Bike season without end

The total avalanche of repair demand has ceased, but repairs still come in. They're jamming up with the demands for ski services. I may be in grease one minute, and Norway the next.

Not just a ski service but a really traditional ski service: this pair of wooden skis needed the bases coated with pine tar. The really good pine tar is hard to get. You can find stuff intended for horses' hooves, but it doesn't act the same way under the torch, and it definitely doesn't smell as nice. The smell of pine tar is like the sound of bagpipes: people are either attracted or repelled. At our Jackson shop, which was located in the base lodge, lots of skiers would walk into the cloud and express their opinions freely. Everything was a public performance in a theme park. The guests felt very entitled to critique the performance, as if every action was staged for their entertainment.

The model name of the skis was an added benefit. I can say I have actually cleaned Tur-Letts for a living.

The repair queue never ceases to present comparisons of old and new. A local enthusiast brought in a ProFlex I would date to about 1994. 

In the background you can see a 2021 specimen.

The owner of the ProFlex wanted it totally done up, modernized enough to improve its function, but only to make it better at what it was in the beginning: the first stages of full suspension for the masses. ProFlex tried to make serviceable and affordable full suspension. Their vision was aided by how little we knew about suspension and the determination of riders to destroy things. But this one already had important early conversions to improve strength. The coil springs were much stronger than the original design with elastomers on a center rod. The elastomer rear suspension tended to fold up if a kid rode a long wheelie. Ask me how I know that.

Routing the cable for the rear linear pull brake was actually a little tricky, since the bike was designed for center-pull cantilevers. On the fork it was simple enough, but the rear cable was routed through the seat tube. That made a very awkward bend to connect to the side-pull linear pull brake, if I went through the designed pathway. Leading the cable around the outside, it could easily get snagged on the crank arm unless secured to the frame. I hate depending on zip ties, but linear pull brakes are superior to cantilevers for mountain bikes, and I don't like to mix brake types by having linear pull on one end and center-pull canti on the other. Brake action should be symmetrical.

Mixed in with the full-suspension timeline was this Specialized exhibiting many of the modern characteristics of carbon frames, but with the last of the 135mm rear hub spacing, 26-inch wheels, and a fixed-length seatpost. Like finding a stone ax with a carbon fiber handle.

Speaking of seatposts, dropper and suspension posts mostly have a threaded collar securing the fixed and movable portions of the post. I almost invariably find these collars loose, often very loose.

The continuing march of smokeless mopeds included this clunky monstrosity still waiting for parts a couple of months later:

That's a funny way to spell "anchor."

This Schwinn smokeless moped was actually a solid, decent product as smokeless mopeds go:

Even if the wheels turn out to have mysteriously exploding spokes, because the bike is a mid-drive, the wheels are just conventional disc-brake wheels, easily replaced or rebuilt. A solid conservative entry in the marketplace.

Many of the bikes that come in for service are covered with greasy crud. We've tried all sorts of cleaning products and methods to work around our lack of a real parts washer and dedicated bike-only workshop space. When I saw a product called Speed Degreaser on the QBP website, I picked up a can to test it out.

It really does blast away many forms of chain crud and accumulated greasy dirt, although I did find its limits in some of the baked-on grime that has come along during my test period. And it's about like huffing ether. So, as a nuclear option it has a place, but regular use probably indicates a growing chemical dependency.

Accessory companies are always offering smaller and lighter minimalist tool kits for a rider to bring along and not really be able to fix anything because they have no leverage. Here is my entry in the nanotool category, the absolute smallest 5mm hex key you can get:

That's actually the stub of a 5mm hex key that I was cutting down to use in a very restricted space on the ProFlex restomod. Back when we sold ProFlex, Ralph and I made low-clearance 5mm wrenches, but I couldn't find any of them, so I had to make a new one. It provided a nice visual for a cartoon I was going to do anyway, about nanotools.

With so many customers forced to shop online to find bikes for themselves and their offspring, we're picking up a lot of service work on the products that actually get through to them. One little BMX bike made me aware of a trend that had developed in headset design, particularly in that category of bike.

For decades, forks had threads on the outside. The fork was held into the frame with a headset that fastened with a top cone and locknut that threaded down the outside of the fork, essentially fastening the fork into the frame like a big bolt. 

