A Weeklong Cornucopia of Bikes

Last weekend was my first ride on my baby since doing an endo a few days earlier. I’d been terrified to get back on my favorite bike because I didn’t want to discover some catastrophic problem. Hell, let’s be honest – I didn’t even want to face up to a scratch. So imagine my relief to get back on the bike and find there are no issues. Even my own bruises have healed up. Life is fine!

(OK, turns out there is a small bite out of my Cambium C-17, and a scratch on my front rim. I’ll ignore the bite, and I’ve polished out the rough spot on the braking surface. It’s all about the patina, right?)

This is a great time of year. I couldn’t care any less about tight jerseys and logo wear. Give me a sweatshirt and a wool cap!

I am sensing a location trend in photo opps this week. My Raleigh International was feeling a little lonely, so I took her out for a spin late one afternoon and found myself stopping for a “water bottle shot” with my iPhone at the exact same spot as I did with the Boulder in the photos above.

I’d been swapping around some components on bikes, so this was an opportunity to dial in the saddle position of the Brooks Pro that was finding its way back onto the Raleigh. I needed the Cambium C17 to better fit the saddle set back on my L’Avecaise, and the Brooks Pro set back is a little closer to my ideal on the Raleigh. Regardless of how precise my measurements are, I still have to finagle the positioning of things so they feel “right” to me on any particular bike. This was no different – I’d ride for a mile, get off and adjust. Repeat. I don’t think I ever even broke a sweat.

Last Sunday started out cold and windless, but by the time I arrived at the downtown airport with my 1966 Paramount – where there are absolutely no windbreaks, incidentally – there was a cold, stiff wind coming up out of the southwest. The airport loop is almost entirely flat, with only two tiny hills. Flags were furiously flapping from poles, nearly straight out, and as I pedaled in a generally northward direction I was flying. Coming into the two hills that mark a turn to the east, and then to the south, I found myself immediately reminded that my bike is outfitted with a 52/42 crank. (And, by golly, that’s the “old man” set of rings I replaced the original 53/48 rings with!)

The white Paramount is a pretty sharp bike and it rides very nicely. Even though it’s a racing bike, the geometry is much more generous when compared to today’s standards of design. Limping into the parking lot, I encountered this wonderful old TWA jet and set up my white and red-trimmed Paramount for a photograph in front of the red with white-trimmed aircraft. Pretty cool visual, I think.

Living near the Missouri River means the geography isn’t especially flat. The roads are replete with undulating hills the closer one gets to the river and the river bluffs. My legs are feeling pretty good as the summer and fall riding draws to a close and riding my fixed gear Hobbs along country roads, particularly on still days, isn’t as challenging as it will be a couple months from now.

This being the case, I am enjoying these rare, nice December days to ride my 70 year old bike. I discovered that fixed gear actually works pretty well on loose gravel, where a rider will pretty much be pedaling the entire time anyway. I don’t know about anyone else, but I seldom find myself coasting along on the freewheel in such conditions.

Obsessive Compulsive Bike Nerd

OK, I’m a nerd. I obsessively ponder and analyze the personal fit of my bicycles. Having settled upon my Boulder as the analysis “control” because it meets my personal fit criteria better than any other bike ever has, I’ve set up a controlled visual comparison of the geometry. Using a static, controlled camera position and a controlled location for each subject, I’ve photographed several of the bikes I ride on a regular basis. In a digital imaging application I’ve traced the primary lines of geometry, points of contact, and spacing from my Boulder. That drawing has been layered on top of each bike for comparison, and then each bike repositioned to align with the bottom bracket of the Boulder. At a glance, there isn’t a lot of difference in points of contact. Reach is not exact, but similar. Saddle position, the same story. Spacing is significantly different, as is trail. Once again, it’s startling how very small differences can make for a completely different cockpit and ride experience over distance, road conditions, and time in the saddle.

In this analysis, we’re looking at a 1966 Paramount. This is a particularly comfortable riding bike for me, although it feels a bit more aggressive than my Boulder. The comparison indicates a great deal of similarity between the set up of the two bikes, which explains to me, in large part, why I enjoy riding this one as much as I do. The comparison also suggests that if I were to raise the stem about the width of the stem, and to use rando bars to achieve the difference in rise I might better replicate the riding experience of the Boulder. The Brooks Pro is well known for an inability to achieve greater set back than many other saddles, my Cambium C17 saddles included. Still, I like the way they fit and am willing to make the compromise.

Here we are comparing to a 1989 Paramount. The wheelbase is shorter and the overall frame more compact, and obviously racier. Both this and my Boulder are Waterford built frames and both have a difficult-to-define ride quality that I enjoy. I find myself having to settle into a different ride position on this bike, which is unsettling at first – it takes me a while to get used to the different balance and stretch if I’ve been primarily riding the Boulder.

In considering this 70’s (?) era Bernard Carre frame and arrangement, I run into a curiosity. One might think the steeper steerer would result in a completely different ride experience than on the Boulder. And while that’s not inconsistent with my own riding experience, the curious thing is that it’s not so different as to be noticeable when I switch riding between the two bikes. In other words, I can easily jump off one and onto the other without my body rebelling. The leverage of the MAFAC levers requires a grip of steel and I will likely swap them out for something that provides greater ease of pull from the hoods – perhaps a pair of 105’s?

The International is a comfy, all-day-long kind of rider, so it’s a little unsettling to notice how much difference there is in the trail between it and my Boulder.

The Lyon continues to be a bit of an enigma for me. Despite an almost identical configuration to my Boulder in terms of spacing and contact points, I’ve yet to feel like I’ve “nailed” the set up. First off, there is a nagging “ting ting ting” that sounds like it’s coming from the brand spanking new bottom bracket. This is far from my first rodeo, and I know that weird sounds are almost never actually coming from that location. I’m exhausting all the possibilities first: saddle, seat pin, pedals, crank, crank bolts, headset, and so on. But sometimes, a duck really is a duck, and after a weekend of riding on smooth paths so I could test all the options, I’ve come to the conclusion that I have a bad bottom bracket. Spinning up to speed is a chore, so maybe it’s binding under load. My wheel set might also need to have the hubs serviced. Long story short: This bike should feel a lot racier than it does. In my mind it’s an issue with something in the set up that I haven’t yet identified. It’s frustrating, to be honest, and that frustration means I cannot yet make a fair comparison to my Boulder.

 

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Speaking of obsessing, I’ve been agonizing over the Lauterwasser bars I put on my 1946 Hobbs of Barbican last year. Agonizing over what? They look cool as hell, and they are certainly the right look for this time period. There’s a great example on the Classic Lightweights site with Lauterwasser bars.
But jeez, I just can’t get comfortable riding with them. They always feel awkward for any distance greater than a couple of miles. So I changed them out for drop bars, a little longer stem – and while I was at it, I swapped out the Weinmann center pulls for dual pivot side pulls.

Gonna have to use your imagination here. The fields of soybeans yesterday were dusty yellows and browns, with a brilliant blue sky framing far off hills of caramel, olive, and bits of sunset orange. The 1946 Hobbs is blue with red accents, and is a blast to ride fixed wheel over miles of pretty flat river bottom highway surrounded by miles of those hues.
And that is the bottom line. Despite my obsessive compulsive tendencies, at the end of the day the ride is really all that matters to me.