Tag: Road

#365daysofbiking Salt beef

January 29th – The cold weather for this winter has finally arrived, and the roads are icy. I’m fairly OK on the ice tyres, but it still takes time to build confidence back up when hitting black ice.

Thankfully, everywhere I’ve been, the major routes are well gritted, even though many motorists swear they haven’t been.

Road salt is not magic. It won’t work instantly, won’t de-ice the whole troad, and won’t allow you to drive like Sterling Moss in cold weather.

Tae care and take it easy, folks.

This journal is moving home. Please find out more by clicking here.

from Tumblr http://bit.ly/2HIAFcU
via IFTTT

#365daysofbiking Trail blazing

December 21st – Summerhill motorway bridge on a dry evening is the ideal place to try long exposure photography, with the opportunity presented by the  motorway below and also down the A461 from kerb level.

Today is a turning point: Not just last day of work for 2018, but the shortest day. Today, I have beaten The Suck – the darkening, grim winter commutes when traffic is bad and huge riding concentration is required. From today, the days will lengthen, sunset will get later and later and the driving will actually improve.

Regardless of the weather, the light will return and things will get better. Today was a turning point, and a very welcome one.

This journal is moving home. Please find out more by clicking here.

from Tumblr http://bit.ly/2SrP660
via IFTTT

IMG_2420 3

#365daysofbiking Solid air:

December 11th – Heading back to work after an errand into Walsall at lunchtime, the air was misty, smoggy and heavy and caught the weak sunlight in an unusual way.

I could feel the exhaust fumes trapped low to the ground, but the effect was quite beautiful.

Sad to see the old Workhouse Guardian’s Office, listed but still rotting and vacant, marooned before the monolithic Walsall Manor Hospital.

As far as I know its the only part of the Victorian municipal workhouse in Walsall to survive, and is a remarkable building. Cruelly stranded and ignored by the hospital redevelopment, it sits forlorn an lost, waiting for a use to emerge.

Even down on it’s uppers, it’s a gorgeous building still.

This journal is moving home. Click here for more information.

from Tumblr https://ift.tt/2PyZPtd

via IFTTT

#365daysofbiking Not forgotten:

December 6th – In an otherwise unremarkable, workaday wall  on a main road in Place, Walsall, one of the UK’s many hundreds of industrial memorials to the lost employees in the Great War.

The fourteen lost souls listed on the memorial worked for the Cyclops Foundry which was near where the plaque is now, and has long since passed into history – but the original memorial was saved and restored by the NHS, who operate Walsall Manor Hospital, opposite, not once, but twice: They refurbished the memorial in 1989, and replaced it totally in 2002.

I’m glad it survived and still stands today, bearing witness to those lives lost, and it’s good to see that 100 years on, people still place crosses here to remember them.

#365daysofbiking Lest we forget:

November 10th – Remembrance this year is of course marked by the centenary of the end of World War 1, that awful conflagration that set the geo-political scene for the following century and formed the warm-up act for World War 2. Whilst I of course feel the centenary is vital to be remembered, I was cautious about the tone of some commentary. I feel that Remembrance in some ways is being changed and that worries me.

I was heartened, therefore to see the special efforts made in Aldridge and Pelsall this year, and that they were so very, very well done. Aldridge’s Poppy Road was a startling, sad and beautiful tribute to the lost and wounded of Station Road in the Great War, and the way it was done really bought the agony of a generation home.

Similarly, the poppy clock in Pelsall, adorned as Poppy Road is in knitted and crocheted blooms is also stunning. It is a different memorial to Poppy Road, and feels more intimate.

Both are remarkable, community led gestures of Remembrance and I thank all those who have e worked so hard to create them. They both restored my faith that the meaning of this most solemn of national events is not being lost.

#365daysofbiking Mystical:

October 31st – Passing Victoria Park on Station Road, Darlaston on a beautiful day on the cusp between autumn and winter I’m reminded how lovely this place really is. 

I’ll never tire of that view of the Mystic Bridge and the leaves turning.

Summer may be long since gone but there is still plenty of beauty around.

August 8th – The rain came in Redditch just as I boarded the train back, and I thought it was probably in for the afternoon. I was however wrong, it seems to have been a narrow band of rain that passed the conurbation, and it approached me once more as I rode back from Shenstone. It caught me in the lanes.

