Category: cycling

UHMW Polyethylene Tape for Cable Rub and Chainstay Protection

Published December 21, 2009

I’ve had little luck finding products to protect bicycle frames against chain slap (on the chainstay) and cable rub on the frame itself. As illustrated here on the Bianchi D.I.S.S. cable rub can be quite ugly, and chain slap can lead to paint chips on the chainstay. After a bit of research I found McMaster-Carr part number 76445A764, a 5 yard long, 2″ wide roll of 0.0115″ thick Ultra High Molecular weight polyethylene (UHMW / Wikipedia article) tape with a self-adhesive backing. Selling for $17.85, this translucent material is commonly used to make slick abrasion-resistant surfaces, so I figured it would work well protecting bicycle surfaces from rub wear.

The roll of tape arrived today, so I devised some abrasion and impact tests which would replicate wear conditions found on bicycles along with testing removability of the tape and its acrylic adhesive.

These five tests, two impact and three abrasion, are as follows. All surfaces cleaned with 99% isopropyl alcohol prior to UHMW tape adhesion:

Impact Test #1

Scenario: Tape applied to curved edge of clear powder coated steel and hit with metal objects such as file handles, tweezer handles, and a chain whip.
Result: Tape dented, no damage to surface below. Tape shown to be deformed by impacts but did not pull away from surface.
Photos: Dented Tape · Undamaged Surface

Abrasion Test #1

Scenario: Tape applied to curved edge of clear powder coated steel and abraded with small and medium fine metal files.
Result: Tape abraded, no damage to surface below. Sharper cutting with the corner of a file may have pierced the tape and damaged the finish below.
Photos: Abraded Tape · Undamaged Surface

Impact Test #2

Scenario: Painted aluminum panel with tape applied to a portion of it. To each of the protected and control surfaces the handle end of large file is dropped 20 times in a space the size of a dime and a metal rod is set in place and hammered gently with a metal bar for 10 impacts.
Result: Small metal nub on metal rod pierced the tape and damaged the metal. No other visible damage.
Photos: Bare Metal Control Surface · Taped With Impact Marks · Surface Below Tape Showing No Damage

Abrasion Test #2

Scenario: Brush made from Jagwire cable housing is placed in an electric drill. Brush is run for 45 seconds against each of the protected and control surfaces on painted aluminum panel.
Result: Severe damage to control surface, much less damage to taped area, occurring only after brush wore through tape.
Photos: Jagwire Brush · Control and Taped Surfaces After Brushing · Control and Taped Surfaces with Tape Removed

Abrasion Test #3

Scenario: Painted aluminum panel is bent, tape is used to protect half of the bend. Wire wheel is run for 45 seconds over both the protected and unprotected areas, simultaneously.
Result: Severe damage to unprotected area resulting in removal of paint and erosion of aluminum. Taped area is undamaged.
Photos: Wire Wheel and Test Surface · Control and Taped Surfaces After Brushing · Control and Taped Surfaces with Tape Removed

This tape was also relatively easy to remove from both the powder coated steel and painted aluminum surfaces. It sticks solidly in place, but picking at one corner of the UHMW tape with a fingernail will lift it and allow it to be pulled off the surface. Some adhesive residue was occasionally left behind, but it was not difficult to clean up with an isopropyl alcohol-soaked paper towel.

With these tests complete I feel that this UHMW tape will work wonderfully as a product to protect against bicycle frame damage due to cable rub and chain slap. Lacking logos and being translucent white it should be fit nicely on most frames. The tape is easily cut with scissors or a sharp razor blade and conforms nicely to simple curved surfaces. More complex surfaces such as joints should be possible to cover with some smart trimming of the tape.

While protecting the frame it will not deaden the sound of chain slap much, so it may be desirable to use some manner of rubber chainstay protector if one wishes to cut down on both noise and wear. As done previously I’ll likely continue making chainstay protectors from old tubes, or perhaps with bits of old tire as Trail’s Edge Cyclery does.

If you would like to see all of the photos from this series, please look here in the UHMW Tape album.

