Do you shave?

You'll be surprised to whom these legs belong

As humans, it is our moral obligation to divide ourselves into the haves and have nots, the doers and the shakers. We must categorize, stereotype and file each person based on our perception of who they truly are. As cyclists, this is amplified. I mean really, what the hell is a gravel bike? I don't own a bike that I can't ride on a gravel road. And all of my bikes have seen dirt at one point or another, but I digress...

There are three types of cyclists. There are those who shave, those who don't and those who shave depending on which bike they ride. As an aspiring professional cyclists, it is important that you choose the appropriate level of leg hair for your chosen discipline.

Does the idea of having tan lines that are perfectly defined on your biceps, thighs and calves appeal to you? Are you willing to suffer through pedaling for hours on ends with some other dude's ass right in front of you? Have you fantasized about having legs smoother than your girlfriend's so you can feel them at night when you are all alone? If you answered yes to any of those questions, you need to shave.

More...

Another marketing fail

The Speed Limit brake. Wow, that is awesome. Order me two. You know what would have been even better, Speed Limiter brakes. Yup, nothing better than actually branding something with a synonym for what it is. Then you could do a whole fixed gear cog range that is called, "Brakes only slow you down." Or even better, a fixed gear specific front brake, you called call it the Endo. Or maybe the "Oh shit this was a bad idea" brake.

I guess since Butt Dragger went with the Speed Limit thing, it would seem logical that they would put the limit on the brake. Such as 5 mph...

It has a bit of flex...

The dichotomy of, oh fuck you! I'm making fun of racers.

Yes, I absolutely need a power meter for my bike that I ride exclusively downhill. 

The fact that ScRAM and SRM are both pursuing this market goes to show that there really are only two types of riders. And no the two divisions don't have to deal with mountain or road or CX or XC or pickles. Racers are divided by how they react to the world around them. There are those that are so uptight they have to use a heartrate monitor during the morning dump to ensure they stay under threshold and those who are blatantly unaware of the mechanical side of their sport.

Caption this...

Oval

Oval - the absolute worst name for a bicycle wheel.

I also noticed they have Oval bearings, Oval bars, Oval stems, Oval brakes....

The World is an Imperfect Place

As a good friend of mine likes to say, "The world is an imperfect place." So shit happens.

If you are anything like myself or the folks with whom I turn the pedals, you probably like to turn the pedals hard and put your two-wheeled love machine through the paces. When said activities are taking place you rarely have time to be thinking about whether you torqued your XTR cranks to the specified 13 NM or if it was done in the alternating fashion prescribed by the Japanese God of Cycling, Shimano. Hopefully, you or your wrench of choice has done said things and you can ride into the sunset without worries.

But as I started this here post, the world is imperfect and shit happens. Anyone who rides has found themselves stranded on the side of the road with a broken bike in one hand and the look of defeat in the other. At this point you hopefully aren't praying to the Japanese God of Cycling that you remembered to restock your saddle bag or that your multi-tool is, in reality, safely tucked in your Deuter hydration pack. If any of those thoughts are racing through your mind, you are not alone. Many a cyclist has been stranded on the side of the road hoping that the red neck that just about killed them five minutes earlier can forget the middle finger salute they received and give said cyclist a ride back to town.

Seeing that I tend to ride with people who are proficient in maintaining and repairing their own bicycles, I have found that there exist two main types of trail side repairmanperson.

Anyone else ever experience this?

I'm pretty sure I'm the only wrench in existence with this problem.

You see, I'm hairy. Like Harry and the Hendersons Hairy. When I wear shorts and I am airing up a tire I always forget that it is a bad idea to have the wheel leaning up against my leg. Using an air compressor to fill things up means the tire expands quickly catching the hair from my legs between the bead and the rim. It hurts.

If you look closely, you can see my hair.

That is all.

BB30 Fixing Bolt

If you still have play in your cranks after tightening the fixing bolt, keep tightening it. The key is to stop before the bolt breaks...

Fucking, fuckity fuck fuck fuck you Vuelta USA.

So here's a great idea for a wheel. Let's take some tiny ass washers and put them between the nipple and the rim. Just to make it better, let's make the rim deep dish and have hidden nipples. It will be rad and everyone will love us.

