Jaysus cycling! (3 Viewers)

[classic seanc]

Fixed gear is sooooo 2007

 

[flashback]

They are mad popular over here.
I always noticed that, and no idea why. Some of them have put a front brake on. Although, I would probably give up brakes before I give up gears.
If I never left the city, I would think about one, but need those gears for the hills outside.

 

[classic seanc]

Arra, as I've said before I'd like to get one, specifically I'd like to make it up myself. People who own them are religiously fanatical about it.
I'd have a front brake on, not too high a gear ratio.

This story might be exaggerated a bit, but I like it:
http://www.sheldonbrown.com/fixed-testimonial.html

I rode a fixed-gear bike exclusively from early in 1979 to late 1981, and in parallel with a touring bike until 1984. In 1979, my (only) touring bike was stolen and I hadn't enough money to replace it, so I scoured the second-hand parts bins for the smallest number of low-cost parts that would make me a working bicycle. The most important part, the part which made a fixed gear bike possible, was a rusty 22" mild steel frame with rearward-facing fork ends and a one and a half inch bottom bracket drop! This gave me nearly twelve inches bottom bracket height. A hard pedal strike was almost impossible, even on off-camber bends.
I had some cottered six and a half inch (165 mm) cranks and a 46 tooth by eighth inch chainring and bought enough other parts to have a fully functional commuter (lights, guards, rack, single brake) for $65. I even had an old mechanical speedo with odometer.
I loved that bike. It was the fastest bike I ever had and it handled as part of my body. At 36 pounds (16.4 kg) (in full commuter trim) it was also one of the heaviest bikes I ever had.
Sydney, New South Wales, is a hilly city of drowned river valleys, sandstone cliffs and gullies and very busy major roads and bridges. The fixed-wheel was a joy to ride in traffic; I had perfect control over direction and speed. I had to work hard on all those hills, and ended up fit enough to be able to draft buses to maintain minimum exposure to traffic on the most exposed, narrow bridge lanes.
A few times I drafted buses or trucks uphill at 70-75 kmh (45 mph), on the flat at 85 kmh (53 mph) and twice I descended Gladesville Bridge without drafting (a one in twelve slope or about 8.5% grade) at 85 kmh. In a 69 inch (5.31 gain/5.52 meter) gear that was a cadence of about 260 rpm! My legs have definitely deteriorated over the years; they now have a built-in limit of about 120 rpm, closely tied to aerobic fitness level and the lack of any need to spin really hard.
Commuting in heavy traffic took a lot of new skills. I still had my cleated shoes, but my freewheel technique of starting up with a half pedal revoltion, coast, flip the other pedal with my toe and reach down to pull the strap tight, did not work at all. I found that the best way to start up in the Transit Lane in morning peak hour was to start at full bore and pick up the other pedal during the first or second revolution, then tighten the toe strap with a quick flick of the free end, once I had a good cadence up (say around 90 rpm or 28 kmh {17 mph}).
Another useful skill I learned, was flat-out acceleration from a seated start. This works well once you learn to do a track stand, as track racers do in order to jostle for position in a matched sprint. This is an easy technique on a fixed-wheel, even when facing downhill. I quickly developed the skill of staying absolutely stationary at traffic lights; some motorists even leaned out and asked "What are you leaning on?"
Over those years I tried a number of gear ratios, but always came back to 69 inch (5.31 gain/5.52 meter), as the most comfortable all-round gear for local riding. The only other gear that saw much work was a 65 inch (5.00 gain/5.20 meter) gear; more of a winter gear, when a lot of riding was at night, perhaps in rain, with the dynamo running around 40 minutes a day.
Very few parts changed on that bike over about 15,000 km of commuting. I used a few tyres and started a new chain. Its total cost topped out at $110. The fixed-wheel was the cheapest in running costs of any bike I've ever had: an all-up cost (including capital) of about seven cents per kilometre. Compare that with 35 cents per kilometre for my Alex Moulton AM14!
I sold the fixed wheel to a friend who was a student at (coincidentally!) the University of New England in Armidale, NSW. Now that's a hilly city! The frame finally rusted through in 1989 and they had a full funeral at the Armidale Tip (rubbish dump).
The only time that I ever came to grief on the fixed-wheel was when I got a shoelace caught in the chain, in traffic. I locked the rear wheel deliberately, but was unable to save myself from falling over when I stopped. Elbows were meant as gravel-buffers anyway.
The fixed-wheel gave me skills which have stayed with me all the intervening years: the stand-in-place trick in traffic; the skills to read surfaces and camber; seated acceleration; oddly enough, a strong wish to maintain a very steady cadence on a geared bike; greater ability to avoid potholes and road debris with just a flick of the hips; the mental techniques to power up hills as if they aren't there and use anaerobic power at will. I might have learned some of these things if I had ever raced, but the fixed-wheel was a better teacher, by necessity!
The fixed wheel stays with me as a bundle of fond memories. I might never have another one, but I do enjoy having had that old clunker.

