To Be Truly Clean

I am not a clean person. Some might say that describes me in general, but, specifically, I'm not clean with my bikes. I tend to lube and re-lube and assume the old lube just vanishes into nothingness. After years of doing it this way--often times using supposedly "self-cleaning" lubes--I realize that my drive-train is almost always dirty. The good news is that it's a well-lubed dirt. I've convinced myself that this fact makes it okay.

At Interbike, we got to pick up a sample of some new wax-based lube: Squirt. We've got it on at least three bikes here at GearReview, but when I decided to put it on my road bike, I decided that this time, I'd clean my bike first. And by clean, I really mean really clean and not "Jon clean".

I started out with a large container of de-natured alcohol for my degreaser. I then proceeded to disassemble my drive-train. I removed the chain (of course), the cassette, the chain-rings, the derailleur pulleys, and the inner rear-derailleur cage plate. I soaked the parts. I scrubbed the parts. I went through rolls of paper-towels. The chain itself was soaked and wiped clean 3 or 4 times. I used up that entire 20-gallon barrel of de-natured alcohol. When I was done and everything was re-assembled, I could touch any part of my drive-train and my fingers would remain clean.

Of course, at this point, my fingers were a long-way from clean, but trust me, this was clean. I may not have ever known a single clean thing in my entire life, but this day, this moment in time, I knew clean.

Then, ever so carefully, I applied a drop of this supposed wonder-lube on my chain--one drop per roller. I ran it through the gears. I waited. I re-applied the lube. I waited some more.

Actually, I waited a few days, but only because it was midnight and I didn't get another chance to ride for a while.

First Impressions?
Everything was smooth and quiet. Shifting was superb.

Well, until I shifted under load and threw my chain off the inside of my chain-rings. I then reached down to put it back on (it got stuck around the bottom bracket when I tried to just "shift" it back on). To my amazement and horror, my fingers were black. Black, I tell you! Where did all this unclean blackness come from? How could this be? Evidently, I don't know clean.

Since then, I've learned that I should have sprayed off my chain with water to rinse out the rest of the solvent and the remaining hidden uncouth blackness. All I know is that I'll probably never go to all that trouble to clean my drive-train again.

Gore Phantom

Gore's aptly named -- for this time of year -- Phantom is one versatile garment. We received this from Gore Bike Wear last Friday, I couldn't wait to try it out, this being fall -- and a rather wet fall, too, I might add.

I'll just run through the specs quickly here:
Softshell with a DWR finish to repel rain.
Three rear pockets (something of a rarity in a jacket).
Zip-off sleeves.
The fabric is Gore Wind Stopper.
The fit is trim, so it doesn't flap in the wind.
There are reflective bits all over the jacket for night time conspicuity.

This is the jacket with sleeves:

When the sleeves are removed, you don't end up with a vest, you really end up with a thick, wind stopping, short sleeved jersey. More or less.

All in all, my initial impression is that this is one well thought out product.

Ay-Up

Last week I got a package in the mail from the good folks at Ay-Up USA, the U.S. distributor for the Australian made Ay-Up lights. The package contained two lights -- one spot beam, one intermediate beam -- three batteries, one charger and handle bar and helmet mounts. There are two small batteries and one large battery... large in that it is bigger than the other two, but still small.

The bar mount straddles the stem:

You can see it better without the light head. Also shown, under my stem, is the larger of the batteries:

Ay-Up has to have the lowest profile helmet mount out there:


There are a couple of interesting things about the Ay-Up lights. First, there is no power switch. If you want the light on, you plug it in, if you want it off, you unplug it. At first I didn't think I'd like this set up, and while I still don't think it is ideal, it's not as bad as I had imagined. Second, while the lights are independently adjustable up and down, there is no horizontal adjustment. Finally, all of the mounts are held on via zip-ties. While light, cheap and easy to use, they aren't conducive to swapping bikes or helmets.

Light On!

This was a new one for me... I first learned about Light On! right here on the blog. Brian -- owner of Light On! -- made a comment about my reviewing a set and a short while later -- after some emails back and forth -- I've got the set.

The light set includes both helmet and handlebar lights, but the beam pattern is the same for both units. The light heads use 4 LEDs with flood style lenses. The switch (see the red circle below) is located on the battery -- which is NiMH, something not seen recently -- and is unique in that it is a 3-position rotary switch.

