The Tube.

This post is mostly about car stuff. Feel free to ignore it.

When bicyclists think of having to replace a tube, they most likely think of the inner tube of a tire. Old school electronics junkies might think of an electron tube.

A while ago, my car's temperature gauge pegged the "hot" mark. I popped the hood and the cool, night air was instantly filled with fog. I grabbed a flashlight to determine the source of the coolant leak, only to find that every square inch under the hood was soaked in the sticky, steaming liquid.

The next afternoon, I surveyed the damage by daylight. I couldn't see anything obvious until I filled the coolant system back up a bit and started the car. Then, the source of the leak became obvious: An oddball part made of cheap fiberglass had cracked on a seam. I couldn't find this part in any of my service manuals, and two local parts stores had no clue, either.

I finally called the dealership. The conversation went like this:

Me: "I have a 2000 [Ford Focus] ZX3 with a nasty coolant leak. I found the leak, but I can't find the part in the service manual."

Ford: "Is it the tube that sits on top of the radiator?"

Me: "It is."

Ford: "We have them in stock. Let me look up the price. [Long pause] $32.70"

Me: "Well, that's not too bad, I suppose. Do you mind if I ask what that part is called?"

Ford: "It's 'The Tube.'"

Me: "The Tube?"

Ford: "Yep. We always keep a few around."

The Tube. Seriously. It's kind of a pointless part for what it needs to do. A small "Y" splitter would have made much more sense. It's held in with a pair of plastic rivets and three hose clamps. A trained monkey could swap it out in 10 minutes or less. I'm not a conspiracy theorist, but it's almost like this thing was designed to break somewhere after 100,000 miles and prompt a $250 trip to the shop.

I have been blowing it off for the past few weeks, since there's not that much rush to fix it. This morning, I finally got around to paying the stealership a visit. For giggles, I simply asked for "The Tube for a 2000 ZX3" to see if they'd actually know what I was asking for. "That sits on top of the radiator?" the parts guy queried. "The same."

Crosswind

On this particular stretch of road, I had a nearly perfect crosswind. About a mile before this, it was the dreaded cross-headwind, which offers the worst of both worlds. I was going to stop a bit closer to the old train depot to capture the full flag of wind, but the big cumulonimbus cloud in the background made me change my mind.



Random Tunage:
Touane - Bassic
General Fuzz - Smiling Perspective

Bicycle Camping at Middle Creek Fishing Lake

7 brave participants this time: Keith, Randy, Richard, Gene, Stephanie (Gene's daughter) and myself. 
Unfortunately, I didn't get nearly as many photos this year as I'd have liked. I was too busy trying to keep up with the pack. My decreased amount of riding this year really killed my speed. I made it. I had a good time, but I was Lanterne Rouge for most of the trip. That's okay, though, because Richard was on a Rockhopper, so I had company most of the time.

I got my panniers put together the night before. With a non-trivial chance of rain in the forecast for both Saturday and Sunday mornings, I eschewed the high-powered bicycle mobile ham radio setup with the Yaesu FT-90. I did still want to haul the 12V gel cell and solar panel, though. I had APRSDroid running on my phone, beaconing my location for the ride out. I had it rigged to the battery and solar panel. I used my VX-7R this trip, since it's waterproof. I figured the extra weight would be fine, as the rest of my gear was lighter than I've loaded on some previous bicycle camping trips by just as much. As for the tent: I found a really cheap mosquito net at a local sporting goods store, so I ditched it. Also along for the ride: My backpack fishing stuff, a tiny canvas stool, bedroll, ponchos, rope, my penny stove mess kit and water filter. Food: Freeze dried lasagna (I will do that again!), ramen and instant oatmeal. And coffee. Can't forget coffee. Gatorade powder, beef jerky and mixed nuts rounded out the fuel for the road.

I went to bed insanely late, but still got a good night's sleep. I woke up later than I'd wanted to, and ravenously snagged a granola bar on my way out the door. I was going to meet Richard in Olathe anyway, so we met at Perkin's for a quick brunch, then pointed our bikes south toward 179th St to get to the arboretum.

There, we met up with Keith, Josh and Randy.




As always, the variety never fails to disappoint. Richard is on a hardtail mountain bike with a minimalist setup in a backpack. Randy is on his LHT with front and rear panniers, Josh is riding a flipping-insane folding bike with a rear basket and front panniers (with a 3-speed internally geared fixed -- as in "not able to coast" -- hub). Keith is on his Kogswell and his loading strategy is similar to mine: Stuffed rear panniers with the bedroll strapped down to the rack.

