My Tadpole Recumbent Trike Experience

I Know These Guys!

2012-01-22T00:35:00.000-08:00

Out of curiosity, I was looking up some pics on Google with the search terms "Aids Life Cycle Recumbent" hoping to see some people from ALC 10 last year. I can't believe it's been that long already! I came across these guys whom I rode with briefly on a stretch during the Aids Life Cycle.

They're riding a Greenspeed GGT Tandem with an internal gear hub in the back. They've been riding that thing forever. The fellow in the back? He donated all the chips for the entire ride last year! Yup, that's like a billion bags. Actually, let's do the math. Chips every day for 7 days for 3,000 people? That's 21,000 bags! Wow, that's nuts.

These guys were really nice on the ride and shared a few things with me to let me know what I was up for. They were the first trike riders I saw at my first day's rest stop. In the next 6 days, I only saw them a couple times. When we finally arrived in LA, the guys treated me for some beer as a congratulations gift. Thanks!

Alas, the Lights Have Arrived

2012-01-18T17:43:00.000-08:00

This is Accessory #3 from a few days ago. It's arrived in the mail exactly as expected! I decided on a new location for mounting it however. I'm open to feedback on alternative locations but it looks to be that this is the cleanest.

ROTEB (Recumbents of the East Bay) - 1/15/12

2012-01-15T20:56:00.000-08:00

This group meets every 3rd Sunday of the month. Found it through Yahoo and have gone a handful of times.

Maybe I should've have rushed so much to get to the Recumbents of the East Bay meet b/c by the time I got there, no one was there! It was 9:50am and the meeting spot was empty. Did everyone forget we moved the meet time from 9am to 10am? Were they gone? Did people just not show up? What's the deal?

As I was unloading, I saw a fellow on his bright green two wheeler waiting. I waved but probably at the wrong time b/c he didn't see me. As I crossed the street towards him, he greeted me by name!

Hi Brian!

Do I know this guy? It was Zack! He sold me an elliptical chain ring back in the day through the BROL forum. Great price and it came quick. It's always nice to put a face to a screen name. Zack runs a shop in Alameda and that's where Paul got his Expedition. Zack later shared with me that he's got over 20 bikes/trikes in his showroom! That'll be a sight to see! Never seen more than 5 trikes together at any one time before.

We really gotta set up some sort of bent trike meet where we can get a turnout of at least 10. That would be cool.

I didn't get a chance to ask for permission from Zack to post his pic, so here's a shot at a distance. He and his wife were the only ones that showed up for the Recumbents of the East Bay Ride! This was after a vote to decide on a new meeting time. With all that, we all figured the turnout would be a lot better than just 3!

We stopped by the usual Starbucks when I took a few shots of their rides. This is the HP Velotechnik Grasshopper, a folding bent with full adjustable suspension! By the time we took some rough roads to test it out, I had already put my camera away. Headlight and rear light are both hardwired and powered by the front hub! The thing's got an internal gear hub in the back too! Fully decked out. The rear's wrapped with a carbon fiber mudflap.

How fast does this thing go? Zack topped out at 43mph coming down the hill on the way back! That's nuts. I was prepared to catch up to him as he zipped down uber quick. Weight on this bad boy is in the low 30's - very light for a foldable full suspension bike! And that weight takes into account the rack and both hubs!

Lightning. Not sure what model this is but its weight is impressive. 24 lbs! That's ridiculously light - probably thanks to the carbon fiber seat. She was taking off up the hill like none other.

I brought the KMX today since I was worried about having to go across heavy gravel again like we did last month during this same ride.

Catrikes in the Park

2012-01-15T20:50:00.000-08:00

I took these awhile back but never got the chance the post them. Just found these pics in my camera!

Here's a shot of my aunt's 2008 Speed. It came with the funky bell and rear rack. Can't tell from this pic, but that's a full set of Q-rings up front!

This was the first time my Aunt and I did an ALC training ride. Here's a few pics from before we started the day's ride.

I was curious how the sizes of the KMX and Catrike compared. It's literally the same length! For some reason, I had thought the Catrike would be a bit longer. Not the case.

Getting Horny Again

2012-01-13T22:24:00.001-08:00

BOOOOOM! I'm hoping that's the sound and feel that cagers will get when they hear this thing. I hope I don't really have to use it. The one occasion where it would've been useful I unfortunately wasn't even riding the Catrike. I was riding my KMX! Ugh. Where's the Airzound when you need it?

This air horn was completely free. Well, it was included with the sale - so prepaid I guess you could say. After the trike arrived in the big box from Texas, I immediately noticed the horn was the rare white and grey version - not the ugly red and light grey standard color that the Airzound normally comes in.

I was trying to think of another another location to mount this, but the last owner did a pretty good job with it. Readily accessible and superloud. I'll post a pic later of where the air canister is mounted.

All Lit Up

2012-01-13T22:07:00.000-08:00

Accessory 3: Headlight and tail light = $5.99/pair from Dealextreme

I was hesitant to mount this on the front derailleur post b/c of the weird angle. Who wants to point a headlight upwards? I gave it a try since it was all I had laying around.

I actually snagged this light from my Ebike. The one's I ordered for the trike hasn't actually arrived in the mail yet. Figured I could test fit it and this is what I came up with. The fastener doesn't really clear the derailleur cable, so I had to move the reflector down. The reflector then got in the way of the old cadence sensor on the small ring. After pulling the reflector down, the light came down with it and that's what we have hear.

The front boom's got a lot more stuff on it since I've taken ownership of this Speed. Just wanted to catch a shot of the Cage Rocket, computer and front headlight. Fairly clean look with color matching accessories. Liking it so far.

Color Swatch

2012-01-13T18:44:00.001-08:00

I've decided on keeping the silver color of the Catrike! No more white dream. Not only do I feel like the $130-170 cost of the powder coating could be better spent elsewhere, but I think it would be good to keep my favorite white/black with red accent color scheme exclusively on the KMX.

The Catrike Speed's going to be a bit stealthy.

I guess you could say this was my inspiration. It's cool that it's got that Robocop/Batman look to it. Not exactly what I'm going for, but it brings home the point that this trike is not exactly doing a whole lot to get attention from motorist other than, "What the heck is that????"

I used to think it was dumb or dangerous for motorcycles to be completely black or grey. Why not have a super bright color like white, red, or better yet, yellow so it can stand out in the mayhem of traffic?

The answer is that I don't plan on ever being seen. I literally ride like I'm invisible. No one sees me. I gotta do whatever I gotta do to cross public roads and get around. If I'm ever riding assuming people see me or relying on their site to save my life, I'd be putting my life in other people's hands. That's not happening. I'm vulnerable and invisible and I know it. I simply just have to ride that way. I'm invisible all the time - every time.

So a grey flag perhaps might not be such a bad idea. I recently saw one online someplace - not too shabby.

Catriking Across the Country

2012-01-12T23:51:00.000-08:00

I've been playing around with the idea and I'd still like to do it sometime within the next decade. I recently came across a couple of rigs that caught my eye - both color matched!

This red one looks pretty good. I take a lighter load by skipping that bike stored in the trailer. Other than that, this thing looks pretty decent. A bit rear heavy, but it looks like it holds a lot of stuff. This is a rare shot of the limited edition seat!

What's even nicer is this one! Looks like it carries a bit of stuff too! Equipped with REI's Novara brand with their signature yellow, black, silver color scheme. Both stand out quite a bit on the road which is good.

Will I be next? Perhaps on a green or blue trike? Looks like both these owners went for the Catrike Road version - all wheels being the same size.

Although the yellow one looks better, I can't help but to think that the red one is more efficient. There's a lot less weight on the rotating drive wheel on the red setup. The yellow one's got a ton of weight stacked on the very thing that propels the trike forward. It'd be interesting to ride each of them one after the other.

I think what I might be dreading more than the trek across North America is the training. I heard something recently from an ALC training ride leader that made a lot of sense,

"Work hard and put yourself through the pain now through training so you can enjoy the ride later."

So true. If I had done more training for the ALC and had a better idea of what to expect, I think I would've had more fun. I spent so much time just trying to keep up and finish each days' miles that I didn't really have much time to slow down and "smell the roses" as they say. It's also not as fun when you're riding all 7 days pretty much by yourself. Weird how you can be lonely in the presence of 2,305 people. But at least I got to set my own pace which was a big thing for being in the minority as a recumbent trike rider on the Aids Life Cycle.

More H20

2012-01-11T18:53:00.000-08:00

Accessory 2: Sunlight water bottle cages, $8.27 x 2 = $16.57 from Amazon

I took the plunge and bought it - the Sunlight 25.4mm (1") handlebar water bottle cage w/mount. That was the shipped price and it even comes with a couple of pads. I suppose it helps if your bars are not quite 1" in diameter or if you need some extra padding. The unit itself comes with padding already in the mount, so no need for it. The cage is fairly substantial. Not dinky at all.

Here's how it looks like before bolting on. I like the clean look. I've seen others on ebay for $5.99 shipped that don't look quite as nice and there aren't any specifications available to confirm it's the right dimension for my trike's rear seat bar. The 2 day shipping from Amazon was another reason I went with this Sunlite brand.

I thought I'd try a Before & After layout for clarity. After all, that's what the photos are intended for. Let's see how this thing looks installed compared to stock.

A shot from the rear shows the clean lines of the Catrike frame. That weird orange thing is my emergency tag. It's got all my info in case anything happens to me on the road - free from my last ALC training ride.

Once installed, it blends in well with the trike. Doesn't look all that funky - at least not yet w/o the water bottle in place.

The look is clean from the front view too. This exposed horizontal bar is also where I plan to mount my rear lights - those are still in the mail en route to me.

The front cage is black too, so it's not awkward. Everything's coming into place. I just hope this thing doesn't annoy me when I'm leaning back. I don't see it being a problem. Accessibility is another thing. I can reach back and Paul showed me how, but I can't imagine it's as easy to get as where I mounted it on my KMX.

The rear shot's not bad either. I had played around with the idea of getting grey ones to match the bike's frame color but ultimately decided to go with the black to blend with the other components on the trike.

Tough to tell what's there and what's not there, eh? Especially from this angle, the cages once installed probably still look invisible....

...or do they? Can you spot it on the rear upper seat bar?

Once I popped in the bottles, I realized I had to readjust the angle. It wasn't clearing the neck rest. Leaning it backwards helps create a more aerodynamic look. Not quite parallel to the angle of the seat frame, but still looks decent.

I suppose it looks as clean as it's going to. Unfortunately, it sits up fairly high. That might be a good thing though b/c then I can reach it more easily.

UPDATE: 1/14/12
Boy, practicing putting this water bottle back in its cage while riding is a talent I'm not sure I'll be skilled enough to accomplish flawlessly for awhile. I suspected it would be difficult, but I'm still a bit surprised how hard it really is. I think a big reason may be b/c I angled the water bottles to lean backwards toward the rear of the trike. Perhaps a more upright position would help? Tough to do while still maintaining the clearance w/the headrest.

3 Water Bottle Cages

2012-01-10T20:20:00.001-08:00

Accessory 1: Cage Rocket water bottle storage unit, $10 + tax from REI

Why on Earth would I want three of these things? Since the KMX was a touring trike that was modded to take on long distance, it's got room for 2 water bottles: 1 for water and 1 for electrolites. The only way to really enjoy the Speed equally as much is to ride it for miles and miles on end. It was when Paul told me that his training ride participants would be covering 125 miles in a single day that made me decide to design 2 water bottles onto the Speed.

Problem?

Since the trike's designed with an integrated location specifically designed for a water bottle cage right smack in the middle of the boom, adding a second one in another location other than the boom (of which there'd be no space anyway) would make it look awkward. I love assymetry, but not on a trike in that way.

I decided the two bottles would be installed on the top seat bar. That leaves the stock location on the front boom empty. What to put there?

I considered quite a few ideas, some of which are more fun and definitely more expensive than others:

1. iHome IH85B (aka 2go or Bike) - $50
A little hard to believe the price hasn't dropped since. This thing basically holds some of the older Apple products like the Ipod and Nano. Includes a speaker and even comes with a remote control to mount to the handlebar! Weighs 2lbs though!

2. Kuats Racks Bottle Lock $33 - shipped
I found this when I was looking for something to fill the water bottle cage space with. Being that it's a cable lock that fits into the volume of a water bottle, it's an awesome and very clean looking concept. Just sorta sucks that the lock is no good. I can see myself using a lock for those brief times I'm hopping into a fast food join for some quick grub. The weight on this thing might bother me too. I don't want to be one of those people weighing down the Speed. The two biggest reasons I picked the Speed out of the other Catrikes in the pride is for the minimal size and weight. I'm not about to offset any of that with heavyweights.

3. Cage Rocket - $10 plus tax
The thing when empty weighs just over 100g. That's miniscule. Honestly though, there's tons of space in the new second generation (not 3rd generation) seat. Holds a pump, plus it has two other pockets that's large enough to hold pretty much anything I'd want to carry along and that includes arm warmers! The reason for getting this though would be more for accessibility of my stuff moreso than the need for additional storage.

All these products have fancy names. I'm not going to elaborate much more on each, but just going to mention I decided with the latter. Part of the reason I chose it was b/c of the price.

Looks pretty clean and it's neat that the color scheme matches. It almost looks like it belongs there.

The thing is basically a storage unit. The black part pops open (w/o having to remove the unit from the cage) to expose space that people can use to store snacks, tools, a camera, MP3 player, phone or whatever other junk we want to carry around.

The thing comes awfully close to the chain! That was my first reaction. I'm bit concerned being that it's almost touching the Cage Rocket while in the middle chainring.

What happens when I pop it into the small one? I'll take it for a test spin later on in the week to see how it works. Maybe this is the reason no one's done this. If there are, perhaps the numbers are few b/c I have yet to see it published on the web. Weird that I've only seen this on someone else's bike/trike 2x. Well known, but maybe not that popular?

People know about it but don't buy it. Could it be the $16 price tag??? At least that's what REI wanted to charge as their "regular price." Discounted of course for $10 before tax. Just picked it up today. I don't think I would've spent more than $12 for this thing.

Cool that the thing is padded though. This prevents rattling of anything that's in there. There's a waterproof version that's priced on Amazon for twice as much, but I've found that one reviewer said the normal one does just fine in keeping out moisture. Good enough for me.

UPDATE: 1/13/12
I haven't taken it for a spin yet, but put the trike on the rollers and shifted through all the rings to see if there'd be any issues with obstructions to the chain. It does rub a little bit. I shifted the Cage Rocket over to the left a bit and it clears by literally fractions of a mm. Nuts. Works for now. We'll see how it goes on the road.

7 Punctures

2012-01-09T09:54:00.001-08:00

The excitement of the Speed got to me. I shouldn't have been following so close behind Paul, but it was too much fun not to. Plus, we had gotten held back at a traffic light and was rushing to catch up with the rest of the group. We had maintained speed with the roadies for quite while and I'm guessing we could've caught up if it wasn't for the next thing that happened.

I was no more than 1 Catrike length away behind him when I saw something that looked like a pine cone. I was too close to veer off and avoid hitting it. I ended up running over something on the road dense enough that it popped the trike up at least 2". It was only a few seconds after the thought came to mind to expect a puncture that I looked down and saw the flattened front left Kojak tire. Ouch. That thing was super flat.

Prior to this incident, I had never pulled off a Kojak tire off a rim before. It was not nearly as easy as it was to take off a Big Apple or Marathon (Racer) tire from my KMX rims. A bit excited, I pulled out my Quik Stik.

This would be the first time it gets used on the road. The Kojak was so tight on there that this tool didn't do much good. Giving up probably faster than I should have (more on that later), I grabbed hold of Paul's (or rather Pedro's) tire lever and tried to yank the thing off. With a bit of struggle, Paul helped me get the thing off as we exposed the tube to inspect for punctures. When got home I managed to break a tire lever while switching out the butchered tube for a new one.

Although I had my fancy mini spray bottle with water/soap for locating the puncture(s), it was feeling air coming out of the tire that helped us locate the first puncture. After the patch, I pump the tire and there's still a leak. Poor patch job on my part?

Nope.

Another puncture. I patched that only to find yet a 3rd puncture and then a 4th. They came in pairs and by the time I found the third pair of punctures, I inaccurately assumed I had found them all. Not the case. There was a 7th hole in the tire!

By now, at least 25 minutes had passed and both the Sag and Paul were probably a bit frustrated that it's been taking so long. Once the tube got back into the tire, we pumped it up. That's when we got into more trouble.

Why wasn't air getting into the tube???
1. Bad pump?
2. Bad connection?
3. More holes I didn't patch?
4. Failed patches?

It could've been anything. After tested the first 2 ideas, one of the guys gave me a hand and used his CO2 cartridge pump. It literally only took seconds before the tire was fully aired up. So we thought....

By the time I put all my tools away, I looked over and saw the tire as flat as when we started 30 minutes ago (if not, 40). It was time to get the Sag vehicle.

The two of them left with an estimated return time of 45 minutes. 30 minutes to ride 10 miles and then a 15 minute car ride to come get me. Not being the type to sit around and do nothing, I gave the repair a try once more.

This time I learned how to properly use the Quik Stik, but not w/o some frustration. Just as I was about to give up, I learned that the tool has to be used at an angle to be effective. It worked great once I figured out the technique (after 10 minutes of frustration wishing Paul had left me the Pedro levers).

Everyone seems to repair tubes differently, so it's nice to learn how others are doing it so I can combine it with my own methods to figure out what works for me. Paul had showed me his way and I took up after his recommendation and did it as such. The tube was out in a jiffy.

After pumping the tube once more, I heard a loud hissing sound. New unfound hole or poor patch job? The latter. Either I suck or those glueless patches are no good (something Paul already mentioned to me before, but I stubbornly resisted and used them anyway until I ran out and used the standard glue patch). The two sticky patches had failed for one reason or another and I pulled them off to expose the huge gaping holes in the one tube I had.

Paul said to use the glue liberally. Put tons on it at least as big as the patch. Makes sense, but either I'm cheap or don't like the mess and had never used enough. Remembering his hint, I globbed on enough of an area to cover the 1" square, but not so thick that it takes forever to dry. The ebay patch went on (a single one covered two of the punch flat holes) and worked wonderfully after I held it in place for 5 minutes.

"How long should I hold this patch on?" I had asked Paul prior to him leaving to get the car.
"Don't know, I've never had to patch."

How lucky! Maybe I have my own share of luck but expressed in different ways. If the world really is a big balance, then I'm taking the hit for the awesome luck I had at ALC where I traveled 545 miles w/o a single flat. Here I am on my last ride prior to this where I had 3 flats on two different tires w/in 10 miles!

I continued holding the patch for probably a couple of minutes before I felt the urgency to pump that sucker back up. I let the tube sit on my seat for awhile so I could confirm there weren't any more leaks. 20 seconds and a few gentle squeezes later, I was on my way to putting it back into the tire.

One thing about putting the tube back into the tire is that it has to be done gently or else pinch flats can occur down the road. Wobbling the tire back and forth perpendicular to the direction of the rim is helpful, but doesn't ensure the tube is properly sitting in the rim. You gotta do it carefully. I wedged it in, experienced a hard time putting the tire back on (annoying, but manageable), and pumped it back up. Air was finally going in! I hit 100psi before I gave Paul a call to see if I should sit tight or continue on my ride.

He sent one of the other TRL's (training ride leaders) over to fetch me. Took about 30-40 minutes after my patch job for Bob and Mark to show up with a van (still barely big enough to hold the Catrike Speed).

Perhaps this incident serves me right for using the air horn on Bob earlier in the day! He had been honking Paul jokingly and I had responded with a loud bazooka-like sound that was close to knocking Bob off his bike.

LESSONS LEARNED? Most of this stuff I should know, but tend to ignore out of either stupidity or stubbornness on my part.

1. Don't follow so close. Keeping a good amount of distance allows me to see stuff on the road ahead of time enough to avoid any trash, gunk or other enemies of tubes.

2. Never use sticker patches ever again - ever!

3. Use plenty of glue, covering an area bigger than the patch.

4. Remove the tube by using the Quik Stik at an angle, not perpendicular to the circumference of the rim.

5. Be gentle when removing the tube.

6. Be equally gentle when inserting it back into the tire.

7. Pinch flats come from under inflated tires. Inflate that sucker to 100psi - not 90psi.

8. Inspect and repair the tube with it sitting on the seat - not on the floor where it can gather up more gunk that can repuncture the tire.

9. Unlike the Shraeder valves I'm used to, Presta valves have a little thing on top that screws up and down to limit the air coming in/out of it (in addition to the cap).

Running with a Catrike

2012-01-09T09:45:00.001-08:00

Wow, this thing flies! Or in the words of an ALC roadie yesterday,

"He's taking off on that thing!" Both Paul and I both were. He'd usually be way up front while I involuntarily kept the rear of the group company. But now with the Catrike Speed, I can finally keep up with Paul's Expedition!

It's not just the machine though. Much respect to Paul for his endurance. He's been training a lot and it shows both physically and performancewise. I don't know if he felt the same way when we approached an intersection and I shouted, "Now would be a good time for this traffic light to turn red!" I could use a break. The red light was timed perfectly, giving me the chance to use the neck rest.

