Bicycles!

[eizbaer]

Edit: aaaand the cheapest seller has increased price by 750/900€ for the 500/1000Wh models respectively. Yup.

everybody's going nuts. it seems a bunch of babboe people like us are trying to secure alternatives... nice.
also: done. found another seller that was still at that same-ish price (with lower delivery cost) but not listed on idealo and the likes. yes i know local bike shops and all that, but they all run msrp, which is 40% higher. anyway here goes. went with the single battery version (while I'd have liked the 2nd battery, I wasn't prepared to fork over 750€ for that option and I wouldn't have gotten the nice color).

+ the kiddie bench + the raincover + rear rack (because cheap and why not)
i may still decide to get a chainglider to prolong chainlife (since we do run gravely stuff regularly) - that was the one thing that was actually surprisingly good on the babboe lol

 

[altoid]

So, uhh, the new gravel setup is hot as fuck?! Both aesthetically and functionally?!

But let’s not get ahead of ourselves, for we have a (literal) mess to attend to first: fitting new tires to the original wheels, whilst replacing the sealant and valves at the same time.

Bontrager TLR sealant is a helpfully easy to spot blue that I kinda wish were true for the Silca stuff I put in. Though it did make my shower look a bit like a Smurf died in it:

Blurry photo, but this fucking mess is why I’m trying Fillmore valves now:

I didn’t take any photos of the rest of the process because it was honestly super duper totes easy. Seriously, both the Contis and the Schwalbes were pretty easy to mount for a first-timer, and with only a plain old floor pump. Look at the pretty:

And on the bike:

And looking so damn good this morning, ready for the first ride:

Will Rogers State Park is bloody gorgeous:

I too am gorgeous:

As is the bike in its natural habitat:

Back to the park:

The ride was fun! Mostly tarmac, with the only dirt being the little loop in the NW corner of the route:

Verdict: the setup feels so good. I used the Silca Professional Tire Pressure Calculator and it suggested 41.5 psi in the front and 43.5 in the rear. Forever scared of my weight’s impact on everything, I ran both tires at just under 45, which was psychologically frightening, but felt absolutely fantastic. I’d be comfortable dropping to the actual recommended pressures based on the experience.

Pressure aside, the Schwalbes roll so well. They feel fast, and I don’t necessarily care about that in and of itself, but I do appreciate how great they feel as a result. I didn’t test them out directly against the stock Bontragers, but they’re in a different league. They feel surprisingly like the Contis, though I ran those at much higher pressure than I should’ve, so it’ll be interesting to see how they feel when I drop it to what Silca says. From my limited experience so far, if I had to run only one wheelset, I’d happily run these full time.

I’ll try attaching the excellent Bicycle Rolling Resistance comparison of the three models for reference.

 

[eizbaer]

Blurry photo, but this fucking mess is why I’m trying Fillmore valves now:

Oof, yeah that sort of makes me dread what’s waiting for me in mine

I didn’t take any photos of the rest of the process because it was honestly super duper totes easy. Seriously, both the Contis and the Schwalbes were pretty easy to mount for a first-timer, and with only a plain old floor pump.

RIGHT??? that was my experience as well… somehow all of YouTube somehow made me dread the process, because most of the videos make you think it’s a complete pain. But it was smooth sailing for me as well, really no more work or hassle than with a tube, because those sumbitches can be fiddly as hell with thin tires…

 

[altoid]

RIGHT??? that was my experience as well… somehow all of YouTube somehow made me dread the process, because most of the videos make you think it’s a complete pain. But it was smooth sailing for me as well, really no more work or hassle than with a tube, because those sumbitches can be fiddly as hell with thin tires…

I think things have gotten much better over the past few years, and some combinations are friendlier than others, so the YT vibe is kinda off by definition. I was just surprised at exactly how easy it was, expecting to maybe need some help from the CO2 cartridges I have lying around, but nope. I just used two tire levers, and didn’t even need the soapy water trick or anything like that.

Definitely not complaining!

 

[Adunaphel]

The YT problem is that every time anyone says that things are easy someone somewhere will jump out of the woodwork to say that their aunt's neighbour's nephew's cobbler's great-grandson once had a huge-ass problem. So they err on the side of caution and tell you all the things that *can* go wrong.

 

[eizbaer]

Well there’s always going to be angry folks with two left hands who manage to not RTFM or to not follow the simplest instructions.
All the „this is a nightmare“ talk about tubeless and internal cable routing (to name just two examples) makes me think the ones posting those videos are nincompoops
Edit: now that I’ve posted this, the latter may just be true for a large part of cycling YouTube

 

[altoid]

My Gravelero/DynaPlug/AirTag mount arrived and it’s truly fantastic. It fits really nicely and is made extremely well—I’m quite pleased.



