Category: Gear
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Azaleas in season
I’d told Nana last night that I’d be cycling the Tamagawa today, and then when I woke up this morning I thought the Asakawa might be more fun — especially if the dogwoods are in bloom. And then, soon after I set out, I saw the azaleas. Everywhere. And I realized this would be a…
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Get unbent
When preparing for last week’s sakura ride, I noticed the valve core in the front wheel is bent. It’s an easy fix: swap out for a new core and reinflate the tire. I even had the spare and a tool on hand, but I didn’t relish the job of reinflating the tire from empty with…
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The Snail is Back, B’s!
I had other plans on Saturday that kept me off the bike, but it was all to the good as there was quite a wind, and today was milder. I’ve been eager to get Hornsby out for a test ride following the drivetrain replacement (see Part I and Part II), and it was only a…
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While you’re worried about pumping gas
There’s been a lot of hullabaloo in the bike pump space recently, first with the emergence of rechargeable mini air pumps and then with the announcement of a couple of new valve systems. A power pump could be nice, but it could also leave me flat on a ride where I had multiple punctures or…
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Matched Set II
I took a pause in the Deore drivetrain swap for Hornsby when I had some alignment and clearance issues with the new derailleur. In addition to sleeping on the issue for a couple of nights, I consulted the shop manual several times to make sure I had done everything by the book. While I was…
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Matched Set I
With the memory of the shifting issues on last week’s ride fresh in mind, and with a belly full of the appropriate beverage, I decided it was time to change Hornsby from the SRAM drivetrain inherited from Dionysus and go instead for a roughly equivalent Shimano set-up. To be honest I’ve been contemplating this for…
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Workshop twofer
The weather would have been OK for a ride today — clear and warm in the sun, with just a bit of chilly wind — but it’s a maintenance day. Hornsby has been in the Workshop in the Sky for several weeks, since the chain incident, simply because there hasn’t been enough sunlight for commuting.…
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International Twist Your Seatpost Day
Happy International Twist Your Seatpost Day to all who celebrate! And that should include everyone who has a seatpost. It’s very simple to play along: It’s important to do this on a regular basis — at least once a year — to avoid having the seatpost seize in the bicycle frame. Take it from someone…
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New Garmin photo dump
In the end, the Garmin 1040 mentioned in last week’s ride wrap-up didn’t have support for multibyte characters, which meant all the place names (once I’d loaded the map of Japan) looked like this: ����. So back it went, and today a spiffy Garmin 1050 arrived, with the Japan map loaded out of the box.…