Project Fatbike halfway there

A year ago I told someone that fatbikes were a heavy, stupid, waste of time, I may have even called my friend " a real asshole" for wanting one.  Now in 2012 I realize that fatbikes are a heavy, stupid, waste of time; and that is exactly why I wanted one. 

Over the past few weeks I have been building a Surly Pugsley. The Pugsley was the first mass produced fatbike in 2005 and to this day remains a pretty rad option for finding your own trails. The process of building a fatbike with it's weird offset frame spacing and piggish 100 millimeter downhill bottom bracket has taught me a few things: #1 I have a very resilient face and #2 being a weight weenie puts you in the 30 pound range for a fatbike, which is obscenely heavy for any other bike.

When you deal carbon, titanium or cocaine you measure in grams; with fatbikes you measure in pounds.

Fatbikes were originally made for riding bikes in the Alaskan winter -which typically lasts 49 weeks- and have up to 4.7 inch tires to give the best float and traction in snow and sand. A fatbike sitting next to any other bicycle looks oafish and clunky almost like a monster truck.  As of December 30th the Philadelphia metro area has had a total of 4 inches of snow making my fatbike purchase a (potential) colossal waste of what could have been a very nice carbon wheelset for my 29er. With any luck it will just dump snow this year and I will be loving life on my 26x4.0 45NRTH Escalators

a fatbike in it's natural element

TO BE CONTINUED

Merry Hanukkah, it's time to get drunk.

Well, it's December again, the time of year when people grumble about where the year went as if they weren't awake for it, and complain about cookies like they haven't been fat for the last eleven and a half months.  As I approach this holiday season with it's thirty degree days and holiday parties I am reminded that there are 2 types of people in the world: people who are good at drinking, and those who are not.

If you are 21 years old and drink 14 Bud Lights with your college buddies, you are not good at drinking, you are an asshole.   If you put ice in wine for ANY reason - I don't care what box it came out of - you are bad at drinking.  If you don't drink, and chose to say loudly "I DON'T DRINK" when someone offers you an alcoholic beverage instead of "no thank you" it is a sure sign that you are bad at drinking and possibly life itself. If you are bad at drinking, please turn off your internet device and go fuck yourself.

Then there are the folks who are good at drinking.  If you choose your beer based on what kind of hops are in it, and know what IBU means, you may be a pretentious hipster, and also good at drinking.  If you use the proper stemware for the type of wine you are drinking and don't fill it up all the way to the rim, you may be good at drinking. If your booze comes in a corked glass bottle instead of a plastic 1.75L jug it is a great first step towards being a better drinker, good for you. 

The Internet: More Than Just Pornography (or so I'm told)

BEER

If you like strong, fancy beer and you are a bit of a weirdo I would suggest you ingest BrewDog. Brewdog is a UK brewery that calls itself  "a post Punk apocalyptic mother-fucker of a craft brewery." While you can occasionally come across Brewdog IPA at your local whole foods; to get the really rough good stuff you need to order direct from their online shop,

If you are fan of imperial stouts with an extra $121 dollars to spend on a SINGLE 12 oz beer you can't go wrong with 32% Tactical Nuclear Penguin. 32TNP "should be enjoyed in small servings and with an air of aristocratic nonchalance, " classy. 

 

If you are a real lady, with hair on your chest, not afraid to punch a guy in the face and think that beer with less than 40% alcohol is for pansies then, "41% Sink The Bismarck!" is for you.  "Sink the Bismarck is a quadruple IPA that contains four times the hops, four times the bitterness and frozen four times to create at a staggering 41% ABV." If you are feeling particularly festive you can get a combo of both beers at a discounted $161.

It's just too bad that Brewdog no longer has their $760 "The End of History" it was a 55% alcohol ale shoved inside a squirrel carcass.

mmmm, let's make out.

If you prefer your drink vessels a bit fancier, they even had a properly dressed gentleman option.

Good day sir! May I shine your Monocle?

I'll keep my fingers crossed that they will make a beer that gets shoved in that coat wearing Ikea  monkey

WHISKEY/WHISKY

There is way too much to say about whiskey, and the mere fact that there are two accepted spellings is sure sign that no matter what you say about whiskey, you won't be right or wrong.  Going to a state liquor store to buy a good whiskey is like going to a whorehouse to buy a bag of chips, those people don't know the nuances and don't care which you choose.

If you know about whiskey or at least understand that: more money = better booze,  head over to
Hard to find Whisky, an online retailer that specialises in supplying rare and collectable Single Malt Scotch Whisky. The HTFW website "offers several thousand of the most sought after Single Malt Scotch Whisky in the world, along with a huge selection of miniatures and a comprehensive range of Irish Whiskey and other worldwide Whiskies".

