Rocklobster Custom Single Speed

At some point I came to the conclusion I wanted a custom made bike. Living in Santa Cruz I had several choices and decided on Paul Sadoff and Rocklobster. Paul has been wielding bikes for over 20 years and may have been the first to wield a singlespeed specific frame. The time was early 2002 and Eccentric Bottom Brackets (EBB) were the rave; it’s still probably the most elegant solution to tensioning the chain on a single speed. When Paul asked what I wanted, besides the EBB, I liken to my Bontrager. Interestingly enough when Bontrager closed up shop in Santa Cruz, Paul bought a good deal of Bontrager Cycles True Temper steel tubing and sub-assemblies, and used the tubing to build frames that were referred to as Nontragers. Well, Paul had long ago ran out of the old Bontrager tubing, but still had a quantity of Tange tubes that was certainly equal in quality. I explained to Paul that I had bought a Marzocchi Atom 100 for the bike, so I wanted something like a Bontrager, only a larger sized, designed for the 4 inch fork I bought, a more relaxed head tube, and disc tabs in the event I decided to use disc brakes. Paul also included Bontrager brake bosses, which use a bolt and bushing that screw in from the top all the way into the frame, rather than a standard boss stud and retaining screw. I was also a big fan of straight handlebars and bar ends at the time. For about $50 he also threw in a steel stem. The photo above is a comparison of my Rocklobster bike and a Bontrager Racelight; the seatposts angles and forks seem identical.

There is nothing more ridiculous than having a brand new bike. The paint is perfect, without a scratch, and you for some reason try and keep it that way. Finally you get a couple of scratches and finally being as imperfect as you, it becomes your friend. In my case I dug a pedal into the side of a hill and the crank arm dented the chain stay; damn. I have gone through so many wheelsets I had to look back at old pictures to remember the what came first. From what I can tell, the first wheelset I bought was a Surly/ Mavic; thinking I would never used disc brakes. I then bought a set of Deore hydraulic brakes and a $75 Shimano Deore/ Alex disc wheelset (the photo below is my first ride with the disc brakes) . Thinking I needed to upgrade to a singlespeed wheelset, I disassembled the front Surly and laced the rim to an Real disc hub and tried using a screw on disc adapter on the rear Surly hub. I suspect the adapter did not hold the disc perfectly straight, as it would squeal when it got hot. To solve this problem I disassembled the rear Surly wheel and laced the rim to a Novatec singlespeed hub. This worked very well about a year until the cartridge bearings (4 of them) wore out. I then weighed the Novatec rear wheel and found it was actually heavier than the Deore/Alex rear wheel and also came to the conclusion I would no longer deal with Singlespeed specific rear hubs anymore, unless I came up with a purpose for the Surly hub, which I did when I later built up my Bontrager reconstruction project 1993 Bontrager Single Speed. It just seemed that the singlespeed hubs where more trouble than they are worth and opened up the ability to buy a better wheelset, like I did with my SASS build, SASS Meets 650b . While technically a singlespeed wheel has less dish and is therefore laterally stronger, I don’t see wheels on geared biked failing, so in the real world it’s simply not an issue.

I have never second guessed my choice of the Marzocchi Atom 100 and still consider it to be one of the best riding shocks ever made, The Atom 100 is the last race shock Marzocchi made with dual steel springs; the newer forks have only one steel spring or no steel springs at all. For me there is simply no substitute for steel springs, and while the Atom 100 is certainly heavier than the single steel spring or air spring, it gives a ride that only a steel spring can give. Interestingly enough, much of the valving and R&D of todays forks is to simulate the feel of steel springs.

One thing I have not discussed is my use of suspension seatposts. This started with my privateer, and worked well taking the edge off the hardtails I was riding. The post I used was a USE, which is one of the lighter of the suspension posts. The USE posts use elastomers and a spring and have about 10 mm of suspension. When Bontrager stopped making their classic squared off seat, I switched to older style Selle Italia, which of course they have also stopped making also. Last year however, after using my suspension seatpost for the stoker seat on my tandem, I found a good deal on a Thompson seatpost and found I have not missed the suspension post in the least.