As a couple of roadies were uncomfortably straddling their bikes behind me, one of them said to the other,

"Cool, it even has a neck rest." They continued talking. I turned around and told them a few things about the trike halfway expecting them to ask if I ride this thing b/c I have back problems. That question never came. I think everyone was just excited that there was not only one trike on the road with them, but two!

I kept up with the pack pretty well until the "Incident" happened.

Catrikes Together

2012-01-06T12:23:00.001-08:00

This weekend will be my first ALC Training ride with a Catrike! It's going to interesting riding it with the roadies. I haven't yet done that. It'll be cool to ride one with Paul too! Two Catrikes side by side! I still can't believe how amazing those brakes are. I always figured disk brakes were disk brakes and they're all pretty much the same - not even close!

The results make me want to upgrade the KMX's brakes, but enough money has gone into the Tornado. No more big accessories or parts for this thing for awhile. Other projects need some love.

A New Flag!

2012-01-04T22:43:00.000-08:00

Wow, this thing came in almost two pieces! USPO did not take good care of this package. Luckily, I think everything's intact. Unless there's more than the plastic rods and the packaged flag, everything looks like it's here. I haven't checked b/c this thing's a gift, but I hope the shrink wrap is in the plastic bag with the poles.

Holy! Look all those stamps! That's nuts. Maybe that's better than standing in line at the USPS.

Here's the package! I haven't unwrapped it, but here it is! Hope my aunt likes her Christmas present!

Remote!

2012-01-03T20:29:00.000-08:00

I've been wanting to get this for awhile and finally took the plunge - the $8.14 plunge. I've read mixed reviews and figured the fairly reasonable price would be worth trying out. I've tested this and unfortunately, it only works when the Kodak Playsport camera is facing you. I suppose this is okay since I had intended on using this for self footage. It would've been nice to be able to use while the camera is mounted on the extension rod facing away from me too.

A bit awkward that it wasn't designed to work from both sides of the camera. After all, how can you be expected to delete photos (there are buttons designed for that) w/o seeing the screen?

With yet another thing to fumble with while on my trike, I need to find some sort of way to mount this thing on the trike - a bracket of some sort. Let's see what I figure out.

This is one of my downgraded photos. Easier on my hard drive, quicker to upload and I don't think it makes much of a difference for viewers. The only difference would be if someone were to print of these photos. I can't imagine any of you guys do that. The original photo was well over 2mb and the downgraded one is no more than 200kb. I'm using a program called Pixillion which easily generates a duplicate photo that uses up a lot less memory.

Catrike Turns White

2012-01-03T15:48:00.001-08:00

Not yet anyway.

There's only a couple reasons to do something like painting a trike yourself:
- You love torture.
I remember stripping down paint on my restoration bike and it was a 5 hr ordeal and that's just the effort for stripping the paint.

- Learn something.

-. Save money.
Exactly how much money would I be saving? I called up the three main shops in SF to see what their prices were. I'm still waiting to hear back on their quotes.

Technically, powdercoating (as my uncle reminded me) is different than just plain painting. Since the trike is powdercoated stock, stripping it down and replacing it with just paint would be a bit like downgrading to say the least. Ever since hearing about car enthusiasts recommending powder coating rims, I've always been interested in pricing. Let's see how they match up.

1. NRI
2. Westcoast Powder Coating
3. Leons Powder Coating
4. Accurate Powder Coating

The Official Comprehensive Catrike Speed Review

2011-12-31T11:31:00.001-08:00

I published this initially on BROL since the readership is much higher. I'm reposting it here for the sake of adding a much needed resource to my existing blog (and in case BROL ever goes under). Here it goes:

WHY I BOUGHT A CATRIKE:
- I gawked at the Catrike ever since I learned about it. I love the lines. Just looks beautiful compared to the other trikes I've seen. And when cost (used) falls into the equation, I never looked back at anything else.

- I like the culture. It's nice that Paulo gives the annual tour and there's a Catrike ride every year.

- There's also a fairly huge following which means there's support for any questions I might have. I'm more than willing to learn about stuff on my own, but it's nice to have someone who's gone through the same stuff. Why make it harder on myself than I have to?

- Since there are so many Catrike purchased, there's also many that are being sold on the used market which helps me out in terms of budget.

- Surely suspension would nice and so would an adjustable seat angle, but personally I can deal w/o either. The KMX has been heavy enough. At 45lbs, I wasn't looking for anything close to that in weight. A suspension trike would've been heavier than the 30lb Catrike Speed for sure - at least within my budget of $1,700.

- As far a the seat angle, the ultra reclined position doesn't bother me one bit. I did some comparisons (shown on my blog) of the Speed vs where I like my seat on the KMX and I recall it being fairly similar.

WHY THE SPEED IN PARTICULAR:
- It's small. I wanted something that would fit vertically in my garage. I have limited space and that was the most efficient way to store it. The one rule in my house is that if there isn't a place for it, we don't get it. It's also small in terms of width so it fits through doorways better than most other trikes in their fleet.

- I wanted something faster than my KMX. The Catrike wasn't an option initially when I first got into the bent world b/c of the cost. The KMX only cost me $700 used on Craigslist, so I wasn't complaining. I was hoping the Speed would live up to its name.

- I like the wheel size. I don't like the rear wheel being the same size as the fronts. The Speed was nice in that it fell into familiar territory. The KMX also has a 20" rear drive wheel with 16's up front (different mm, but close enough).

SPEED:
- Yes, it lives up to its name. Perhaps it's the weight or maybe I've just ridden the KMX Tornado so long that the 12lb weight difference is just so overwhelming. I literally feel the lower rolling resistance of the configuration. It's like night and day. There's absolutely no way to not notice the difference in performance of the trikes. At $1k for the KMX Tornado and $2,600 for the Speed, it comes at a price.

CLIMBING CAPABILITIES:
- The 42T middle chain ring feels like a climbing ring compared to my KMX which currently uses a 42T chain ring (stock is 40T) as the largest downhill chain ring! In other words, I typically climb steep hills with a 22T or a 32T chainring for less sloped hills on the (modded) KMX. I can climb the same hills on the Speed using the 42T middle ring!

- The climbing capabilities on this thing is amazing. I'm surprised there aren't any compromises to get the flat and downhill speed. I have yet to really use the smallest 30T chain ring on the Speed in real world riding. I've only tested it for the sake of seeing what it was like and checking that everything was working okay.

FRAME:
Ground Clearance:
If you're looking for lots of ground clearance, neither the Speed nor the KMX are for you. This thing is low - way low. If you have problems getting up and out of trikes, then look elsewhere. You'll hate this. Many owners already have an issue with the bottom of the frame scraping against speed bumps and other uneven ground. The owner of my aunt's trike bashed the idler somehow - yes, even with the Speed's idler protector. Easy to see that it can happen considering the limited ground clearance. The last owner of my trike opted to protect the underside with a tire tube. Precautions are made b/c it's really an issue for those that need more clearance for the type of riding they do or the environment in which they ride.

Design:
Maybe FFR can chime in on this, but I suspect their choice in using the KMX frame for their electric mods has a lot to do with the durability of the frame (warranty, quality and strength of a steel frame), but probably also b/c it's got a square section vs a round. Perhaps square is easier to mount electrical components (especially mid-drive systems). I won't pretend to know a lot about this. FFR can say a few words for clarification if they wish.

HANDLING:
When my aunt bought a Catrike Speed not long ago, my uncle took it for a test ride and though the steering was broken - something was wrong with it. He didn't realize that the Speed was designed to be a bit "twitchy". It's all part of the sporty feel of the trike. Moving the handlebars a bit here or a bit there causes the trike to turn quite a bit. Although the stiffness I learned this weekend can somewhat be adjusted and the handlebars can also be adjusted, note that the trike itself is inherently "twitchy." It's just the way it is. Physics majors would probably be able to explain it better, but I'm sure it has something to do with the narrow dimension of the distance btw the two front wheels.

ADJUSTABILITY/FITMENT TO THE RIDER:
Handlebars:
Although there's adjustment capabilities for the KMX, there's tons more for the Catrike. The distance the handlebars are from each other are somewhat fixed on the KMX. They can be pulled closer to the rider or further out at a fixed angle which can ultimately alter the distance they are from one another, but not by a huge margin. While the KMX's handlebars angle are welded, the Catrike has a proper headset which allows free movement of the handlebars to sway left or right before fixing it to your custom position. Tough to explain w/o photos, but just know the Catrike allows more flexibility in handlebar configuration. The KMX's setup happen to fit me just fine, so no complaints in that department. I can't say this'll be true for all riders. I'm 5'-7" and 145lb's. I believe this fixed handlebar setup was compensated by the seat forward/back adjustability that's absent in the Catrike lineup.

Seat:
The seat on the KMX is adjustable in increments. The Catrike's seat angle is completely fixed. The KMX is definitely has a softer foam cushioned seat whereas the Catrike is just mesh like all the other trikes out there (majority of them at least). The KMX setup allows for different types and thicknesses of foam to be swapped out while the Catrike's configuration can be changed by altering the tightness of the straps that secure the mesh seat. Looser allows it to sag and stiffer makes it harder. The seat position itself can be moved forward and back by 4 increments on the KMX. No such adjustability exists for the Catrike.

CUSTOMIZATION:
- I doubt the KMX was ever designed to be modded, but I've successfully been able to do so w/o much of a problem. The learning curve for me was just huge b/c I didn't know much about bicycle components when I started. The KMX frame allows multiple sizes of rear wheels. The Catrike Speed maxes out at the stock 20" wheel unless you purchase Utah Trike's extension kit to allow a larger size. As for the front wheels? KMX has a proprietary hub (although FFR was able to mod theirs with custom hubs using what I suspect to be custom axles). The Catrike uses what I believe to be a typical axle with standard quick release skewers for all wheels.

- All the other components to be modded pretty much can be done on either trike. The wheels are probably the only thing worth mentioning in this regard.

WEIGHT:
OMG, this is a big one. The overall weight is quite different. KMX is 45lbs and the Catrike Speed is 30lbs. What's even more crucial though is that the rear of the Catrike Speed is a lot less heavy than the front. The KMX's huge weight seems to be balanced more evenly across the length of the frame. Although this weight distribution may be ideal for cars where 50/50 is often desired, that's not necessarily true for trikes. Though open for debate in other threads, I believe lower drivewheel weight translates directly to higher speed and efficiency. This opinion comes from:

1. Racing my KMX Tornado against a friend who claims he's 100lbs heavier (though probably closer to 50lbs) on his Expedition. He's tons faster. No doubt about it.
2. Swapping my rear IGH wheel for a lighter weight one (less than 3lbs difference) and the differences were quite noticeable.

- A lower weight is also nice b/c it allows me to pull it up onto the rack (I haven't done this yet, but it just makes sense) more easily. 15lbs is a huge difference when the thing you're lifting is more awkwardly shaped than a dumb bell.

- For some reason, I suspect even if I strapped 15lbs of weight to the Catrike Speed to equal the overall weight of the KMX, the Speed would still feel faster.

- Storing the trike in a vertical position would've been easier on the Catrike Speed if it wasn't for the lack of a rear brake. Speaking of which....

BRAKES:
Performance:
The Catrike's brakes are ridiculously awesome. They stop on a dime. No joke. When engaged abruptly, it's like hitting a wall. It's nice having that ability. You can obviously engaging it for a smoother experience. The KMX has cheaper brakes and doesn't brake nearly as well as the Catrike despite having a third rear brake.

Rear Brake:
I hate that the Catrike doesn't have a rear brake. I suppose it saves money on production costs, is one less thing to break or maintain and adds weight but I miss the rear brake I have on the KMX. The KMX can power slide like none other. I love it. That's all gone when riding the Catrike. You win some. You lose some. The smoothest way to add a rear brake on a Catrike is unfortunately with the extension kit ($150) which comes a bit pricey and that only allows you the option. It doesn't include the cost of the cable nor the caliper itself.

No emergency brake on the Catrikes? Sorry Paulo, but that was a horrible move. But then again, most trikes don't come with a rear brake as standard equipment or even as an option. Perhaps the introduction of the rear brake is something uniquely KMX. The KMX comes with a stock emergency brake button on the lever. The Catrike? It comes with a high end velcro strap? Pleaaaase. Catrike did such a great job on the rest of the trike and they decided to go cheap on the parking brake. This can easily be upgraded yourself with the right component, but it's a disappointment that this feature was missing. All trikes should have parking brakes that don't equal to a 5 cent piece of velcro. In the meantime I'm using a "Bike Brake" branded rubber band thingy which works in the meantime but is nowhere as clean as a button setup.

PRICE:
Those with sub $2k budgets like me have a hard time getting into any serious bent trikes w/o getting one used. New ones these days seem to be priced at around $2,100-3,400 (maybe you guys can comment on the accuracy of this since I haven't really looked at many new ones over $1,400). Both the KMX and Catrike brand are great for those on a limited budget and allows those into the sport who otherwise wouldn't be able or want to. If you have $700-1000, get the KMX, understand it's limitations and upgrade as you have more available funds (assuming you like that activity of tinkering and modding). I spent close to 2 years doing this. If you have a budget of about double and have interest in a Catrike Speed, you can get one for $1,100-1,800 (or window shop for one) depending on the mileage and production age of the trike. First production models with the ugly blue mesh seat used go for as little as $800 before shipping while newer 2011 ones can land in over $2,000. I've noticed 2008-2010 models go for about $1,300-1,600 or so as of the date of this post.

DIFFERENCES IN PREVIOUS VERSIONS OF THE SPEED:
Those that have read up on this thing, know that the Speed is pretty much Paulo's baby. It's tweaked almost every year as a developing trike. More changes have gone into the Speed than any other model as what I suspect to be an attempt at refining for perfection. Other threads will educate you more on the differences btw the years, but you're looking mostly at the frame's shape and seat angle. Crankset height off the ground from my understanding has also altered a bit. Some may prefer grip shifters which can be found on the older models.

I put my trike side by side with my aunt's 2008 and it looks very similar. Was the seat angle different? Tough to tell even when looking at them both at the same time, but for sure the bend on the upper portion of the seat is more extreme on the 2010 than it is on the 2008. Were decals different colors amongst all those in that year or was it just my '10 that had black stickers and her '08 that had red? Perhaps a minor difference that some of you may be considering when purchasing.

SMOOTHNESS:
The gears of the Catrike Speed and I suspect all the Catrikes or (non KMX's) shift very smoothly. I don't think my used one's been tuned and even then, it's been shifting flawlessly. A few awkward sounds here and there, but it's nothing I shouldn't be able to fix when I get some time to attend it.

The ride is also very smooth. Of course you feel the road as you would a sports car, but I'm surprised even with the slick no-tread Kojak tires that the ride is as smooth as it is. Is it smoother than the KMX stock? Definitely. Smoother than the KMX with Marathon Racers? Not quite sure. I can't say one way or the other. If there's any difference, it's not obvious.

ACCESSORIZABILITY:
Though some may see the super heavy weight seat as a drawback (and it is), but the frame itself allows mounting of all sorts of stuff that a mesh seat doesn't quite offer. Mesh seats go over the tubes which pretty much hide it and limit where you can mount stuff easily. Whereas the KMX is all exposed and ready for mounting of things such as:

- I was able to put my bike license plate on the back in a really clean it-belongs-there kinda way.
- My water bottle mounting brackets fit super nicely, again as if it was that way out of the factory. If symmetry is your thing, it's worked wonders with water on one side and Gatorade on the other. It came out to a pretty sleek look.
- I also strapped on a Timbuk2 handlebar bag (currently discontinued) onto the back w/o a problem.
- My vibration alarm fit nicely under the seat within the metal frame well hidden from view.
- The recent addition of the Topeak bag was a nice touch. It took some experimenting, but worked out in the end and I have no regrets with the mounting design.

The Catrike's two horizontal bars at the top of the seat are often times used with Minoura or Topeak water bottle cage mounting brackets. Two fit there quite nicely. Perhaps not as convenient to retrieve, but it works. The single cage on the boom was a nice touch in that it follows the lines of the trike and I can't imagine it anywhere else. Of course this limits you to one bottle which may be fine for the casual shorter distance rider. But for those that ride longer routes and cover more miles w/o stopping, two bottles are great and can be put nicely here above the seat.

STORAGE:
While the KMX as I mentioned takes some improvising to figure a storage solution, Catrike offers a few integrated solutions for those that want to carry more stuff.

The new Catrike seats as I mentioned previously, have 3 pockets. One on the left at your lower back, another smaller one under the seat on your right and a place for your pump. That'll be sufficient for most. For those that want to carry more on the road, there's the Arkel bags. Though the fitment of the Arkel bags are poor at best on the Speed, they're available and some people seem to deal with them okay.

Some find that the Nashbar or any triangle bags that typically are designed for DF bikes fit okay.

The Catrike's frame design also allows for standard trunk racks to be installed like you see on a typical bicycle. Not the case with the KMX. The KMX uses a proprietary $89 plus shipping rack.

FENDERS:
Fenders can't be easily put on a KMX without some customization. I actually haven't seen any for the front wheels. The stock rear one is a great touch though. That rear fender really finishes off the look of the KMX. I like that the front wheels are bare, but that's only until dirt kicks up into my face on a rainy morning ride.

Catrikes allow easy fitment of fenders on the front wheels. I believe this requires a special bracket. Not sure if this is supplied/designed by Utah Trikes, Catrike themselves or Planet Bike. Either way, they're available and I've seen them installed. I personally still prefer to run fenderless, but I'm sure others would like the option of having them and now you know what the limitations are.

TAKEAPARTABILITY
Catrike wins in this category. A few screws loosen everything, The seat can't be removed anyway (nor would you want to), the boom holds nicely with quick release skewers. All three wheels have quick release skewers too which are absent in the KMX. The KMX requires tools to lug around to remove the wheels, most of which aren't necessarily on a standard bike tool.

So if removing pieces for a more compact unit to fit into a sedan (non truck, SUV, wagon or hatchback) is important, note doing so with a KMX (which I've done on a few occasions where I drive long distance) isn't nearly as easy as I can imagine it would be with a Catrike.

IRRITANCE:
Yes, I made that word up. The KMX's boom seems to like to loosen itself, especially during aggressive pedaling down hills. Part of it is due to the poor design of how it's secured. The KMX uses two screws. The only contact that secures the outer boom sleeve to the main frame is the end of the screw to a corner of the square frame. Hard to explain, but you'll see it immediately if you ever look closely at a KMX boom. I suspect an easy way to manage this w/o too much redesign is to cut a V-shaped groove into the end of the screw so that the full surface will make contact with the boom. Anyway,...

The Catrike doesn't have this issue. As Paulo noted so humbly in his Youtube video, owners of trike competitors have admitted that there's more technology in the Catrike boom than their entire trike! I can't say if KMX was the competitor (though I doubt it since hte quality, features and price point are completely different), but whomever it is, they remain anonymous.

I haven't dealt with the Catrike enough (being that I've owned it for less than 2 weeks) to know what irritates me about the trike if anything. I'm still in the honeymoone fast and I love the thing too much to see any flaws quite yet.

CONCLUSION:
If you know you're getting a non-suspension strike with twitchy steering that's super low to the ground and the stock seat angle is perfect for you, then the Catrike Speed might be the ticket.

Car Analogy:
If the KMX Tornado is the Scion of tadpole recumbent trikes in that they're super affordable relative to all the features you get stock, then the Catrike Speed must be the Mazda Speed 3 in the world of comparable bents. The quality and performance are there with a slightly better price point. Not seen as high end as HP Velotechnik, but provides all the needs in a cool sleek way.

Or perhaps better yet, a comparison can be made btw the Speed and a Lexus. While the Lexus continues the great reputation of reliability as a Japanese motor company, the Lexus brand also has been privileged to sit alongside luxury brands and may be even considered competitors. Though often compared with the high end of Mercedes and BMW, the lower price point and good reliability of this Japanese car seem to both be attractive traits appreciated by fanatics.

The Speed is the same way. Though not quite an HP Velotechnik nor (TR)ICE, it's still considered higher end all while achieving this at an attractive price point. Lexus and Speed are both answers to those who are looking for something above mid level (Acura and Trident), but want to take advantage of price tags that look like bargains compared to the high end brands. Perhaps "upper middle class" may be the term that most accurately describes the Speed and Lexus.

Motorcycle Analogy:
Continuing with a similar analogy of rides: If you're a fan of the Suzuki SV650 motorcycle, the Catrike Speed may be comparable to that as well in that it's well loved by novices as well as professionals. It's at the perfect price point as a higher end intro ride but still well used and loved by riders who have owned it for years and compared it to others they've ridden.

Mt. Bike vs Road Bike:
While the KMX is like a mountain bike on three wheels, the Catrike Speed is like a road bike w/an extra wheel. The two are vastly designed for different uses and does each very well. Try to take on the same conditions meant for the other and you may find yourself wishing you had the other. Neither trike has enough clearance to hop onto (nor off curbs) w/o scratching the frame.

Other:
I'd consider the KMX a great training trike. Riding the KMX as extensively as I did (from SF to LA in 7 days across 545 miles) allowed me to really appreciate the upgrade to the Catrike Speed. You travel a shorter distance on the KMX with the same force as you would on a Catrike. Strength and endurance was built on the KMX and now when used on the Speed, makes the Speed feel like a demon. Dare I say a Speed Demon? No plans to let go of the Tornado. It's worth more to me than anyone would be willing to pay for it. If the perfect fan comes along, I may consider. For the time being, there's two bents in my fleet and I don't plan on being a collector by any means. I expect the Catrike Speed to provide perfect use now, but also plenty of room to grow on.

