Sturdy mountain bike tail light?

On Wednesday, July 2, 2014 12:27:54 AM UTC+1, Joerg wrote:
James wrote:

On 02/07/14 08:37, Joerg wrote:





I've had numerous cables break. My first one at age 12 or so. 10th gear,

full speed, intersection, red light, car stopped in front of me. Pulled

brake ... thwack ... "Oh s..t!" ... *KAPOW*



Another time I had to go straight in a hairpin curve because my front

brake cable snapped, hoping there was no cliff or anything behind the

bushes I saw. There wasn't. But ... there was a brick wall.



The risk with mountain biking is higher. Going down a really gnarly hill

everything on the bike shakes like crazy. I even had chains fly off many

times. If something snaps off it'll flop around to its limits and if

that means touching the knobs of a tire that could result in an ugly

crash.





Disc brakes and an internally geared hub would solve a couple of

problems for you.





T'is why I now have an MTB with disk brakes. But no geared hub, the

Rohloff which supposedly can take hard MTB rides is way too pricey for

my taste.



--

Regards, Joerg



http://www.analogconsultants.com/

A Rohloff hub with minimal service (change of oil every 5000km) lasts forever and is infinitely rebuildable. That makes it a sound secondhand proposition. Cosmetically hard used but mechanically sound Rohloffs quite often go for bargain prices on ebay.de.

Andre Jute

SMS wrote:
On 7/1/2014 5:26 PM, Joerg wrote:
sms wrote:
On 7/1/2014 1:23 PM, Joerg wrote:
Ralph Barone wrote:
sms wrote:

[...]

dx.com:
http://www.dx.com/p/convenient-durable-aluminum-alloy-water-bottle-bracket-fixing-adapter-for-bicycle-handle-bar-black-239985.



The DX mount looks useful and not too kludgey.


It works, I've got one. But I placed sturdy rubber under it because
else
it can leave ugly teeth marks in the handlebar if you ever need to move
it. And I will now have to because I want to shorten my handlebar a bit
and also install Ergon GP2 grips.

I like using either heat shrink or plastidip so there isn't another
piece to worry about, but rubber would be fine too. The conduit clamps
are smooth which I guess is one advantage to them.


Yes, smooth clamps would be wonderful. I never understood why they
cerrated them. But nothing is perfect in the world.

These are smooth
http://www.dx.com/p/high-quality-universal-motorcycle-7-8-handle-bar-mirror-mount-holder-clamp-adaptor-black-pair-191861.


You could even connect two of them together with a short piece of M10
threaded rod and use a light that uses an 18650 Li-Ion battery since the
narrowest part off the barrel diameter would be just about the right
size (7/8") (an `8650 battery is 18mm in diameter and 650mm in length
and 18mm is about 0.71").


Yes, those would work. The motorcycle market is genrally served with
much better and more durable stuff than the bicycle market. If I had the
time I would simply hack a motorcycle light and be done with it.

--
Regards, Joerg

http://www.analogconsultants.com/

SMS wrote:
On 7/1/2014 6:00 PM, jbeattie wrote:
On Tuesday, July 1, 2014 2:15:09 PM UTC-7, sms wrote:
On 7/1/2014 1:45 PM, jbeattie wrote:



Any time I've had a yoke slip, it did so during a test run, and it
did not result in any catastrophic problems. I don't recall ever
breaking a brake cable. I'm positive that I've never broken a
straddle cable or rod, although I had some NeoRetros where the cable
slipped in the anchor bolt on one brake arm. IIRC, it was threaded
in to aluminum, and I was afraid of over-torquing.
http://www.jensonusa.com/images/Colo...5/G0000MEY.jpg
IMO, that anchor should have a threaded SS sleeve.



When I was in college I was riding my bike home on a sub-freezing day,

going down a hill, and brake cable snapped. Further down the hill the

other one snapped. fortunately there was enough of a level section at

the bottom that my speed fell enough before reaching the busy road at

the bottom.

Did you check to see if the cables had been filed? A double cable
failure seems suspicious to me.

I've broken a lot of stuff on bikes, but I guess I'm lucky when it
comes to brake cables. I've broken shift cables, but they take harder
bends and are much lighter.

