Finally got the set-up on the new bike to a point I truly like. I’ve already smoked the tires. I’m gonna have to get a pic of the tire smoke to share with you all. The build is working out well. Very aggressive fixie. You can’t see me now, but I’m cheezin’ .
This is the only clip i have from the Bike Party. Way to go guys…. it was a good time.
Just built this up yesterday and got hit durring my test ride. Surprisingly the bike seems okay. Its got a few scuffs, broke a pedal and had to re-tension the rear wheel. I put it together from parts i already had around. Lucked out to have a ratio that worked on this frame’s vertical dropouts. I miss my steel fixie, but in my situation this should work out just fine.
Sneak peek at my latest project. Yeah, thats what you think it is. :)
Winding narrow streets make my day. Thanks to Justin sourthernvelo.org for snapping this pic.
I love working on bikes almost as much as riding them. Its when it all comes together and great mechanisms from times past come back to life, as eager as ever to work together and take the rider out on the road, that i find my satisfaction in the work. When it is a bike of my own that i have given attention to, the satisfaction multiplies. Thats the way i feel about the Bridgestone right now. I gave it the bi-annual overhaul it always gets. As usual the grime cleans away and all the chips in the paint are revealed. Even so, old school gruppos clean up well and add to the vibrance of a well used and well cherished frame. I know its not an SLX tubed, and that some of its gouges leave it a bit more vulnerable to corrosion, and its only ‘kinda light’, but i put most of the nicks in it myself. I wipe the road grime off the bottom of the frame. I brought it back from the dead and accumulated over 7,000mi on it since. When i got this bike it was a gift. I almost died in a crash and my roomate had this bike donated to me from his brother-in-law while i was bedridden and trying to gain the energy to recover. I crashed a Cannondale and hadnt even heard of a Bridgestone bike. It was in bad shape. The rims were shot. Every bolt head was stripped. I had some P.T.S.D. about bikes that haunted me. My brother was diagnosed with cancer at the same time of my crash. He fought that disease head on and lost with valiant effort. He encouraged me to fight through my recovery as well. I don’t know why i recovered and he didnt, and maybe there isnt a resolution to it in this world anyway. What i do know is that the encouragement from mostly him is what i used to drive me to not only sit up on my own again, but to learn from my experience and not be driven back by the fear of it all. Iv’e overcome the P.T.S.D. and the Bridgestone was a valuable tool in it all. The frame was in pretty great shape, but everything else was shot. ( id say a home mechanic didnt own a metric set) At one point i remember having to saw through a Cinelli stem to salvage the 26.4mm clamp bars (that im still riding). When i look at it i think ‘boy that Bridgestone sure has come a long way’ and it reminds me that i personally have to.
So, here’s a toast to that bi-annual reminder.
Goodbye 2010 and good riddence 2010 Rippers. This is a video i showed to SE Racing after a frame failure on a Ripper Fixed. They claimed it as an honest part failure and gave me a 2011 P.K. Ripper fixed under warranty. The new changes seem to make a big difference. The tube diameters, wall thickness, and materials have all been changed and it looks like i should be able to fit a 35c slammed all the way in on the rear, which is more than i can say for the old one. I saw a build riding 38c and i wonder if it would take 40c????? Either way im gonna ride the hell out of it until a nice steel steed falls in my lap. Posts with the 2011 model still to come. Damn aluminum.
I have used the blow in, hairspray, blowdrier, air compressor, and glue methods on many grips. i typically just blow in em and put em on. If it doesnt work ill try the next most involving and drastic step until the grips are installed without slip. i just kept having problems with my new oury grips. i wasnt going to glue them, but it always seemed that with ourys they would continue to otherwise slip. After hairspray didnt work, i rinsed my bars and grips and dried the ourys with a blowdrier and tried this method. if u ride ourys, this is THE way to get them on easily and WITHOUT SLIP! Seriously, it works. try it!
