Shameless Pimpage

Part 1 - The Pimpage - Easy money for MORE



Part Duex -
New light mounted and lightly tested - Check
New tire mounted with stan's - Check
Ready for a whole lot of Rosy - Check (\M/)

Also in another strange coincidence my new flashlight ALSO came in yesterday a Fenix light I got off SaC. Pulled out my untouched batteries from last winter for the knock off version that sucked, put in and left on for 2+ hours with no problems. I'm rotating all the batteries thru the charger. I do note one side of the charger is broke-ass. With it's reflector at short distanced the damn thing is BRIGHT!

The new tire was almost painless to mount, I think I spent about 10 getting it on one side, getting the bead aligned then getting the other side 2/3'rds on. Added a ton of Stans and then a few minutes to wrestle on that final third of the bead. Then I hooked up my wimpy floor pump and was able to easily inflate it to 60 lbs setting the beads. Then a few hours of shake and set. I'd say by this morning it hadn't lost any air! That's awesome. Even when new on there the ardent had some minor bead leaks/etc. The power of running a REAL toobless tire. Can't wait to try it out at the Rose tonight.

Also trying to layout a Falls Church based Bar Ride so far I have:
DFH
4 P's
Mad Fox
Dogwood Tavern
Public House #7
Clare and Don's Beach Shack
JV's

Now I just have to figure out a starting point. Maybe Vienna.

Flat as a pancake compressor.

While out searching high and low in storage for a ice scrapper this morning I decided to check my rear tire on a lark. Surprise!

It was flat as a pancake. It's been slowly leaking a while. Over the last few weeks it's been getting faster. At the end of the first lap yesterday the pump said it was down to 20. I pumped up to 33 or so and did the next lap, I think it was in the high 20's by when I finished. The ardent was a good tire but I don't think it lasted well and being non-toobless it didn't hold air as well as a toobless specific tire.

Guess it's time to mount the Specialized Purgatory I've been hanging onto since June. No biggie. See if I can get it to mount up myself this time. If not, I know what I'm ordering for Christmas!

Got some other stuff I need to fix around the house so hopefully I have time.

Yawn. I got to bed pretty early last night i thought but I'm still tired. Even though I woke up at 5:30 pretty much fully awake. ugh.

Gemini XERA came in and wow it is TINY! About the size around of soda top (20 oz) and about as long as 4. Pics on Flickr. The new MS still impresses with how damn powerful it is. Though the lack of spot in it sorta sucks. I think the Gemini will give a solid balance to that issue.

Flying like Super Something

Tuesday I took the rig up to CJ after work again and got 14 miles total between there and back. Nice ride and the shake down went very well.

Yesterday I arrived at Wake nice and early after picking up an order at REI and RickyD hauled me out to the top of the berms for an impromptu jumping/filming session. Unfortunetely his camera mount wouldn't hold the camera up so he probably didn't get a lot of good video.

The annoying thing there that i noticed was I was burping my rear tire on the landings. I guess I was maybe dropping 3 feet or something max. Didn't seem very far, but I know I wish I had a smoother touch on landings. Just haven't done enough of them yet. Had to re inflate after the 2 sets of 2 jumps I did, both times the tire was down to like 20 PSI.

The tire rub issue continues to worry me enough that I'm probably gonna by 2 new tires to replace my current one with on Payday. Probably try a Specialized Captain Control in 2.1 or 2.2 if I can find it or a Crossmark UST again in the 2.1.....grrrr. Unless I can find a Mutano Raptor UST in 2.1/2.2

Got another 14 miles in. Gotta see if the wife is gonna let me try the MoCo epic on Sunday. I really want to as a test for some big riding the weekend after. I figure if I can hang pretty well on 40-50 miles of moco I can do 30-35 miles of Penn or WV.

Does this tire make me look fat?

Does this tire make me look fat?

Last night I finally picked up some more Stans so I could finally swap on the new tire for the rear of my bike. I've replaced my old MAxxis LUST Ignitor with a Maxxis LUST Crossmark. Following some people's suggestions I went from a 2.1 to the 2.25.

HOLY COW the damn this BARELY fits. As in I have to deflate it a bit to install the wheel! The CM is a massive tire. The old Ignitor went 1.5 lbs, the new Crossmark goes 1.9!!! Test riding in my basement it seemed not to rub but I'll have to get it actually out on trails. I think with this tire I'll be able to comfortable run at say 35 psi and get a nice cushy ride out of it. Damn it was a biatch to get on, feels like a much stronger wire bead in this one.

Now I just have to figure out my new front in the next month or so.

And I'm sick as heck since Sunday, I got a cough that started mid last week and by sunday I was misserable (Saturday wasn't bad). Monday I was off fortunetly and layed around all day. Had a backache from hell thats just now really getting fully better.
MY cough is a bit better today but now the damn thing moved up into my head. hu?? Thats frickin backwards! aARGHHHHHHH!!!!!

Also had to do a full lube/pm on the bike yesterday. I'd washed it on friday and didn't dry it or spray the moving components with the teflon/lube/dryer and it was BAD!

August, where are you going?

Where are you going this August?

Myself, I've already gone to Dewey Beach and had a semi-relaxing 4 days of Beach Time(tm). One of my favorite parts now is that my wife and i did a round of Out Run 2 and almost finished the whole first stage, which i've never gotten that close. It was a hard fought race with both of us making some good passes and driving. We also took one long ride out to Lewes and a bunch of short rides. Unfortunetly on the way back from Lewes, the wyf, in a fit of not paying attention attacked my rear d, and bent it pretty good, my 2 big cogs in the back are currently unreachable. Gotta do some creative bending tonight to see if I can get it better or if it's time to order a new rear d next week on payday.

Monday I'm going for a ride anyways but I guess I'll have to limit myself, and maybe go for a pile of mileage out at somewhere like Wakefield or maybe I can survive schaeffer.

Also on the repair/replace docket is my rear tire. It's got a TON of tiny gashes that aren't sealing well and a few rips. It's amazing how well it's held up. But I'm kinda pissed as those tires only have about 600 miles of my own on them and maybe 50 or so from the original owner. Oh well.

Also I need to get the damn garmin in for repairs, I want it fully fixed for the fall, I'm going to push hard to break 1k off road miles this year.