Last weekend I took "Pinky", my mountain bike, for it's maiden voyage through Castlereagh Nature Reserve.
Pinkie
The park was established in 1995 and covers an area of 490 hectares. There's a nice flat loop around the park (approx. 5km) with plenty of side shoots to explore.
Castlereagh Nature Reserve
It's been years since I last visited the nature reserve and I recall seeing plenty of wildlife there such as wallabies, lizards and a smorgasbord of birds. It seems that bird watching is still pretty popular in the park as I spotted two people with binoculars admiring the wildlife.
I stumbled across this huge goanna, it was well over 1 meter.
That's not a lizard, this is a lizard.
The park is flat and well suited for people who are new to mountain biking or finding their MTB legs after spending years on a road bike or touring bike (as I have).
Last Sunday I took part in Cycle NSW's Spring Cycle. The registration fee includes transport on all Sydney trains which is a great way to get to the start of the ride.
The riders start heading off between 6:30am and 7:00am so it makes for a very early start to the day.
Now that's early!
After shaking out the cobwebs and getting a quick breakfast, I rode down to the train station ready for a trip into North Sydney. This year I decided to ride my touring bike and have some fun.
At the Station
Sydney Trains
At the start line, bike mechanics, sponsors and coffee vendors made it an easy wait for other friends to show up.
Coffee!
I got talking to Mark, from http://rvvelonaut.blogspot.com.au/ His adequately named Green Jelly Bean Rotovelo has recently seen him cross Australia from Perth to Sydney. Mark seemed likely a genuinely nice bloke who was more than happy to share his experiences and talk about his epic ride for Legacy.
Marks Green Jelly Bean
Nice to talk to fellow cyclists
One of the things I enjoy about the Spring Cycle is that there really does seem to be a Spring festival atmosphere to the race. All sorts of bikes come for the ride.
All types of bikes at the Spring Cycle
Keeping with the fun theme, Patrich decided to ride his restored steel framed, 8 speed internally geared hub bike.
At the start
Taking it easy at several stops along the way.
Relaxing!
Quick, take the pic, I can't hold my gut in for much longer
Suck that gut in Patrich
Free Banana stand, who can resist?
B1 and B2
Another car show, they seem to follow me lately.
Looks like the MG club's in town
At the finish line, we relaxed under a tree and watched out for our other friends to finish. Unfortunately one of them crashed out which had us waiting for a while. At least he was not badly injured, just a bit bruised and sore.
At the finish line
Olympic Park
Patrich did a great job capturing the Spring Cyle action from his Fly6 Camera.
Well, the official ride was over, and an enjoyable one at that, but we had other plans. We decided to ride back home via the old aqueduct making it a 100Km day.
This is an extract from http://www.canalreserve.org which gives some interesting history on the old aqueduct.
"The Lower Prospect Canal Reserve is a unique parcel of bushland that snakes through a densely populated area of Western Sydney. The corridor stretches for approximately 7.7 kilometres from Prospect Reservoir to Sydney Water Pipehead at Albert Street, Guildford (see map) and varies in width from 40 metres to 100 metres covering an area of approximately 54.6 hectares."
There a sections along the cycle path where you can still see the remnants of the old aqueduct, really enjoyable ride actually.
The old aqueduct
Under the bridge down town
Nearly home
I bid Patrich farewell towards the end of the aqueduct cycleway and made my way over to the M7 cycleway to see me back home.
All in all, the Spring Cycle+ was a great days riding on the touring bike.
I got the frame back from the sand blasting and powder coating guys. I settled on a pearl white paint scheme for this one. The powder coating results are ok, but I do get a better finish when I paint the frames myself. You can see that the paint hasn't quite adhered to the metal on some of the high points on the frame, most notably near the bottom bracket. This was the first frame that I took to get powder coated and it will probably be the last. You just can't beat the attention to detail that you get when your painting your bike out of a passion rather than quickly pumping out as many powder coated products as you can to turn a profit.
Here's a pic of the frame with test fit bottom bracket from my box of spares.
Pearl White Apollo Frame - Nice!
Test Fitting the bottom bracket
A rainy weekend meant that I also got to spend some time on the rear wheel. A lot of what I do to this bike will be determined by what I can do with the rear wheel and built in Shimano 3 speed hub.
