It's dark out there

With just a month to go until Midwinter, it is very definitely dark out there and my commute in both directions now starts and finishes in pitch blackness.  I'm lucky enough to live in a small village which, although on a reasonable busy road, is a couple of miles out of the nearest town.  The upshot of that is though, that most of my usual and very lovely rural commuting route is completely unlit.

I discovered in short order on my first night ride that my front light, bright though it is, struggles to illuminate much beyond the first two yards of road ahead of my front wheel.  The road surface is not that great in parts either and so, with some regret, I looked for an alternative winter route.

I've found that by taking a different route to the station in the morning, it's only the first couple of miles out of the village that are in pitch darkness.  OK there's more traffic going that way, but a seriously bright, flashy rear light and a high viz jacket mean that I've done as much as I can to be seen.  No close calls yet either so it must be working! 

To be honest, commuting in the dark is not nearly as bad as I thought it might be.  As with riding in the wet (and to a degree, the wind) one's mind tends to make a bigger deal out of the situation than ever transpires to be the case.  Through a sleep-fogged, pre-coffee brain first thing in the morning, getting on the bike in the cold and dark is not often an appealing prospect.  However, after the first few pedal strikes, the world is a brighter place, figuratively if not literally!

To paraphrase something I read recently, it is not what you ride that counts but that you ride at all.  In any conditions, it is preferable to commuting by car.


In other news, I spent some of the weekend mucking about in the garage on the resurrection of my fixed-gear MTB.  It's an old bike that I used to commute on years ago which was converted to fixed-gear knock-around duty when I found this site.  An addiction to fixed gear (and other quirky bikes to be honest - folders being a case in point) was born that, even though I have other bikes, continues to this day.  I have raided it for parts over the years but decided to get it back together for reasons which escape me now.  It's not going to be pretty but will (I hope) be an absolute hoot for bombing around the local lanes and trails in the mucky winter weather.  Bring on a bit of snow is what I say!

Dahon saves the day

Generally, the train I use to commute is very reliable but once or twice recently has been delayed. There's a lot more rail traffic at the moment as a result of the Olympics, but last night it was cancelled altogether. No bus alternative either just the option to wait an hour for the next one or go miles out of my way via another city. Fortunately, I always have a third option - cycle all the way home.

Well it was a lovely evening so I girded my loins, ate a banana and headed off. From the station home, it's eighteen miles in all and quite a pleasant rise really. Once clear of the city, it's miles of rural A road and do I put the Red Hot Chili Peppers on my iPod and pedalled.

I did this once before and seem to remember some relatively harsh hills but yesterday was different. I must have got fitter and stronger because at no point did I need first gear (I rarely ever do these days) and spent most of the journey rocking along in third gear. The D3HG really needs higher gearing for me now. The stock gears are fine for sedate town riding or the relatively unfit but I need something more to push on. I've considered a new crank and larger chain ring before but noticed this week that a smaller 14T rear sprocket is still available at some places to replace the stock 16T one. It looks at first glance as though the chain may have to run close to the hub cover, but for under a fiver I'm prepared to try it! That mod should raise the gearing quite nicely and give me a faster bike.

All in all though, it was a really pleasant ride back and far from any sort of inconvenience to be honest. People I know are amazed that folding bikes are so capable on little wheels but they really are. With the higher gearing mentioned earlier, my bike would be capable of serious distance at a decent pace. Good old Dahon.

Another mod I've considered for a while is the addition of some bar ends to increase the number of hand positions available when riding. I have worried though that they may impede the way in which the bike folds. Until recently, I had completely forgotten about an old set that I fitted to my beater fixie mountain bike. They are a little bigger than I was planning to fit but nevertheless earlier today I whipped them off the MTB and fitted them to the Dahon. A bit of minor adjustment later and it all works a treat! Plenty of hand positions and a fully foldable Dahon. Brilliant!

All of the cleaning and greasing the other day seems to have done the trick as well. I'd still like better pedals and maybe a small saddle bag for breakdown essentials and I'd love. Brooks saddle too. That's all part of the fun of living with a bike for many miles. Making changes that you know are needed for functional reasons based on experience and not fashion or vanity! OK so the Brooks saddle would be a fashion thing but they are cool (and I believe comfortable too)...

On my daily rides, I often spend time in my head planning longer and more adventurous bike journeys. Some are really fantasy goals at the moment but I have some great ideas for doable long rides in the next year or two.

And of course, they will have to be on my Dahon!

My bike leaning against a bush.  Arty.

 

Cockpit porn.

Mileage to date and a bit of a disaster

Last week was a much shorter one than usual owing to my staying in a hotel all week.  However, I managed to clock up a few miles as mentioned earlier.  This week I'm back on the cycle commute but on my hybrid and not the Dahon.

On Monday morning, I set off as usual but felt my rear brakes rubbing slightly as though the wheel was out of true.  I couldn't figure out why until, about a mile and a half from home at the bottom of a hill, I braked and heard a "ping" from my back wheel.  Stopping to investigate the matter revealed this:

Broken spoke(n) - not one, but two!

