Tuesday, January 29, 2008

Snow Day

Monday Morning Snow Day


For the first time in a long while Fort Lewis has a snow day. All classes were canceled due to dangerous weather conditions. I`m guessing 10 to 16 inches of fresh snow fell in the time period of 30 hours. The snow was even to deep for for my trusty 29er and I was forced to walk to the cafeteria for once (I will never walk somewhere if I can ride my bike even if it takes longer to ride the bike). The day before there was about 20 to 26 inches on the ground and now it looks to be about 36 inches. Thats a little bit more snow than we normally get in Ohio around this time of year.

Monday, January 28, 2008

Had a super sweet ride today in the gulch. The temp was around 30-34 deg and the snow was very light and 3-14 inches deep. The trails were pretty hard riding because they are usually torn up by other bikers and runners but the Horse Gulch road was gravy! The hard packed snow path about 2 feet wide, and gave good hook up even with Crows. I did see some Pug tracks though and those were good riding as long as you stayed in the track. I now start to regret selling mine.

Horse Gulch Road


Multi Tasking


Fisher in the Gulch



Ugly kid


Down Horse Gulch Road


Panaramic

Saturday, January 26, 2008

My Whip

Specs: 21.43 lbs, Gary Fisher X-Cal 29er Medium
Rockshox Reba Race Tuned



Ritchey WCS with Tuned WCS rings
Eggbeater SL Pedals
Sram PG-970 Cassette with PC-951 Chain
Sram X-9 Rear Derailleur Tuned
Shimano Dura-Ace
Front Dreailleur Tuned
Truvativ Giga Pipe SL Bottom Bracket




Formula Oro Puros with Goodridge Lines 160mm Rotors.
Control tech Bolt-On Skewers



Easton EC70 Bar
Bontrager Foam Grips
Ritchey WCS 100mm Stem
Sram X0 Twisters Tuned
Nokon Housing with Stainless Cables
KCNC Seatpost
Selle Italia SLR Saddle Tuned
Omni Racer Post Clamp



Stans 355 29er Rims
Stans Crow Tires, Front and Rear
Stans Yellow Tape and Sealant
DT Swiss Supercomp Spokes
DT Swiss Alloy Nipples
Hope Pro II hubs




Wednesday, January 23, 2008

Top Pull Road Derailluer Conversion

A few peeps out there have been modifying their old Shimano 9spd road derialluers so they will work on their Mountain bikes. I wrote a step by step guide on how to perform the modification.

I performed the actual modification to a Brand new 7700 Dura-Ace 9spd derailleur that I bought at the shop for around $65.

1. Un-bolt the pivot arm bolt from derailleur using a 3mm hex key.
2. Remove the E-clip that secures the second pin that
secures the pivot arm.
3. Remove the pivot arm form the rest of the derailleur
4.
Some material wi
ll need to be removed form the pivot arm now so the arm will align with the rest of the derailleur properly when flipped.
5. The necessary modification to the derailleur to make it fit is now done.
If you want to you can remove even more material where you want to to make the piece lighter.6. The derailleur can now be reassembled starting with the pivot with the 3mm hex key bolt followed by the pin with the E-clip.
You are now done!



Tuesday, January 22, 2008

Damn It`s cold in Durango


Trainer Torture Not so Bad any More.
This morning at 8:00 it was a low temperature of -6 Deg F, trainer stand weather. After setting up the trainer I set up my laptop so I could try and squeeze a little enjoyment out of my morning base ride. I selected a movie of watch form QuickSilverScreen.com ... Blood Diamond, a sweet watch by the way and long to, 2 hours and 14 min by my timer. Started the movie and started spinning at the normal 70% heart rate. Watching a movie always seems to help time go by a little bit faster and the better the movie the faster time goes by. After a 2 hour 20min ride it had warmed up to around 13 Deg F, so still no riding outside.

KCNC Ti Pro Lite


KCNC Ti Pro Lite
I just received my new KCNC Pro Ti lite post to replace my old Thomson Elite. I made the buy on Ebay for $90 shipped out of Great Britain. Out of the box the first thing that I noticed was the lack of weight, compared to my Thomson. The KCNC features a two bolt clamp design and elliptical center like the Thomson, the similarities end here. The KCNC has shaved the clamping pieces and decreased the wall thickness of the seat mast, the seat mast is graduated for easy post positioning and the clamp has the bolt torque spec clearly posted on both sides. The post was much lighter than my Thomson, 156.7g vs. 292.4g, thats 135.7g saved. The seat mast and clamping bits are made from scandium and the bolts are 4mm hex head made from Ti The post had a nice snug fit in the frame.. maybe to sung, mounting the saddle was by far the biggest downer of this product. The upper rail clamps are not connected to each other so this made installing the saddle rather frustrating. I tightened the bolts to 30in-lbs instead of the recommended 44in-lbs to avoid over clamping the rails. Just a quick note, if you have carbon rails you may need an even lower clamping force to avoid cracking the rails. Just riding my bike between classes at school I can notice a fair amount of flex in the post giving a noticeably softer ride.

The Good:
-Low weight, 156.7g for the 27.2x400mm
-Looks great
-Softer ride

The Bad:
-Difficult setup
-Price $107
-Skinny rail clamps may harm carbon rails.

Overall:
Great product! I am very satisfied with this buy, I was planing on buying an Easton EC90 or an Extralite Ultuapost and this is lighter than both and seems to be nice quality. Highly recommended Seat post!
 

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