Tandem Tadpole Tornado?

2011-12-27T20:31:00.000-08:00

Is that what this thing is? OMG, how did I miss the release of this? I happened to go through the Utah Trikes website looking at a BROL member's ICE trike and accidentally fell upon a blue tandem KMX trike! Wow! Pretty nuts.

Doesn't look that slick though. A design issue with these tandems always has to do with the connection btw the front section and the rear. Looking at this awkward pyramid shaped contraption isn't very attractive. Bold yes, but it looks like I could have designed and welded this at home in my garage - not the look we're going for KMX! Could I have done better? No and that's the point! Ugh. The color's cool and I'm glad they have something new for their new product, but the execution of a tandem isn't quite working. And at $4k, I'd like to know who's buying these.

With my criticisms aside, I'd still like to take this thing for a test spin both as a front/rear rider. Looks like fun, but I'm disappointed there aren't any improvements in the technology or design of it overall.

I'm happy to see better components. The gearing uses an 11-34T rear cluster which is nice for hill climbing. What were they thinking w/the design of the rear rider's handlebars? It doesn't even look like that thing would really work. Not excited about this new one KMX. Please try again.

UPDATE: 12/31/11
A buddy of mine informed me that the KMX Tandem is actually a Utah Trikes custom build. No wonder. I guess it's a good way to show off what UT can do at their shop. Pretty ingenious and it's cool that they made the effort. This explains the unrefined look that I hope KMX otherwise would have mastered if they had done it themselves.

I still can't imagine many people buying this thing. There aren't many tandem buyers to begin with and to choose a KMX for that purpose doesn't seem to make a whole lot of sense to me. Most tandem rides tend to be longer than single person rides. I can imagine tandem rides are more for exercise and leisure than they are for commuting or running errands. For long rides, KMX just isn't the natural company to go to.

Surely, I've completed the ALC on a KMX but it's far from recommended. Super durable and I'm glad I took it to prove to myself (and perhaps others) that it's possible, but I would not have picked it as my first choice if I had the luxury of choosing another trike.

On The Road

2011-12-25T22:55:00.000-08:00

The test ride impressed me. I'm glad I got the Speed. It really does live up to its name.

UPHILL:
The only things I've heard about the Catrike Speed were positive, but I couldn't help but to think that there are drawbacks. If speed is what it's known for, then perhaps braking or hill climbing are expected drawbacks. We'll see.

I quickly noticed after taking on the first hill that if there are any drawbacks of the Catrike Speed, it's not an inability to climb hills. The thing hauls up hills like none other - even in the middle chain ring! Of my first two rides lasting longer than 5 minutes, I only used the smallest chain ring on the second ride and even that was only out of curiosity.

The crazy thing is that it climbs ridiculously well on the second 42T chain ring! My Tornado's largest ring is 42T! The downhill chain ring on the KMX is the climbing ring on the Speed! That's nuts!

The KMX has a 22/32/42 crankset.
The Speed? 30/42/52.

If the Speed can climb on a 42T chain ring, the 30T small ring does wonders. With a 52T large ring, the trike feels like it has a huge gear range. I also noticed that having 9 speeds instead of my stock 7 allows minimal changing of the crankset. Most of the gear changing is done on the rear cassette.

Gotta exchange more Xmas gifts. More reviews to come.

First Impressions of a Catrike Speed

2011-12-25T00:47:00.000-08:00

The only time I really got to ride this thing was around the block at a recumbent shop in Los Angeles and another time when test riding my aunt's. That's pretty much it. Total time on the trike prior to today? about 10-15 minutes.

This afternoon after running around getting last minute gifts for the in-laws, I had some time to inspect the trike further and go for a test ride.

INSPECTION:
- The end of one of the boom skewers was missing. When I mentioned it to Patrick, he said he'd send over a spare from one of his old road bikes. Awesome! What a good seller. I don't blame him for the missing piece. I could tell he tried hard to make the sale smooth. It's nice that even after the sale, he's very responsive to questions via email.

- The trike's got 2 computers? Why? Not sure. I'll shoot that question over to Patrick and see what he says. Both have magnets, but only one has a sensor.

- The rear pillow underneath the headrest turns out to have housed speakers! Custom speaker mount! There's a cord that plugs into an MP3 player. I haven't tried it out, but it's quite ingenious and it turned out fairly clean in terms of looks.

- The 2010's come with the newer upgraded seat. This one's got a place for a pump, but it also has two additional pockets for whatever. In one closest and accessible by my right hand under the seat, I put my garage door opener. Super convenient. I put the included bike tool in the other.

SETUP:
- I didn't really like the foam and wanted to keep the trike as simple and close to stock as possible. I removed the underseat padding. The trike definitely feels different now. I feel more "in" the trike than "on" the trike which is something I prefer.

- I removed the speaker system b/c at the time I didn't really know what it was. I'll give it a test try outside the trike just to see how well it works. I'm not much of a music fanatic so not having this wouldn't be a big deal for me.

- The Airzound was a cool accessory that was included. I pumped up the air canister to the recommended 90-100psi and depressed the button. BOOOOOOOOOOOTTTTT! That thing is loud! No doubt, that'll get the attention of drivers even with their windows rolled up and the music blasting. I learned just a few hours ago that there's even a volume control! Another great thing about the particular Airzound that was included was that it was the white/grey version as opposed to the one with the orange button. White matches the trike and my attire so much better. Glad Patrick went with that rarer color. It's hard to find - at a good price.

- The left side was making some noise during my spin around the block. I also noticed the brakes needed some adjustment. I didn't break anything down nor did I crawl on my knees to get it seriously repaired. I just pulled the brake pad out a bit for better clearance with the disk and it's worked okay. I'll fine tune it later. For the time being, I wanted to ride!

- I removed the reflectors from the front wheels. I'll leave the back. Not sure why, but I left the rear alone.

- After my first 15 minutes of my ride, I had been hearing some rattling and quickly pulled over to address it. My adjustement of the headrest wasn't complete. After tightening the screws, it worked out well.

- I tried twising the thumb shifters in a more ergonomic direciton, but it didn't budge. Not sure how it works.

RIDING IMPRESSIONS:
Too tired. I rode fast enough to feel like I was about to puke. Gotta get some rest. More details tomorrow.

Did It Come?

2011-12-24T00:19:00.001-08:00

Rushing home, I was expecting to possibly see a package in my living room. Did my wife sign for it?

Uh oh. She's not home! The last thing I wanted to see stood before my eyes. Before I could even get into my living room, I saw on the door the UPS tag.

"Will return Monday for 2nd attempt for delivery." Something along those lines. Ugh. Monday? That's two days from now. At least Monday's a Holiday for me and I'd be home to receive the package w/o a problem, but I would've missed my weekend of riding.

Trying to relax and get the absence of my trike off my mind, I took the ebike out for a spin. Guess what I saw! A UPS truck! I followed it 'til it stopped which unfortunate for me was at least 8 blocks from where I live. Ugh, how would I carry the box and my bike back to the house??? I didn't really care; I would've leapfrogged it if I had to. I'm destined to get to that UPS truck!

Approaching the driver, I say, "Sorry, I know you are busy with a delivery schedule 'n all but do you think you might have my package?" I gave him my street and told him how big the box was. I figured it'd be the only one that size and he would've had to remember.

No, we don't go there. Then he told me where my truck might be. I rushed home to drop off the bike and pick up the car. But before I reached my driveway, guess what I saw?

Another UPS truck! Could that be it? I ran through the same routine only to learn that it was again the wrong truck. Ugh! How unlucky can I be? I stored my bike, hopped into the car ready for a joy ride through the 42 block radius looking for my truck.

20 minutes pass. Nothing.

It's getting dark. This should make it easier to spot big trucks double parked in the residentials. Oooo, I see something! I bust a U-turn and approach the truck only to find that it's a PG&E truck! Ugh! This is my third wrong truck!

Just as I'm about to give up after my 25 minute trek, I see a brown truck. Yup, maybe that's it. I bust another U-turn and disappointingly noticed that the driver looked like the one I saw 15 minutes ago. Ugh, the same truck?

Looking closer, I realized it wasn't! It's a new guy! Same height and same colored hair, but the truck driver was different! Yes, here's my other chance. Could the 4th truck be it?

"Oh yeah, we have it."

In my head, I'm saying, "Yes! Yes! Yes! I found it!!!!" The search was so worth it. The driver warns me of the same concern I had before pulling out of my driveway looking for the truck. "Will this fit in your car?" I had pulled up in my sister's Mini Cooper. The seats were folded back and while doing it I had promised myself that if I found the package I'd make it fit one way or another. I don't care of it's hanging out the back.

That's when I became really convinced that hatchbacks are totally awesome! Man, these things fit anything - even a 2010 Catrike Speed! It fit perfectly. Good thing I didn't have any passengers b/c the front passenger seat was pushed way up forward. No biggy b/c my only companion for the next 5 minutes would be my long awaited Catrike Speed! Home sweet home.

Yup, here it is in my garage! Not much of a looker. I was too excited at its contents to really care about all the holes on the backside and the weakening cardboard.

The box is bent out of shape but I'm hoping the stuff inside is in good shape and not damaged. Insurance ran through my mind.

I began unboxing. I had been curious how this thing would be packaged. I can't imagine how I'd box up a recumbent for shipment. Sounds like a complete hassle. I noticed there was foam in it as Patrick had said he would include to protect any protrusions. That would've helped if he had taped it or somehow secured it to the box. But instead, it lay in the box pretty much useless. All parts shift during shipment.

If everything's in good shape, then I suppose it doesn't really matter. I'll have no way of knowing until I put this thing together and start riding.

Patrick included a separate box of goodies:
- 3 sets of pedals
- Bike tool
- Even latex gloves!
- Paperwork from the sale
- Some pedal strap thingies
- Skewers

How's a Catrike look without legs? Here she is disabled. Fresh out of the box. One thing that was nice was that Patrick took apart only what he had to in order to make it fit in the box. This meant everything's easily put together. Apart from the wheels and boom, the only thing to install was the derailleur.

The chain ended up getting pretty mangled during either packaging or en route to my house, so I had to remove the whole thing and reinstall it. I had been worried that I'd have to tune the derailleur and all the gearing. I hate doing that.

The pedals for some reason look reversed so I had a hard time installing them, but I finally got it on. Tested it with my shoes and it works!

Uh oh! Missing piece! The boom typically comes with 2 skewers that secure the boom. I looked in the box and found the other skewer, however the other end where it screws into was missing. With all the holes in the box, I'm not surprised that it fell out somewhere. I'm pretty sure the seller packaged it in there b/c all other loose items were in a separate taped box. I really wish that foam was taped to the inside of the box and that there was more foam or newspaper.

I moved the complete working skewer to the rear hole and that prevents the boom from sliding. So at least I can at least ride this. No downtime while I get a hold of the missing piece from probably Utah Trike.

Part of the house rules is that we can't buy anything w/o first finding a place for it. This is where the Speed will sit when I'm not enjoying it on the road. I decided to use the bike stand for this trike to hold it in place since it doesn't have a rear brake. The KMX does, so it stand just fine w/o one. Perfect! I don't need two!

I can't wait to take this thing out tomorrow. Should I take those ugly reflector's off? I have no plans to ride this thing at night. It might be a good idea to remove these.

1.5 years of research to finally get a hold of this Speed. She's here where she belongs. Yummy! At $1,300 (+ shipping covered by my aunt/uncle), the cost was very reasonable for a used Catrike. Still pricey for a non-motored vehicle, but I think it's a good catch for a bent trike of this caliber. Let's hope it's as fast as the name of it suggests. Off to sleep before my test ride tomorrow.

Mods on My Mind

2011-12-21T22:51:00.000-08:00

I can't help it. It's what I do. Here's my list of future mods I'm already thinking about and I don't even have the trike yet!

This is the old list. New one is in the update at the bottom of this post.

- Bell ($3.50)
- Flag ($49)
- Shorter 155mm crankarms ($45)
- Paint job. Red, white or blue? (free)
- Arkel bags ($139 + shipping/tax)
- Handlebar grips ($12)
- Crankset. I'll probably want to drop this down. I can't imagine using a 50T chain ring. Perhaps I could replace the high gears with some low end to take up the SF hills. Who knows though. I might fall in love with the big crankset.
- Water bottle cage bracket mount, 2 ($16)
- Water bottle cages, 2 ($4)
- License plate ($5)

I'm actually surprised there isn't much more than this. It's crazy how buying a better quality trike from the start means you actually get stuff you don't have to upgrade or replace.

- The wheels are awesome. No needs for upgrades there. Although I wish I had kept the black spoked ones I had bought before but ended up selling b/c they didn't fit the KMX Tornado.
- The trike itself is already superlight at 30lbs so no need to upgrade components for that purpose.
- The trike's designed for speed so there will be minimal need for gearing changes if anything. The rear cassette is already an 11-32T!
- Much of the other tools and things that I had bought can still be used for the Speed. Maybe I'll want another bike tool and patch kit so I don't have to take stuff from one trike/bike to another.
- No hydration stuff needed. I don't plan to ride this long distance anytime soon and I can use my existing water bottles. In the case that I ride with anyone on the ebike or they end up using it, we'll more likely than not be traveling shorter distances that wouldn't require more than two water bottles. Once each is sufficient.
- Lighting and computer already come with the used trike. Unless I'm looking to upgrade, there's really no need.

UPDATE: 12/27/11
Yup, the mod bug probably bit me before I even got the trike. Here's the list so far for fun new toys. The list is much different than above. I learned a few things.

- Bell: I just need that pedestrian bell. I'm picking one up from ebay with the compass on it for like $3.50.
- Rear light. Even in the daytime, it's good to have a rear light on a trike. Good for foggy days too.
I ordered a set of these today, 12/28/11. I decided to go with the same ones I bought for the ebike. It fits perfectly on the top seat bar. Looks nice, stands out, comes in black and it's only $4.99 shipped.
- Headlight: I have a front light, but a nicer one would be good. Not sure what I want. With the standard mounting on the frame, the choices are limitless (unlike with the KMX's old frame. I believe they caught up in developing a mounting location for the new ones.)
- Fastback Norback frame pack: It's a bag that holds securely to the underside of the boom for extended storage. Currently looking for a used one b/c that retail $43 plus shipping ain't cutting it.
- Shorter crankarms. I'd prefer 155mm ones but I'm having a hard time locating a pair with 130BCD of an ISIS BB type.
After some searching, I'm finding these are super tough to find in black and with ISIS BB. I may have to swap the bottom bracket from ISIS to square taper and paint the grey that it comes in.
- Flag: Worth getting a second flag for taking out the KMX and Catrike at the same time?
Savings is only $5.50. Not sure if I want a second flag yet. I'll buy my aunt hers (Christmas present) first and continue thinking about whether I really want another one for myself. I honestly don't see the Catrike and KMX being ridden at the same time.

NEED NO MORE:
After further exploration, I've decided I no longer "need" (want) the following:

- Arkel bags. They don't fit properly and there's plenty of space in the underseat compartment.
- Handlebar grips. Now I know why Catrike went with the cheap kind. It's b/c it needs to wrap around the thumb shifter cables. Most other handlebar grips are too tight and won't work.
- Crankset does NOT need to be exchanged for lower gearing. Low end gears are perfect.
- Unless I ride extensively, I don't think I'll need two water bottles anymore. Originally I thought I'd have to put the air canister that powers the Airzound in the stock cage, but it already fits nicely tucked under the seat! Very clean look. Almost invisible.

Interesting how the mod list is a lot shorter than the KMX's. I'm guessing it's b/c the Catrike is just so good stock.The gearing is fine. If anything, it can go up a notch for more high gears. Low end ones are superb as-is. Nothing needs to be done as far as weight goes. It's comfy. No complaints in that department.

Waiting for Christmas

2011-12-21T17:41:00.000-08:00

It's more like waiting for the Catrike. Just reviewed my tracking number and the Speed is in Ceritos. At least it's in California. It's that much closer to my door. I'm getting antsy. Can't wait for this thing to come. I've never ridden a Speed apart from when I fell in love during my first test ride and then another with my aunt's. Both rides were less than a fraction of a mile. I'm expecting to love this thing though.

Where's that UPS guy?

What Comes of the Catrike?

2011-12-19T23:20:00.000-08:00

What am I expecting out of the Catrike Speed?

Quieter
I'm hoping this thing will be tons quieter than my KMX Tornado. I don't know if it's that I modded it and the derailleur just can't handle all the chain slack needed from the crazy big gear range or what, but the thing gets loud. Lots of chain tube rubbing. I'm hoping the Speed will be speed around like a ninja on steroids.

Faster
I need this thing to be quick. My KMX seat alone used to weigh around 15lbs if I remember correctly. That's a ton! The Speed's seat is just mesh so it basically weighs nothing! It's important that I'm not being swept at the next ALC training ride. I hate being last. Especially on a bent, everyone thinks you're trying to be cute so it really sucks when you come in last. I gotta at least keep up with the crowd on the 10-12mph average speed rides. I think we averaged about that including stops last time, but somehow I just got bogged down. I blame the stupid bag on my the KMX (which I've fixed since and it's tons better). I went on a 10+ mile ride with the new rig and although the bag swayed to one side after an aggressive power slide, it at least didn't rub against the wheel.

-----

It'll take some time before the Catrike Speed becomes a looker. The bland gray doesn't really do much in terms of looks. The stock setup will look sorta blah compared to the KMX Tornado. I'm hoping to change that in the next year or so. I'm trying not to get bitten by the mod bug too hard, but we'll see.

Catrike Shipping Today

2011-12-19T08:06:00.000-08:00

The seller says the trike's packaged and ready to go. It's shipping out today! That'll mean that it'll get here plenty in time before New Year's. What a cool gift. Much thanks to my uncle and aunt who were nice enough to cover my shipping costs. I can't wait until this gets here! Hopefully it won't be raining when it arrives. I really want to take it out to my routine route to see how well it performs over the KMX Tornado on the paved roads.

It's arriving by the end of the week! Yes, that means in time for Christmas! Awesome. What a lovely Christmas present. This is going to be crazy fun. Can't wait to ride this thing. I guess I'm not waiting to paint it before putting it back together. I'm getting on this Speed Demon this weekend! And no, I don't care how cold it might be.

Catrike Joins the Fleet

2011-12-16T09:56:00.001-08:00

After over a year and a half of drooling over the Catrike lineup hoping that one day I'll have one, I took the dive and our brand spanking used trike will be on its way. I told myself I wouldn't participate in bids, but I gave into my passion. Along with a mountain trike, will be a road trike. I'm expecting this thing to be a speed demon compared to the Tornado.

No love for the Tornado? Of course there will be! I'll never forget the Tornado and have no zero intention of selling it. It's like my third arm. It'll be my all around off street climbing monster. Speed will be reserved for the trike that sports that name.

Originally, I had thought of the Catrike as being an improved upgraded Tornado. Not the case. The Catrike will never be able to withstand the abuse that a Tornado can undergo. The plan is pull out the full potential of both trikes. The Tornado will be rugged and the Speed will be swift. I can't wait to be able to catch up to Paul on his Expedition. Hopefully it really is the trike that makes him faster. That green machine hauls arse! He's since lost 15lbs and is going faster! The gap's getting longer. Time to shorten that. Watch out Paul, I'm coming up!

At least now Paul won't have to wait for me. I'm expecting a lot out of this new trike. Hopefully it'll be as good as I'm expecting. Only time will tell.

33 Miles!

2011-12-13T22:27:00.000-08:00

I hadn't ridden for awhile, so it was nice getting back on the trike and participating with an ALC training group. This time it was in Mountain View! New ride for me. I've never ridden in that city before so it was fairly refreshing to see the new views.

My quads were killing me by the end. But that wasn't the worst part of the ride.

The horrible part was that I damaged my Topeak Dynapak - in a big way. Although I made every effort to adjust the clearance with the rear drive wheel, it wasn't enough. The weight of the extra stuff I put in it on top of the vibrations of the road added to the load and brought the bag far down enough drag against the wheel.

What a nasty sound!

I kept riding since I was in a group and didn't want to fall behind. I didn't notice as much friction as I would have imagined. I kept riding for a few miles until we came to a stop. I hopped off the seat, raised it a bit and kept going.

Eventually, the bag swung to the side and cleared the wheel. It looked awkward, but at least it was working - so I thought! The side of the bag on occasion rubbed up against the tire. It was like a saw blade on butter. It wasn't until after the ride when I got back into my car and inspected the bag that I noticed there was so much rubbing that the tire almost busted a hole! The friction shaved off the fabric and got into the foam and almost went completely through! Luckily it didn't, but it's still pretty bad. Battle scar.

I knew I should have taken the trike for a test run around the neighborhood before going on a 33 mile ride! Ugh. Lesson learned.

Every Detail Counts

2011-10-26T18:08:00.000-07:00

....and that's why I spent the money on these puppies. Ooo, ahhh. Are they pretty? Got them from ebay just a few days ago and they've already arrived! I'm glad I spent that extra $0.02 per cable end to get it earlier and support a USA seller. It was worth it. I've been wanting these things for awhile but never bothered to get them 'til now. Nice finishing touch, eh? At $0.33/apiece they're over 300% more than the cost of the regular ones. Decent though for something so low cost.

