Ice Bits Riding, Missed Snow Day, More Project MB-1

This past week started out with nearly 24 hour local news of the big storm coming to town. Monday, as you can see from above, we got something, it was not really snow and not really ice, snice? While cold, it was not bad for the morning commute, not slippery like our earlier frozen frost mornings. Well, it was so cool out with the ice bits, that I took some on the bike shots, too.

The trick with the moving shots was I had some camera button issues because of the winter gloves I was wearing. Danged buttons are pretty small and close together. Several times I shot the camera off when I was trying to push the shutter button.

After Monday's snice, Tuesday was just kinda wet, with some coldness. Then, Tuesday night we got our snow. It was wet snow, I could tell by the way it droooooped off the car in the driveway.

I like the snow. I love the quietness it brings. I went outside to take this shot at around 11pm something. So . . . . . quiet. And, pretty.

Well, very, very shortly after I shot this . . . BAM . . . no more electricity. The wet, heavy snow was starting to take its toll and areas were blacking out.

Now it was even quieter . . . and darker. It was still amazing how bright it was though. If you look closely, you can see how the snow was drooping off the rear window of my car. Can you say, wet snow?

Project MB-1

As has been said many times before me, "A project bike is never done . . ." I decided to refine the headlight battery mount just a little, as it was not as tight as I would like.

(Fabrication pictures: Project MB-1 Battery Mount Pictures)

The refinement is a bit subtle, but remember, I be a perfectionist, lol. The key change was to lengthen the lower support piece and use a small piece of double-sided tape to reduce twisting and offset the jostling happening while avoiding road junk and hitting driveways and ramps. Also, I added a upper lip to do the same thing.

Installed, you cannot really see a whole of difference, except the bracket appears a little longer, which, of course, it is.

Overall, the bike is working out great and is fun to ride. The geometry and fit feel good and I just like looking at it, so that is a good sign, too.

The only sad thing is that I missed the chance for a snow ride, since I ended up getting sick. I think the issues of harder breathing in the cold recently finally caught up with me, plus, apparently a bunch of us in a meeting Monday were dropping out sick, so I get to blame someone at work.

Slow and Steady -- Gets Me There

A pretty nice day to be riding the bike. This morning was on the cool side, about 30 degrees out. Amazing how much lighter it is getting in the mornings. I guess my morning lights pictures will have to wait until I decide I want to get up really early now.

This was taken in the afternoon as I was leaving work.

Felt kind of slow today, I guess my muscles are all still healing and not quite up to 100% ability. Seems like everyone was passing me today. I just kept to my lower gears and not pushing too hard. Give the body some time to heal, be kind and gentle.

The hip seemed a little better today. Still cannot stand on my left heel, which is my guage at the moment. Work is pretty challenging and my work space is looking pretty crazy. I have my chair adjusted so I can almost lay flat, then put my left leg up on a rolling 2 drawer cabinet; I have a seat cushion from a broken chair that I use to kneel on, and I have a loaner laptop on top of my tall cabinet so I can stand and do my work. By the end of the day, I am pretty tired. I cannot wait to be able to just sit at my desk -- it's the small things in life.

So, I have to rant about bike headlights. What's the deal with people having their lights aimed toward what would be an auto driver? Do they not realize that is such a pain and does not do anything for their cause of being seen? Do they not understand light does not have to be aimed directly at you for you to see it? Do they think they are the only ones that matter out here, especially on a narrow MUP (multi-use path)? Makes me want to get a mega spot light with a push button switch, so I can blind those cyclists with poorly aimed headlights. Geez, give the rest of us a break?

Sure miss my drop bars, though I like having reliable brakes. Will have to take some time to test to see if I can get my drop bar brake levers to work more effectively when I am riding on the brake hoods. Either way, I so love riding the bike and getting to commute by bike gives me that opportunity without necessarily having to plan or schedule a special ride time.

Even better is riding on nice sunny days like today. Today was even better because it was meet up with Evan after school and ride home.

Fine-tuning My Headlight Mount

Just before my full-time commuting, I had been working on a custom mount for my B&M Ixon-IQ headlight. I tried to create a simple, aluminum bracket. I'm all about functional aesthetics.

However, the guage used did not hold up to the vibrations and where I had notched clearance for the front brake cable a stress cracked formed. Darn!

Well, it was a good idea, just not the right materials. Given the vibration because the headlight was stuck at the very end, I would have had to make a support brace and that, aesthetically did not really appeal to me.

I have used Ram mounts in the past for things like mounting my GPS in the car as well as a video camera, so I looked at that as a solution. While a bit more, okay, a lot more $$ investment over my hardware store supplies, they are proven quite sturdy. I tried two different sizes and found the smallest, while more aesthetically pleasing, did not have the holding power for light.

 Here you can see the small form of the tiny mount, really cute, but the clamp section was not stiff enough and tightening the bolt bent the clamps halves without maintaining a tight enough fit on the end points.

Bouncing the bike caused the headlight to go droopy, dropping the light angle down too far.

I ended up using my "temporary" mounting solution, just refining how I attached the original mount bracket to my custom piece. I would love a bit smaller form factor, but this is quite sturdy and provides much better adjustments than my original homemade bracket.

Here is what the light looks like on the bike. I can easily reach the light to switch from off to on, change from low beam to high beam. You can also see why a standard handlebar mounting bracket would not work in my case, since the space is used by my MB-5's original thumb shifters. Plus, with the headlight a little lower, the light angle with ground is lower providing a bit better road condition definition (more shadows).

Making a Secure Rear Bike Light

I originally mounted my Dinotte 120R light below my rear rack. This offered an out of the way location and was the most unobscured should I be carrying anything. This worked pretty nicely until I started using a pair of panniers, then I discovered getting to the on/off button was very awkward, if not nearly impossible if I was wearing gloves.

The mountings I use tend to be semi-permanent, meaning not easily removed. Even though the little Dinottes are designed for easy on and off, transferring between bikes, I preferred a bit more secure mounting. Less hassle for me to have to take the light on and off when I went into and back out of some store or other stop.

Anyway, I found I needed to relocate my light and I chose to use my seat rails (see it in the photo below). This also required a custom mounting since most light attachments are designed to be attached to the seat post, though those do not meet my out of the way and secure criteria.

As you can see, I was able to located the light as high as possible and tucked inbetween the seat rails. Thank goodness for the small form factor of the Dinotte!

To make the mounting, I used two cushioned "P" clamps, readily available from the local hardware store. I removed the rubber liner and then flattened one clamp flat. Once flattened, I then reformed it to the shape of the light. The second clamp I also flattened and cut to match the mounting holes of the shaped clamp.

Next, for mounting, I used two small, nylon "P" clamps, which wrap around the seat rails, with the mounting holes facing on the outside. I did have to add a rubber spacer between the light and the flat mounting bar (you can just see the rubber spacer in the picture). The light mounting brackets are attached to the top side of the nylon "P" clamps. If clearance with the seat had been an issue, I would have just located the mounting surface below the seat rails.

This actually provides a nice, higher mounting point from  my light and the on/off button is very easy to reach, even when riding, but I don't recommend that maneuver.

On the Dinotte, it is an extremely bright, single red LED with 3 different flash options. I have had several comment on how bright the little light is from a significant distance.