skyler profile

I dream about a separated bike lane on the parkway! I would even pay a monthly subscription! My partner doesn't bike commute because of it, even though she's just going down to Cap U. I can avoid the Parkway west of Lytton St. Overall Dollarton is even worse.

I guess I'm a bit braver, and my massive surface area of reflective material and 1000 blinking lumens seems to be working. I'm truly getting way fewer close calls with the vest.

I commute down Mt Seymour Parkway everyday in nearly all weather (they don't plow the bike lane, sadly) - sometimes by bike, sometimes car, sometime bus. Here's what I've concluded:

- Red blinky lights aren't that effective. When you're in a car with the wipers going, or just in light rain, every light is a blinky light. There are a lot of small red tail lights in the distance.

- White is a much more visible light colour for the back of a bike.

- Reflective clothing is more visible than lights - it stands out from the crowd of lights

- Reflective clothing is all about surface area. Your bandoleer ends up looking like pretty thin lines/not that visible. I bought a vest that is 100% white reflective from Aliexpress for $27 and I have had notably fewer close calls. People are obviously seeing me. The visible reflective surface area is like 2+ square feet, vs maybe 20 square inches (0.14 square feet) on your bandoleer thing.

Great info, thanks. I've been dreaming of this setup with an e-thirteen 9-39 11 speed cassette. Sounds like it should work.

Too bad so many full suspension bikes can't do rings smaller than 30t, or I'd do it on all my bikes.

I think Shimano deserves more blame than they get for the horrible concept behind their 12speed cranks. All they had to do was take the M8000 cranks and give it a few direct-mount chainrings. But, the way they went about it - by having chainline change through the use of different crank spindles, and then giving it such a narrow Q-factorthat the 52mm chainline version won't clear many frames - is just infuriating.

Naturally, many manufacturers are forced to spec 55mm cranks because the narrower chainline simply won't clear their chainstays.

Shimano had the best cranks in the biz - 24mm steel spindle, hollow alu arms, great price:weight - I can't believe how wrong they got it with this approach.

Most likely all bike bearings fail from contamination rather than normal wear so it won't actually matter, but the nerd in me cares. 

In a high speed bearing the balls float between the races on a film of lubricant. The balls don't actually touch the races once it's spinning. If there's too much grease in there, it can add forces that prevent the ball from floating up on that film of lubricant, meaning you could end up with more metal on metal time. It's the sort of thing that makes a difference in industrial and aerospace applications. If you go by the book for high speed bearings, it should be 30% fill, I think. That said, bike wheels are quite slow.

100% fill for riding in non-stop atmospheric rivers, haha.

Andrew, no! Don't do 100% fill on hub bearings! Bearing lubrication works with speed - when you've got the speed (such as in a hub bearing) let the grease film form as intended if you want to maximize bearing life.

For low speed bearings, 100% fill by all means.

Ah, so that's why I've almost never cleaned R&R climb! It's my damn pedals!

The Titan has been near the top of my frame dream/wishlist for a while, and your comments about mulleting it boost that. I've run my Instinct BC with a 27.5 rear wheel, using a Ride9 link to correct the geo, and was similarly blown away by the cornering and poppiness. (If my 27.5 rear wheel wasn't terrible, I'd keep it like that.)

Another big selling feature is that your use of a 28t chainring didn't seem to affect the suspension performance. My preference is definitely for the shorter derailleurs, lighter cassettes, and - in my experience - much better reliability of 11 speed, with a 10-42 cassette. But I still like that 28/42 low gear. I really wish more frames didn't make using a 28t such a compromise.

It's kind of amazing how close Shimano came to making the best cranks on the market, and still missed. All they had to do was make direct-mount chainrings for the M8000/7000 series stuff. One chainring series with a 51mm chain line, and another for superboost (57mm?). These would have instantly been the benchmark for crankset reliability, with their 24mm steel spindle, pinch-bolt spline interface, and Hollowtech strength-weight. 

Instead, for M8100/7100 etc, they decided to make the chain line adjustment through different spindle lengths, with spindle washers, and an ultra-narrow Q-factor that means you need to run a wider chain line if your cranks don't clear your frame. And it's so narrow that they don't clear on a lot of bikes! Now they're having to make alternate cranksets for a different ratio of Q-factor to chain line, so that they can clear more frames? What???

This the most complex and annoying solution to a simple problem, imaginable! Are bike shops expected to stock 9 different SKUs of Deore cranks? 

The new short cage derailleur is on the right track at least. From the start, a refinement of M8000 with an 11 speeds 10-45 would have suited me even better. My 11 speed XT with a Sram 10-42 cassette has continued to be far, far more reliable than any 12 speed drivetrain I've had. I've even gone back to 11 speed on my all-mountain bike, after 2 years of frustration with 12 speed.

This is a really good idea!

Yup, back in Vancouver.

The big difference for me is foot speed while pedaling. I'm 6'2", used to ride 175s, and have happily switched to 170s. On the 170s, my feet trace a smaller circle, so for the same cadence, my feet are traveling slower. Which means I can get a slightly higher cadence for the speed at which my muscles/knees feel comfortable, which means I'm getting the same power as before, with less torque, which means my legs just last longer. One thing I've noticed is that people tend to get out of the saddle to climb/accelerate way sooner tend to be on crank arms that are too long. They're either too far behind the pedals to push hard, or can't get the power they need whole seated without getting to an uncomfortable foot speed.

Furthermore, shorter cranks move the point where you put power down in the pedals toward the back of the bike, relative to where your saddle is, which effectively steepens your seat tube angle. This, to me at least, is a huge benefit on BC's steep climbs, where being in position to sit balanced and push on the pedals on a sustained climb is important. I can handle 175mm cranks on bikes with >75° STA, but I'd still rather not.