Bicycles!

[eizbaer]

Drop bars and mud guards is exactly what I wanted, although the plastic extensions make them look a bit ridiculous. I'll see if I can remove those

if I had a bikeable commute that’s also exactly what I’d want - and what my 18yo donkey would be turned into… I might still do it just for the fun of it.

 

[Adunaphel]

Drop bars and mud guards is exactly what I wanted, although the plastic extensions make them look a bit ridiculous. I'll see if I can remove those

Oh, I can see why the combo would be very nice on a commuter bike. It's just a combo one very rarely encounters in this country, hence me not being used to the look of them. Drop bars are generally for recreational use, and maybe get an ass saver installed for inclement weather use, bicycles used for commuting are generally flat bars or worse.

 

[altoid]

Got a new bike today

OHAI FELLOW TREK CHECKPOINT RIDER! Digging that ALR 5 livery! And aside from frame and seatpost material, identical spec bike.

edit: only just realized you both have praxis cranks on there... did praxis get bought by trek or something? I'm only familiar with cannondale putting their own cranks on their stock bikes, somehow didn't have trek on the radar for doing that as well.

Supply chain issues have wreaked havoc on inventories around the globe, and that can manifest in interesting ways. Trek has shipped a lot of their bikes with Praxis components in light of unavailability of the correct Shimano stuff. The T47 BB on these bikes is Praxis anyway, so I'm guessing they have a relationship with Shimano and/or Trek, or maybe they just had inventory. From the Specs section of this page:

Drop bars and mud guards as a combination feels weird every time I see it, but whatever works for you, enjoy! Looks like a bike that you should be able to ride for many many thousands of kms.

Funny, it only looks weird to me without a rear rack. I should get fenders for teh lulz…

 

[eizbaer]

Supply chain issues have wreaked havoc on inventories around the globe, and that can manifest in interesting ways. Trek has shipped a lot of their bikes with Praxis components in light of unavailability of the correct Shimano stuff

Ah did not think of that yeah!
Canyon also shipped a bunch of GRX spec bikes with rotor cranks… that then got loose and started creaking. Nightmare.

T47 is nice though. Stupid pressfit bullshit.

ANYWAY what kind of crank lengths are you people running? I know this is encoraching on religion territory here, but there's a bunch of people nowadays that swear on super short cranks? My Aeroad for some reason came with 175mm cranks (it's only the L size, not XL or anything)... and to be honest the difference to my other bike (172.5) is actually rather noticeable, which is not something I would ever have guessed. So yeah, talking about cranks, I will have to switch cranks on the Aeroad. For reasons.

 

[altoid]

ANYWAY what kind of crank lengths are you people running? I know this is encoraching on religion territory here, but there's a bunch of people nowadays that swear on super short cranks? My Aeroad for some reason came with 175mm cranks (it's only the L size, not XL or anything)... and to be honest the difference to my other bike (172.5) is actually rather noticeable, which is not something I would ever have guessed. So yeah, talking about cranks, I will have to switch cranks on the Aeroad. For reasons.

I’m reasonably sure I’ve always had 172.5mm as an adult, and even the bike fit I had didn’t reveal any changes in that aspect.

But then I watched a video about the Appleman 2XR FIT crankset, and now I want to try one.

 

[Adunaphel]

ANYWAY what kind of crank lengths are you people running? I know this is encoraching on religion territory here, but there's a bunch of people nowadays that swear on super short cranks? My Aeroad for some reason came with 175mm cranks (it's only the L size, not XL or anything)... and to be honest the difference to my other bike (172.5) is actually rather noticeable, which is not something I would ever have guessed. So yeah, talking about cranks, I will have to switch cranks on the Aeroad. For reasons.

My MTB has 175mm cranks, and my road bike has 172.5mm cranks, and I cannot say that I've noticed much difference between the two. That might be because I use both bikes quite differently (MTB for errands and such, road bike for on- and offroad exercise adventures), and the seating position between the two is also quite different.

 

[eizbaer]

But then I watched a video about the Appleman 2XR FIT crankset, and now I want to try one.

