Single Speed Cyclocross Build

I built a bike!

I feel like its been awhile since that has happened, and it took place mostly in Manarea v2.5 AKA the refurbished basement shop.  I've done hodge-podge work in the basement the last few winters but it was always a hack of a setup and it was primarily just to avoid the really cold days in the shed.

It was always on the to-do list to rework things in the basement, it was pretty gross down there.  I just wasn't sure how far I wanted to take the project.  In an ideal world I would have dug a bit deeper and graded everything and poured cement. But 'aint nobody got time for that so it turned into ripping out the old moisture barrier doing a bit of digging and raking to grade the dirt floor out and then laying down a much better/thicker moisture barrier.

I inherited a work bench from the demo project of Tony's garage, hung some bike hooks and BOOM.  Cold weather hibernation shop is a go!

Ok to the build.  This time of year Nashbar move out their model year generic frames at next to nothing ($79 to be exact).  They have gotten me with this three times now.  The blue chromoly MTB frame that was a monster cross for a time and is now Jake's go to whip.  The green frame which was my light touring / commuter for several years and now the red frame, a steel CX bike.

My commuter wasn't getting ridden this year really at all, due mostly to my wrist / stiff joints in the morning issues I've been dealing with.  That may not always be the case but that bike was always way over built for what it was doing 90% of the time and I really only used it on a touring ride one time.  Which was awesome but I have just never gotten around to doing that kind of riding and I think its unlikely I ever really would.

Now that I'm racing cross (and will probably continue to) I felt like I would get a lot more use out of a SS cross bike now plus I can always still commute on it here and there and get a good workout.  And at $79 for the frame and being able to swap almost all parts over this build ended up costing me maybe $130.

look at how awesome it is!

I pretty pleased with how it all came together.  All the leftover available components all matched completely.  White/red/black saddle, white stem, black fork, black bar tape...it was meant to be.  I had some left over cx tires that I had bought on clearance a long time ago and then never used because I got a deal on Clemente's through Chainline.  They get reduced in volume really bad on these old road rims though.  Eventually these will need some new wheels but this is more of a beater bike and will probably get 'new' parts as they trickle down from my 'better' bikes.

Only extra parts I had to buy were the handlebars (wanted something wider than I had for better SS torque), A better cable hanger for the front brake (the one I had been using on my commuter was a joke) and a chain ring.

I agonized a bit over gearing.  I have a very intimate knowledge of SS gearing for MTB but how certain gears translate to CX courses was a bit of a mystery.  I actually shift quite a bit at times on my geared bike.  I  did some research but there are too many body types and preferences when it comes to SS to get a good across the board recommendation.  I usually take what I read online and subtract a few gear inches (I'm a spinner) and go from there.

I settled on getting about the biggest ring I could find for a 104BCD crank that would create good ratios with all of the MTB sized cogs I already had.  Settled on 42-19 for my go-to race gear for now.  Most recommendations fell in the 55-65 gear inches range and 42-19 comes in at 59.7 (for reference I rode 44.4 inches for MTB).  This might end up being a bit steep for me depending on the course but I think its the best place to start.  It also allows me to easily step up to a 20 if I need to or down to 16 for commuting on the road.

I'm using the DMR STS tensioner I had been using on the party bike.  That build has gone into hibernation for a bit until it can inherit some better parts and I find the time to improve the braking.  This should work for now but I might eventually get a better tensioner and some sort of chain watcher for up front.  I'll have to see how it works once I can start riding it.

Now I can double up at CX races I have to drive farther to.  Race my category and SS so I'm not driving 2hrs to race for just 45mins.  Will probably also make a great winter training bike that I can either mount on my actual trainer or put the fenders on get ridiculous out on the snowy roads in the spring.

Who wants to buy a nashbar touring frame, real cheap?

Call me Curmudgeon

In my end of year gear post I made mention to me waffling back and forth between upgrading to a carbon fork or getting hydro brakes.  I was having a hard time figuring out what I wanted to do for next year.  Each option had their pros and cons and I would randomly talk myself both in and out of each decision quite frequently for awhile.

I thought I had figured it out at the time of that post and hydro brakes it was.  Then Bully told me to man up and get the carbon fork and for a bit I was waffling again.  Then today I realized that I wasn't actually waffling between two choices, I was at odds with both choices independently at the same time...get it?

