New Bottom Bracket = Good

The old bottom bracket just ain't what it used to be.

Or at least that's my guess.  I bought the Tempo about a year-and-a-half ago, when I was working up in Humboldt County, California.  I didn't right the bike much, up there.  The commute was nearly twenty miles each way on a steep, windy road with no shoulder.  Deranged tweakers drove the road on a regular basis as a community service, just to clear it of cyclists and pedestrians.  I never did try riding my bike from Redway to Whitethorn.  So the cool old Schwinn stood in my living room, occasionally coming out for a quick spin around town or a trip to the laundry.  I can't really speak to this bottom bracket's history. 

Since July, I've been riding 16+ miles a day just commuting.  Wow.  It's been fun.  In early October, I started to feel a little looseness in the bottom bracket.  I could feel a wiggle in the cranks when I was pedalling.  Being a DIY bike mechanic, I took the cranks off and adjusted the bottom bracket to remove the wiggle.  (One sentence makes this sound so easy... in reality it took me more than a week of trying different things to figure out how to get the plastic plugs out of the cranks so I could remove them!).  That worked for a couple of days, then the wiggle came back.  I took the cranks off again, retightened, and replaced the cranks.  That worked for a few more days.  I removed the cranks, pulled the shaft and bearings out (bearings went all over the floor), cleaned and greased everything, then put it back together.  In this process, I noticed substantial wear both on the bearing races on the spline and on the bearings themselves.  The carriages looked pretty beat-up, too.  So I put it all back together and ordered a brand new sealed bottom bracket--the old workhorse, Shimano UN-54.  Good thing, too, because now no matter how I tightened the thing, it was loose again in less than a day's riding.  I guess that by removing all of those metal shavings, I made it even looser! 

Those metal shavings were probably pieces of the left-side bearings and bearing race.  The drive side of the shaft had a deep gouge in it.  The new sealed bracket is such an improvement! 

Part of me wanted to replace the shaft and loose bearings--it is a more durable system than the tiny bearings in the sealed BB--but the sealed BB is such a no-brainer!  There is no adjustment, very little grease (just the threads on the non-drive side of UN-54), and it goes very quickly.  I did the replacement in about fifteen minutes.

We're on the road again with good bearings between my feet!

OH!  And here's a quick shout out to the guy I watched in his pickup truck on 16th Street, last night under the UPR tracks at about 8:10pm.  There was a cyclist in the far-left lane, pushing at about 18mph.  The guy in the truck came up behind the cyclist at like 30mph and laid on his brakes, following the cyclist closely up and over the rise as far as I watched them...   Hey!  Guy in the pickup!  What was on your mind?  What did you expect the cyclist to do?--did you think he'd speed up to 30mph by the time you overtook him?  18mph is a good, solid pace for a commuter-cyclist.  AND!  There are three other lanes for motorists to choose from!  Good work to that guy on the bike, who did everything legal, held his ground, kept moving, and was easy-to-see. 

Anyway.  That gave me pause. 

My weekend ride: ~Early 90's~ Sakae Litage Prism





SR Prism Litage on top of Twin Peaks, San Francisco October 19, 2010

   On the weekends I put away the Tempo--which is a great bike--and usually spin around on my "shiny bike".  It's a Sakae Ringyo butted aluminum frame back from way back.  I picked it up off Craigslist a few years ago, last time I learned the hard way how not to lock my bike.  You can see in the picture above that this awesome light-weight frame is here burdened with a U-lock.  It's a necessary evil if I plan to run errands in the city in the background. 

So this frame is really light for an old bike and it's got beautiful lugging.  It really stands out.  I bought it as a frame-and-fork only and have built it up Campagnolo Veloce... now I am slowly upgrading it to a Chorus group.  This is taking a long time, though, because it doesn't make a lot of sense to discard perfectly good and functioning components.

As you can see I don't have integrated shifting--parts of this bike are still in the early 90's. 

The bike was--I'm guessing--probably originally all-Suntour.  If my memory serves, these SR bikes were made by Suntour so it seems to stand to reason.  It's a guess, though and it doesn't matter at this point.

I have two of these bikes--the other one is mostly Shimano 600-Ultegra with old-time integrated shifters.  The bikes fit me pretty well and I haven't seen anything else that looks so slick and weighs so little for under $500. 

Someday I might get a new road bike, but I'm not sure of that.  I never have had a new road bike and there are so many wonderful old frames out there--we can buy high-end 70's racing frames now for comparative peanuts--that I may not ever.  I believe in recycling and I really enjoy building up old bikes. 

I will admit to having just bought a new mountain bike... I'll feature that one one day not too far off in the future.

I introduce these bikes so that "strangers" in the photographs can be recognized as family.  These Litages are great climbers and so they often get photographed at the top of hills.

Cycling -- more than recreation, more than a commute.

Yeah.  I know.  It's all about bicycles with me.  Sometimes it is.  I don't expect everyone to do as I do (though some part of me wishes that more would).  I do hope that my stories help others realize that driving a car ANYWHERE is not the only option.  ANYWHERE.  From 19th Avenue in San Francisco to Mount Desert Island in Maine--there is a way to get there without a car. 

