does seem to be differences in building 'experience'. How this translates into feel whilst riding and or durability I have yet to see.

So far the salsa delgado disc are holding up well, and the 29mm width is so good, allowing super floatation and low pressure. They were pretty malleable to build with which was quite nice, as they didn't seem to spring out of true when approaching final tweaks. The DT, somewhere inbetween I'd say.










I do have a dream wheel in me somewhere, and that is a DT 190 ceramic centreloc front with comps to a delgado with alloy nips. I know I can do it, and make it strong, but the consequences of screwing it up would be pretty har$h...

Speedgoat

Speedgoat is a shop in PA, USA. They have exceptional stock and excellent knowledge. They do a top website too, with a good blog-read-thing.

I am going to copy and paste one of their entries here, as it made me laugh out loud. I hope that isn't interwebrude, and I would encourage one and all to check it out every now and then...

TECH QUESTION OF THE DAY

Q: Number one, on a scale from one to ten how likely would you say it would be to taco this wheel? I ruined my front wheel on my Unit 29 3 days after getting it, and I want to get a new wheelset that I won`t have to worry about. I`ll take some added weight to get a set that is bomb-proof. I don`t really do anything too crazy, but I will be doing stairs and two-foot drops. Also, are the inside of the rims drilled or not? i.e.I want them to be tubeless ready. Thanks for the help.

A: The first part of your question would be completely ridiculous even if you had included your weight and all the other pertinent information necessary to begin to help you with this, but, as you haven`t included any of that information, and it`s very late at night as I`m answering this, I`m going to go ahead and fill in some details and then attempt to answer it.

For the sake of argument, assume these variables:

The "it" in your sentence is Lemmy from Motorhead, who weighs (for the sake of this example) 92.08 kilograms.

If Lemmy, traveling at a velocity of 34.4kph toward an elevation with an overall height of 4.8 meters consisting of steps with tread measurements of 30cm each and numbering in total five, were to be riding your Unit (not bloody likely Lemmy`d be on another guy`s unit, but you know, hypothetically here) equipped with Industry 9 All Mountain single-speed wheels purchased at Speedgoat, and built by a guy named Steve at Industry 9 on a Tuesday with high humidity and consisting of a rigid bicycle frame and fork manufactured of a steel-based alloy consisting of 0.31% carbon, 0.6% manganese, 0.9% chromium, 0.2% molybdenum, 0.04% phosphorus, 0.04% sulfur, and 0.3% silicon and welded with appropriate rod, not exceeding recommended temperatures, wearing an 859g fur costume depicting the character "Ren" from the Ren & Stimpy cartoon show and the 294g habit of a nun as protective headgear, were to impact said elevation in a body position that placed 43.4% of his weight forward of the bicycle`s bottom-bracket shell, and 56.6% of his weight behind the center of the bicycle`s bottom-bracket shell, I would estimate that the answer, using your system of 1-10, would be 6.

Obviously, though, the details matter.

Seriously, you are in danger of becoming lost in a wilderness somewhere between Mountain Bike Action and reality, and we must act quickly to save you! First, you need to experiment with tubeless setups about as much as you need to try snorkeling with that Kona. There is no consistently reliable tubeless system for 29er use (so, no, the i9 wheels aren`t made for tubeless) and conversions are strictly for the 145lb racer geek riding in a well groomed area--preferably indoors (see previous blogs about this). You do not appear to be said scrawny racer-boy, have roached at least one wheel already (albeit a factory-built wheel that wasn`t very strong), and do not want to experiment with lower air pressures. Did you know you can pinch flat your tire with no tubes in it? How about ripping it right off the rim when cornering? Then there`s the delirious joy of the burp, when a rock, impact, or just a corner rolls the edge of your tire just enough to send a delicate spray of liquid latex into the face of the guy behind you (not the bad part yet) and instantly drop your tire pressure down to a rock-crawly 5psi (the bad part).

So stick with tubes for now, and, if durability is your primary goal, get some Chris King hubs laced with 14/15 spokes and brass nipples (not alloy), 3-cross all around, to Sun Rhyno Lite 36-hole rims. You can build them in our Wheelbuilder.

That`s durable. But please also type "industry 9" into our blog`s search and you`ll see that I`m using these i9s on my rigid 29er single, and they kick ass. Ample rock garden use, and I`m 205lbs. Do I think you`ll bust them? I have absolutely no idea what you`re capable of, but are the i9s solid wheels based on what we can tell so far? Yep.

Sustrans

On Monday I cycled to Edinburgh and then back to Glasgow, on my trusty road rat. For the most part I used the National Cycling Network route 75. I have had a mixed time with the Sustrans routes. They make for interesting rides for the most part, and offer a good guide for long distance commuting (I had a *big* timbuk 2 of stuff to take with me and bring back) but they are exasperating sometimes too.

I lost the route a total of 5 times. Of these, I was able to re-find the route 3 times. Unfortunately, when it really mattered, after 9+ hours of riding with a heavy bag, on a 48:18 into the teeth of a very strong headwind (the weather was 'challenging' on Monday to say the least: the reason I had not run to the hills...) and I had been riding (with no lights as I had forgotten them) for 4 hours in total darkness.