I have always been somewhat of a no-nonsense racer/rider.  Always err on the side of simplicity and durability.  I think that is why I took to SS so readily.  Investing large sums of money to drop weight and increase maintenance has never really jive'd with me.  I would much rather have a solid fork that works just fine and I know can take a beating and brakes that work just fine and I can fully service myself quickly and cheaply.   I don't want to worry about applying the correct torque to a carbon steer tube and have to bleed possibly corrosive DOT brake fluid if my brakes go wonky...at least not right now.  I've upgraded to a tubeless config for this year, that is going to be my tech advancement for this season.  I am going to master the crap out of that so that I can fully and easily maintain it from my shop.  We'll see what that does for me this coming year and if I get fast enough maybe then my curmudgeoness will fade and I will demand the finest and most expensive tech.

In the mean time I put my BB7s back on, mounted the rotors on the new wheels, cabled everything up (quickly and easily) and threw the new grips on.

As is it comes in at about 22lbs even (just using a little home scale with me shouldering the bike).  Not the most accurate measure but probably a good estimate on reality.  It will be rideable with pedals, a chain, cog and cassette spacers which at most will add another pound or so.  Not too shabby and as is I am about $400 richer without one of those upgrades on the horizon.  That means plenty more funds for actual race fees, or gas or nutrition.  So maybe I won't be going quite as fast as I could but I'll be able to easily afford to go slow way more often.  Besides this is just more motivation to work harder...didn't end up spending the money to drop an extra 1000g?  Better HTFU.

End of Year Gear Extravaganza

Christmas has come and gone and now its time to look ahead to 2012 full force and mess with all my new gear of course!

I've got a full week of 'forced vacation' to mess with new toys, brew some beer, ponder upgrade choices, finally get some time on the slopes, etc., etc.

My race bike has begun to take its new form for next year, the bike shop has moved into the basement this year on account of I hate working on bikes in a 20 degree shed.  FYI metal gets real cold when it sits out in the cold.  I got a few new bits for xmas this year to get me rolling.  I bought myself some new wheels before the holidays, my Dad got me a new crank/bb, and Gina got me a new stem and grips.

Wheels are Stan's ZTR Crests, running tubeless with some Maxxis Ignitors on there right now, I stuck with the 180mm Stylo cranks and a new Stylo Race stem.  Not sure what makes a stem 'Race' but I'm sure I'll be faster now.  I had contemplated hard about going to a full carbon fork but lately I have been waffling on that a lot.  The fork I wanted was pretty expensive and I'm having a hard time mentally qualifying spending that much money in essence to just drop some weight and maybe increase some chatter absorption.  I think dropping the weight in my wheels as well as running tubeless now with be enough of an improvement in that realm and I feel like spending some of the money I was saving for the fork on a nice set of hydro brakes might be a better investment.  That way I improve the bikes weight and ride feel as well as its stopping power.  Now I just need to figure out which brakes I am going to go with...

I am really liking the bikes weight right now and most of the stuff I need to add isn't very substantial weight wise: cog, chain, pedals, brakes, grips thats it.

I also scored all kinds of GoPro accessories.  Very much looking forward to doing a bunch more filming this winter.  I got the vented helmet mount for another angle while biking, a grab bag full of various mounts to mix and match and some of the moisture absorbing strips to try and combat those issues I had while filming the Mighty Chicken vid. 

I'm also running a fairly hilarious inventory of Cytomax now as well as Clif Bloks and Stinger waffles.  Or more appropriately murder juice, murder bloks and murder waffles.

As for beer, its been a long time coming but this week I will finally be getting my next batch going.  A Black IPA with a full 6oz of hops!  YeeHaaaaa, can't wait to drink some of that after a sweet day of spring skiing in a few months.

"That's a lot of frame"

AND a spicy meat-a-ball!  Got the Y11 all stripped down and cleaned up last night and daaaaayyyyyyuuuum is it looking good.

mike you will appreciate or hate that I took these pics with HDR, no epic landscape but doesn't that Trek just pop?!

Upon closer inspection everything is indeed in great shape.  No hidden cracks, dings or other show stoppers.  Even the old Judy fork is actually still working quite well and I stripped the decals so unless you look close you might think its a SID race.  And really all that matters when you are riding a bike is that people THINK you are on really expensive weight weenie parts.

After cleaning it up and giving it some thought I have my plan at least for version 1.0 and based on what I've come up with I think it removes the eventual need for a 2.0, I think the end product will actually be pretty awesome and hopefully very rideable.  I will be retiring the Redline for the season and stealing a few parts that are due for replacement anyway.  The cranks/BB/pedals will come over (with a newer/used chainring I found in the shed).  That BB is pretty whupped but will work just fine for this ride.  I'm also stealing the stem because I want to use the old aluminum flat bars from the Redline from before my carbon upgrade and I need the oversize clamp diameter.  I would just use the bars it came with but Naro, in true mid/late 90's form, rode his bars incredibly narrow (PUN INTENDED).