This was the first time I have pulled apart a vintage Shimano internal hub so I took plenty of photos during the disassembly. The condition of the hub and gears actually look to be in pretty good shape. There was plenty of accumulated dirt and grease in the hub as is expected but the pleasant surprise is that there was zero rust in the actual hub. This is great news as I was expecting the hub to have seized and hence why the gear cable had been snapped somewhere up the line. The following photos serve as a pictorial sequence on how the hub came apart, hopefully, putting it back together will just be reversing this order.
Step 1 - Plenty of junk on it - I was thinking the hub was seized at this point
Step 2 - The gear cable thingy has been screwed off, note the lock nut washer thingy
Step 3 - The nuts have been removed, clip spring thingy, and that long skinny bolt that runs through the hub
Step 4 - The Cog slides off, use your cone wrenches to loosen the cone
Step 5 - Looking into the heart of the hub
Step 6 - The non drive side of the wheel, loosen both bolts, care not to lose that spring
Step 7 - Now the whole things can come out
Step 8 - Note the position of that little piece of metal that stops the barrel falling out
Step 9 - All the parts as they came off, Right to Left, top row is non-drive side, second and third row are drive side
Next step will be giving these parts a bath in a degreasing solution, buying the adequate lubrication for the hub and putting it all back together.
Around about this time last year I participated in an organized satirical tweed ride. It seems that organizers this year are not holding a formal event, but I guess nothing will stop like minded people going for an impromptu ride around Sydney and stopping for a picnic all happening to wear vintage tweed.
Three Stooges (Andy, Peter, and Patrich)
Last year I joined Patrich for a ride on our restored retro fixie bicycles.
Queen Victoria Building before the ride
This year I may actually go for a Tweed ride down to Windsor for some pie. We've coined that event as the FiWiPi ride (FIxie to WIndsor for some PIe), maybe it's time we did this ride in Tweed :-)
I took receipt of a vintage Apollo Mixte the other day. I have been wanting to build up a Mixte for quite some time and finally found one that is a great candidate for a restoration.
Apollo Mixte
The bike must have been sitting outdoors in the elements as is evident by the surface rust on the frame. Apart from the surface rust, the Japanese Tange Steel frame seems to be in pretty good shape.
Tange Steel.... Lovely!
The front wheel has a couple of broken spokes so I may try to source some spokes and try my hand at rebuilding a wheel. The rear wheel has a 3 speed Shimano hub that looks in decent shape.
Shimano 3 Speed hub, wonder if it still works.
I'm really digging the Center Pull brakes, but I may need to replace them for a new set as I've had a problem with the brake lever spring snapping on past bike restorations.
Center Pull brakes, loving these.
Good old English threaded bottom bracket is in decent shape, but I'm not sure if I'll keep the Cotter pins so it may get replaced.
English BB on Japanese Bike
I'm not too sure what I have in mind for the old girl, but I'm sure it's going to be a beauty. I've stripped the bike down and it has been sent to the Sand Blasting and Powder coating guys for a new lease on life.
Keeping the weekly kilometer averages on your bike over winter can be difficult at times. Waking up early on a Sunday morning then jumping on a bike when the temperature hits below zero is more challenging than the ride itself, especially when you can smell pancakes and the warm maple syrup that the rest of the family is preparing for breakfast. Well, sometimes it is easier just to go and join them and eat those lovely warm pancakes. I had a similar choice to make last Sunday and chose the pancakes. However, there is a cycle story at the end of all this. Now as you may know from reading some of my other blogs, I ride several different bikes depending on what I feel like on the day. Typically, I would ride my Giant TCR along the length of the M7 as I have ridden this route countless times and it gets rather boring unless you are pushing the pace along and trying to beat your personal best. That said, it means that I rarely take my touring bike on the M7. However, I also hate changing a flat tire in the dark so when I do ride the M7, I tend to do so in the morning. This is where this week’s blog photo comes into the picture.
Killing the winter morning blues
The touring bike is a perfect choice for a late Sunday trundle in winter along the M7. The cold wind chill effect keeps a large percentage of riders off the track, especially at night, and the thicker Schwalbe Marathon Plus tires decrease the chance of a puncture.
I hit the Mp3 player and some classic Dio “Killing the Dragon” made for a very enjoyable 40km late night ride.
My MP3 Player, a neat little gadget really.
I hope this inspires you to look at other ways to keep on the bike this winter. Ride well.
