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Cool Bike
May 24th, 2010 | No Comments »I originally wrote ‘Cool Bike’, for a mtb CD called ’26inches.com CD’ back around 2004. I found it while doing a system clean up and thought that it was still pretty pertinent today. While the parts have changed over the past 6 years and we have started to see a return to anodised parts from the big brands, as well as a raft of very cool frames and bikes from smaller builders, I still think we are a long way from bikes being as cool as they could be.
I hope you enjoy this article….
Cool. It’s a word that conjures up all sorts of images. “Birth of the Cool’, Miles Davis’ legendary jazz period is one of them. One of the many UK movements such as the Mods is another. Cool for the most part was a state of being that was attained, you did not go out and buy it, it was not marketed to you on the boob tube, it was something that was achieved as a by product of what ever it was that people were into. Cool was hand crafted.
I personally do not think there was very much in the way of cool things in the 70’s or the excessive 80’s (other than the birth of mountain biking!). It could have been something to do with the marketers ever increasing hype to buy things that we were told were cool and the ever increasing levels of greed in society; cool is not usually associated with greed. To me, true cool has faded; it is still there but now bubbling away under the surface, almost like an underground movement. True cool is not something you walk out into the street and see anymore (seeing a Chrysler PT Cruiser with sad flames is not cool…it’s sad), you have to know where to look these days. (more…)
Digital validation
May 23rd, 2010 | No Comments »I did a piece some time back about the ‘lust’ of technology as it pertains to art – something about using 3D programs to recreate what is effectively a photograph and questioning the point of it all. Lately though I have been pondering technology on the whole, as it pertains to our every day life. This pondering topped out last week when I was watching the interaction of a mother and her son while not enjoying a late afternoon coffee (it really was not very good) at the local food court.
It is fair to say that Australia on the whole is a tech fad crazy nation. These are not my findings but those of bigger more ‘informed’ corporate’s in the telco world. After Japan, I think Australia laps up tech in a manner that is not normal, bring the latest techno wonder out and no sooner will you see it all over the streets in downtown Sydney, the iPhone is the most recent of these, though I am sure not the last. It will be interesting to see the reach of the about to be released (locally) iPad.
But it is in watching this acceptance of these techno wonders that I personally have to wonder about the true benefit they offer to society as a whole. Before I droll on, I will state upfront that I do not, nor will not, have an iPhone. I have an iPod, I WILL buy and iPad, but under no circumstance will I buy an iPhone. It’s important for me to put that out there because it ties directly into not only my, but other observer’s observations about the trend developing at a societal level with the infiltration of such technologies.
It seems for many out there, the need to be connected has consumed their lives. They can not go anywhere anymore without being ‘connected’. Watch the morning or afternoon commuters walking along, and a disturbing amount are doing ‘something online’. Go to dinner and at least one person will answer an email, SMS… or those ruder of the crowd will actually answer the phone while in the middle of dinner. I stood in line at the post office and watched the girl in front of me update her Facebook profile that ‘she was standing in line at the post office’! I can’t help but ponder, who actually cares?
Sure, I occasionally do it on my Twitter feed*… from my desktop. It is fun and I do have my share of witty banter through twitter. I though do not feel not need to share the humdrum of everyday life with others online when I walk out the door. But many do and I have to ask why? To me it seems that it has got to the point that for many people out there, the drivel they share with ‘everyone’ is some sort of strange self managed validity – I crap on, therefore I am. But what would these people do if they could not do this? We are supposed to be living in the most informed of all periods of time, information is at our fingertips. Why though is it that as a society we seem to be hitting the bottom of the barrel? We are more disfunctional then ever, the general level of knowledge is at an all time low and, in places like Sydney, relationships and interpersonal connections are more strained than ever.
On one hand as a collective, we so called communicate more than any other time in history but is that communication actually worth anything more than white noise, offering nothing more than an easy way to escape partaking in more meaningful discourse? After all, real discourse means having to be truly informed on real happenings, not just that your friend went to the can. It’s a tough question, social media is here to stay and I do believe in it. I partake in it (well, you are reading this!), as do others I know. I also enjoy the connections that are made through it. What concerns me is that for an increasing chunk of people out there, it has become their reason of being, in a perverse way giving them a form of validation and, I am sure, a feeling of importance that really does not exist. There are very few people in the world that are so important they can not enjoy dinner, a drink, whatever, without the need to spend half the time tapping into their Blackberry or iPhone no one has that much to say…. all the time.
So we come back to the mother and her little boy at 4pm at the local mall. She plonked him down, gave him food and then proceeded to spend the entire time ‘communicating’ on her ‘Berry, or whatever she was using. The whole time, while she was absorbed with her tiny screen, her son tried everything to get her attention, to participate with him. Yet, so absorbed was she, she failed to notice. Eventually he gave up and resorted to self absorbed silly antics and it was easily the saddest and most disturbing thing I had watched in some time. I am not sure what possibly could be so important for her to be treating her son like that, and judging by the shopping bags she was not ‘working’. I feel that she, like many others was ‘self validating’.
Maybe this is the honeymoon period, where people are drunk with this technology. If so, sooner of later we are going to sober up because, before the advent of 3G networks or SMS, we all managed to get by and it seems actually be just as social, if not genuinely more so, without the need to be in contact with everyone 24-7.
*Twitter is indeed an odd beast. On one hand it validates my argument but on the other hand, if you are connected to genuine people or ‘things’, who share interesting things, it can be really entertaining and informative.
