This Raleigh Raveino 4.0 is the first road bike my partner ever bought. She used this for everything: touring, triathlons, commuting, grocery getter, and joy rides. It was in desperate need of love and had been sitting neglected in favor of her mountain and gravel bikes. She was making some comments about just giving it away since we don't have space for things we don't use. We recently reached a place in our lives where road biking is back on the table. She wanted a new road bike, but nothing she test rode really spoke to her, regardless of budget. This bike has a lot of sentimental value for her, so I low-key encouraged her to hang onto it. I stealth-asked a bunch of questions about her component preferences with the intent of surprising her with a whole new modern group, but she still holds this bike as her platonic ideal of a general road bike for flogging. No major component changes, got it.

Sorry, I don't have a good pic of before the overhaul.

What was wrong:

• Front brake track was worn way beyond the safe limit; I've never seen a rim that worn without blowing out
• Chain was past 125% wear; fortunately the jockey wheels and chainrings were still okay
• Seatpost was single bolt design and we couldn't dial the angle for all-day comfort
• Cable sheaths were cracked and worn-through
• Bar tape was worn through in places
• Saddle was packed out, torn, and no longer comfortable
• Bent derailleur hanger

What got changed:

• Deep clean everything, ultrasonic parts wash for the brakes, derailleurs, and crankset
• NOS cassette (holy hell, finding the exact match cassette involved some bike part archaeology)
• New cables and housing
• New Raceface zero setback seatpost
• New Terry saddle
• NOS Bontrager Aeolus Comp 5 bladed spoke rims
• New cartridge pads
• New Rubino Pro tires
• New chain
• Aluminum lock bar end plugs

Yeah, the pedals are gnarly, but she wanted the old pedals. And I'm waiting for a pack of Fastenal stainless M5 bolts to backfill the braze-ons on the stays.

Her first test ride was a climb up the biggest hill in town and was a resounding success. She's overjoyed!

The bike has over 7,000 km on it, and this was still the original front tire, while the rear one has already been replaced twice. I got lucky - the tire I had been eyeing on was 60% off, so I managed to get two for the price of one.

The new one is 5.05" wide, compared to the original 4.8". It fits the front just fine, but I’ll have to see if it works on the rear once the current tire wears out. I’d really like to get this wider tire on the rear too - I love how mean it looks.

The knobs on this Snowshoe 2XL variant are almost twice the length of those on the Avalanche model on the right (when new). I bet that, combined with studs, it would give infinite traction on just about any kind of snow or ice.

The world’s best-selling vehicle model is a Chinese bike

@shifter created a nice video where it tells how the story of that bike model crosses the history of the country, while looking for an exemplar to try personally.

Even China, after moving away from the bike, is getting closer, even if the vehicle has changed a lot, and between bikes and mopeds, there is a whole spectrum of undefined vehicles.

crosspostated from da: https://mastodon.uno/users/rivoluzioneurbanamobilita/statuses/114057475253743972

Some bicycles get rode into or through lots of deep water, other bicycles often get left out in the rain and foggy weather.

Any which way, bicycles can most definitely rust from the inside out, so are there any recommended ways to protect against the elements?

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/20804245

Bikepacking on the Buffalo Bicycle

Nice read about a trip on the buffalo bicycle (which was posted about here some time ago), with an interesting view on the "world bicycle relief".

No hating on my mods allowed. Yes, it's duct tape.

I love commute by bike for grocery and stuff, but riding in rain is my least favorite stuff ever. Even though i have poncho, it makes me looks like a Ring Wraith on bicycle, and it's quite fussy trying to put it on. And even i get to keep everything dry somehow, the rain drop might sometime score a direct hit on my eyeball like the car salesman slapping the car. It's annoying, irritating, and frankly quite dangerous. My vision is blurred, so is my glasses, and it almost got me into trouble a few times.

So how do you guys protect your eye and keep your vision clear? I live in tropical area so the rain can be quite heavy at time, and i can't wait until it stop because sometime it will go on for hours, even if it get lighter.

How can anyone fuck up an eBike worse than a Cybertruck? Watch and find out...

So I let the chain wear down too much in the past two years and the rear sprockets appear to be worn out and will need to be replaced. The stock 50T chain ring is also showing signs of wear but appears to still be good for a few years.

I wanted to use this opportunity to see whether I could switch the gearing up a little.

The 13-16 gearing has been surprisingly capable but I need just a little more hill climbing ability; the lowest gear (2.64m) is just barely enough sometimes. I'd like it a tad lower I think.

On the high end, I usually ride in the upper two gears on flat ground. The highest gear (7.98m) feels just a tad too much sometimes though and I then fall back to one lower (6.49m) but that feels a good bit too low. That doesn't bother me a lot but it'd still be nicer to have a gear that's just right.