Oh dear lord... I've only seen those abominations on gym or fitness bikes in order to be able to accomodate everyone and because the weight etc of the thing doesn't matter anyway. But yeah, that'd be best to actually find out what length would work best. However... it did take me multiple rides over nearly half a year to actually notice that the cranks on my aeroad are too long, so I'm not sure whether just a quick spin at the bike fitters would actually make me notice.

My MTB has 175mm cranks, and my road bike has 172.5mm cranks, and I cannot say that I've noticed much difference between the two. That might be because I use both bikes quite differently (MTB for errands and such, road bike for on- and offroad exercise adventures), and the seating position between the two is also quite different.

oh for sure, see above - it took me a while to actually figure out the length was "wrong" and that was with both bikes being set up very similarly (seat height, reach and such - some geometry differences remain of course). I don't even actually know what the crank length is on the old donkey or the cargo bike dumpster fire (not that it matters in this latter case, cause the body position is horrible anyway).

 

[altoid]

Oh dear lord... I've only seen those abominations on gym or fitness bikes in order to be able to accomodate everyone and because the weight etc of the thing doesn't matter anyway. But yeah, that'd be best to actually find out what length would work best. However... it did take me multiple rides over nearly half a year to actually notice that the cranks on my aeroad are too long, so I'm not sure whether just a quick spin at the bike fitters would actually make me notice.

These are intended as a pre-purchase rental, which seems reasonable. Though the teo week period might be a bit short, especially for those of us who struggle with consistency anyway.

 

[eizbaer]

Sooo errr… classifieds happened. It really is astonishing how big of a market there is of parts off of new bikes, completely unused, because either wrong size or people wanted to upgrade straight away. Both of these got me this mismatched set of force d1 cranks (upgraded to red by PO; I actually like the look of the “old” force better, so yay, as mechanically they’re exactly the same) and force d2 power meter chainrings (wrong number of teeth). Both I got for roughly half of what they’d have cost me retail. Wtf.

 

[Eye-Q]

Since my employer subsidizes a bike leasing scheme with 55 Euros per month I rode the Ten07 Unicorn last week and asked the bikeshop to give me a quote for the following:

Ten07 Unicorn framekit yellow
SRAM eTap AXS (GX Eagle eTap AXS derailleur, Rival eTap AXS shift-/brakelevers, Rival brakes, 40 teeth chainring, 10-50 cassette)
Front wheel with SON dynamo hub
Front light: Busch & Müller IQ-X (no rear light, I have my Garmin Varia RTL515 for that)
Rear wheel with Hope hub
Handlebars: Ritchey WCS VentureMax
Saddle: SQLab 612 Active (I have that on both the bikes I mainly use and I can ride 300+ km in one go on it so just sticking to well-tried)
The mudguards which are offered by Ten07

Even if it costs 5000 Euros in total to buy (which I doubt) I would pay about 58 Euros from my own money for 36 months which means I'd have an investment of "just" around 2k Euros (plus about 900-1000 to buy it after the three year lease is up). That includes insurance, three yearly checkups and 500 Euros in spare parts for the three years.

 

[eizbaer]

SRAM eTap AXS (GX Eagle eTap AXS derailleur, Rival eTap AXS shift-/brakelevers, Rival brakes, 40 teeth chainring, 10-50 cassette)

Welcome to the dark side
… I may have some of those same parts (crank, brifters) down in the basement waiting for a frame (but xplr in the rear rather than eagle)

 

[DaBoom]

I got to pick up my lease bike after returning from Ringmeet. I couldn't (be bothered) list what parts it has, but it's an Orbea Occam LT with aluminium frame. By the shop's recommendation it got some brake upgrades and tubeless tyres.

Still needs a new saddle, as the stock one is definitely not for me, but other than that I've already tested how much more capable than me the bike is on trails. Moar practice needed, then.