The last issue with my Rocklobster is the handlebar. The bar I originally spec’d on the bike was a Bontrager Racelite 680 straight bar with bar ends. There is still no better setup for climbing. But like everyone who rides long enough, I started experimenting with different bars. Originally I switched to a Misfit Psycles FuBar. The folks at Misfit Psycles read a posting I had on MTBR.com and offered a handlebar if I would use it and write an opinion on it. Misfit Psycles FuBar Well it turned out to be a pretty good bar, but I never did like the sweep of the bar, which necessitated a 150mm stem. The long stem made my hand position fairly comfortable, but it destabilized the front end and climbing was more difficult; still I rode with the bar for about a year. My current bar is the Titec H-Bar, which is a licensed copy of the Jones H-bar. This bar allowed me to return to my 120mm Rocklobster stem and brought my hand position farther forward, making climbing much easier. It’s no Bonty 680, but I like it much more than the FuBar. The next handlebar I may go with is the Groovy Luv Handles. They are similar to the Jones straight tube ti H-bar, but with less sweep. Apparently they only come in steel or ti; the steel bar has been desbribed as punishing and the ti is $250.

This bike has been my go to and comeback to bike for 8 years. It’s comfortable and of course made just for me. At some point after you have been riding you really should get a custom built bike. I highly recommend Paul and Rocklobster; he’s been making frames longer than most and has a reputation for making a very high quality product for very reasonable prices. Yes, he rocks! And so does my bike.

My Road to Singlespeed

My single speed craziness started with a Bontrager Privateer and a Jamis Dakar. I bought the Privateer in 1998 and was satisfied with the Trek version of Keith’s classic bicycle, which I still own today; see the photo on the left. If I had to do it again I would probably would have gone with a larger frame over the medium I bought, as Bontragers run small. Although I bought the “S” Sport level, I upgraded the hubs, shifters and cranks to XT, resulting in a XT gruppo with Avid brakes. The original shock was a Rock Shox T2; an elastomer version of a Judy XC, that is upgradeable with cartridge kit to the equivalent of the Judy. After attempting such an upgrade, I blew out the cartridges at a rate of 1 a month, so I replaced it with a Marzocchi Super Fly. The T2 shock also had a special Bontrager designed crown with steeper geometry. The Marzocchi upgrade stabilized the ride not only because it’s a stronger shock, the more relaxed geometry with a standard crown really calmed down the steering. This was made possible as the 1998 (and 1999) were the only Bontrager frames made with a 1 1/8” head tube. The picture here is the current condition of my Privateer. With the exception of the King headset, shorter stem (As I said before Bontrager’s run small, so with the smaller stem it can be setup closer to a small frame size; I did this for my wife), seatpost, pedals (I still have the originals) and front rim (I taco’ed the original), the bike is the same build I bought in 1998.

Well after happily riding my Privateer for 3 years, I decided to go with a dual suspension bike and bought a 1996 Jamis Dakar frame from Supergo.com (later bought by Performance) and built it up. The pictured bike has the same frame with a slightly different (but surprisingly similar) build; imagine this bike with a red Marzocchi Atom 80 fork. Well this left my Bontrager just hanging in the garage, so I figured I’d check out this single speed thing.


My first foray was to buy a Surly Singleater, TruVativ Stylo single speed crank and a spacer kit. I started with a 32:16 gear ratio with the Singleator in the push down mode. I then bought a Surly SS rear wheel from Sheldon Brown and ran it with a 16T and 18T freewheels. For some reason this caused the chain to skip at the rear (16T) freewheel. The reason is as follows,