I got extra b/c these are going on my new e-bike project!

New Storage Design Works!

2011-10-18T19:37:00.001-07:00

I don't have any doubts. This setup should work out perfectly. Functionally, it'll work. It's just a matter of whether or not I like it. Being that the bottom of the Dynapack is already all scraped up from the failure of the last setup which dragged it along the road, I'll have to keep that. I may as well figure a way to mount it and this is what I came up with.

I was so confident that the side-storage solution word work and when it didn't, it was a big disappointment. Rather than doing a test ride with the new configuration, I wanted to toughen up the bracket some more before taking it to the streets.

Solution?

Another Profile Designs computer mount. This time I'm using the short 35mm one to keep the longer 60mm one from angling clockwise from the overwhelming weight of the rear Topeak Dynapack. (By the way, that red reflector thingy was a freebie from Tom. He sells them on BROL if you're looking for a set. He offers them by the singles so order as many as you want!

The mount is basically a shim. It fills a gap to prevent any movement of the vertical bracket. I can adjust how long it is by screwing it looser or tighter. For additional adjustments, I can simply lift the entire bracket up and down the shaft of the existing longer bracket.

And this is the outcome! Because of the design of the Profile Designs mount, I can fine tune the angle of the pack to the millimeter!

Option #3 Failed!

2011-10-09T16:10:00.000-07:00

I gave it a try on my first real ride today with the new storage unit mounting system. Less than 10 miles in, I heard a sound coming from the unit - a dragging sound. Looking down, I saw that the Topeak Dynapack was dragging on the ground! I guess I can't return the item anymore! When I got home I found it was all scratched and dirty on the bottom.

For the next mile or so, I tried just lifting it up back into place. However, it kept slipping back down. The Topeak Xtension Bar was slipping on the frame. There was nothing wrong with the bag. It was the mounting that was the issue. Eventually, it got so loose that I couldn't ride anymore.

I pulled over and tried to remount it like I did for Option #2, on the back of the frame just above the wheel. I may have crossthreaded the screw b/c it wouldn't attach properly. Luckily I was riding with Mike and he taught me to screw it in from the other side which would clear the crossthread problem - and it did!

Another problem.

The bag was so heavy with all the gear in it, that it slipped down and sat on top of the wheel! That wouldn't work either, so I relocated the fender close enough to use it as support for the bag mount. It looked funky, but it worked for almost another 10 miles until...

SNAP!

The bracket sheared off! There was no repairing solution now! So what to do? Well, I'll call up Topeak for a warranty coverage, but until then what am I supposed to do? Luckily I'm on a recumbent.

I had to carry it in my lap the rest of the way home! Don't ask how inconvenient it was to shift gears and brake all while pedaling.

So what now? What's the long term plan? Well, I'm going to option 1. It won't require the use of the Topeak Xtender Bar. I'll give it a quick 2 mile test ride before deciding what to do.

Vote for your favorite on-board storage solution

2011-10-07T18:38:00.001-07:00

I came up with three ideas. Let me know what you think. Please leave me a comment with your preference. Your vote is really important. BROL members can also leave your feedback in the poll here.

#1: Rear mounted trunk w/o fender (nor rack)

The profile looks decent and the design maintains the same sleek look. We're missing the stock rear fender which makes the lines not quite as clean. I like how it floats above the wheel though which unfortunately leads to a drawback.

The storage unit has no choice but to double as a fender, defending its contents from mud and dirt. Yup, that means by the end of the day, the whole bottom side's getting dirty.

#2: Rear mounted trunk with aftermarket fender

It might look a bit busy back there, but at least my trunk will be protected. I may opt for another style fender. I'd like one that curves more parallel to the shape of the wheel. The current Planet Bike one is a bit too straight for my liking.

Mounting the spoiler back on requires the Topeak BarXtension accessory mount b/c the stubby Profile Design one is only 60mm - not long enough for the trunk bracket.

#3 Side mount trunk with stock fender

Lastly, the storage unit is brought to the side of the trike. This keeps the clean profile of the existing trike w/o any excess stuff up top. Keeping the weight in the middle of the trike will probably keep handling more similar to how it is currently with the Timbuk2 back beneath the seat.

Originally, I was hoping I could access the storage with this design while in motion, but that wouldn't be safe. I can keep the brackets looks and rotate the trunk for easy access while seated though.

So please vote. Let me know what you like and why. Also tell me what you don't like and why. I'm open to any all all comments. Don't be afraid to be mean. Give it to me straight. Let's hear it. Register and vote here on Blogger or leave me a note on BROL here.

On-board Storage Solution!

2011-10-07T18:32:00.000-07:00

I've been designing on-board storage solutions for my trike ever since witnessing the convenience of being able to carry lots of stuff: sandwiches, granola bars, bike tools, etc.

The products and accessories I ordered a couple days ago arrived from Amazon this afternoon (about 2 hrs ago). Here's what I have to work with:

Firstly is the bag! I heard conflicting reviews about the actual size of this thing. I was hoping it wasn't too big and not too small. Here it is next to my helmet for reference. Looks to be the perfect size! We'll see.

As another reference, here's the Topeak Dynapack seat post mounted storage unit on top of my stock KMX 20" rear tire.

What sorta stuff fits in here? 2 wrenches, XShot camera extension mount, waterproof cover, one spare tube of each size, Gel, Clifbar, granola bar, ziptie, tube patches and my bike tool.

I'll have to mount this to the trike somehow. That's where this little gadget comes in. It's a T-bracket. Topeak calls it their BarXtender. You can mount it in various angles.

This is an extra long computer mounting bar. It secures directly to any handlebar or frame of a similar dimension. It pretty much lets you extend a bar perpendicularly.

Now how do all these pieces come together?

Blackburn Toolmanator Warranty

2011-10-05T11:17:00.000-07:00

So the bulky tool I got the first time around broke and that was the reason for the Topeak Hexus II replacement - the chain breaker part of the tool broke. Being that the chain breaker was one of the main things I need in a tool, it was pretty important to have that on hand in case a chain snaps. I've had experiences with that where the chain breaker definitely came in handy and I would've have been able to get my sister's bike operating well enough to get home w/o it.

I decided to call up Blackburn for warranty coverage to see if they could help me out. It turns out that the item is covered! We had a hard time determining if the tool was the Toolmanator 1, 2, or 3. Apparently their directory or system doesn't have photos! We were comparing specs. There are too many versions of it. Either way, I should be getting some sort of replacement in the mail within 2 weeks. We'll see what they send out. In the meantime, I'm still trying to figure out how to remove the tire levers from the Hexus II.

New Toys

2011-10-03T16:52:00.001-07:00

I can't believe I lost my other tool! This is the third one. I've tried a different one each time. The first one's chain breaker broke, so I got basic Topeak replacement. Somehow I completely lost it so I figured I'd have to get yet a new one eventually. Today is eventually. Not cheap, but hopefully this will be my last one.

I read about this tool from a bicycle maintenance book I read recently. The chain gauge tells you how much your chain is stretched in percentage. This gives you a better idea of exactly when to replace it. A bit expensive, but I splurged on this $14 piece of metal.

The 8" tires on my electric scooter were a pain in the butt enough that I eventually had to take it to a shop who charged me $10 to remove and replace my self supplied tube. I figured rather than doing that again, I'd pick up a set of heavy duty tire levers for $7 to do the job.

Shopping for Chains

2011-10-03T09:43:00.000-07:00

My uncle recently bought some replacement chains for his wife's new Catrike Speed! It got me thinking about the difference btw chains. SRAM makes 4 different 8-speed models:

PC830
PC850
PC870
PC890

I called them up asking for the differences btw them since their website all had the same description and no details on how to decide which to get. At varying price ranges, I'm wondering what I'd be missing by getting the cheaper PC830 vs the PC890.

To my disappointment and I suppose expectation, Kyle who answered the phone was a bit hesitant. There were lots of silent moments in the conversation and "um's" and "uh's". When I asked if there was a recommendation of one vs the other for mt bikes vs road bikes, he didn't seem to have an answer either. The quality and longevity of all 4 chains he said was the same. So the difference?

How smoothly the gears shift. I suppose I don't really care how smooth it shifts. Plus I'm sure that has a lot to do with the derailleur hardware. So lesson learned? PC830 or other cheapest chain indeed is fine for me. There's no real need for me to get anything else fancier. I suppose if I had the top of the line derailleur and I didn't have to buy 3 chains at a time, I might consider the higher end "smoother" chain to go with my hardware, but that's not the case right now. PC830 it is!

UPDATE: 10/4/11
Dan gave me some value able information about the differences btw the chains. Please take a look at the comment from him below!

3 Flats!

2011-10-02T19:03:00.000-07:00

After 545 miles of riding the ALC, I didn't get a single flat and what happens today? 3 flats in less than 10 miles! The last one made a hole so small I could barely see it. I'm just lucky I was close enough to a Starbucks to put the tube through some soap and water. From now on I'm carrying a bottle of soapy water with me. That helped a lot. I literally stood there for at least 10 minutes looking for a super tiny hole - never would have found it w/o soap. Once I slapped some soap on there, I found the culprit in about 20 seconds - way faster!

Metcalf Mountain

2011-10-01T21:07:00.000-07:00

Mike, Paul and I have ridden together before but never with any other bents - until today! Eric and Tom came out with their trikes and here we are at our first rest stop.

Some how we decided to climb a big mountain. Dirt bike enthusiasts from the south bay will be no stranger to Metcalf Mountain. Except instead of riding up, they bring their big 4x4's.

After huffing and puffing and me asking about 3x, "Are we really going to the top?" we made it. Eric had to cut out early, but here's the rest of us at the Motorcycle Park . We hit 16% grades! Ouch! And in 102˚ heat!

If we climbed any longer, I would have been pretty exhausted w/o Tom's offer for extra water. Man, his ride can store a lot! He shared sandwiches with me on the way, bananas and even home-made granola bars! Thanks Tom! I should have taken pictures of the bars. They were good!

Someone decided that visiting the skatepark would be a good idea! I'm so glad Paul suggested it b/c I had been wanting to take the trike to one for quite some time. My high school friend had offered to take some videos next time we met up, but today was perfect b/c a skate park was not too far from our route.

Yup, we got a shot of it! I'm up so vertical that the flag is dragging on the ground! It was a bit intimidating at first being that there were at least a gang of 20 kids there at the park and we were the only ones who didn't know what they were doing.

The guys there were surprisingly very inviting. A couple of them even helped me get the trike up there on one of the ramps to start the off the action. If think if there weren't so many people there and it wasn't about to get dark soon, we would've stayed a bit longer. What a blast!

Pretty awesome when the kids were chanting, "He's gunna do it! He's gunna do it!" I'll post a video soon. Why wait, here it is:

Wide Angle Lens

2011-09-29T21:54:00.000-07:00

It's irritating that I find myself constantly either retaking footage or deleting it altogether b/c I couldn't catch everything I intended to in the frame; which is why it got my attention when I found this:

I've always wanted a fish eye lens and found that they make 'em for flip cams and cell phones! Yup, it's attached by a magnet. Super tiny and it arrived in the mail just a few days ago. $16 shipped from China I presume.

It works well! Loving it actually. I made a couple videos already. The thing comes with two metal rings (one is a spare) and it sticks onto your existing camera.

The lens itself is magnetic and just snaps right on when you need it. Purchased from Deal Extreme. Indeed the deals are extreme but so is the wait time. It took 3 weeks to arrive!

This is me blogging on the kitchen table. Decent shot, but you can't really see much of the context.

With the camera held in the exact same place with the new lens, you get this shot! Wow, what a difference eh? You can easily see the entire table and back wall.

If I lowered the camera and shot straight, I could have captured the ceiling! I can't wait to see what this does for trike footage. I'll update the review after a trial run to see how many times the lens falls off the camera while riding - hopefully I won't have to report any of that. Wish me luck!

UPDATE: 10/2/11
I lost the fisheye lens!!! I went on a ride yesterday and apparently the magnet isn't as strong as I was hoping it was. I'll purchase another, but this time no action shots.

Replacement KMX Wheels In This Week

2011-09-20T14:24:00.000-07:00

I got a word from Matt at Utah Trikes that my new replacement wheels will be shipped out today. He said I can expect to see them by this weekend! Great news. That means I can ride this Sunday if I have some time. Hope they last longer than the previous ones w/o making annoying sounds!

UPDATE: 9/29/11
The wheels actually arrived last week on 9/21/11 in the afternoon. I love the mail delivery guy! Knock! Knock! Knock! The wheels looked great. They were wrapped better than the last ones! Indeed the j-hooks were installed in alternating directions onto the hub like they should be. I'm glad Matt from Utah Trikes recognized this when I brought it to his attention and fixed the issue so quickly. Instead of spending $85/each on relacing wheels, I only had to spend $14.75 or so to ship my old wheels to them.

Of course getting new replacement wheels (the ones they now use on the newer KMX's) meant I had to put on new reflective red tape (which I had plenty of left over) and remount the computer magnet. No biggy. Both worked out fine and I finished that and mounted the wheels in probably a bit over an hour. Not too bad.

I'm ready for this Saturday's ride....squeak free!

On the Fence About ALC?

2011-09-18T16:40:00.000-07:00

No, this isn't a post for myself. It's for anyone like Vickie (yes, that's spelled correctly). I met a newbie named Vickie on this morning's Recumbent Riders of the East Bay monthly ride. She's heard of the ALC and mentioned she had considered riding. What do I tell people who are on the fence as a first time rider?

1. It can easily be one of the most or the most physically challenging event that people do in their lifetimes.

2. "You only live once." I hear this clique all the time. It's so overused that I almost don't even know what it means anymore. But it's so true. There will be lots of things we do in our lifetime and most regrets we have in our lives will be things that we wish we did - not things we wish we didn't do.

3. The ride is fully supported. Food, tents, organized rest stops, vans to carry your stuff. It's all there.

IS THE RIDE HARD?

1. Of course! Most people who do the ride aren't hardcore cyclists, yet they're able to participate in the ride and complete a majority if not all of the 545 miles.

2. 2,500 people do it a year. You can do it too. Remember, one guy last year strapped his walking cane to his bike frame! Also remember that rumors have it that one person also passed away due to an accident on the ride. Be careful!

3. Better to have attempted and failed than to have never done it at all. Don't be intimidated by the sheer number of miles (or days). Not everyone completes every mile due to physical constraints and sometimes our bikes just won't let us continue. It happens.

OMG ALC 11

2011-09-11T23:30:00.001-07:00

I signed up! Peer pressure got to me. It wasn't at all the possibility of winning the raffle prize of a $1,000+ road bike for my sister. No, it couldn't have been that. I may not ride this year and figured even if I didn't win the bike (which I didn't), the $55 would go to a good cause - and of course is tax deductible.

Paul even offered to pay for my registration fee! What a great guy! He literally handed me his credit card. It was an awesome gesture, but I declined. Figured I'd use my Expedia rewards gift card! I knew that would come in handy!

Source of the sound

2011-09-05T13:19:00.000-07:00

I figured it out or rather City Cycles figured it out. 20 minutes after dropping off my trike this morning, I get a call back from Hansen telling me what's making the noise. Spoke rub. Apparently the KMX front spoked wheels are built incorrectly. Rather than alternating the j-hooks of the spokes like standard, KMX built them facing all in one direction. This causes increased rubbing btw the spokes - more than normal. Over time this has started making even more noise. I'm told that eventually this could pop spokes. Not safe.

Conclusion? Well, Mike and I were already disappointed with the mag wheels. The cup of the hub on those black mags were weak. Overtightening easily snaps it causing all the bearings to come loose which makes the wheel shaky. Broken cups can't be repaired. The whole wheel was replaced. I thought that spoked ones would be better. At $240 for the set, I was expecting at least a decent correctly built wheel. Not the case! Ugh, after this rebuild of the wheel so that the spokes are facing the correct direction, I would have paid $240 + 2(85) = $410 for the set! That's ridiculous!

If I knew I was going to be this serious about riding the recumbent trike and would be putting this many miles on it and had all this information about lack of quality, I definitely would have spent more on a Catrike (assuming I wouldn't mind parting with the extra dough to acquire one).

To sum up KMX's design quality in one word? Disappointing.

UPDATE: 9/7/11
I was asked by BROL to give Utah Trikes a chance at correcting the issue. I contacted them and heard from Matt today. He offered to replace the wheels with the newer style which are laced properly. Sounded like he was glad that I brought this issue to his attention. I guess shipping will be the only cost and that'll be much cheaper than relacing at $85/each. I just hope City Cycles hasn't started on the wheel build yet. I'll call them now.

They haven't started yet. I offered to pay City Cycles for helping me identify the problem but Hansen from the shop said it's okay and they're cool with me just picking up the wheels.

UPDATE: 9/9/11
I bought the guys at City Cycle a 12 pack of Red Label Jamaican beer for helping me identify the source of the sound. I swapped the paper bag with John who built my 20" wheel last time in exchange for my original wheels back. I need it for Sunday's ALC Thank You BBQ ride. The alcohol set me back $16.60 but I figured I was saving $85 x 2 (wheels) = $180 - $14.50 (shipping to Utah Trikes) = $165.50. Not bad.

I shipped the wheels out per USPS and it should arrive at UT's door step in about a week. It'll take some time for Matt there to send me the wheels so I should be in good shape with brand new replacement wheels in about 2 weeks at the most. I just gotta be sure I have enough reflective rim tape to cover an additional two wheels. I'll probably have to hit up Ebay for another $7.99 set. No biggy.

Squeak

2011-09-02T17:38:00.000-07:00

Ugh, this squeaking thing is killing me. Ever since my ride with Paul a couple weeks ago, there's been a constant squeaking noise coming from the right wheel. After all this time, I'm starting to hear it in the left wheel as well. It's definitely getting irritating and even moreso is that I've tried pretty much everything I can think of to fix it w/o luck.

WHAT HAVE I TRIED?

- Removing the rim tape, cleaning the holes/screws and retaping.

- Tightening these screws.
- Removing the king pin, cleaning the top and bottom sealed bearings, regreasing it, reinstalling.
- Removing the brake pads. The sound still occurs with the pads removed.
- Removing and cleaning the tie bar from the steering mechanism. Lube and cleaned.
- Tried the pencil thing. Tried tapping on all the spokes and they sound fine. Squeezed it and they're tight.

- Applied red Loctite to the outer race of the bearings.

- Tightened the rotors.

- Put graphite powder btw the nipples and rim.

- Put lube in the same place.

I even brought the trike to a new friend of mine, Tom who tried a few things at his house this afternoon in the list above and no luck. I dropped by 3 bike shops and all told me they were either too busy or didn't know what to do.

One bike shop owner I came across accidentally while visiting another shop said he was in the business for over 40 years as a bike mechanic. He had a difficult personality, but sometimes these are the guys that you can really learn from if you can get over their big heads. I stuck with him and listened to what he had to say and he thought it was the drivetrain - something to do with the derailleur on the back wheel. Front wheel noise is coming from the back wheel? Uh, I highly doubt that but this guy's got 40 years experience. He looked at least 60 and I can't really argue with that. I'll try some adjustments tomorrow, but I'm not hopeful.

I'm on Page 8

2011-08-30T11:43:00.000-07:00

...of Adam Rice's blog. Thoughts so far? Well, I need to remind myself that this isn't an ALC ride. There won't be designated rest stops every 15-20 miles and there sure as hell won't be a bunch of people cheering me on to continue. This'll be a sad and lonely ride. Do I really want to do this? Yes, I think it'll be good for me. Although I can compete, I was never much of an athlete and school wasn't my forte. This ride will be more of a self accomplishment than anything else.

The ride will definitely be more mental than physical. I can feel that already. Being alone for 2 months straight? Riding in deserts? Eating alone? What will all that be like? And anyone who I see along the way riding a bike or trike embarking on the same mission won't be Chinese. I'll tell you that much.

I am riding across the United States of America on a trike

2011-08-30T10:54:00.000-07:00

Yes, really.

If I ever had a life goal in terms of self accomplishments, it's this: I'm going to ride a recumbent trike across North America. Yeah, I know. It's nuts and it'll take no less than 2 months. I'm not a camper but then again I wasn't much of a cyclist either. A handful of people have already done it and only one died - not from the trip. Their documentation on the blogs should be adequate in prep for my own journey. See new list of links to the right under, "Long Distance Trike Riders."

The only question is when will I be doing this? I probably should have done it this year just after the ALC ride, but I was never really serious about the trek until about 3 minutes ago. When else will I have 2 months off? Not sure, but when it happens and Angela's comfortable taking care of the kids while I'm away, I'm leaving. I'll be cool if I do it when our kids are old enough to appreciate what their dad's embarking on.

Until then, whether it's 2 years from now or 20 years, I'm reading all I can in prep for this insane once in a lifetime ride. I'm in no hurry. I need to give Apple some time to develop their Ipad 4 and/or Iphone Nano. So for all those who are saying, "Don't do it. Don't do it. It's too dangerous," I'm doing it. I have enough time to prepare, so off I go to the internet world for research....

Oh and no, I'm not going in cold turkey. I'll take a few week long tours to see what I'm up against as training for the epic ride. It'll be insane. Lonely, but insane.

XShot Test Shot

2011-08-29T16:34:00.000-07:00

Just before 4pm, my package arrived from the little white truck. I heard it coming.

