April 24th – Meanwhile, the fly tipping I recorded had gone by the time I passed next day. I tip my hat to Walsall’s Clean & Green team. It’s a horrid job, but very well done.
Cheers, folks.
Images
April 24th – It’s not often I cover matters of religious division here on 365daysofbiking, but there’s a time and place for everything. I’ve mentioned before that I prefer a gearhub to derailleur gears; low maintenance, reliable, bombproof. Gearhubs, hub gears or IGHs are a divisive thing – I use an Alfine by Shimano; it offers 11 gears at a 404% range, and works like a charm. The disadvantage is it concentrates a lot of weight at the rear of the bike, and life can get really challenging if they fail.
People get very energised about hub gears, and about the oil one should lubricate them with. Allow me to explain…
Last week I had trouble with my gears not engaging correctly. Often with Alfine units – which run in an oil bath – the slipping indicates that the oil in the hub needs a change, and this one hadn’t been done for about 3,000 miles. As it happened, I was wrong; the adjuster mechanism had slipped slightly when I’d last fitted the wheel and resetting it’s position solved the problem, but not before I’d drained the oil and changed it a couple of times for thin stuff.
The standard oil Shimano recommend is thick. The procedure is to remove a small plug on the hub, screw in a length of pipe which attaches to a syringe, and ‘suck out’ the old oil. I generally leave it overnight to drain. I then clean the syringe with alcohol, suck up 25ml of clean oil, and squirt that into the hub. Because this one hadn’t been done for ages, I used a thin oil, and then reinserted the plug, a rode the bike for a while. I then drained the thin oil the same way. I repeated the process until the oil coming backout was reasonably clean.
Rather than use Shimano oil, which is expensive and goes thick in winter, I decided to use oil by another hub-gear manufacturer; Rohlhoff. Rohlhoff hubs contain more plastic parts than Shimano, so their oil should be OK. It’s thinner, but seems like good stuff.
The Rohlhoff oil also comes with a ‘cleaning oil’, so tonight’s job was to drain the hub once more, and pump in 25ml of cleaning oil. I will ride the bike tomorrow, and then drain it again, before finally pumping in the new oil.
Sounds like a parlarver, but it’s easy, really. I love the hub gears, and sometimes, you have to demonstrate you care.
Say it with oil.
I bet this has made the purists tut their disapproval…
April 22nd – Using a bike rack, you’re doing it wrong (and making it difficult for anyone else to do so, too).
Photo taken through the train window whilst stopped at Butlers Lane this morning, hence poor quality, sorry.
Come on you dozy wazzock, it ain’t rocket science, is it?
April 20th – An odd day, really. I had a family thing to do most of the day over in Lichfield, but the weather was terrible anyway, blustery and wet. Spinning around Brownhills and Burntwood in the evening, I passed Chase Terrace Technology College.
They have a couple of signs like this. I find them offensive, not only in terms of accepted English, but graphically and syntactically.
Whoever approved them should be dragged out on the street, and slapped with a copy of a The Typography Manual until they publicly repent.
For an educational establishment, this is piss-poor.
April 15th – I seem to be going through a mechanical rough patch. It happens, I guess, but it’s frustrating. My bikes are never the cleanest around, but I like to keep them mechanically tip-top. Thus when you have a rash of failures, it can be really disheartening. Following a spate of punctures last week, and the bizarre failure of the crank, yesterday the tension bolt on my saddle snapped, making for an uncomfortable ride home.
I use Brooks saddles – traditional, made in Birmingham, they’re the best thing I’ve found for my bum, and they give years of service. Lauded and hated equally by the cycling community, there are all kinds of myths surrounding Brooks saddles; you need 500 miles to ‘break one in’, they need constant oiling, they’re ruined if you adjust the tension.
A saddle is a saddle – it either fits your arse or it doesn’t. If a Brooks doesn’t feel nice when you first get on, it’ll never fit you and you’ll hate it forever. But if it does fit, wearing it in will make it fit even better. I oil mine using Proofide once a year. I occasionally nip the tension up a half-turn when it gets a bit hammocky to ride. Again, about once a year.
I have never been as comfy on a bike as I have with a Brooks between me and the miles. I love them. I can ride all day (and often do) and never feel sore on them. But that’s me.
Always try a saddle before you buy it.
My only criticism of these posterior wonders of comfort is the tension pins are crap. They snap usually at the point where the thread finishes, as this one has. The head fits in a socket at the nose of the saddle, and there’s a nut (not shown) that tightens against a shackle acting against it, and the rails. This takes most of my weight, and fatigues. The threaded part above has been filed to enable me to get the nut off without damaging it’s threads.
Easy enough to replace, this is the second time this pin has broken on this saddle in it’s ten year lifespan. What’s annoying is they’re a cheap £4 replacement, but postage doubles the price. Fortunately, last time this happened, I ordered a spare, too.
I love Brooks saddles. But they ain’t perfect and they’re not for everyone…
April 12th – I got a long ride in today, but the afternoon was dull and overcast and I hardly took any photos at all. I was just too busy, stoking the miles in. I left mid afternoon, and headed out via Stonnall, Canwell and Middleton, then on to the canal near Middleton Lakes. I headed into Birmingham against a fearsome headwind, along the canals of the city centre, then out via Smethwick, Great Bridge, Darlaston and back to Walsall. Picking up some shopping, I headed home early evening. It was a great ride – just about 50 miles in total.
As I came over the Arboretum Junction, I took this from the stopline. Walsall looks gorgeous in the dusk.
Apriul 12th – I must have passed this hundreds of times without noticing it. Facing the footpath on the Birmingham Road, just on the edge of the Highwayman Car Park at Shenstone Woodend, this Ordnance Survey monument. Cast Iron, now at a jaunty angle, it sows a benchmark in the absence of a building to carve one into.
I had no idea these ornate cast iron ones existed, and they seem relatively rare. A fine, uniquely British thing.
April 10th – returning down the dam, another sign of spring. The bugs have risen.
This isn;t a murmuration of starlings, or even a flock of sparrows. I don’t know exactly what they are, but the air was thick with drifting, buzzing, irritating clouds of insects that got in my hair, eyes and clothes.
Interesting how they all seem to emerge at exactly the same natural trigger point. In a day or so, they’ll be gone.
An annoying, but fascinating beit of nature.
#30daysofbiking – day 7. A very short ride today! Left for work early, have an evening function and have a full day. So, I rode my #Brompton from the office to a nearby grocery store to get a sandwich between two meetings. A lovely ride on the pathway next to the Eerste River (First River) in Stellenbosch. It runs just behind our office building at the University. (at Stellenbosch University)
Gotta love the Bromptons…
April 5th – I wasn’t feeling great. I wasn’t down anymore, but I felt achey and muzzy like I had a cold coming, the weather was grey and windy, and I contented myself with a trip to Chasewater. On the way I passed the remarkable shrine to Jamey Coleman, who was tragically killed here in a hit and run incident a week before.
It pulled me up short. Don’t think I’ve ever seen so many tributes.
Please – if you know anything at all about this incident – no matter how inconsequential you think it may be, please do contact the police.
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