On a downhill, the highest gear is always sufficient for me; feels pretty much exactly right. I wouldn't mind slightly more metres of development but, honestly, I don't care very much when I'm already going way past 30km/h and I don't ride downhill for very long usually. I'm unsure whether reducing the highest gear slightly would make me pedal uncomfortably quickly down hill though.

Stock and current config:

I'm currently thinking about a 44T chain ring with 12-17:

or 12-16:

The lower gears being lower and closer together sounds very nice.

In the higher gears, my hope is that the slightly lower highest gear would allow me to use it the majority of the time on flat ground because I suspect the second highest gear would feel quite a bit too low as a fall-back.

I could see 12-15 being an option perhaps but that also gets the lowest gear much closer to 13-16 again:

But obviously the lowest gear gets very close to the previous config again.

Where I have a hard time is imagining how significant the difference between 2.64m, 2.19m, 2.33m and 2.48m are in an uphill scenario. The jump between the lower gears in 13-16 (3.25m to 2.64m) in practice feels significant but not that large either and we're talking about a much lower absolute drop being gained in the low end by switching gearing. I don't know whether the practical effect of this is linear though and I suspect it might not be.

I'd really appreciate practical experience here. Have you changed gearing on your Brompton? From what to what and how significant were the differences?

For the vast majority of winter I get by perfectly fine without studs simply by having wide tires and running so low pressures that the gauge doesn't even register. However, there's that handful of trips, especially towards the end of the winter, that I could really use the extra grip you get with studded tires. I decided to continue on the custom / diy theme with my bike mods and used 13mm self-tapping screws instead of dedicated tire studs. It's ones with a wide, flat base but I'm still considering taping over them to protect the tubes.

This is the rear wheel, I think I'm only doing the outside row on the front. I only have about 25% of the knobs studded and the increase in grip is already immense.

In 2023, my goal was 4,000 miles, and I made it, so I started with the same this year.

In late September, 2024, my local club did a ride across our state, about 350 miles over 4 days. After that, I was about 20 miles shy of the 4,000 goal, and hit it within the following week. I normally ride 80-120 miles per week, so 350 was a huge jump.

Then, I upped the goal to 5,000 miles, then finished that in late November or early December. A friend congratulated me and noted that 5,000 miles was almost 100 miles per week, so I made the new goal 5,200 miles.

Of those 5,348 miles, 2,111 miles (~39%) were on Zwift. I did three imperial centuries on Zwift this year, and several more metric centuries on Zwift. The rest were all outdoor, ranging from 25 miles to 120 miles.

I haven't decided on a goal for next year yet. Right now it's at 5,200 miles (it automatically resets to the same). But, for various reasons, I'm not sure whether I'll ride that much this year.

Had a 2000km goal. Have a 3000km goal for this year.

Just bought my first road bike and put it on a trainer for the winter. Still tweaking the saddle and such for a more comfortable ride but I'm not there yet.

Have anyone tried these on a non folded bike?

https://liteprobicycle.com/products/litepro-elite-folding-bicycle-k3-plus-pig-nose-front-bag-adapter-mount-alloy-modified-front-shelf-racks-bike-for-fnhon-dahon?_pos=2&_sid=0f57a7976&_ss=r

#biketooter #bikewrench

I'm pretty excited about this. Riding downtown was always a bit hell. It still is in most parts.

The Balloon Cycle

There floated over the hamlet of Ville neuvye-la-Garenne, the other afternoon, in mid-air, a balloon. Suddenly it appeared to burst and fell rapidly toward the earth. Fearing that a disaster had occurred the terrified folk ran to the spot at which they expected the aerostat would reach the ground, when to their amazement they saw a parachute detach itself from the car and descend gently. Immediately the earth was touched one of the passengers jumped upon a small bicycle which he had brought with him from the aerial regions, and he disappeared in the direction of Levallois, in the neighborhood of Paris, as rapidly as the machine could carry him. The explanation of this singular occurrence is simple. The balloon was the Caliban, and the ascent was made from Levallios by Captain Capazza and M. Hervien, the latter being the cyclist. Their object was to test the possibility of a balloon being used for carrying war dispatches, and they assumed that an enemy succeeded in destroying it. Yet they proved that by means of the parachute they would be able to make good their escape and to outdistance their pursuers with the aid of a portable bicycle.—London Telegraph

https://archive.org/details/BRM_1894101801/page/n5/mode/1up?view=theater&q=Balloon

Recently a bicycle race from Bath to Kensington, 106 miles, for the (captaincy) and (subcaptaincy) of the Middlesex Bicycle Club commenced in the Bath Market-place, the competitors being Mesate, Pearce, Leaver, Goulding, Percy, Tyne, Spencer, and Walker. The diameter of the driving wheels varied from 45 to 52 inches. The first six miles of the race, which was over a capital road, were done in a very short space of time. At Newbury, which is about midway, the first two riders to arrive were Walker and Tyne. Here the wheel of Tyne's machine collapsed, making him lose two hours in the first half of the race. He went on again, but was quite out of the running. The race was won by Mr. Walker, of the Middlesex Bicycle Club, who started at ten minutes past five a.m. and arrived at Kensington at fifteen minutes past three p.m. - the greatest speed on record for the distance.

