Trek 800 Antelope Build

[dodge dude94]

Just wait until you're wearing shorts and your bare leg just, ever-so-slightly touches the hot engine.


Yeah, you get the cooling fins cattle branded into your leg and it hurts like hel1 for a day. Not fun.

 

[comfortableshoes]

The burn on my calf was way worse than I thought. It's now turned into an oozing mess. The pic below doesn't do it justice. It hurts like whoa. I'm planning on a nice long ride tomorrow., I'm going to have to cover the burn with a large bandage because when my jeans rub on it, ouch.


muffler burn by lessherger, on Flickr

I've made no progress on the "new" Trek 800, other than to hit all the rusty spots with WD40 and let it sit. I also washed down the tires, I need to get at the gears with a wire brush to remove whatever hardened grease-like substance is on there, it's full of grit. It almost looks like black undercarriage rubber that you spray on your car... Or we used to anyway. It's going to be a beast to clean off.

Anyway, just finished a celebratory beer, got an email from my professor that I got and A in my first grad school class. Not a bad way to start the school year. Makes me much happier for my future in school. I was worried I was too old.

 

[comfortableshoes]

The miles on this build are getting easier and easier. I've put 63 miles on Eagle Arse. The bike has been going great. (knock on wood)

I've been craving a nice long ride since I got back from orientation. It hasn't happened because of rain and obligations. This AM I could see a storm was blowing in but I decided to go for a ride anyway. I'm glad I did. I was sprinkled on for a short while but for the most of my hour long ride I was dry. The roads were damp but not well, a few puddles here and there.

I stopped at the McKeown School for a photo, I almost always ride past this place on my rides. It's also where I vote.

McKeown School by lessherger, on Flickr

After that I decided to ride out to RT 97. I'm going to see if I can ride it further out, but today there was a statie parked at the multiple intersection and I didn't want to go past him. He was positioned to stop people from running the light and to chase down those stupid enough to blow it in front of him. Anyway. On my way out there I stopped for a sip of water and a photo at the North Beverly Cemetary. In the fall this cemetary is stunning in red and gold colors.

North Beverly Cemetary with Eagle Arse by lessherger, on Flickr

I looped around and came back the way I came, and took a quick detour up to the Beverly Airport. Which I'd never seen. They had a couple of aircraft on display, one of which was a Korean War era Russian MiG-15UTI. Which was really neat. The paint is starting to peel off of it in places, but you can't see that in the photo.


Eagle Arge with a Russian Fighter from the Korean War by lessherger, on Flickr

The stats: 16.57 miles, 53.47 minute (several stops for pictures), max speed according to speedo- 28.6 max speed according to GPS 32, average speed according to GPS was 10.9mph Though the app added an extra 30 min and dropped a mile from the run. I ran out of juice in the phone at the end of the ride.

These grips are a candidate to be used for a friction drive. After destroying my last gloves I wore my weightlifting gloves, real leather, and it started to chew through the palm of those too!. I'm going to go pick up a new pair of cycling gloves soon, we'll see how those fare.

I pumped the muffler burn with my pedal, I might have said a few bad words. Yikes, that hurts, even with a cushy bandaid on it. Luckily i think it's at tthe point where it's starting to heal and stop oozing.

 

[comfortableshoes]

On my most recent 24 mile ride I noticed that the bike gloves I bought helped some, bu not as much asI'll need to ride more than 25 miles.

I have 2 pairs of Doc Martins, one with shock absorbing gel insoles and one without. I decided to wear the old pair with insoles because my newer less scuffed pair was starting to smell like 2 stroke smoke. I noticed far fewer vibrations with the insoles than without.

This got me to thinking. What if I padded a pair of gloves with some of that insole material?

I stopped at CVS and picked up a pair of ball of the foot shock absorbing inserts, these are small and only for part of the foot, rather than the gel insoles that are for the whole foot.

I finally found a pair of work gloves that the Eagle Arse grips don't shred, Firm Grip Extreme Grip. They have a smooth rubbery palm that feel like leather and looks like leather but isn't, I don't think. They look like they are padded but they aren't. I glued the ball shock absorber gel insert into the appropriate spot of the glove using E6000 glue- it dries clear and flexible. It's like shoe goo only stronger and more flexible when dry.

So I'll wear the cheapie Bell gloves under the Firm Grip gloves with the glued in insert. I almost with I'd bought the full sized inserts so I could have cut them to the full size of the palm. We'll find out if they work on my next ride.

If you want to follow along with me in my travels and "training" for my epic round trip go to this thread.

 

[comfortableshoes]

Managed to get 90% of my homework done for the weekend, I have about 100 pages of text to read then I'm golden. Woot!

To celebrate I charted out a 30 mile ride. I'm doing it tomorrow. So we'll see how the gloves hold out and what kind of mileage I get. Hopefully I'll get to go again on Sunday.

After charting out my ride I decided to check up on my lights. They have been misbehaving, as in not working quite right. Turns out the solder joints on the connections had cracked. I spent a little time tonight fixing up all 6 lights. They now work perfectly and all connections are good. very happy with that. BUT the batteries were dead in most of the lights, so I'll have to buy a few batteries tomorrow AM. Luckily CVS is open 24 hours, I can stop before my ride. The only issue is that there are no bike racks. Maybe next week I'll get to work on the project of wiring them all into the brake switch

Sad accident this week. A little girl was riding her bike to school. She was in the crosswalk with the crossing guard. A driver didn't see her and hit her. Luckily she suffered only injuries to her arms and legs and will be okay. I know the spot where she was hit, the ONLY way you can't see the crossing guard is if you aren't looking at the road. It's well shaded so even at dawn or sunset there is no glare, full visibility. I'm willing to bet the driver was on his cell phone or texting. He was only cited for driving through a crosswalk. A mere $200 fine. Shame.

 

[comfortableshoes]

A rain storm was threatening so I only did around 26.5 miles. The gloves with the inserts held up well. Though it took me a bit to fit them on in such a way that they were not annoying. After 26 miles my hands don't hurt much at all. That is pretty encouraging. So gel insoles INside work gloves do the job at helping with vibrations.