Saturday, March 17, 2007

The Bicycle That Would Be King










Ok, the bike has been built, but as most things go for me it was not as easy as it should have been. So...... I paid a visit to Lee at Upstate Bike and Skate to help with the build. He was just about to put in the headset when he realized it was the wrong size. He rummaged though his bins, and nothing. We ended up pulling an old Peugeot off of the wall for the cups.


Once that was taken care of, there were no spacers of the right size, so he used 1 1/8 inch spacers instead of 1 inch. I was riding this on Saturday one way or the other. That being done, then the stem didn't want to fit. After wresting with one off of some old handle bars I realized that the rubber o-ring at the top of the headset was why the stem didn't work, it was the right size. It was a good thing too, because the Midge bars have a very tight bend at the drops and would not slide though a traditional stem. After that everything went fairly smooth. Lee had enough cable and housing for a front break only, so I only have a front break. Not a big deal as I have it set up as fixed for now. The cranks go on and I realize I left the bolts at the house, but Lee has some in stock and they are better than what I had anyway. The chain line needed to be tweaked and I had to switch out the chain ring bolts. Then everything falls into place. It should have only taken an hour or so, but I got to the shop at 1:30 and left at 5:30, but the bike was built and I was going to ride it Saturday.

Finally, I must give credit where credit is due. Adrienne, thank you. With out you this would not be possible.

Wednesday, March 07, 2007

All Hail The King!








For a change this will be a post dealing with cycling and bikes. After......seven months the Mercian is in my hands. Its a custom King of Mercia model, kind of a cyclocross/touring bike. I picked up the frame today at 14:25. I am very excited to have this thing built and on the road or trail. I will keep everyone posted on the progress. I'm taking Friday off to do the build so I will have it ready by Saturday. I know these are not the best of pix, but after I downloaded them , the batteries in the camera died. More later. Now, I'm up to my elbows in bubble wrap.

Saturday, March 03, 2007

New Article




I have an article that was recently published here: www.63xc.com