Taking advantage

Taken before the recent foot of snowfall.

The winter we're experiencing here in the Northeast isn't any more or less brutal than any other year that I can remember, but it certainly doesn't fall into that nebulous category of "mild." We've had quite a bit of snow, but hey, it's winter.

I don't ride in the snow. I just never really saw the benefit of investing in studded tires for what would only likely be a few rides a year.

It is, however, important to sneak out whenever possible. At this point, it's not about staying in shape. It's just riding to take a ride. Fresh air. Body moving.

Other than that, it's winter maintenance, a project bike or two, and soaking up more and more information and perspectives on cycling.

On a whim last night I cued up Netflix and watched "Reveal the Path," a movie about a bunch of dudes who apparently went to some far off places over a summer and documented their exploits. I used to say I couldn't stand watching golf on television. It's accessible enough that you should be out playing it, not watching it. I feel the same way about bicycle stuff, but when there's a foot of snow outside, you have to get your fix somehow.

The locales in "Reveal the Path" were stunning. What were intended as backdrops for cool mountain-biking and vague talk about "taking the path" and "just going out and doing it" almost seemed to steal the show. The Scottish highlands, the Alps, Nepal, Morocco, Alaska--well chosen, boys.

It was pleasant enough, and they didn't seem to come on too strong with their whole message, although there was a website at the end where I'm sure you could indoctrinate yourself further. Above all, it was nice to see bikes going through green grass; a lack of winter gloves; and again, those bikes--very high end mountain/trekking bikes. Not exactly where I think I'm headed, but as I watched I kept thinking boy, I could use a nice mountain bike at some point. It would be nice to have in the stable.

Repairs

I've been very lucky since I returned to bicycles in 2012. Having read all the horror stories, I was prepared for battle, but the breakdowns, crashes, accidents, and other headaches just never came.

That lucky streak ended recently, but I suppose it was as gentle as possible.

First, just as I was starting a brief ride, I tried to shift into my lowest gear, so I pushed as far as I could on my thumb shifter. I'm not sure what happened next, but I think the pressure pulled the cable out of the cable clamp. I think I didn't realize this, so I just kept pushing the shifter forward. I ended up pulling the cable housing through the shifter.

Oops

Oops.

I was desperate enough for a ride that day that I kept on going, single-speed style. But just as I was returning, I hopped off my bike and realized I had a flat rear tire. A large chunk of beer bottle glass was firmly entrenched in the rubber.

Old shifter from an 80s Fuji. Perfect replacement.

Facing several days of single-digit temperatures, I decided to do a little maintenance. I figured I would fix the shifter and tire, and finally take apart my derailleur, with the hopes of giving it a good cleaning. I was pleasantly surprised at how easy everything came apart and went back together. I see much joking about old French build quality, but I have nothing but good things to say about 80s-vintage Sachs-Huret friction derailleurs.

Bits and pieces. 

I don't really like riding in bad weather, but riding in the winter means your bike picks up a lot of road gunk. No big deal; my bike isn't precious enough to keep indoors whenever it's slightly wet out. But it does mean that frequent scrubdowns are necessary; you can feel all that grit when you pedal. And I think I was probably the first person to ever get that deep into that derailleur.

All cleaned and ready to get dirty again. 

The only casualty was the small plastic cover that goes over the dropout bolt. It's just aesthetic, but I was a little irritated. Perhaps I'll come across another one of these days.

Enjoying the winter rides

Don't worry, I don't ride on the sidewalk! 

I can't quite take a break from my bike. The weather has been quite lousy lately; rain and snow have lingered, and we're gearing up for another cold snap after enjoying about a week-long respite from the last one.

My limit is 20 degrees. Anything below 20 degrees and I'm not taking the bike out. It just gets painful, no matter how properly attired I am for the ride.

It's not just the cold, either. It's always wet, and the sand and salt spread on the road just seems to torture my bike. I'm not a neat freak about the Peugeot, but I have my limits.

Hanging from my basement ceiling awaiting a wipedown. 

The downtime is probably a good time to just do something else for a while. Relax. Do some maintenance. Work on some stuff around the house.

But I just can't resist getting out there. It has been in the high 30s-low 40s this week. Relatively speaking for this time of year, it's balmy. The recent melting has widened roads.

This wonderful wall my Peugeot is sitting against is Hope Cemetery, Worcester's municipal cemetery. I love living near cemeteries; they are beautiful, peaceful places. They are full of history and character.

Surveying all that is before her.

This is one of my favorite monuments. I've never checked out what the story is behind her -- one of these days -- but she always looks to me like she has this perfect view of the gently landscaped grounds. The hair, the pose, the garb, the patina. It's just all right.