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Snowy Stony Creek Ride

Published December 20, 2009

Today a group of us set out for a ride at Stony Creek through the snow, along the usual trails. As pictured above the ride entailed Nick and Marty Shue, Jon Rose, Carlos McIntyre, Bob Costello, Kristi Heuvers, and Erik Silvassy, and I was behind the camera. We rode in from the trail head, did one regular route of the single track (Pines → Snake → Roller Coaster), then a generally-rare in-daylight backwards lap of The Pines.

While there was snow on the ground, none of us (save for Bob) had studded tires on our bikes, and none of us were wanting for them during the ride. Despite a couple icy bits on the two track (including one that I fell on while trying to pass Marty so I could get out front of the pack and take a picture), almost all of the single track was simply snow covered. A few of the climbs resulted in tire spin and loss of traction (leading to walking), but nothing was icy enough to cause problems.

With the bright sun and temperatures hovering around freezing this was an ideal day for a winter ride. Things were warm enough that I rode comfortably in just a long-sleeved shirt and head cover, having stripped off my jacket and balaclava early in the ride. All said, it was a great day for a ride and a nice way to spend it with friends.

If you’re interested, here is one more image from today, showing the bottom bracket area of my bike covered in snow.

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Failed CrankBrothers Eggbeater MXR Pedals

Published December 18, 2009

A number of months ago I purchased a pair of CrankBrothers Eggbeater MXR pedals. A few weeks ago I let a friend of mine borrow them for his new bike, to use until a set that he ordered arrived. Unfortunately within a few rides they had failed, with the plastic end cap popping out, the body wobbling around the shaft, and the bearings feeling very stiff. While these are the cheapest Eggbeater pedals made I had expected them to last for more than a handful of rides. After all, I’ve been using the second-lowest-end Eggbeater C pedals all year and they continue to work great.

Seeing as the pedals should still be under warranty I filled out a support ticket and submitted it, along with the image above and this one. They had space to upload two images for context, but I only had one image of the pedals. Here’s the text of the support ticket which I hope will result in upgraded replacement pedals:

I purchased some Eggbeater MXR pedals back in May as spares and put them on a bike a couple weeks ago. Within a handful of rides rides on fairly basic Michigan trails the end cap had come out of one pedal while riding and the pedal stopped moving smoothly and began wobbling. Closer inspection showed a ball bearing in the grease behind where the cap was. This is shown in the picture of the pedals below. The other picture is my girlfriend’s dog, wet from a bath.

While I understand that these are your cheapest pedals, I was hoping that they would last for more than a few rides. If you are able to help me out with these under warranty, is there a way which I could upgrade them to the SL model instead, even if for an additional charge? I’ve recently used a friend’s set and found that I prefer them over either the MXRs or the Cs which I use on my other bike.

Thanks very much!

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It’s Almost Winter…

Published December 16, 2009

Here’s Bob putting more air in the rear tire of his bike after tonight’s cold weather made it feel particularly soft and uncomfortable to ride on.

For tonight’s ride we started out from my house with the temperature in the low 20s and headed up to River Bends for a quick ride on the trails there. This resulted in 14.31 miles over an hour and a half, making for a rather pokey 10.1 MPH average. With the air as cold as it is anything over 13 MPH or so hurt, and the trails we were on are lumpy and icy enough that one tends to poke along in a relatively low gear. Not long after returning the National Weather Service had my area listed at 18°F.

Cold weather riding is nifty, and I’m glad that I’m appropriately equipped to do so, but it sure is a lot harder than when its nice out.

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Ice, Dogs, and Ridge Trails

Published December 12, 2009

Today I went for my first below-freezing ride of the season, ending up in River Bends (surprise!) poking around both single track trails that I already knew and some that I just came across for the first time. Some of these new (to me) trails resulted in a better mental picture of how the trails, disc golf course, and rivers fit together.

After riding a bit of the unmaintained single track I happened back up to the normal hiking trail, and ran across two women with dogs on leashes. Following them was a small beagle, and they told me that it just started following them and if I see someone looking for a dog that I should let them know it’s with them. After sniffing me (and allowing me to note the presence of a license and name tag with phone number) on its collar, it started heading back the way it’d come, and the direction I was going. After telling the ladies that I’d take care of the dog I followed it for a while hoping I’d hear someone calling for it.