Maybe I shouldn't have been so surprised since I've seen photos of this thing before, but this pole is a bit beefy.

All the reviews on this thing were right on. It's definitely a quality piece. I'm sure it's more durable than the $10 competition ones I saw on Amazon. It's got that HTC cell phone type of finish on the handle. The telescopic extension does have two grooves on either side to keep each section from rotating. This keeps the camera as steady as your hand can keep it. After using it for a few test shots, I found that it's pretty good for keeping the camera level. Especially when you're not looking, it would otherwise be tough to tell if the camera is level to the ground. By putting a finger on the grooves, you can easily tell if you're in the proper position.

MD80

2011-08-28T16:59:00.000-07:00

While waiting for the Xshot camera extension to arrive, guess what popped in the mail? My DV MD80 mini camera! I bought this thing for under $12 shipped. I wasn't expecting it from China for another couple of weeks, but here it is!

Some call it a thumb camera b/c that's about the size of it. It comes with a variety of clips and brackets for mounting. One of them even has a magnet on it for securing to things like....a trike!

I took it for a spin and the quality reflects that of a $11.56 item, but what more can you ask for. It's designed as a spy camera - not really for super high quality videos. You get what you pay for I suppose. But as a bonus feature, it even has a sound sensor so that it only turns on after hearing a 60db sound. Pretty neat.

While doing some research on this thing, I came across a Youtube video of another product that probably would have been a lot better for filming first person videos. At the bridge of the sunglasses is a little camera lens.

The fat arms house controls, a microphone, micro SD card slot and an MP3 Player. The lenses aren't photocromic nor polarized, but it's crazy what you can get for $11.50 shipped from China these days.

Rig me up

2011-08-26T17:10:00.000-07:00

Most people won't want to spend 50 miles with me on a bike, so how else can I give them the next best thing? Video footage.

I spent 40 minutes this afternoon putting together a camera rig to get some footage of me on the trike. My arm isn't long enough and it hasn't grown the past year. I decided to use a 5'-0 long cardboard tube I found laying around the garage from one of our living room rugs. It was strong and a good length so I figured it'd work.

With a little bit of strong double sided 3M tape and the Monkey Grip Tripod, I figured I had it set. Hahah. It only took 30 minutes to realize it wasn't going to work. The camera kept falling to the side and during playback everything would be 45 degrees off or worse - completely upside down.

Unfortunately even if the rig did work out, I won't be carrying around a 5 foot long cardboard tube everywhere I go. I thought about strapping something to the underside of the trike, but there's got to be a better way.

Even with my background in design and construction, I figured I could fabricate something really cool but mounting it and unmounting it would still be an issue and to carry around a rig on a trike w/no panniers would be a hassle.

Not much luck today.

If nothing else, I've at least been able to entertain the UPS truck driver that stations near my house during his lunch break. I'm sure this afternoon was the first time he's ever seen a weird three-wheeled bicycle thingy rolling down the street with a cardboard tube attached to the end. That'll be his last time b/c I'm getting a new rig.

It's called the Pocket XShot - normally $30 plus shipping and tax but of course I don't pay full price for much. $20 shipped from Amazon sounds about right. It'll be here Tuesday. We'll do some test shots then.

So what's this thing do? It's basically an extension arm for the camera. It telescopes out much like an old school tv cable antenna. Cameraman holds the handle and the camera sits on the other end. Only 7.5" long but will extend up to 30.5".

It seems kind of stupid at first. $20 for a long stick? But it's not so much about the product as it is about the value of what you can get with this little gizmo. After seeing some videos on youtube of people using this, I'm convinced that it'll help me get some footage that I otherwise won't be able to get.

During my last ride with the boys, I tried getting some closeup shots of their rides but it can get a bit dangerous riding so close with cars, pedestrians and other obstacles to look out for. This extension should help. Also when reclined on the recumbent, it's tough to get over-the-head shots. If I can extend the camera 30.5" + the length of my arm, I can get some pretty neat shots not otherwise achievable with just my body.

How else did I convince myself to spend $20 on this stick? I figured I could use it for more than just triking. Vacation photos! Maybe our future vacation photos will include shots of me too instead of just the wifey. This camera on a stick would come in handy during cool outdoor activities too like snowboarding. I wish I had it when we went parasailing earlier this month. I'm sure after I get it, I'll find more and more uses for this little gadget.

Hase Pino Tandem?

2011-08-25T22:09:00.000-07:00

Funny name, eh? I've added another bent to my dream list: Hase Pino Tandem. It's a two-wheeler my wife and I can ride together.....if she was willing and....if we wanted to spend $4,900 on a ride.

Something about a white one get's me excited. I've been loving this color for the past 3 yrs on everything from trikes to cars. It accents the black very well. This particular model is the fancier version. I think it's $7k before tax and shipping. Ouch. That's like the price of a used car.

Yes, both riders can pedal at different speeds. No, both riders cannot steer the vehicle - only the rear upright rider. Yup, that means being the person in the front is a bit scary. At least the front rider (pilot) has a set of brakes for approaching a stop sign or traffic light. But once the tandem arrives at the intersection, it's the rear rider (stoker) who usually puts his feet down. The pilot stays put just praying that the tandem doesn't fall over.

I saw one of these at the ALC. It was ridden by a mother and son team. I bet if they weren't already close, they learned to be after the 7-day 545 mile ride.

Maybe when the wife and I retire and we don't have many other things to do and we have a few thousand to throw around, we might get this. Until then, it's nothing more than a new post on my blog. *Sniff sniff*.

Mommy, it's raining!

2011-08-23T18:19:00.000-07:00

So my new ALC bud just ordered a Catrike Expedition. And this was just 2 days after receiving a HP Velotechnik Speed Machine! So jealous. Anyway, I was researching how it would look in green and was surprised I came across some Catrike photos I've never seen before.

Covered trikes! That's actually a very clean look! It's not as dorky and home-made looking as the one's I've come across before. I'd ride this thing!

And if you want full protection, there's an expansion pack! Look mom, I'm covered! That's pretty cool. You can actually ride in full rain and even your legs stay dry. This might be the funkiest trike I've ever seen.

It's tough to actually imagine what it's like riding it until you see this pic! Now that's pretty cool isn't it? I could do without the trailer though. So where can you get one of these? Click here.

If I want my wife to ride with me, I'll have to get one of these for her. This one's definitely more dorky looking. It doesn't have the clean lines of the one above, but it definitely provides more sun coverage. Where to get this? Click here.

Drooling over a carbon fiber lowracer

2011-08-22T22:56:00.000-07:00

It pretty much speaks for itself. And when the price is $1,500 it's so sad to not get it.

It's got my dream wheel and it's made of my favorite material - carbon fiber! Even the seat is made of carbon. I picked up one of these seats at a store before and it weighs less than a stack of paper plates.

And if you're not gawking at that, you'll surely notice the slick looking wheels. Wow! Yup, those are carbon too.

The fact that it's a lowracer means you can keep yourself up using your hands! No immediate need for a stand. Unless you actually ride on grass, it's better to wear some gloves though!

Other than the fact that the seller on BROL has no history and this could be a complete scam, I'm not sure why this ride hasn't already been sold.

Crankforward?

2011-08-22T20:10:00.001-07:00

I heard this turn thrown around but never really cared to look for what it really meant.

And then I found this. Looks like a mountain bike doesn't it? But notice how the seat isn't directly over the pedals. Trek calls this a "comfort bike," but many with more extreme angles are known as "crank forward" bikes.

A bit of a cross btw a traditional DF bike and a recumbent.

Here's one that's a bit more recumbent. Almost looks like a regular bike - just a bit longer and appears to be more aerodynamic. Yup, that's an Aerospoke rim on the back. Looks good! I wonder what it's like to ride one of these Rans crankforwards.

What is a velomobile?

2011-08-22T19:52:00.000-07:00

Whenever I bring up a velomobile, people ask exactly what that is. Here's a great picture that shows what's underneath that fiberglass skin - a trike!

It's still weird how the weight is offset by the decrease in wind resistance. These things are fast!

Bay Trail & Los Gatos Trail Ride

2011-08-22T12:26:00.000-07:00

Although our computers all calculated different mileage, we've determined that we covered about 43 miles yesterday.

It was our first Norcal BROL bent ride with more than 2 people! We celebrated with some good food! Not really. It was more of a bathroom break with a pre-lunch bonus.

Hey! Look who I got into riding a bent! I'm guessing BROL will soon have a new member. Paul here on a Speed Machine road with me on this year's past ALC ride. This is our second ride together. I'm still jealous of that suspension.

If you want to know what recumbent serenity looks like, this is it. "On top of the world!" as Mike likes to say. One of the best things about a trike? When you arrive, you're there. No getting up. No finding a place for your ride. Just relax.

Look who else relaxed with us? None other than this 92 year old fella (who looks 78 years young). After staring a bit at the trike, Mike invited him to have a seat and that he did. Is he sleeping in this pic? Naw, just caught him in mid blink.

Do you really use all 72 gears?

2011-08-22T00:53:00.001-07:00

My trike has 72 gears. Do I use all of them? No.

While explaining some info and sharing some opinions on trike gearing to one of the fellow members of the bentrideronline forum here, I analyzed my gearing and calculated how many of the 72 gears I actually use. Let's start with what I do NOT use.

- I never engage the IGH while in the middle chain ring.
That means the available gears in both low and high gears of the IGH are unused in the middle chain ring. It would be redundant to do so b/c it would pretty much just give me many of the gears I could otherwise just get by not engaging the IGH at all and just shifting to one of the other (smaller/larger) chain rings.

Since the IGH has 3 gears (neutral, low and high) and is matched with an 8-speed cassette, there are at least 8 x 2 = 16 gears I do not use.

- I also never engage the IGH to the low gear while in the large chain ring.
That's 8 unused gears. That's too similar to the gears in the middle chain ring w/o the IGH engaged. Remember that the IGH has some inefficiencies when engaged. In the neutral position, it's 100% efficient. So therefore, it's much preferred to not engage the IGH unless you have to.

- I also never engage the IGH to the high gear while in the small chain ring.
That's another 8 unused gears. This setup introduces more usable gears than the situation above, however switching back and forth btw chain rings and engaging/disengaging the IGH is something I want to avoid. For simplicity, I'd like to engage the IGH only t0 reach the extreme high and low gears for equally extreme situations. It is not to be used during normal riding.

- I don't use about 5 of the lowest cassette gears while on the largest chain ring with the IGH on high.
That's 5 unused gears. Since I've reserved the IGH for only the high and low end gears, there's really no use for all 8 gears in the large/small chain rings with the IGH engaged.

- I don't use about 4 of the highest cassette gears while on the smallest chain ring with the IGH on low.
That's 4 unused gears. Same as above.

So of the 72 gears on my trike, 16 + 8 + 8 + 5 + 4 = 41 are unused. I guess you could saying having these 41 "extra" gears is a side effect to the drivetrain modification that enables me to have ultra low 8GI and high gear inches of 97.

Q: So again, how many of the 72 gears do I use?
A: 72 (available) - 41 (unused) = 31 gears.

Wow, that's pretty astonishing! I only use 31 gears? That's less than half the gears. I just realized that! Time for a graphic.

Taking a closer look at the bottom left corner and top right corner of the gear chart, you'll notice there are overlapping gears when compared to the center three columns. Technically, the IGH only needs to be used to achieve the lowest granny gear producing an 8.9GI.

The second to last lowest gear of 11.7GI is too close to the IGH in neutral while in the smallest chain ring. That produces 11.9GI's. I can't say I can notice a 0.2GI difference.

This all means I don't really need three of the lowest gears with the IGH engaged on low while in the smallest chain ring.

Using the same logic with the high end gears with the IGH engaged on high, I don't really need the 68.8GI gear. The use of it would be purely for convenience. There are other ways to achieve this GI (w/o engaging the IGH).

So in real life use of trike, I actually only use 31 - 4 = 27 gears! Does that number look familiar? It's what's attainable with a 9-speed 3 chain ring crankset road bike. Though the number of gears are the same, the range definitely isn't equal to my setup.

What would I do differently for ALC 11?

2011-08-18T22:50:00.000-07:00

I attended an ALC event this evening before watching Stuffed and Unstrung, the Jim Hansen puppet show. While waiting for the slideshow to begin, I was put on the spot by one of the other ALC participants (who happened to be a high school classmate) when he asked me, "Are you riding again this year?"

Err, uh....um....

It got me thinking about what I would do differently if I did ride again in next year's Aids Life Cycle. There's a bunch of things I could do differently, but how can I be more prepared? The list begins now:

1. Bring an alarm clock so that I won't have to use up cell phone juice throughout the night.

2. Buy thermal underwear way ahead of time - months ahead. No one sells that stuff weeks before b/c it's out of season. Who would have thunk.

3. Don't bring energy gels. The ride has energy blocks and they're good enough (better actually).

4. Tape the flag pole to the bottom frame of the trike before giving it to the shipping company. I had to toss it b/c they wouldn't take it with the pole installed on the trike.

5. Bring sandals.

6. Take more videos of activities other than the ride (e.g. eating, walking, sleeping, etc).

7. Take 2 second videos every time the scenery changes. These can be linked together to create a pretty cool 5 minute video of each day.

8. Bring warm clothes so I won't have to use my tentmate's. I had to borrow Angela's little-bit-too-small fleece shirt b/c I forgot to bring long sleeve shirts! On that note, I should have also brought my fleece hooded sweatshirt.

9. Bring a collapsible cup (from The Container Store) for brushing my teeth.

10. Clean the spokes daily b/c when I returned, I found that one of them was a bit rusty.

11. ???? I'm sure there's more. I need some more time to think about it.

Turn Signal Light Project

2011-08-18T10:32:00.000-07:00

I've always wanted to add an LED turn signal to the trike - something I obviously use at night but that's also bright enough for daytime use. I first came across this idea when looking for something for the pocket Sharper Image electric scooter, but I figure I could probably do the same thing to the trike.

COMPONENTS?

First I'll need some sort of button. I thought about a toggle switch, but then I found this and it not only integrates onto the bike much better due to it already having a mounting bracket for the handlebar, but it's also compact and has a clean look to it.

Of course I'll need some lights to flash. How about these? I can pick them in any color except for (unfortunately) amber. Yellow's the closest thing. That might work.

And of course I'll need some way to store the power. AA batteries! It even comes with a switch. I have one exactly like this for a single 9 volt battery. They're super cheap. $1/each or so.

WIRING?
There are two lights (left/right) and power. But the trigger's got 7 wires? Umm, errr.... not sure how this thing is put together.

1. Left light
2. Right Light
3. Headlight
4. Horn
5. Ground
6. Negative power
7. Positive power

Is that right? I also know there's got to be relays and flasher gizmos but I have no idea how it all comes together. Hopefully the fellas at the BROL forum can help me out. If not, I'll turn to Endless Sphere (an electric bike forum) for some advice.

RESOURCES:
Endless-Sphere
BROL

Lock it up

2011-08-17T18:30:00.000-07:00

Since coming back from ALC where locks aren't needed, I need to address the reality of the City. People steal stuff. They steel a lot of stuff and they do it all the time. I just read a couple posts on BROL about people getting their trikes snatched.

Nothing fancy. The old lock and bracket went back on the trike just now. The way that the new seat frame is angled makes the lock conflict a bit with the water bottle cage, but no biggy. I made it work. It's just not as convenient to take on and off - which I guess could be a good thing b/c it used to slip out when I stored the trike vertically against the wall.

Ding and Direction

2011-08-16T14:20:00.000-07:00

Accessory 50: Compass bell @ Nashbar $3.49

Does that say fifty up there? I can't believe it! I've done a lot in the past year to this trike. The more accessories I add and the more I modify it, the less I want a Catrike Speed. Every upgrade means more work (and $$) I'd have to put into the Speed to catch up to the Tornado as it stands now. In other words, the Catrike Speed looks worse and worse after every mod to the Tornado. The gap is only getting bigger. I'll never get over the weight advantage of the Catrikes though.

What a smart idea! Integrate a compass into the casing of a bell! No tax and shipping was free from a recent promotion when any Nashbar product is purchased. The thing is a bit bulky, but the bell works suprisingly well. I currently have a Daiso knockoff version of the standard bell and it doesn't ring nearly as loudly or as high pitched as this one.

Hopefully after I install this thing, I can get a better idea of which direction I'm heading (in case the sun's not visible from where I'm at). I'm off to go install this....

Okay, it's installed! it fits in place of the old one. One good thing about this bell is that the angle at which the flicker is used to sound the bell can be rotated at any angle along the perimeter of the bell. How convenient! In fact this angle at 10 o'clock is even more ergonomic than the fixed one I had before that pointed directly in the 9 o'clock position.

When I ordered this thing, I was worried the compass wouldn't be readable due to the vertical angle it has to be mounted. After getting it on though, it doesn't look like it'll be a problem. The letter I can't see indicates the direction I'm heading. I can't wait to test the bell out! Watch out pedestrians! A friendly ring is just around the corner.

ALC Buddy

2011-08-15T00:03:00.000-07:00

People say they make life long friends on the ALC ride. Riding alone, I met a lot of nice people along the route. One of these guys reached out to me and got in touch from remembering my license plate on the trike. We got together and rode 21.73 miles this afternoon (exact figure determined by his cool Garmin thingymabob).

This is the first time I've seen a chart of one of my rides. Thanks Paul! It's pretty cool to see all the specs.

I'm glad we did this ride instead of attending Sunday Streets. This month's route wouldn't have been worth going to. It's only a few miles and it forks off into dead ends - nothing as gorgeous as Sunday Streets from last month.

$9,500 delta recumbent trike?

2011-08-02T23:13:00.001-07:00

I had never seen a delta style recumbent trike near this price tag until today! Yup, $9,500. Ouch. That's the "original" price. The seller's asking $5,250 shipped (that's about $5,000 base) I'm definitely not buying that. I wonder who would actually fork the money over for this thing? It's cool, but $5k cool? I'll follow the listing and see where it ends up. Until then, let's take a closer look at the trike and see why it's so uber expensive.

These things seem to win races over tadpole trikes (the ones with two front wheels). As far as high end delta trikes go, this is it.

A couple reasons for the high price tag is the special components on it: The Rohloff internal gear hub driving the rear wheels and the Schlumpf High Speed Drive (also internal) up front.

What does all this mean? It means there's no derailleur. The chain doesn't need to move from cog to cog at neither the front or rear ends! That's pretty neat. That means shifting this thing should be super quiet and there isn't any need to tune the drivetrain once it's set up. There may be some annual maintenance needs for the internal gears but that should only require a couple minutes to grease it.

Where does the price tag come from? Just the two aforementioned components add up to $1,500 + $750 = $2,250. The frame is titanium and the trike is discontinued. You couldn't even build this yourself if you wanted to. I believe the price of the base model is at least $3,500 plus tax and shipping. So if it were available and you put it together with the custom components, it'd be at least $5,750. Not sure why the seller claimed $9,500. It's from a dealer whom I've met in person before during my visit to Bent Up Cycles earlier this year so I trust the numbers.

The cool and convenience factor isn't that price tag though. Brand new, the price tag on this puppy is higher than the current used value of my car! My car's got an engine and full leather interior. As rare as this trike is, I think I'll keep the car.

Electric powered KMX?

2011-07-25T23:41:00.000-07:00

Yup, they exist. I've posted a couple before, but here's another that caught my eye.

See the gears above the rear fork? That motor powers these puppies up to at least 50mph. Crazy fast speeds cost a bundle. Prepare to pay at least $1,500 on top of the cost of the trike to get one of these.

It's definitely an experience you'll never forget. Their videos are amazing! Pretty scary stuff. These guys don't just sell power kits. If you're not up for the high speed stuff, then FFR also sells the trikes in stock condition:

http://www.ffrtrikes.com/kmx_karts

The toughest part about an electric setup for me to swallow is the location of the batteries. To generate the power to push the trike at high speeds requires some pretty hefty sized ones.

Where to put 'em? This is the cleanest setup I've ever seen. The battery enclosures look good too!

Final Flag

2011-07-25T15:32:00.000-07:00

Accessory 49: Flag @ bikeflagsusaakacatflags.com
$32 + $5.50 shipping = $37.50

That's an expensive flag! The last ones were $6/each and come with the two-piece poles! These ones are made-to-order I think. When I asked when they would be ready to ship, the seller said that it's still be made a day later.

The shipping costs were accurate. When it arrived in a tiny little box, the stamps did add up to the shipping cost. The company doesn't try to getting extra profit by exaggerating the shipping. I suppose that's good but the unit price is a bit on the high side. Either fortunately or unfortunately, this is a flag I like so the price was what it was.

My last two flags fell off on the road, I'm hoping this one will stay put. I'll need to strengthen the bracket that connects the two sections of the flag. So is the flag pole too long? I wonder how much drag it'll cause.

The alternative was either a checkered racing flag in black/white or red/white. I was having a hard time finding a simple red triangle flag. The retailers call them "red" in the description, but when ordered, they arrive more orange than fire engine red.

This new flag is definitely red, recommended by my buddy Mike Beatty who's got a cool blue one with custom KMX lettering.

Another thing to add to the trike storage area. Hopefully by putting it here, I won't forget to bring it.

UPDATE: 8/26/11

How high should I make the flag? High enough to see over a car? Or does it need to be lower so that driver can be at eye level? I think both. I'll be lowering it tad so that the half way point of the flag is at the car's roofline.

