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6jun2002

Trashpicked a coaster-brakes one-piece-crank one-speed bike. It was missing handlebars and the spokes were saggy. Mostly better now. I had an incredible day, fixing it up.

I hate it.

(a 23may2002 email)

Uh oh. I trashpicked a green cruiser, Monday night - spent Tuesday afternoon getting it rideable (reseating the tubes, unfloppifying the spokes, chasing out three or four spiders, and digging up a length of 3/4" copper pipe for temporary handlebars). Boy, had I forgotten how to ride with coaster brakes.

Thomas said: It's not like learning to ride a bicycle :^P

Tuesday was a fine day. I was thinking: when I goof off with passion, it's all good. Not like when I just futz and putter and don't accomplish anything. Hm, like today. :^/ And then tonight I was all over chopper-bike how-to pages...

(Oh - Monday night, I also found an ironing board, an industrial hatrack, and a skateboard. And other crucial random crap. All right near 8 S Ave. The cruiser was from right across the street. Which is maybe not so good.)

Symptom: it's tracking all tilted, ridden no-hands. Diagnosis: I think I trued the wheels off to the left - could be, must make it to MITOC or SCUL where there are truing jigs and check. It's hard to tell, what with the fenders. Or maybe the frame is bent. I'm having real trouble sighting it, by-eye, kind-of-thing. (My Mom calls that awful-mouse, the best the kids could manage with their grandmother's German. Mouse oughta should something like mass, for measure. Where'd the German-English dictionary go? Last I saw it was in the other room with the Desert Peach collection. And the G-E science dict? Drat, it's only G->E. Awful is something like eye or approximation, maybe. Aeffle?)

The kickstand and its mounting hardware were found on two separate occasions. It's a useful size for at most a 24"-tires bike - completely unusable on this one. I'll probably try it on MoxieMoron at some point. (deNIED!)

The other Tuesday night, down my street, I was... shopping, so to speak, doncha know - I thought I'd spotted some conduit curbside (I don't carry a Leatherman - I carry a micrometer (and bungee cords or inner-tube or hook-and-loop, and a swiss - I should take hex wrenches, nowadays)). What I'd seen didn't turn out to be anything sturdy, but I did find most of this bike kickstand. Oh, I might as well tuck that away somewhere. Meanwhile, a few months ago, Inman-ish, I had trashpicked an excellent toolbox, about as sturdy as plastic ones get, with some tools - small crescent wrenches (uh, plus whaddayacall, the new-moon wrench other end) and hex wrenches and socket-wrench sockets and stuff. I'd left that on the back porch pending cleaning - which ended up being the next day. So, upon closer inspection, it turns out the big bolt and tapped blob of metal in the tool box are the other half of a kickstand. To confirm this, I installed it on green-bike. Whole kickstand. A little one - turns out it's for a smaller bike. For the moment, it's kind of amusing to have it on green bike. Maybe I could add some sort of standoff at the top - it'd only take an inch or so.

Plan is: to flip this over and make it into a tall bike.

But in the meantime, it's really nice having a halfway-sensible backup bike for when the Trek's down and out (which happened oddly often, last month), so the time scale on chopping it is ill-defined. (Also, I trashpicked it from a nearest neighbor, and I don't want her to cry or nothin' when she sees it...)

5jul2002

The other day, I was on a mission to Ace Wheelworks (Somerville, MA). If I've got a bike in good repair, I usually try to go to, say, Broadway Bicycle School - but that's a little over the hills and far away for me on a high-geared one-speed (uhh something big and 18). I'd never been too happy at Wheelworks before, but others disagree. Maybe it's just because they're kinda upscale for my taste - plus there's invariably a long line. Dunno.

Anyway, I went there twice the other day. One of the derailleur pulleys had fallen off my mountain bike, and I'd only managed to find the pulley itself and the bolt, and not the bushing or covers. I was very much expecting to have to get a whole new one, but they hunted through a junk drawer and found me a couple of sets to try. I was on a roll, so I asked for some punctured inner tubes, too.

I went back later for a new chain for the mountain bike. (It was time.) I started to lock up outside, but one of the employees was just coming out the door and said "Hey, funky green bikes can park inside."

10jul2002

New handlebars for green bike. I trashpicked a 20" bike with no wheels, and its handlebars will do for greeny. (The rest of it has since become MoxieMoron, shortest of tall bikes, which project, BTW, used up most of the conduit, hose clamps, and the 20" wheel in the background - this will delay the tallifying of greeny indefinitely. Maybe some other chop for this feller. ObSourGrapes: I'm not sure that tall-ifying it will show off this lovely frame to its best advantage. OTOH, USB Devastation is what you get if you just put a long fork and a banana seat on something this size and shape (hilly top tubes) and that bike is tall enough that I have to dismount very sideways or else. So I think I'll do that some other bike, maybe a girl's bike. Also, I've already had green bike's bottom bracket apart as a test run for MM, which was on wayyy tight.)

fall2002

This bike lived out its previous life tied to a tree in the rain. I keep a roof over it most of the time, but it's a relief to have a bike that I'm comfortable leaving out on occasion (e.g. ride it over and tie it up outside the SCUL fort when forecasts call for radiation (although, with this bike geared so high, I really suffer on the outbound trip (negi-g-well activity)). It also feels more or less safe to leave this one locked up at a subway station or car-rental place and take off for, say, a weekend.

19oct2002

Sorry, I think I'm going to turn my attention to the three-speeds in the basement, now. Green bike has very ..edgy, nervous handling, compared to my superslacky mountain bike. MoxieMoron is probably no good for cargo (I'm even afraid to wear my heavy duster on it), but it actually handles sweeter than this deranged thing.

Not that English 3-speeds aren't supposed to be a little that way, too, but really I think this is even worse.

28oct2002

Yeah, no, I like the '63 Armstrong pretty well.

I am not riding this damned thing uphill to the Fort ever again, not till it's chopped hard (this sort of frame would be lovely on an unconscionable fork) and geared down.

05may2003

Yeah, file this with cannibalizeables. No longer a going concern - I traded its rear wheel for some parts. It'll make something lovely some day.

09jun2003

Hm, now I'm getting kind of interested in finding this a long fork - especially since there's an extra 3-speed wheel around. And especially there's a long waiting list to ride SCUL's battleships. But Greeny's head tube is too long to try Bumblebee's fork on it =(