Spindles and Gears

Spoke Too Soon

2009-04-07T21:50:00.000-07:00

I was silently thinking about why my Clydesdale weight combined with a heavy "laptop" and construction ridden SF roads pounding on my Dahon's 16 inch rear wheel... when it happened. Twang... A spoke had let go. I figured this was not a big deal as I had replaced broken spokes and in fact built many wheels in my past. This however is a uniquely tiny bike and with many unique things falls out side of "normal" range. My 16 inch (305) wheel with a 3 speed hub requires a 125mm long spoke. It turns out that even custom spoke cutters at the best bike shop in town can only cut 136mm spokes. What? So finding this out on a Sunday night with a pending meeting on Monday morning that required a bike to attend, I was forced to go to a deep dark place and..... make my own spoke. Well not completely, but I bent a much longer spoke into a tiny spoke. After a whopping 6 miles of riding it is still holding up. My fingers are still crossed....

Notice the eerie headless spoke. Ichabod Crane watch out....

1st Shirt

2009-02-23T19:54:00.000-08:00

Here is my first attempt at sewing a shirt. It's intended to be a mountain bike shirt. Unfortunately the cold rainy weather and a head cold have been keeping it off the trails.

It is made out a holey but tough polyester with spandex cuffs. I am hoping the holes are sufficient to not sweet to death and that the polyester keeps my flesh in tact when the rubber goes skyward. The pattern was made by roughly copying a combination of 3 shirts and in keeping with the hol(e)y theme it was made out of the Sunday paper and finished on a Sunday. Good or bad luck or just purely coincidence? I soon hope to find out.
For the next round... elbow pads. I only realized after I was done, that I couldn't really add elbow padding. It needed to be added before the sleeves were sewn into tubes.

Happy New Year!

2009-01-26T22:09:00.000-08:00

For Chinese New Year, I hung up a very sweet kite that a friend very graciously gave me for x-mas. It is very similar to one that I saw on a business trip to Taipei. This one apparently came from a dusty back room of a tiny kite shop in San Francisco's China Town.
This kite has a ~30' tail of tiny masks with feathers on sticks to presumably balance or damp the mask wings. I have to admit I have my doubts if it will fly or not... but after a quick check of youtube, sure enough there are several videos of people flying these things. Maybe when I get tired of it flying around the house I will take it to the park and give it a go!

Sewing Time: Dog Collars

2009-01-18T18:16:00.000-08:00

The wife decide it was time for the dogs to have a change of neck attire. So out came Pinky (the pfaff sewing machine) and after some swearing out popped a spacey collar for the Goose.

The Goose thanking me for the new duds.
And some thing more demure for the dainty Vespa:

But still a bit spacey to match the Goose.
These were made out of 80mm of 1.5" wide fancy pants ribbon and 2" wide webbing. Also a slip buckle, snap buckle and a D ring all for 2" wide webbing.

The Dez, Castle Dome

2009-01-09T14:58:00.000-08:00

On our recent trip to AZ, the wife decided we should climb the biggest mountain we could see from Wellton. It happened to be Castle Dome in the Kofa wildlife reserve which she found here. So on 01/01/09, yea 911 backwards we headed up this:

And sitting on top at 3788' it looks like this, but be careful of jumping cholla :

The wife climbing out of a cave about 400' below the top.

Sewing Time

2009-01-08T21:29:00.000-08:00

In these apocalyptic economic times, it is time to figure out how to survive on our own. So for X-mas my cave wife got me a sewing machine. She of course got a Pfaff to match our German kraut making crock and highly designed German vacuum. Of course it came with many links to how to hem woman's pants. So of course my first real projects were for my Jeep. Here are some pictures of a bag I made that fits between the wind shield and the roll bar.

Yes, the machine is pink! Not exactly my favorite color but I can deal. Maybe other men would start sewing if they made them army green.

The wife picked out the red zippies. Which I have to say look quite good.It runs up the middle between the seats.

I found the limit of the Pfaff is 8 layers of nylon webbing. I am pretty impressed given that it is not an industrial machine. But it does have a walking foot thing that seems to help with many layers.

I also made some nylon door stops for the jeep out of nylon webbing. Those were 3 layers of nylon webbing and the Pfaff punched those out easy.

Trunk Time

2008-11-30T17:54:00.000-08:00

As the winter rains approach, it is time to add a rain gear trunk to the red tiny Curve. This is a TransIt trunk bag from Performance. It fits well on the rack and when put on backwards adds a caring handle. It is big enough for a rain jacket and some pants.

Tiny Red Bicycle

2008-11-09T23:48:00.000-08:00

Behold the tiniest folding bike I could find used in the area. It's a 2008 Dahon Curve D3 with 16" (305) wheels. It is quite fun to ride but the main reasons that I have added it to the stable is:
A: It folds so it can go on BART any time. It is actually small enough to fit between my legs while standing.
B: It has 16" tires which is the minimum allowed on AC Transit bus racks. Plus AC Transit is suppose to allow folding bikes (and strollers) on the bus. I may need to try this if the 2 bike racks are taken.

The 3 in the D3 is presumably because it is a 3 speed rear hub. The gearing seemed good for flat riding up to probably 20 MPH. Which I have got to say is slightly sketchy given the short wheel base and small wheels. However 1 ride around my hilly neck of the woods proved a bit too challenging for my lazy man style. So I got a 18Tooth rear cog to replace the stock 13T. This seems to be much more reasonable in the hills. So accordingly to Sheldon Browns calculator the gears went from ~35/48/65 gear inches to 25/34/46 gear inches. This is slightly off because his calculator uses a 16 X1.5" and the stock tires on the D3 are 2.0". Changing the cog is fairly easy mater of pulling the wheel out of the frame and pulling a lock ring off. Of course a slightly longer chain is required.

The New Deck

2008-08-21T23:03:00.000-07:00

The goose gives the deck a one tongue out. However the blinding light at the end of the deck is a little much...

Cross Bike Brake Shush

2008-08-21T22:42:00.000-07:00

Uh oh.... the shush shush noise. The classic rhythm of hard earned energy being squandered and helping to speed up the heat death of the universe for no good reason. Here are some quick things to check.

1. Is the back wheel completely in the drop outs? (up into the frame "u"s as far as it can)

2. Are all the cables housings in the correct spots? Not hanging on the edges of the eyelets.

3. Are the brake pads lined up with the wheel rim? Right when the pad touches the wheel it should only touch the wheel and not the tire.

4. Does the brake pad hit the tire during any part of the travel?

5. When you spin the wheel does the wheel rim get closer and further from the pads?

Harleymom, next time you get an itch for a swim, drop by and I will take a look.

Mountain Biking: Squealing Brakes

2008-08-16T12:54:00.000-07:00

Hayes Trail disc brakes squealing like a pig? Try bonding the pads on with RTV High Temp silicon gasket maker. This is available at most auto parts stores. Just put a thin coat of the RTV on the back of the pads install and squeeze the levers for 24 hours. Elastic cords or thick rubber bands will hold the levers squeezing the pads. You want the pad bonded to the pistons not the housing. Ride on...