The first position is off, then low, then high. Low beam uses two of the LEDs while high uses all four. The light head attaches to the handlebars using a large O-ring like Lupine uses.

More and more manufacturers are using this O-ring arrangement and I think that it works brilliantly. The claimed out put for each light head is 500 lumens -- giving a combined 1000 lumens.

The List

You've been asking for it, and I've been compiling it... so here it is.

The following manufacturers are confirmed -- i.e., I have the lights, or they are in the mail -- to be participating, in no particular order:

Lupine
Wilma (for sure)
Betty (maybe)
DiNotte Lighting
600L Spot
600L Wide
200L
200L dual
Exposure Lights
Joystick Maxx
Enduro Maxx
Race Maxx
Ay-Up
LCP4N
Light On!
Expedition 1000
Light and Motion
Stella
Nite Rider
SolMate
MiNewt X2
MiNewt X2 Dual
TriNewt
BR Lights
Not sure which models, yet.

I am still working on a couple of other companies, so the list might expand. This review looks to be the biggest one yet. As new lights arrive, I'll post more information -- I recently received the Light On! lightset, so I'll be previewing that later this week.

Adidas Supernova

To understand what drew me to the Supernovas, you have to understand what type of glasses I was wearing, and how long I'd been wearing them.

There I was, at the Outdoor Demo, and the glasses I always wore on shorter rides, somehow weren't turning out to be comfortable "all-day" glasses. In fact, as it turns out, they squeeze my brains right out of my head--no small feat on one with such a tiny pin-head as myself. It was getting such that I'd rather deal with the dust and the unrelenting desert sun, than continue to wearing this C-clamp--I mean these sunglasses.

It was then that I saw the Supernovas lying idly at the Adidas booth. You see, in addition to checking out bikes at the Outdoor Demo, we get to check out equipment. I immediately snatched up a pair of these to sooth my aching head. At first, I didn't care about anything else--only that they didn't squeeze the life out of my noggin.


As it turns out, these are as adjustable, and in the same way, as the Evil Eye Pro's that James got to review. As you can see, however, the Supernova's are a frameless design and, as such, are quite light.

Of course, I'll have a full review in the coming weeks and/or months.

Photochromic Clear

I've reviewed photochromic sunglasses before, but these are a little different. Rather than go from a light tint do a darker tint, these lenses go from clear (95% transmission) to dark (5% transmission).

Before sunlight:

After sunlight:

I find this range of light transmission amazing. This means that you can begin the day before the sun comes up, and as it gets lighter, your glasses get darker, as needed.

The lenses came in Rudy Project's Raydon frame. These have adjustable nose pieces and adjustable ear pieces. The lenses are also interchangeable, so if the photochromic clear aren't quite right for the conditions you are riding in, then you could swap out the lenses for a different tint or color.

As usual, though, the photochromic doesn't work inside of cars -- the lenses require UV light to trigger the change and most automotive windows are coated against UV transmission.

Yeah, the above has nothing to do with lights, and I know that many of you are waiting for the list. I'll have the list of lights up later this week. It won't be final, but it should be nearly so.

A Curse

I don't really ever get flats. I mean, I've had flats before, but it isn't the norm. On my mountain bike, I used to often get flats--only because I'd push the envelope of low-pressure in my USTs. On my road bike, I can think of twice in the first 2000 miles or so. The first time, I was prepared with a mini pump and a spare tube. I remember that I couldn't quite get the pressure up to a comfortable riding level of near 100 PSI. After that, I got a CO2 inflater. My second flat was much nicer. I was back on the road quickly with rock-hard tires.

Allow me to digress...
There is a trend in road cycling to make wheels with deep rims. This is a fine trend, as trends go, because aerodynamics in wheels is very important. However. I don't have aero wheels. Because of this, I hate the trend that has sprung up from the first trend. Namely, all tube available at my LBS have extremely long stems. When I bought my current spare tubes, I found a place online where I could get short valve stems. Also, I had the option of picking the standard threaded stems or smooth valve stems, "which causes less damage to pumps." I went for short and smooth. I was pretty excited about these tubes.