How high does it sit now? 80" once installed on the flag mounting bracket. That's about 4" higher than the clearance of my garage. Do I want to clear it so I can roll right in? Maybe. Is that my finger in the top left corner of the camera? Yes.

For Sale: Sachs 3x7 internal gear hub + extras

2011-07-21T10:20:00.001-07:00

Up for sale is my Stage 1 IGH setup. It's perfect for anyone looking to increase their gear ranges to climb hills and speed down them faster on a budget. Please see my previous blog posts for details including gear charts.

I am selling this b/c I have upgraded to a Stage 2 8-speed setup with a custom wheel and no longer need this. It's therefore available to go to a good home. Note that this setup (unfortunate for me) is actually lighter than my current setup. The hub weighs under 3lbs. My current one weighs OVER 3lbs. Ugh. If you want a lighter weight IGH setup with everything you need (except shifter cable and housing) for cheap, then this is it.

I only have one set, so first to pay gets it shipped. As with all my sales, I include:

FREE shipping
FREE insurance
FREE tracking

Your new setup includes the following:

- Sachs 3x7 internal gear hub mounted on
- a 20" (406mm) wheel
- with rim tape
- Wrapped in a KMX beaded tire
- All proprietary hardware (shifter, mounting hardware)
- Sunlite anti-thorn tube (1.75-2.125" although the box says something else)
- 11-34T generic Megarange 7-speed cassette

Everything in this photo is what will be shipped to your door in the USA for $175. Perfectly priced for those that do not want to spend over $1,000 on a Roloff.

Note the red cassette box is empty b/c it's already mounted on the wheel. The little clear plastic baggy contains the hardware and proprietary Torpedo shifter.

Note that this is an older setup. The hub has not been serviced, but has performed well. I did NOT use this for my recent 7-day 545 mile ALC ride so I have not put that many miles on it myself. I purchased it used so I do not know how many miles were put on it prior.

This IGH is different than the SRAM 3x7 which people have had reliability issues with. This SACH's version is an older model but supposedly has been built a lot better. I have researched and found no complaints on this unit. It's pretty much bullet proof.

For those that are overwhelmed by this and aren't familiar with an internal gear hub, it basically gives you 3x the number of gears you currently have (assuming you have a 7-speed rear). If you have a standard 3 chainring crankset and a 7-speed cassette, this setup will put your trike at 3x7x3 = 63 gears.

The gear range will give you an ultra low gear to climb hills and an ultra high gear to speed down hills faster. The cassette I've included is somewhat rare. An 11-34T 7-speed cassette isn't very common. It provides a huge range for those that want both high and low end gears. It's worked well for me and I hope it works well for you too.

I can ship this the next business day after receiving payment. It's ready to go!

UPDATE: 8/22/11
It looks like the IGH went to a really good home. Look how excited the buyer was to receive the package! http://homebrewedbikes.blogspot.com/2011/08/yipeeeee.html. I'm super happy that it went to such a bike enthusiast who can really make use of the IGH to its optimal potential. I couldn't have sold it to someone more deserving.

Is Riding a Trike Harder?

2011-07-18T11:49:00.000-07:00

I got that question at least 20x during the ride and I didn't really have a straight answer since I'd never attempting anything at this caliber on an upright bicycle before. The most I've ever ridden on a DF bike at one time was just in college years ago riding to and from class. I road around the neighborhood to explore but even those rides didn't stretch out for more than 1 hour.

So the differences btw riding a trike and bike?

1. The trike is slower:
Lots slower up hill. Slow = 2.5-3.5mph. As I mentioned, riding with DF riders on a team would be tough. You'd never get to ride together except for that split second as they pass by you yelling, "On your left" on the uphills and when you pass them on the downhills,

"Brian on your left please! Brian on your left please!"

If you don't mind being passed by people every few seconds and hearing, "On your left" throughout the day, then triking is for you. Keeping up on a trike is a game of "leap frog" as one rider put it. Trikers can keep up by taking shorter rest stop breaks, getting on the route early, riding longer and coming from a stop much more quickly since we don't have to clip in and out of our pedals.

The ability to ride slow on a trike can be an advantage on super steep hills. While some DF riders are forced to walk their bikes on these 15 degree plus hills, trikers can continue at their super slow speeds b/c we don't need to balance.

2. No balancing required:
This also means we can go down hills fearlessly. Yes, I think I hit 50mph on that hill after the "Half way to LA" point. That was the most fun hill I've ever descended. Amazing experience! If your equipment gives you more guts to go faster, then you will. The trike has that advantage and in that sense, it's easier than a DF bike.

3. No clipping in and out of pedals:
Although it seems like very little time saved, it adds up. From a stop sign or traffic light, trikers can accelerate much more quickly than upright bikes. The advantage is pretty surprising. I never realized this until my first (and only) formal ALC training ride. Trikers can also stop on a dime b/c we don't have to worry about falling over.

4. No butt sore:
The trike is easier in that there's no sores to complain about or to treat on the rest stops. The only thing I needed to give a rest at night was my eyes and body. I never visited Medical other than for sunscreen and moleskin for my foot. I can imagine it's tough for DF riders to continue riding at the same pace when they're uncomfortable in their groin area. That's a non-issue for trike riders.

5. Better gearing:
Although DF bikes can have custom gearing just as easily as trikes (if not even more easily due to the simplicity of how the components are put together), trikes tend to be customized by their owners much more often than DF bikes. For the most part, DF riders ride their bikes as they are straight from the factory. Bent riders are peculiar in that trikes are awkward to begin with as are their owners. We are attracted to weirdness and embrace it by tweaking. We tend to mess with parts more often than DF riders.

The gearing on the KMX Tornado has been replaced completely over the past year and as I mentioned in previous posts, it can pretty much climb a tree. With gear inches down to 8.9, there's no hill I can't climb on the trike that a DF rider can.

The weight of trikes already tend to be fairly heavy, so any addition of weight from an internal gear hub is not as big of a deal. If you asked a carbon fiber 17lb DF bike rider to add 3lbs to their rear end by installing an IGH, they would gasp. That's almost 20% additional weight! Trike riders with 35+ lb rides tend to be more willing to add this weight for the advantage of being able to climb hills more easily.

6. Mirrors
I swear fewer than 10 people had mirrors on their bikes. Yes, that's 10 out of 2,300 riders! I'm not comfortable riding anything w/o mirrors, so in this sense, riding a trike was much easier. Mirrors can easily be attached to regular bicycles since they attach the same way on the handlebars, but this shows how much more trikers tend to modify and accessorize their rides than DF riders do.

7. Less neck sore:
Since the default recumbent position of the trike is looking forward and toward the sky, there's much less strain on the neck. DF rider's default position is looking down in their aero position and have to strain to look forward. This can easily lead to fatigue that trikers know nothing about.

8. Durability:
Most DF riders use a road bike. Road bikes are light and fast, but are also quite delicate. Most trikes are like mountain bikes on three wheels. The durability was tested on a couple stretches of rough roads on the ALC ride and it shined! No repairs had to be made and the need to inflate tires was minimal. This saves a bunch of time on the route since there are fewer needs for repair. I did meet one DF rider however that didn't have a single flat tire on the entire 500+ mile route. So DF bikes can definitely withstand less than ideal conditions but they just need to be equipped with the proper tires and tubes. I'm sure a bit of luck is involved too. The fewer times you have to pull over and repair something, the better off you are. This is another advantage of the trike and definitely makes riding easier in this sense.

CONCLUSION:
I would never ride a DF bike on the ALC. There are too many advantages of a trike that I would be neglecting if I chose the alternative. A recumbent is as fun and as cool as you imagine it to be. The only drawback is the speed up hills. Most of this can be offset by higher speeds down hill. I would see the same people throughout each leg of route b/c we'd be taking turns passing each other.

My major concern apart from possibly having to replace a rear drive wheel tube, is taking up too much space on the bike lanes. The last thing I want to do as a stand out I-chose-to-ride-a-weirdo-recumbent-trike is to annoy and bother other DF riders. I didn't want to feel like I was messing up the experience for DF riders with my wider-than-a-bicycle trike. This luckily was never an issue. I pulled over closer to the shoulder than the other trikers and I think the DF riders appreciate my consideration for them. I also acknowledged their presence and looked out for cars as they attempted to pass. This helped me gain a level or respect enough that I felt like less of an annoyance and more of a team player improving riders' experience (and safety) on the ALC.

Riding Alone on the ALC

2011-07-18T11:23:00.000-07:00

So what's it like riding alone on the Aids Life Cycle ride?

I wasn't really alone. Angela was a great help and was much more than a volunteer nurse and tent companion. She was of source of great support throughout the ride. As far as riding on the actual trail, I was surrounded by thousands of riders, but I personally wasn't part of a group or team.

Paul who recently emailed me concerning the bent trike had asked about riding a recumbent on the ALC. I'll post something about that topic next. His question inspired me to write a bit about riding the ALC solo.

For those who don't already know me, I wasn't much of a cyclist and generally am not much of an athlete. I've got decent hand eye coordination (can juggle with ease), but don't participate in many team sports. I'm much more of a pool and bowling kinda guy more-so than a basketball player. The last time I rode a bicycle for more than a couple hours prior to getting the trike was back in college over half a decade ago.

As a student of architecture w/an odd work/play/sleep schedule, I found a few solo activities to keep me occupied like golf and weight lifting. Unlike my former college roommate, I don't get embarrassed being seen eating by myself on campus. So when it came time for the ALC, riding alone wasn't much of a concern.

In fact, I noticed that when a member of a team popped a tire on the route, the rest of the team would stop and assist. This was probably one of the major reasons I was able to catch up with the rest of the DF riders. How else was I able to catch up as a solo bent rider?

2. Durability:
The trike is super durable. I got zero flats during the entire 545 mile ride! I was pretty surprised considering how many others I saw stopped on the side of the road making repairs to their bikes on a regular basis.

3. No Schedule:
My only schedule was to get out onto the route as early as possible and get back as soon as I comfortably could. This meant no waiting for friends or teammates to brush their teeth in the morning or finish their breakfast. As a solo rider, I could hit the route on my own schedule. Angela helped out tons since she was required by her volunteer group to get up and ready by 6:15am daily. This forced me to get up early too at 5:30am at the latest.

4. My pace:
Not having a team to ride with allowed me to ride the route day after day at my own pace. No waiting for other people to hit the restrooms or finish their snacks.

5. Trike 'n bike:
I'll put up another post about trikes vs bikes, but wanted to mention here that trikes and bikes obviously have different speeds and capabilities. Riding with DF riders would be tough. Literally hundreds of bike pass me on the route throughout the day. I'd be lying if I said I passed by an equal number on the downhills, but for the most part I completed each day in the first 2/3 of riders by the time we hit camp. As a trike rider, I'm glad I didn't have any teammates on DF bikes. I'd otherwise feel like I was slowing them down. There were no trike teams on the ride. Although I rode with a couple trikers during a few stretches along the way, no other trikers really road together for this reason.

6. Purpose:
The reason for riding the ALC was to give something to my future kids to be proud of their dad about. It was for a personal accomplishment. Again, as a non cyclist attempting the ALC (although I trained for 1 year for it), my main goal was to finish every time of the 545 mile ride. It really wasn't until the last few days that I really learned to appreciate the ride as a ride. I was focused the first couple days on just finishing the route before it closed at 7pm. With so much focus, I wasn't really thinking much about not having anyone to talk to along the route. That wouldn't have been the case anyway b/c there were lots of friendly strangers willing to chit chat at the stop lights, stop signs, traffic.

CONCLUSION:
I took all this for granted at the time and never really appreciated how convenient it is to ride the ALC as a solo rider. Although it'd be nice to have a friend ride with me, I never really expected that to ever happen. Since I wasn't much of a cyclist, I was never really part of the cycling perscene and therefore didn't have anyone who would consider riding the ALC. My personal friends also have better things to do than take vacation time to ride 545 miles from SF to LA. That's not really their thing.

From day 1 of training when I heard about the ALC, I knew I'd be riding alone. It was no biggy. Throughout the 7 days, there wasn't one time I felt lonely. I'm happy to have ridden alone with the opportunity to ride with other trikers if I wanted.

Sunday Streets SF

2011-07-14T19:03:00.001-07:00

This was the first time I took the trike for a spin since I completed the Aids Life Cycle. It was also my first time trying out the Schwalbe Marathon Racer on the back drive wheel. I originally had the regular much heavier Marathon. Since the tire did so well on the ride and didn't rupture once, I figured I could take the risk of a weaker Racer tire to gain some extra speed and agility.

It was well worth it b/c the tire does do wonders. I don't know if it's the tread or the slight decrease in weight, but riding the trike with the Racer tire is much easier than with the Marathon. It performed decently in the bit of sand I encountered this past Sunday as well.

It looks like I'll be keeping the Racer on there for awhile.

I don't know if I wish I used this on the Aids Ride earlier or not. Perhaps if I did, I may have experienced a flat since it's weaker. I may never know. I guess I should be glad I made the decisions on the trike setup that I did in prep for the ALC. No regrets - really, no regrets. The setup was perfect.

I still have my eye on a Catrike Speed, but that probably wouldn't be a financially smart idea. It would still need a lot of work to make it perform to the level of my custom created KMX Tornado F72.

Sachs / SRAM IGH setup for sale

2011-06-19T00:04:00.000-07:00

I'm selling the Sachs / SRAM 3x7 internal gear hub with 20" (406mm) rim (w/tape) and tire. It'll be matched with either the Schwalbe Marathon tire or the Big Apple. Prices to follow.

Would you do it again?

2011-06-16T22:14:00.001-07:00

I keep getting that question. On Day 3, I said I'd never do it again.

After the ride ended, I had second thoughts. I already reconsidered after my friend Jonathan expressed interest in doing it with me next year. I'm not sure how serious he is, but if he really did participate as a rider, I may actually do this all over again!

If I joined Aids Life Cycle 11, what would I do differently?

1. I'd start collecting donations sooner.

2. I'd contact corporate companies for donations.

3. Backup tires aren't needed. I'd leave both at home and rely on the tire boots for any repairs.

4. I'd bring 2 of each tube instead of 4. I didn't use any extra on the ride. No flat tires.

5. Gloves need to go into the sleeping bag with me to keep warm. They're slightly damp in the morning which isn't all that comfortable.

6. My energy gel can stay at home. Clif supplies their energy blocks which does the same thing but better.

7. I need to label my water bottle with my name and rider number in case I lose it. So many people lost their bottles on the ride. I saw at least 5 on the route.

8. I can't forget to bring my warm after riding clothes. I had nothing but my thicker riding jacket to wear at night and early morning. The hooded sweatshirt is coming with me next time.

9. More socks. Washing clothes and drying them on trees isn't fun. It also takes up too much time. I need a jersey for every day of the week, a new pair of pants and socks. I'd rather not have to do laundry in a camping setting.

Trike Pickup and Cleanup

2011-06-14T21:57:00.001-07:00

I picked the trike up early this evening from the Cow Palace. Mc Collister's bike transportation service had driven it from LA back to SF. Today was the last day to pick it up. It was nice seeing familiar faces at the pick-up desk. One of the entertainers was there waving people good-bye.

Even though I covered the trike each day with a nylon cover, moisture managed to accumulate making the tie bar rusty. I'll have to attend to that tomorrow with a chrome buffing agent. I only had time today to give the trike's frame and components a good thorough clean. It's amazing how much dirt I've collected on the thing in the past 7 days.

I'll also need to pick up another flag since Mc. Collister's didn't allow me to transport mine on their truck. I'm not surprised though. The trike already takes up more space than a bike and I'm sure the company struggled to fit it in with the upright bikes. Adding a flag would have only made it more difficult. Here's my chance to look for another red flag. Amazon, here I come.

After getting back home with the trike, I decided to swap the super durable Schwalbe Marathon tire with the thinner Racer version I had sitting in the garage. Reducing rotational weight should help me pick up some acceleration on the trike during my next casual outing. While I was at it, I made some minor adjustments to the internal gear hub. It seems to be working better than it did on the ride.

When removing the rear wheel to replace the tire, I noticed that one end of the axle was loose! No wonder the trike's back end was making noise the last couple days. Looking back, it was a bit dangerous. I doubt the wheel would have fallen off, but the problem definitely didn't help the alignment.

During my ride on Friday, someone had mentioned to me that my rear tire was angled in one direction. After pulling over to the closest sidewalk, I had checked it and hadn't noticed anything loose. I should have looked harder. The bolt on the cable side of the hub was way loose. It's fixed now, so I'm definitely not so concerned now. Thinking what could have happened though, worries me a bit.

ALC Aftermath

2011-06-14T21:48:00.000-07:00

It's been a few days since I completed the ALC. A few thoughts:

1. My horrible tan line is improving on my face. My wrist still has a very well defined line separating my white hands from my dark arms though. I won't mention details on the farmers' tan on my arms - it's worse. It's starting to peel.

2. Although I mentioned that I would never do the ALC ever again, I'm reconsidering. My buddy Jonathan mentioned he'd be interested in doing it with me another year. I'm not sure how serious he'd be but if I got the Catrike Speed trike I wanted, I'd strongly consider doing the ride all over again. I can't believe I just said that!

3. The pain in my knees are starting to go away. That's not unusual. It's usually the first day that I feel a bit of pain and it goes away the 2nd or 3rd day.

4. My quads burned every time I went up a flight of stairs at my friend Danny's house. I continue to feel it every time I climb stairs.

5. I didn't think I'd miss the ALC, but I honestly find myself wishing I was back there. It was great to be surrounded by people that treat each other so well. I know for sure I'll miss the costumes and outfits from each of the themed days.

ALC Photos!

2011-06-13T10:57:00.000-07:00

The ALC had a total of seven photographers and videographers following us during the ride. You can see their professional work here to see the event captured on film.

I'll also be uploading my own additional photos of the ride to a Photobucket account shortly. Please look out for that to catch even more funny pictures and videos too!

ALC Day 7

2011-06-12T01:25:00.000-07:00

This is part of my morning routine. After finishing breakfast kindly retrieved by Angela from her exclusive Medical tent, I pack up the tent. It only takes about 10 minutes.

During the last few days my pant leg kept getting caught on my chain. Here it is rolled up at Rest Stop 1.

We did it! No pictures tonight b/c I can't find the camera for some reason. I was much too excited to reach my friend's house and shower. But first we had to stop by Downtown LA for my favorite meal, a Steak Picado from Chanos. That stuff is great. It's the only meal I'd travel to LA for and then leave immediately.

Here's Joe, whom I met on the ride! I mentioned him earlier. He's a Positive Pedaler. He's been really nice to me during the ride and would tell me what good and bad things to watch out for on the ride. He's done the ALC ride 3x before all on the trike! This photo was taken at the lunch stop at a ball park.

This last day of ALC was fairly fun! I was on the road by 7am or so and traveled about 80 miles to get to LA! One tough part of the route required me to get off my trike, carry the 43 lbs down one long flights of stairs, bring it through an underground pedestrian tunnel and bring it back up two flights of stairs! I managed though and from there on out, it was just a matter of continuously dodging cars and other pedestrian traffic.

It's a miracle none of us got hit by car doors of careless drivers opening them from their parked car. No casualties to account for either.
We had a huge welcoming as we entered the destination spot in LA. Hundreds of people lined up being the gates and cheered us as we entered with their claps, bells and whistles. It was quite an experience!

Luckily, Closing Ceremonies didn't start until 4pm. I believed I arrived at around 1:45pm or so. Upon getting to the finish line, I met a few other trike riders who weren't in the ALC ride. They were fanatics who had ridden their recumbent casually and wanted to get a good look at a few that completed the 7 days. The tandem trike guys had already arrived drinking their beer as they handed me a can.

It was time to celebrate. 7 long 9-12 hour/day rides came to a close.

I arrived at Mc Collister's bike shipping and they were not able to take my flag so off and to the garbage it went (it doesn't fit in the luggage either)! Too bad I couldn't take it with me. It was a brand new flag I got just the day before the ride started a week ago!

My buddy Danny from USC School of Architecture was nice enough to pick me up from the closing ceremonies. He got pretty excited about the trike too and before riding it around took a shot at lifting it above his head - and he did it! That's pretty insane. It's an awkward shaped object of 43 lbs. A typical road bike is in the low 20's. One with a full carbon frame? 17lbs.

TOP 5 THINGS I'M NOW GRATEFUL FOR:
1. Toilet paper that isn't see-through.
2. Not having to line up for the restroom.
3. Not having to wake up at 4:45am every morning.
4. Feeling enough energy to eat.
5. Being able to eat something other than the snacks that have become mundane of the 7 days.

Do you know what happens when you've ridden 540.7 miles over 7 days without ever having looked into a mirror up close?

After I arrived at my friend's house, I looked at my reflection and saw in front of me a panda - a reverse panda. What's a reverse panda? Black skin and white eyes. That's exactly what I looked like plus blotches on my forehead from the opening in my helmet where the sun shown through. Pictures to be posted.

ALC Day 6

2011-06-10T18:34:00.000-07:00

Lompoc to Ventura

85 miles today, but it didn't feel like it. Although Day 1 and Day 3 made me think twice about participating in the ALC, today wasn't too bad. Even though I covered 85 miles today, I felt like I could keep going.

I'm starting to get my routine down. Too bad it took 6 days! Here's me in the tent this morning just before eating breakfast.