Why I Ride the Way I Ride : 2nd Installment (hitting the streets)
I started my very first urban bicycling on a BMX. actually, on a few BMXs. Growing up, i was way into the BMX world. I rode the hard pack race track until i was old enough to venture freely out on the streets and started on street freestyle. I quit that quite some time ago now, but it lingers in the core fibers of my being. i remember all the bikes i owned and how they each handled and why they were retired. If there was a single bike i wanted more than any other BMX on the market in those days, it was the SE Racing, PK Ripper. Well, its been a while since i thought about a Ripper. It came up again as i was researching urban cycling solutions for fit urban rider. Then i found out that SE makes a 700c fixed gear PK Ripper. More on the Ripper to come in a future post. Theres a huge bike boom we are in the middle of right now. A huge trend in this current boom is fixed geared bikes. Typical pros you hear convincing people to ride these things are reasons like… simple = reliable; Fixed gears are helpful to train the legs to pedal with an efficient round pedal stroke; simple = less stress; trains the mind to be concious of the pedals’ location to improve handling, simple = ability to be more durable; steep “track” geometry allows for hairpin steering. …. whatever. The feeling is why I enjoy my fixie. I see a lot of folks saying things like “im so connected with the bike or my city”. I thought they were most likely high out of their minds and everything just felt soooo connected. I shouldn’t judge. I know what they are all talking about now. The fixed set ups give you feedback in a different way than a freewheel. It almost oversimplifies things and forces you into a box of restrictions. It takes out the ability to glide. So what you have to work with is a set of physics you must accept are always in motion. If that rear wheel is turning, you know that the crank is moving. once again…. over simplified. There is also little rest for the rider. Hills multiply that. My current main ride is a 1986 Bridgestone 500 with a Shimano 600 friction drivetrain and 14 speeds. Its 4130 chromoly steel. Its fairly light, stiff, simple for a geared bike, and fits me like a glove. It is my mule. I run my errands around town, to and from work, and sometimes ride up and over Buffalo mountain on it. Its not as light and effecient as the Pogliaghi, and its way more capable of travel than the Ripper fixie. I am a point A to point B street riding powerhouse on this bike. It takes the abuse quite well and keeps on rolling, but, I need to lace a new rim on the rear wheel and get a set of tires before its back on the road. I picked up some debris while hopping up a curb several weeks ago. That rim is toast and the tire slashed and gashed. I can’t wait to get it back up to speed <—- pun intended , but it has given me some time to tap into the potential of the Ripper when in town, and leave town on the Pog.
Where’s the Beef
Where does beef belong? In a casing to make a savory sausage? Flame broiled and served between two buns? How about the chain of a single speed or fixed geared bicycle? It only makes sense. The more simplistic a machine becomes, the easier it is to fortify what really matters. The chains on my simple childhood bikes were 3/32” measurements. As a child on a single speed coaster brake thats all you need. In my teens, riding BMX, I switched to a freewheel and hand brakes as well as an 1/8” chain. If observation of this progression serves correct, now that i’ve simplified to only one gear again, what sort of beef can I order up? I’ll tell you. The Shadow Conspiracy Interlock V2 chain. 
Wtf does that mean? That means beef. This chain is a 1/8” pitch like the older BMX chains of the past, but the link system that every other chain everywhere uses is thrown out the window. This chain is all half-link interfaced. Not only does the half-link allow for better chain length measurement (leading to that harmony fixie riders know as perfect chain tension), but the interlocking plate design allows for more…. you got it… beef. This chain isnt for a racer. its not light by any means. Its for taking a beating, be it getting bashed in chainring stalls on a fire hydrant BMXing it up, or the constant interaction of riding a 700c fixie through town to your next destination. On a fixie your chain must deliver. Period. I know that there are many serious BMXers who swear by this design and most will tell you that they have been running the same chain for years. I plan on doing the same.
My mission is to promote urban cycling, commuting, and sport touring in East Tennessee and beyond. 