It was very pleasant riding past Hillend Loch with a full moon, and then as I came into Airdrie, bam, the route came out onto a road in a new development of housing and it just disappeared. Obviously I didn't want to do the last 15+ miles on busy dual carriageways, in the heavy rain, with a gusting strong headwind and a heavy bag and no lights, so I spent 30mins looking for the route. I went down every side street and did several laps of the area looking for where it restarted. Nope.

Bugger.

Of course, if I had a route guide it might have helped. But I'm not stupid, its should have been slightly more obvious where it went. Ach well...

11 hours on the bike: 120+ miles with the first 60 taking 3.5 hours and the rest, well, the rest. Yep, it was a strong wind.

S m all

It is amazing how incredibly small things can have a much bigger impact. The butterfly effect? maybe...

Or maybe it is simply because we are all so used to things working well, and therefore being inconspicuous, that when they *don't* work, we sit up and take notice.

Either way.

Went for a ride today. Classic Scottish, high winds, very wet under tyre, rocks, roots, waterfall crossings on small shelves, Loch side beautiful...

Also was riding the indyfab, and (no sniggering now) the front brake wasn't up to scratch. it felt for all the world like there was some contamination in the cables. After the amount of effort I put in to get those cables routed and sealed I was a bit pissed off. Still, I reasoned, there may be a simple and easily remediable solutions. And so there was....

It transpires that the inner cable 'sleeve', which I had cut at an angle in order to thread it through the stainless steel conduit and the Avid BB7 body, was protruding by around half a millimeter out of the tiny rubber 'boot' at the bottom of the cable stop on the BB7 casting.

When I actuated the brake, the rubber slightly compressed and the angular cut meant that the rubber pushed directly against the cable as it slid through the sleeve. the more I pulled the brake lever, the more friction.

So, I trimmed the sleeve to a straight cut, replaced the rubber booty and BAM! brakes are 100% again.

That just goes to show...take care of the pennies and the pounds look after themselves, or something....

Seven morphed

While I'm about it, this is the current incarnation of my Seven...it is doing duty at the moment as a cross bike. Singled with a 38:18, and a hotch potch of stuff in order to make 700c wheels work on a 26" frame. It was a custom geometry bike built around an 80mm travel fork, but it works nicely with my Rick Hunter brazed 5 piece 440mm a-c gem of a fork and the ever-so-useful Paul brake combo...quick steering, very fast and excellent power transfer.

Growing a moustache

Recently I sold a 94 Kona kilauea and bought a Cotic Roadrat. The main reason was my growing love of 700c wheels.

Initially, I had a set of flat bars and a long-ish (Steelman) stem on it.

Then I added bar ends, as I am so used to my Jones bars, the 'elbows out' position afforded by flat bars is now uncomfortable.

The Jones bars are far too po$h to use on a town bike, so I picked up some nitto moustache bars.

Here's the results:

Bodge

One of the difficult things about using Jones bars is attaching a race number to your bars. This may infact be the *only* difficult thing about Jones bars, apart from the fact they ruin you for other bars.
I have been messing about in my 'garage' for a bit. tidying up, throwing rubbish away, sweeping and putting up hundreds of butchers hooks on metal tubing attached to the shelving in there with screw in circular fittings. This allows me to hang up everything I need to and then some. Bags, both Timbuk2 and ruck sacks, tools, dry bags, even stem and handlebar combo's that are waiting to be used again.
Almost immediately I started clearing things up a bit, I found a rear reflector bracket. One of those generic kind you find on 99% of bikes sold these days. It has an adjustable reflector on an 'elbow' and a circular bracket for grappling whatever frame tube is nearest. The bolts are cheesy cross-head and the nuts thin and recessed in hexagonal, err, recesses.
So - I sat there looking at it thinking it really needs to get binned, but something clicked in my head. Maybe, just maybe I could find a good use for it.
I checked things out and found that, yes, with a little strip of rubber inbetween the bracket and the Jones 25.4mm 'middle' tube, I was able to orientate the adjustable elbow section (once I had removed the reflector) in such a way that 2 holes pointed directly forwards.
After replacing the cheesy bolts with decent M5 allen key bolts, and the thin nuts with nylocs, I had a 'bodge' part.
The next stage is to utilise the 2 forward facing holes and some wire to allow a relatively rigid number plate holding structure. It will be light, re-usable and most importantly it will mean I never have to zip-tie a number to my cables and race in fear of it catching the front tyre, rubbing all race or worse getting trapped between the tyre and the fork (and yes, in a strong wind, that did indeed happen to me once).
All good. Finished pictures when it is finished.

Apophenia

The Middle East.
Oil running out.
Ex KGB agents being poisoned with Thalium.
Muslim persecution.
The West's Leaders a laughing stock.
Public Opinion ignored.

Apophenia.

Dock cross

Just back from Rosyth docks cross race. Great course shimmied around an area of waste ground, car park and green belt. Winding slimey off camber singletrack and 2 steep climbs. Excellent stuff. Its always so good to ride in the least expected places and find it to be gruelling and fun all at the same time.

