Tag: Tech

April 9th – Whoops. The bike I’ve been riding over the past few days has been having an issue with the front brake pats just lightly touching the disc. The noise was irritating me, so before I set out today, I got down to realigning the caliber, and then noticed the pads were a bit worn. Having spares on the bench, I whipped the old ones out.

Oh dear. The bad set, for those not in the know, are on the left, the replacements on the right. The pad on the one side is so worn, it’s to the metal, and the spring is mashed, too.

I also had an issue with the piston sticking. Hopefully that’s sorted.

Hydraulic brakes wear pads quicker. I must remember that. 

March 18th – Gone 6:30pm, and still not dark. I stopped on Catshill Junction Bridge, and took a throwaway shot of the Humphries House flats, looking ghostly in the half-light. 

The more I use it, the happier I am with this camera. There’s clearly a lot more fiddling to be had yet, and I must sit down and read the manual. But for a point and shoot operated by a monkey, it doesn’t do bad.

January 21st – another one for Bob’s big book of bicycle breakdowns. These are a pair of Shimano SPD XTR clipless pedals – the mechanism on them engages with a metal piece on the bottom of special shoes that means I ‘click in’ to them and can pull the pedals up as well as push down. 

These are considered a fairly high-end pedal, and have a platform – the black grooved frame – around them for additional foot support. They cost about £70 a pair, I guess and are generally good quality. This pair had done about 10,000 miles.

They are built around a cylindrical bearing held together internally by two nuts – an adjuster and a locknut, and this keeps everything adjusted and spinning without play.

Except when the threaded part snaps from fatigue, the bearing falls apart and the pedal tries to come off the spindle. The one on the right is normal, the one on the left, fatally broken.

Thankfully, it wasn’t far from home and was still ridable with care. That’s an unwanted expense in January…

January 5th – A fiddly maintenance job this evening. Studded ice tyres currently fitted to my bike have small, very hard carbide studs in them to grip black ice. They sit in pockets in the tyre tread, and on the back in particular, if you skid on tarmac or brake very hard, they rip out.

Once I’ve lost ten or so, I delve into the spares box and whip out a small bag containing replacement studs, supplied by Schwalbe, the tyre manufacturer. 

By deflating the tyre and pinching the cavity, with pliers one can pop fresh studs in, using a drop of washing up liquid as a lubricant. Fiddly at first, once you’ve got the hang, it’s easy to do.

It may sound overzealous, but for the want of a couple of studs, you could slide. A stitch in time, and all that…

December 28th – The winter boots are on. These Schwalbe Marathon Plus Winter are on their third season now. A 38mm 700c tyre with grippy central rubber tread, flanked by twin rows of proud, carbide studs, they grip well on black ice and make short work of snow. They’re not infallible but give me confidence when cornering and feel sure-footed and secure when the chips are down.

They are, however, noisy in use and not terribly fast; but they’re home for the next few weeks at least.

If you’re out on the roads over the cold spell, here are my tips for safe cycling, even if you don’t have winter tyres…

  • Stick to main routes where possible. Avoid backlanes and canal towpaths.
  • Ride on the road, out of the gutter where standing water freezes.
  • Take it steady, and ease off on the speed – particularly downhill.
  • Use your momentum and judge it – avoid braking where possible.
  • Turn gently without braking.
  • Use your back brake rather than your front, and pulse it don’t clamp it on. Just light touches.
  • Move with the bike. Go with it if it slides, don’t fight it.
  • If you lose the back, you can pull out of it with care. Lose the front and you’re gone. Bear that in mind in a slide.
  • Give other roadusers more space, and consider the consequences if they slide. 
  • Let a little air out of your tyres to increase contact area.

Take it easy, folks.

December 27th – Another foul day. Overcast, misty and cold, it came on to rain in the afternoon, with the lying, dirty snow still stubbornly refusing to shift.

I went out – togged up for it this time – to Chasewater to see just how good the ice tyres were. A blast down the bog boardwalk proved them grippy, as did the surefooted handling on wet mud, slush and ice.

Rolling resistance is high though, and they’re very, very noisy.

A decent ride though, in very poor conditions.

December 3rd – It was very late when I came home through Brownhills. There was a frost, and the roads, despite having gritted, were glistening in that menacing way winter cyclists know and are wary of.

I’m still rocking he new Schwalbe Marathon Plus tyres I fitted a few weeks ago; these revised rubbers are vastly superior so far to there older incarnation, and they’ve been excellent on wet, greasy roads. I wondered what they would be like on ice, so took them for a run up the canal towpath.

They seemed to hold the track well. Only time will tell, but so far I’m very impressed.

Watch out for the black ice folks, it’s a killer.

November 7th – This is annoying. Just about every bike wheel has spokes of some sort, and their job is critical and load-bearing. As you ride, the spokes on the bottom of the wheel are in compression, and the ones at the top in tension, and as the wheel spins, the spokes are alternately pushed and pulled.

The do a lot of work considering they’re just 2mm diameter bits of stainless steel wire.

I carry lots of weight on my commuting bike – anything up to 20 kilos, and together with my resplendent girth, the wheels come under some stress, particularly on the pothole-strewn backroads of Walsall.

On Thursday, the bike felt odd on the back end. An inspection showed me that three spokes had broken, which need to be replaced. That’s a pig of a job, especially as they have broken at the rim end, which means removing the tyre and rim tape and replacing the nipples.

Today, I procured replacements and hoped to do the job when I got in – but it was far too wet and miserable.

I don’t know why the spokes failed; probably just excess weight and fatigue. But I’ve now lost trust in that wheel and wonder what else it has in store for me…

October 7th – An odd bike spotted in a rack near work. It was so odd, I had to take a closer look.

It’s a Kettler city bike. Kettler are, I believe, a German brand with an office in Redditch selling into the UK. It’s a large bike, and looks very heavy indeed. Dynamo lights powered by a bottle, rather than hub generator and rim brakes – the rear an unusual crossover cantilever design mounter under the chainstays – mark this bike out as being a cheap model. More expensive steeds of this type would have hub brakes.

The bike clearly needs some love – the chain was as dry as old bones and red rusty, as were many of the components. I’m tempted to pop back just to lube the chain. It must squeak like hell in use.

An unusual thing, for sure…

October 1st – Spotted this bike on the train today. It’s a Cannondale, a brand I’m not keen on, mainly for their curious approach to design and resolute defiance of industry standards.

I snatched these images on the phone, as the owner was clearly happy with his new steed. The bike has an interesting feature – ‘Headshok’ suspension. Rather than conventional front systems, where both fork legs travel together and work in tandem,  this system is at the fork crown, and much of the mechanism – dampers etc. – is in the head-tube and between crown and fork.

Initially appealing, it means all the load in work is on one member, rather than two; the system is utterly proprietary, and requires frequent, expensive, short milage interval services. Finally, you only have to look at them funny and they stop working.

There are avid Cannondale fans out there, and many love Headshok. My experience was that it was a whole bag of hurt.

I wish my fellow cyclist all the best of luck with his new bike. I think he’ll need it.