Ok, so I was bored. With my mountain bike out of action, and the cyclocross bike taking a break from the heat, I thought the commuter bike could use a little more attention. The one thing Sterance has been missing is a head badge. No more. After coming up with a drawing, I transfered the design to the unsuspecting head tube with some quality 3M painters tape. The idea for this design came from an interview with Gary Fisher I saw on the Trail Tapes podcast. This gloss white skull badge turned out pretty nice. Maybe a cross between The Punisher and a Tim Burton character? I used a pair of hemostats to pull the eye and nose masking off, leaving nice clean edges with no marring. but, if I get bored with it I can always find some sandpaper and start over, or possibly continue with the pirate theme.

On a related note, Sterance has been on the road for almost a month and has about 50 miles on the imaginary odometer. Prior to Sterance, I could not understand why so many people liked single speed bikes so much. Well, now I understand. Even though Sterance is heavy, old and slow, it is a lot of fun to ride, and makes both of my other bikes feel sluggish and immensely frustrating when they have drive train issues (like the M2). There is something nice about riding a silent, smooth and simple single speed. I am almost tempted to convert one of my other rides, but I’m not quite there yet. Although I’ve ridden a fixed gear bike, I don’t think it is something I’d like. I am a little partial to my still functioning knees; the swelling on the left knee has gone down considerably from the M2 crash (see the last blog entry).

I’ve been commuting everyday in the 90 deg. weather, but I had not ridden any trails since Colorado. I took the M2 out to Rock Bridge with Eric (on his Pisgah). Everything was going as well as it could considering the temperature and misbehaving front and rear derailleurs. On a climb about twenty minutes into the ride my chain broke, and I hit the ground. Luckily, my back tire and a large rock broke my fall. One of the chainlinks exploded (not the PowerLink), the crankset (not just the chainrings) is bent, and the rear wheel is a lot bent. To be fair, the crankset was already a little tweaked. To top things off the SID is acting up. So lets see what needs to be repaired/replaced:

• Rear Wheel (very bent)
• Rear Tire (cut sidewall)
• Chain (busted)
• Crankset (bent)
• Fork (dead)

On the bright side, I replaced the Kool Stop pads with XTR pads and the incessant squealing is completely gone.

So I acquired another bike today. This time it was* a late ’80s Trek 400. This behemoth measures in with a towering 64 cm frame. Those are 700c wheels, and that head tube is about 8″ long. The bright red paint is in pretty nice shape, and the bike is in excellent condition overall. The drive train consists of full Suntour Edge, with Biopace like chainrings. But, the Trek 400 has already been passed off to Klunk. As much as I want to ride a 64 cm frame, I had to pass it along.

Other news:
I decided the saddle on the singlespeed really needed to be tan, camel actually. The natural cork bar tape really clashed with the black vinyl saddle, but no more. In case you were wondering how I came to this decision: after a few shots of Turkish coffee, some regular coffee, and finally a little homemade thirteen year old Slovak pear brandy (we had some friends over for dinner), I had a shocking and profound epiphany. The thought of a tan/brown seat had crossed my mind earlier, but I really didn’t want to sacrifice a nice Brooks saddle (or the requisite cash) to the elements and sitting in the rain all day. So, after the brandy I realized I still have a stash of SEM Camel vinyl paint left over from my old ’61 VW bus. I quickly unbolted the saddle, removed the faux carbon fiber bits, slapped up a quick masking job, and turned my Terry Fly CrMo saddle into this beauty:

Better-late-than-never update — 19.2 miles of fun:

Date: 2006.07.08
Time: 3:30 PM
Conditions: 85° F, a little warm
Mileage: 19.2
Time: 1:04
Average Speed: 18.0 MPH