The race started very fast with a road flat and climb linking us all into the course. Obviously this favoured a geared rider and the Savalas Players were behind a morass of racers. The next section was the technical singletrack, which was obviously a challenge to some as there were men down everywhere. A few bursts of speed had me sitting in 14th or so, with Chris and Jac not far behind. The carpark and waste section ended in a set of steps, that if you timed well, you could just ride the left side of the steps, preventing a dismount and run - far faster.

From here the course climbed to it's highpoint through trees before a winding descent to the car park again. This was obviously a good spot to rev up and pass riders before the singletrack - where it was very difficult to pass. This I managed on a couple of occasions and after a relatively strong mid race (for me) I was up in tenth. I had lost touch with Chris who was suffering on his 32:18 on the relatively flat and fast course. Jac was leading the ladies, despite feeling a little under the weather.

My choice of the Seven with a 38:18 was paying dividends in that I was able to spin fast enough to not get dropped on the road section. Enjoying the swoopy technical stuff, and being au fait with the roots leaves and off camber corners allowed me to sit behind others and pressurise them before quick sprints to gap them. It worked well, and soon enough I was up in 8th.

At this point with around 10 minutes to go I caught the 7th placed rider, and sat on his wheel as he was racing cannily and I could not find the power for a pass. 2 laps whisked by and then the bell. Still I was sat behind and really needed a mistake on his behalf to make the pass, but it was not to be.

At the end there was a little confusion regarding the placings, and I'm still unclear whether I was 7th or 8th. Chris was a little back, but smiling since he had regained his jacket (it was so very very cold) and Jac took the win.

Best heckle goes to stalwart support Player Marty with 'eye of the tiger, bring it home'.

See naegears pics.

IF update

So how is it going? In short, so far, so good. Several good long rides, in conditions varying from deep mud, to wet sandy grit to moist loam. No mechanical issues (which is nice) and no odd quirks.

The steering is gorgeous. Really, really confidence inspiring in technical situations and at speed. It feels light and maneuverable without being in any way skittish. The ride in general is very forgiving. The Moots post does the job it was meant to and flexes perceptibly, soaking up chatter and bumps. The frame itself is also very compliant in the way that good ti frames seem to be.

The parts are also performing well. The magmaa saddle is the most comfortable I have used. A real find. The stem hasn't slipped (yet), making it considerably less of a pain than the wedge type. The rims do seem flexable. Probably not surprising given the weight and width. But no issues with coming out of true and the softness is probably a virtue given the full rigid chassis.

DT - the best. That's all. The brakes are superb, still light and very responsive with good modulation. With the longer 2 1/2 finger levers on the Paul brakes the system is a quantum improvement over the RoShamBo brakes. The fork. Ah yes, the fork.

I'll tell you no lies: I have never trusted Pace stuff particularly. I think because I have witnessed several of their forks being less than durable. And, of course, there is that old bugbear of the British Engineering thing. But: it rocks. Light, comfortable, excellent tracking and looking good. Time will tell..., but so far I feel misguided at least on the rigid fork.

It is a very, very good bike. As it should be, but I am privileged to have it.

Auchentoshan cross

The Auchentoshan cross event came and went this last Sunday. It was wet, it was windy, it was dark and I was liquid burping tequila. The tequila in question was provided the night prior by my very lovely friend G funk savalas. He happens to have a bottle of competition standard, single village tequila. It is beautiful, rich, sipping tequila totally removed from the rubbish used for slamming. Beautiful it may be, but it isn't the best being burped up on a start line all too early having forcibly ejected myself from my kipsack.

Bang! off we go, to the woeful tunes and Jammie Johnson, the ever ruddy MC, and for once I got a so-so start. Chris on his amazing brown humu kona cruiser cross beast, Jac, going for gold, and Dave rocking the full rigid rig were right there too.

We zipped around the super, if muddy, course and the 20m run up was as hard as it ever is. A nice addition to the course was the double gates, a fluid dismount leap and remount style was rewarded.

The rain battered down mid race but relented as we closed, with poor Chris puncturing on his last lap. Odd given the shear girth of his cruiser beast tyres, and more than a pain in the deep mud he rode it in on floppy rubber. Jac snatched the second place, which must leave her well up in the overalls, and Dave whipped in to finish his first cross race in some style.

All good.

I.P.A

Anyone who knows me will know that I love bitter. Bitter beer is the best. IPA is probably my favourite of the style. Created tosurvive the long voyage from Britain to India, IPA has a particularly high concentration of Hops added. This is the preservative for most modern beers (some fruits and other odd things such as heather have been used in the dim and distant past).

Goose Island IPA is new to me, but having enjoyed their Honkers Ale i was definately keen to try it.

Summary: recommended.
Detail: 5.9% ~ relatively strong compare to most UK IPA's but not unsettlingly so.
Colour: deep, rich and pleasing.
Heft: pretty strong in any quantity for a school night or afternoon, perfect evening beer.

Swiped from Kelvin on the other place

Futura 2000: the name conjures beautiful abstract paintings, odd, spikey alien lobster-clawed figures, record covers for Mo Wax, and Maharashi. An excellent fix for the addict.