Al's Blog-o-Sphere

I recently spent a week on vacation in Washington DC. I am fortunate to have an Aunt who lives there and my wife and I were her guests for the week. We did all the usual touristy things, museums, the Zoo, monuments and restaurants. But I had one day where my wife wanted to go shopping and that gave me an opportunity to do something else that she didn’t want to do.

She was shopping at Union Station and there happens to be a bicycle tour and rental place there called Bike and Roll. I used the opportunity to rent a bike and ride around the Mall area of DC.

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I’ve written about it here before, and now after five years of development, I finally have my hands on the Lucid Brake bike light. And while it’s everything I had hoped it would be, I still am a bit at a loss with what to do with it.

The concept was simple. A bike light that also alerted those behind you that you were stopping. It uses an inertial sensor to know when the light, and whatever it is attached to, stops or slows. The eight LEDs around the octagonal PC board, like a stop sign, come on brightly when stopping and flash furiously for a sudden stop. It’s quite an attention-getter, as it is designed to be.

The LEDs flash or glow steadily, depending on the mode of operation, but are almost an afterthought to the brake function. One mode even leaves them off until a stop.

The board is coated and waterproof with the only bare spots being the battery connections which hold the 2 AAA batteries firmly. The device is meant to be lightweight and minimalist for the weight-weenies in the cycling world. For those who prefer a little more of a package, there is a translucent plastic cover that snaps over it.

It has no on-off switch! Continue Reading…

Whether I’m out riding or not, I’m thinking about it and how to do it better. In pursuit of self-sufficient power for extended overnight tours, I’ve been playing around again with generating power while on the road.

I came across a post somewhere on the internets about charging 5v USB devices off of an old style generator like used to be used for headlights on bikes. Technically, they are dynamos, but I know you’ve seen one once. I have a couple kicking around in the garage from long ago.

Bottle dynamo rescued from garage

So, I cleaned one up and began thinking about building the circuitry needed to produce a 5v USB charging source.

Meanwhile, I came across a all-in-one solution, only money required.

It was a Pyle PBDNC10 and I found it on Amazon.

Well, in the interest of simplicity and cutting haywire, I decided to order it. It was only $35 and was basically a bigger “bottle” generator with all the circuitry built in. Just plug a USB cord into it and ride. Continue Reading…

Well, the restoration of the 1980’s Ross bike is coming along. I’ve been doing a little bit at a time, mostly as parts come in.

Ordering parts for a bike this old online is sometimes a crapshoot. What you can find online is almost universally poor in the descriptions. Dimensions, if given, sometimes lie. I sit in front of the computer with an old part, measure it with calipers, and make my best guess which part to buy.

My first mistake was a new quill stem – the piece that holds your handlebars and goes down into the fork. I wanted to change it because the old one was never long enough for me. It was both too short and too low. I wanted to bring the handlebars further out in front of me as well as raise them up. I thought I found the part and ordered it. It came in and was beautiful, an adjustable angle and longer than the old one. But it didn’t fit. It was 1 mm too thick to go into the fork tube.

Over the years, tubing on bikes has gotten bigger and bigger. The bikes from the 70’s and 80’s often had a inside diameter steerer tube of 21.1 mm. It was common with Schwinn, Ross and some other brands. The piece I got was 22.2 mm. Close, but not going to work. Continue Reading…