totally rode in the rain today

Saw a raccoon that was the epitome of the term "face plant". Poor guy.

I rode 25 wet and cold miles one-way to work. Felt good at the end though. (Duh!)

Bike commuting lessons learned:
1) the wool hiking socks were good choice this morning - they got completely soaked but my feet stayed warm

2) good call on double bagging my clothes and cell and wallet in my backpack - the backpack is lousy in rain and terrible waterproofness

3) loving my DiNotte helmet-mounted light - bright and puts the light where I am needing it most

4) not paying attention to your speed, miles, data, etc. can make the riding more fun - in other words, you needn't track the data to know you're having a good time

winter projects x 2 (Nate's tinkering du jour)

Since it has gotten colder and darker, and I have not been riding as much as I was, say in July, I have decided to embark on an upgrade of my so-called "rain bike" my older purple mid-1990s Cannondale pictured below.



I've used it for training rides, commuting, recreational rides and such. I've gone back and forth between having road pedals (which require the speacial shoes with cleats) and plain ol' platform pedals (which you could pedal in flip flops if you dared). It has a 21-speed Shimano RSX drivetrain, Mavic rims laced to Shimano hubs, RSX brakeset, Specialized Mondo tires, and improvised fenders and a rear rack. I added also a cycling computer, lights, and a bell. It is about as close to a multi-purpose vehicle as you can find and still be on 700x23c smooth tires.

Since I recently needed to replace bar tape, I decided it would be a good time to consider other upgrades. It started with buying a carbon fork to replace the stock aluminum Cannondale fork - all aluminum is very, very "buzzy" on even the smoothest of pavements and leads to fatigue fairly quickly. The whole project spiraled from there. See a midway strip-down photo below and a bare frameset shot below that.





My kitchen/workshop where I cleaned parts taken off of the Cannondale. Note the coffee pot - I was doing this after 10 o'clock at night, probably closer to midnight.



Once I stripped and cleaned the parts off of the Cannondale (I have a whole newer Shimano compact double 105 drivetrain, brakeset, etc. to put onto the Cannondale) I checked them over and they all look good still. I decided that it'd be a shame to toss them in a box and forget about them. Also, once the Cannondale is re-assembled, would I really want to continue to subject it to rain and grime?

I traveled to a local bicycle recyclers and found a suitable frame to put the Cannondale donor's parts on. The frame is a 1970s Raleigh Super Course II (made in their Carlton shop) with Reynolds 531 steel. It features pretty chromed dropouts, a paneled paint job, and just the right amount of patina without being too abused in its former owner's hands.

Here it is as I received it.



Here it is after I added a few parts to it.



I still need to find a couple of odd bits, mainly related to fitment of the newer style brakeset (need longer bolts) and the rear derailleur hanger (need an adapter of sorts to slide into the horizontal drop out). I think a place like Harris Cyclery or a local shop can help me out.

Hopefully, I keep in mind this is supposed to be the new "rain bike" when I am done!

biking in the wet

It's really Biblical crappy wind and weather today in the PNW. I had to pop over to the Commute By Bike blog for their advice on riding in the rain.

And I just got rid of a wetsuit today...

waiting game

I ordered a hiviz yellow jacket from E-Bay at the end of October. Still has not arrived. Grrr.

I could use it too since the Daylight Savings Time has changed - plus it is typically very rainy.

wish list item: DiNotte lights

If I found a wad of money in a trunk, I would spend some of it on better lights for bicycle commuting now that Daylight Savings Time is upon us.

DiNotte makes lights that seem (based on my viewing of a few product demos on YouTube) much brigter than you'd expect to get from such a s small package, and they take AA rechargable off-the-shelf batteries, not a specialized, expensive, cumbersome battery pack.

Of course, with his convenience and performance, the cost of the product is well north of the $100 range, which plants it in between most battery-powered head and tail lights and the higher end, higher powered, rechargeable units.





Photos are all from the DiNotte web site (http://www.dinottelighting.com/).

Here are videos posted to YouTube demonstrating the lights and their effectiveness.




Of course, if I had a set of these, the cost of the lights would be more than the cost of the bicycle!

rain, rain, go away

It rained all-day today, at least when I would have been riding a bike. Plus, I had a meeting where I had to look nice.

So, I decided it was better to keep the bike at home today. Plus, I saw gas prices at a local station slipped 4 cents per gallon since last week. Big oil is hurting for business. Demand has dropped. All because I rode my bike 4 times to work this month so far. [insert heavy sarcasm here]

It's better than what happened last week. On the way to work, gas was $3.39/gallon and I remarked to myself "hey -- it's been that price for at least a week". When I went by later that day it was $3.41/gallon.