Curse
The first time I found I had a flat--two days ago--I didn't even consider using my new shiny tubes. I pulled out the old spare I'd been carrying around for 6 months or so and patched up the other tube to replace the spare. Sure, it nixed my ride for that day, but I knew I'd have time "tomorrow" for a ride.

Tomorrow came (yesterday), and the same tire was flat. Yes, I checked the tire for debris (and even removed the offending shard of metal) after changing the flat. I grabbed my mtn bike and headed out on the trail. It was a good ride, but I only had time for a short mtn ride, when I would have spent almost twice the time on the road. Plus, I really wanted to try out my new heat-molded Shimano insoles.

I checked the tire again last night, and didn't waste any time with the old tubes. I fixed the flat with one of my two new tubes (with the short, smooth valve stems).

This morning, I finally got back on the road again.

Let me pause here and tell you about a conversation I had with my wife last night.

"I'm cursed," I said.

"Nonsense," she replied, "a couple of flats hardly constitutes a curse."

"You're wrong," I said with a foreboding voice. Also, I might have been pointing my finger with a crazed look in my eyes--just for effect.

Okay, back to the story. After about 2.5 miles into my perfect ride this morning, I was beginning to question my decision to hand-check the pressure of my tires--the tires I pumped up last night--because things were feeling a bit soft. When I came to a stop at an intersection, "a bit soft" was no longer very accurate. The light turned green and I limped across the intersection to come to a stop below a friendly--bright--street lamp.

I was frustrated--it being the third flat of the week and all--but not undaunted. I had, after all, one of my new tubes with the short, and smooth, valve-stems. I think I was most frustrated that I hauled my heavy HID--well, heavy by my road bike's standards--along and it would probably be light by the time I completed my task.

I calmly removed the offending tube, inserted the shiny new one, and got out my handy CO2 inflator to finish the job.

And that is when things really started to go south.

My CO2 inflator refused to get a solid grip on my shiny new smooth and short valve-stem. Meanwhile, precious CO2 was escaping unhindered into the atmosphere. I pulled it off, put it back on and tried again. Again, the CO2 was leaving the inflator, but not entering the tube. After about 4 tries, I compressed the tire/tube enough to get that reluctant short valve-stem out of the rim far enough for the CO2 inflator to grab on and function properly. The result was a tube that was under-inflated, but probably full enough to get me the 2-3 miles home on my own power.

You'll notice I didn't say it WAS full enough, but said PROBABLY.

Yes, fool that I am, I sought to get in a little more CO2--get it a little fuller. The funny thing about presta valves, for those of you unfamiliar, is that in order to put air in, you need to open the valve. I jammed the CO2 inflator on the valve-stem--effectively opening the valve--and tried to get a little more air in. Wouldn't you know it, but it didn't seat properly. The result: 1) All the air was let out of the tire/tube. 2) All the CO2 (or at least enough to equalize it with atmospheric pressure at around 4700') left the inflator.

Empty tube.

Empty inflator.

"Cursed," I said out loud to no one in particular.

Shame
I pulled out my mobile and called my wife to come pick me up.

Adidas Evil Eye Pro

We've received quite a bit of gear for review lately -- some of it came back with us from InterBike and some of it arrived in the mail since our return. Today, I'll look at a pair of sunglasses that followed me home... I just had to keep them!

While at the Dirt Demo, we stopped by the Adidas Eyewear booth to see what they had in their line up. I walked away with the Evil Eye Pro glasses.

The angle of the arms is adjustable.

While the nose piece is also adjustable, for a customized fit.

There is also a wicking sponge along the top of the glasses to help eliminate dripped sweat from getting on the lenses. The glasses also came with a soft case, a hard case and a spare set of lenses -- the spare lenses are an orange tint that is not dark at all, very nice for rainy and overcast days.

Look for an in depth review soon.

It's Getting Dark Earlier

It's getting dark earlier every day, with the big hit to evening sun -- if you are in the United States -- happening November 4th when we move our clocks back to standard time. So, what's a guy/gal to do? Why use lights of course!

I'm starting to collect the lights needed for our 3rd Annual LED light review.

As and aside, I can't believe that we're on number three. Looking back, I also can't believe how improved these lights are over the initial LED lights we tested in the Winter of '05/'06.