The usual suspect of a skipping chain is a spring loaded tensioner. Most spring tensioners work by pushing the chain down and away from the rear cog. This results in very poor chain wrap. When peddling the majority of the torque from the chain is on the front chainring is on the teeth at 12:00 –0300 and on the rear cog it is the teeth from 6:00- 9:00. What this means is the very area of the rear cog where, chain wrap is necessary, a push down spring tensioner pulls the chain off the cog. This transfers the torque to the tensioner pulley wheel, which in turn pulls the tensioner arm upward. The chain then rides up in the cog teeth in the 9:00-12:00 position. Since it takes a great deal of torque to turn the rear wheel and there is practically no chain warp in the area, the tensioner will fail and the chain will jump over the teeth at the 9:00-12:00 position on the cog, causing it to “skip”. The answer is to first make sure your chain is as short as possible (a half link is a good idea but it will create a weaker link). Next use a spring tensioner with a push up mode or even better a tensioner without a spring so the arm can be locked up; this way tensioner cannot be defeated by overcoming the spring tension. A quick fix is to zip-tie the tensioner arm to the chain stay. This will create a tensioner in a push up mode that does not rely on spring tension. This is a photo I set up to show how such a setup would look.

When this first happened I was in the middle of a ride. I switched to the 18T freewheel (with a 32T chainring) which turned out to be the so-called “magic gear”, or a setup where the chain does not need a tensioner with vertical dropouts. I then figured out that with a half link, the same was true with a 16T freewheel. At some point later I sold the Surly wheel and bought a Spot wheelset that I really didn’t like and I ended up selling it, and returning to a spaced rear wheel. I have only one picture (of poor quality) of this Bontrager as a single speed I took on a Soquel Demonstration Forest ride. This is the bike I rode until I has custom bike made for me by Rocklobster in 2002.

Next: The Custom Bike

Changes to the Burley Tandem

This is a follow-up to my blog on our Burley tandem that my bride and I ride Our Burley Tandem. I have made two changes for the better. First I switched from a Nitto mustache bar to a more conventional drop bar, the Nitto Noodle bar; called the Noodle bar because it has some extra small tweaks and bends to make it more user friendly. The switch went remarkably and has played out as a much more comfortable cockpit than before. This also resulted in an embarrassing but very positive discovery that I have had my Shimano 9 speed bar end shifters setup wrong for years. All this time I figured it was natural for the shifters to index the first 3 gears, then friction the next three and index the final 3. Well it turns out it only does this if you screw up when you install them. You can install the shifter levers in 4 possible configurations, but only one way is the right way. Once I read up on the right way to set them up, I actually had all 9 gears index! You have no idea what a difference this is. I usually have no problem with friction shifters, but trying shift smoothly when your not sure whether the next shift is friction or index is near impossible.

The next change was too replace the triple crankset with a compact double; the reason can be summed up in one word, "chainsuck" (I don't know is that two words?). The original "Cyclone" crankset (not Suntour), was a middle of the line crank, similar to a Shimano Tiagra or Sora, with a Shimano 105 derailleur. The problem seemed to be the middle chain ring. When we would get occasional chainsuck, it would sometimes deform the middle chainring, leading to more chainsuck. I would remove the middle chainring, pound it flat and re-install it; it would work for a while, but eventually chainsuck would rear it's ugly head, which has resulted in us falling over several times and sometimes having to limp through a ride with no workable middle chain ring. My bride made it clear, "This is your thing, I don't care what you have to do; fix it!"

I had two thoughts. The first was a better crankset would fix the problem, but there are limited choices. My thought was if I could find a highly quality square taper crankset, then I wouldn't need it to be tandem specific. My other thought was to go with a compact crank and eliminate chainsuck entirely. FSA is the main player with tandem cranksets with their Gossamer aluminum ($205) and SLK carbon ($305) including FSA exterior bottom brackets. I also had the plan of buying a DuraAce triple and converting a Ultegra arm by heli-coiling reverse pedal threads. The DuraAce crank was an ebay item, that while I paid for it with "Buy-it-now" they were never delivered. I finally spotted this Sugino Alpina2-800D, compact 48/34. It was one of the nicest square taper compact cranks I have seen (second only to Sugino Mighty Tour) and my choice was made. The primary issue with the compact crank was losing the low, 30:30 gear. My solution was upping the cassette to a from a 11-30 to a 11-32, leaving me with a 34:32; almost the same gear ratio. We went for our first ride and it was magic. Before, every time I down shifted the front derailleur from the middle to granny gear, I would wince, hoping it would not chainsuck. Now, no worries! The gearing was spot on and no chance of chainsuck ever. More important, my bride was very happy.