For some reason the rear canti studs and brakes were missing when I got the bike but luckily when you work on bikes long enough you amass tons of random tidbits that you keep in a bin.  Including a few sets of canti studs and heaps of old V-brakes.  Only real thing left was some sort of tensioner.  Designs have evolved quite a bit from when I first converted and I had to do some tech vs. cost balancing.

I was very intrigued by the Yess ETR/V but the price point was just a tad too high and it actually seems a bit overbuilt for what I really need.  But that vid demonstrating how it works with actual current full suspension designs is pretty impressive.  I wanted to stay away from any spring actuated stuff because those never seem to hold up and almost always end in zipties.  So I went with one of the simpler designs that I could find at a pretty reasonable price somewhat locally.

 DMR STS (Simple Tension Seeker)

Slap it on, dial it in and then tighten it down.  Changing rear flats will not be enjoyable but I really don't flat that often (knock on internet wood).  Should have it in about a week and then the bike will be ready to ride for anything I get in before the real snow starts to fly.  Showing up at the Turkey Burner on this thing could be real funny and if/when I do the winter race at Fort Rock this could actually be a good implement for that.  Gina wants to call it 'HoneyBee', thoughts?

Old URT Full Suspension Single Speed

I really hope I'm starting a trend here.  Well 'starting' probably isn't the right word but definitely facilitating on a regional scale at the very least.  Full suspension single speed is nothing new but it is being pondered much more heavily lately at least as far as I can tell from my own blog reading and seeing the various new tensioner designs that are coming out.

I was of course drawn to the concept because its in that limbo area of not ideal, why would you build that, doesn't that defeat the purpose, dude are you nuts?!  It's been in the back of my mind for awhile and lately I've been getting the itch for an off season fun build project.  Two years ago was the goofy 96er monster cross which morphed into my now very functional touring bike last year.  So now in a normal cycle I am back to 'goofy'.  A few weeks ago the FS singlespeed idea popped back into my head so I started poking around for ideas.

I stumbled across some folks pondering the use of old URT (Unified Rear Triangle) bikes from the mid 90's or so.  URT was one of the earlier rear suspension designs that has since been completely abandoned for the most part.  Most contemporary designs are far superior with far more pro's and way less con's than URT.  URT has one huge pro for this application however.  URT bikes were sometimes also called 'floating drivetrain' because the bottom bracket was part of the suspension swing arm and would pivot along with everything else.

This keeps the distance between the cranks and the rear hub intact even when the suspension is doing its thing.  No chain lengthening or shortening = SS friendly.  So now I have a concept I like and is definitely a bit goofy now I just have to find a bike...

Queue memory banks and I have a flashback to poking around in the attic space above Naro's parents garage a few years ago looking for bike parts (how appropriate) and coming across a relic from years past that I thought was quite hilarious at the time.  You guessed it, that relic was an old Trek Y11, one of the finest URT frames of it's time.  A quick call to Naro along the lines of "is that thing gonna just sit up there for the rest of time?....if so can I frankenbike that thing and get it back SHREDDING?"...we work a quick barter deal and TA-DA!!!

It is in surprisingly awesome shape considering it is probably pushing 15 years or so.  I'm still trying to decide how much $$ I actually want pour into this thing.  I'm thinking more along the lines of giving this thing some hand me down parts and maybe a few fresh parts here and there.  It would be nice to find some of the old purple/green/pink/ridiculous anodized parts from the mid/late 90's but finding stuff like that will probably be a lot of work.  Maybe it makes sense to whip up a "version 1.0" just to see how it rides and then pimp out a version 2.0 later.

Recap Alert!

Right around this time of year, at least for the last few years I've found myself taking a look back at how the race season went and dropping bombs on weird plans for the coming year.  To date I've tagged sprint triathlons, almost slayed adventure racing only to be derailed by the Universe but the alternative opportunities that presented themselves in AR's absence have been pretty sweet so I'm not complaining.

NEMBA Racing has really come into its own this year and I am pretty motivated to stay heavily involved.  Racing mountain bikes has a whole new aspect to it that makes it even more appealing to focus on now.  I feel like I'm right on the cusp of being pretty fast and with the added motivation and support from a full blown team I think I might be able to make that jump.  I've made continued improvements in my confidence with some of my placings this year and I'm thinking about actually upgrading some of my tech and dropping some weight from the bike for next year to try and give myself some of the advantages everyone else enjoys.  Right now I'm thinking of a nice light carbon fork (I think I'm done with suspension for good) and finally going tubeless with some nice light hoops.