Ashima PCB
May 19th, 2010 | No Comments »
It’s few and far between when one comes into contact with a product in the bike world that is 100% truly fresh. The PCB or ‘Pancake Brake’ by Ashima is one such product. Yes, it’s a disc brake but it’s unlike most others on the market not by what it does but in the way it does it.
And now for a bit of drivel…
Traditionally a disc brake applies force via a piston, housed within the body of the caliper. The piston is pushed out by the ‘brake fluid’ in the system, exerting a force on the rotor via the brake pads. This is the principle that pretty much all disc brakes use, from cars to motorcycles and mountain bikes, and a disc brake for the most part is a fairly simple hydraulic mechanism. A well designed system allows for a progressive application of force, so the more you apply pressure (by pulling in the lever), the greater the force applied, much like a vice. This is commonly known as ‘modulation’.
But in any hydraulic system the fluid within is prone to expansion when exposed to extended periods of heat and for a brake system, that can be exposed to prolonged heat (via the metal pistons) through things like heavy and constant application, this can cause issues as the expanding fluid pushes the pistons out into the rotor, radically reducing ‘modulation’ as well as power. One could also say that this problem is not helped by the fact that disc brake systems on a mountain bike are teeny weeny when compared to their bigger brothers, so the problems are amplified.
The Ashima PCB though is quite a radical departure from this in that they do away with the pistons and instead apply the force via a membrane that effectively replaces what would otherwise be 20mm traditional pistons. Pretty neat. To keep things really short, advantages of the PCB are claimed as:
- With no pistons, you loose the main mechanism to transfer heat to the fluid.
- Being a membrane that’s expanded under pressure, the membrane elasticity has an inherent memory, so the pads will always retract to .7mm.
- The fluid flow has been designed to be single path, meaning that from start to end, it flows in one direction, on a single path; most brake calipers use pathways within the body to channel the fluid to the pistons. It also allows for a thin body as well as the ability to locate the hose to the left or right of the body.
- One way flow means bleeding is dead simple too and with the Ashima bleed kit, will change the way you think about bleeding a brake.
- The fluid transfer tube, that red tube that passes the fluid from one side of the caliper body to the other, also helps cool the fluid.
I could go on about the technicality of it all but the most important thing is how do they actually work in every day use?
I strapped my test units to my 6″ dually that I use for pretty much everything at the moment and they replaced my Hope Moto M4 and Moto Mini, running 180 and 160mm rotors respectively; I fitted a 160mm Hope rotor to the front and crappy 160mm Shimano Deore to the rear, though the PCB will ship with the Ashima AiRotors (180mm front/160mm rear) which I feel will only add to the overall performance. For the records I weigh in at 97kg (213lbs) in full ride gear.
Accustomed to 4 generations of Hope brakes, the first thing that struck me with the PCB was the way the mater cylinders sat away from the bars. There’s nothing new or strange here, Hayes, Formula and others use similar designs but for a first timer to this, it seemed odd. I do have to chuckle when I hear people comment how such designs are prone to tree damage as to me, if you are hitting a tree hard enough and front on like that, your brakes surviving are the least of your problems.
Once fitted, lever reach was easy to adjust and with the new blade design fitted, I could dial the reach to just the way I like it. During a ride the brake levers were comfortable and I think I am actually a bit of a convert to this style of design as it gave me a little more hand clearance than more compact units. In terms of the master cylinder and lever design, what did I like?
- Easy reach adjustment.
- The nice rubber lined clamp.
- The all aluminium piston shaft (the shaft from the blade to the body) body housing with internal ball to allow smooth action.
- Considered anodised bolts.
On my first ride I realised the new sintered pads needed bedding in but once done, over a period of weeks I have been riding the brakes through a range of different conditions but mostly the sort of riding I would do on a typical ride – a selection of XC single track, ranging from fast and flowing to tight and rough as well as hard steep braking on the road, where the tyres grip hard and tax brakes. It should also be noted that we have had a second pair tested on a 8.5″ DH bike in DH use.
Once bedded in I have found that the brakes offer plenty of power, even through a 160mm front rotor. Admittedly ‘brute’ pull up power was not as firm as running through a 180mm but I put this down directly to the rotor size, not the power of the brake itself. In tight singletrack, where one can often find the need to brake hard to snap a corner, the PCB worked very well providing ample power which is evident by the fork dive under application. Certainly when I needed to stop, I stopped and did so without thought. I should note that on a lighter XC rig running pure XC use, the 160mm rotor would actually be a perfect blend of weight, power and feel.
Modulation has been good from the start and I am not sure if it’s me becoming more accustomed to the brake or if under more use it’s hitting its strides but I feel that modulation has been improving with each ride. Generally the more you pull the lever in, the more bite you get as it firms up so it’s easy to gauge the amount of power you’re putting into the units – the PCB do not suffer from the on/off feel of some brakes on the market.
Perhaps the best way to describe the overall performance is that I feel one should not have to ‘think’ about the brakes working – they should transfer what you are thinking to the motion of the bike seamlessly. In my view, the PCB did this perfectly and the only time they didn’t was when I expected the grab of a 180mm rotor failing to remember they were grabbing a 160mm. Even then, I feel that they easily out performed my previous brakes both in terms of modulation and lever feel.
Reports back to me in terms of use under DH conditions are that after bedding in they performed well and pulled the bike up without issues. The second two stage brake Ashima is working on I feel will be the perfect DH companion due to the reported insane amounts of power they deliver. For now my personal view is that the PCB is a strong viable alternative to other brakes on the market for everything up to heavy trail to AM use, when coupled with the right rotor.
Old school billboard
May 18th, 2010 | No Comments »You have got to just love this… doing things the old school way.