Araya Rims, Gold 16b to RC-540; No More Tubulars!

07/15/2010

Well obviously it has been too long since I posted on this blog. I have been doing all my postings on my political blog OSB Politico and just riding. I also see I picked up a couple more followers; welcome and thank you. Anyway it was time to clean up the Soma NJS bike The Soma Bike is Done . My original build used wheels built with Araya Gold Tubular rims; Keirin bikes only use tubular tires. I have never used tubular tires, but they were once very common, so I figured I could embrace the retro side of me, and add one more NJS component. Well it didn’t work out so well. I wasn’t about to spend the $270 @ for Soyo NJS tires (and those are the cheap ones), so I went with $80 Vittoria CX. This is where I went wrong. What I failed to notice was the NJS tires are 1 1/8 wide, that’s over 28.9 mm! Yikes. I bought the Vittoria’s at a standard 21mm and they were a mis-match. I did not really know it at the time so I tried gluing them anyway but the tire would not lie down against the outside edges of the rim surface no matter what I did. After three tries I just hung up the bike and moved on to other projects.

Well the time has come to fix this problem. I could look for some wider, ie Vittoria Pave EVO CG in 27 mm or the Continental Tempo in 1”, both about $100 @. They are pretty much on the opposite side of the spectrum with the Vittoria being a ride it till it wears out and the Conty a quick and sketchy race tire, but good on the track. I decided to do neither and punt.



I sold the rims and tubulars on ebay and bought some really cool Araya RC-540 rims. The RC-540 is considered a clincher version of the Araya Gold. They are really just a very nice race rim similar to the classic Mavic Open Pro. What sets them apart is the top surface of the rim was polished before it was anodized. It’s nowhere near the finish of a the un-anodized Araya Gold, but it is also more durable. They are also impossible to get outside of Japan, so I used an ebay importer and they were delivered straight away.

Here's the rear wheel hanging in the garage. I laced the rims with the longer spokes for practice; just waiting for the shorter spokes. I’ll admit I am not an experienced wheel maker. I’ve made maybe 7-8 wheels but I’m getting faster. I held the slimmest of hopes that the old spokes would work, but my doubts were realized. Since the clinchers rims are about 50% taller at the spoke, this made the spokes too long.

I fumbled around with a spoke calculator and finally came up with 289 for the front and 299 for the back. The fumbling was figuring the ERD, or Effective Rim Diameter. The spoke calculator asks for this measurement, which is the inside rim diameter plus the additional length the spoke would need to thread into an installed nipple. Since the nipple is up, inside the rim cavity, it's not always and easy measurement to take accurately. I finally came close using the rod end of a caliper, adding 3mm x2, or 606 mm (there are also web pages with ERD ratings for most rims, but it is recommended you measure it yourself; the rim database said the Araya RC-540 had an ERD of 606.3mm) . The Suzue hubs have 36 spoke holes, have a 67mm spoke hole diameter (circle) and the flange spacing is 74mm for the front and 67mm for the rear; again the front is 3 cross and the rear 4 cross. I used this simple spoke calculator and came up with 288.8 front and 299.6 rear; try it yourself. This calculator only works with same size flanges and doesn't take into account the dishing of a rear wheel with a freehub for a gear cluster. Spoke Calculators can get very involved such as this one from machinehead but this one from wheelpro will handle most wheel builds.