Well I had a little bit of time in hand and didn't think it was wise to proceed all the way to work on a damaged back wheel.  I turned around, limped home and grabbed my hybrid out of the garage.  It's going to be at least the weekend before I can get it to the bike shop, although it's due a service and so needed to go in anyway. 

Therefore, the mileage tally on my Dahon stands as follows:

Week 15 - 34.5 miles
Week 16 - 3 miles

Total to date - 998 miles!!!

So tantalisingly close to the 1,000 mile mark but that's not going to happen for a week or so.  Shame.


However, having the "luxury" of 21 gears at my disposal has allowed me a little leeway to experiment.  I have a long-held plan to build a single-speed, fixed gear road bike.  I love the simplicity of a fixie and one or two sites I've seen recently have featured riders doing really long tours/randonee on such machines.  Rugged, simple and capable. 

So last night I tried to find one gear ratio that worked pretty well for all situations.  Such a gear needs to :

• Be comfortable for pressing along at reasonable speed on the flat
• Be low enough (but still have something to "push" against) when climbing hills
• Enable me to spin down hills without running my legs round at a crazy cadence

And I found one.  It works out to about 65 gear inches but bearing in mind I was fully laden with a heavy rucksack, a slightly higher gear should also do the trick nicely.  I have a Shimano crank-set to fit to the fixie project and so by using its 39T chainring and fitting a 16T rear sprocket (commonly available)  I'll hit my perfect ratio pretty much dead on.  Happy times. 

I have an old but barely used early 80's Raleigh donor bike in the garage just waiting for a new wheelset and fixed gearing.  Maybe a summer project if I can free up a bit of spare cash!

This has everything!

Clearly the title of this blog alone reveals that I am a fan of folding bikes.  However I am fond of fixed gear bicycles too and have, in brief moments of madness, considered combining the two.  I am also a great fan of the late Sheldon Brown's cycling website.  It really does have everything for the cyclist but for me this is the icing on the cake:

A fixed gear folder and an old-school one at that!  The link to the full story is here:

http://www.sheldonbrown.com/raleigh-twenty.html

There's also another link from Sheldon Brown site to the site of a friend of his who has riden a pimped Raleigh Twenty for over 25 years:

http://www.bikexprt.com/bicycle/mytwenty.htm

Needless to say, I want one!

A couple of pics

I'm still getting used to this iPhone thing and the Blogger interface. I took a couple is snaps on the way to work yesterday. The weather wasn't great so I didn't stop for any scenic ones. Here's the obligatory "bike on the railway station platform" shot:

Folded ready to get on the train:

And on the train (this phone has no flash so apologies for the poor picture!):

I wish I could've taken some on the move too. There was a huge double traffic queue like the one I sat in the other day. How I laughed smugly as I zoomed between them all to the front of the queue. I did stop to take this one though:

It's a road I ride downhill on the way in. The combination of telegraph poles and trees mean that (especially on bin day) it's like the Star Wars pod racing sequence! Laughs all the way!

Interestingly (or not) on the way home yesterday, I left the office car park at exactly the same time as a colleague in his car. Through a combination of traffic and traffic lights, it took almost the full four miles to the station for him to catch up with and pass me!  I don't know who was more surprised!


Added from laptop:  The iPhone blogger app is quite good but doesn't seem to let you put your pictures in line with the text.  On a personal note, I need to sharpen up my photography skills - some of those pictures suck on the big screen!

Customer service

I popped up to City Cycles to sort out the back tyre of my Dahon on Saturday.  To be honest, although I'm certain that it shouldn't have worn in the way it has, tyres being consumable and all, I was primed to have to cough up for the replacement.

However, after a quick chat with one of the guys in the shop, I was given a replacement tyre at no charge.  They'd have fitted it if I'd wanted them to as well but I couldn't leave the bike with them.  Not a difficult job to do though.

I fitted the new tyre today and it's a Michelin - a really good one.  It has a nice thick tread to keep out the worst of any puncturing objects and feels much sturdier and generally tougher than the Dahon one I took off.  It's also slightly narrower than the original so has less rolling resistance too.  I think they're only about 13 quid so I'll definitely be buying a matching one for the front wheel as well.

Maybe a set for the hybrid too...

Anyway I can't speak highly enough of City Cycles.  They're a Raleigh dealer mainly and as Dahon are a recent Raleigh acquisition, they are a little bit new to them.  However that hasn't stopped the few minor issues I've had  from being dealt with fairly and professionally.

A big thumbs up all round, I'd say.

My other steed

As I mentioned, I've had to be unfaithful to my Dahon this week.  Fortunately, as the Dahon is an inanimate object (unless I'm pedaling and then it becomes a very slightly more animate object) I don't have to worry about my pet rabbit getting boiled.  Better yet I don’t have a pet rabbit, although I do have a dog although I doubt we have a pot big enough to get her in.  I digress…

So here is a snap of the bike I've been on for the last few days:

I bought it about five years ago from Halfords and since then it’s been used for very infrequent leisure riding.  It’s not very flash, isn’t made from carbon and doesn’t have a fancy Italian name.  However, I do like it - quite a lot in fact.  It’s higher gearing means that it’s a bit faster than the Dahon and it is very smooth and comfortable to ride.  This week’s weather mean it would have benefited from having mudguards front and rear but needs must and all that. Happily, last night I actually managed to find an old seatpost-mounted rear mudguard that I bought many years ago in my previous incarnation as a commuting cyclist.  So although my feet got wet this morning, my bum remained blissfully dry.

