Cities without cars

Remember "Vanilla Sky"? A 2001 movie with the famous scene where Tom Cruise walks alone through the completely empty Times Square in New York? The Times Square is the heart of New York City. It is the place that never sleeps. There is no way to see this place so empty - with no cars and no people. Creators of "Vanilla Sky" showed us the impossible.

Tom Cruise running through the deserted Times Square in "Vanilla Sky" (Source: Google Images)

 

We are so used to seeing cars in city centers that we can't picture cities without them anymore. For decades our cities have been designed with cars in mind. Pedestrians and bicyclists have been pushed off the streets - out of cars' way. This is the reason our streets have zebra-striped crosswalks painted on them. You are simply not allowed to cross the street anywhere you want. This is the reason why we have designated bike lanes, often separated from car traffic. You must ride your bike on those narrow paths between the gutter and fast-moving cars.

 

If we want to see how a large city could look with no cars and a calm pedestrian traffic, we must search for those old pictures from 1890's and early 1900's. Cars basically didn't exist back then. When I look at these pictures I see wide, open streets, calm pedestrian and horse carriage traffic, people walking across the street in any place they find convenient. Essentially, the entire city was one large pedestrian-only zone.

 

Compared to XXI-century cities, the difference is striking. But it's not the buildings that have changed so much. It's the streets. It seems obvious that once cars entered the city, the change of its landscape was enormous.

Estabrook Trails

The fall is here. Days are getting shorter and there is not much daylight left after 5p.m. to go for a longer ride. Despite all this, I decided to revisit the Estabrook Woods trails on Concord/Carlisle border.

 

I have found the entrance to this trail before, from the Red Coat Ln in Concord. From there the trail opens up and leads through the Estabrook forest. After passing Estabrook Rd on the left, the trail gets a bit wider.

Eventually, I reach the Mink Pond on my right. Then I continued north where the trail ended at the paved Estabrook Rd. The full length of the trail didn't take me more than 20-30 min. to ride and I was able to go pretty fast in places, maintaining a speed of about 20km/h (12mph). That doesn't mean that the trail is smooth and easy to ride. There are sections much more suitable for a mountain bike or at least a bicycle with much wider tires and perhaps a front suspension. The trail gets rocky in places so staying focused on the road is important.

My plan was to ride across the forest and find exit to Stearns St but once I left Bellows Hill Rd and entered the next section of the trail, I got lost. I must have taken a wrong path and instead of going north, the path took me south through the middle of Estabrook Woods. It was getting dark so I rode slowly, especially that the trail was even more rocky than before:

Finally, I found a path going left (east) and after a while I ended up at North Meadows Rd. It was getting dark quickly so I decided to go back. I took Monument St to the Reformatory Branch Trail and went back to Bedford.

In general, Estabrook Woods trails are fun to ride but the next time I would stay on the main, western trail only (between Red Coat Ln and Estabrook Rd). The other trails in the forest are just too rocky and riding a bike there is a bit difficult.

The Phoenix Bike Project - part 2

I am making a pretty good progress with my old/new Frankenbike. I cleaned most of the components and those few missing, finally arrived. I also had the new wheels built.

The more challenging part was to prepare the frame and fork properly. I have worked on removing the old paint from the fork and found out that even the powerful bead blaster I have is not powerful enough. That powder coating seems to be very hard and durable so blasting it off was just too slow. What worked much better was a simple power sanding tool with 180 and 320 grit sandpaper pads and a Scotchbrite pad for final polishing. For those hard to access areas I used some small Dremel tool brushes with steel bristles. The fork is now shiny and clean, ready to be installed.

I have to work on the frame now and once this is done, it will be time to just put all this together. Phoenix bike will be reborn soon.

Gravel bikes - a new trend?

I have been reading some Interbike reports recently and apparently, this year the hottest thing is the arrival of gravel bikes. To be honest, gravel bikes did not just came out of nowhere at this year's Interbike. Some companies noticed this newest trend a while ago and introduced dedicated gravel bikes, such as Salsa Vaya.