In the 1990s, faced with a huge wave of abusive riders and inexperienced mechanics, the industry came up with a headset that required a fork with no threads.

This rapidly became the norm, spawning its own set of complications and drawbacks. Be that as it may, at least you knew what to expect. But now a category of headset that looks like the threadless type has developed threads on the inside of the steerer tube.

To adjust this correctly, you need a threaded top cap that goes directly into the fork, rather than being secured with a bolt that goes down through it into some sort of anchored nut pressed into the inside of the steerer tube. The bike shown here had defectively-machined threads, so the top cap can't go in far enough to secure the mechanism. There is no tap available to tidy up the threads. The way products are made and distributed these days, the company can't even send the guy a fork. There is an alternative fastening system that they are sending, that goes in from the bottom of the fork, because the typical threadless anchor system is not designed to fasten securely inside an internally-threaded steerer.

We get a lot of garden cart wheels in need of tires. On this one, the wheels were rusted onto the axle, so the customer dropped the whole axle and brought it in.

Two wheels is two wheels. I clamped the axle in the work stand and changed the tires with it hanging there.

I rag on the weird mutant stuff we see these days, but every so often something comes in from the Pleistocene Era of mountain bikes to remind me of the mutants I didn't have to deal with too much, because I was out of the bike business during the mid and late 1980s while a lot of crazy things seemed like good ideas to product designers.

 

I spent my last couple of days off getting my car worked on. I had the good fortune 32 years ago to find the best mechanic anywhere. He wasn't very near where I lived at the time, and then I moved further away, but he has never been wrong and has never wasted my money. Poor people have to consider quality over convenience. But it's a bigger undertaking to come off of my wretchedly degenerated riding schedule since the end of regular commuting, and crack off back-to-back 40-mile days over hilly terrain. Fortunately, the weather was nice, but 40 felt like the new 100 for me, especially the second day.

The new Brooks seat with the cutout is great for drying small laundry at rest stops:

My liner gloves had gotten sweaty by the time I stopped for snacks and water. I'd left home in the morning chill, and now the day was getting up around 60F (15.5C to the rest of the world).

To make the last of the route I resorted to the old Superman juice: cognac and coffee. Back when bike racing was an art, not a science, a guy who was racing at a much higher level told us about that concoction as the secret potion for long races. I'd used it for events over 100 miles. Combined with a strategic dose of ibuprofen, it got me through this grind in good shape.

The proportions are critical. Too heavy on the coffee and you just get an acid stomach and jagged energy with nothing behind it. Too much cognac and you don't care if you get there or not. Done right it is truly remarkable. I could feel it kick in and wear off. You only get a couple of rounds out of it at most before your body calls bullshit and declares that it is really, truly fried.

I say every winter that I will be more dedicated to maintaining fitness like I used to. Hey, it could happen.

It's tough getting old:

Bitch bitch bitch about the time change

Social media is full of the semiannual carping about all aspects of moving the clocks. Lots of people have no idea which is Daylight Saving Time and which is Standard Time, they just know that it's stupid and they hate it.

I never gave much thought to Daylight Relocating Time until I started riding a bike a lot. When I was training to race, I had to calculate whether I had enough daylight for a training ride after work. When I was commuting -- and I still do -- I have to decide whether to risk riding in dusk and darkness. The jet lag aspect didn't "dawn" on me until I was over 50.

Human time is an artificial grid laid over natural time. Plants and animals respond to light and darkness. Humans do too, which causes most of the friction between metered time in general, and mandated displacements of the schedule in particular. Since humans already have the constant stress of accommodating artificial time, which goes unnoticed because it has been normalized for generations, the extra squeeze of switching the clocks provokes whines and squeals. Especially now that the Internet can broadcast and magnify such things, it has become a spring and fall bitchfest that has even led to legislative proposals to stay sprung forward or hold back and make Standard Time the unalterable standard.

With so-called Standard Time only in effect from the first Sunday in November to the second week of March, the so-called Daylight Time has become the de facto standard, because it occupies more of the year. If we were to stay one way or the other, I would prefer the later sunset, although I have a lot of trouble waking up when it's still dark out. Who invented that anyway? And who was the sadistic bastard who came up with the alarm clock, to yank a person from blissful slumber when they are clearly not ready?

