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I Like This Bike

Published May 20, 2011

Today was the Salsa El Mariachi‘s first trail ride, and it went well. Riding all the single track at Stony Creek and the two hardest climbs was great, and the rigid fork played a huge part of it. Being fully rigid and a single speed this bike feels completely different from the Titus, but in a good way. It fits me better than the VooDoo Dambala did and is the most comfortable rigid bike I’ve ridden. While not something that I’d set out for 40 – 60 mile rides on (at least not as it’s currently set up), it’s really fun on trails and I can see myself riding this quite a bit.

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Salsa El Mariachi: Built

Published May 20, 2011

After work today I tore down the VooDoo Dambala and cleaning the parts for assembly on the Salsa El Mariachi frame. After the parts were disassembled and cleaned, after another five hours passed (including a break for dinner) this pile of parts turned into the bike you see above. It’s currently fitted with the rigid fork, but at some point in the future I’ll probably switch to the squishy Reba. For now I figure it’d be nice to get back to having a rigid single speed to ride, especially now that I’ve got some nice, reliable, wide-profile wheels.

I’m still waiting for another Carnegie’s Bar to arrive from the UK for this bike, but in the mean time it should do just fine with the FSA CarbonPro that had graced the VooDoo. There’s also going to be a bit more fiddling to do to get the saddle position right, but I think everything in a good starting place for now. With any luck I’ll be able to get out to Stony Creek tomorrow and try it out.

I’m really happy with how the look of the bike came out as well. Without really trying I ended up hitting a blue/shades-of-grey color scheme. While I’m not interested in spending an inordinate amount of time color coordinating a bike, I do like it when everything falls into place to have something nice looking. And here I was questioning the blue color of the frame at first…

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MPHD Coating the Salsa El Mariachi

Published May 18, 2011

After work today I set to coating the inside of the Salsa El Mariachi frame with Amsoil MPHD . After removing the Alternator dropouts (PDF) I cleaned off any remaining grease on the bottom bracket shell and head tube and liberally fogged the tubes with the corrosion protectant. Tubes were done one at a time with the frame slowly rotated afterward, then once all tubes had been treated I hung/propped/laid the frame in all manner of positions to try and ensure that the protectant evenly coated all of the internal surfaces. After a number of rotations I hung the frame to with no tubes horizontal and headed off to get some dinner.

The frame continued to drip and dry, and after arriving home I was able to remove much of the residue left on the frame with isopropyl alcohol and a paper towel. I hope that the MPHD will dry sufficiently over the next two days so that on Friday evening I can assemble the bike. Tomorrow evening I plan on disassembling the VooDoo and piecing together the major components (crankset, wheels, etc) so that come Friday I can properly build up the bike. Perhaps then on Saturday I’ll be able to go for a test ride out at Stony Creek.

The photo above shows the frame after the initial applications, but still with quite a bit of spill-over in the rear of the frame, on the newspaper spread on the garage floor, along the down tube gusset, etc.

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Bald Mountain and Addison Oaks are Wet

Published May 18, 2011

After work today I met up with Jon at the Clarkston Road crossing of the Paint Creek Trail to ride Bald Mountain and Addison Oaks. While Bald Mountain was a bit wet Addison was so wet that we skipped the second half (and most fun part) of the trail. Still, it was nice to get out and ride some single track, particularly something other than Stony Creek. This isn’t to imply that Stony is bad, it’s just the local go-to single track and it’s nice to have a bit of variety.

The photo above shows one of the wonderful new maps at Bald Mountain State Recreation Area. The story I’d heard is that the old park manager was retiring and didn’t do much his last few years there, but when the new person took over he started making all manner of positive changes. I’m not sure how true this story is, but within the last year all of the (previously terrible and generally useless) intersection signs in the park have been removed and replaced with new, high quality maps. Kiosks like this also have been put in place, and now Bald Mountain has a nice feeling of being-cared-for to it.

Here’s two more photos from today, one of a fallen tree which someone has formed into a sketchy log pile (note the chainring marks) and the other which is impassible for a typical rider. Also, here is a GPS plot that Jon recorded of tonight’s ride. Note that heart rate is definitely not mine.

Tonight’s ride (per my bike computer) ended up at 23.66 miles, 2:03:14 moving time, for an average of 11.56 MPH, with a maximum of 26.56 MPH.

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Amsoil MPHD for Steel Bicycle Frame Protection

Published May 16, 2011

Having picked up a like-new steel frame I want to protect it as best I can, so I was planning on spraying the inside of the tubes with J. P. Weigle Frame Saver, a classic bike industry corrosion resist used inside of steel frames. Unfortunately, it’s now being manufactured from unobtanium. Digging for alternatives (and on the suggestion of David, from whom I purchased the frame), I looked into (and ultimately purchased, via a local distributor) Amsoil MPHD Heavy Duty Metal Protector.

