Odd day.

I was planning on a winter bike ride with CBC. It starts at Logboom park so I rode there last night to make sure I knew the distance and time it took. It got dark during the ride so I kicked on all my night lights and noticed that my headlight was low on juice. No big deal, I was only 7 miles from home and I had more than enough power for that distance.

I rode home, worked out a few alternate routes that avoid needless downhills followed by 8% grade climbs. Excellent. I cleaned my chain, filled my water bottles, and checked my tires. All good.

This morning, I get dressed and head on out for the CBC ride. At 5 miles out, 2 miles to Logboom, my shifter cable snaps. Great, now I am a single speed, I turn around and head home. Climbing up the 10-12% grades was interesting but not too bad, I am not sure what gear I left the bike in but it was low enough to climb with a bit of grunting. I get home and decide I want to have the Corsa ready to ride. I take out the floor pump and work on the tires. BAM! A seal goes out on the floor pump. So now I have only half the work done on the Corsa, so I take out my trusty Topeak Road Morph and fill up the tires. Prefect, the road morph is a trooper, no issues, in fact I over filled the rear tire and had to dump a bit of pressure as I don't run 120psi in the winter. I love my road morph, it is the model from 2002/2003 or so and has a pressure gauge, flip over tab for my foot and a hose to prevent bending the stem of my tube off. A nearly perfect device, and one I love.

So now I need a new floor pump and I need to take my Rohloff hub + Raptobike to the shop for new shifter cables + an oil change. Ah well, the sun is still shining, I guess I will go for a pleasure ride on the Corsa.

Lucy

I love this picture of Lucy rolling around in the dirt. It really conveys her playfulness. I find Lucy so cute and fun. She has such wide range of behavior, and really is a doggy dog. She goes from Fashionista:

to Playful:

to Intent:

to Competitive:

to lounging:

she digs:

And she always is part of our pack with Casey:

Project Streamliner

As some of my readers may have divined, I am deeply interested in getting a practical streamliner. I want it to be useful for commuting, long ride such as randoneurring or the stp, and hpv racing in the super-street class.

The idea is that I start with a tilting trike such as the one above. Then I work with Coroplast and make a shell for it. Garrie Hill has already done this for his trike, the model of his shell is below:

From RandomPictures

Then I clean up the surface, paint it, mount it and end up with a nice red streamliner. Something like Lonnie's below but made of coroplast and a different shape. But I do love the red with silver striping.


I am thinking of using PVC piping for internal struts to mount the rear especially since the tilting wheels means I have to allow for them to move. A front strut coming off the BB will provide the mounting location for the fairing as well as a place to mount a front light. I will also have a strut pointing straight up to brace the fairing. I will probably talk to terracycle and replace the stock idlers as well. I will want to raise the seat a bit and I am thinking that I could use side mount drum brakes on the rear wheels and then wire them up to one brake lever. I would move the tilt lock down under the seat and put the rear brake lever on the left side. The front brake would be on the right. I will cut the fairing into pieces so it can be removed and reattached. I am currently thinking a front section, two cockpit sections (top and bottom) and a rear section. With the trike separable, that means I could separate the entire thing into 5 pieces for travel or transport. I would paint the fairing red, and put silver reflective stripes on the sides similar to Lonnie's streamliner. I will also put numbers on the fairing for race events and organized rides such as the STP.

Currently this plan is all potential and no actualized in any way. But if all goes well, I may end up with the trike in 2010.

More on Practical Streamliners.

After posting the other day about the following streamliner that was at the Ford HPV challenge 2009, I was reminded of a streamliner from Portland.

Jester in F40-like clothing


Todd's Streamliner in Portland
I believe that Todd's Streamliner above also has a Jester at its heart. It is based on a Varna shell and he added gull wing doors and a larger canopy. He takes it on the street and always does well at the Human Powered Challenge in Portland since he knows the handling and abilities of his streamliner much better than most riders do.

I have to admit I am very tempted to look into this.