Life, Lust, and Silly Puns

My dad didn't want to spend too much money on the rebuild, and I remembered I had my old riser bars that came stock on my Mesa. So I put those on. I cut 1" off each side before I put them on ;) No specific reason. I await my brakes. I'll post pics once I get my new brakes on.

It's starting to look like a decent beater bike now, instead of some crappy mart bike.

So one Black Friday a few years ago, my dad decided to get a $40 bike from Walmart. Luckily, it wasn't a Y-frame. Here's the best picture I could find of it.



I didn't want/forgot to take pics of the bike before I started fixing it up, so the pic above will have to do. It was stored outside, so just imagine random bits of rust in nooks and crannies. The brake pads are terrible and deteriorated (not worn out!), and the brake calipers are plastic, so whenever I brake, the calipers bend. It has no quick-releases whatsoever. The shifters are friction shifters, not index-shifting. Index shifting, you press a lever once, and it shifts 1 gear. Friction shifting is like turning a knob. ~80's technology.

Anyway, what's been done already? First off, I replaced the seat with my old WTB seat, and the disgusting handlebar "grips" with my old ones. I raised the seatpost, too :P. I used my Dremel with a wire brush bit to get off all the rust. I cleaned the chain (link by link!) and lubed it, and also adjusted the front derailleur. I also cleaned the cassette. I spent 30 minutes with Goof Off and got all the (peeling) decals off. The frame looks much better without those lame decals. I'm ordering a new brake kit today (levers, cable housing, cable, calipers, and pads). Hopefully I'll get new tires and tubes, handlebar, and seat post quick release, with the priority in that order. I'll take pics after I get new brakes.

It's a good beater bike, and once I get new tires and tubes (and hopefully flat handlebars), I might bike to school on it occasionally. ;]

Yup, switched 'em with my old Raleigh, although something was funky about my right metal pedal. Somehow it didn't fit my 15 mm open-head wrench. So I had to use a monkey wrench. No pics, use your imagination. :P

Yup, I cleaned my disc brakes the real way, so no more squeaking for me. Last time, I used a towel and water, which did the job I guess, but not what you're supposed to do. You're supposed use either denatured alcohol, which is better, or isopropyl (rubbing) alcohol, which takes more to do the same amount of cleaning as denatured.

I also adjusted my pads, so no more rubbing, either. Disc brakes are a PITA. Sure, they're better at stopping in all conditions, but Cupertino's mainly dry anyway. Whatever. I'm just glad cyclocross bikes come with canti's :]

And no, I'm not going to talk about the name this time. I was thinking back at my purchase of my current Mesa (at Performance). I remember feeling kinda stretched out on it. However, what did the guy do? He said I'd grow into it, and didn't do anything else. Now, a good LBS would have put on a shorter stem, and done some other fit adjustments. Unfortunately, Performance isn't the type of shop to care about your needs. Not only do they have too many customers to care about, but if you don't like buying a bike from Performance, there are many other customers that will. So one customer won't make that much of a difference. If I'm gonna spend >$800 on a bike, I want to be fitted to it, and know that I made the right decision. And for that, you need the care of an LBS, not a retail store.



Also, I'm takin' this bike to college, I don't wanna get s*** for the brand name.

Sorry. Had to say it.

Step 1: Get rid of dork-disc.
Step 2: Get 3 or more zip-ties.
Step 3: Tie your cassette to your spokes in at least 3 places.
Step 4: Cut ends of zip ties.
Step 5: Revel in your shift-able fixie.
Step 6: After enjoying, cut and dispose of zip-ties





I apologize for terrible pics.


Edit: So I tried it myself, and turns out, it's not exactly like a fixie. First off, you can't go backwards, and when you stop your pedals (coasting) your chain falls off. Here's the punishment for going backwards or coasting.





Note: I am not responsible for you being an idiot and hurting yourself. Fixies are hard to ride. Enjoy being a fixie-hipster at your own risk.

This time, it was Calabazas Cyclery, in San Jose. They were the closest shop that carried Cannondales, where I was originally going to go check out their CAAD9's. It was a heck of a ride, but thanks to Jasper's implanted GPS chip, we got there w/o getting lost.