So next year I'll continue to attack the EFTA series looking for yet better results and maybe another top 3 in the overall.  I want a sub 7hr NH100 and I would like to get in a 12 or 24hr now that I can pretty much guarantee I could field a 4 man team without even having to try that hard.  I'm also thinking about making stabs at Singlespeed-a-palooza and I've heard chatter about SSUSA2012 being in VT...might be worth checking out.

I'm also interested in getting some big mile touring rides in next year.  I really liked the challenge and adventure aspect of really big point to point rides.  I'm thinking I'd like to try some sort of multi-day trek I just need to figure out something that makes sense.  I recently found out about these guys, http://nerandonneurs.org/, and I am intrigued by the format.  Only problem now is similar to mountain bike racing 5-6 years ago, I'm the only one I know looking into stuff like this with an appropriate bike ready to go.  I'd settle for a few more big road rides next year, its always fun getting in a few big passes/gaps.

Off season training will be similar to years past, nothing too weird to get ready for tri's or AR just a whole lot of strength training to get ready for skiing and continue to build for next year.  This winter is looking up, already flakes flying as well as whispers of some epic trips in the works.  I'm hoping to increase my number of AT days this year as well as get some ridiculous camera courage with D-Bone and make the stupidest edit ever (pro callout).

It also is appearing like I have to take this blog up a notch.  I have always sort of putzed along but on a recent check of my STATS it appears like I have gotten over 10% of my traffic over the last 5 years in the last month.  (HI EVERYONE!)  Not sure how I take things up a notch, more content? new content? should I buy a domain?

Frozen Shed Session

Gina had a NH Humane Society Holiday party tonight so I figured I would freeze my ass of in the shed and get started on yet another massive parts swap / build as well as do a bit of maintenance on the good 'ole nothin but troubles.

I'm not sure why I continue to bother with those skis.  Edges are burred to complete worthlessness but I suppose every little bit helps...cant get any worse I guess.  They will hopefully be phased out a bit soon anyway.  Once everything fills in and those damn bindings I got a deal on actually ship I will have some fresh fatties to break down to nothingness.

The real action of the evening came with my latest parts swap and bike birth / rebirth.  I can't seem to build a bike and just leave it.  At least some of my bikes anyway.  I was very pleased with my monster cross bike, I thought it was a good build and it performed well at the NH100 last year but when it came down to it it was just too damn heavy.  Sure technically it could do anything / go anywhere but it required so much more energy to do it that it just wasn't really working for me.  I want to commute more next year and my commute is not an easy route and if I want to really get into it a bit more I will need something a bit lighter and more suited to that task, plus a light tourer might allow me to more easily dabble in cross next year? hmmmm

Soooo I scored yet another cheapo Nashbar frame (touring variety this time around) and I am cannibalizing most of the parts from the monster for use with the light tourer and using spare parts to turn the monster into a burly winter SS since my old ice bike has since devolved into parts.  Seemed a decent compromise and the additional investment needed to make it happen is going to come in very low so it made sense.

 so much for the monster

I felt bad stripping the monster down, but I am excited about the two bikes that will emerge from this process.  I had hoped to make it a bit farther this evening but my hands were starting to get pretty cold and working with cold metal tools/frames wasn't helping.  I ran into a few incompatibilities and parts that I thought I had but didn't so I had to table a few things until later.  I should be able to get the burly winter SS back online with just a few more headset spacers.  I thought I had more than I did and I came up about 10mm or so short.  Once I get the spacers I can get the fork mounted again, finish the cockpit and I'll be good to go.

 as far as I could get tonight

Drive train is finished at least.  Running 32-20.  And yes Shine, the zipties are back.  I'll be running my old Thomson stem from the Kona as well as those carbon bars.  Should end up looking pretty sweet and working pretty well as both a decent winter bike and a poor weather / loaner / backup SS.

I also started throwing parts on to the touring frame.  Cranks, pedals, derailleur, seat post, saddle, headset.  Some from the monster some from the parts bin.  Unfortunately the front derailleur from the monster has a clamp diameter that is too small for this frame so I'll have to get a new one.  I still need to buy a fork at some point as well as some rim tape for the wheelset I plan on using.  I am a little worried that I should have bought the 58cm frame but hopefully I can make the 56cm work.  I always felt a bit stretched out on the monster so I thought I would try sizing down but looking at it on the stand it looks small.  Fingers crossed.

I love me some cheap builds

Once I get the parts needed I will start separate posts for each of these builds as I complete them.  Gonna have to figure out new names for each...

Wrenching is Fun!

It's been awhile since I've had a decent bike maintenance session, I haven't renovated a dumpster bike for a while (no time!) and luckily my stable of bikes has been running just fine so there really hasn't been a need.