Puffy snowboarding gloves fit the bill.

One new addition this year has been the puffy Burton snowboarding gloves you see perched above the Pug. It was the most money I have ever spent on gloves, and it seems to have been money well spent. They do have their limits -- I was at a scene for work last week in about -5 degrees and it was pretty chilly. But for bike riding in 20 degree-plus weather, they perform flawlessly.

I truly enjoy riding my bike in the cold. I end up warming up pretty good, and I am always in a better mood after a ride, no matter the climate. When it's 70 degrees in May, I will look back on the dead of winter and maybe shiver a bit while wondering what possessed me to drag my bike out of the basement at the first sign of the low sun. But I'll also look back with a smile that even in those conditions, I still made it outside, in the fresh air, zooming along, clearing my head.

Racks and rides

 This morning marked the debut of an old rack I threw on the Pug. It's a nice Blackburn that I took off of the Fuji I rebuilt for my son a while back, and it went on pretty good, although the braze-ons on the bike were not threaded like they were on the Fuji, so I had to use a nut and bolt instead. It seemed to work out fine. 

I've been thinking a lot lately about a recent post on Lovely Bicycle; the discussion revolved around how short a bike ride can be while still being enjoyable. The comments were interesting--you can tell a lot about what kind of bike riders people are without them coming out and saying it, but it made me think about what kind of bike rider I am.

 When I got back on a bike about a year and a half ago, the big goal I had in mind was fitness. Walking simply wasn't enough of a workout, and I had never been able to make running work for me. Fitness was not a singular goal; I had always loved riding as a youth, and I was excited to feel those sensations again. As I kept riding, I wondered if the motivations and inspirations were changing. I don't think they were changing as much as they were fluctuating. What does it matter, anyway? If I'm out on my bike, that's the point. I think every time I go out for a ride I look forward to checking off the fitness box, but I also just look forward to riding my bike.


 The other night, for example, I had been jonesing all day to get out for a ride. I finally got out and rode through Kelley Square, up Vernon Street, and down Vernon Street. I felt great; God knows how many calories got burned, but those 7.5 miles made my mind and my body feel better.

 A few weeks ago, I tagged along with Worcester Loops, a sort of underground riding group (they tend to drink in parks after they finish), for a 13.7 mile loop around the city. It was thrilling, challenging, and invigorating. It was a beautiful, warm evening, and it was lovely to see parts of the city on a bike I had only ever driven through.

 I wasn't thinking about how many watts I was pushing out; I was having such great fun leaning into the Washington Square rotary like I was a MotoGP rider.

 One of the comments on the Lovely Bicycle blog post went something like "If it's not worth starting up Strava, it's just transportation cycling..." I've never done Strava, but when I read that I thought, hey, I resemble that remark! Most of my rides average about 5-8 miles. I'm probably putting in 40 miles a week. I simply don't have the long stretch of time that a longer ride requires. That commenter probably does as many miles in a week that I do in a day. But is he getting what he wants out of how much he rides? Am I getting as much as I want out of my rides? Hey, maybe the answer to both is yes. I think I have some longer riding in me, but right now, I don't know any better. I rode a few miles to the library with my cool new (to me) rack, dropped off a book, and rode home. It was immensely satisfying. I don't know what a 25-mile ride feels like, but at this point, it's all relative.

Zucchini Provencal

I've been making this at least once or twice a week for about a month now.

Trek 1100

I'm a little conflicted. I bought this Trek 1100 a few weeks ago for $25 on Craigslist, and I don't know what to do with it. Perhaps it's good that I sort of haphazardly picked this one up; perhaps I'll turn it into a "teachable moment."

My long-term goal over the next year or so is to purchase a new road bike. I already ride a vintage Peugeot, so I want something new, light, fast, and trouble-free. So I didn't even want this bike, which is an '89 according to the former owner.

It has a Suntour Edge 4050 "groupset," which bascially means a related group of components. Crank, brakes, derailleurs, shifters, etc. A guy in Charlton sold it to me. When I went to pick it up, his wife was the only one home, and said she "hadn't been feeling so well lately" so had stopped riding. I felt a little sad.

It just seemed like if you have a chance to buy a $25 Trek that's in great condition, you should just buy it first and ask questions (why did I buy it? being the first one!) later. Craigslist is flooded with overpriced bikes; this simply was too good to pass up.

It doesn't fit me. I may have actually considered keeping it, but part of the reason I want a new road bike is that I want one that fits me. I think I should be riding a bike that's 58 cm from the middle of the crank to the seat tube. This one's 54. My wife was a little irritated--she said I should have gotten rid of some of the junk bikes I have piled up in a short period of time before I went taking on another project. She was right, of course.