I noticed I had missed a call from Gene, who was battling flat tires and running late. He told us to go forth.So go forth we did.



There's not much I can say about the trip between the Arboretum and Louisburg, KS. The rest of the riders moved onward at my request, while Richard and I kept our slow pace. Keith and I kept in contact with the radios, operating on 446.000 MHz. UHF is usually pretty good out in the open.

Richard hasn't lived in the area for very long, and he'd only seen most of the little townships we went through on maps: places like Stilwell, Aubrey, Bucyrus, Wea -- and later on, Rutlader. Most of these are remnants of railroad towns or military road towns between Forts Scott and Leavenworth. These days, the townships either look like the fringe of suburbia or nothing but farm land. Approaching Wea, I was already starting to get a headache as well as cramps in my calves and quads -- likely a combination of heat illness and just being undertrained for this kind of trip. I gulped down 32 ounces of gatorade, which helped with the cramps a bit. 

Getting to the convenience store in Louisburg took what seemed like an eternity, but upon our arrival, there everyone was. We decided to move around the corner to Sonic, grab a quick bite, and refill out water bottles. I snagged some electrolyte tablets from c'Dude, which helped quite a bit. I called Gene to ask where he and Stephanie were, figuring as slow as Richard and I had been traveling, they were certain to be hot on our trail. Gene had another round of flat tires just south of Wea township, and was pretty sure the cause was crappy rim tape. I called Dad for a SAG while Josh ran across the street for electrical tape. Gene and Stephanie arrived, bikes on the back of Dad's PT Cruiser, soon thereafter. In a feat of heroic blister-inducing madness, Keith gorilla'd the flat tire off, then I went to work taping up the rim ghetto-style with electrical tape. Hey, it works pretty well if you use a few layers!

The whole group of seven was finally on the road in the same place at the same time. That didn't last long, as Richard and I fell off the back of the peloton again a few miles south of Louisburg, and eventually out of radio range with Keith again. Eventually, we trudged past Rutlader Outpost.


Then we found the awesome camp site that the group had picked out: Shady, far away from obvious idiots, and not too far of a ride on gravel.


Commence unpacking!


I set my shelter up using the bug net. I'd initially thought of sleeping with my head toward the bike, but thought better of that plan later. I used my little tripod with only one set of legs extended to hold the head end of the net up. With a yellow poncho on the ground, my bedroll, and the bug net, I stayed really comfortable all night. This photo was actually taken Sunday morning.


Food came out, war stories were told, and a good time was had by all. More than half of us brought fishing poles, so it was off to the lake for some relaxation by the water's edge.


Randy and Gene reeled in a few small panfish, catch and release style. I got some solid nibbles, but couldn't bring any fish to shore. That's fine, though, because I had a blast.  While fishing, we all watched as distinct thunderheads started building high in the atmosphere, trying their best to form a line of storms.

As the sun set, the thunder started rolling, the breeze picked up, and the once-isolated clouds coalesced. I packed up my fishing gear and wandered back to camp. It wasn't clear whether or not we should be prepared for rain. Looking at the sky, there was rain coming from the storm, but it was hard to judge where it was going or how it was building. I opted to put my Poncho Tarp plan into action. Wind was coming from the north, a bit of an oddity this time of year. I battened down the north face of my shelter with tent stakes, then ran rope through the southern grommets, and connected the poncho to my tripod along with the bug net. I tied the hoods of the ponchos shut, then anchored the west end of the poncho shelter to my bicycle wheels with the same bungee cords I held the bug net up with. It was ugly, like something you'd see in Survivorman, but it looked like it should work. By the time I was done setting up, it was completely dark, and the ominous storm was still building, without a drop of rain on our campsite.





We sat at the picnic table in awe, watching the light show. With the first sprinkles, we all decided to pack in for the night. The rain was light and came in waves, and I stayed dry. With a torrential downpour, my feet probably would have gotten soggy, and I don't think I'd trust this shelter in strong winds, but it did work. I had two "windows" with the poncho tent, one toward the lake, looking through the tripod, and the other toward the campsite, looking through the bike. There wasn't much to see, though. I left my VX-7R plugged into the battery overnight to charge, and had it scanning the weather band in "Weather Alert Radio" mode.