Since no one was calling for the dog I eventually grabbed it by the collar and played with it while calling one of the numbers on the tag. The person on the other end of the phone seemed pretty excited that I’d found their dog, and in not much time her husband was on his way to meet me. It seems he jogs River Bends frequently, so we were able to establish a place to meet; one of the benches in a notably straight part of the path. No more than 10 minutes later he came jogging through the woods and I was able to get his dog back to him. I’m really glad this worked out well, as both seeing a lost dog looking around for someone familiar and knowing that someone has lost their dog is a pretty sad thing. Here’s a picture of the dog while we were waiting for its person.

While riding around other parts of the park I came across lots of ice, all of which was fun to ride across even without studded tires. As these were mostly narrow and mostly snow covered puddles it was quite solid and not slippery and in places where I did break through there was just a bit of mud beneath. However, at one point I came across a larger flooded area, part of which is seen above, and while it was tempting to try riding through this bit of floodplane on smooth/hard surface it’s possible that this area could have been a few feet deep, and with the ice being an inch or so thick, I didn’t want to risk falling in. Not to mention that unlike the aforementioned puddles it had a slick glare which caused me a great deal of difficulty when setting my bike down, resulting in a controlled slide / almost-fall as seen above.

Towards the end of my ride I was heading along one of the single track-bearing ridges when I veered a little bit off the trail. Normally this isn’t a problem as I can hop up the edge of worn (into a U) single track and continue on like normal, but in this case with the snow kept my front wheel in the groove while my body and bike continued on off the trail. This resulted in a rather amusing tumble into the brush and down the ridge, with me looking back up at my bike (as seen here) after I stopped. I’d previously been afraid to fall here, as the hill is fairly steep and covered in a bunch of woody brush. However, with it being winter-time and my wearing multiple layers of clothes, the fall was mostly something to laugh at. This was actually my first decent tumbling-fall since the crash at Addison Oaks resulting in the skinplug, and thankfully the outcome was much different.

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New Project: Vassago Fisticuff

Published December 11, 2009

Here’s the start of a new project, building up a road / path / dirt road bike around a Vassago Fisticuff frame. While I haven’t decided on everything about it yet, I’m pretty certain that it’ll have disc brakes and be setup as a 1×9 with mountain bike parts, starting with a 44t chainring up front and an 11:34 cassette, shifted using an SRAM twist shifter on a HubBub drop bar extension for twist shifters. This should give plenty of range for going fast on smooth stuff and climbing the steepest roads in the area while still being easy to shift. Coloring will be mostly brown/black with silver bits as needed, with things such as brown powder coated Velocity Deep V rims, beige bar tape, Salsa Moto Ace Bell Lap bars, and a honey-colored Brooks B17.

There will be some odd niggles to sort out, such as fender and rack mounting, particularly with the close-proximity brake and fender mounts, the lack of rack mounts, and the slot dropouts, but it shouldn’t be much of a problem. Being a steel frame I’ll also need to seal the inside (with Frame Saver or a similar product) and promptly deal with chips (it arrived with a tiny one on a seat stay), but this shouldn’t be too difficult.

To see pictures of the Vassago Fisticuff as it currently exists (just a frame), please check out this album: Vassago Fisticuff.

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Bike Route?!?

Published December 1, 2009

On tonight’s bike ride I noticed new signs in River Bends indicating that a dead-end loop of trail (including all of the the newly paved stuff) is marked as a Bike Route. There is a sign leading into this pavement indicating so, and the sign above is seen on the way out. This strikes me as a bit odd, as there are no Bike Route signs at the entrances to River Bends, and were one to follow those signs expecting a way through, a rider would just find the trail looping back on itself through some rather rough sections.

I suppose I could take this as a good sign (ha ha!), indicating that the trail connecting River Bends and Utica together will be completed soon. Unfortunately, a past conversation that I had with the engineer of the new trail project indicating that the trail is to end there for the time being until funding to complete the trail is found. I suspect that the signs are part of the bigger project and this plan, and were installed simply so one could say that this segment is complete. Now, if only the remaining few-mile segments between Rochester / the Bloomer rail trail, River Bends, and Clinton River Park (behind Dodge Park) would be completed.

