one monkey typing

I guess it's official, Giant has no idea how to build wheels.

This is on my Giant Seek 0, which I like pretty well otherwise.

270 miles, 2nd broken spoke. I don't know how long ago it broke, I was just doing my pre-work week mechanical check and found it.

(viewing from the drive side, proceeding clockwise from the valve)
The first broken spoke was #12
The second broken spoke is #8
both drive side, of course. Not a big deal with an IGH, there's just a plastic ring that snaps off to get spokes in and out.

My previous Giant bike broke 12 spokes in about 1200 miles, at which point I gave up and bought a double walled rim and some butted Wheelsmith spokes and built my own rear wheel. That was my first ever wheel build and it ran for 15,000 miles without even going out of true a millimeter.

Given this experience, when the first spoke broke on the new Giant, I just bought a whole 50 pack assuming that I was going to need them.

Today's (*) flat tire actually had a reason (all previous flats on this bike have been due to snakebite - which I've pretty much eliminated by keeping the tires well inflated and changing my riding style to less in the gutter so I'm not hitting rough bits as much).

Looks a bit like a steel wire from a wire brush or something. Does not look like a wire from a tire band.

(*) this was from September 4. I changed the post date but this is not reflected in the post for some reason.

I got to work with a flat tire Friday morning. Could not find a leak. Dropped in a new tube. When I got home, I submersed the tube and found that the patch I put in last night was a bad job with a tiny little leak. Removed it and reapplied more carefully. In the future I will test the patches before reusing the tube.

First flat on the new bike today. I hit a pothole and got a pinch flat. Observations:

• I put my headlight on the helmet. That's a lousy place for a light, it gives you no contrast to see potholes. The handlebar bag is in the way for lighting, but I'm going to have to figure out something else - perhaps on the bars under the brakes or something. I have to get the headlight down lower.


• The skinnier tires are actually a little easier to change than the 32 to 35s that I run on the other bike. Or maybe it's just these particular tires. I have some Nashbar Prima 2 tires coming - they're $15 and the reviews say they are long-lasting (4000/8000 miles on front/back) and pretty puncture-resistant.  The tires this thing came with are said to only last 2000 miles or so, so I'll be wearing them out this summer.


• I flatted in a lovely spot for changing a tire - 5 foot wide paved shoulder, good lane markings, a proper curb and a nice sloping mowed grass verge. I've had to change tires on a rutted loose gravel spot with a dropoff into the ditch and no shoulder before.


•  I hope I don't flat again before I get home - I only have one spare tube and no patch kit. I suppose I should toss a patch or two and some cement into the kit. (I hate glueless patches - they don't work well for me and I just have to scrape them off before putting on a REAL patch).

The Bontrager Race Lite 32 that I had on the back is showing cord through the rubber. I have no idea how many miles it has on it. It was on the front when I bought the pair. When the rear went, I replaced them both with Marathons and hung the one in the front up. When the rear Marathon died I put the Race Lite on the back. I really have given up on keeping track of mileage on tires but it has been quite a few miles on this tire, probably something like 10K all told.

The Marathon that was on the front is now on the back. I expect it to last until fall of 2013. The front now has a new Pacela Panaracer 32 that I bought on clearance for $12 about 3 years ago and has been in the basement.

Odometer: 28105

The surviving Top Touring 2000 that Eric gave me a couple of years ago started acting wonky last week; the handling got really squirrelly feeling, like it was squirming, and I started to feel bumps when I was on smooth road. I didn't see anything on the first inspection, but when I looked again a couple of days later I found that there was some very slight sidewall bulging and some weathering. I suspect it has separated tread inside given how it was giving me a weird feeling while rolling.

Not wanting to have a tire blow out at 30 MPH, I pulled it off and trashed it today and put on the old Bontrager Race Lite from a few years ago. That should hold me until the studs go on next month. I also have a brand new Pacela tire in the basement for next year. I think the front tire is a Marathon. I'll probably put that on the back next spring and the Pacela on the front.