I had a second hope that the shorter 3 cross spokes might work with the rear 4 cross pattern, but no luck, they were 295mm and as I said I needed 289mm. The spoke size might be a little off, since the old spokes were 295 and 302 respectively; 7mm difference where my spoke calculator showed a 10mm difference. My LBS didn’t have the spokes I needed so I had to order them. I did notice the 302mm rear spokes were a little short (or just barely covered the spoke threads) when I removed the old rim, so if they had been a millimeter or two, it would have been more consistent with the spoke calculator; just to be sure I also ordered some spokes 287 and 298. Like I said, I am not a boy wonder wheel builder, but I figured I can return the spokes I don’t use.

07/19/2010

Okay I'm back. Why did I do that? Why did I round 288.8 up and 299.6 down? Well guess what? The 299 spokes were a little short. I don't know if most wheel makers want the spoke threads completely covered with the nipples, but I do. When I built up the rear 4x wheel, there was about .5 mm of threads showing. By simply rounding up I would have spokes the right length (300mm). So I bit the bullet and went out and bought the right length spokes. They say that the money you pay to make up for your mistakes wrenching bikes, is tuition. I am a bit perturbed about the info I found on some of the forums I checked trying to nail down the spoke size. There were several that recommended rounding down, or even going for a millimeter shorter if they don't have the size you need. Most spoke nipples have 3mm lead way once the spoke threads are covered. The only way would want to round smaller is if you don't mind the threads showing, or you are going to use 16mm nipples opposed to the standard 12mm. While I'm not a perfectionist, I do like to think what I do is done the right way. I did return the 287/ 298 spokes I ordered, but I still had to pay for shipping both ways. I also have a nice collection of spokes; 287mm, 295mm, 298mm and 302mm. Hopefully they'll come in handy some day.

And here they are! Suzue Pro Max NJS hubs with Araya RC-40 rims and DT Champion 15g spokes; 3 cross in the front and 4 cross in the back.


I chose the Specialized Pro Roubaix for two reasons, primarily they were the only non-committed road tires I had. So a better question is why I bought the tires to begin with. The reason is these are some of the sweetest tires on the market. The reason why, is the tires are made by Vittoria. The Roubiax-Pro is similar Rubio Pro and the Roubiax S-Works is similar to the Open Corsa Evo, both with a slightly lower thread count. Both designs are referred to as Open Tubular construction, meaning like tubulars they are hand made, have an inner latex tube with an outer casing; they are rated 700x23/25c, meaning the volume of a 25c and the tread of a 23c. I also like these tires because you can get then very cheap because the come stock on Specialized race bikes, and every one wants to switch them out for something else so I got them at half price on the take off table. I have actually not tried the Ruobiax Pro, But I have tried both the Roubiax S-Works and Vottoria Open Corsa Evo. I would not place them on the same level as a tubular, but they are a very comfortable tire. Hopefully the Roubiax will not disappoint.





The final build (so far) :
Frame: Soma Rush (55cm);
Fork: Threaded Tange steel;
Headset: Tange Levin (NJS);
Bottom Bracket: Hatta R9400 (NJS);
Crank: Shimano Dura Ace Track (NJS);
Pedals: MKS (NJS);
Toeclips: MKS aluminum (NJS);
Straps: Toshi (NJS);
Handlebars: Nitto B125 CroMo (NJS);
Stem: Nitto Pearl (NJS);
Rims: Araya RC540; Spokes/Nipples: DT 15g; Hubs: Suzue Pro Max (NJS)
Tires: Specialized Pro Roubiax;
Wheels: 3 cross front/ 4 cross rear;
Cog: 16T Shimano (NJS);
Seat post: Nitto Jaguar SP72 NJS;
Seat: Brooks B-17 Champion Sprinter
Brake caliper: Tektro;
Brake lever: Soma.

Dog Gone It!