Sorry for any errors.

So a modern rider typically takes at least 4 hours to do a century ride and that is at top amateur/pro levels. Averaging 25 miles per hour for that long is very difficult. Most avid club cyclists will average around 16 mph in the real world and can finish a century in around 6-7 hours.

In this race, it started at just after 5 am and was won by the finishing rider just over ten hours later at fifteen minutes past 3 pm. So the average speed of the winning rider was just over 10 miles per hour. You'll have to forgive me for not knowing metric time but in real units, the race was 170 km, and the average speed was 17 kph.

In terms of wheel size, the 700c wheels of today are around 28in in diameter. The racers here were riding between 45-52in. So 45in is 1.143m, and 52in is 1.32m

I speculate that these were likely Penny-farthing or Ordinary velocipedes

The frame is a single tube following the circumference of the front wheel, then diverting to a trailing wheel. A mounting peg is above the rear wheel. The front wheel is in a rigid fork with little if any trail. A spoon brake is usually fitted on the fork crown, operated by a lever from one of the handlebars. The bars are usually mustache shaped, dropping from the level of the headset. The saddle mounts on the frame less than 18 inches (46 cm) behind the headset.

One particular model, made by Pope Manufacturing Company in 1886, weighs 36 pounds (16 kg), has a 60-spoke 53-inch (130 cm) front wheel and a 20-spoke 18-inch (46 cm) rear wheel. It is fitted with solid rubber tires. The rims, frame, fork, and handlebars are made from hollow, steel tubing. The steel axles are mounted in adjustable ball bearings. The leather saddle is suspended by springs.[32]

Another model, made by Humber and Co., Ltd., of Beeston, Nottingham, weighs only 24 pounds (11 kg), and has 52-inch (130 cm) and 18-inch (46 cm) wheels. It has no step and no brakes, in order to minimize weight.[33]

A third model, also made by Pope Manufacturing Company, weighs 49 pounds (22 kg) and has forged steel forks. A brake lever on the right of a straight handlebar operates a spoon brake against the front wheel.[34]

All three have cranks that can be adjusted for length.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penny-farthing

The original posted article from 1874 is on page 2 at the top right of the news paper archived here: https://archive.org/details/NPDP18740922/page/0/mode/2up?q=bicycle&view=theater

I didn't think aluminum rims or clinchers were a thing all the way back then.

Here are all the rest of the cycling highlights of The Iron Age like chainless drive too.

stationary trainer:

https://archive.org/details/IronAgeVol54Jul121894/page/n95/mode/1up?view=theater

::: spoiler Bonus riding lawn mower:

I'm not sure I can link like that to archived images from a catalog. Page 279 is missing from the scan. This is the whole catalog: https://archive.org/details/sears-roebuck-catalogue-111/page/n136/mode/1up?view=theater The bicycle section starts on page 137 of the slider.

For reference:

At this early point in the history of license plates in the United States of America, none of the 45 states, territories, or the District of Columbia, was issuing its own plates.[1][2][3][4] The State of New York remained the only state that required vehicle owners to register their automobiles. The system of using the owner's initials as the registration number, begun in 1901, remained in effect. This would change in 1903 when a number was assigned to each owner to display on their vehicle. Across the country the increases in the number of automobiles was being noticed, and there were many cities, like Chicago, that had already begun to require their owners to register their vehicles.[5][6]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_the_United_States_for_1902

1902

• February 12 – The 1st Conference of the International Woman Suffrage Alliance takes place in Washington, D.C..
• March 7 – Second Boer War: Battle of Tweebosch – South African Boers win their last battle over the British Army, with the capture of a British general and 200 of his men.
• March 10 – Clashes between police and Georgian workers led by Joseph Stalin leave 15 dead, 54 wounded, and 500 in prison.[1]
• April 2 – The Electric Theatre, the first movie theater in the United States, opens in Los Angeles.
• May 20 – Cuba gains independence from the United States.
• July 2 – Philippine–American War ends.
• August 22 – Theodore Roosevelt becomes the first American President to ride in an automobile, a Columbia Electric Victoria through Hartford, Connecticut.
• August 22 – A 7.7 earthquake shakes the border between China and Kyrgyzstan killing 10,000 people.
• September 1 – The first science fiction film, the silent A Trip to the Moon (Le Voyage dans La Lune), is premièred at the Théâtre Robert-Houdin in Paris, France, by actor/producer Georges Méliès, and proves an immediate success.[7]
• November 16 – A newspaper cartoon depicting U.S. President "Teddy" Roosevelt refusing to shoot a bear cub inspires creation of the first teddy bear by Morris Michtom in New York City.
• December 30 – Discovery Expedition: British explorers Scott, Shackleton and Wilson reach the furthest southern point reached thus far by man, south of 82°S.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1902