When I walked in, some old guy asked if I needed any help. He didn't seem very friendly. I declined his offer and started looking around. I saw a few sleek road bikes, although the bike shop was mostly BMX or MTBs. All the road bikes were out of my range. Anyway, I decided to talk to someone. A lot of the staff were talking amongst themselves. I looked around for help, then decided to talk to the old guy again. It didn't go very well, and in addition to the fact that the staff didn't seem interested in the customer, I had a terrible first impression of the shop.

And just when we were about to leave... the old guy asked another guy in his 20's to "take over". This totally changed everything. He was really friendly, although in the beginning, he treated me as though I didn't know anything about bikes. After I started using more technical terms, he realized I actually knew something about bikes. Toward the end of the conversation, he said he was actually surprised by how much I knew about bikes :D

Well anyway, I talked to him more, and my very initial suspicions of needing a cyclocross bike were right, although I will admit I am very confused right now. So they have this Kona Jake, with decent components for $950. I don't really like Kona's style, though. They also have this old Cannondale 'cross bike with a few chrome-finish components that I don't really like for $920. Did I mention it comes with full Tiagra and a 105 RD? Awesome, I know. But the stem, seatpost, and maybe the headset will need replacing...

And those were the only two bikes they had that were in my price range. And so, we left (after Jasper asked a few questions) to Jasper's house. I did some major bike studying. Thanks to our excellent economy, I found lots of bikes withing my price range. But no, seriously, the only sub 1K '09 'cross bikes (picky, huh?) I found were the Giant TCX 2 and the Kona Jake. The Giant is overpriced for the components that come on it, although it does look nice. The Jake's components are nice, but as I said before, I don't really like their style.

Giant TCX 2 - $975


Kona Jake - $900 MSRP, $950 in Calabazas


Edit: So I was browsing Kona's website, and I saw their '05 Jake. It actually looks good, and the components are a Sora/Tiagra mix. The price? $750. Thanks a lot, economy. (Replaced a few people with the word "economy" so that I wouldn't be pointing specific fingers. Tricky, see?)


So what do I do? I haven't found any one bike that sticks out as the bike I should get. Shall I risk a Scattante from Performance? (Yes, that's the brand name.) Let's check the specs of their 'cross bike, shall we? Hm... oh yeah. FULL 105 for UNDER 1K. So what's the big deal? Here's Shimano's component group, in order from crappy to pro: 2200, Sora, Tiagra, 105, Ultegra, Dura-Ace. So yeah, I'm getting 105 components for the price that Giant charges for a Sora-Tiagra mix. Generally, low end road bikes today come with Sora. Only rarely do you see 2200 parts put in.

Scattante X-560 - $950


If only those fools are Perf. bike didn't name their bike line that, I bet they would sell many more bikes. For the value and quality, (yes, their frame quality is decent, since it's made by Fuji and rebranded) it's actually a really nice bike.

Although I'm still unsure about their name, I did see 2 Scattante's on my biking trip Saturday, and surprisingly, Bikeforums did not bash Scattante. Yes, there were some comments on its name that I agree with, but overall, most people praised it for its value and quality (for the price).

If I could buy a bike tomorrow (or this weekend, whatever) then the Scattante X-560 would be the first on my list, because of the full 105. Second on my list? I'm not sure. The only thing holding me back from the X-560 is the brand name, which yes, is a tiny thing. And maybe the $950 price tag. However, all the other bikes have multiple things holding me back, (price is one, style is generally the other) so while the X-560 didn't climb to the top of the list, we'll say it got pushed up there.



And thus concludes my extremely long post.

So it's Sunday morning, and I'm trying to avoid doing homework. So what do I do? I weigh my bike :P

This is me with my shoes and jacket etc.



We'll call it 102.


And this is me being all buff carrying my bike in my left hand and taking a picture with my right.



133-ish?

My bike weighed less than I thought it would. 31's not bad.. right?

Left Saturday morning, around 10-10:30. Jasper couldn't come, but we still rode. There were a ton of road bikers today. We only saw 2 or 3 other mountain bikes, but all the other bikes were road bikes. Some noteworthy bikes: 2 Cervelos, 2 Scattante (rofl), and a Specialized Allez -__- . We saw a couple pack riders, but otherwise they were biking alone or in pairs. We went a little farther than Saratoga High, which was a 5 mile point, then we headed back. It was really windy, and my hair kept on coming out of my gigantic helmet vent. That was really annoying. On a better note, I didn't have to use any of the tools I had brought. In the end, we finished 2 Clif bars, half a bottle of powder-mix Gatorade, and some water. My dad was exhausted, but I wasn't as tired. I also mentioned that I could bike farther, and with the addition of all the road bikes we saw today, I think he may be more convinced on getting me a road bike ;] Just maybe.

