AustinBike

I will bring an extra beer for you.

Hipster handlebars with brake levers

They are both important. I had never considered the shifter until Brian pointed it out, his argument makes sense. However, having just moved from a 10sp SunRace cassette to an 11sp Shimano cassette I can tell you that even though the Shimano is technically "thinner" because it has to be narrower to handle more gears, the Shimano feels sturdier. The SunRace had a cheap feel/sound to it.

Who is riding this week? I was at WC after the rain and it was pure hero dirt. Should be back to moon dust by now.

You'll lover the Fox 34 @130, one of my favorites.

I would never say that about my singlespeedS 😉

Have their black butte porter while you are there.

I have a full squish, a hardtail, a SS hardtail and a fully rigid urban SS. The urban SS gets the most mileage but mostly because it is my knock around bike and it does the longer exercise rides. The full squish gets most of its action on the EB and road trips like Bentonville. The hardtail is just for fun. The hardtail SS is the favorite bike of the bunch. More fun than a big travel bike (for me). Most SS riders have multiple bikes, I'd be willing to bet that most singlespeeds are bought as second bikes, so there is a fallacy that someone will tell you in 30 seconds that they ride one because they don't always ride one. Also, I am skeptical of people with only one bike 😉 What we all need to do is come together as a community and embrace everyone's bikes and stop beating each other up. Except fixies. Screw them.

This is flawed. To put my car in drive I have to depress the brake first.

Maybe I am biased but everyone should ride every trail. Not doing so is like those bonewipes go to dinner with and look at a menu and say "oh, I can't eat this and I only eat that." Or the people that go to Spain and seek out a McDonald's. Ride every trail just like you should try every cuisine. I'm headed to have Nepalese food in an hour. Expand your tastes, try new things. Pedernales is a great trail and people should ride there. The worst possible outcome of riding there is "eh, it's not for me..." But you got out. You rode a trail. You experienced something beyond the keyboard. And maybe you learned something. Some rides are better than others, but I have never had a bad ride in my life, just a few trails that I will never ride again.

When assholes are banned only outlaws will be assholes. And apparently we'll be on singlspeeds.

When singlespeeds are outlawed, only outlaws will have singlespeeds.

Stuck a link up on my site for additional coverage. Whenever anyone has these events they should ping me, I can amplify the message to the broader community. Every mention helps.

Then you need one. Whether you buy two is your call. Some people like everything to match. Smart people just buy exactly the same model and only replace one. It's your call, I could go either way.

Rotors is rotors. Brake brand generally makes no difference. The only time that matters is if you have some weird off brands with weird sizes. I had a Hope that was once off-sized by a few mm, it was a 183mm and the standard was 180 so I needed some spacers. 160mm, 180mm and 203mm are the most common sizes. The mounts for the calipers are all standardized so all you need to do is remove the old calipers and put the new ones on, everything should fit with no problem. You only need new rotors if your old ones are damaged or too worn down.

This is what I bought, about $100 less: https://www.merlincycles.com/shimano-xt-m8000-front-and-rear-disc-brake-set-85820.html Took an extra week to get here but worth the savings. Just note that the ones I bought did not have rotors. I used the existing rotors with no problem, that might be part of the price difference.

Gonna be hot so ride fast to stay cool tomorrow. I will be there for an early lap and the regular 5:00 social lap.

The cutting wasn't the problem. Heard that the issue was getting the olive on with a braided cable. Maybe I'll give it a go in a couple of weeks, no urgent need today as I am skipping town to beat the heat and that bike is not part of the plan.

You may want to buy a 12-pack of good IPA and then invite the forum over to your house to show you how it is done. You'll learn something in the process. Apparently free cold beer is a mating call in the bike world and it will attract people quickly.

If you buy enough things in small bags you have an endless supply 😉

Neighbors bought a bike for their kid online and I offered to set it up. Took me less than 30 minutes including unboxing and getting rid of the box. They came over to pick it up and brought 2 really nice bottles of cabernet. At that rate I was probably paid ~$150/hour or so for my work. And the kid's bike was set up right.

Yeah, that does not suck.

I use Stans, not orange and the stems occasionally clog. But I can usually just pick it off the bottom, never had an issue that needed me to clean the whole thing. I do recommend getting something like this: https://www.amazon.com/Valve-Presta-Core-12-Continental/dp/B077L2DXPJ/ref=sr_1_1_sspa?keywords=presta+valve+core&qid=1564399442&s=gateway&sr=8-1-spons&psc=1&spLa=ZW5jcnlwdGVkUXVhbGlmaWVyPUExMURDSUVLWExCREhSJmVuY3J5cHRlZElkPUEwNzY1ODU3VU9YNzc1RTdDRzdIJmVuY3J5cHRlZEFkSWQ9QTAxNjA2MzExU0tFN1JEMDlLSDJLJndpZGdldE5hbWU9c3BfYXRmJmFjdGlvbj1jbGlja1JlZGlyZWN0JmRvTm90TG9nQ2xpY2s9dHJ1ZQ== Also, as someone I was riding with this weekend discovered, having a presta stem remover in their pack would be a really good thing. So buy a couple of cheap ones and toss one in your pack.

“Putting washers on the banjo bolt”. Is that what the kids are calling it these days? but on a serious note, the brake hoses are braided and I hear that is a pain

Added this to my skills set this week. Things like this were intimidating but I finally bit the bullet. Here's how it is done: http://www.austinbike.com/index.php/repairs/352-upgrading-to-shimano-xt-brakes I am still not comfortable cutting down the hoses on my Hope brakes, so I don't know if those will go onto the hardtail just yet. Next up is learning to service a rear shock and a fork. Maybe I need to bring a 6-pack to Mack Turtle's place one of these days.