The Bike Hive

On June 18th, my wife and I drove to Goshen to do the annual Pumkinvine ride.  They offer a 50 mile and a 100 mile (actually, 103 mile) ride through Amish country in northern Indiana.  Proceeds benefit the Pumkinvine trail, a paved rail trail that runs between Goshen and Shipshewana, Indiana.  We planned to do the century, my wife's first this year and my first one in nearly three years.  It would also be Kathy's longest ride (a new PR) and my second longest.  As a matter of fact, it's been 25 years since I've done a ride longer than this. We met up with Kelly, a long time friend and frequent riding partner of Kathy.  We left the Elkhart county fairgrounds at 8am with no preconceived notions of average speed and no hurry to finish.  The ride was well marked, but just in case I had downloaded the route to Kathy's Garmin so we had an easy to follow map. The country is beautiful in this part of Indiana.  For the most part, things move a little slower up there

I received this frameset as a Christmas gift last year and it quickly turned into one of my favorite bikes.  I haven't spent much time trying to find out the exact model and year because, frankly, it really doesn't matter to me.  I have a serious appreciation of old steel, particularly Italian steel.   (Don't mistake me for a curmudgeon though.  I like carbon fiber too- I own a couple carbon bikes)  I was raised in my mechanical youth with steel and they still have a soft spot in my heart. When I was younger I worked in a small shop in a small town.  The only Colnago bikes I ever saw were in a magazine.  To me they were rare and expensive, something I wanted badly but never thought I'd be able to afford one.  At that time the used bike market wasn't anything like it is today (how eBay has changed things!) and these types of bikes have become much easier and less costly than they were in 1990. For the last few years, I've enjoyed building my classic steel

This posting is a shortened version of a technical paper I wrote for work. I hope you enjoy, and learn in the process! At one time, all bikes were made of steel.  Steel has been popular thanks to its strength to weight ratio and ease of use.  These factors as well as it’s low cost and availability make it ideal for use in bicycles.  The most common type of steel used for bikes is chromoly , and 4130 chromoly is the most widely recognized.  So what does chromoly mean and what do the numbers 4130 refer to? Steel is an alloy of iron and other metals.  The term ‘alloy’ is commonly used to refer to aluminum but it actually refers to any metal that’s mixed with other elements in order to achieve the desired mechanical properties such as strength, weight, durability, hardness, weldablitly, etc.  ' Chromoly ' refers to a specific type of steel alloy that combines Iron with Chro mium and Moly bdenum (chro-moly, get it?) along with small amounts of other metals.  Changing

This is the last in a series of posts about the Trek Travel bike tour my wife and I took with the owner of the shop I work at and some friends.  Part one covered the first two days beginning at the Sea Ranch lodge and finished with us staying in Bodega Bay, and part two covered the next two days from Bodega Bay to Tiburon.  My post today will cover the last day of riding into San Francisco and back to Tiburon. Day 5 The last day of riding on our trip began with a short ferry ride from Tiburon past Alcatraz Island to San Francisco.  Once back on land we headed through San Francisco past fisherman's wharf, past the Presido, to the base of the Golden Gate bridge.  Before crossing the bridge, we regrouped to get some pictures with the bridge in the background.  The view was incredible and the bridge was like nothing I've ever seen.  Crossing the bridge was a treat - the view was spectacular but the foot and bike traffic was heavy enough on the path across that it was tricky t

A few years ago I had the opportunity to attend Interbike, the annual bicycle industry trade show in Las Vegas, with a couple coworkers.  The show promised and delivered the chance to see all the cool new products that were being released for the next model year, talk to industry insiders, and learn about new product and tech. Along with all the product and clinics, there were stars of the sport there.  Meeting John Tomac again was a treat, as was big George Hincapie, Jay Miron, Ron Wilkerson.  But our biggest surprise came while we were headed out to grab a drink when we noticed a familiar face at a table facing the isle...we both stopped, looked at each other, and said 'That's Eddy Merckx!' Even though we were starving, we decided quickly that we couldn't let an opportunity like this pass by.  We jumped in line and waited our turn to see Eddy.  Waiting in line might seem like a horrible way to spend a half hour of your life at a trade show.  In this case, it ga

This is part two in a series of posts about the Trek Travel bike tour my wife and I took with the owner of the shop I work at and some friends.  Part one covered the first two days beginning at the Sea Ranch lodge and finished with us staying in Bodega Bay.  My post today will cover the next two days that lead us to Tiburon.   Day 3 That tiny person is my wife Day three  had us riding north for a while in order to do a loop inland for a bit.  This ride featured plenty of riding on the coast that was spectacular, but we also had the opportunity to see some of the forest near the coast.  We started by riding up the coast the opposite way that we had ridden the day before.  We rode along the coast for about 10 miles before turning inland where we were treated with more beautiful riding through the woods in the Russian River valley.  We actually stopped to walk into the woods to get pictures of the huge trees - like nothing I've ever seen. Climbing after leaving Occi