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I am pondering adding a red light to the back of my helmet to increase my visibility.

Has anyone done something similiar? Can you recommend a light that fits to the back of the helmet?

Ideally something that can take rechargeable AAA's would be a bonus.

Thanks

J

Have just replaced the seat post on my touring bike after the nut at the top that holds the saddle in place had polished the old tube smooth.

It took 4 years before it finally failed and became unrideable. Is this normal wear and tear, or indication I've done something wrong?

Any ideas what to do with the old tube?

J

I am thinking of adding a set of front panniers to my bike for touring purposes, not so much because I need the extra volume, but to balance the weight about a bit more.

The bike I have has a braze on half way up the front fork, but it doesn't allow for a bolt to go all the way through the tube as some racks require. I'm just not sure which rack to get. Does anyone have any recommendations?

J

I am looking to make up another set of wheels for my beast of a tourer. they need to be able to take a 700x38 and a 700x32 tyre.

What do people recommend by way of rims? I want something affordable and strong, weight is a secondary concern.

Thoughts?

J

http://www.bicycle-heaven.com/blog/uploaded_images/9_WaterBottle-Adaptor.jpg-766742.jpg

"Shimano also offers a "bottle cage mover" to move the seat tube cage upwards so the bottom of the bottle doesn't hit the battery."
http://www.bicycle-heaven.com/blog/2009/08/electronic-shifting-new-old-school.html

The "bottle cage mover" looks perfect. Now to track down where I can buy one...

J

Upon the recommendation of another forum member, I recently forked out on a couple of 800ml Science in sport bottles (http://is.gd/ea7JD), which are great bottles and an improvement on what I was using before, slight bug, due to the position of the mount holes on my bikes frame, I can't fit the second bottle in its bottle cage. There is enough space, if I can lower the height of the bottle cage by about 2". Which leads to my question. Does anyone make an offset mounted bottle cage, or an adaptor to do this ? or should I be breaking out the engineering workshop?

Thanks

J

Currently my bike is sporting a pair of Vredestein Volante Race tyres, 25-622's. Which are lovely in the summer. Only during the wet days of winter I am finding them near suicidal under braking.

Do people have any recommendations for folding tyres of 25mm or less, that actually work well in the wet?

Thanks

J

I am in the market for a set of panniers front and back, and I am trying to come up with a decision between the ortlieb back roller classic or the vaude aqua back. I am after a bag that is 100% waterproof (as near as damnit) and as indestructible as possible.

Does anyone have any views either way, is there anything to choose between the two?

Thanks

Julia

I am pondering the idea of taking my bike with me on a trip to spain, which will mean I need to take the bike on a night train from Paris to Barcelona. All evidence I am finding online is indicating that the french don't take bikes on trains, meaning that I am likely to need to pack the bike in a bag of some sort and hope for the best.

This being the case, what do people recommend for transporting a bike by train when you aren't supposed to ?

Thanks

Julia

Not a test, don't worry.

Now for the tricky part of learning to ride fixedwheel without killing myself...

J

You lot missed a crucial step (as did the LBS who helped me in the end). This is a 30+ year old bike. It predates all this metric lark, so a 15mm spanner didn't fit. Had to use a 16mm one at the LBS instead. But I got them off, and now fitted a pair of shimano spd's...

Thanks for the help everyone.

J

Ahah!

Now I know that, I am getting somewhere. Unfortunately my crappy adjustable spanners aren't enough to get these off. They either are to short, but fit on, and thus I get no leaverage. Or long enough to get a decent lever on, but too wide to fit on the pedal to undo it. Looks like a trip to screwfix tomorrow to get some real spanners...

Thanks

Julia

A while back my father dumped on me his old collection of bikes. In amoungst the numerous bits of junk, were 2 bikes of interest. A Holdsworth fixed wheel "british club bike" as he called it, and a ten speed touring bike made by Carlton. The carlton was in abit of a shit state and is in desperate need of a refurb, which is in progress.

The holdsworth however was in reasonably good nick. The tyres and tubes had perished during storage, I had to source a new set. Which due to the obscure wheel size (26 x 1.25 aka 32-597) took me a while to source. Also due to its age the pedals are the good ole fashioned toe clip jobs. I got a cheap set of spd pedals off 'bay, which whilst abit of an inconsistant part for such an old machine, it is my one consession to modernity.

This evening I spent putting new tyres and tubes on, which look really good. The only part left to do, is to swap the pedals. And here I have come abit stuck. I cant seem to get them undone, my spanners keep slipping off. I keep getting confused by which thread is on which, I know one of them is the opposite thread to normal. But I am entirely stumped to remember which. I think the cheapy adjustable spanners I am using aren't helping me in the slightest.

So my hope of a quiet first ride on the fixed this evening has floundered. Doh.

Adding insult to injury, the heavens have just opened as well.

Doh.

J

PS will post pics in day light.

In the uk cyclists with any ounce of clue tend to just smile and nod, and move swiftly onto another topic when you mention riding fixed.

Here in .nl, people look at you like you have gone completely mad. Considering the average number of functional gears on a bike in this country seems to be about 1.3, you would think they would be more understanding of the idea of fixed, or atleast single speed. But if you are not riding an old clunker, then you must obvious be in the serious cycling crowd, which means you must have lots of gears. And lycra. Let us not forget the lycra.

This said, there is a small number of fixee people, I haven't seen any outside of amsterdam tho. A friend of mine has just bought her first track bike, having given up on lacing the fixed hub into a wheel for her old bike. So hopefully, when I get my old holdsworth road worthy again, there will be another two Fixed nutters here.

But for all this, there is one thing that is almost guarenteed to get you strange looks in .nl. Cycling with a helmet on...

J

Not sure if I am allowed to plug it here, but I have a pair of pedals with toe clips. They are going to go on ebay tomorrow evening unless anyone wants them before hand.

They are nothing special, they are hardly used (less than 50 miles). They came with one of my road bikes. Selling cos I went to SPD's.

J

Having lived in .nl for the last 2 years, I have been amazed by how few FGSS types there are here.

The dutch view on cycling is seriously screwed up. Dutch cycle paths are populated by gaggles of young students, cycling with an average of 1.7 people to a bike. At nothing more than a brisk walking speed. Yet if you try to cycle at a sensible speed in the road, you get nicked for it. It seems bikes here need atleast two of: squeek, rattle, pretty girl on the back.

The reason for the lack of FGSS I can't quite explain, I have seen a few people using it in ams, usually the messenger types. I did ask about it in a couple of shops and just got laughed at. There is a small place along tram line 13 in ams which understands the concept and is where I have seen the highest concentration of FGSS bikes. But even then it is very very rare.

If you want to do some nice riding in .nl, my advice is to get out of Amsterdam. Head north, or south east. North Holland is very very pretty. Or the province of Utrecht is rather stunning. http://is.gd/pb3L is a good book that I have found quite useful for plotting rides.

Just bare in mind, .nl may be considered by some as a cycling mecca, it may have no hills. But it is famous for windmills for a reason. It has an omni directional headwind :p

For cargo bikes, the netherlands is the place to go. They are everywhere and used for all manner of funky things. http://www.fietsfabriek.nl/ is the canonical source, they make some very nice, if expensive range of cargo bikes, trikes, and quads. They are built like the proverbial stone outbuilding, and will last forever if you look afterthem (and say, oil the chain once in it's life unlike the dutch).

This said, they all seem to come with a 3speed hub gear, which with the weight of the bike, plus the fact that it has the aerodynamics of a brick means that they don't do much more than a brisk walk...

There are other manufactures, I can post links if they are of use.

Good luck bringing one back by train tho...

J