I drifted in and out of sleep for a while, and when I started seeing stars overhead through the tripod window, I got out and rolled the poncho tarp off the bug net. The breeze felt awesome, and I actually got chilly enough to tuck into my flannel bedroll, then I was sound asleep. Apparently, I missed out on the pair of lumberjacks that decided to chop down a tree near our campsite at Ass:30 in the morning, all the way down to yelling "TIMBERRRRR!" before dashing out of the woods, dragging with them an entire tree. So much for not camping near the idiots, eh? I slept right through it, but it was the talk of the campground over breakfast.

I was rudely awakened at 6:30 AM, not by rowdy idiots, nor even the sun, for my head was under my bedroll. No, it was the cicadas that woke me up with their hideous hemipteran hubbub. I'd exhausted my supply of drinking water overnight, so it was time to fill a few bottles with lake water and filter that stuff. My headache, acquired some 15 hours prior, was still lingering.

We partook in our morning nosh, packed the things away...


...then headed back north. Riding didn't help my headache any, but we were just 7 miles away from a convenience store. More of the same with me being slow.


Richard and I caught up with the rest of the crew at BP in Louisburg. I bought some excedrin and some insane caffeinated crap to rinse it down with. I dumped a bunch of ice into all my water bottles, and went back outside. Randy, Keith, Josh, Gene and Stephanie were talking about a gravel tour to get back home. Richard and I decided to stick mostly to pavement. We parted ways with a farewell all around.

While Richard was pumping his tires up to their maximum PSI, I snapped this picture of his Garmin Montana handlebar mount, which I believe he made out of a car mount. Richard works at Garmin, and the Montana has a lot of stuff from his team inside.


Richard and I pressed onward toward Stilwell, stopping for shade a few times along the way. The headache went away quickly, and that raised my speed and morale quite a bit. Another water bottle top-off at Stilwell Station, then we made our way west to Pflumm. Pflumm is gravel, but north of 199th, there's only a mile of the stuff. Right after we hit pavement, we ran into the rest of the group one more time:


Unfortunately, the circumstances weren't that great. Gene had flatted twice more. Keith, close to home, darted north to pick up the SAG Van for Gene. We all parted once again. The rest of the riders were up the road long before Richard and I even got on our bikes. We made our way north again, saw Keith coming back with the van before we even got to 159th. Richard splitted off at 159th, then Keith and Gene passed me in the van at 151st.  From here, it was going to be a solo ride, and I was hurting all over.

I ducked into QT at College and Pflumm for a bathroom break and a V8 juice, and saw another bikey friend of mine, Bill Burns as I was rolling out. Keith texted me that he'd arrived back at home safe and sound, and with 4 miles or so left to cover, I pretty much had this trip in the bag.

I made it home at a little before 3:00 PM, so this was not a 'by the book' S24O. And despite all the suffering I was doing in the saddle, I needed this, and if I had to do it all over again, I probably wouldn't change a thing. Now I just need to get back into shape, because there WILL be another bike camping trip this year. Stay tuned for the fall edition.

This is one of the Williams Foods facilities in the area. If you've spent any time in the sodium seasoning aisle of a grocery store, you've probably seen their pouches of chili and taco mixes, among other stuff.  Occasionally, whatever they're messing with inside this building causes the surrounding air to smell exactly like the spice and cereal cupboard at my grandparents' old house, before grandpa died. It's an odd, pleasant and completely nondescript aroma, so  complex that my schnoz couldn't begin to dissect it to its individual components. It doesn't smell this way all the time. A lot of times, it just smells like chili powder or fresh ground black pepper.

I also encountered a veritable roadside hardware store. Every 10th of a mile or so, I saw a couple of large, unused zip ties. This particular one also had a trailer hitch retainer pin next to it. A lot of times, when I see things in the road that would be hazardous to other cyclists, I pick them up and dispose of them, or if they're too large, I move them out of the way. I snagged a few of these from the roadside for my own personal use. Never know when you'll need some huge zip ties.




I also had a quick chat with some of the regular amateur radio operators, who were going on about the heat and the price of gas. They said I need to get my head examined. I believe one has to be a bit eccentric to ride a bike in the first place, so there's probably a grain of truth in there somewhere.

Bike Week 2011: Monday

Before work yesterday, I decided to ride to the Overland Park breakfast stop at Deanna Rose farmstead. I didn't sleep well the night before (long story) and this jaunt added about 10 miles to my usual 6-ish mile commute.Chilly: lower 40s.

