[jabberwocky]

Another vote for “just use a 135mm hub”. I had a steel Poprad disc frame for several years that was originally 130mm; since disc 130mm hubs are hard to find I just used 135mm MTB hubs and it worked perfectly fine. I think that Surly even sets their disc frames at 132.5 so either spacing works. It isn’t hard to move steel stays 5mm.

[jabberwocky]

I hardly ever shop in B&M shops, so I form most of my opinions on shops based on how big of a douchecanoe their shop riders are. There are a few highly regarded local shops I totally ceased visiting or recommending entirely because I was tired of being run off the trail by people in their jerseys.

On that criteria, Bikenetic gets my recommendation. Almost always a chill, polite bunch when you run into them.

[jabberwocky]

If its going to rain again, after a wet ride I’ll generally just throw the bike in the stand, wipe the chain/drivetrain down and relube it. Takes a few minutes. If its been a rainy week and the next few look sunny and nice I’ll do a more thorough cleaning.

[jabberwocky]

Alternate solution:

[ATTACH=CONFIG]11737[/ATTACH]

(I hate geese)

[jabberwocky]

Really, all you have to do is think for a second about whats gonna happen/where your hand/body/etc is gonna go if the tool slips when really cranking on something. Most of the time its possible to orient a tool in a way that if it suddenly breaks free your hand just shoots off into space and doesn’t slam into anything pointy.

Its something you learn very quickly woodworking, at least if you want to keep all your fingers.

[jabberwocky]

Hah. I can remember arguing with someone (volunteer with the park patrol) when that limit went into effect that the police would eventually use it as a revenue source. He claimed that they would never be conducting normal speed traps, that it was just there as a tool to curb the most egregious behavior. :rolleyes:

[jabberwocky]

A while back I dismantled the rear derailleur cage on my mountain bike to clean and lube the pulleys. This is a Sram type 2.1 in a 1×10 setup. When I reassembled, I put the long pulley screw in the top and the short in the bottom, opposite of how it should be. The way it manifested was the derailleur would stick and not tension the chain, but only in certain gears. For a few rides I was getting baffling chain drops all over the place until I finally figured out what I did. The long screw is apparently just long enough to jam the mechanism, but only in certain orientations.

[jabberwocky]

Its nicely illustrative of the core problem that a thread about the crap women deal with (sometimes on a daily basis) gets turned around to be about how hard men actually have it. :rolleyes:

[jabberwocky]

@dasgeh 138171 wrote:

I would imagine this thread is not at all surprising to the women here (and I second, third, fifth, all of their comments – I’ve been oogled and harrassed. It’s not her, it’s them). This is the reality we live, and it’s the reality your mothers, aunts, grandmas, sisters, wives, girlfriends, woman friends, nieces and daughters live.

I know. I’m not sad because its at all surprising (its unfortunately not). Its just aggravating that its true. I used to lead mountain bike rides for MORE and occasionally would have issues where a woman showed up and a few guys on the ride would hang around them and clearly make them uncomfortable (and yeah, I talked to the guys, or when that didn’t help, ask the creepers to take the front for a while to get them out of their hair). It annoyed me as the ride leader when it happened, but I’m sure its much, much worse for a woman who has to deal with it all the time.

@bentbike33 138173 wrote:

Anything I can do to make people more comfortable without being misconstrued?

Honestly, just pass as soon as possible. I’ve been guilty of inadvertently making a solo woman uncomfortable commuting before. Sometimes you just end up going about the same speed as someone on an empty section of trail. I didn’t think anything of it until a female friend pointed out that it can be disconcerting when an unknown guy is following you, and I’ve tried to be more cognizant of that since then.

[jabberwocky]

This thread makes me sad.

As a small consolation, I did witness a guy on a road bike crash while turning to ogle a woman jogger on the W&OD several years ago. Occasionally karma does its thing.

[jabberwocky]

@Emm 137227 wrote:

$7

If you plan ahead, tubes can be had much cheaper than this too. Lots of online shops carry generic (almost always rebranded QBP) tubes for pretty cheap. The last few batches I bought came from Price Point. Their house brand tubes (http://www.pricepoint.com/Brand/Price-Point/Price-Point-Tube.axd) are about 2 bucks apiece. I just get 10-20 at a time and don’t worry about tubes for a few years.

[jabberwocky]

Tubes should hold air outside a bike tire. It sounds like the patch didn’t take. Adding patches to a failed one generally isn’t going to make things better. :p IMO you should just stop messing with the tube and replace it.

Over the years, I’ve generally gotten past patching tubes. This is especially true of pinch flats, which tend to leave a slice rather than a hole. IME patches aren’t as good at dealing with them. In my mind, its just not worth the trouble of dealing with a failed tube. I keep a stock of tubes on hand and if I get a flat I swap the tube and call it a day.

I do keep patches in my seat bag for in-field repairs (if I go through my one spare tube then I can start patching, and I’ve given them away to people I’ve come across who left home unprepared. My favorite are the Park glueless patches. They are basically stickers and hold up well enough and are very easy to apply.

[jabberwocky]

120 bucks? For that price just get a pancake compressor and call it a day.

Plus, its bontrager. Which means it will work for a year or two tops.

[jabberwocky]

The Old Reston one changes almost instantly when the button is pushed. I’ve crossed that intersection maybe a thousand times and don’t think I’ve ever waited more than 5 seconds for it.

The Van Buren one is relatively new, but honestly the sightlines at that intersection are great and if traffic is light I usually just roll it. It changes pretty quick too if you do use it. Maybe that intersection is more heavily used at rush hour but I’ve never seen much traffic there.

I generally like the lights at larger intersections. Though the first time I was hit by a car while riding was the light at Maple Ave in Vienna (I had the signal, a girl in the far lane didn’t notice the light had changed and gunned it as I was crossing). And it would be nice if the timing was better on some of them (Maple and Gallows, for example, sometimes take forever to change).

I’m surprised Hunter Mill hasn’t gotten anything.

[jabberwocky]

@PotomacCyclist 135675 wrote:

Road deaths increased to 38,300 in 2015, from 35,236 in 2014. I had been citing 33,000 as the number of annual traffic/road fatalities in the U.S. but that’s far too low a figure now, unfortunately. That also means 105 Americans die each and every day, on average, in or because of cars.

The really sad part is that cars themselves have been getting safer and safer every year. A 2016 car is so far beyond a 1996 car when it comes to safety of the people inside its not even funny (and compared to a 1976 car there is just no comparison).

We’ve made the cars safer while pretty much totally ignoring the driver inside.

[Author]

Posts