A recent article in Bicycling magazine (Doggoneit) brought to mind one of my run-ins with an errant K9 and a dark desire that came to life, but fortunately there was so serious injury or death. The farmlands at the Santa Cruz/ Monterey border allows for some very pleasant bicycle rides. One ride I am quite fond of, takes me through the city of Aromas. As I exited the town, heading toward Hwy 129, there was this devil dog on the opposite side of the road, whom I affectionately named Clipless. Clipless seemed to have some deep seated dislike of bicyclists; he would be laying on his demon porch, continually scanning for his next victim. The day was one were I forgot this recent ride history (the devil dog), until I was a minute away from repeating it. As I approached I saw the house and it all came back to me; the devil dog, the growling, the frame pump, the chase, the gnashing of teeth and the accelerating away to relative safety. But this time there would be an intervention from a source known intimately to all bicyclists; yes, a UPS van. Clipless was lying in his usual spot, no doubt dreaming of the day when he would drag the bloody, spandex clad remains of a bicyclist to his demon porch. When Clipless saw me he jumped to its feet with his full attention on me, he may have seen spandex, but not the UPS van. It was like watching a train wreck, were you know you shouldn’t watch, but you look anyway. Clipless sprang upon the road, devil yellow eyes locked on the Celtic tattoo on my left calf; and he never knew what hit him. One moment he was eyeing India ink and the next he was seeing alternating views of the undercarriage of the UPS van and the asphalt road below him. The UPS van never stopped and I doubt the driver even saw the possible carnage in his wake; but there was no carnage. Clipless emerged from the rear of the van, dazed and confused, but apparently no worse for wear. As I rode past, re-installing my frame pump, Clipless was making his way back to the porch, looking much like a DUI driver trying to negotiate a straight line and failing his FST. A week later I rode through Aromas again. As I approached the domain of Clipless, I once again removed my frame pump, ready to do battle. But this time and every subsequent ride, things would be different. As I rode toward my destiny, I again saw Clipless laying on his demon porch. But this time, he simply raised his head from between his extended front legs, looked in my direction and lowered his head back down and closed his eyes. There would never be another battle with Clipless and one day about 6 months later, he was gone and the demon porch was been empty ever since. And in a way I miss him; well as much as one can miss a devil dog. The incident also showed me that our brave men and women with brown shorts not only bring cool swag, but are guardian angels in disguise; who knew?

SASS meets 650b

I finally got the funds for a wheelset. Since I already have a a rigid Single Speed Bonty Conversion , I wanted to do something to make the SASS unique. My decision was to go with a 650b (27 ½”) wheelset. The SASS has a lot of room for big wheels/tires; the bike comes stock with 2.40 tires. My criteria for the wheels besides 650b, was the rear had to be both disc and rim brakes compatible (needed for a flip flop hub and drilled cog) and the front just disc compatible. I looked around for a wheelset under $500 and found only one; the Stan's NoTubes 355. My other choice was to build a wheel with Velocity Dyad rims and a Shimano Deore or XT hub. I decided on the Stan's wheels, which with ZTR hubs (re-branded WTB Laser-lites). The next decision was tires. I found a bargain on Kenda Nevegal 2.35 and went also for the folding bead.

About a week later the big brown truck showed up with the wheels. Almost all new wheelsets look nice, so I won't bore you the owws and aass. Two issues I had not thought through and they involved the hubs, specifically the rear hub. First the hubs are not easily converted to a solid axle and the freewheel shell is aluminium. After I mounted the rear wheel I found the outside cam QR that came with the wheels, could not hold the wheel in the sliding dropouts. I switched over to a Shimano (interior cam) and it seemed to hold. However, now I didn't trust a QR, so I added a Surly Tuggnut tensioner to be safe; I also later upgraded to a Surly BMX cog with a wider base. I first mounted the tires with tubes and went for a ride; it was like magic. So nice, I realized it was also the weather and trail conditions, not just the new wheels. Still I liked the bigger wheels. For those of you that need to know such things; the bigger wheels fit the SASS frame perfectly and resulted in a 11 1/2" bottom bracket measurment.