Only one more day left! I'm not sure this is the reason why my ride went so well today or if it's one of these:

1. Hopeful that I'll actually finish!
2. Can't wait to go home and sleep in a real bed!
3. I'm actually getting used to this.
4. The refreshing Steak Picado and Horchata drink I had last night.
5, 7+ hours of sleep despite being awaken by my aunt's text last night on my cell phone in the middle of my sleep. My rest hours are between 9pm-5:00am.

Even after today's 83 miles, I feel like I could easily ride another 60. My feet weren't hurting me. I didn't get tired. It seems like T-mobile's connection is much better in a bigger city like Ventura close to LA. I can upload pictures 10x as fast, so here's some to share!

At one of the rest stops, I took a photo with one my my trike buddies. He rides a higher end Catrike Expedition. These are the trikes people use to ride across the country. It's very well built and equipped. Joe here is part of the Pos Peds (HIV Positive Peddlers) group. He's the reason we ride.

Angela and I finally got a chance to take a picture together! She's usually working at the medical tent either on one of the rest stops or back at camp. We actually only get to see each other for maybe 3 hrs/day.

Can you beelieve this team rides with these outfits on? They did a little dance at rest stop 4. It was hilarious!

One of the rest stops had a zombie theme! Here's one of the lady's trying to kill me, as if the ride isn't doing that already.

The last person I thought I'd see on the road is my friend Jesus. Here he is posing at the porto potties. This is so not PC, but it was so hilarious.

LESSONS LEARNED:
1. Anything can be accomplished with the right combination of environment, support, hope, purpose and encouragement. It makes a big difference that people are cheering us on as we're passing their neighborhood or when we're approaching the base camp. People even cheer as we climb big hills!

2. If you eat the same thing over and over again, you won't want it anymore. The thought of peanut butter and jelly gram crackers makes me want to hurl.

3. Endurance is competition to speed. During the last leg of today's ride, I knew I was behind. I had already arrived to the last rest stop late and got away with not having to SAG to base camp. Although I was riding slower than other riders, I kept going as they began to slow down. A few of them had dropped to the side to repair tires while others simply got tired and pedaled slower. I kept going at my consistent pace. By the time I reached camp, at least 50 other people have followed whereas I thought I'd be dead last.

ALC Day 5

2011-06-09T19:10:00.001-07:00

Santa Maria to Lompoc

If you've never heard of Lompoc, it's b/c it's a tiny city. Ever heard of one with only 3 taxi cabs? That's Lompoc!

Today was a very animated day to say the least. It was "Dress in Red Day." Someone realized that during the old route, riders looked like the AIDS ribbon as they lined up and down the hill. Dressing in red made it all stand out.

When you tell ALC riders to dress in red, they don't just dress in red. It eventually became "Red Dress Day," meaning everyone where's a red dress!

There are a ton of pictures, but I couldn't resist posting this one. This guy was a Roadie (volunteer) helping out at one of the rest stops. He was passing out the paper bags that we use to hold our lunch goodies.

Today we had turkey sandwich, chips and a nectarine. A lot of people wore equally silly outfits and road on their bicycles with them! It was a pretty impressive display of cycling ability.

Since it was a short day and we covered only 47 miles (as opposed to 107 miles on our longest day), I arrived at camp at just before 2:00pm. I'm usually at camp btw 6-7pm.

I got a chance to leave the camp to visit the city of Lompoc. After waiting in the shuttle line for 45 minutes, I found out Angela could not come with me b/c her dinner break was only 1 hr and it would take us at least that long to get into the city, have dinner and come back.

I left myself and headed to Vons where they had a Starbucks! I was craving for a Frapachino! Upon arriving though, I decided to grab dinner instead and found a Mexican place just across the street. Eagerly, I asked the waitress,

"Do you have Horchata?"

She confirmed they did and brought me a Texas sized glass. Needless to say, I swallowed it down practically before my Steak Picado arrived and ordered another. After getting my bill, I found out it was a free refill! Maybe I should have gotten another. I love that stuff! There's a single Califoods grocery market on California street at the top of the hill that sells that stuff. It's made by Kerns. Other than that, it's only sold at restaurants as far as I know.

So how is my camera powered? I got this solar powered battery pack from Amazon for only $17 and it works great! It sits in the sun for the day while I'm riding and I can charge my camera or any other USB device (except my cell phone for some reason).

ALC Day 4

2011-06-09T18:54:00.000-07:00

Paso Robles to Santa Maria

Day 4 was super exhausting - so much that I didn't blog. I didn't even feel like eating and for those who know me, something must seriously be wrong. ALC was serving Mexican food and I could barely take 5 bites of it before calling it quits and heading to bed.

We got some pretty cool statistics in the newspaper this morning. Can you guess how many eggs we make for 3,000 participants? 44,600! Click on the photo to the left to see more interesting stats.

There were some incredible views along the way! I actually made a u-turn to get this shot! How would you like living on that block?

Last year, the line for taking a photo with this sign was 2 hrs! The crew finally decided to make more than one line and the line was cut much shorter. I only waited about 30 minutes before taking this shot. Other riders would lift their bikes up above their heads and stand on the rock! I wasn't about to attempt it with the 43lb monster, so here I am on the ground.

ALC Day 3

2011-06-07T22:03:00.000-07:00

Though not the shortest of the trip, today was the shortest ride so far: 66.7 miles.

King City to Paso Robles.

This day like all the rest had some cool photo opportunities. Here's one of a riding team. Yes, they actually wear that stuff while riding!

I arrived at camp at 4:18pm! That's great timing considering we're only permitted to ride until 7pm. Lots of people were held back at a small town with a population of 120. Yup, only 120 people live there and in one afternoon, they make enough money selling hamburgers to ALC riders and volunteers to pay for their whole school's sports program for one year! Last year they made $11,000 in a single afternoon! Wow!

Today's ride got tiring at the 2nd rest stop and moreso during lunch. I think it may be the lack of sleep, but I promised I'd update this blog daily, so I'm doing my best to keep my word.

The big thing today was the Quad Buster! it was a huge hill that everyone dreaded. It was the one thing that I was pretty much preparing my trike to overcome. I did it! Not only did I climb up the huge infamous hill, but I did it twice! I came rolling back down at 40 + mph like an insane man and went up it all over again!

It was soooo hot today. I got sunburn and in a little while Angela said she'd help me put on some Aloe on my sunburns. I'm sort of ignoring her as I'm typing this. She's in the tent with me now and just finished washing up.

I did my laundry today - the old fashioned way with a bucket, soap and a hose. The stuff's still drying in the tent hung up with binder clips.

Once getting into camp, I saw lots of people with ice cream! Where'd they get that? It turns out that our camp is located in some sort of entertainment area, It looks to be the park of an outdoor mall of some sort. There's restaurants (though not open today) and the Gellato place which was! I had something called the Italian Ice. Think of a healthy form of a slushy - strawberry flavored.

ALC Day 2

2011-06-06T22:02:00.002-07:00

Okay! We finally got the Internet working flawlessly. Time to load some pictures! The evening came and went pretty quickly. It's 10:05pm and we need to get up at 4:45am to wash up, take down the tent, have breakfast and get ready to ride by 6:30am. I was a bit late this morning and didn't leave until 7am. I need as much time as I can get.

Today's the longest day, 107.3 miles! Ouch! The route is from Santa Cruz to King City.

I'm having a hard time loading the pics. This T-mobile internet thing is lagging big time. It's been almost 10 minutes and it's still uploading one photo! Sorry, we'll have to try and load pics again tomorrow. I really need my sleep for the big day head of us. We're conquering the Quad Buster hill. It's supposed to be a big one!

I tried uploading pics again and it's lagging way too much. Sorry to disappoint, but I need my sleep!

ALC Day 1 - San Francisco to Santa Cruz

2011-06-05T21:13:00.000-07:00

It took me a bit of time to connect to the internet from my tent in Santa Cruz, so I'm starting to use up more than my 30 min/day (the netbook's battery life won't give me more than this if it's going to last 7 days). No time for photos unfortunately. I'll have to post something tomorrow.

Everyone gets a newspaper every morning which covers the details for that day. We covered 82.5 miles today. What a rush! The first 16 miles was a breeze and it didn’t really get tiring until about mile 50. At mile 61 I was pretty much cursing and hoping this would end, I finally arrived to rest stop 3 when I contemplated whether or not to continue.

The moment I got up off the trike, I started getting light headed. Not a good sign. That mixed with cold fingers and toes didn’t sound like a healthy situation. I sat back down on the trike, took a few minutes to reset and then went to the food line to collect something to eat.

I walked my handful of stuff to the picnic able and began munching. Slowly I was starting to feel better. That’s when I went back in line to grab even more food. Gold fish! My favorite! The bag was too big so I didn’t finish it all. They ALC staff also called out that there was only 12 minutes left before they close the rest stop. That means if I don’t leave soon, I might not make it to rest stop 4 in time.

I made it! Rest stop 4 was only 10-13 miles away. After that, camp was only 5 miles away! What a beautiful way to end the ride for the day!

Then rumors spread that it was going to rain. As I’m typing this, I hear dripping outside. In a few moments anything outside will definitely be wet,, I’m glad I finished my shower and ate my dinner already. It’s 9:08 and I’m heading off to bed soon, We’re waking up at 5am tomorrow to get ready. We need to break down our own tents and start out at 6:30am, I can use all the time I can get, so I’d like to leave by then. Tomorrow is one of the longer days. I think it’s over 100 miles!

I’m here alone in the tent b/c Angela’s still working the medical tent. She has a meeting that started just a few minutes ago. I imagine she won’t be back here to the tent until about 10pm. I’ll try to get some rest soon.

Good night.

No time to blog

2011-06-04T20:05:00.000-07:00

....at least not right now. My intention was to blog an entry of today's Orientation, but I was supposed to sleep as of 4 minutes ago and still have a few things to finish up before the ride early morning. I'll be up at 3:45am. Ugh! Good night y'all.

Conquering Mt. Tampalpais!

2011-06-03T15:10:00.000-07:00

I did it! I've been talking about climbing that hill on the trike all year 'round and I finally did it. I didn't even leave the house looking to climb that monster. As I crossed the Golden Gate Bridge, I just kept going on and on and on past Sausalito. I saw a big hill that went back towards the City, decided to head that way and later found the hill turning into a mountain.

The ride would've been a death trap on the one lane (in each direction) on a foggy day at 8am. Luckily it's Friday in the middle of the afternoon and no fog in sight.

No pictures to prove I fulfilled the trek, but what can I say?

Along the way just before Corte Madera, the drivetrain started getting really stiff. I stopped, turned back and found that the cable came off the rear internal gear hub! Uh oh. Last time I tried putting the cable back on, I had to use tools that I didn't bring with me on this ride. Prepared to sit there for 30 minutes to fix this, I took a deep breath and began the repair. Maybe it was my patience or maybe it was practice from last time, but I was able to fix it in just a few minutes and I was on my way.

I found a new bike path that literally runs alongside the 101 freeway. If it wasn't for the fence dividing the path from the cars, I wouldn't have dared to go on this path. Mid way through, I decided to look back to see if my flag was still there.

Slowing down and looking back towards the sky, I saw a white pole half as short as the one I had installed this morning.

No flag.

No one would have stolen it this time, so I figured the red flag I lost a couple weeks before just fell off during my ride. This has never happened before. It's odd that the flag is falling off. That's two flags now! At least I can feel better knowing that the Bay to Breaker's folks weren't the thieves I thought they were. It was my fault both times. I need to tape this thing together next time.

Off to the bike shop I go tomorrow. Now do I want yellow or orange?

Rear weight evaluation

2011-06-03T01:17:00.000-07:00

The Sachs 3x7 hub weighs only 900g. That's why it feels so much lighter than the current Sturmey Archer CS-RK3 that weighs 1,155g. That's a 255g (0.56lb) difference.

The Schwalbe Marathon tire weighs 440g. The Racer version is only 290g. That's a 0.11lb difference.

New Generation Seat Installation!

2011-06-02T17:57:00.000-07:00

The seat finally came! After 3 days of waiting, it arrived at 5:43pm this evening. These new light weight seat was supposed to be delivered on Tuesday but didn't hit my door until Thursday!

I've opened the box of course but have not installed it yet. I'm waiting for Angela to finish her dinner before she goes off to work. I love the trike, but my wifey comes first. That doesn't mean my eyes aren't wide open and my body isn't jittery with excitement.

UPDATE: 11:29PM

Let's start with an evaluation of the seat. The major differences are:

1. The weight (although not by much)
2. Width
3. Mesh cover straps on differently
4. Horizontal back bar has been removed and replaced with a tie strap.
5. I later found that the side bars are angled differently.

WEIGHT:

This is the weight of the stock seat w/o the foam and mesh.

As for the new seat? 4.4lbs. The difference is only 6.2-4.4= 1.8lbs!!!!

I literally put each of the seats on the scale about 7 different times using the same scale to check the accuracy of my weights. I couldn't believe the difference wasn't more extreme. $250 for a measly 1.8lbs?? Really? We'll do another weigh-in later.

WIDTH:

The left side is the stock seat and the right side is the new seat. The new one is wider. I guess this was a response to all the people complaining that their butts didn't fit into the seat comfortably. I had no such complaints. I actually prefer the narrower seat. It's more snug.

MESH COVER:
I don't have a picture, but the mesh cover is now attached by Velcro straps rather than a backpack style plastic snap. I suppose this is easier to put on and off. Maybe this cuts on a bit of weight too. Negligible though. The few grams won't make a difference.

HORIZONTAL BAR:
Another big complaint about the old seat is that the horizontal bar can be felt through the foam after long rides. I got used to it before replacing the foam, but I'm still constantly reminded of the slight discomfort. I'm glad KMX addressed this in the new model.

SIDE BARS:
The thin bars that run along the side of the seat.

This shot is from the Venom. The seat I ordered is supposedly this one, but it looks nothing like it. Notice how the angled bar is straight compared to....

....the Typhoon's. This one is clearly angled. Mine came angled and I had a difficult time making it fit. It didn't even look like the pieces from the seat fit together.

FITMENT:

See how one side is perfectly aligned? This looks correct, doesn't it?

This is how the other end of the side bars looks like. It's way off!

In order to get it to fit, I had to completely remove the plastic seat backing exposing only the frame. This enabled me to get all the pieces in. The angle of the screw was still a problem, but I just muscled it in.

The parts looked like they were built in a garage rather than a factory. The fitment is horrible.

CONCLUSION:
The minimal weight reduction isn't worth the money nor the trouble. The only reason I'm keeping this is b/c I'm using it for an extensive long distance ride. If I were riding the Tornado casually in the City, I definitely would not want this "upgraded" seat. The regular one is fine. I'm not sure what scale Utah Trikes used to weigh the seat, but it's definitely not 4lbs 1oz as they claimed.

I feel a bit ripped off, but there's nothing I can do right now. I don't want to waste all the work I put in this evening installing this thing. Plus, I'd have to fight Utah Trikes to pay for return shipping. I guess that would be worth it assuming I'd get at least a majority of my $250 back.

Hunt for a red flag

2011-06-02T16:37:00.000-07:00

Ever since my red safety flag got stolen during the Bay to Breaker's run, I've been in search for a replacement. Sports Basement was supposed to order me one. I called a week later for status and they kept saying that it was on the way. I later get a call from them saying it's arrived.

Really?

I show up and they have trouble finding it. After 15 minutes, they find an orange flag that was transferred from another store. After a week and a half the flag was never even ordered! Why'd they tell me it was special ordered if all they did was transfer one from a different store? I could have gone to that store and gotten it sooner if I wanted an orange one!

They apparently "ordered" the flag last week and when I call today to get status, guess what? They got my order, never even bothered to call me and guess what? Another orange flag. I'm looking for red folks. Red! Fire engine red. I came to Sports Basement b/c that's where I got my last one before the mean drunks snatched it.

No luck. It looks like I may have to make one. But even the two fabric stores I went to don't have the vinyl I need. I'll head to another one tomorrow to see if they have what I'm looking for.

If and when my KMX seat finally arrives in the mail today and if I have extra time, I'll head over to Home Depot to see if they have a red flag. At this point I'd pay $20 for this $7 thing. Can't believe no one has a red safety flag. I called up all the San Francisco bike shops and even a few in San Mateo - nothing.

Chain Me Up

2011-06-02T10:55:00.000-07:00

I've decided to replace the chain as another preventive measure. It's probably best to keep the trike in tip top shape before the ride. It's coming up Sunday!

In researching various chains priced from $8-80, I found there are weight differences btw different types. Chains differ in flexibility to accommodate various speeds. A 10-speed chain needs to flex more than a 7-speed one since the chain moves left and right across the cassette at various distances.

I stuck with the reliable SRAM brand. 310 grams each. Being that the trike is so long, it requires about 2.75 lengths of chain compared to an upright bicycle that only needs one.

The chain is already lubed. I'm glad I used gloves for this one! Those two silver things in the middle are the SRAM Powerlinks. They enable the chain to be taken apart easily by hand w/o the use of tools.

To replace the chain, I simply put the new one alongside the old one to get a match in exact length.

I took this and a few other pics to remind myself exactly how the chain is routed through the trike. I remember messing up one time and had a hard time figuring out exactly how it's all supposed to come together.

While I was at this, I made some rear brake adjustments. I removed two of the washers so that the brake pads would hug the rotor a bit more closely. The distance the rotor is from the brake was changed ever so slightly when I replaced the hub.

I was surprised to find that while testing out the brakes, the rear wheel would shake. The axle was moving up and down! Not good. I removed the outer bolt, repositioned the wheel and tightened it back. It's in good shape now. I'm glad I caught that one!

Replacement Idler

2011-06-02T00:42:00.000-07:00

The only real function of an idler is to change the angle of the chain while it connects between the front chain ring and rear cassette. The seat is right smack in the middle, so the chain needs to somehow route it's way underneath. That's where the idler comes in. I read somewhere that idlers need to be replaced every so often. This is a wear item and when no longer usable, these things can make a lot of noise and cause lots of trouble with the drivetrain. Rather than waiting until that time comes, I opted to replace it before the ALC ride as a preventive measure.

I can't believe these things cost $20/each! There are two power idlers and one return idler for at total of 3. So that's $60 total for plastic circles with ball bearings. These are the new ones on the floor of my garage prior to installation.

I suppose I should be happy compared to how I'd feel about maintenance components for cars. At least the trike doesn't have a $100 O2 sensor to replace.

My alternative to these stock replacement idlers was a Terracycle version. That set would have been over $150. Utah Trikes states these are performance parts but from what my buddy tells me who bought these, there's no difference. It's definitely quieter, but there's no noticeable performance gain. Totally not worth it. I'm glad I got the cheaper OEM ones so I could use my $90 difference elsewhere.

50 Minute Run!

2011-06-01T22:13:00.000-07:00

This was my first 50 minute run. I know it may not be much for a marathon runner, but I'm definitely not runner. 5.2mph was a bit slow but still got my heart pumping. My back was drenched with sweat by the time I was done.

Blogging on an iPad

2011-05-29T08:45:00.000-07:00

I discovered there's an app for that of course, but it's $2.99. Not bad I guess. I can bypass it with a ghetto work around using the HTML code field. I will see if I can post pics later. Tying on this thing is irritating andc I am getting a headache in the car. Ugh!

The Weigh-in

2011-05-24T13:33:00.000-07:00

Before ordering the new generation KMX light weight seat, I need to be absolutely sure how much the thing weighs. I've sent an email out to Utah Trikes hoping to get a response later today or at least by tomorrow. I'll rip out the seat frame this evening and weigh it so I have a solid number to compare the new one to.

I'm getting conflicting information.
1. One KMX Viper owner tells me it weights 6.95 lbs.
2. Another says their old steel Venom seat weighs 9 lbs.
3. Utah Trikes claims the new Venom seat weighs 6lbs less. That would mean the new seat weighs 1lb. Highly doubtful.
4. I contacted the owner of BROL to see if he can help weigh the seat since he's reviewed one and has one in possession.
5. I've also contacted another BROL member for numbers. He has the 2011 Venom.
6. There was one more Venom owner (probably the older one) that I emailed just today.

Hopefully these guys can get back to me on the actual weight. I wish KMX was more cooperative and didn't have a dealer take care of all their calls. KMX themselves should have specs of their parts, shouldn't they? Looks like KMX is slowly giving up on their customer and their own brand, looking to dealers to support them rather than the other way around. I don't see good things for the future of KMX. Hopefully I'm completely wrong.

UPDATE: 5/25/11

I removed the seat this afternoon for the final weigh-in to see what the stock seat weighed. While I was at it, I took the opportunity to replace the idlers and clean up the frame. The midsection of the crucifix was pretty dirty.

So how much does the stock seat weigh? Drum roll please...

With the pump, alarm and both water bottle cages, the total weight was 9.2lbs. I should have weighed the frame + wheels but forgot.

UPDATE: 5/26/11
I did it! I did it! I gave in. I ordered the aluminum seat and was able to negotiate for free shipping. I used the fact that I'm using this for the ALC and that some shops offer a 10-15% discount for riders participating in this event as leverage. No tax, but the total still hurts. $200 for the aluminum seat and an extra $50 for the hardware. I'm hoping that the old horizontal bracket under the seat that physically mounts to the frame can be swapped to the new seat. If this works, I won't need the hardware and Matt (Utah Trikes) said that I can return it for a full refund if it's not damaged. I've never been so excited to return something. Hopefully this is the case.