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No Studs Lost! (Broken In Nokian WXC300 Tires)

Published November 28, 2009

A quick ride up to River Bends completed the recommended 30 mile break-in period for the Nokian Hakka WXC300 tires that I picked up for winter riding. The relatively-giant knobs and studs make for an uncomfortable, difficult, vibration-y ride and lead to sore sit bones. The metal on pavement contact also makes for a twitchy ride, very similar to what one finds when riding in light snow. At one point I automatically braked hard while turning and my front wheel slipped while making a harsh metal on stone sound.

During this break-in period no studs were lost, likely due to careful braking, acceleration, and turning. As can be seen here (full res) the center studs which had more contact with pavement were pushed further into the tire, which should help keep them from tearing out during normal use this winter. I can’t help but think of a device which would perform this break-in automatically over the course of a few hours using a motor, weights, an old fork, and an old grinding stone, but that’d definitely be overkill for just me and my one set of tires.

Now that this process is complete I can’t wait to get normal tires back on the bike and ride some single track before the weather gets really bad. I may try for this tomorrow, but with the current forecast it looks like it’ll be sometime mid-week before that’s possible.

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Continental Divide!

Published November 16, 2009

Here, have a low-res (due to bandwidth constraints) through-acrylic photo of the train rounding a snow-covered curve a bit west of Denver, not long before passing through the Moffat Tunnel and crossing the Continental Divide.

Thus far the trip has been rather nice. At meals people are seated four to a table, with groups less than four combined as needed. Thus far this has worked out well, and I’ve met some rather interesting people. Food eaten and meal companions have been as follows. While this list currently contains three meals, it’ll be updated with breakfast and lunch from the 17-Nov, as appropriate:

Dinner #1 / 15-Nov-2009:

Food: Bison meatloaf a chipotle sauce, salad w/ vinaigrette dressing, bread, mashed potatos, and a key lime cake covered in blueberries.
Companion(s): A woman who takes the train because of a fear of flying, a retired Air Force cargo and commercial pilot living in Salt Lake City, UT who has the time to take the train and strongly dislikes our airport security, and an oral / maxillofacial surgeon interviewing for residency and booking cheap last-minute travel from Chicago to Omaha.

Breakfast #1 / 16-Nov-2009:

Food: Cheese omelet with grits, bacon, and a croissant.
Companion(s):The same retired pilot from dinner last night, eaten while sitting in the Denver station during a short layover.

Lunch #1 / 16-Nov-2009:

Food: Chipotle black bean burger (Morningstar Farms) with crinkle-cut potato chips and chocolate ice cream.
Companion(s): A boyfriend/girlfriend couple taking the train from Boston to Emeryville, then to Portland and back to Chicago (from there he is then flying back to Turkey to visit his parents and she’s heading to her family’s place in Milwaukee), and with a rather quiet woman who lives near Corvallis, OR who seems to regularly the train when traveling.

Dinner #2 / 16-Nov-2009:

Food: Ricotta-stuffed ravoli-esque pasta, steamed veggies, salad w/ blue cheese dressing, bread.
Companion(s): Retired couple from Sacramento area. Husband works as a process engineer, formerly making Polaris missile fuel for Bridgestone, now for the pharmaceutical company they were spun off as. Wife is a retired librarian, considering applying for director positions.

Diverant from airline food there are no vegan, vegetarian-variant (non-ovo-lacto, etc), or religion-specific (Kosher, Halal, Hindu, etc) meals. Overall the food is definitely better than airline food, but I am glad that I brought some extra snacks on board^† as I find myself wanting something to munch on that’s a little more in line with my normal tastes.