When I pulled up a few minutes after 6:30, commuterDude was already at the stop. We'd been trying to talk to one another on the radio most of the morning, but either the repeater we were using was having problems, or we were both in the wrong part of town to punch into it.


Suburban bike rack:


Drew also showed up, still rockin' the FCR.


In the evening, it seemed to be a case of someone jettisoning bad music* from their cars, as I found two separate audio CDs on the side of the road about half a mile apart from one another.
Mercy Me and Switchfoot, in case you cared.




As for today? I'm going to ride to work and ride home, just like I do most of the time. Tomorrow, Overland Park hosts another breakfast event as part of their Wednesday Farmer's Market. I look forward to meeting some more folks there!

* Not a statement of artist talent. I like some Christian music, but neither of the two are really my style.

Kicking off Bike Week 2011!

Yesterday started Bike Week in Kansas City. Bike Week and I go back about 4 years. Bike Week 2007 was when I set myself to riding both ways to and from work as much as possible. I'd ridden the entire trip home from work a few times, but Bike Week was a turning point to my commutes. It was the week I realized I didn't need to rely on the bus; that I could get around under my own power. The switch had flipped on: "Any distance is biking distance."

There were many inspirations for me to start this journey, from picking up a bike in the first place, to trudging through the winter, to writing about it. Even though I now have a more modest distance to work, I hold Bike Week dear for getting me into longer distance commuting. There's been a lot of comeraderie around it as well. I genuinely love meeting other bicycle commuters. I love talking to inquisitive folks about it. I love showing people good routes and little-known shortcuts.

I didn't go anywhere yesterday, but today, I had to get some groceries.



Here are some other recent photos.




Up really late doing some data recovery for someone who installed Ubuntu over Windows without making sure everything was backed up.


Our two cats, tolerating one another.


I'll leave you with this slide show of all the photos I've taken during Bike Week the past 3 years.

Hamming it up

I've been interested in Amateur Radio since I was 8 years old. Back then, you had to know Morse code well enough to encode and decode a few words per minute.  Try as I might, that part gave me the most trouble. By the time I graduated high school, the FCC had ditched the Morse Code requirement. Then, the cost of equipment had me in sticker shock. All my life, I've been friends with various amateur radio operators.

A few weeks back, I got a good deal on a pair of handheld transceivers from a friend in California, a Yaesu VX-2R and Yaesu VX-7R. This turned a "pie in the sky" thing into a tangible, attainable hobby.


The VX-7R is beefy and heavy. It's got an alloy case, and it's submersible to 3 feet for 30 minutes, and can withstand hours upon hours in the rain. The VX-2R fits in the palm of my hand. It's light and packed with features. I don't really know how well either of them transmit just yet.

Few things motivate you to get licensed like having new hardware and being unable to legally use it to its fullest potential. I've been cramming these past few weeks, and a group of Volunteer Examiners was hosting a testing session tonight. I went in knowing I'd do really well on the entry-level Technician test. The group let me take the next-level General exam as well, but I missed one question too many to get that license. I hadn't even studied for general, and I guessed at more than half of the answers. I'll go back and take that test sometime later.

Anyhow, looky looky!


That VX-2R is definitely going on my S24O adventures, and there's actually a lot of entertaining banter on some of the nearby repeaters.

More bikey adventures coming soon!

New Personal Record

I woke up to see this:


Definitely time for a ride. The main roads have been clear enough to ride on for the past few days, but over-eager drivers combined with shoulders made of 3-foot (or deeper) plow banks means that my usual rush-hour bike commute is still kind of on hold. An early morning ride a little longer than my usual commute was definitely in order. Partially to shake down Frank in real snow, testing out the new cyclometer (which read -5.2°F by the time I got back home) and partially just to say I've ridden in colder than -5. My previous cold record was about 2 and a half miles at -4.



As for snow handling, these 2.25" tires handle amazingly well, but they still don't have the floating capacity to handle the un-plowed church parking lot down the road from me. In fact, powering into the un-plowed mass grabbed my front tire with enough oomph to throw me into what had to be a comically slow-mo endo. As usual, I love playing in the snow.

My favorite photos from 2010

I didn't take nearly as many photos last year as I have previous years. I spent 1/3 of the year unemployed and a lot less time on the bike total. I also got a better camera built into my phone. It's nowhere near as good as my trusty Canon point and shoot, but I think I generally took "worse" pictures this year than in years past because I didn't always have the Canon on me. Here are my top picks from 2010, in no particular order.