Once back home, I got the idea of converting the wheels to tubeless. The Stan's wheels are obviously made to be tubeless, but there are no tubeless 650b tires as of yet. However Stan's has advertised from the beginning, to be a means of converting standard tires and/or rims to tubeless. They sell a spoke tape and rim-strip for this purpose, along with their sealant. The Stan's rims come with their version of spoke tape, and their “Olympic Valve stem”, which is a stand alone valve stem, designed to work with just the spoke tape (no rim strip) . The Stan's web site said most applications using the Stan's rims, work with the spoke tape and Olympic valve. Kenda tires are on the Stan's recommended list, it also recommends wire bead tires, especially for 29er tires, but with the exception of Intense, IRC and Hutchinson (they also recommended to my riding buddy, not to use WTB 29er) tires, most standard tires should work; so I figured the Nevegal's folders should work.

I first tried mounting the tire with soapy water and a floor pump; that did not work. I do not have a compressor, so I went to a gas station and used the tire “pump”. The first station's pump did not have enough air volume to work. I went to another station (across the street), which was a little better. I still had to use the pump is short bursts so it could build up pressure and volume. After 3-4 bursts, the tire sealed enough to start filling up the tire and you could hear the beads snap into the “bead socket”. Okay, that worked, but I still had to pour in some Stan's sealant. I returned to my house, deflated the tire and broke the seal on one side. I then poured in the sealant and took some time nudging the loose tire bead onto the “bench” (the flat area that divides the center spoke groove; Stan's rims have a wider benche than other rims for better sealing). I used my floor pump with about 5-8 quick pumps and the bead sealed; a few more pumps and the bead seated. I mounted the other tire much the same way, using a tube to seat the tire before I poured in the sealant. I pumped both tires up to about 40 psi.

My next ride was at Wilder Ranch; the Eucalyptus and Enchanted loops. This may sound over the top, but I now can not understand why anyone that rides with a rigid fork and can afford them, does not use tubeless tires. The combination of the 650b and tubeless, smoothed out the bumps, holes and roots to a new level; even technical climbing was easier. I have previously tried running standard 26" 2.30 Hutchinson Pythons @ 30 lbs with a rigid fork and front end wallowed badly. There was none of that with the tubeless.With the rolling nature of the 650b and the suppleness of the tubeless, I now have to reset my limits with a rigid fork. Another way to explain it is, it's like the wheels now have a dampener. I'm faster, with a smoother ride, more in control, and climb technical sections with less effort. OH BTW I tried to drill a Shimano BMX cog to mount on a disc hub, but a cobalt drill wouldn't even leave a mark; I have since ordered a Tomi Cog.. Hmm, but you no what? I think I need more riding time. I'll get back to you...But when it comes to mountain bike wheels and tires I am now spoiled. Damn.

Bianchi SASS Fixie

I got a new bike. I certainly didn’t expect to get a new bike but my friend Spike gave me a frameset. But not just any old frameset, but a shiny chrome Bianchi SASS; SASS is Bianchinese for Shiny Ass Single Speed. Now if the truth be known, I really didn’t need another bike, but I was on the look out for a SASS, Why? Well, umm, er, you see...hey, it's a Shiney Ass Single Speed, that's why! And the idea came to me; a fixed gear mountain bike. Yes! I have heard stories about these, but never seen one in person. If singlespeed is the equivalent of climbing Mount Everest, fixed gear is like doing it without extra oxygen. The most logical build would be a fixed/freewheel fliop/flop rear hub. They only catch is a SASS is made disc specific and you can’t have a flip/flop hub with a disc brake since you only have one caliper. The answer was simple, a cheapo side pull brake would do the job. For components have a Planet X chrome BMX crankset that I bought in parts for no particular reason. I also have some Ritchey handlebars, stem and seatpost and Shimano brake levers, so all I need (besides wheels) are the brake calipers and a seat. I decided on a Avid BB-7 w/ 185mm rotor, a generic, but long throw canti-brake and a THE seat, on sale and looking a lot like a old style Bonty seat ; the total price, less than $80.