 

[flashback]

Sounds about right alright.
In terms of cost, the Specialized I spent a grand on is dirt cheap per mile.
There is only one big hill on my commute, but it drags out, and has a steep finish. I tend to just muscle up it, but in the summer heat, if I'm tired I will drop into a lower gear leaving it on the same chain ring.
A fixer could be a goer, I could leave it anywhere for a start.

 

[rettucs]

have to share this one with yis.

Went out for a 3-hour spin yesterday morning in Wicklow. Towards the end of the lake drive in Blessington, just where the valleymount road heads up towards the N81 I decided I'd eat a banana. After eating the banana, as I always do, I flung the peel into the ditch. If someone wants to convince me thats wrong, go for it, but in my head theres no issue. It'll decompose within days, and thats all there is to that.

Anyway, a minute or so after disposing of the banana skin this lad pulls up beside me in a massive land rover jeep, rolls down his window and tells me to bring my rubbish home with me.

I've never reacted this way when out on the road bike before but I completely flipped. I started roaring at him, calling him a hypocrite, driving his big air poisoning machine, yet having the gall to give out to me for throwing a banana skin into a poxy ditch. I think he was a little shocked so he drove off. I can't imagine what I must have looked like in his rear view mirror, arms waving, shouting, pointing to the sky (to tell him what he was damaging), etc.

mad.

 

[Pedronimus]

I'd consider it fine to throw a piece of food into a ditch, especially on a bike.

 

[rettucs]

I'd consider it fine to throw a piece of food into a ditch, especially on a bike.

agreed. I eat nutri-grains and muesli bars when on longer cycles. I also take energy gels on occasion. I always put the wrappers for those into my pocket and bin them when I get home.

banana skins on the other hand.

yer man had some neck on him. I actually went after him to give him a bit more of my mind, but he got out on to the main road and I couldn't catch him.

 

[IFF]

i don't think you did anything wrong in this instance. as you said, it'll biodegrad in 2-3 days

hell i know people who use banana skins as fertilizer so you know, you did nothing wrong

 

[Space]

There's some cheap lycra in Lidl atm fyi ktnx.

 

[classic seanc]

There's some cheap lycra in Lidl atm fyi ktnx.

That was last thursday. All gone now. I decided to show up late for work so I could get into the shop and the bargains at 9am. But, like an idiot, I went to Aldi instead of Lidl.

have to share this one with yis.

Went out for a 3-hour spin yesterday morning in Wicklow. Towards the end of the lake drive in Blessington, just where the valleymount road heads up towards the N81 I decided I'd eat a banana. After eating the banana, as I always do, I flung the peel into the ditch. If someone wants to convince me thats wrong, go for it, but in my head theres no issue. It'll decompose within days, and thats all there is to that.

Anyway, a minute or so after disposing of the banana skin this lad pulls up beside me in a massive land rover jeep, rolls down his window and tells me to bring my rubbish home with me.

I've never reacted this way when out on the road bike before but I completely flipped. I started roaring at him, calling him a hypocrite, driving his big air poisoning machine, yet having the gall to give out to me for throwing a banana skin into a poxy ditch. I think he was a little shocked so he drove off. I can't imagine what I must have looked like in his rear view mirror, arms waving, shouting, pointing to the sky (to tell him what he was damaging), etc.

mad.

Gratifying innit?

 

[Space]

That was last thursday. All gone now. I decided to show up late for work so I could get into the shop and the bargains at 9am. But, like an idiot, I went to Aldi instead of Lidl.

There was a few bits left in Moore St yesterday.

 

[rettucs]

