Ride home for Wednesday, 14 June
The sprog got discharged from hospital early, so I was out of there shortly after mid-day. On my way over to the bike shop I saw a branch of Running Room and thought I'd stop in to see if they had anything that would be useful for my trip to Cape Breton. The guy there recommended trying a powder called eLoad, but said my best bet would be Cytomax and even told me where to get it in Halifax. I picked up two sachets (16oz/sachet) for $3.75, which worked out even cheaper than Gatorade. The eLoad has more than just sodium and potassium, too, so I'm hoping it'll stop me cramping. With any luck I should be able to get a long ride in before CB to test it out.
I got back to IdealBikes and they hadn't even looked at my bike - fair enough, as I'd told them I wasn't planning on being back till later in the afternoon. Dave pulled down my bike and got Roger to look at it, and he agreed that the hub was pretty shot, and also the rims were whacked - the rim was true on one side and all whaley on the other, pretty much unfixable. The forks turned out to be OK, though - I guess it must have just been the angle the bike was at, when Roger measured them against a spare hub they were straight. Roger tried a 700C wheel on the bike and it fit fine, so he figured out what would be required (new wheels and new cassette plus some labour) and did a quote up for me. I said that'd be great and I'd come back next week, and Roger looked at me and said, "oh... I was going to do it for you now!" Can't argue with that, so I called the woman who hit me and explained that the wheel needed replacing and it came to a total of $430 inc tax. She agreed to come down to the bike shop that evening and pay for it, and Roger agreed he'd fit it all for me and wait for her to pay me for it, so he set to work. I sat my the front desk and read a magazine and watched people stream in... I counted 23 people while I was there, over a period of an hour and a half. Halifax definitely seems to have an active cycling population, but I can't help wondering where they're all riding.
Roger had to grind out the front forks a bit with an angle grinder to get the new wheel to fit, and nibbled a bit out of the front brakes to drop the pads down enough. The rear dropouts also needed a bit of grinding down, as well as the screw that held the derailleur in place - it was obviously a pretty tight fit, I ended up with an 8 speed cassette on there. Even after repeated tinkering Roger couldn't get the derailleur to work right across the range since the cassette was wider, so he switched out a couple of different derailleurs until he found one that worked, an Acera model from Shimano - this is apparently a mountain bike derailleur, but since I use friction shifters I can get away with using all sorts of random drivetrain components without worrying too much.
The wheels are Alex DA22 double wall rims, and they're noticeably lighter than the other rims - especially since it's rotational weight. It felt like a new bike on the way home, especially with the new gears; Roger said I effectively had a new gear at the low end, and a new gear at the high end, but otherwise it was the same. The bike certainly had a lot more pep to it, and I'm looking forward to doing a longer ride - not over the next few days, though, as Tropical Storm Alberto is supposed to pass over us over the next couple of days. Perhaps it'll end up shifting the persistent rain system that's been hanging over Atlantic Canada for the the past few weeks? That'd be a definite bonus...
Distance logged: 14.970km
Time: 39:38
Average speed: 22.7km/hr
Max speed: 56.9 km/hr
Temperature: 22C, sunny
Cumulative distance: 3384.903km
Cumulative cost per km: $0.48
Monthly distance: 270.255km
Monthly cost per km: $0.47
I got back to IdealBikes and they hadn't even looked at my bike - fair enough, as I'd told them I wasn't planning on being back till later in the afternoon. Dave pulled down my bike and got Roger to look at it, and he agreed that the hub was pretty shot, and also the rims were whacked - the rim was true on one side and all whaley on the other, pretty much unfixable. The forks turned out to be OK, though - I guess it must have just been the angle the bike was at, when Roger measured them against a spare hub they were straight. Roger tried a 700C wheel on the bike and it fit fine, so he figured out what would be required (new wheels and new cassette plus some labour) and did a quote up for me. I said that'd be great and I'd come back next week, and Roger looked at me and said, "oh... I was going to do it for you now!" Can't argue with that, so I called the woman who hit me and explained that the wheel needed replacing and it came to a total of $430 inc tax. She agreed to come down to the bike shop that evening and pay for it, and Roger agreed he'd fit it all for me and wait for her to pay me for it, so he set to work. I sat my the front desk and read a magazine and watched people stream in... I counted 23 people while I was there, over a period of an hour and a half. Halifax definitely seems to have an active cycling population, but I can't help wondering where they're all riding.
Roger had to grind out the front forks a bit with an angle grinder to get the new wheel to fit, and nibbled a bit out of the front brakes to drop the pads down enough. The rear dropouts also needed a bit of grinding down, as well as the screw that held the derailleur in place - it was obviously a pretty tight fit, I ended up with an 8 speed cassette on there. Even after repeated tinkering Roger couldn't get the derailleur to work right across the range since the cassette was wider, so he switched out a couple of different derailleurs until he found one that worked, an Acera model from Shimano - this is apparently a mountain bike derailleur, but since I use friction shifters I can get away with using all sorts of random drivetrain components without worrying too much.
The wheels are Alex DA22 double wall rims, and they're noticeably lighter than the other rims - especially since it's rotational weight. It felt like a new bike on the way home, especially with the new gears; Roger said I effectively had a new gear at the low end, and a new gear at the high end, but otherwise it was the same. The bike certainly had a lot more pep to it, and I'm looking forward to doing a longer ride - not over the next few days, though, as Tropical Storm Alberto is supposed to pass over us over the next couple of days. Perhaps it'll end up shifting the persistent rain system that's been hanging over Atlantic Canada for the the past few weeks? That'd be a definite bonus...
Distance logged: 14.970km
Time: 39:38
Average speed: 22.7km/hr
Max speed: 56.9 km/hr
Temperature: 22C, sunny
Cumulative distance: 3384.903km
Cumulative cost per km: $0.48
Monthly distance: 270.255km
Monthly cost per km: $0.47
posted by steve at 6/14/2006 09:15:00 pm
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