Now about the wheels. Finances as they are, I do not have the funds to buy/buid a new wheelset; I’m thinking 650B. I do have a rear wheel off my rigid SS bike, with a flip/flop free/free, non-disc hub/rim; that will work for the rear. I also have a front disc wheel off another bike, they only difference being the caliber is setup for 180 rotor, rather then the Avid 185, but I figured it would work okay and I figured right. As I said before, I wanted to have the option to run this bike as a fixed gear. Now, track cog with thread onto a hub made for a BMX freewheel, but there are no reverse threads to lock it down. A work around involves using an old loose ball bottom bracket lockring. These rings thread the same direction of the track cog, so you cannot completely rely on them to hold the cog under reverse torque. But, they are an added precaution and with the aid of some locktite, (which I did not use), it came be a reliable fix; but a bugger to remove. Since I will have a rear brake, I will not rely exclusively on rear torque to stop/slow the bike, so I figured the locktite was not necessary.

So, I put it all together and headed out to Soquel Demonstration Forest in Santa Cruz to try out this fixie mountain bike thing. Today was the day. Spike showed up in his van with his new Sette 29er dingle speed and I had my SASS fixie. In case you didn’t see it, here’s another pic; I added the rear brake and lever. SASS frames are disc only, but my plan was for a fixed/free, so a disc would not work. The plan was a Demo Forest ride (Santa Cruz, CA). The ride is about 13 miles, starts with 1000 foot climb on apaved and fire road, 2000 foot downhill singletrack (we road Tractor), and 1000 foot climb back out to the lower trail head; difficulty is somewhere between medium/expert to expert. The first climb was not much different than usual, perhaps a little easier because of the fixed gear. In the middle of the climb there is a single track, which gave me my first real taste of off road fixed gear riding; very awkward at first. When setting up for an obstacle, once tendency, especially on a flat or down hill, is to stand up and momentaarily coast; this of course is not possible on a fixie. I have read the technique is to lock up the rear wheel just before the obstacle. My first inclination was to just go for broke and hope I wouldn’t catch a pedal; this worked exactly 5 times. Number six didn’t result in a fall, but convince me I needed to start working on locking the rear wheel; the technique is easier than you would think, especially with a rear brake. After 3-4 tries, I found when the release point was and after that I started actually looking forward to the numerous log crossing on the trail.

There were also a number of ruddy downhills. I first tried to stay seated, but that was too painful and unsteady. The trick is to standup, brake and pedal at the same time; again something that takes some practice, but is picked up fairly quickly. By this time we were at the top entrance to Demo Forest and the Ridge Trail. It’s pretty much downhill after this and my original plan was to switch to a freewheel at this point, but I decided to continue on with the fixed gear. Using my newly acquired skills I continued on and found I was able to negotiate increasingly more difficult terrain. On my mind however, was a small patch of downhill baby heads after the helipad. Again I had planned to switch to freewheel before the baby heads, especially since I had crashed the last 2 times I had ridden them. But, again I had already negotiated the trail to this point, so I again decided to continue. The baby head section is very rutted, so you really have to pick your way through without the front wheel washing out. I took the section to the right, which is less rutted, by requires a quick right at the bottom. I put my mind in “I’m going for it” mode and before I knew it, the front wheel dropped down at the bottom and to my surprise I made the turn and rode to the second section. This section is longer but not as steep and I made it through feeling very good about myself (especially since Spike took a minor spill in the first section). We finally reached the trail head to Tractor. Of the 5 main trails at Demo Forest, Tractor slightly less technical than Braille or Sawpit, but has a number of long sweeping turns and can be ridden a very high speeds. I picked it because if I did fall, I would do less damage to myself then the other two, which have some very steep downhills and no safe place to land if you fall. The ride was a hoot and I actually found myself wishing it was more technical (next time). Once I got to the bottom I was pretty much done, but it was a great ride. I expected my legs would be toasted, but it was my upper body that was feeling worse for ware. I pretty much crawled back to the lower trail head (a 1000 foot climb out). I was left with the realization that a fixed mountain bike is very rideable (if I can do it anyone can) even over technical terrain. It was a HOOT and it’s something I want to do again!