If not, I'll have to grind down the frame to make the new hardware fit. Crossing my fingers hoping this thing goes through. If it does, it'll be pretty darn amazing. The price still seems high though b/c I just remembered that carbon fiber seats are about $350. That's way out of my price range for a stupid seat. Plus I'd have to figure out some way to fabricate brackets to mount from the seat to the frame - all in 9 days (and that's assuming there's zero ship time and the seat can magically appear in my garage). Not going to happen.

I'm really relying on the seat bracket being interchangeable btw seats. I'm desperate enough to figure something out if it doesn't. We'll just have to wait and see.

UPDATE: 5/27/11
I got some exclusive pics taken by Utah Trikes! These aren't published anywhere else. These are spy shots of the aluminum seats! Hush hush.

Looks similar. I hope it's "exactly the same." The intention is to use all the parts except for the cross bracket in the middle of the photo.

If I can omit the furthest piece on the right and replace it with my current one, it'll work. *Deep breath*. I am a bit concerned though b/c it doesn't look exactly the same from what I remember.

UPDATE: 6/1/11
The seat's still not here! Ugh. I've been waiting at home when I could be out triking. I'm giving Utah Trikes a call tomorrow to get a tracking number.

UPDATE: 6/2/11
A bit frustrated that the package didn't arrive Tuesday as Utah Trikes said it would and it's now Thursday, I called them back up for a tracking number and apparently it's supposed to arrive today. If I had the tracking number earlier, I wouldn't have waited around to receive the package and could have taken the time to train some more on the trike.

It's 2:26pm and the package still isn't here yet. I'm expecting it before 6pm, but that's a few hours from now.

The scary thing though is that the UPS site says that the package weighs 10 lbs. I really hope that's not true. I'm waiting for a 4lb 1oz item with maybe a pound of packaging material. We'll soon see. The seat should hopefully be installed by this evening.

Shave me

2011-05-23T17:52:00.000-07:00

Whoa la! This is the Braun M90! It had only occurred to me a few days ago that I need a shaver for the ALC ride! With 2,500 riders and a few hundred volunteers, access to the sinks will be limited. I figure I should stay away from the cream and blade and go for an electric shaver.

I found one that can be charged by USB, but it got horrible reviews. I found another one from Ross that's super tiny and only $10, but that too got horrible reviews.

I finally found one by Braun, a trusted brand. It's the same manufacturer as the one I have now. The one I've been using works without being plugged in for a total of 20 seconds before it goes dead. The battery's history. This was a handmedown of my dad's from who knows when.

It didn't take me long to find a compact travel sized one that runs on batteries that got good reviews on Amazon. I ordered this one for $18.15 shipped! It's got a protective swivel cover, sideburn trimmer and brush. I hear it gets pretty good battery life on two AA cells.

The design of this thing is pretty good too. The silver part swivels out to reveal and protect the foil. It also prevents it from accidentally turning on while being stored for travel.

New Wheel Review

2011-05-22T17:56:00.000-07:00

Wow! It's either this thing weighs a ton or the 20+mph headwind really whacked me in head. This thing was super slow. I felt like it was worse than when I had the mag wheels all around and the Schwalbe Big Apples on all 3 wheels.

Do the benefits of having a rear brake and being able to climb any hill outweigh the costs? Errr, I'm still thinking about it. It undoubtedly looks amazing now with the matching black spoked rear wheel but boy is it heavy!

The shifter for the hub is now a lot more reliable than what I had on the SRAM 3x7 and looks better on the handle bar but again, I'm not sure it's worth it yet. The weight is a big drawback. I made it worse by using a Schwalbe Marathon tire rather than a Racer tire. Once I get some (hopefully) reliable Qtubes in the mail, I'll put the Racer back on and see if there's a noticeable difference. The new hub is harder to remove and put back on (sorta) so I wanted to keep the rear wheel pretty much puncture resistant. The weight penalty hurts though - big time.

I'll have to take it for another spin on a less windy day to get a more accurate assessment. Hopefully I'll have good news to share. The weight's been hurting so much on this test ride that I'm strongly considering, 85% blowing $163 on the upgraded 5lb lighter weight seat from KMX. We'll see.

I Placed Second!....to last

2011-05-21T21:54:00.000-07:00

I attended the race to meet some fanatics and got much more than that! This is me in a Velomobile. It's made of the same stuff kayaks are made from. Super durable and comes in 11 different colors. The dealer brought this one and was nice enough to let me to take it around for a spin.

Here's a little bit of marketing for him. Visit his site and check out what he's got to offer. He's a super nice guy - very easy to get along with.

There were about 29 riders a couple families and friends came, but people came alone for the most part. I guess it's a bent thing. We're kinda weirdos and don't have much company in that respect. Much like magicians I guess. The announcer made a comment about how socially awkward we are. Hahah.

The track is 0.2 miles. Pretty short. But when you're going around 8 laps like I did for the "trike's only" event, it feels much longer. I placed last in that event. Ouch. I'm happy that one of the guys who beat me was riding a Catrike 700 - a white one! Looked great!

Rick pretty much built this thing! He bought the clear cover, but everything else was built with his two hands! That's a grey Catrike Speed hiding in that fairing.

Meet Paul and his faired recumbent. It's got side entry so he can hope into this thing w/o the help of a crew. He took this exact model across the country. Over the three month ride, he covered 50-90 miles/day! That was 11 years ago but still lots to be proud of.

The Mango was one of the favorites. Greg rides this Velomobile as a commuter! Yup, that means every day! The Milkman was also a first time visitor to the velodrome. Covered 57 laps in 30 minutes.

This is what an 80T chainring looks like. The owner built this whole thing himself including the welds. A chainring that big has to be custom built, right? Yup, he built that too! There were a of homebuilts at the race.

I didn't get a chance to chat much with this Cal Poly team, but they had a whole crew representing their HPV group. Here's the front half of the fairing.

And here's the other half. This is the reason why they brought a whole crew. They need one rider, one launcher and about 3 people to catch the Velomobile when it stops at the end of each event.

This is what happens when your derailleur catches onto a spoke and rips apart. As we were watching the 30 minute race, we heard a huge crash from behind us.

Cal Poly's HPV crashed big time. The rider came out unscathed....from what I saw. Here they are trying to straighten the chain out w/o taking it apart. It's harder than it looks. How many Cal Poly kids will it take to do it?

This guy pretty much beat everyone's butt. He's faster than the Velomobiles!

A bit about Velomobiles. They are the jellybean looking things with full fairings where you typically only see the rider's head or sometimes just their eyes. The surprising thing is that even though these things weigh 55-65lbs, the reduction in air resistance or improvement in aerodynamics offsets the increase in weight. These things look like they're hitting the upper 30's in mph. Crazy fast.

This is the start of the elimination round where the last place person in each lap is disqualified until there's on man standing - yes, all the riders are men. No women recumbent riders came to the event. Lots of our wives decided to stay home or do their own thing, as did mine.

I was impressed at the shutter speed of the Kodak Sportplay camera. They're catching these images w/o blur!

Here's one of Cal Poly's rides - the one that suffered a gruesome death at the end (the bent - not the rider).

Here's one of their other ones.

The famous Mango! One guy called it a banana. This thing was fast. It better be for $8,000. Looks really slick. The lines are cut nice on this one. I wish I had a shot of the rear.

The colors were just too cool to not take a pic. I brought my naked trike over for a snapshot. It was a beautiful day!

I should have taken more still photos. It's such a pain pulling them from videos due to the software I use. I would have to convert the video to another format and then make stills. Such a headache. I'll do it later, but not tonight. There was a Catrike 700 out there worth mentioning. It was white too! The rider was cool.

There was a lot of downtime in between races. There were a few surprise events: 60 and older event, 6'-0" and taller event. This gave me some time to take some shots with the others.

The shape of that Velomobile is nice, huh? I like how the rear is carved out like that.

Arm Warmers

2011-05-19T16:43:00.001-07:00

ACCESSORY 49: Arm bands, $30 Amazon

It sounds stupid - I know. Arm warmers. Why not just wear a jacket like the rest of us? The advantage of these which I discovered not too long ago is that they can be bundled up and stuffed into your jersey. Unlike a jacket that weighs a lot and is bulky, arm warmers are much more convenient to put away when not in use.

It blends right into the color scheme! Canari had the only two toned arm warmers I've ever seen available online or in a store. They're designed very well. Rubber in the upper sleeve holds it in place. The seams are all of high quality.

I found out the hard way of the disadvantages of a jacket. It was cold in the morning so I wouldn't have left the house without a long sleeve. Later that day it was too hot to keep on. My jacket had removable sleeves and even trying to stuff the sleeves (while wearing the vest part of the jacket) into my bag was a task. These are small enough to fit in the jersey pocket!

Energy Gels

2011-05-19T13:18:00.000-07:00

First was the energy drinks like Gatorade, then came the bars like those made by Clif. Now we have energy gels. Having only tried it once, I did some research and found a bit of info. Here's a review of the competitors by once LA local:

My First Trike Race

2011-05-19T10:44:00.000-07:00

Driving an SUV (2002 Toyota Rav4) back in the day certainly didn't stop me from racing in the Rallycross events competing with much more nimble cars. The KMX is like the SUV of trikes and that's not stopping me either. I'm racing the 43lb+ monster at the Velodrome this weekend!

What's a Velodrome?

Think of Indy race track for bikes. I'm expecting the riding surface to be extremely smooth like a gymnasium floor. We'll see if I can hit 25mph. That's my goal at least. I'm not sure how the banked angle of the track will affect my riding.

Should I be worried about the tires wearing unevenly b/c of the banked track? Maybe I'll swap tires during the breaks. There are a few types of races going on that day.

200 meter sprints
That's a little more than half the track or 16% the length of the 0.75 mile track I usually ride. It's short! This race won't require a lot of endurance which gives me a chance at a win. With an improved gear range beyond more than anyone would need, I have enough choices to smooth out my acceleration. I'm hoping not to come in place for this event.

Newcomer's Race
4 laps. The thing is only 0.2 miles long. This event is a total of only 1 mile! That's 1.25 laps on the Golden Gate Park race track. Definitely longer than the 200 meter race. This wouldn't be so tough if I wasn't racing against 2-wheeled bents. The cut the wind better and are much lighter. They've got the full advantage. I plan on placing last in this event.

15 Lap Race
There are two races for this broken down to (recum)bents with fairings and bents w/o. That's the equivalent of 4 laps on the Golden Gate Park track). That's a good number. It would take some energy to keep at top speed for this long. This will be a tough race for me.

Trike Race
8 laps or just over 2 GGP laps if at least 3 trikes sign up. I really hope we have at least 2 other trikes who want to race. I'm very excited about this event. Of all the races, I have the best chance at this one.

30 Minute Race
Hopefully this is where my endurance training will come in handy. This event will be the most challenging. I'd be surprised if I came in anything above last place. There's always a chance. We'll see.

I'm never been so excited at the potential to place last. Even if I'm dead last, it'll be loads of fun. It'll give me an idea of the performance of the trike and me as a rider vs the other folks out there. For the past year, the only competition I've ever had for speed I've ever engaged in was the occasional run in with upright bike riders who had no idea I was racing them.

A couple weeks ago, I almost lapped a road biker. I struggled and struggled hoping to do it, but I was about 1/4" behind and it didn't seem hopeful.

3 months ago, it took these road bikers 2 miles before they'd lap me. I'm slowly increasing the gap. It'll be interesting to see how I perform with the other bent riders. I may be the only trike and I'd bet I'd be the only KMX out there on the track. KMX's are named after BMX's. KMX's weren't designed to be familiar with paved roads. They're the durable aggressive counterparts exploring uncharted areas.

PREPARATION?
I've never raced before, but I'm sure there's more than a handful of things I need to do to prepare for the event.

1. Weight shedding:
I'll have to get rid of some extra weight on the trike especially since I've added about a 1lb from the new rear hub and wheel. The bag is coming off, as is the water bottle mounting brackets. No flag. The old SRAM 3x7 would have been better for racing, but I'm not swapping the wheel again for reasons of convenience and I also want to see how the new setup performs. An argument for keeping the new Sturmey Archer hub though is that it's brand new and spins much better. I have a feeling the SRAM 3x7 IGH (internal gear hub) needs servicing to be as efficient.

2. Car:
I need to borrow my parent's SUV to take this thing out to the track. I'd rather not have my prized possession bobbing up and down on the freeway on a standard bike rack like I've been doing to transport it.

3. Parts and Tools:
I need to be sure to bring extra tubes in case anything happens.

4. Swapping tires:
Putting the Racer tire in the back would probably be a good idea, but that'll require removing the back wheel. If I do that, I may as well swap out to the lighter wheel all together. After a test ride Friday or Saturday morning, I'll make a decision.

5. Camera:
I'd like to record the event but I may not have anyone accompanying me to help out. Hopefully I can befriend a fellow bent rider's pit crew or cheerleader.

Camelbak got me moldy

2011-05-18T23:34:00.001-07:00

Yuck! The last thing you want to see from both of your $12/each + tax (Chill Jacket) water bottles is mold growing out of it! Angela warned me to wash it more often and I didn't listen. Guess I deserve it. Getting frustrated and not wanting to buy another two bottles, I contacted Camelbak for some help.

I was hoping they'd send me new ones under warranty, but instead they old me the bite valves can be removed! The mold had been growing from underneath and w/o removing it, I wasn't able to get access.

After prying with a knife, the valves finally came off. Now soaking in soapy water.

Schwalbe Marathon Tire

2011-05-18T21:29:00.000-07:00

After getting my first flat on the rear wheel sitting on Schwalbe Marathon Racers during the Bay to Breaker's event, I was even more eager to put on the Marathon tires. The Marathons are significantly heavier than the Racer version and is definitely thicker. Even just after a visual comparison, I'm much more confident riding with Marathons in the rear. I'm hoping I won't have to ever change out the rear tire. Wish me luck with the new setup.

The Marathon weighs a whopping 1.4lbs by itself! 440g which is just shy of 1lb (0.97lbs).

How much did the Racer version weigh? The scale doesn't even read it! That's gotta mean it barely weighs a few grams. The specs say 290g (0.64lbs).

Another reason for running with the Marathon and keeping the Marathon Racer as a backup (rather than the other way around) is that the Racer version is foldable. A folding bead comes in handy.

New Wheel!

2011-05-18T16:24:00.000-07:00

A little reminder of how the existing one looks like.

I've been researching for months to get the new wheel together. It was all in my head and even after getting disappointed that City Cycles didn't stock the red nor white spokes I wanted, I was still excited to mount this thing on the trike.

It was 11:50am yesterday when City Cycles called to let me know the wheel was ready to be picked up! They open at 11am, so I never would have guessed I'd be first in the queue and they could finish so quickly. Perfect timing b/c I was just about to take off for lunch. Now I knew where I'd be going for my hour break - City Cycles clear across town on Steiner.

Ian whom I've been working with recognized me right away. Even before I could finish asking for the Sturmey Archer hubbed wheel, he asked John, the builder where it was.

"The small one?" asked John.

"Yeah," replied Ian.

Ian grabbed it from behind the counter and it looked great! It looked exactly like I imagined. The silver nips matched the silver hub quite nicely. I couldn't wait to mount this thing! The only thing left to complete the look was the red reflective rim strips which I ordered that evening. I found them for $12.99 - enough to cover the front wheels too (in case the new red color from a different ebay seller didn't quite match the existing front ones). Estimated arrival date? 5/26 at the latest.

Back to the wheel. I didn't even go upstairs. I took off my jacket, put on some gloves and got to work still wearing my work clothes: dress shirt and jeans.

Comparing the weight of the new wheel to the old one scared me. It was heavier - way heavier. The new wheel is 5.0lbs! And that doesn't even include the tire and tube!

The old one I took off and replaced? 3.8lbs. That's a 1.2lb difference.

With the tube and tires, it's 0.8lbs more for a grand total of 5.8lbs! Ouch! That's more than 13% of the weight just in a single wheel!

As for the original mag wheel? How much did that weigh? 3.8 w/o tube and tire. That's the same as the SRAM 3x7 IGH. All the weight saved by going to spoked rims, went into the hub.

After mounting the tube and new Schwalbe Marathon tire that arrived in the mail the night before, it was a whopping 5.8lbs! The current one was less than 4. That's a big difference for rotational weight.

There was more bling to be added. The new 8-speed cassette was mounted first, followed by the old disk brake I had from my mag wheel. Alas! I have my rear brake back!

Although I had test fitted the hub prior to the lacing of the wheel, I was still concerned about fitment. All this trouble could easily lead to this not working. Looking at the mounting hardware, I got a bit nervous. There didn't seem to be enough threads after mounting the wheel on the frame through the dropouts to secure it.

Lucky me.

It worked. It worked. Well, not quite but at the wheel's at least on the trike. There are tons more components than the SRAM 3x7 wheel - a lot more. If I was worried about dismounting the SRAM 3x7 wheel during an emergency wheel patch on the road for Aids Life Cycle, doing the same with this new wheel would be a disaster. The hardware and mounting just isn't as well thought out on the Sturmey Archer as the SRAM internal gear hub.

I gave the wheel a spin and it there was lag - lots of lag. I'm hoping it was the disk brake that needed some adjustment. The disk was dragging on the brake pads. After some adjustments, I spun the wheel again and Whola! It worked. The wheel spun more freely than the SRAM 3x7! I had yet to take a test ride, but was very happy at this moment.

A hub is no good without a shifter, so that came next. It took me at least 35 minutes just to determine a location on the handlebar to mount it. My original plan was a no go.

I thought about physical locations of the grip shifter, rapid IGH shifter but didn't realize I cannot operate both in the configuration I had imagined. The mirror was also a problem. I needed clearance to operate the rapid shifter and still be able to use the mirror. Even after dropping the brake lever, bell, and grip shift down, there still wasn't enough room. I'd have to figure out a new layout for the left handlebar.

Sliding the components down the handlebar wasn't easy! The bar's definitely not mandrel bent. The dimensions are not only dissimilar throughout it's length, but it actually bulges out above the bend!!!! Horrible quality on this KMX. Not the same diameter throughout!

After the struggle, I finally got it on. The IGH shifter is darn close to the tire. Unless I want to risk stripping a layer of my skin off or lose a finger in the spoke, I definitely have to wear gloves and practice using the shifter in this location.

I'll need to buy new replacement handlebar grips since the one's I have now are too short.

UPDATE: 5/22/11
I took some pics during Race Day, so here is one of them. The other close-ups came out blurry.

Up Until 2:45am Working on New Gearing

2011-05-18T16:11:00.000-07:00

I picked up my new wheel yesterday and was so excited to install it! After finishing up the installation, I remembered I needed to swap out my corresponding shifter to an 8-speed (from 7) to operate the new 8-speed cassette. Being me, I didn't want to rest until I finished. Needing at least 5 hrs of sleep to operate normally, I hit the sack at 2:45am.

So how did all this happen?

Assuming products of the same manufacturer would make compatible parts, I tried to get all my components together last night only to find out this afternoon that they do not work together!

The SRAM MRX Comp 8-speed shifter has a 2:1 ratio. The ratio comes from how much tension the cable makes based on a single gear shift of the shifter. The ratio needs to match the rear derailleur that it operates. The derailleur I have is the stock SRAM 3.0. I only learned recently that it has a 1:1 ratio, meaning it is not compatible.

What a waste of $12.

Amazon has some good prices and with the Prime membership that ships stocked items in 2 days, I guess I sometimes get overly excited and button happy - mouse button that is, which translates to quick purchases.

So the question now is do I get a new shifter or a new derailleur? I really like the grip shifts as opposed to the index shifting or rapid shifters, so I'm leaning towards replacing the rear derailleur with a compatible one.

OPTION 1:
However, I just remembered that Mike gave me a twist shifter a couple weeks ago. I wonder if it's a 1:1 ratio one. If it is and it's an 8-speed, it'll work! It'll be silver and won't match the other side, but at least it'll work - if it does.

OPTION 2:
On my trip to Monterey to pick up the SRAM 3x7 IGH, Andy also gave me a couple high end shifters (with faded numbers) and a nice derailleur to go with it. Both are supposedly high end and after doing some research found that the components combined are sold for an excess of $120. That's a lot compared to the $12 shifter I got from Amazon, eh?

OPTION 3:
Spend additional monies and buy either a shifter or a derailleur.

I'll give the first two options a try when I get home and will report back later.

....

Okay, it's later. I didn't have the parts for Option 1 so I dug up the XTR derailleur that Andy got me and it works! It's got 1:1 ratio. After 40 minutes of adjusting, the chain finally moves through all the cogs. It can still use some tuning, but for now this'll do. I didn't have enough time to take it around for more than a few runs up and down the block.

So far the trike rides fairly well considering the extra weight of the new wheel. I'm pleasantly surprised. I won't be able to gauge the performance difference accurately until I take it for my routine ride. Another variable worth noting is the new Marathon tire that replaced the lighter weight Marathon Racer.

Training Does A Body Good

2011-05-16T22:59:00.000-07:00

My weakness is endurance. To improve on this, I'm running as much as I can. I'll post here to keep myself accountable for the remainder of the month. Stats today?

Covered 2.87 miles running 5mph for 30 minutes plus a 5 minute cool down period.