[vvill]

Spotted the Man today heading east on the FMR detour. We said hi.

[vvill]

Good luck Tim! You’ll be missed but I know I’ll see you on Strava. And there’s a whole bunch of KOMs waiting for you. Like hozn, I enjoyed the HP rides you led, and I can easily recall the whooshing sound of your carbon wheels when you get going. I’m sure you and A will enjoy the next chapter of your life in Seattle (I actually prefer the West Coast/Pacific to here myself!)

[vvill]

@hozn 159911 wrote:

Cool — do you know if they make these small enough to fit the cable bosses for zip-tie mounts on bike frames?

Sorry, don’t know. I’m sure I have a few you can have to try if you like. I have these (0.5 inch): https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000F5K82A

I’ve mostly used them for Garmin/camera mounts in odd places, or weird stuff like securing a pump to an old sagging seatbag, or for a spare tube since it’s not as flimsy as the rubber bands that come with tubes, or even temporarily securing a hard-to-mount tire to a rim. You can fold them over to make them narrower (or perhaps trim them with scissors, they’re quite soft) but then you’d lose some strength from reduced hooks/loops, not that you need a ton of strength for cables. I guess you could just keep wrapping the wider unfolded part around the whole tube to keep it in place although down/toptubes may need an extra one since they’re wider.

[vvill]

I use velcro zip-ties a bunch of a lot of things. They can be a little more fidgety than regular zip-ties if it’s a small opening, and tougher to get them quite as tight if you need that.

But otherwise I prefer them – mostly because they’re reusable, and you don’t need clippers/cutters. They can pick up dirt a bit too over time which may eventually lead to them not being reusable I guess but so far I haven’t had any failures with them.

[vvill]

IIRC you were already a few lengths ahead in the stream crossing!

https://photos.smugmug.com/photos/i-TLqjMcj/0/c626534a/X2/i-TLqjMcj-X2.jpg

[vvill]

@Tim Kelley 159419 wrote:

I frequently have to flag people’s files who either get in a car, or have a GPS error, so I’m pretty good at picking out what looks legit and what doesn’t. Check for multiple, fast accelerations at stop lights. 0-30 over and over again can be an indicator.

Same. Maybe not “frequently” but yeah if you click on “Analysis” and choose Time scale it’s usually easy to tell what’s going on. I usually won’t flag minor GPS errors because that typically means the segment is just too short.

[vvill]

Clearly, you *need* carbon wheels!

[vvill]

You were braking on the C&O?

I don’t have much input on this as I’m not even sure what kind of pads I use. Other than Hilly Billy Roubaix I’ve never worn through pads abnormally fast. I’ve read that in really muddy conditions solid rotors (no holes or cutouts at all) will do the best job at keeping pad wear down.

I don’t bother keeping rotors with pads as I switch out wheels all the time.

[vvill]

@hozn 159081 wrote:

Thanks, viill! — Indeed they are nice wheels! Thanks for helping make this build possible. I will admit that I miss my loud hubs, though! . I’m sure I’ll end up with another Hope Pro (4?) wheelset, but even those aren’t as loud as my Pro 2 Evos.

I see you put on nicer rotors too, good decision! Hope the wheels work well for you. The hubs will be serviceable but yeah nothing bling. They are very new though – this was 29 wks ago according to my ‘gram (which admittedly would be many miles for some folks, but back then I still had about 15 wheelsets.)

[vvill]

Nice wheels!

[vvill]

What hozn + HarryMm said. Additionally, in my experience external BBs also eliminate the futzing around with square taper BB spindle measurements (just look at this https://www.sheldonbrown.com/bbsize.html ) and also issues with having to tighten the cranks enough to stay on the square tapered part of the BB, whilst not having them too tight. Hollowtech II / GXP are just sooo much easier to deal with (and other systems too I assume – my bikes are all one of those two).

There might be a special crankset like a Rene Herse where you could justify a square taper but then I’d also want a quill stem and downtube shifters, I guess. And all brake cables protruding up and out of the hoods. And there’d better be some mighty fine lug work on the frame.

[vvill]

After switching one of my bikes from square taper to external BB I ended up switching all of them (even the beater bikes). I much prefer them!

[vvill]

Looks awesome – wish I could’ve gone.

[vvill]

@dkel 158941 wrote:

I hadn’t ridden Two Sisters westbound for a looong time until last week; I was amazed how steep it is going that way. At my best I’d keep it to 70gi. You’re a beast for going after it at 80-something.

It is surprisingly steep when you’re not feeling energetic. But at least it’s short.

@jrenaut 158945 wrote:

Now that you’ve gotten me curious, my previous PR on that segment was fixed (46X16 or about 77 gear inches).

Ok I have to admit here that I haven’t actually ridden it with that 80+ gearing. Though I have done 48×16 on it plenty of times – and I’m sure Dirt and OneEighth have as well.

[vvill]

it’d be fine on Hains Pt if it’s not windy, and Two Sisters is short. just go hard for 30 secs, wheeze, and repeat.

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