Coming home from a family reunion in Nebraska while I was laid off, I snapped this and desaturated the background.


My wife and I saw this Garden Spider on a fishing trip at a nearby lake. If you haven't figured it out yet, I kind of like spiders.


Snapped during The Crystal Method DJ set that I went to with commuterDude a few months ago, I hit this guy with a quick, medium-powered flash on a long exposure in a very dark part of the club, capturing something like 2-3 seconds worth of tracer from the multi-colored LED he had on a string.


I tested bikes for 3 different manufacturers in 2010: The Swobo Baxter, the KMI Urbana and this one, the Wabi Special fixed gear. While I don't have any one that's more favorite than the others, I can say this one was the most transformative for me.


And while we're at it, I really did like the way the Urbana tackled anything in its way while having that European utility bike look with big, industrial welds and massive, blight-be-damned tires. I can't think of one picture that captured its essence better than this one.


Rowdy was a really old guy. Half Golden Retriever and half Chow, he started having hip problems a few years ago as both those breeds often do. He put us through a scare in February with an infection in his leg, and then had to be put to sleep a few months ago. He was 60 pounds of muscle and fur with the bark of a ferocious beast, the disposition and playfulness of a little puppy and a giant heart of gold.


I took this a few days ago with my wife's old phone (with yet a better camera than the LG Env3 I've been using most of the year) and I like it. This phone takes better macro shots than my old phone did. I really need to learn to carry my Canon around more often, though.


Taken at the beginning of one of the longest days I've had at work in a while, it's hard not to love the colors of autumn.


One of the first things I had to do at my new job was reprogram a bunch of barcode scanners for our warehouse.


Chris moved to the Philipines last year. Before he moved, we took off one an impromptu Dark-Side Ride through Mill Creek Streamway Park. This was taken in a corrugated steel tunnel that goes under the railroad tracks near 91st and Woodland Road, illuminated only by our rear blinkies. I miss hangin' with ya, pare!

In Today's News

Stocking caps are making headlines.


I had to be in to work really early today, and temperatures dropped into the mid-30s overnight. That means it's time to start breaking out the real winter commuting gear. I was still dressed pretty lightly, but this is the first time this season I've needed a stocking cap.

The early commute also gave me the perfect opportunity to do a totally dark ride with the Light & Motion Vis 360 (shown left) that I'm testing out for BikeCommuters.com. At an advertized 115 Lumens, I was figuring that this light would end up being most useful as a "to be seen" light, but it actually casts a really good beam that's totally suitable for night-time riding at speeds of 15 MPH or so. The fact that it's helmet-mounted makes it good for Pothole Patrol. The side markers are brilliant and eye-catching, and the rear light is suitably luminous as well. I expect a full review to be done in the next week or so.

To test it, I took it out with a few other headlights I own, and took pictures of beam patterns. Its competition:

• A Bell Orion I found on the roadside back in early 2009, loaded with a pair of fresh CR2032 batteries. This embodies the ubiquitous cheapo front headlight from discount stores. It's usually helmet mounted. I made a handlebar mount for it when I found it (missing the helmet mount)
  
• Blackburn Flea
  
• NiteRider Evolution Halogen (15W Bulb)

I'll save the beam comparisons for the full review, but here are some teaser images.







And the beam shot from the Vis 360. This was the darkest spot I could find at my apartment complex this morning, far from the best place to do this sort of thing, but gives you a good idea of the beam pattern. I can say it's not nearly as bright as my halogen, but it knocks the socks off of my Blackburn Flea. It had better, for the price!


And off topic, we're finally getting settled in at our new apartment. We had a lot of help moving, but the tedious process of organizing and unpacking has seemingly only just begun. Oh, and the Brown Recluse spider infestation that we were dealing with at our old place won't likely be a problem for much longer, even if some of them did move with us. I found this friendly guy on our first day at the new apartment. It's a Wolf Spider (Hogna carolinensis, specifically) sitting atop a 50-cent piece (Diameter: roughly 1.2")


I really like large spiders such as Silk Spiders, Orb Weavers, Wolf Spiders, Tarantulas and Nursery Web Spiders. They are typically very gentle, but eat most smaller spiders and any other bugs nearby. I'm pretty sure the days are numbered for any Recluses that happened to stow away in our belongings.