Tag: Road

November 35th – I passed through Chasewater in a splendid, cold golden hour, hoping maybe to catch some red deer. Sadly, the deer were elsewhere as there was a rugby match on over at the club, so they’d probably wandered to more peaceful environs until the shouting and cheering was over.

What I did find, however, was a beautiful north heath which, as Ian Anderson would have put it was ‘Glowing in the evening cool’ – and the view of the Paviours Road footbridge in low, golden sun was gorgeous.

Not a bad ride at all today – but bitterly cold and still with the treacherous, slippery conditions.

I have a feeling we’re in for a sharp winter this year.

September 3rd – It’s been a while since I bored you with disc brake pads, so it’s your lucky day – or maybe not.

I favour a hydraulic disc brake on all my bikes, road or off-road. On road bikes, I think the Shimano 785 based callipers are the bees knees; combined with a decent disc and pads, they control my resplendent girth down the steepest of inclines and without snatching.

The only issue I have – and I’ve covered this before – is the mystery of what exactly happens to rear pads in particular when they overheat. Sometimes, despite the best care, pads will develop a sheen, lose the nice grip and squeal horridly. I’ve been trialling aftermarket alternatives all summer to see if other manufacturer’s inserts are better.

I tried Kool Stop, an expensive brand. They were nothing special, and glazed out. Clarks performance was tepid, but lasted well. My best results have been with Uberbike sintered and semi-metallic. These are an interesting design – 785 road pads normally have a backplate with cooling heatsink fins. Uberbike have separated the two, so you can re-use the cooling fins on a slightly thinner pad, which are only £6 a set instead of the £20 for a set from Shimano. And they work a dream.I had one set glaze out near the end of life, but other than that, great.

I thought the front set had taken the same dive while winding down from the Roaches the day before, becoming squeaky and losing friction, so swapped them in the workshop the next day, to find the pads had worn to the spring, and that was the wail.

I really do recommend Uberbike pads.

July 25th – The great feline sleep out continues, this time again in Scarborough Road, Pleck. This puss clearly wasn’t enjoying the scrutiny as it dozed on a shady garden path.

I’m unclear why Scarborough Road is so densely populated with cats – like The Butts, in summer it’s a rare journey where passing through either, I don’t meet one, yet other places where I’d expect to similarly find them – Shelfield, Darlaston – there never seem to be any around.

A curious mystery.

June 8th – Passing down Scarborough Road in Pleck, south Walsall I noticed these cats, clearly waiting for the return of their owners from work. The two black and white ones seem to be siblings and clearly aren’t particularly fond of each other; I’ve recorded them studiously ignoring each other before.

I’m intrigued by the grey one, though – I’ve not seen that one before and it looks like a gorgeous cat. 

I was also amused by the disgusted expression of the one in the foreground. If looks could kill….

March 17th – Coming back from Lichfield, tired after a hard week, I stopped on the motorway bridge at Summerhill and tried long exposure photography again. 

I finally got just what I wanted. and the experiment of setting the camera on the ground looking down the hill towards Sandhills worked better than I could have imagined.

That’s taken a while, but I’m happy with that.

October 3rd – Spinning through north Walsall on the way home, I was held up by this little thing peering up the road. Tiny, but with enough cute for several litters of kittens, she was apparently waiting for her owner who she’d spotted up the road.

The joy at the reunited pals, separated by a day at work, was beautiful and infectious.

A gorgeous little young cat, brimming with charm and life.

August 10th – Popping up to Aldridge on my way to work, I noticed this character pointing the way to a local drainage supplies company, Venture Plastics, on Brickyard Road. 

In what seems to be a nod to Futurama’s Bender, it can’t have been an easy thing to do so well. Brilliant.

Wonder if it has a name? My compliments to the creator. A masterpiece, and brilliant advertising.

August 1st – A mechanical mystery. Three month old Shimano hydraulic brake pads, which suddenly lost grip and appeared to be glazed or contaminated. The pads are the sintered metal type and are genuine manufacturer parts.

Sometimes, long periods of braking can ‘glaze’ pads. causing them to become highly polished and shiny, meaning they don’t work well. The common treatment for this is to file the surface of the pad and pop them back in. 

These I have degreased, cleaned, filed and even surface ground, but whatever I do they quickly glaze again. New pads of the same type were just fine.

Anyone got any idea what’s going on here? I’m wondering if overheating has caused the pad material to harden…

July 25th – In Rushall, a couple of apple trees have fruit growing well on the boughs right now. Some looks better than others, depending I think on if frost caught the blossom or not.

It’s not the largest harvest I’ve ever seen, but it’s big. It’s going to be a decent year for apples and pears, I think.