You know how sometimes a song will take you back to a place in time or drum up special memories or thoughts? For example . . .
When I hear "Jump" by Van Halen I remember my mom boycotting my desire to go to the 1984 Van Halen Concert in Portland, Oregon.
When I hear "Only the Young" by Journey I think about Louden Swain trying to drop weight in a silver suit in the movie Vision Quest - which by the way is one of the best movie sound tracks all all time if you ask me. Journey, Dio, Hagar, Foreigner, Madonna, Quarterflash . . . I gotta watch that movie again just for the songs. And if you have not heard the song Lunatic Fringe by Red Rider, view this clip from the movie and tell me it doesn't get you pumped up.
When I hear any song from from Metallica's Black Album I think about my dingy college weight room because I swear that CD never stopped playing for at least a year after that album was released.
When I hear "Hey ya!" by Outkast I think about climbing flights of stairs because that song was on my play list while looking for apartments in New York City - I must have climbed over 100 miles of stairs that week.
Well, my head begins to swim with urban bike riding intensity with I hear the song "The Funeral" by Band of Horses. The song just came through on my Slacker Radio stream and immediately I started to fill with adrenaline. Enjoy this Bike Hacks Classic to find out why.
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Great article in yesterday's New York Times about Danny MacAskill, whom you've probably seen in one of his YouTube videos. He's the guy with the mad urban trials riding skills, who rides along the ridge of a spiked fence, does backflips off of trees, etc. The article is a great backgrounder on the guy--his star is taking off, but he seems super humble and thankful. Worth reading.
I follow quite a few blogs via Google Reader and one of them is KC Bike Commuting. When I was trolling a while back I saw a great hack and emailed Noah to give props and ask if I could post here. He kindly said yes. Enjoy and check out his blog for more good stuff. All text and pictures credited to Noah.
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Using a 5" long section of old
inner tube, I lash my modified Mini
Maglite to the handlebars of my road
bike as a backup-backup headlight.
Take a 5-inch section of old inner tube (this one flatted years ago) and
cut two holes through both layers using a pair of scissors. Make sure
they're big enough for your flashlight to pass through. This is a 28mm
inner tube. Much smaller than that, and this might not work too well.
Pass the body of the flashlight through one hole, then wrap the tube
around your handlebar. Stretch the tube out and pass the tail of the
flashlight through the other hole. Adjust angle accordingly.
Pedaling a rickshaw isn't the easiest task in the world, especially when its loaded with a couple of occupants. This rickshaw driver from Nepal came up with a better(?) solution...install a windmill to help propel the pedicab. The windmill consists of a metal drum that is designed to catch the wind and drive a gear attached to the rear wheel with a side-mounted gear. I'm not a physicist, but wouldn't this create additional drag? Here's the tag from the video:
Big drum on top of rickshaw rotates as rickshaw moves forward. It observes wind and supports driver to move forward. According to the driver: He has came up with this hybrid system with drums that assist rickshaw driver to move forward. In addition, it has feature that make driver easy to cycle. This built by professor from next town
Even if it doesn't actually work, at least it might work for attracting customers...
If you have been following this site for the past few weeks, you know that we are giving away a Flashbak light to the winner of a Haiku contest. The contest has now concluded and I have decided that I will spend several hours on my roof overlooking Times Square, and with the assistance of beer consumption, eventually choose a winner. It could take days of consumption and contemplation, so thank you in advance for the patience of all the contestants. I may just scream the Haiku at the people on the street below and see what kind of reaction I get. It is New York City, so no one would probably even take a second look at me.
I introduced the Flashbak way back in this post, but never did an official "review" so that is what I hope to accomplish here. As I stated back then, when I first opened it I was a little intimidated. To me it was almost like opening a box containing a string of Christmas lights. For those of you that don't remember, here is what it looked like when I opened it. In case you are wondering I faced the lights down because I wanted to add intrigue and have readers guess what is was . . . I'm sneaky that way.
Most of the bike lights I have owned have attached to my bike with a simple screw bracket or zip tie. The Flashbak on the other hand contains three major components, all held together by rubber coated wire:
1) The Light rectangle
2) The Battery Pack
3) The On/Off "Remote" Switch
The lights and the On/Off switch also have metal spring loaded clasps that help to secure the device to, whatever. Here is my setup almost every day when I commute. I am able to carry pretty much everything I need in one rack bag.
I wanted to install the light in a way that would make it stationary - in other words I did not feel like attaching it for example to the back of whatever I am wearing because I do not often wear the same thing every day and I did not want to have to keep attaching the light to whatever I was wearing based on the weather. So I went with one of the setups that is shown on their web site - I attached it to the back of my rack bag. My bag has a top pocket and I stashed the battery pack there.
I ran the On/Off switch wire to my seat post and attached it to the lock cable that I use to secure my seat. I then used a reflective ankle Velcro strap to keep it from bouncing around when I ride. The On/Off switch is very cool because it also blinks and you absolutely know if the light is on.