Not too many pics, there wasn't much scenery. Just roads and stuff. In one picture, I blinked, and in the other picture, I looked retarded. So none of that for you.

Oh, and a side note, my dad and I hit 23.2 on a slight downhill slope. I wonder what I could hit... hm. Maybe later I'll temporarily mount that cyclometer on my bike and hammer it. :P





Oh yeah.


Edit: You know how I said I wasn't as tired? Apparently it kicks in several hours later...

So before school ended, I called CBS to see if they had the Crank Brothers Multi-10. They didn't. I knew Evolution had them, cuz I saw them last time I was there.

And thus began my commute. Going there was easy, as it was mostly downhill, and the wind was blowing to the side of me, or at times behind me. I was on 3-8 the entire time, except for the stoplights. Yeah, it was really windy today, and there was lots of dust. My the time I go to Evolution, my eyes were red. I bought my M10 and admired it. It was a little hard to open, though. The way back was windy hell. I had a headwind the entire way, although there were brief periods of no wind. I had to stop at Target to rest. One time while hammering through the wind, it was really hard to pedal, but I glanced at my shifter. 3-5. It felt like 3-7 or 3-8 on flat ground, and I wasn't moving very fast. Total trip time: a little less than 45 min. To sum it up...



Credit to Rick Smith of yehudamoon.com for the comic. I love it.

Afterwards, I spent 5 minutes adding teflon lube to my new M10 and now it opens smoothly.



Gotta unflip my stem cuz tomorrow I'm riding 10-15 miles with my dad and Jasper. I'll try to remember to take pictures ;)

So me 'n Maiko went to CBS today to get a floor pump. They had Specialized floor pumps, but the only one I brought enough money for was the Sport model, but it had a plastic barrel. The metal barrel version was $10 dollars more, but I wasn't sure if I wanted to spend the extra money. I'm not working in a bike shop, so the most I'll use it is like, once a week. But the thing that sold me was the free one-year warranty, so if it did break, I could pay an extra $10 then to get the metal version, or just get another plastic barrel version.







Heehee.


Oh, and afterwards, we went to the media training. Last year, robotics was pretty fun partly because of the small size of the club, where you felt like you knew everyone. This year, (not to be racist) the club is ~60% Indian, ~75% of which are freshmen. Also, ~30% of the robotics members probably don't know anything about engineering at all. They probably joined because "Oh robotics sounds fun, and my mommy tells me I'm talented, so I must be a useful contribution to the team." Not that I'm saying robotics has no good people, but I just feel that the addition of so many people isn't necessarily beneficial.



freshmen.

Well I talked to the guy at Evolution, and even he said he points most of road customers to CBS... and they mainly deal with mountain bikes... so I guess I'll take the hint. CBS builds the bike too, but I guess quality will suffer a little, but it should be fine I suppose. And the fact that CBS actually gets people with road bikes. And their inventory is more than half full of road bikes.

I'm paying MSRP in both shops, but since this is hypothetical it really doesn't matter. I'm not getting a road bike for a couple years anyway.



Sad face much?

Alliterations aside, I finally got a plier and took 5 minutes to remove the dork disc I had for way too long. (It's the plastic disc between your cassette and rear wheel spokes) Don't get me wrong though, you're supposed to keep it for the first couple of weeks to make sure your rear derailleur is aligned.

Pics!







And you should consider it. ;)

So me 'n Jasper went on a bike shop tour (actually only CBS and Evo., but whatever) and as it turns out, Evolution is pretty good. They order bikes from certain companies, among them, Specialized, Giant, Marin, a few others. So I asked around, and it turns out that I may not need a cyclocross bike. For the price I'm paying, the 'cross bike will be total crap, so I may as well just buy an entry level road bike and put the thickest knobbies I can on the bike.

So blah blah blah and a pizza later, I'm at Jasper's house and we decide the Specialized Allez (Al-lay btw ;]) is my best bet. For the price, I can get decent components. Bikeforums says to ask for a front derailleur upgrade, LBS (local bike shop) should only charge about $15 ish... but I'm not sure.




Why can't I get it now?

Edit: CBS says they'll charge ~$40 to upgrade Sora to Tiagra front derailleur.