No doubt, hunters and gatherers who woke up and got themselves into position before the morning light were more successful than the ones who strolled out after brunch to see what might be available. This transferred to agricultural societies, and then to industrial ones. But there's no avoiding the change in daylight from winter to summer solstices. When we lived according to the daylight alone, how far you pushed into the darkness at either end was somewhat up to you. Now that we have to punch a clock, the discrepancies have more of an impact.

If we did not change to Daylight Relocating Time, first light in the peak of day length would begin at about 3 a.m., and sunrise would follow at about 4 a.m. in northern locations in the Lower 48 of the USA. Your local time depends on where you are in your time zone. The western edge can differ significantly from the eastern edge. The sunlight moves smoothly across the chunked-up human boundaries in which we try to corral time and domesticate it. Thing is, we can tag it with a number, but it always manages to escape.

If we stay on Daylight Relocating Time, sunrise in the dark months of November, December, and January would be pushing 9 a.m. in some places that are northerly and westerly in their zones, like Seattle. It would be solidly after 8 a.m. most places.

When the Bush administration pushed the start of Daylight Relocating Time well into March, I was initially lured into the general griping, because sunrise was finally coming early enough to bring a hopeful feeling of spring to the mornings. The clock change two weeks into March knocked our sunrise back to January, while turning the afternoons into detached pieces of April, brightly lit but still cold. It increased opportunities to exercise outdoors after work, but March being March the conditions out there weren't always very inviting. But as the winters have rapidly weakened overall, it's starting to turn into bike season. Just remember that cold weather can return, and big dumps of dense, clumpy snow can ruin everything. March snow, except at what passes for high elevations in New England, can be too sticky to ski on, but too persistent to ignore when trying to get out on the roads.

Even when the time change waited until April the saying was that there wasn't much to look at, but plenty of light to see it by.

Whatever the clock says, it's hard to see the light go, and a welcome sight when it returns. Most people can agree on that.

Trailbuilding as commercial art

 Our energetic trail builder has a creative past, with forays into music and design. His other traits, which sustained him through a hitch in the Coast Guard and other adventurous occupations, also include considerable organizational ability if the subject interests him in some way. Thus his career has included a lot that was not overtly artistic. But an artistic sensibility shapes his actions rather than mere soulless athleticism or mercenary pursuit of maximum monetary gain.

While the trails are built to technical standards using proven designs, lines have to be chosen based on observation of the local terrain. Mountain biking is unnatural, and a consumerist activity, but its environmental impact is low because the features have to coexist with the natural forces at work on them. And animals like finding easy passageways through the vegetation, as any trail builder soon sees. Ancestral routes often used game trails, as humans evolved from slightly removed to dangerously removed from the natural order of things. Game uses human corridors now, as well as their own herd paths. Nature just keeps going on as best it can, in spite of or in step with human activities.

Art, in cultures that don't make it central and therefore don't understand it, is presented as touchy-feely, and the province of flakes, charlatans, and generally impractical people. This is a disservice both to art and to the generations of young people who eschew practicality if they feel an attraction to their imagined world of art. Art needs to be presented as a practical subject and used not just to develop powers of observation, but to address in the same way that reading, writing, and arithmetic are addressed, the basic skills of construction that go into creating a work of art. Don't wait for expressed interest. Just put it out there and see who runs with it.

Maybe they're doing that now, but they weren't doing it when I was a kid. Art classes dealt with important things like perspective and composition, but didn't get into the actual handling of the tools. And art was an elective, so you had to decide -- before you were old enough to know how much it might matter to you -- to ask for it.

One book I read around 1979-1980, as I was first trying to launch a career drawing pictures and writing stories, stressed the fact that an artist can benefit significantly from being businesslike, and that artists through history had done so, although exceptions abound among the famous names whose birth and death dates turn out to be depressingly close together. A lot depends on luck. I don't mean the luck of finding work and getting compensated for it. I mean the luck of having innate personality traits that aid a person's curiosity in finding the right questions to ask. Nature and nurture come together to shape a young person.

The trail builder's crew commands a decent price, but it's not going to propel any of them to fortunes. They take pride in their skill and in their product, born largely of experience as riders, even if some of them have aged out of the most risky maneuvers. It's art, but commercial art. It's a kinetic sculpture that the viewer enters and forms a part of. It's more than that, of  course. But it's all inspired by creativity and expression through movement.