Salsa Vaya 2 - one of the first dedicated gravel bikes? (Source: SalsaCycles.com)

 

But until now, this "next big thing" was ignored completely by the biggest manufacturers. This Interbike showed that gravel bikes may be the next fixie thing - a trend that is about to stick around for a a while. That's good. While the fixie fashion was in my opinion just plain silly (I would never recommend a brakeless fixie bike for city riding.), gravel bikes are clearly very different animals. Or are they?

 

I am trying to understand what a gravel bike really is. It seems to be a mix of a cyclocross bike, touring bike, 29er MTB and probably something else. From what I figured out so far, a gravel bike is essentially a cyclocross bike but with a slightly relaxed geometry (longer chainstays, slacker head tube angle), clearance for slightly wider tires on 700c wheels and often - disc brakes. All this makes it very similar to a 29er MTB, but on a bit lighter side. It just seems to me that manufacturers smelled a new, tiny market niche and will try to persuade us that we need just one more bike.

 

I guess, all this means that we can probably call those bikes we already own, gravel bikes as well. Have a road bike? Put the widest tires your frame can handle and you can likely call it a "gravel bike". Have a 29er? Use skinnier tires, about 40mm wide and swap handlebars to drop bars. Have a touring bike? Just remove all that touring junk (racks, fenders, etc.), put wider tires on and you have a "gravel bike". Have a cyclocross bike? You're pretty much all set, just replace those knobby mud tires with something more suitable for dry conditions.

 

Interestingly, over the last few years I have been slowly converting my old Lemond Poprad into a gravel bike - not knowing about it! First, I replaced brakes and handlebars, then wheels and tires, and finally the crankset. All these modifications made my bike more off-road friendly and suitable for the conditions I like riding in the most. Now I know how to call them - gravel grinding.

Am I right or am I completely missing the point? Are gravel bikes something entirely new that didn't exist before?

I guess it's official!

When you leave your house in the morning and everything is covered by a thick fog blanket,

when it get's chilly enough that on your morning ride you have to put a light sweater on and when you see those first colorful trees around,

you know it's official. Summer is over and fall is finally here.

Fall is coming (Source: yehudamoon.com)

Low gearing on a road bike - Part 2/3: "Choosing a crankset"

In the previous part, I discussed several possible options of lowering the gear ratio on a road bike with STI shifters - a task that seems to be non-trivial, since nearly all road component groups are designed around large-chainring cranksets, such as 53/39T or 50/34T.

I showed that even a compact crankset with a 110mm BCD (bolt circle diameter) and 50/34T chainrings is just not enough. That's because the smallest chainring that can be installed on such cranks is a 34T and there are no road cassettes that will have sprockets larger than 30T or maybe 32T (SRAM). This means that by replacing the cassette and keeping the cranks, we can't achieve a 1:1 gear ratio.
 

But what to do if we want even lower gears?
 

Replace the crankset - is the answer. Finding the right one, is the challenge. There are some classic offerings from Herse, Stronglight, TA and Velo Orange but all of these look just too retro for my taste, use square taper bottom brackets and have no ramps and pins to ease shifting with indexed STI shifters. Plus, all these cranks can be quite expensive - somewhere between $385 to $450, without bottom brackets (Velo Orange option is actually cheaper but it's also the most old-school looking).

Rene Herse cranks. (Source: Compass Bicycles Ltd)

TA Specialites Carmina cranks. (Source: Google Images)

Velo Orange Grand Cru 50.4 cranks. (Source: Velo Orange)

White Industries came up with their VBC cranks, which also use a square bottom bracket, lack good ramps and pins and use proprietary chainrings. They look a bit more modern though, but I have no idea how smooth shifting would be. At $350 (for a 46/30T setup without a bottom bracket) they are not the cheapest either.

White Industries VBC cranks. (Source: Google Images)

 

In my search, I considered several options:

1. Budget option

Use Shimano Tiagra FC-4603 cranks. These come with 50/39/30T rings and cost about $120, but I also found them for only $87 on ebay. Bottom bracket, such as Tiagra 4600, costs about $25. Set of chainring bolts: $8-$15. I would need these, since I would have to remove the 50T entirely and replace the 39T ring with a 46T ring from my current cranks.

TOTAL: $120

Pros and cons? It is cheap but also heavy - Tiagra crankset weighs over 1000g. The biggest problem is that I would be limited to 1:1 ratio with my 12-30T cassette. If I want something lower, I would have to spend much more and replace either chainrings, cassette, rear derailleur or all of these. Is it worth it? Only if you're on a tight budget.