MINISTER FOR Communications, Energy and Natural Resources Éamon Ryan has urged Dublin City Council to adopt the Parisian model for its city bicycle rental scheme.
The city council has signed a deal with outdoor advertising company JC Decaux for 450 bicycles in exchange for allowing the company street advertising space estimated to be worth in the region of €1 million annually.
JC Decaux already runs the Paris Velib scheme as well as several other bicycle rental schemes in Europe, but there are differences in how each system operates.
After a presentation at Paris town hall yesterday, Mr Ryan said he would like to see Dublin introduce the Paris scheme. "The best working example is Paris. People think they'll all be stolen, but when you can show such a good working system, I am hopeful. The scale of this is so good - 20,000 bicycles. You need that scale."
The scheme would work best if the mayor of Dublin had real power, like the mayors of Paris, London and New York, Mr Ryan said. The number of one-way streets in the Irish capital were also a deterrent to cyclists, he said.
At the Velib station outside the Paris town hall, Matthieu Fierling, the deputy head of the project, told the Minister how the city installed 750 wholly automatic bicycle stations last summer, has 1,200 across the city now, with a goal of 1,451 by this summer.
On average, 80,000 bicycle trips are made in Paris every day, with up to 120,000 on peak days. By next summer, the city will have 20,600 bicycles in service.
If cyclists were encouraged, Mr Ryan said, cities like Paris and Dublin "will reach a tipping point where the bicycles start to dominate the streets instead of the cars". Like Paris, he noted, Dublin was a flat city where the average journey was less than two miles.
"In the city, for any journey under four kilometres, the bicycle always wins, and it's the only form of transport that is door-to-door."
Because the average bicycle journey in Paris lasts 22 minutes, the designers of Velib made the first half-hour of bicycle rental free, to encourage people to return bicycles quickly, for maximum turnover. There is a €150 deposit to discourage theft; one can buy a day pass for €1, a week pass for €5 or an annual pass for €29.
"In Paris, the three deterrents were fears about theft, maintenance and parking," Mr Fierling said.
Velib bikes come with their own lock and basket. They are maintained by the contractor and there is a station where they can be returned every 300m.
By this summer, Paris will have invested a total of €90 millioin the Velib system and the street hoardings which finance it.
The city has also built 400km of bicycle lanes, many of which are shared by buses. Mayor Bertrand Delanoë made Velib self-financing by linking the contract for maintaining and renting the bicycles to a monopoly on 1,600 city-owned advertising hoardings.
Nearly 5 per cent of Dublin journeys are by bicycle, Mr Ryan said. "Once you get 7, 8 or 9 per cent, there's no reason you can't go to 20 per cent."

some words of advice to Mr Ryan.

Dublin is a shit city for cycling in. People come along and dig up cycle lanes and don't put them back the way they found them, and they get away with it because there seems to be no standards regulating those kinds of things.

Cycle lanes are a joke. They're either on the path where they never get cleaned if they get littered with glass or whatever, or else there in bus lanes where buses don't give a shit about you and get irate for getting in their way, and will try and squeeze by you regardless (the only way to combat this is to cycle out in the middle of the lane so they can't get by).

There is nowhere secure to lock a bike in the city. If, say, every multistory car park had to make a certain percentage of its space available for free, covered, secure bike parking, then more people would be confident of cycling into town and leaving their bike somewhere it wouldn't get robbed.

VAT on bikes. If they are serious about getting people cycling, they need to get rid of this and make cycling cheaper. VAT on repairs also. Or at least offer tax relief on it (might sound extreme but johnny govt will save in the long run - both in terms of wear and tear on the roads and in people's general health levels improving).

Nackers are gonna throw these rental bikes in the liffey.

Nackers are gonna vandalise these rental bikes.

Dublin is a shit city for cycling in.

The end.

 

[Lefty Frizzell]

Well said scutter. I completely agree with you but i do believe nacker is spelt with a capital k.

 

[rettucs]

Well said scutter. I completely agree with you but i do believe nacker is spelt with a capital k.

ah, thanks.

damn them Knackers anyway

 

[Lefty Frizzell]

ah, thanks.

damn them Knackers anyway

 

[classic seanc]

For the last two weeks my work had me cycling round the city all day. I reckon it was about 2 million times better than being in the office.

Things I noticed about cycling in Dublin:
99% of people don’t lock their bike securely, even people with nice new bikes.
Most people have shit bikes, no doubt because a good bike will get robbed. This doesn’t encourage cycling at all.
People don’t maintain their bikes well at all. I assume they don't know how. But again, this doesn’t encourage cycling.
Pedestrians are scared of cyclists (unnecessarily in my view), except during rush hour. They have a herd mentality.
Many many people don’t know how to use gears properly, and quite a lot of people have a strange obsession with the little ring-little cog combination.
Not all couriers are the maniacal demons that they appear to be, they could be much worse and they know what they’re doing. Though some are pricks, and snooty too.
George’s st. is a mess
Cobblestones hurt my testicles.

 

[Pedronimus]

If, say, every multistory car park had to make a certain percentage of its space available for free, covered, secure bike parking, then more people would be confident of cycling into town and leaving their bike somewhere it wouldn't get robbed.

That's a good idea.

I think they should try to encourage people to use their own bikes in town rather than making a whole load of these new bikes available. Spend all the cash on road maintenance and secure lockups instead.

But then again this might be a big jolt that gets lots more people cycling and may make the whole cycling experience safer....safey in numbers and all that.

 

[Lili Marlene]

learn to cycle seanc

 

[classic seanc]

learn to cycle seanc

I'll cycle up and down your face boss.
I can cycle, I can even use the special shoes now without falling over or anything.

 

[Lefty Frizzell]

Were you cycling the scr around town?