Meals are served with plastic plates and cups, stainless steel utensils, and disposable table cloths and napkins. Meal choice is made at the table and preparation takes ten to fifteen minutes, implying that non-breakfast foods are semi-prepared. As my breakfast contained eggs it was pretty easy to tell that they were freshly cooked, although they may have been from boxed eggs. The menus are half standard items, and half chef’s special / specials of the day. Breakfast and lunch are first come, first serve, with the queue being assigned numbers which are then called out across the train as available. For dinner someone comes around and asks which of a predetermined set of times one wishes to eat at (one of four), then the reserved time is written on a slip of paper and used as one’s dinner reservation. My dinner reservations for both yesterday and today were at 7:15pm, which allow for eating to take place sometime after sunset. After eating one typically returns to their room to find the seats transformed into beds, ready for sleepytime.

Traveling this late in the year with the sun setting so early makes it a bit dull later in the evenings, but drawing the curtains to block light from the car’s hallway and turning out the in-cabin lights makes things outside, including stars, plenty visible. Towns, and their typically rail-side industrial areas are particularly visible and interesting at night. Last night I also used this time to watch a mountain biking historical film called Klunkerz, and today I’m writing this post. I wish I’d brought along one more movie for tonight, but books or the provided-daily newspaper will defintely suffice.

After spending the whole of the day sitting in various comfortable chairs and looking out large windows (floor to ceiling, wrapping around to the roof when in the observation / lounge car) looking at beautiful mountains and canyons I feel certain that this is a wonderful way to travel. If one can afford the extra time and doesn’t mind being with minimum facilities for a few days, this is an ideal way to cross the country. There is generally no security theater^††, comfortable seating, decent food, self-service coffee/water/juice, the ability to move around, time to walk outside during smoke breaks / extended stops, and the ability to isolate one’s self in a comfortable private cabin. If I wish to talk to others the observation / lounge car is easily accessible, but while sitting here I’ve felt completely detached from the other passengers, free to simply sit and look out the window, relaxing and watching the country roll by.

^† Brought along in a Trader Joe’s paper grocery bag were Trader Joe’s Oh My! Omega trail mix, TJ’s Tom Yum Cashews, TJ’s “This apple walks into a bar…”, Meiji Almond, Cisco’s Coconut Sable Biscuits, Suntory’s Black Boss Coffee, a 10oz bag of caramel corn from “Nuts On Clark” in Chicago’s Union Station, and two bottles of Goats Do Roam-brand wine; one eponymous and one bottle of Goats In Villages. Note that a personal stock of alcohol is permitted to be consumed in one’s private cabin, but it may not be brought to common areas such as the dining car, observation car, or coach seating.

^†† Unexpectedly there were fifteen or so low-visibility (non-uniformed but with badges and firearms strapped to arms or legs, wearing logo’d jackets) DHS folks all armed with handguns, with two dogs, waiting for us at the normally-lengthy stop in Grand Junction, CO. The cabin attendant indicated that normally they visit the train in Reno, NV looking for drugs, but these dogs were bomb sniffing. I tend to believe the explosive dog claim, as when I walked past one and the dog started to sniff me, the officer holding it pulled it back. I’ve never had a drug sniffing dog not be allowed to sniff me all it wanted. While lingering around the outside of the train during this extended break I overheard the DHS individuals repeatedly refering to a female and boarding the train via the dining car’s non-public ground-level entrance. Despite this, I never saw anyone actually being removed from the train, and all the identifiable DHS individuals seemed to depart the area at the same time, in unmarked vehicles, before the train left the station.

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Rough Riding

Published November 12, 2009

As expected, the Nokian Hakka WXC300 tires acquired last week are not fun to ride on pavement. They are very noisy (read: difficult to talk over) and knobby enough that the vibration makes one’s ass sore pretty quickly. However, the package recommends that they be ridden for 30 miles on pavement before use off road, so today’s group ride out to Metro Beach and back worked well for this. With roughly 18-19 miles on the tires I’ll attempt another ride tomorrow to finish off the break-in; possibly a quick 12 mile-ish ride up to River Bends and back.

I can’t get the noise out of my head. An hour and twenty minutes of 300 metal spikes hitting pavement with every tire rotation. With a circumference of 2099mm and tonight’s ride being 18.79 miles, that’s roughly 3,034,070 discreet metal-on-stone click sounds in rapid succession, not dissimilar from similar to riding over a sheet of bubble wrap. An endless sheet of bubble wrap. For an hour and twenty minutes.

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