This time around, we're bringing back some old faces and adding some new ones. Manufacturers that we've seen before include DiNotte, Lupine, NiteRider and Light and Motion. Newcomers will include Ay-Up and Knog, both out of Australia. And more! Last year's review was big, and this one looks like it'll be as big, or bigger than the previous one.

Now, it's your turn. What LED-based lights would you like to see included? I've got my list, but I'd like to see yours.

Qualifications: The light must be LED based -- none of that HID or halogen stuff. The light must be bright enough to use for off road cycling -- no 5mm flashing lights, thanks, and no 1W lights either. The lights can be helmet mounted or bar mounted or both/either. They much be rechargeable, no disposable batteries. That's it. As before, the lights will be grouped by category. Leave your requests in the comments section or email me.

Interbike... Grab Bag II

Well, continuing in the tradition of grabbing-whatever-photos-haven't-been-posted-yet, I'll start out with the mega-conglomerate that is SRAM:

Firstly, we have the all-new SID (pre-production, of course). I'm excited to give this one a try as I've long felt the previous SID behaves much like a soggy spaghetti noodle would if mounted to a bike.
By now, you've probably heard of the new cassette for SRAM's Red group, and here's a nice cut-away of it. Truly, it's an ingenious design--something both light-weight and long-lasting. Hopefully, that little engagement point won't dig into the free-hub as much as current offerings do.

Next we have a concept bike built by Cannondale in the SRAM booth. As you can see, that fork isn't a Lefty, but a Righty. There's nothing particularly clever about that, and I'm sure it didn't take a lot of effort to make the switch. However, take a look at the next photo.
Using an internally geared hub (built by SRAM--hence its location in the SRAM booth) this particular bike is a "Righty" in the rear, as well. It would certainly make changing tires easier, that's for sure.
At the other end of the spectrum, we find here a nice-looking traditional townie-type bike by Seven--including a very nice titanium rack up front for all your trips to the store. My favorite part, I'd have to say, is the titanium shallow mustache bars. Can I get a set of those?

An old classic reborn is the new all-carbon GT Zaskar. I remember really wanting one of the old aluminum Zaskars back in the day. I hope this one can live up to the name.

Interbike... Grab Bag

This post will give me some space to post images that I haven't posted in previous posts. This will also wrap up my coverage of IB, but Jon might have more to share later.

One of the more surprising bikes I rode was the Iron Horse MKIII.

I've always thought of them as a budget brand, but budget or not, the bike rode very well.

I also spent some time on Giant's Anthem -- Giant named their demo bikes so that they could keep track of them. Most other companies numbered their bikes. That's the reason for the "Allison" on the bike's top-tube.

I actually rode the Anthem twice... I liked it that well. The shorter travel worked very well on the smooth-ish trails at Bootleg Canyon. In fact, I preferred the Anthem to it's longer legged sibling, the Trance.

Cane Creek had this Data Acquisition system set up on a Morewood -- the red arrow is pointing to a potentiometer.

The POT feeds data to this PDA using a serial interface.

This enables the engineers to look at shaft speed, position, damping profiles, etc. helping them fine tune the shocks for the best performance -- and back it all up with hard numbers.

We got to ride Cannondale's Super6 road bike. I normally ride a Cannondale aluminum frame and I found that the fit was different on this bike. The top tube was noticeably longer. Longer TT notwithstanding, this was one fast, responsive bike. I cannot comment on it smoothing out the road because the course they had us on is some of the smoothest road around. It's not very enlightening.

Fox was showing off it's F29 fork. As the name implies this is an air fork with longer legs for the bigger 29inch wheeled bikes.

Giro was sporting this new look for it's popular Xen helmet. The cover is fabric and the beak/bill/visor is covered with a rubbery material. Very trick.


Look was showing off it's new Quartz pedal line up. Not only is the design very, very open -- good for getting rid of mud -- but even the cheapest ($99) is pretty darn light, at 230g per pair.


And that's -- as they say -- a wrap. Check back in later this week for more light-related news, and, hopefully, a preview of some upcoming reviews.

Interbike Day 3 - Continued

Though the normal stress of running from appointment to appointment was gone, on Day 3, it was replaced by the stress of making sure we saw everything. It seems every year I get back from Interbike only to see something on some website that I missed. I really didn't want that to happen.

