A cost of a new bike

As I mentioned here back in January, (or I thought I did) I bought a new Breezer Uptown 8 as my general commuting bike (in all but the worst weather, because I cant bear to get her dirty yet)

Now I knew this when I got it but didn’t think it completely through I guess. I have a Toppeak track rack+bag system for my older Giant bike that I use every day. Now this bag is pretty great, I love how it locks and slides into the rack and everything, but the Breezer comes with a spring rack that has the built in dynamo powered rear light meaning that my go-to commuter bag for everything from change of clothes, to food, to knitting, can not fit without some modification.

This is sad, giving me options to get a new rack to put on, switch the racks around (best solution really) or what I have now, old punctured inner-tubes tied on one side and locked to a carbineer on the other (for quick release!). This is not the most elegant design, and I won’t be winning any cycle chic points for it. The bag is not quite steady in this setup either, but it should be ok for most of the time I think.

I took a picture of the Breezer as it was just out of the box (that the kind folks at Harris Cyclery packed for me) and tomorrow I will take one, once its on campus, because yes! Tomorrow I ride my new baby into campus, and ride home in the dark with my nice dynamo headlight!

Its kind of exciting to have a new bike, hopefully I have it adjusted properly, in terms of seat height and handlebars.

Only problem seems to be my rear dynamo light... It has connectivity from the front, tested with my voltmeter, but I can get no resistance from the light nor can I get it to light up. Its LED so not sure why, but might be the capacitor that keeps it lit even when stopped, died...

Other than that, I am very excited :D


(Except for the fact that its going to be raining tomorrow and that means I am not going to bring it in, so it won’t make it to campus until Wednesday or Thursday this week, booo)

a little end of year roundup

Well for sure it’s been an interesting year for me, and well obviously for the first 6 months of this little ol blog. I first actually became interested in cycling and transportation and planning and all that this spring in the UK, I was in a ENV planning program before but was focusing a bit more on policy then planning. That has certainly changed and with it the sites I read and where I go on the interwebz. I think commuting this semester by bike has certainly been really useful; I spent money on some upgrades for the bike, some nice accessories that needed to be done. However, I truly need a different frame and a different bike if I hope to keep this commute up for sure. I am looking at the Breezer UpTown 8 and now I need to find a local dealer that has one so I can test ride it, which is turning out to be more of a problem then I originally anticipated.

I did some rough math for the semester, and it seems I did between 900 and 1050 miles for the semester, I tend to lean a bit more toward the higher number but I think I was just under 1000 miles for the semester. That’s about 500 hours in the saddle, and it’s been good. It’s been exciting, depressing, painful, joyous, and peaceful. I missed 2 days due to snow and excessive baggage needing to be transported (more then my bike can carry safely at the moment) and well I don’t feel safe biking on a rural highway with snowplows going by me at 50. I have been yelled at, honked at, almost run over, whistled at, complemented, had pictures taken of and been attacked by lots of rain and head winds. It’s been an interesting semester. I look forward to the next, hopefully on a new bike that will be better for me and better for my riding conditions. I look forward to this New Year with excitement for sure.
I wish you a happy New Year and keep looking for posts into the New Year; I got a couple coming up soon (read when I get to write them) and back to some infrastructure Friday posts for sure!
Be well