As I mentioned on Telegram, we have a huge drainage problem in LA since nothing was ever build to handle any meaningful amount of rainfall, which we do occasionally get. So even on perfectly sunny days I might ride through a bunch of standing water that’s been there for a few days, and it won’t be a clean experience.



Since this happens off-road as well, what with water crossings and such, I ordered some Ass Savers—namely the Win Wing 2 for the back, the Mudder Mini for the front, and the Speed Mullet for the middle. They look a bit funky, and I don’t expect to use them super often, but they did well enough on the test ride that I’m glad I have them as an option.



I don’t know about y’all, but I’m incredibly lazy about cleaning my riding shoes. Silca’s awesome Gear Wipes just might change that, since this took literally two minutes. I got some of the singles for portability, and have two in my handlebar bag.



Now, today was a fun ride. It was hard enough that from mid-way through the first climb I mostly only saw the sweeper, who very kindly rode with me. But I persevered and survived all of it. The riding was tons of fun, but it was effectively a solo ride, so my quest for enough fitness to actually do group rides continues.

 

[eizbaer]

My Gravelero/DynaPlug/AirTag mount arrived and it’s truly fantastic. It fits really nicely and is made extremely well—I’m quite pleased.

the texture seems... off? I dunno... I first thought that thing is so specific, may just be 3d printed and I was about to question its longevity because of that lol (what with UV light and all), but the texture doesn't quite fit. looks solid enough anyway

I don’t know about y’all, but I’m incredibly lazy about cleaning my riding shoes.

schrödingers shoe cleaner here! well not quite...
my gravel shoes: every ride, full on garden hose. anything less doesn't cut it.
road shoes: errm... never? (not quite true, but true enough)

 

[altoid]

the texture seems... off? I dunno... I first thought that thing is so specific, may just be 3d printed and I was about to question its longevity because of that lol (what with UV light and all), but the texture doesn't quite fit. looks solid enough anyway

It’s a rougher texture than anything else on the bike for sure, but you can’t really see much of it anyway once it’s mounted and there’s a bottle in the cage. I’m happy enough with it.

It is 3D printed with some industrial stuff. I expect it to last plenty long.

schrödingers shoe cleaner here! well not quite...
my gravel shoes: every ride, full on garden hose. anything less doesn't cut it.
road shoes: errm... never? (not quite true, but true enough)

My kingdom for a garden hose…

 

[eizbaer]

It’s a rougher texture than anything else on the bike for sure, but you can’t really see much of it anyway once it’s mounted and there’s a bottle in the cage. I’m happy enough with it.

It is 3D printed with some industrial stuff. I expect it to last plenty long.

Oh the texture just threw me off because it isn't what I expected a 3d printed part to look like... but then again, they're getting quite good anyways. looks like it has little particles in it, like it's reinforced with glass fibres or sth (if it were carbon they sure as hell would market the crap out of that, right?). in any case, seems to be done professional enough so you can expect them to take care of the UV side of things.

regarding the looks, you're right of course. won't see it anyway, hidden away as it is.

 

[eizbaer]

So errr… because of the great weather I originally wanted to go ride, but then remembered I still had to switch cranks and chain (waxed). Which also meant I had to clean the bloody cassette. And I discovered canyon didn’t take too much care during assembly: b adjustment screw of rear derailleur was completely off, the little metal chain stay protector behind the chainrings fell off and the old crank was way beyond its 54 Nm torque spec.
Anyway… got it done. Will still have to do new bartape (no bueno from Canyon either) and tubeless setup - which I’m actually a little scared of because it’s hookless bullshit.

 

[leviathan]

My todo list for today was quite long. But, with the weather being as it is, I chucked most of it in the bin, took the bike out of the cellar, and went on my first ride of 2024. Rode to the local farm shop to get some stuff and brought it over to my gf's place, and came back a bit later.



Tested the new backpack that converts into a side bag mode and attaches to the bike. Very nice imho, will use for commuting and groceries and stuff later in the year.



The way between our towns is a really nice "bike highway" that the city of Darmstadt and neighboring towns are building, intended to one day connect all the way to Frankfurt. The parts that are done are rather good, wide and very smooth, allows for quite relaxed riding.



However, on the section that I use, there's still one new bridge missing - or rather, not open for traffic yet, the bridge itself has been in place for weeks now.



15 km total, not a distance to speak of. But I notice that my overall fitness is rather bad. Need to ride more, I guess.

 

[altoid]

I the diversity in this thread!

 

[Eye-Q]

Diversity? That I can do - today I got up early-ish to cycle to the old Elbe tunnel which is now (thankfully) open only for pedestrians and cyclists. There are two identical tubes of which one is currently undergoing renovation so it'll be as nice as the one I'm standing in which already has been renovated. Early Sunday is a good time to have it empty-ish to take that kind of photos:

 

[eizbaer]

OKAY the weird s-works sizing may have saved me here lol (s-works ares)

Did my first ride on those suckers today and dear god the weird combination of basically a sock strapped to a ridiculously stiff sollte with two boas works really well. Insanely comfortable.