The rain was sweet, warm and enjoyable when it came, following skies that would surely have won an Oscar for best supporting performance. 

What wasn’t so great however was that one more, with insufficient rain to wash it away, the roads became greasy, slippery and soppy with the road debris and wash down.

It pains me to say it but we need heavy and prolonged rain to clear this away.

June 26th – Another hot and sunny day, and on the way to work, it was clear that fish has been breeding successfully in the canal at Pleck: Looking into the green water under Scarborough Road bridge, tends of thousands of tiny fry had had hatched. Further up the canal, larger fish were heading in that direction, one presumes fo lunch.

Who’d ever have thought these canals would be so green, beautiful and full of life?

June 2nd – Coming back from Longdon, this was a good chance to see what Dark Lane was like this days. Dark Lane runs from Borough Lane to Thorley’s Hill near Goosemoor Green, and was a lane that always suffered from storm silting, being a remarkably deep holloway.

The bottom end of Dark Lane serves a farm, but further up the hill, it’s closed, and for several hundred metres it’s now been reclaimed by nature and coated in thick mud and vegetation.

It was a lovely place to explore, and brought back memories of when it was open. But if you go and look, be prepared for the mud. It’s deep.

November 27th – Been a while since I discussed brakes here, but the glazing issue of the rear pads I had – I think I’ve cracked it. And built Frankenbrake as a result.

I, like many utility and commuter cyclists, like to ride a bike that’s essentially a tourer. I like the bars, the variety of positions, and I like that Shimano finally made hydraulic brakes for road and cyclocross bikes with the same bars.

The trouble with tourers for years has been that they’re mongrels. No one groupset (ie. drivetrain with brakes and controls) is wholly suitable. Tourers carry load, don’t mind a heavier bike as it’s sturdy and stable. They like a wide gear range – preferably a triple front ring. And solid wheels with damn good brakes. 

So a good tourer may have utlegra, SLX, XT and 105 series parts all working together.

Brake options have traditionally been anything you want as long as it’s canti, but since road discs and suitable frames appeared – first cable, then hydraulic – our braking options have improved. 

My rear brake – A Shimano R785 lever with a BR785 calliper – has been eating pads. They appear to glaze, loose all friction, and no matter how well cleaned, filed or surface ground, never regain bite. Pads are not cheap. I thought I’d cracked it using Uberbike pads – but the last two sets have gone really quickly.

The last set went a week after fitting, and without the same happening on the front, I decided to solve the issue. I’ve been using a primitive parking brake on trains – I use a rubber loop to keep the back brake on to stop the bike rolling about. It turns out that the brakes aren’t designed for continual operation like that, and the vibration from rocking was weeping fluid out of the piston seals, on to the back of the pad plate, and dropping the odd drip of fluid onto the rotors.

I’ll stop using the band. But that left me with a possibly faulty rear calliper, which has never been quite as snappy as I’d like. And Shimano are transferring to flat mount – a format incompatible with my frame – for their 785 replacements.

I knew the 785 was a variant of the XT mountain bike, 2 piston brake with slight design changes in shape. Reading about, I found people who’d put Shimano 4 piston callipers on XT levers for mountain bike use, so I figured a 4 piston Saint calliper should therefore work with a 785 road lever, as the same oil volume was being moved as the XT model, if you see what I mean. They all use the same hoses and fluid, a light mineral oil.

So I ordered a saint calliper, got the bleed kit out, and got oily. The result is that the Saint calliper works really well, has a much bigger pad friction area, and is nice and firm, yet progressive. It’s a bit more fiddly to set up as the piston stroke isn’t as large, but it’s working well with patience.

To any home mechanic who’s thinking about this, it’s an excellent upgrade – but as with any brake fluid operation, remove pads and keep well away from the disc as you will spill oil everywhere.

Meanwhile, a slow handclap for Halfords. When on the off chance I called in for a bottle of Shimano mineral oil brake fluid, the twit behind the counter said ‘Use Dot 4 – it’s all the same stuff.’ – it so isn’t. Dot 4 is Glycol, not oil, and will swell and perish Shimano seals and cause premature failure. Urrrghh.

Now, let’s see how well these pads last…