For the 8th night of Hanukkah you can pick up the last bottle of Ben Wyvis (silent) - Final Bottling - 1965 37 year old for just shy of $2300, it comes in a wooden locking box.

Another option, (if you really loved me, mom) is Macallan - Rarest Decanter - 1969 42 year old.
"Just 148 of these fantastic packages have been produced, which include an engraved crystal decanter, two crystal nosing glasses and certificates about the whisky, all of which is displayed in a hand crafted wooden box constructed from the staves of the cask itself". I have always wanted to get drunk for the cost of a slightly used Toyota Camry, which is perfect because this booze cost over $19300.

I imagine drinking a whisky this rare is something like eating an endangered Siberian tiger steak while being given multiple orgasms by Mila Kunis.

Since I tend to spend almost all of my expendable income on bicycle components I will probably never buy any of this fancy booze myself,  I will have to settle for being good at drinking Dogfish head 90 minute IPAs.

You don't need a softer seatpost, you need a harder ass

First: there was the Cane Creek Thudbuster, the seat post for people too poor for a full suspension mountain bike but, who still had $200 to spend on unnecessary crap.

Shown here prior to being installed on a 1986 Slingshot mountain bike

With up to 3 inches of travel from the replaceable elastomer the thudbuster seemed like a not too terrible an idea.   The thudbuster existed for years making an assortment of fringe cyclist happy, people put thudbusters on folding bikes, tandems and decade-old steel bikes with Spinergy RevX wheels.
Fast forward to 2012 (the Chinese year of the kickstarter campaign)
What seemed almost palatable coming from cane creek apparently, wasn't good enough for some people.

Enter the Cirrus Body Float suspension seatpost.

Sweet scaffolding Bro

Their aim: provide comfort, reduced lower back and soft tissue trauma, improved cornering and handling ability and suspend the rider and not the bike
Instead of a nearly maintenance free elastomer the Body Float uses springs that can be loaded to your specific riding needs and body weight. Heavier springs can be installed for heavier riders and for more ‘cushion’ while lighter springs are utilized for lighter riders and for a more fine-tuned ride on smoother surfaces. The post has four pivot points for added rigidity.
Looking beyond the testicle numbing, sterility inducing, ass-hatchet that is the Selle Italia Flite saddle the Body Float looks like a garbage sculpture. With handling much like a Softride who could want anything more?

As it turns out the folks over at Cantitoe Road wanted more.
With a design that is less "trampoline" and more, "hey is my saddle clamp broken" Cantitoe Road has designed (but not yet built) the BioFloat.

The BioFloat seatpost uses a clamshell elastomer to trap the saddle rail clamp, completely separating it from the alloy outer clamp. This not only diffuses vibrations and shocks, it provides 360º of “float” for the saddle, letting it truly move with you as you pedal. Oddly, this seems like the least likely to fail so I'm sure it will never come to market.

Meanwhile in France -a country considered to fairly effeminate even by European standards- this is how they prepare for a bike ride:

This 28 year old woman is field testing Pinarello's the newest UCI Approved seat post

So instead of buying a new seatpost, get on your trainer and watch reruns of Paris Roubaix

"I wish I had a suspension seatpost" said Greg Lemond never.

The UCI might be a Bag of Dicks

It's been a pretty big week for the UCI.

"AIGLE, Switzerland (VN) — Julien Carron will step down as technical coordinator at the Union Cycliste Internationale at the end of November, according to press reports.
Carron has been central to the world governing body’s equipment-approval program, which is essentially a mandatory pre-production check on equipment to ensure that it is UCI-legal before it ever rolls off the assembly line, thereby reducing start-line confusion for racers and commissaires."

The Approval Stickers are mandatory however even riders sporting bikes with those stickers will have to have their position checked, their clothing checked, their bikes weighed, and checked to make sure there are no motors in the seat tube, all before giving mandatory blood/urine/semen samples. The "Approved" stickers (which cost well over $10,000 per frame design) amount to nothing more than UCI masturbation.
Additionally:
"Beginning in January 2013, forks will have to be approved along with their corresponding frames. The UCI cited difficulty in checking frames where the fork as been changed out, and the increasing number of time trial bikes being sold with illegal forks on an otherwise legal frame."

"Hey you peeing in the cup, is this the original fork or did you perform some kind of magic? "
-Some Asshole

I have created my own logo that I encourage any small frame builder to use for free, especially those builders that cannot afford the $10,000 price tag.

Peace out Mr Carron

I like bikes and Stuff

Few things in life are as simple and beautiful as a bicycle. Riding bikes is flying without the wings.
This blog is mostly about bikes and partly about all things the other things that make life worth living