It could use a set of bar ends for comfort and the slightly vain side of me thinks it could do with a better looking saddle (though it is fairly comfy) and thinner tyres.  The very vain side of me thinks it needs a fancier looking headstock and flat bars too but by the time I’ve done that lot, it’d be easier to buy a new bike.  Obviously.  

As it happens, my eldest daughter has outgrown her small mountain bike and this one fits her very nicely with the saddle lowered.  This, I am hoping, could be all the excuse I need to shell out on a nice new road bike.

I’m sure if I managed to overlook the Dahon folder, manky old fixed-gear mountain bike, and 1980’s Raleigh project fixie (as yet unfinished) I could swing it past the wife…

Sans folding bike for a bit

A confession:  I was not "bloke on a folding bike today" but rather "bloke on an ordinary bike.  Allow me to explain...

Last night I took the rear tyre off my Dahon and found the source of my woes.  The rim has worn through the sidewall down to the reinforcement in two places.  I don't know how it happened as I only rode about 100 yards with the puncture before re-inflating the tyre.  But happened it has and, while I'm not very happy about it, the sorting out is a story for another day.

However, once I'd seen daylight through the hole in the side wall, I didn't fancy trusting my neck to that tyre again.  Call me "Old Mr Overcautious" if you like.  Anyway, cutting to the chase, with the car not being a palatable option, I had to use my other bike.  It's a nice hybrid on 700c wheels that I bought from Halfords a few years back,  Nothing to write home about but a nice enough bike really.  Crucially however, it has not got mudguards.  And today the rain was little short of torrential.  End result, I got soaked!  At no point did I wish I was back int he car though.  There's still a certain air of smug superiority that one can exude when pedalling hard in wet traffic surrounded by company car idiots drivers in their BMW 520s and Audi A6s.

I was also pleasantly surprised at how fast the bike was.  It's much higher geared than the Dahon and the extra turn of speed really helped to make a wet commute a more fun commute.  Quite a convincing argument for up-gearing the folder so I'll look into it after next payday.  The closer spaced gears (21 in all) also made it easy to find a comfortable cadence instead of the spin/heave options available with only three.  I do love the simplicity of the 3 speed hub gear though so overall I think it wins.

I can't do anything about the Dahon's tyre until the weekend at least so Friday's commute will be back on the hybrid as well.  OK not a folder, but a bike none the less.

My bike (actually this time)

I gave the Dahon a wash and check over this afternoon and took the opportunity to pinch my wife's iPhone in the process for a few snaps.  So here is is:

I've changed one or two things since buying it such as:

• Removing the awful plastic chain guard
• Taking off the rack.  Useful but it places the load too close to the pedals meaning your heels hit whatever it is on every rotation
• Fitting lights and a bottle cage 

But other than that it's standard.  Here are a few more images:

Here's the "clickety, clickety" Sram 3 speed hub:

  

The front and back brakes - both bite hard, even in the wet:

...and fifteen effortless seconds later, here is folded up.  

I love it to bits but as one of life's "modifiers" there are a couple of other changes I'd like to make.

It could really do with being higher geared.  It's fine for tootling around town I suppose but even in third (top) gear on a modest downhill you end up spinning out and coasting a lot.  Conversely, first gear is so low it's rarely ever used - only at the top of a steep hill when I'm knackered and carrying a lot of weight.  Such occasions are few and far between and could be dealt with equally well by gritting my teeth, standing up and heaving in a higher gear.  So I'm planning to add a 46 tooth chainring and crankset soon to increase the gear range by about 20%.

I'd also really like a set of bar ends on it to increase the number of positions that I can rest my hands.  I think it may effect how well the bike folds though so a little experimentation is in order before shelling out some hard-earned.

Finally I'm not keen on the pedals.  Most of the time they are fine and, on the plus side, fold really easily.  However, they are made of a hard smooth plastic so if riding in anything other than trainers or in the wet, your feet tend to slip about a bit.  Again it's livable with but ideally I'd like a set of metal ones from MKS.

However, they are only a few minor mods really and without any of them it's still a great bike. 

My bike (sort of)

This blog would be more than a little random if it did not have any pictures of my folding bike.  Were it not for the fact that any pictures I have are utterly crappy ones taken on my BlackBerry, it would have. Indeed it shall have but for now we must turn to the Dahon website for information.

This one is the same as mine (only mine's blue):

And here it is folded (only black, not blue):

Now just for kicks, here is something that is high up my "want" list (and which, given the typically parlous state of my finances, will stay there for a very long time).  A folding bike that will perform like a racer and which would (I feel certain) see me capable of keeping up with the peloton on "Le Tour".  It's utterly off-the-wall and I love it, ladies and gentlemen je vous presente:

The Dahon Vector X27:

Awesome n'est pas?