Based on the descriptions of Frame Saver and how it coats and dries to a waxy finish it appears that this product will do the same with the same result. As a test I sprayed some spare sheet metal, uncleaned, and with a piece of tape on it to determine thickness as can be seen here. Frame Saver is reportedly a thin brown liquid that runs and pools yet still seems to cling nicely and this seems to be the same. Once I’ve seen how it sets up I’ll decide if the frame will actually get treated with it, but thus far the results are looking good. Also, at $6.60/can (16 oz) it’s considerably cheaper than the Frame Saver product would have been, had I been able to find it. J. P. Weigle Frame Saver was typically priced at ~$14/can for 4.75 oz. With this I should be able to do my frame then let any friends who pick up steel frames use it as well.

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RSS Graffiti Test Post

Published May 16, 2011

For years I’ve been hesitant to use Facebook too much, instead opting to post everything to nuxx.net, with article-length content going in a wiki, photos going in the photo gallery, and blog posts going here at the blog. Since Facebook has picked up steam, is going to be around for a while, and is the de facto non-geek online identify, I figure I should start using it more.

To continue centrally publishing content but allowing it to be available in Facebook I’ve enabled the RSS Graffiti application, set it to pick up nuxx.net blog‘s RSS feed, and let it do its thing. This is my first post after enabling this and thus a joint test / welcome-to-me-actually-posting-stuff-on-Facebook.

UPDATE: I’ve opted to not use RSS Graffiti and instead allow Facebook’s Notes application to import RSS feeds. Hopefully this will work better.

UPDATE 2: Damn you for being broken, Facebook! Notes consistently returns an error saying that it’s failed saying that there is a problem which is being worked on.

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New Bike Parts!

Published May 15, 2011

Earlier today I purchased the parts pictured above to build up into my next bike. They are used, but this seems like a decent deal on what should become my next bike building project. I rather like my VooDoo Dambala, but I’ve had my eye on the Salsa El Mariachi frame for a while now, particularly because of the swinging dropouts. When a deal offering a slightly used frame, matching rigid fork, Rock Shox Reba suspension fork, and headset appeared on the MMBA forum in my size I jumped on them, and soon I hope to rebuild the VooDoo’s parts (including the new wheels that I built) on to this frame.

For a total of $730 I ended up getting the following parts:

· Salsa El Mariachi Frame, 18″ / medium; very well cared for (only one small scratch in the top tube).
· Salsa CroMoto Grande 29’er Fork, a rigid fork designed to be used with the El Mariachi.
· Cane Creek 100 Headset, a standard, high-quality cartridge bearing headset.
· Rock Shox Reba Team 100mm travel fork, a perfect squishy fork for this frame.
· Bontrager Duster Wheelset
· 2009 SRAM X-9 Derailleur

The price for the frame+forks+headset was $650, but I also ended up with the derailleur and a used wheel set (another $80) that I’ll put on the VooDoo before selling it. I’ve also got a set of Race Face Deus cranks and bottom bracket en route via a super deal at Wickwerks. I’ll be setting the rings aside for later use on the Titus and using the cranks+bb along with parts from the VooDoo to build up the frame. I’ll then find parts for the VooDoo and build it into a bike to sell.

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Heritage Park Bridge

Published May 14, 2011

Yesterday while hurriedly riding around before the rain I happened over to Utica‘s Heritage Park to check out the new bridge. My last post about this showed just some bare concrete footings, but now there is a quite nice, wide bridge. Once Shelby Township has finished with the asphalt path through River Bends there will be a solid, safe route from Stony Creek all the way to Metro Beach. There’s still a bit of work that will be needed on a frequently flooded crossing under Van Dyke, but everything takes time.

Here is another photo of the bridge as seen from one of the approaches, and this amusing pipe that’s been in place long enough for a tree to grow around it.

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Giro Rivet Gloves

Published May 12, 2011

For most of last year I rode wearing a pair black Giro Rivet gloves in size XL. These unpadded and super-vented (note the mesh along the sides of each finger?) gloves are what I prefer for warm weather riding. Last year after setting up for the Addison Oaks Fall XC Classic I left them on my bike rack and drove off, losing them. They were a bit worn at the time and I figured that other gloves could replace them, but with it getting warmer here I missed them and swung by RBS yesterday to pick up another pair and I’m quite glad I did. They fit just like I’d remembered and left my hands comfortably cool while riding Stony Creek last night.

Speaking of Stony Creek, a week ago while riding with Kristi I stopped along the paved path on the east side of Sheldon just north of Stony Creek High School and trimmed back the shrub which normally overhands 40% of the pavement. As the nice weather rolls on the shrub seems to get larger and larger, resulting in a need to swerve around it while riding past. It appears to be located at a relatively unmaintained section of land, so I figured that cutting it back wouldn’t upset anyone. A photo of it from a week ago can be seen here.

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