The light runs on three AA batteries (mine came with them installed) and I have been riding with the light for about two months and it has performed like a champ. On one of my first nights out with it, I received a compliment on it from a rider that I passed.
As far as distance recognition, here is a picture of my bike about 40 paces out (end of the green arrow) to give you an idea of the testing distance.
And here is a short video at the same distance after sunset.
Overall I am very happy with the light. I think I would definitely use it with a backpack as well, but if I was just riding with a shirt or jacket, it might not make the cut. If you are a commuter and you use a bag on your rack or wear the same backpack daily, I think this light is a winner and would be well worth the investment. It's bright, the battery life is good, and the "remote" is a cool feature for sure. I also have five other lights on my bike and all together, it is really hard to miss me. On another note, I have ridden with it in heavy rain as well and there have been no ill effects.
A big thanks to the Flashbak crew for allowing us to review the product and for sponsoring our Haiku contest. For further information or to purchase your own, visit the Flashbak Web site.
Who amongst us does not use a search engine at least once per day? I did not really think about it much until today, however I would hazard a guess that every day I use the Internet I search for something at least one time.
So when a news feed this morning informed me that Nokia has developed a bike charger aimed at mobile phones and the first two sites I visited did not have pictures (the Reuters and PC World pages only had text) I opened up a search engine typed in "nokia bike charger."
Proving our world is dominated by the automobile, the search engine naturally thought I had mistyped and wanted to correct me . . . see below.
No my search engine friend, I did not mean "nokia car charger." Being a naturally curious fellow I wondered how other search engines would perform. Turns out 2 out of 3 subscribe to the automobile Matrix . . .
If inquiring minds want to know, Google and Ask both questioned my intentions and Bing did not question me. I did eventually fine a decent picture via the site ElectricPig.co.uk. The picture does not actually show very much, but here you have it for now:
The photos do not reveal the guts of the device but you just have to think that it is a dynamo hub of some sort. I have my own hairbrained thoughts on generating energy that I'll share in a future post. As a hint, my idea will most definitely confuse search engines =)
The deadline to submit entries for our Bike Hacks Haiku contest to give away a Flashbak was Tuesday and a few people submitted right before the clock struck midnight and the contest ended with a "Ding, Ding!" (at least in my head). So enjoy these last few entries and I will follow up with a long overdue review and an announcement of the winner soon. Ride safe!
While the Monsterbike may not be the best for tackling hills or going fast, it would certainly teach an important lesson to anyone who doesn't check their mirror before opening their car door.
Reader John, who blogs at Hackin5hit, and also submitted bike haiku, sent along details on an awesome trailer hack.
John introduces the project on his Hackin5hit blog this way:
- - - - - - - - - -
It started as two pieces of 1/2"emt (electrical conduit, $1.80ea @
Lowe's), an old wheelchair discovered in a pile of junk behind someone's
house (I paid them $20, probably could have been free), a piece of
uni-strut from a garbage can outside WSECU in downtown Olympia, an
air-hose coupling from Harbor Freight (already had this but not more
than $2 new) and the bin was ~$12 on sale @ one of the big Lowe's-Depot
stores. There is a little bit of aluminum angle stock from my scrap bin
and a bit of scrap hose for the flexible bit of the hitch.
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Here is a picture of his hitch (more details in video below):
And the full meal deal, as shown in the Haiku entry is here:
John went on to describe what he did via video, the full blog entry can be found here:
Thanks John! Sorry it took me a while to get this posted, but better late than never =)
John has a hanging work stand that will be featured in a future post so stay tuned!
In early May we put up a post on a cool project focused on investigating bicycle culture in South Africa. Bicycle Portraits is a project where the authors/photographers catalog cyclists they meet as they ride around South Africa. The result they are hoping for is a book they can share with the world. But to get there they do need pledges of support.
The site they are using to promote the book (KickStarter) invites interested individuals to participate in getting the project off the ground. There are different awards and incentives and Stan asked if Bike Hacks might be interested in helping to promote their cause so they can meet their financial goal. We certainly support those interested in promoting bike culture so we give you the following.
If any Bike Hacks readers wish to support the project by pre-ordering the book, there is the chance to score a 10" x 12" photographic print of the donor/winner's choice. What do I mean by winner? Interested readers should do the following:
2. Submit a picture of your bike (you can be included if you wish) in front of a landmark of your choice to Bike Hacks. Let us know you are interested by using the Submit Your Hack link.
3. We will post entries we receive on Bike Hacks for all to view.
4. Stan and Nic, the authors/photographers will then pick a winner from those who submit. The winner will choose the photo of their choice and get a 10" x 12" print, along with a post card from the road.
The project funding deadline is June 17th and thus the deadline for interested readers is also June 17th. Last time I checked they were at 54% of their goal. If you are not interested in ordering the book but still wish to support the project, visit the site for other donation opportunities.
If you love bikes and books, this is your chance to help promote both. Ride on!