Shimano Tiagra FC-4603 crankset. (Source: Google Images)

 

2. Still quite inexpensive but lighter

This is essentially the same approach as option 1, but with the Shimano 105 FC-5703 cranks for $217. These cranks are hollow and the weight of the crankset is only about 850g with 50/39/30T rings.

TOTAL: $260

Pros and cons? Yes, it is lighter, looks much better, but it is still only 1:1 ratio. To achieve lower gearing I would either have to replace the 30T chainring with a smaller one or replace the cassette (with e.g. 12-32T) and a rear derailleur. This may quickly all add up to $430. Is it worth it? Depends. It is probably the cheapest option with a good weight-to-performance ratio: relatively lightweight setup, still not too expensive and 1:1 gearing can be easily achieved. But, using triple cranks with 2 chainrings only means that chainline and q-factor suffer a little but other than that, it does look attractive.

Shimano 105 FC-5603 crankset. (Source: Google Images)

 

3. The best choice out there?

However, within the $300-$400 range, I think I can do better. Sugino OX601D crankset is the smaller cousin of the $500 OX801D cranks. The finish of OX601D is a bit dull and the price is lower, but except that, there seems to be not much difference between these two. These cranks can be ordered with many different chainrings down to 44/30T and they come with 110/74mm BCDs (That's what Sugino calls Compact Plus). This means that theoretically, even smaller rings down to 24T can be installed. Not to mention that the largest ring is aggressively ramped and pinned to help shifting and the bottom bracket is included in price and features outboard cups!

Sugino OX601D crankset. (Source: Google Images)

 

Since OX601D can be purchased for $330, is it worth paying more for the OX801D? Their reported weights are quite different but after lots of research, I found out that while 920g of OX601D includes the bottom bracket, the 790g of OX801D does not. In fact, I read that the bottom bracket for both cranks weighs about 105g, which would mean that there is only 30g difference in weight between them. Apparently, the more expensive crank has alloy chainring bolts, high polish finish and... a higher price. The rest is about the same as its smaller cousin.

But how about the gear ratios? By purchasing the cranks with 44/30T rings (Unfortunately, there seems to be no way to order them with 44/28T rings.), I am still limited to 1:1 ratio, but future expandability of such system looks much more promising. I found out that I very rarely use the smallest 12T sprocket in my cassette, therefore, reducing the largest chainring to 44T makes sense. By doing this and eventually replacing the small one with a 28T ring, I can still maintain 16T difference between the rings - a maximum allowed for standard road derailleurs. Of course, I am not limited here. With different derailleurs, I can lower the gearing even further to 44/28T +12/32T or maybe 44/26T + 12/32T. This is the beauty of cranks such as OX601D and this is why in comparison, compact road cranks combined with a huge 36T cassette sprocket is a dead-end solution (You can't install a smaller ring than a 34T on compact cranks and there are no road cassettes with sprockets larger than 36T).

TOTAL: $346 (with an extra 28T ring)

Pros and cons? Not cheap, but highly expandable and flexible system. Possible to achieve a truly low gearing with integrated, indexed shifters.

Low gearing on a road bike - Part 1/3: "Finding the best solution"

A standard road bike used to be equipped with a 2-chainring crankset: 53 or 52-teeth large ring and a 39-teeth small one. Within the last few years (roughly since 2006) we witnessed the (re-)introduction of a "compact" version with 50T/34T chainrings. I believe that many cyclists welcomed this option wholeheartedly, as the usability of the large 53T ring was somewhat questionable. Not everyone can be Lance Armstrong to spin that huge 53T chainring on local roads effectively.

Still, sometimes even the 50T/34T combination can be very limiting, especially that the largest rear cog available in a standard road cassette is only 30T (Shimano) or 32T (SRAM). This means, steep hills remain a challenge for weaker riders that are left on the road without a truly low (<1:1 ratio) gearing. Actually, achieving such a low gearing on a road bike is not that hard at all, but the tricky part is to do it with integrated shifters (such as Shimano STI). If we don't mind giving up on our indexed STI shifters, the best option seems to be to build a road bike with mountain bike components, as these come with smaller chainrings and larger cassette sprockets.