So my dilemma is this. It could use new tubes, tires, wires and cables. Maybe some new bar tape, and some brake pads. That's basically it. It's in really good shape. Do I invest in those parts (I can do it all myself) and see if I come out in the black? Or do I simply send it off into the universe for what I paid plus maybe some labor for wiping it off? Will the Gods of bike karma look kindly upon that, ensuring that I will be rewarded down the road?

The Fuji

It's not quite refurbished, it's not quite restored, but it rides well and it was great fun working on this bike.

As the cracked and peeling decals illustrate, this is a Fuji Boulevard from around the late 1980s-early 1990s, judging from the online catalogs I've looked at. The above photo shows what it looked like the night I brought it home. It had been posted on Craigslist for months, and something caught my eye about it every time the price dropped. I keep thinking it was the rack that sealed the deal, but who knows? The price hit $30, and I pounced. I visited the guy's house, made it look like I knew what I was doing in giving it the once-over, and drove away.

The Fuji Boulevard is a very heavy bike. Slotted at the lower-end of Fuji's line, it appears to have been a sort of pre-hybrid: definitely not heavy-duty enough (well, it has the heavy part down!) to be an off-road mountain bike, but big and solid and comfy enough to make a nice city cruiser. The advertisement was weird. It was described as a "teenage" bike with 24-inch wheels. But it was  most definitely a smaller-to-medium size adult bike with 26-inch wheels. It was a 10-speed, with a Sugino double crank up front and a Shimano 5-speed freewheel in the back. The seller described the rear wheel as slightly bent, which was basically accurate. The spokes were corroded and rusty, too, so I decided early on the big find for this project would be new wheels. I figured that when complete, I would have my oldest son try it on for a possible upgrade from his 24-inch Nishiki. If he didn't feel comfortable on it, I figured I would just sell it for what I paid, or try for a small return.

Any experienced bike flipper would not have gone near this bike. Like I said, it's heavy. It's pretty basic. It was not a hugely expensive or unique bike when it was new. It needed more work than, quite frankly, it was worth. And I only paid $30 for it! The wheel issue should have sent me running--that's a big expense on a bike that I wouldn't be able to sell for much. But the other big reason I dove into this project was to teach myself some repair and refurbishing techniques. The big ones on this bike were the bottom bracket and the headset. It's such an uncomplicated part--just a spindle, some bearings, and "cups' that hold the bearings against those spindles. But I don't think a lot of people would attempt the repair. Two tools are required--a crank puller and a bottom bracket tool. But they're not too expensive, and will be used on future projects.

It all came apart pretty easy, and all went back together pretty easy. I stayed with the Sugino double for two reasons--I liked how it looked, and I didn't want to spend the (admittedly short) money for a triple that most modern mountain/hybrid bikes come with. Just figured I could always add it later. I might need a longer spindle, but hey, now I know how to remove a bottom bracket. Which was half the point of this project, like I said.


I had disassembled everything and cleaned everything, and the project kicked into high gear when, one afternoon a few weeks ago, I came across an 2000 Fuji woman's bike described as a "beach bike" or something like that. It was $10. I emailed the seller to ask if the wheels were true, and he said yes, adding that he had inflated the tired and took it for a spin around the driveway with no drama. I scooped that up, and had my wheels. The freewheel on the rear wheel was a 7-speed, so I transplanted the rear derailleur as well. I had to slightly squeeze in the new, wider freewheel, but it didn't seem like it was too much of a stretch. The original setup was friction, and the new 7-speed setup was indexed, so there was a nice upgrade. That led me to the only real new parts I bought (besides the bb bearings. cables and wires): the SRAM grip shifters. I had some extras from another parts bike, but they were horribly difficult to re-cable, and were hard even to get back together. They were older no-name units; newer grip-shifters are much easier to service. It seemed like a splurge, but I had already committed to an indexed system with the rear wheel. Plus, I knew I needed new grips for the straight bar setup. New grips, I figured, would be $8 to $10. The basic but pretty-good-quality SRAM grip shifters are only $17 for the set on Amazon, and come with their own set of grips. So I thought that was a pretty good value.

The only parts of the project I farmed out to the bike shop was the new chain (I just wasn't ready, particularly considering the frankenbike 14-speed setup) and brake adjustment (I fiddled with them for five minutes and threw in the towel). Labor charges well-spent, I say.

It rides true and smooth, and miraculously enough, the new drivetrain works like it's factory. My son loves it, although he checked off the "rack delete" option, and requested the kickstand be reinstalled, which is fine with me--it's his bike, now.

What a great feeling, riding it without any drama for the first time after putting it all back together. I'm sure there will be another project down the road that will do its best to discourage me from further projects, but this one was a great way to start out.