A Week of Commuting by Roadster

I've commuted on the Roadster all week this week.  (For lack of a better name, right now I'm just calling it the Roadster, and I'm afraid that will stick rather than something more creative.)  I've covered probably about 70 miles and done about 4000 feet of climbing over the past five days.  Here are my observations.

1. The slack geometry on an old roadster takes a little getting used to.  It wants to go straight, but when you're moving more slowly, every time you twitch the handlebars one way or another it wants to go straight in that direction.  At the beginning of the week, it was disturbing, and I thought maybe I had left something loose - I hadn't - or the frame was out of line - it's not, at least to my knowledge.  It's steering tendency reminded me of the time I crashed on some sand, got up and tried to ride straight, but my stem had been knocked sideways in the crash, so as soon as I started, the bike veered off to the side.  Once I had assured myself that all was right with the bike, I figured it would be one of those things I would get used to, and over the course of the week, I have, and I quite enjoy the ride characteristics of the slack geometry now.

2.  The AG dynohub works just fine with the modern LED lights.  I like it better than the bottle generator on the Happy Little Three Speed Bicycle because it always feels like there is drag with the bottle generator.  I know there is some with the bottle generator, and some super sensitive souls like Jan Heine would find it excessive, but my guess is the drag with either system is probably practically negligible.  Not being a super sensitive soul, I can't tell a bit of difference between the Sturmey Archer Dynohub and the Scmidt Dynohub I have on the Rivendell.  Since it is still dark when I leave for work in the morning, I appreciate the Roadster's lighting system.

3. The ride, in general, is more comfortable.  I think it's probably partially the slack geometry and largely having larger diameter tires, or tyres, if you will.  The HLTSB just does not have room for tires wider than 25 mm.  I believe the 26 by 1 and 3/8" tires are closer to 35 mm.  I thought about trying the Col de la Vie tires from Panaracer, but given all the glass and goatheads I ride over on a daily basis, I stuck with Schwalbe Marathons, which have been my go-to tires for decades.

4.  I do like the chain case.  In the photo above, the bike is parked where I always park at work.  For some reason, and in spite of my protests to the administration, they use leaf blowers to clear off the sidewalks here, and they always come blow the sand around near the bike racks, and it seems that they always do that right at the bike racks right after I've cleaned and lubed my chain.  Now I have the chaincase.  Hah! Take that leaf blowers.

5. I do miss the Happy Little Three Speed Bicycle's front basket, but I wanted to mount a headlight on the Roadster with the traditional mounting bracket.

6.  I was thinking this morning - and this is probably another post in its own right - that one of the reasons I have been riding a three speed, and I really like riding the Roadster, is that I feel it makes bicycling appear more normal.  A bike like this looks like a bike you would ride to work.  Now that the weather is nicer, I'm riding up in my corduroy suit jacket.  As a bicycle advocate, particularly as a bicycle as, not an alternative, but what should clearly be the mainstream form of transportation advocate, I'd like to think that people would see someone on a Roadster, in a nice jacket, and think, "Huh, bicycling is a normal way to get around."  However, I concede, and do realize, that it probably does not look normal - a middle aged man on an even older bicycle, riding along into the sunrise.  Still, I think it's a better advertisement for the merits of bicycling that a middle aged man in lycra, clipped into a carbon fiber racing bike.