Also my fresh crank, chain and newly aligned rear mech were making quite a bit of noise, so I was afraid I’d screwed something up… but after 5 km or so everything quietened down, so that was probably just the waxed chain still being stiff (thus not running through the mech properly) and carrying a bunch of excess wax.

 

[eizbaer]

hookless bullshit.

hookless bullshit.

hookless bullshit.

holy crap hookless is bullshit.
Anyway... somehow made it. First wheel was a complete nightmare, then I came across this here trick to get hookless tires to seat, even with a trackpump. and once you've done it for a wheel and figured out how coerce the bloody thing to half-seat on one side (which is really fun with a 25mm tire... look how that MTB tire in the video gets twisted), the second wheel is actually quite straightforward. but still. hookless is so bloody tight, oof.
anyway, the red valve stems look nice. yes, the wheels are dirty, sue me. also: my rear tire seems to have had a puncture - some fizzing occured, so i slapped a bit of tape across the hole to help the sealant out a bit
also did the bar tape, which worked out alright. yes, it's zipp bar tape, i dunno, it was on sale or something. also fixed my wonky brifters. wrapping the bars is a bit weird, because these are the three-piece-adjustable kind, so you kinda have to wrap up to a very defined point. also there's two ridges in the tops that remain very mushy. oh well. result looks fine.

 

[altoid]

After last weekend’s gravel adventure illuminated just how out of shape I am, I’ve considered resorting to desperate measures for some Strava glory, and have drawn up an easy route right in my neighborhood that I could get at least Local Legend for, if not the KOM. I haven’t yet created the segment, as I want to frontload it with some good efforts, so it’ll happen one of these days. Lulz shall be had!



Jokes aside, I’ve been enjoying riding through the wealthyish nearby Playa Vista, as it’s overall a fairly car-free experience, even though it’s about 2/3 on public roads. The change of scenery is nice.



As I didn’t find/make time for a second weekday ride last week, I found myself on Sunday morning in desperate need of 2h47m of riding time, and with a mid-day appointment making that a bit tricky. So I went a bit far and combined three of my favorite routes for major victory. Literally didn’t take a single photo, barely stopping at all, and was absolutely late for my appointment. Still pretty damn happy with the solid effort.



I realized last week that having three full sets of kit just isn’t enough with the increased riding I’m doing. More than recently I found myself not having clean bibs, and that messing with my scheduled. I decided to remedy that, and my favorite jerseys were out of stock in my favorite orange color, so I went full hi-viz, with matching gloves!



And finally, I cleaned out part of my hallway closet this weekend to better store cycling stuff in there, which was a good start. Today I upped my game by adding a shelf for a little more storage surface, and also installing the wheel hook I got so I can store my second wheelset like the mega pro I clearly am. Pretty happy with how it’s all coming together!

 

[eizbaer]

After last weekend’s gravel adventure illuminated just how out of shape I am, I’ve considered resorting to desperate measures for some Strava glory, and have drawn up an easy route right in my neighborhood that I could get at least Local Legend for, if not the KOM.

I've long ago given up on trying for cycling KOMs, tbh - even ones I create myself. Anything that's flat will be taken by some group ride bunch that has the frankly insane aero advantage of the draft and probably a tailwind and anything resembling a climb I'm simply too heavy for... there's just too many cyclists here. Surprising to see that your marina loop isn't segmented yet, seeing how it's such a nice and clean 1mi loop. strangely enough, with running, there's quite a few segments around here that do lend themselves to sniping with a few quick (or less quick) sprints.

edit: local legend is always a consideration, though, of course. I've had the odd idea to find myself a nice little loop like yours and do this years Wings for Life run on something like that. Nice and flat, so no undue elevation crap, will be a looooong run (aiming for 25km / 2:09h) and thus should pretty reliably yield the LL from a single run... only to be gone again 90 days later

 

[Adunaphel]

Every season I pick up a few LLs on the less popular sections that I like to ride (or a popular section that is part of most of my rides in the period that I ride multiple times a week). Easiest way to get them is to find a less popular stretch that is good to ride.

 

[eizbaer]

got an email from babboe telling me to register my bike because they were doing a recall now. wow. apart from that, they say about 20 times in the accompanying FAQ and in the process of registering that there is no further information at this point and to not ride the bloody thing. if you need it for your day to day life like we do? tough luck. can't help you there. weirdly enough, the recall is only for the non-drive and rear-hub-drive models at the moment, not our crank-drive one - but they still advise not to ride any other model either. feels like they're completely lost.
also, funnily enough, there's a new CEO since 19th february, who would've guessed it...
still not convinced they'll be able to salvage any of this dumpster fire - replacement should arrive by the end of the week.