This has got to be one of the dumbest, asinine ideas I have ever seen realized. Zipp uses washers but they actually increase the surface area of the nipple. These little shits only cover the end of the nipple. The only use I can see is to add some flex in the nipple to rim interface. But isn't that what the rounded end of your god damn nipple does. I seriously have no fucking idea what these are for or how the fuck they are supposed to go in the rim. I've tried everything I can think of, any ideas?

Not only are the washers a bad idea, but Vuelta USA can't even get there fucking ERD right. Nope, you were off by a factor of those spokes are way too short. Did you forget to measure the distance from the outer side of the rim to where the nipple actually rests? I thought so. Thank you for wasting my time. I guess next time I know to tell the customer to send your wheels back and try buying something from a wheel company that doesn't have to contact Taiwan to get a fucking ERD on a rim they sell.

And right about now, I think Vuelta USA can go fuck themselves. Anyone interested in sending them hate mail, you can use my name. It's Moose K Nuckler.  Thank you and good night.

Tuffy and Solid tube?

when you really dont want to flat and you hate your wheelset!

Fuck the Cool Factor!

I'm gonna go ahead and say what none of you want to hear.

You know all those blingy parts you recently purchased, all those fancy colored due dads that were supposed to be so much better than last year's model, all those Chris Bling and American Crassic lightweight parts. Those are all shit. You might as well throw them away. You might as well recycle them.

Yes. I get it. There is a cool factor involved in every purchase. Having the latest and the so called greatest is a way of life and if it motivates you to ride, I'm cool with that. I'm just sick of all the bull shit marketing that goes into those fancy parts that everyone is drooling over. Fuck the cool factor!

This is how it all breaks down. The safety bicycle came out a couple of hundred years ago, or so, and not much has changed since. You have two hubs, a bottom bracket bearing, a crank, a chain, some cogs, a steering bearing, a frame and a few other miserable parts that aren't worth mentioning. If you came across one of the original safety bicycles, or a penny farthing for that matter, you would notice that all this hyped up bull shit is almost identical to what came out a hundred years ago. All of our fancy manufacturing practices have done what? Provided you with a better selection of colors.

Bicycle Ejection Seat

Why didn't this product catch on?

Designed to fail

The Light Bulb Conspiracy is a documentary that drags us through the annals of time via the idea of planned obsolescence. The name of the film comes from the collusion of light bulb manufacturers to set the burn time of light bulbs to guarantee a steady flow of "need" from the public. It explores the thousands of patents that have been filed that are for longer burning, longer lasting filaments. They even show a light bulb that has been burning in Fire House back east for over 100 years. For the past decade or so they have had web cams watching the bulb. Two of them have had to be replaced.



The idea of planned obsolescence is not a new idea, nor is it an idea that seems to be fading into the sunset as we have increased our knowledge of materials and industrial processes. Quite the contrary, as better, lighter, stronger materials have become available, we have seen a decrease in product life expectancy. Not only have the products become less and less durable, but the season cycle or the idea of the never ending need to have the newest and the best has replaced the consumer's desire to have a product that will last. Why would I want a light bulb that lasts forever?

This bike shop is fucked!

A couple months back I found myself sitting around a tall table in a sports bar sharing beers with other bike shop owner/managers. I was in California at a retail management course specially tailored to the needs of bike shops. We were out after a full eight hour day of classes. No riding, not much moving around, lots of book work. We needed to unwind and let things air out. If you know what I mean.

As it goes with these types of events, there was a lot of shop talk. The bull shit was getting so deep our server had to put on rubber boots to make it to the table. Most of the evening consisted of what do you do about this? and how are you doing with X brand? Stuff that would bore even the most passionate industry insider. However, there was one guy at the table that had a pattern to his stories.

One story would be about how hard it is to make any money owning a bike shop and how he was struggling just to make ends meet. Then he would tell stories about "dumb" customers who he had to throw out or just didn't get that he was trying to "help" them.

Hmm.

Customer dropped this one off. And admitted that he knew the cassette had come off and then tried to go for another ride...

Look I made a lefty!

I don't know, I think I can get a few more rides out of 'em.

Destroyed

This bike had some "drag" in the headset. I pulled the top cap and I knew immediately what the problem was. The top bearing was fixable but the bottom was completely gone. Unfortunately this is an old USPS Trek with a 1 1/4" bottom bearing size with no taper on the bearing. The Trek dealer in town said he could possibly get one for me but he would have to call and find out. For now, it still has drag.

Right Tool for the Wrong Job

Note: A chisel is not the appropriate tool for removing bottom bracket bearings.