Travelling with my bicycle on transit, I have so much flexibility.  Traffic is just something out the window.  If the bus is a little late--and I miss my connection (like I did yesterday)--then I have a backup plan.

Yesterday, I had a site visit to do at a rural property south of Sacramento.  I hatched up a plan to travel from my office to the site using a combination of transit and my bike.  Seeking to be honest and considerate, I ran the notion by my supervisor first and got his approval.  "The agency doesn't have a policy on bicycling.  I don't see how it's any different from you walking from an airport terminal to a rental car agency.  Just be careful out there."  So off I went, with my bike, to the bus stop about two blocks from my office.

The bus was nearly ten minutes late and arrived at the transit center after my planned connection had already left.  I was able to catch light rail instead, which didn't take me as far as the planned bus route, but at least it was in the right direction.  I was already planning to ride my bike five miles from the bus... instead I got to ride nine miles from rail.  No biggie--there was a bike lane most of the way out of town and no wind. 

When I got out of town--about thirty minutes into the ride--I had to remind myself that I was at work.  I rode on rural roads through pastures and oak savannah.  Beautiful, picturesque.  It is the sort of ride I might do for recreation.  Despite missing my connection, I arrived at the site in time to stop under a tree and eat my lunch.  It was truely a wonderful afternoon. 

I met my contact at the wildlife refuge and rode around with her in an SUV for a few hours, doing the sort of work that I do on refuges. 

At the end of my visit, I looked at my watch.  If I had driven one of the agency SUV's from my office, I would have been diving into rush hour traffic.  I would have had to return the vehicle to the motorpool, on the other side of the city, before returning home. 

Instead, I got back on my bike and headed back to light rail.  From there, my bike and I took the train downtown, to within three blocks of my apartment.  I was home from work about twenty minutes earlier than normal, ready to set about preparing supper. 

So.  I do the bike commute thing.  It's great and I think many more people should try it.  I ride my bike to the grocery store--people should try this, too, even if it means buying or making a basket for your bike!  Each week, I take my bike on Amtrak so that I can go home to Oakland to see my family and work on my house.  I ride my bike to the hardware store pulling a trailer.  And now, I am seeking to bring my bike into my workplace.  Our agency is seeking to show a smaller carbon footprint and 'be greener'.  Well.  I can get on that bandwagon and shoulder a little of the necessary work to make it happen! 

Out of this, I get a fun ride mixed in with my regular work schedule.  It's a nice diversion from sitting at my desk, composing more emails. 

Maybe you aren't ready to take your bike on the bus for a cross-town excursion.  Maybe you aren't equipped to carry all of your groceries home from the grocery store.  That's fine.  It's like anything else--work in increments.  Set goals that move you toward indpendence from the gasoline pump. 

This sort of independence is more than just being prepared to do a bike ride that might make you sweat.  There is something to being prepared to walk into your workplace with your bike helmet.  Believe it or not, though you think you look like a goober with that thing on, a lot of people respect a person who rides into work. 

It might be a big deal to sell your 4x4 and trade the Jeep in for a Specialized Stumpjumper.  I know there is a lot of testosterone wound up in off-road riding, mud-bogging, muscle cars, or just driving around in the sort of equipment that helps people understand just how tough one is.  We all have our insecurities.  Those will start to vanish when you've been riding a bike ten miles a day for a month and gas prices hit $5/gal. 

Cycling is something a lot of people do for fun.  Cyclists on the road, following the rules, and using their bikes as a means to accomplish missions that we ordinarily do from the seat of a motor-vehicle... those folks are honestly trying to take one for the team. 

Go team Human. 

The Railroad Bridge on 16th Street

So I have a new personal initiative.  No one is required to follow me.  I know that I often pontificate as to how others "ought" to behave but I make no such announcement here.

The Tunnel under the SP railroad tracks on 16th street in Sacto is intimidating on a bike.  Traffic there is moving fast and goes over a blindish rise after coming out of the tunnel.  Signage (as you've seen in earlier photos, below) suggests that bikes "MAY" use the sidewalk. 

Well.  The sidewalk is for WALKING in my opinion.  In many places,  local ordinances agree with me.  The sidewalks on this tunnel are also tunnels--and none too wide.  They are barely wide enough for a cyclist and a pedestrian to pass.  I have ridden through these tunnels many times and have often inconvenienced some poor pedestrian trying to pass in the tubes. 

In the mornings, when I ride to work, I am now riding IN THE TRAFFIC LANE.  And not off to the side somewhere but in the MIDDLE of the far-right traffic lane.  My route allows me to turn onto 16th when all the traffic is stopped at a light.  I can ride into the tunnel with no traffic and be quite visible to the motorists behind me--they cannot miss my flashing tail light.  There should be no excuse for someone hitting me. 

There are FOUR lanes in the northbound direction here.  Plenty of room for motorists and cyclists alike.  I expect that many of the motorists that I see every morning are doing just what I am doing--driving their usual commute route to work.  Well.  Over the next few months I hope the horns stop blaring and they start getting used to seeing me here.  After all--I just need to get under the tracks.  I turn onto 16th street immediately before the tunnel and turn off of it to get to the bike path immediately after the tunnel.  Nobody has to put up with me for long.  We just all need to share the road. 

Wish me good health!