 

[Eye-Q]

Even if it costs 5000 Euros in total to buy (which I doubt)

Oh, err, nevermind - my employer caps the price of the bike at 6000 Euros and with all the bells and whistles I'd like to have (electronic shifting, red anodized hubs and cranks and whatnot) the current offer from the bikeshop is above that since the red anodized parts aren't available in a less expensive range...
That said, I don't need those expensive red anodized parts per se, it just would have made a nice contrast between a yellow frame and red accessories.

With a bike costing exactly 6000 Euro in total I'd have to pay 75 Euros per month from my own money on top of the 55 Euros I'm getting from my employer. Ah well, currently I'm putting more than that into my savings account (plus a pension fond plus a life insurance) which means I'm able to afford it so I will in fact get a bike for 6000 Euros. That's more than I paid for all of the bikes I currently own combined, but when you have the opportunity to get subsidized 40% from your employer you wouldn't say no, would you? Additionally, I'd sell my current cargobike and with all those expensive parts (Rohloff gearbox, SON hub dynamo, 100 lux head lamp) I'd get at least 2000 Euros, maybe 2500 for that...

 

[eizbaer]

Huh… another brake service for the cargo bike, this time I also took the time to bleed them, since they felt rather spongy.
Well… that sure will have me worried in the future. The process is rather straightforward, but the system easily took 10-15 ml of oil before it started coming out of the system at the top again so much air, damn.
First I thought I’d done something wrong because the lever had zero resistance when I’d put everything back. But pumping it for like 50 times fixed it and resulted in a much more confident feel than before.
Anyway, if this was three state of things after 1.5 years, I dread to think what my 8yo cyclocross bike will look like… luckily that lives on the trainer now.

 

[gt1750]

About 220 km in, loved every single one. Best bike I ever had

I have also removed the mudguard extensions, definitely improved the looks.

 

[calvinhobbes]

Speaking of brakes, how do you guys clean your disc brakes when necessary? I’ve tried various things, but ultimately gave up and took my bike to the shop and now they’re completely silent and super effective again.

 

[eizbaer]

Speaking of brakes, how do you guys clean your disc brakes when necessary?

Tbh mostly I just don’t because the cargo bike eats pads so quickly.

Kidding aside:
take the wheel out
Take the pads out
don’t touch the levers, otherwise getting either back in will be a bitch.
Clean pads and brake assembly (and discs I guess but those should be clean to begin with) with liberal amounts of bike cleaner (lightly degreasing) and any old rag or paper towel.
Make sure to never touch the brake surfaces of either pads or discs during the process. Oil/grease on either of those = squeal.

This should get your brakes to near new unless the pads are either completely contaminated or glassed over - in which case: just get new ones, pads are cheap.
If you don’t want to get the pads out I guess you could try running a rag in between them like flossing your teeth. Again with a liberal amount of cleaner, so you don’t end up introducing oil/grease through the cleaning process.

 

[calvinhobbes]

take the wheel out
Take the pads out
don’t touch the levers, otherwise getting either back in will be a bitch.
Clean pads and brake assembly (and discs I guess but those should be clean to begin with) with liberal amounts of bike cleaner (lightly degreasing) and any old rag or paper towel.

Thanks! That’s pretty much what I tried. I guess I will have to apply more elbow grease (without getting any of it on the brake discs or pads) and/or a different cleaner.

And of course, it’d be great if the owners of the apartments in my building could agree on covered bicycle parking, but that’s not going to happen.

 

[altoid]

About 220 km in, loved every single one. Best bike I ever had

I have also removed the mudguard extensions, definitely improved the looks.

That pedal + bottle color combo looks so cool with the frame!

 

[Eye-Q]

About 220 km in, loved every single one. Best bike I ever had

I have also removed the mudguard extensions, definitely improved the looks.

IMHO the looks can be improved even more with Sekuclip spoke reflectors. Yes, the bike already has just a single white reflector, but the reflectors which wrap around the spokes are even neater.

P.S.: I jinxed myself last weekend when I had a group ride and told everyone that I had pretty much zero punctures this year even though I already cycled 8600 km: since Monday I've had one on each of the two bikes I mainly use...