I don't really want to say that I'm actually looking forward to putting studded tires on, but I'm curious to see how the new Nokian W240s ride.

Odometer 25800

That flat tire took out the tube irreparably (rode a few feet too long on it, there are a dozen tiny holes). I had a brand-new spare in the garage, but it had dry-rotted. I guess in the future I'll keep my spare rubber in the basement, the garage gets very hot and very cold and probably has petroleum fumes and such, and I've had tubes rot there in the past. I should probably move my tires out of there as well.

Went to Meijers this morning, but they have nothing but those horrible "self-sealing" inner tubes. That's code for "won't actually self seal, but it'll spray gunk all over and make it impossible to patch. And we'll charge you double. Forget it, the bike shop will be open this afternoon.

They also stock nothing but 27" tubes. Now, 27" tubes will work in 700c tires, but they're not optimum. As far as I know, nobody has made 27" bikes for a decade. Maybe some of the department store crap bikes are 27", I don't know. It does lean me even more towards thinking that if I ever buy a touring bike it'll have 26" tires. You can ALWAYS buy 26" tires and tubes, at any department store and in any country in the world.

My tomato plants weren't terribly happy this year. I'm nursing some Big Boys and I think one Early girl and I think they'll make it and take off soon, but the Cherry that I put in the ground a few days ago died; I probably injured the roots. Next year I'm going to use rolled newspaper pots for everything. The cukes I started like that are happy.

...but Meijers doesn't open their garden section until some late hour like 8AM or something, so I went across the street to Lowes. It's too bad I didn't need Big Boy tomatoes or one of the ridiculously-sized tomato plants, because they have literally hundreds of those. They had ONE SPOT for cherry tomatoes, which means maybe 16 plants (2 flats) and of course they were gone.

So I grabbed one grape tomato plant. What the heck, I've got a couple of empty spots. Maybe we'll find a cherry tomato plant somewhere else.

Next year I'm going to put some work into a more proper seed starting system. I really need to have a cold frame, and perhaps a heated base for sprouting, they seem to be pushing that stuff. Just getting them up out of the basement and into actual sunlight would probably help a lot.

As an aside, I had a flat on, um, Thursday I think, slow leak. Patched it Friday morning, found that the Schwalbe Marathon that was on there was paper thin down the middle, so I tossed on the remaining Top Touring 2000 that E.O. gave me a couple of years ago (one of them self-destructed). It's doing well but it feels like it's filled with concrete in comparison to the Marathon. I think it's actually skinnier even though they're both theoretically 32s.

I didn't find what caused the flat, since I rode on it for at least 6 miles after noticing that it was going flat, it probably just came out. But since I'm not using that tire anyway, I guess it doesn't matter.

Odometer: 24006 duh

Studded tires taken off the bike (perhaps a bit optimistic, but last year I took them off on March 7 and got away with it). Very little riding this winter, only 273 miles put on these tires this winter.

Got the power washer and a hose out and washed it for the first time in a few months, but since it'll still freeze, I had to blow the water back out of the washer.

Then I figured out why the tool kit has tried to fall out of the bottle cage a few times lately; broken weld. I replaced it with a spare cage I had sitting around, though it's a cheap piece of junk, it'll last a while.


odometer: 23341

Had a soft tire last night, started to change it but it was only soft, figured I could pump it up and see how far I could get; at least I could get to a road that wasn't busy with 60 MPH traffic. Made it home, but it was dead flat this morning.

Found a small puncture. Did not find the cause. Installed the spare, the punctured tube is at home awaiting patching, the alternate spare I put in the bag I'm not too sure of, it might be dry rotted. I didn't test it, as I don't have any more spares anyway. I'll test it tonight after I get the other tube patched.

This is my first flat with the Marathon tires. Rear tire, FWIW. It MAY have been a pinch flat, I didn't look at the tube closely. I'll check it better tonight.

I just cut up another tube that was dry rotted along the folds, to use as straps to tie up a tree that needs straightening, heavy duty rubber bands and other utilitarian uses.

Odometer: pretty close to 21000 miles.