If you've been in New England lately you are well aware that it has been WET. But I still gotta ride my bike and with Pat's Peak on the horizon I have to try and snag as many miles as I can to get myself ready. Monday night's group ride was a wet one indeed; rained hard at first but then let off and then poured at the end. 14 miles in the pouring rain and mud will take a nicely running bike and turn it into a pile of crap pretty fast.

What I thought was going to be a normal boring hour or so in the area, cleaning and dialing things back in got real interesting and ended with me having to take my X7 trigger shifter completely apart.

FYI if you need to get BB5 disc brakes lined up real nice this article is the easiest most succinct I have found. I have had my doubts about disc brakes lately because I could never get the feel I wanted. Part of this is probably due to me being so used to V and being semi resistant to change. I also think that I never really had the discs set up right. After getting the rotors properly aligned things feel a lot stronger...granted I haven't ridden it yet but I think I might start to like them better now.

Got the drivetrain cleaned up and I was ahead of schedule (I have to try and set a time that I am going to work in the manarea otherwise I end up in there for waaaay too long) so I decided I wanted to slide my rear wheel back a tad. My Kona has sliding dropouts so you can set it up as SS or geared. When I set the bike up geared I put the dropouts in the middle of its slide range figuring that made the most sense. I also ride a Redline Monocog and now that I have been riding both bikes for a while I have noticed that I really prefer the Redline's longer wheelbase. So might as well slide those dropouts back as far as they go to lengthen the Kona's wheelbase right? Easy enough, I had an extra derailleur cable and housing in case the distance of the slide was too much for the current cable (it was). So I slid things back, recabled and went to test the shifting. And all hell broke loose. Shifter was completely thrashed, made it half way through its range and then just locked up, levers froze, nothing.

This is getting wordy so I'll skip to the end...I had to completely take the shifter apart and get into the guts. I was pretty worried at this point that I was screwed. When I popped the casing off a spring flew out and I thought for sure that was it. Too many gear mechs, springs and moving parts for me to figure out. Then I remembered that I have two advanced degrees. Played with it for a bit got the ins and outs figured out and came to the conclusion that the thing that was screwed up was the little gear indicator that shows you which gear you are currently in. Weird huh?



All that thing is is a little piece of thin plastic that extendeds down into the ratcheting system in the body of the shifter. There are 'teeth' on the plastic of the indicator that also engage with the teeth of the shifter so that when you shift the teeth on the indicator move with the teeth of the shifter and the little orange piece of the indicator moves down a notch. Turns out that little piece of plastic was getting jammed up about halfway through for some reason and preventing it from actually shifting. Remove the indicator, problem solved (I never look at that thing anyway). And now I know how trigger shifters work (X7's at least, but I would imagine the principle is similar for all).

Not sure how it happened...whether it was caused by moisture in there somehow warping the plastic or if I screwed something up when I recabled it but it was a learning experience and fun in a way.

1 Part Showing Off, 1 Part Insurance Reasons

So I bought a house recently and some family and friends haven't seen it in all its glory yet and instead of trying to format all the pics and send them around in emails I figured I would just post them all up here in a photo essay of sorts.

So here is our 'Storybook Home' on a fine Spring day:

Thar she blows

Character with a capital 'C'

Quaint

Old Skool

Lots of perennial landscaping (thanks Maureen!)

S.H.E.D (and pooch)

Entrance to Fern Gulley (aka my soon to be permaculture experiment)

not sure what happend to this picture but I like it

So there you have it. Our little slice of awesome.

The Manarea is an Island

The Manarea is a perpetual work in progress but I feel like I have it setup enough to unveil it to the world. I have lost track of what 'version' of the area this is...I think its 3.0 because 2.0 was a renovation to the last area back at Squamywood.

The area is now an island of sorts completely removed from the house in a 100+ sq ft shed. I'm not going to lie, if you are a male and you like outdoor activities you will be jealous of my shed, hell there is a chance that even if you are female and hate the outdoors you will be jealous of my shed.

Behold.

My canvas.

It was somewhat difficult to capture the area in photographic form. There isnt really a good spot to capture it all and taking multiple pics never really does it justice. It's too hard to get a mental picture and tie it all together. But I did my best...


Be sure to click and pull those up in their full glory. There is all kinds of subtle awesomeness scattered about. And its only going to get better, like I said, perpetual work in progress.

man area v2.0

finally got my new stand in the mail, after having to lay the smack down on pricepoint.com for a broken piece of plastic. I took the opportunity to revamp my man area. I present to you the man area version 2.0 complete with workstand more ceiling hooks and a spider man trash can (not pictured)