Or is it?

I am running a typical cyclocross crankset on my road/cross/touring bike. It has a 46T/38T chainrings, which combined with a 12-30T, 10-speed cassette gives me a decent range of gear ratios. Yet, in some situations, I wish I had even lower gears available. Unfortunately, the cranks (a standard road type) have the BCD (bolt circle diameter) of 130mm and the smallest chainring I can install on these cranks is 38T. In order to increase the gear ratio, I would have to install compact cranks, with a 110mm BCD. However, the smallest chainring available for such cranks is only 34T and combined with a 30T rear sprocket, it is not the sub-1:1 ratio I would be looking for. What options do I have then?

1. Use compact cranks. Change the cassette.

This seems to be a decent solution, especially that compact road cranksets are readily available and SRAM makes large-sprocket, Shimano-compatible cassettes with 32T and even 36T cogs. The problem is the rear derailleur capacity. Road derailleurs are not designed to work with sprockets larger than 28-30T. Recently, SRAM introduced the new WiFli road derailleurs that can now handle a 32T sprocket, which means that a 12-32T cassette may work with a standard derailleur in some circumstances, but choosing a 12-36T cassette means that the derailleur will have to be replaced with a long-cage MTB model. Unfortunately, these are rarely compatible with road group components. One known to work with 10-speed road cassettes and STI shifters is the Shimano Deore RD-M592 9-speed (!). Other options exist as well.

RD-M592 rear derailleur - 9 speed but works with 10 speed STI shifters. (Source: shimano.com)

 

There is a fundamental problem with this solution, though. Instead of just decreasing the chainring size, which could reduce the crankset weight as well, we have to increase the weight of the bike's rear end by using a huge (and heavy) cassette with the huge 36T sprocket. Also, there is no way of lowering the gear ratio past 0.94 with a 34+36T setup (a 34T chainring for compact cranks and a 36T sprocket in the cassette). To do it, the entire crankset would have to be replaced as well. That's why it clearly looks like an all-wrong, dead-end solution.

2. Keep the same cassette. Change the crankset.

This would be the best option of them all. The goal is to use a smaller than a 34T chainring and relatively large cassette sprockets. Theoretically, by reducing chainring size, we can not only lower gear ratios but also decrease the weight of the bike. We don't necessary have to change the rear derailleur for a one with a longer cage (although this depends on the final chainring selection) nor STI shifters. This means we need a crankset with a BCD smaller than 110mm, designed for road bikes. And this is the problem, as very few of such cranks exist. There is a bunch of retro-looking cranksets for square taper bottom brackets, but if you would like to use modern cranks with outboard bearing cups, your selection is very limited. The notable example is Sugino OX801D, which comes with 110/74mm BCD for a wide range of chainring combinations, down to 24T. Unfortunately, it costs $500 and it's availability is limited anywhere outside of Japan.

Sugino OX801D - one of its kind?

Alternatively, a triple crankset could be used, set up as a double, with the largest chainring installed in the place of the middle one. I am not sure how smoothly such contraption would shift, but theoretically, it is possible to achieve a 0.75 gear ratio with a smallest 24T chainring in the front and a 32T sprocket in the cassette. There are some issues with this solution. Front road derailleurs are designed to work with a 16T difference between chainrings so this setup may work if we stay with e.g. 46/30T or 44/28T rings. Such combination looks potentially promising as it allows for a 1:1 or even lower gear ratio. The q-factor (width between cranks) may suffer a little but it should be still smaller than when using mountain bike components.

I will discuss this option more in part 2. Stay tuned.

3. Settle for the middle. A compromise.

The third option is to settle for something simpler - a compact crankset with a 34T chainring and the largest cassette a road derailleur can handle. This would probably be a 12-32T cassette with a medium-cage derailleur. It may be a stretch on some frames, especially those with a shorter derailleur hanger. Obviously, this way we won't have the 1:1 ratio, but it will be close. The winners are bicycles set up with all-SRAM components, as they can take advantage of WiFli derailleurs and shifters.

This finally brings me to the point of this post - we desperately need manufacturers to follow Sugino's example and introduce more modern road cranksets with smaller BCDs. Sure, a 34T chainring is nice, but a 28T or even 26T is nicer.