Your latest bike purchase?

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Originally Posted by dkel

Yeah, that's pretty much my experience. Plus the stink of that transmission fluid.

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I unscrewed one side of a 3 speed hub in a moment of youthful indiscretion. The guts came out like a springy snake in a peanut can, and it took many allowances and extra chores and a grudgingly helpful shop to put it back in order. I remain committed to external gears.

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Originally Posted by honestmachinery

I unscrewed one side of a 3 speed hub in a moment of youthful indiscretion. The guts came out like a springy snake in a peanut can, and it took many allowances and extra chores and a grudgingly helpful shop to put it back in order. I remain committed to external gears.

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I don't do any service unless I have the service manual handy, or some detailed info in a book or online. Even then, I can very easily—and all too often do—get in over my head, turning a half-hour job into an hours-long chore. So far, I've gotten myself out of every situation I've gotten myself into...so far (knock on wood!).

To your point about external gearing: service and maintenance is pretty clear on a derailleur system, and it's a very robust system to ride. IGH systems require almost no maintainance...until that maintenance interval is up! An IGH merely delays—and compounds—the inevitable. For my temperament, that works out pretty well, but it's clearly not for everyone.

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Originally Posted by honestmachinery

I unscrewed one side of a 3 speed hub in a moment of youthful indiscretion. The guts came out like a springy snake in a peanut can, and it took many allowances and extra chores and a grudgingly helpful shop to put it back in order. I remain committed to external gears.

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In 1967 I was handed a bike with an exploded 3 speed hub in what sounds like the same condition. For me it was almost pure joy of discovery while figuring out the original intent and format. Gears, springs, carriers, thrust washers, clip rings and so much more. All service manual and google free. Once self assembled, tuned and working the bike was still too big for me to ride with my butt on the seat. :mad:

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Originally Posted by LhasaCM

Saturday's 40* States ride was the debut of my new commuter (and every other type of ride) bike. It's a Rose Activa. I got it to replace my Breezer Beltway 8 whose bottom bracket was starting to get to me (it was a weird externally bearing ecccentric, so was very creaky), as was the rear hub. Since the majority of my mileage is with a trailercycle attached, I wanted something that had a bit more range, and with the whole drive train a bit more solid and able to cope with the load I put on it, without getting into eBike territory since this still is my one and only bike for all occasions. Here it is sitting in our garage (before I put the car back in).

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I opted for the Rose because, once I settled on getting a Pinion gearbox (I started looking at a Rohloff as an upgrade for my Alfine 8 - but then got smitten by this), it was the most affordable and most accessible option of the various companies that sell Pinion bikes, even with the cost of shipping it from overseas. It was probably 2 months of obsessive research/reading reviews/watching reviews/etc., and literally looking on the websites of every company listed on the Pinion website (relying heavily on Google translate) before I made the decision. I still need to fiddle with a few things to get the fit just right (maybe change the stem length if the microadjust isn't enough), but fortunately, I picked the right size :)

All in all - it was about 2 weeks from placing the order to the bike shipping, and it arrived 2 days after it left the shipping center in Germany. There really wasn't much assembly involved - rotate stem and adjust handlebars and seatpost, ensure everything is properly torqued, install the pedals, and add air for a usable bike. One minor issue with the purchase - while they got my other substitutions right, they did not heed my request to swap the standard tires (2 inch wide Schwalbe Mondials) for something slightly less suitable for off-road and slightly lower rolling resistance (e.g., 1.6 inch Marathon Supremes). Since I did not want to attempt the 50 States on the Mondials, I got some 1.5 inch Panaracers from Bike Rack just before they closed Friday, which I'll probably keep on for the foreseeable future. As a result, there's a bit too much fender clearance right now for my liking, so that may be an upcoming weekend's project. I also need to look at replacing the front thru-axle or front rack since, as currently setup, I cannot remove the front wheel without also disconnecting the front rack (the "handle" can't turn because the rack is in the way).

* I only made it to 40 before the guilt from my daughter for being gone so long (and driving my wife crazy) was sufficient to convince my tired legs to throw in the towel before the rest of the hills of NW. I'm hoping to finish on Wednesday so then I can wear the t-shirt honestly (since it just says that one rode the 50 states; it says nothing about how long it took over how many different rides).

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That's a nice looking bike. Enjoy and congrats.

I'm seriously looking at the Masi Inizio. Anyone have any experience with it? It would be mainly for commuting on the CCT, which can get a bit bumpy in spots.

New helmet day!

Got this guy in the mail yesterday and did a short ride this morning. Comfy and lots of features that I'm looking forward to testing out. Most importantly though, it's aero for faster commutes to work.

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I've decided to build myself a new set of carbon wheels for the road bike (or could use them on the commuter, I guess).

So far my favorite far-east rim experience has been Light-Bicycle, so I'm building a set of their new 46mmx28mm rims: https://www.lightbicycle.com/Road-bi...available.html

These are impressively light (we'll see how true to estimates final product is), not sure about aerodynamic properties but they don't have any specific claims or comparisons there. Really the reason I'm buying them is the 21mm internal width which should make a 28mm tire profile very nicely (compared to the <17mm internal width on my current rims that are making this tire size lightbulb a bit).

Plan to build these with silver Hope Pro 4 hubs. And either CX-Ray or Laser spokes (24/24, 2x/2x).

This time getting them with logos.

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Originally Posted by hozn

Plan to build these with silver Hope Pro 4 hubs. And either CX-Ray or Laser spokes (24/24, 2x/2x).

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Bladed spokes look cool but...

Lasers are essentially the same weight and a third of the price. DT Swiss Revolution (not bladed) spokes are also almost the same weight (4.74 vs 4.34) and a third of the price.

I have the xrays on my aileron/hope wheels. The spokes were the most expensive part! Next build I paid attention to the cost per spoke a bit more and went with the Revolutions.

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Originally Posted by Tania

Bladed spokes look cool but...

Lasers are essentially the same weight and a third of the price. DT Swiss Revolution (not bladed) spokes are also almost the same weight (4.74 vs 4.34) and a third of the price.

I have the xrays on my aileron/hope wheels. The spokes were the most expensive part! Next build I paid attention to the cost per spoke a bit more and went with the Revolutions.

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Yup, CX Rays are made from Laser spokes, so they are the same spoke basically. You just pay $3/spoke vs. $1/spoke. I'm not sure that's worth it to me for 1 aero watt, but I might decide to do it for aesthetics :) I've been very happy with 24/24 lasers on my current wheelset.

Or, build "November-style" and run CX-Ray up front and non-drive rear, Laser or Race drive-side rear.