Last weekend Jaxon & I fixed up our fat tire cruisers.
It was a little premonition of things to come.
I pulled the red shelby out of hibernation,
and put the black fendered shelby into hibernation.
Jax swapped his aluminum donkey dick handlebar stem
for an old schwinn stem that was lying around.
The blue bike has been the main grocery getter.
It's a good rider but the random aluminum crank had been bugging me.
There's a trick axle conversion that makes it possible
to use a 3-piece crank instead of the one-piece unit.
Even though my goal started out more aesthetic
by swapping in the fluted campy knock-off crank,
the other benefit was the 49 tooth chainring with stock drillium.
It's only a 2% change from the 50 but it should help,
as we live in a hilly area.
Yeah it's a prissy change but what the heck.
Another cool thing is they make the rubber block pedals with the larger thread,
so it's still possible to ride barefoot.
Here's the potential of what this bike should do...
I could watch that video a million times.
So anyway last night we figured what the heck,
let's do the Critical Mass ride.
We hadn't ridden it since earlier this year.
It took a couple minutes figuring out which bikes to ride.
Me blue, Jaxon white.
Jaxon's too big for the tandem,
especially with his long hair other riders think he's a girl.
I told him he needs to pen in a moustache or beard.
So we rode out to Balboa Park from the house,
which is a good 40 minute ride on the cruisers.
Showed him the finer points of San Diego
like the sketchy Front St homeless bridge.
We missed getting to the fountain but at least crossed the bridge.
The first part of the ride is always an exciting mash of riders.
Even though this wasn't his first time,
I'll admit I was concerned if he could hold his own with the frenzy of riders.
Critical mass is like driving in really bad mexican traffic.
Even with our single-speed cruisers,
we managed well with all the faster bikes.
The lucky thing for us is 80% of the time the ride goes near our neighborhood.
This ride was a little longer in the North Park/downtown area,
so by the time we rode up through the airport we hung back a bit.
Way more relaxing to ride up Harbor along the bike path.
We even got to check out the $5,000,000 construction of the San Salvador,
the replica of Juan Cabrillo's flagship.
Weird how it looks like pictures of some of the stuff at Burning Man!
We made it home without a hitch.
A great excuse for a full moon night ride.
TP
It was a little premonition of things to come.
 |
| dago cruiser power trio |
I pulled the red shelby out of hibernation,
and put the black fendered shelby into hibernation.
Jax swapped his aluminum donkey dick handlebar stem
for an old schwinn stem that was lying around.
 |
| postwar schwinn DX - dago style |
The blue bike has been the main grocery getter.
It's a good rider but the random aluminum crank had been bugging me.
 |
| crank removal tool |
There's a trick axle conversion that makes it possible
to use a 3-piece crank instead of the one-piece unit.
 |
| cruiser 3-piece crank axle |
Even though my goal started out more aesthetic
by swapping in the fluted campy knock-off crank,
the other benefit was the 49 tooth chainring with stock drillium.
It's only a 2% change from the 50 but it should help,
as we live in a hilly area.
 |
| campy sucks - klunker style |
Yeah it's a prissy change but what the heck.
Another cool thing is they make the rubber block pedals with the larger thread,
so it's still possible to ride barefoot.
 |
| Schwinn Dago style |
Here's the potential of what this bike should do...
I could watch that video a million times.
 |
| Schwinn partial klunker |
So anyway last night we figured what the heck,
let's do the Critical Mass ride.
We hadn't ridden it since earlier this year.
It took a couple minutes figuring out which bikes to ride.
Me blue, Jaxon white.
Jaxon's too big for the tandem,
especially with his long hair other riders think he's a girl.
I told him he needs to pen in a moustache or beard.
 |
| homeless bridge |
So we rode out to Balboa Park from the house,
which is a good 40 minute ride on the cruisers.
Showed him the finer points of San Diego
like the sketchy Front St homeless bridge.
 |
| critical mass san diego september 2012 |
We missed getting to the fountain but at least crossed the bridge.
The first part of the ride is always an exciting mash of riders.
 |
| critical mass san diego september 2012 |
Even though this wasn't his first time,
I'll admit I was concerned if he could hold his own with the frenzy of riders.
Critical mass is like driving in really bad mexican traffic.
Even with our single-speed cruisers,
we managed well with all the faster bikes.
 |
| Jaxon - critical mass |
The lucky thing for us is 80% of the time the ride goes near our neighborhood.
This ride was a little longer in the North Park/downtown area,
so by the time we rode up through the airport we hung back a bit.
 |
| san salvador ship - san diego |
Way more relaxing to ride up Harbor along the bike path.
We even got to check out the $5,000,000 construction of the San Salvador,
the replica of Juan Cabrillo's flagship.
Weird how it looks like pictures of some of the stuff at Burning Man!
We made it home without a hitch.
A great excuse for a full moon night ride.
TP
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