I guess it's possible but not a lot of vandals hanging around the EE
buildings. I think it was the combination of a cheap department store
"10 speed" and the very cold weather.


Corrosion is one problem. During my time at the university my bikes had
to park outside the whole time, day and night. Since I rode every day
there was also a fair amount of slushy salt-laden snow splashed onto
just about anything on the bike. My cables nearly always snapped at that
little ball that latches into the brake handle.

--
Regards, Joerg

http://www.analogconsultants.com/

Andre Jute wrote:
On Wednesday, July 2, 2014 12:27:54 AM UTC+1, Joerg wrote:
James wrote:

On 02/07/14 08:37, Joerg wrote:
I've had numerous cables break. My first one at age 12 or so.
10th gear, full speed, intersection, red light, car stopped in
front of me. Pulled brake ... thwack ... "Oh s..t!" ... *KAPOW*
Another time I had to go straight in a hairpin curve because
my front brake cable snapped, hoping there was no cliff or
anything behind the bushes I saw. There wasn't. But ... there
was a brick wall. The risk with mountain biking is higher.
Going down a really gnarly hill everything on the bike shakes
like crazy. I even had chains fly off many times. If something
snaps off it'll flop around to its limits and if that means
touching the knobs of a tire that could result in an ugly
crash.
Disc brakes and an internally geared hub would solve a couple of
problems for you.


T'is why I now have an MTB with disk brakes. But no geared hub, the


Rohloff which supposedly can take hard MTB rides is way too pricey
for

my taste.



--

Regards, Joerg



http://www.analogconsultants.com/

A Rohloff hub with minimal service (change of oil every 5000km) lasts
forever and is infinitely rebuildable. That makes it a sound
secondhand proposition. Cosmetically hard used but mechanically sound
Rohloffs quite often go for bargain prices on ebay.de.


Maybe some day, if I find a deal. The gear ratio of 5:1 seems ok on the
Rohloff for MTB use. But you'll also have to re-spoke, true the wheel,
and so on.

The other risk is whether it's really mechanically sound or whether
there is some not-so-nice reason why the seller sells it. I've had mixed
experiences on Ebay. Sellers suddenly no longer returning phone calls
when there is a problem, et cetera.

With the regular derailer deals you can buy new at decent prices and it
works well.

--
Regards, Joerg

http://www.analogconsultants.com/

I've broken a lot of stuff on bikes, but I guess I'm lucky ...


never had one break.

one day riding back from town around noonish, rode up to Main into a film set.

several burned out cars lined up north from the lights, 2 in back mounted by a Plymouth Caravan ?

The Raleigh's cables snapped.

On Sun, 06 Jul 2014 04:38:45 +0100, Phil W Lee
wrote:

Road flares aren't legal here,

So much for the international version of my road flare bicycle light.
I hate it when that happens. I guess I'll go back to calcium carbide
(acetylene) bicycle lanterns. I don't think a carbon arc lamp can be
made small enough.

Not all flares contain potassium perchlorate, but if they do, they
might contaminate the water supply. You did the right thing giving it
to the local fire department, assuming they disposed of the ash
properly:
http://www.cdph.ca.gov/certlic/drinkingwater/Pages/Perchlorate.aspx
http://www.spiegl.org/rocket/flare/flare.html
http://water.epa.gov/drink/contaminants/unregulated/perchlorate.cfm
http://www2.epa.gov/sites/production/files/2014-03/documents/ffrrofactsheet_contaminant_perchlorate_january2014 _final.pdf

(...)
They didn't need to extinguish it (igniting it in the sandpit was
sufficient), but it did burn far more rapidly and spectacularly than I
would expect the designer intended - probably some internal crack
allowed the burn surface to be excessive, as with yours.

Yep. That's what happened to me. It was quite impressive and
sufficiently bright to make me drop it and run for cover in case it
decided to explode.

It took them longer to set it up than to burn it out.
About 90s of very bright fun

Normal burn time varies with flare size but is usually 15 to 30
minutes at about 750 C.

--
Jeff Liebermann
150 Felker St #D http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com
Skype: JeffLiebermann AE6KS 831-336-2558