One of the cooler single-speed innovations I've seen was at the Spot booth--their new belt-drive.

In order to have a continuous belt, however, Spot has put a removeable slot in the rear drop-out. (A note to builders: they're selling this drop-out so you can put it on your own frame.)

Another neat idea came from this novel approach to stowing a spare derailleur hanger for emergencies. They carry replacements for most frames.

They also have a generic hanger that bolts on with the QR skewer--it wouldn't shift well, but it'd get you home.

Here is the generic hanger mounted on a frame.

We stopped by the Rotor booth to see their recent foray into light-weight components. Here's their stem.

The face plate of the stem.

In addition to some beautiful machining, they use an interesting approach to bolts. By using a dual-threaded bolt, they can eliminate the head. Not only does this lead to a very clean appearance, but it also saves a tiny bit of weight. If you're the kind of person who doesn't use cable end-caps to save weight, you'll relate to this approach.

We just had to swing by the Jelly Belly Sport Beans booth and shake things up a bit. Eventually they caught up with me when I got lost and couldn't find my way out of the convention center. I had to return the motorcycle.

Interbike Day 3

This was the last day of the show, and the least hectic. We kept our schedule light on Day 3 so that we could wander a bit -- instead of running from one appointment to another -- and see what we would have otherwise missed.

But first, we stopped by USE/VDO to check out their new stuff... like the Exposure Maxx lights. Here are the Joystick Maxx and the Enduro Maxx:

If you look closely, you can see they they etch the output right on the front of the Enduro Maxx... 720 lumens. The little red knob on under the Enduro is the release that allows the light to slide off the mount. A tremendous improvement over the previous mount.


As I've mentioned elsewhere, the batteries are not user swappable. Now, you charge them in place -- as before -- and if you need more run time, there is an external battery pack that can be plugged in. I'm looking forward to trying them out on the trail and road.

Calfee had this trick carbon fiber spring on display:

Supposedly, he's used it, too.

Purely Custom -- known for custom bits like top caps, valve stem caps and bar end caps (not to mention some of the coolest yo-yo's) -- have this little do-dad to help get more stuff on you bike.

We actually left with one of these, so I'll be reporting back on how stable it is. It looks like it a novel solution to the accessory mounting dilemma.

We stopped by Ritchey to see what they had on display and were shown this rigid mountain bike fork -- sorry big-wheel guys, this one is for the 26" variety.

It is full carbon... and I mean full. The only metal on this thing is at the canti mounts. And those are removable. Check out the dropouts and disc tabs:

Interbike Day 2 - Continued

Day Two Continued ... It seemed like it lasted longer than one day...

As you might have read elsewhere (as if you ever look to other websites for information...), Crank Brothers had a lot to say. Surprisingly enough, though, they didn't have much to say in regards to pedals. For the most part, they only had some color changes.

The most interesting to me was their wheelset.

They have aluminum "nipples" that extend half-way across the radius of the wheel to meet up with a steel spoke which then connects to the rim in a very unique way.

Their stainless-steel and aluminum bonded cranks, Cobalt, are now offered in a outboard bearing design.

They also introduced this strange quick-release wheel skewers which offered two levers that can be closed--or opened--separately requiring less force or together for a traditional skewer feel.

Crank Brothers will also begin to use Maverick American's height-adjustable seatpost, the Iodine.

Their headset, the Directset--not pictured, sorry--is an interesting idea for saving weight. Traditionally, A headset has the outer shell, the outer race, the bearings, the inner race, and the inner shell. Basically, Crank Brothers has made the outer shell of the headset the outer race. Though this saves a bit of weight--and they are quite light--if you neglect your headset, you won't be able to just replace the bearings, you'll have to replace the whole thing.

Besides the Fulcrum wheels, Campagnolo had little else of note for this year. Next year, however, they'll be celebrating 75 years, so look for a number of changes and interesting developments. Here pictured is the cool reflective logo down the leg of their bib shorts.

Besides the carbon cranks, Shimano has a new carbon-reinforced aluminum Dura Ace wheel.

As you can see from this cross-section, the carbon is to stiffen the wheel, but there is aluminum throughout. Retail should be around $1200.

My feet ache, I'd better sign off for now.