Four in a hundred

Yes, I'm still pissed off about it. Most of the time I'm riding my new bike, so I'm not reminded of it, but when I ride my backup bike, I have two computer mounts to choose from. After my recent exploding tire incident, I found myself on my trusty ol' aluminum steed and couldn't resist the temptation to drive myself nuts. The photo below tells the whole story. The Garmin Edge 25 is shorting me by exactly 4% on miles compared to the Planet Bike computer. I lose exactly one mile in every 25. Thanks NASA.

One of these things is not like the other

Left: Planet Bike Protegé 9.           Right: Garmin Edge 25

I like the nice small form factor of the Garmin, which is just about as small as a bike computer can get. And I like the Garmin web site and all the neat analytical tools it affords. But it just irks me that it seems to measure distance differently than any other bike computer I've ever had. It irks me even more to think that it might be the more accurate and my other computers were inflating my mileage all these years!

Pari-Moto-a-go-go

Pop goes the (rear) Pari-Moto

1,250 miles. That's more or less how many miles I got out of the stock tires that came with my Cycles Toussaint Vélo Routier v2 before a rather stout twig punctured one and ended its useful life. I might could have (as we say in the South) gotten a little more mileage out of them if I had rotated them a while back, as the rear tire seems to have worn a fair bit more quickly than the front. But benign neglect is my general modus operandi in most things, and tire maintenance is no exception.

As you can see from the photo at the right, the center section had worn down to a smooth, thin skin, so this was likely to happen soon - I've probably been on borrowed time for a while now. I had read on several forum posts that the Pari-Moto was designed as an "event" tire, and particularly given their $40 price tag, shouldn't be expected to last a long time. I had taken that message to heart and introduced a couple of ounces of Stan's NoTubes sealant into each. Stan's promises to seal holes up to about 1/4 inch diameter. That's pretty close to the size of my hole, but I think the tread was just too thin to close up. I can't fault Stan's for that. Or Panaracer/Pacenti, maker of the tire. They were billed as a low mileage tire, so no real surprise.

Reason Number 437 to have fenders on your bike: when you get a catastrophic blow out in a tire filled with sealant, you don't get sprayed with liquid latex.

So, the time has come to replace the original equipment. The cream tires always seemed a bit of a novelty to me anyway. But they looked great on the bike and they really grew on me. Still, now that it's time to replace them, the temptation to go back to black is all but irresistible. The black/tan sidewall combination just speaks to me as the classic look of bike tires. And now that Compass Cycles has converted to René Herse Cycles, I decided to pull the trigger and switch to the René Herse Loup Loup Pass 650b x 38. Jan Heine swears they are the best tires available, so I'll put him to the test. And it's a silly thing but who wouldn't want their Vélo Routier to bear the logo of the magician of Levallois.

Last of the Compass tires..?

So I dutifully ordered a pair of the Loup Loups with the extra light casing and a pair of the recommended Schwalbe xxlite inner tubes, which Jan swears will take my riding to "an entirely new level." All arrived at the house with lightning speed - kudos to the René Herse warehouse team! Though I must report that the René Herse tires I ordered came with the Compass branding.

I was eager to get the new rubber on the rims, but I took the opportunity to true the wheels which came from the manufacturer a bit wobbly and through my year of negligence hasn't gotten any better. So now with more or less straight rims I set about to install the tires. Here, beloved reader, is where the story goes all sad and weepy like. Because you see, the tubes I ordered blew to bits before either of them contained 70 PSI. I mean concussive explosions. I thought the casings of the tires might have been damaged, so violent were the blow outs. I've had defective tubes that did that before, but only very rarely and that both of them did it inclines me to think there's a problem other than that I don't know my own strength.

The more knowledgeable readers may note that the Schwalbe SV14A is actually a 26 inch tube and 650b tires are 27.5 inches. So of course the tubes are too small for the tires. True, yet the René Herse website contains the following note:

Maybe Jan and his riding buddies are all such fly weights that they only pump their tires to 55 PSI, but I'm a big boy and need more pressure. I like to have them inflated to at least the upper 60s, and that's just about where these things blew. Maybe the 26 inch tubes should have worked but they didn't. Whatever happened, it made a big boom. $32 plus shipping goes poof! I'd make a stink with Jan about it, but I can't be bothered. I'll just chalk it up to experience.

I subsequently installed a pair of Schwalbe SV21 tubes I already had in inventory and had no problem whatsoever. I have also now ordered a pair of SV21A, the xxlight version of the 27.5 inch (650b) designated tubes in the hope that they will take my riding to an entirely new level. I can use all the help I can get. I'll let you know in time.

A pilgrimage to Levallois

53, rue Victor Hugo

Finding ourselves in Paris recently, as one only occasionally does, we felt compelled to jump on the number 84 bus and ride it to Levallois to make a little pilgrimage to 53 Rue Victor Hugo to visit Cycles Alex Singer where I had the very great honor of shaking the hand of Olivier Csuka, probably the last of the French Constructeurs. 

Monsieur Csuka was busy being interviewed by what looked like a couple of reporters. Nevertheless he was extremely gracious and spent a few minutes discussing his approach to designing bespoke bikes which basically involves understanding the rider's "practice" and building the bike around the riding style, the size, the age, the strength of the customer. It seems like the kind of typically French process that would take a long, leisurely time. But then who's in a hurry when you're in Paris hanging out in a bike shop with the last of a line of legendary craftsman? 

The showroom floor

He generously let the Managing Partner and I visit the atelier in the back for a few minutes to see where the magic happens. It was satisfyingly messy with all manner of parts hanging from the walls and ceiling and big piles of lovely lugs and whatnot scattered around every flat surface in the place. Oh, man, would I like to spend my days there, surrounded by half-finished projects, scribbled notes, odds and ends of every conceivable description littering every nook and cranny - and trust me, there are a lot of nooks and crannies. 

I didn’t end up buying a €6,000+ work of functional art on this visit. Maybe next year. Not speaking French and not wanting to hang around long enough to get Mr. Csuka’s focused attention, we beat a hasty retreat to Le Royal Pereire where we were just in time to fit in a couple of Aperol Spritzes before the cocktail hour began in earnest. Oh Paris, je t'aime.